About Galonnese

The speech was made in response to the proposals of the Macedonian king Philip II to revise the conditions of the Filocratic world . The name "On Galonnes" is conditional and was given by Hellenistic grammars and publishers, since it begins with the question of the return of this island to Athens ^[1] .

Galonnes, located northeast of Euboea and opposite Thessaly Magnesia ( Magnesia ) and belonging to Athens, was in 346 BC. e. captured by the pirate Sostratus, who created the base there for his robbery attacks. The Athenians, as far as is known, did not try to return the Galonnes to their control. After some time, Philip II expelled the pirates and placed a Macedonian garrison on the island. The inhabitants of neighboring Peparef , allies of Athens, captured the Galonnes, but the Macedonians equipped a new expedition and regained the island. ^[2]

In negotiations with the Athenian ambassadors in 344 BC. e. Philip, who refused to return Amphipolis and possessions to Chersonesus of Thrace , agreed to give up the island, which did not matter much, but the head of the embassy, ​​Gegesippus, said that the king could not “give” what he did not own, but could only “return” Galonnes to Athens. Annoyed by his remark, Philip interrupted the negotiations. ^[3]

The debate over Galonnes revealed the Athenian-Macedonian contradictions and brought the start of a new war closer, as the political influence in Athens passed to the anti-Macedonian group. Demosthenes and Hegesippus delivered speeches that revealed the aggressive plans of the Macedonian king, and exercised their eloquence, playing with the words “give” and “return”. Aeschine rebuked Demosthenes on this subject that he “argues about syllables” ^[4] .

The speech is devoted generally to Athenian-Macedonian relations and the requirements to reconsider the conditions of the world. It begins with a response to a letter from Philip to the Athenians with a proposal to give them Galonnes (§ 2-8). He then addressed the issue of the fight against pirates (§ 14-17), the conditions of the Philocratic world (§ 18–29), rejected the right of Philip to dictate his terms (§ 30–35) and suggested that controversial issues be brought before the arbitral tribunal (§ 36 -37). In conclusion, he discusses the question of the boundaries of possessions in Chersonesos (§ 39–45).

The speech “On Galonnese” was preserved in the corpus of Demosthenes' works, however, Libanius , who wrote a preface to it, concluded that it most likely belongs to Hegesippus and was included in the collection instead of a similar speech by Demosthenes, the text of which must be time has already been lost ^[5] .

The latest researchers join the opinion of Libanius, since speech in language, structure and style is very different from the works of Demosthenes ^[1] .

What kind of island in ancient times was called Galonnes is unclear. Based on the message of Strabo , who writes that “there are many islands in front of the region of magnets; only Schiaf, Peparef, Ikos, as well as Galonnes and Skyros matter ” ^[6] , it is assumed that this is one of the islands of the Northern Sporades group, possibly Skazura .

In addition, there is an assumption that we are talking about the island of St. Eustratius , located much further to the northeast and often used by pirates.

In 1838, the island of Liadromia was mistakenly renamed Galonnes ( Alonissos ) and now retains this name, although in ancient times it was called not Galonnes, but Ikos.

• Demosthenes . Speech. T. III. - M .: Nauka, 1996 .-- ISBN 978-5-88451-012-8 .
• Worthington, J. Philip II of Macedon. - SPb. - M .: Eurasia - Publishing House Clio, 2014 .-- ISBN 978-5-91852-053-6 .