Epithets for Makedonian Kings

Hi,

I'm thinking about how to call my deceased Basileus Alkyoneus, looking back from 10 years onward now. I decided to give each of my kings a sort of "cognomen", like it was in reality with Megas Alexandros, or Demetrios Poliorketes. So, Antigonos "Gonatas" because of the greaves, or because of him being from Gonnoi (that's what I read in wikipedia).

I thought about calling Alkyoneus

-"Asiatikos", because under his 16 years of reign Makedonia conquered most of Mikra Asia.

-"Rhodios", because he conquered Rhodos, quite important given the humiliation that suffered Demetrios Poliorketes. That conquest was only one of many though, and long before his kingship.

Were the Greek at all fond of calling their kings or generals names for beating a certain faction, like the Romans did so frequently ("Germanicus")?

Then, my current Basileus Perseus will most likely be known for the tightening of control of the Hellenes of the south. How about "Autokrator" (meaning Imperator)? I know it's historically an East Roman or Byzantine title.

Any ideas are welcome. :smiley:

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

Were the Greek at all fond of calling their kings or generals names for beating a certain faction, like the Romans did so frequently ("Germanicus")?

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I don't know any examples for a habit like that. Names that come to mind are things like "Savior", "The Great", "Fatherlover" :inquisitive:, "Sieger", "Victor" and such.

I would use the Region + Nicator.

The triumphal cognomen like Asiaticus, Africanus, Germanicus etc. were an exclusively Roman thing AFAIK. Hellenistic monarchs did also have cognomen. At first those were given to them by their people or armies like Antiochos I Soter ("Saviour") for saving Asia Minor from the Galatians or Seleukos I Nikator ("The Victorious") well for being victorious. Later on however they began to choose their cognomen for themselves as part of their self-image that they wanted to propagate; the first one to do this was Antiochos IV called Epiphanes ("The Manifest" or "The Illustrious") or sometimes also Theos Epiphanes ("God Manifest"). That's at least how it was in the Seleukid Dynasty. Don't know about the others though but the about the same process from typical nicknames given because of triumphal deeds or distinctive features by their troops and peoples to self-chosen propagandistic "throne name", if you will.

Asiatikos or Rhodios would mean "from Asia" and "from Rhodos", so I would not use those kind of cognomen. Hellenistic kings wouldn't degrade themselves to adopt Roman *spits out* naming customs anyway. ;)

EDIT: If you want to name them "Conqueror of Asia" or something like that you'd have to form the according compound noun. My knowledge of Ancient Greek grammar is to vague to give you any instruction on that, though. Could be something like "Asiorketes" or "Nikasiatikos" or something like that. That's just a wild guess though.

The epithets never managed to be coded for the traits in EB1 (at least I don't think they were). I'm outlining some stuff in my head for EB2, but I'll need to find the time to get it all done and proposed in EBH.

Keep your fingers crossed that I, or someone else, get some openings.

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Originally Posted by konny

I don't know any examples for a habit like that. Names that come to mind are things like "Savior", "The Great", "Fatherlover" :inquisitive:, "Sieger", "Victor" and such.

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ΦΙΛΟΠΑΤΩΡ, ΦΙΛΟΜΗΤΩΡ, ΦΙΛΑΔΕΛΦΟΣ aka "loved his father", "loved his mother" and "loved his brother" should be considered as

ΦΙΛΟΠΑΤΩΡ (spelled as Filopator)= "respected his father dearly and wants to continue his work" or "takes after his father whose work he aims to emulate" or "son who looked after his father, has his acceptance and continues his work".

Ancient Greeks were absolutely great in saying with one word what we modern ones can't say with 1000.

Anyways you Americans must know of a city celebrating that "brotherly love", Philadelphia.

How about Antigonos the Dead?

:hide:

That's true. Greek has to be the language with the world record of the amount of information put into compound nouns. And that's really something, because German is also quite capable of compressing information into compund nouns. English however sucks at that (no offence).

Ironic since Philadelphia has one of the highest crime rates in the country and some of the most boorish fans in sports history.

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Originally Posted by machinor

EDIT: If you want to name them "Conqueror of Asia" or something like that you'd have to form the according compound noun. My knowledge of Ancient Greek grammar is to vague to give you any instruction on that, though. Could be something like "Asiorketes" or "Nikasiatikos" or something like that. That's just a wild guess though.

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I would be very interested what that would be correctly... Nikesas Asias or something??

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

I would be very interested what that would be correctly... Nikesas Asias or something??

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"Kataktesas Asian"="he who conquered Asia"
"Asiokrates"="He who has prevailed over Asia"

Cool, thanks a lot, keraunos. Now I know what to carve into my cross-golf club. :D

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Originally Posted by abou

Ironic since Philadelphia has one of the highest crime rates in the country and some of the most boorish fans in sports history.

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wasn't philedelphia the old name for 'Amman(jordan)? just wondering.

also, seeing that this is a titles question, how were hellenistic monarchs adressed? was it just using the title "king" only, or could it also be like some other titles used in modern european monarchs, you know, the "styling", where they have a million adjectives before a name..just curious.

I think that may depend on which occasion and by whom they were adressed. Certainly the Ptolemaic kings and queen would have been adressed in the Egyptian fashion with all their titles like "son of Zeus-Ammon" and "king of Upper and Lower Egypt" etc. in formal meetings and official appearances.

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Originally Posted by keravnos

"Kataktesas Asian"="he who conquered Asia"
"Asiokrates"="He who has prevailed over Asia"

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Great keravnos, thanks a lot!

You would make me incredibly happy if you could additionally tell me what a king's name would be who would be known as "Ironfist", or "Enforcer", or the "straight and unforgiving but always just ruler", something along the lines. :smiley:

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

You would make me incredibly happy if you could additionally tell me what a king's name would be who would be known as "Ironfist", or "Enforcer", or the "straight and unforgiving but always just ruler", something along the lines. :smiley:

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Please... :smiley::smiley::smiley:

Well, I don't think it's an easy job to find such words. I could tell you some moder-greek ones, hoping they wuld suffice, though I hardly doubt that. I suggest you just wait for someone to answer, or make a personal request through pm to someone with at least some decent knowledge of ancient Greek.

Maion

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

Great keravnos, thanks a lot!

You would make me incredibly happy if you could additionally tell me what a king's name would be who would be known as "Ironfist", or "Enforcer", or the "straight and unforgiving but always just ruler", something along the lines. :smiley:

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Ok, I will try, but I need to clarify, this will NOT be 100% what the people at the time would say. It is a mistake to try to make 21st century monikers into -3rd century ones.

Anyways, here goes...

"Ironfist" = ΣΙΔΗΡΟΠΥΓMΟΣ transliterated into "Sideropygos" from "Sideros"=iron and "pygme"=fist (in the appropriate form of that word)... it literally means "Ironfisted". However I am not sure whether that can be used, or in fact existed at that time. -Double checked... Wasn't used.
"Ο ΕΧΩΝ ΣΙΔΗΡΑΝ ΠΥΓΜΗΝ" οr "O echon sideran pygmen"=He who has an iron fist, may be used.
ΠΥΓΜΑΙΟΣ, on the other hand, a form that was used, means pygmy.
http://www.glosarium.com/term/18772,18,xhtml

Iconography of coloured people of Sub Saharan Africa and Pygmies in ancient greek/Etruscan art is the following. Please take note that the date is 400-500 BCE and the artist was keen to show off the differences between the races. The pictures presented below shouldn't be considered as racist or condescending because quite frankly they are nothing of the sort. Just artstyles of that time.

http://www.archive.gr/modules.php?na...rticle&sid=102

"Enforcer", hmm that would be a tough one. Closest one I could think of would be "ΑΥΤΟΚΡΑΤΩΡ" "AYTOKRATOR" (meaning having all commands bestowed upon him, all commands coming from him) but must ALWAYS be used along with "strategos" as in "STRATEGOS AYTOKRATOR" as without it it would mean "Imperator" and it was used that way, only after Octavian Caesar took over.

"ΣΤΡΑΤΗΓΟΣ ΚΑΤΑ ΤΗΝ ΚΟΙΝΗΝ ΦΥΛΑΚΗΝ" transliterated into "Strategos kata ten koinen phulaken" was the title of Pyrrhos when acting as a local garisson leader for Demetrios (prior to him being sent as a hostage to Ptolemaios I), meaning "General assigned to the common guard" or "General of all allied forces".

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"straight and unforgiving but always just ruler"

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Well, DIKAIOS or "just" comes to mind. The absolute extreme of that would be "DRAKONIOS" from DRAKON and his laws which were absolutely strict, when implememented in Ancient Athens. As such, all future laws which were strict would be called "Draconian".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dracon

and I though Philadelphia was named after the cheese...<.<

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

just kidding...

I have a question regarding greek hehe how would they call their "shoes" or "sandals"...or whatever they wore?:sweatdrop:

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/cgi-bin...&group=typecat

For Sandals.

Thank you very much keravnos for the very detailed information. I hope I'm not too much of a bother.

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

Thank you very much keravnos for the very detailed information. I hope I'm not too much of a bother.

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Centurio, absolutely no bother. History has been an affliction of mine ever since I remember myself. Bear in mind however that my free time is soon coming to an end and as such I probably won't be able to respond. Unfortunately RL is our lord and master.

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Originally Posted by keravnos

Iconography of African Americans and Pygmies in ancient greek/Etruscan art is the following.

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"African Americans"?!

PC claims another victim it seems :clown:

No offence meant for anyone of course ;)

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Originally Posted by Kongeslask

"African Americans"?!

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Black/ Negroid/ use whatever you want. I guess it looks a bit out of place. I just wanted to off anything that would remotely come across as racial prejudice, and I went to the exact opposite direction... :embarassed:

-coloured- is great, thanks bovi.

The Norwegian current PC word is what amounts to "coloured", unless I'm already under the lavine. The word is ridiculous of course, we've all got colour and it doesn't make sense even if you would say that my own phenotype is colourless.

It's usually more useful to use their name, or nationality, but in the rare occasions where it becomes necessary to refer to a person and I know neither I prefer to use Neger, the Norwegian equivalent of Negro. People tend to react to it though, because a bunch of other people have used it in a negative context. It's hard to stay abreast of the avalanche of expressions that start out PC and become inappropriate when they've been used in negative contexts enough times.

It's the same with various words that we've iterated through that designates a homosexual or person with Down's syndrome. It's a stupid game that I see no reason to play.