Alexan-Duros
The Voyage
Aprilis 28 279 BC
The waves of the Pontus Euxinus pushed towards the Χρυσό κέρατο (Golden Horn), advancing as an endless phalangite towards the rocky shoreline. Most would die off-shore but some, more fortunate ones, would enter the Bosphorus and reach the city of Byzas. This three century-old empoika was still a modest one, although its children would one day outlast Rome itself and rule over the richest Orthodox state before the rise of Muscowy. But let's return to our Aprilis 275 BC crimson morning. Yes, it was a crimson morning and any hellenes would know, by lore passed from father to son that crimson mornings the likes of these are bad for fishing, and even worse for trade.
But in the tiny harbour, the Byzantines didn't notice or simply refuse to notice. To the North, another empoika called Histria was crumbling under the tyranny of Zalmodegikos, a Getai Basileos who dared take 60 hostages and banned the citizens of Histria from fishing around Peuce. The starving people of Theocritos ware in need of supplies and the sons of Byzas ware there to give them, for a profit there is.
So despite the ill omens, the veteran seamen ware buisy prepareing for the long journey ahead, as Jason would have done, had he remained a simple sailor and hadn't returned the Golden Fleece, defying the crushing straits of Bosphorus with his chosen league of gentlemen.Lemboi and birames entered and left the harbour while psiloi and rare σκλάβος (slave) would load Demeter's gifts onboard them. Sometimes Makedoinan or Ionian ships would join the εμπορικός στόλος (Trading Fleet)
A juvenile thrakian wathced this splendid spectacle of hellenic discipline and organisation from atop the Acropolis> His simple tunic and woolen cloak along with his lack of sandals mistook him for a helot or at best, a poor psiloi. But on closer inspection a man would notice his straight ebony hair that dropped to his shoulders, his robust body and not last, his repulsive smell. This was no Hellenes, this was a Thrakian and a Trausos.
His name was Syrmos Eptaporus, first born of Tarsa and Arsinoe, and he was leaving Europe for a mercenary's life of pheonician purple and adventure in the service of the Seleukids.Damas, his grandfather (on the mother's side) faught in the service of Meghas Alexandros himself as a hippeis before he fell to malaria in Ghandara. His gorgeous daughter Arsinoe was bethroaed to Tarsa, the archon of the Trausii, becoming his fifth wife. Mourned at his birth for an entire week, Syroms Eptaporus was the obvious result of this unlikely couple.
As he grew older, he heard stories of his grandfather's exploits in the East and became ever more curious of the hellenic ways. He heard stories about Prometheus, or myths about Pan and his flute, about Orpheus and his journey to the lands of the dead, and countless others about Marathon and Pericles the Cunning. He was more hellenic than he would think.......
TO BE CONTINUED....... (Updates on this page)
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Re: Alexan-Duros
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... except for the image you posted on the top I can't say I understood or liked too much, but anyway a nice surprise to see a Romanian fellow involved in such things!!
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