The
kingdom of Macedonia was originally situated along the
Haliacmon and
Loudias rivers in Lower Macedonia, north of
Mount Olympus and east of the
Pierian Mountains and the
Vermio Mountains. Historian
Robert Malcolm Errington suggests that one of the earliest Argead kings established Aigai (modern
Vergina) as their capital in the mid-7th centuryBC. According to Maria Girtzy, the only ancient source referring indirectly to Emathia's boundaries was by Herodotus' testimony that Macedonis lay between Loudias and Haliacmon; thus Emathia (as alternative name to the district of Macedonis) was bounded by Loudias to the north and the plateau of
Edessa to the northwest, the valley of Haliacmon to the south along with Vermio Mountains to the southwest, and the Thermaic Gulf to the east. Some ancient geographers give Emathia as the name of a town in the region, or as a name in alternation with Macedon. Pieria took its name from the Pieres, a Thracian tribe that was expelled by the Macedonians in the 8th century BC from their original seats. Sometime, during the
Archaic period,
Bottiaeans were also expelled by Macedonians from
Bottiaea to
Bottike.
Almopia was incorporated into the kingdom during the reign of
Alexander I (r. 498–454 BC) and
Almopes, that originally inhabited the area before, were expelled from the region.
Amphaxitis and the eastern districts of
Crestonia,
Mygdonia and
Bisaltia were also added to the kingdom later. There were also included the subregions
Anthemous and
Crousis in it, which were originally part of
Chalcidice. Additionally
Eordaea was incorporated to the Argead kindgom earlier than the rest of Upper Macedonia. The Argeads conquered gradually the
Thracian-inhabited areas east of the Axius in the 5th and 4th centuries BC. The regions of
Edonis,
Sintice,
Odomantis and Pieris, conquered by
Philip II, were termed in
Latin Macedonia Adjecta (Επίκτητος Μακεδονία). West of Lower Macedonia,
Upper Macedonia was a geographical and tribal term to describe the upper/western of the two parts in which (together with Lower Macedonia) Macedon was roughly divided. Miltiades Hatzopoulos has suggested that the
Macedonian dialect of the 4th century BC spoken in Macedonia proper, as attested in the
Pella curse tablet, was a sort of Macedonian 'koine' resulting from the encounter of the idiom of the '
Aeolic'-speaking populations around Mount Olympus and the Pierian Mountains with the
Northwest Greek-speaking Argead Macedonians hailing from
Argos Orestikon, who founded their kingdom of Lower Macedonia. However, according to Hatzopoulos, B. Helly expanded and improved his own earlier suggestion and presented the hypothesis of a (North-)'
Achaean' substratum extending as far north as the head of the Thermaic Gulf, which had a continuous relation, in prehistoric times both in
Thessaly and Macedon, with the Northwest Greek-speaking populations living on the other side of the
Pindus mountain range, and contacts became cohabitation when the Argead Macedonians completed their wandering from
Orestis to Lower Macedonia in the 7th c. BC. According to this hypothesis, Hatzopoulos concludes that the Ancient Macedonian dialect of the historical period, which is attested in inscriptions such as Pella curse tablet, is a sort of koine resulting from the interaction and the influences of various elements, the most important of which are the North-Achaean substratum, the Northwest Greek dialect of the Argead Macedonians, and the
Thracian and
Phrygian adstrata. ==See also==