Appendix 4: Racial Types in Ancient Greece
THE FOLLOWING WORK COMES WITH THANKS FROM THE RESEARCH OF KARL EARLSON
SKELETAL ANALYSIS REVEALS RACIAL NATURE OF HELLENIC SOCIETY
Angel (1944), calculated that during the Classical period of Greek history (650-150 BC), 27% of the Greek population had been predominantly Nordic in type.
This is perfectly in line with other observations, which have determined that the Hellenic population consisted of two, possibly three elements initially: Nordics, Mediterraneans and Alpine types. Only later were non-European elements introduced, mainly through the importation of slaves.
Angel observed that prior to the Classical period, the Nordic element had been larger, and that after it, the element in question had declined. [Angel (1943; 1944; 1945; 1946a, b, c.] Angel (1971), also noted that the immigrant Indo-Europeans, were of Nordic subrace.
Peterson (1974), studied portrait busts of famous ancient Greek personages, and concluded that the aristocracies of Hellas were a product of closely interbreeding, Eupatrid clans. These clans were mostly Nordic in type, being largely descended from the Indo-European invaders.
The study of Greek literature which Sieglin (1935) performed, has demonstrated that many individuals in the elites of ancient Greece, had blond or red hair. For instance, Alcibiades, Alexander the Great, Critias, Demetrius of Phalerum, King Lysimachus, Ptolemy II, Philadelphus and King Pyrrhus, were all fair-haired individuals. Dionysius I, the ruler of Syracuse, had blond hair and freckles, whilst the Athenian playwright Euripides, also had a fair and freckled complexion. [Gunther (1956).]
HELLENIC IDEAL WAS NORDIC
Indeed, the Greek orator Dio of Prusa noted that the Greek ideal of beauty was a Nordic one. The Greeks, he said, admired the blond Achilles, but thought that the barbarian Trojan Hector, was black-haired. [Günther (1956).]
In his "Argonautica," the Greek poet Apollonius Rhodius, describes the hero Jason, and all fifty of the Argonauts, as blond-haired. [Sieglin (1935).]
The poet Bacchylides said that the women of Sparta were blonde, and Dicaearchus said much the same thing about the women of Thebes. [Gunther (1956).]
For the Greeks, the most beautiful woman who ever lived, Helen, was a blond, as were those mythical men such as Adonis, who were famed for their handsomeness. [Sieglin (1935).]
Although a Nordicist, and thus disparaging of White non-Nordic inputs into Hellenic society, Günther's works on the subject of Greek racial history (1927; 1928; 1929a, b; 1956; 1961), are particularly valuable. Günther performed a detailed analysis of Greek history, from a biological perspective. Utilizing craniological, literary, and pictorial evidence, he reconstructed the racial structure of ancient Greece. He concluded that the Nordic sub-race formed something of an ideal for the Greeks, and that the Nordic element was more influential than any other. At the summit of its achievements, Greece possessed a large Nordic element, but as this element declined, so did Greek culture and civilization.
In the 4th Century AD, the Jewish physician Adamantios, described what he called the "true Greek" – or where the “Hellenic race has been kept pure” as follows:
"Wherever the Hellenic and Ionic race has been kept pure, we see proper tall men of fairly broad and straight build, neatly made, of fairly light skin and blond; the flesh is rather firm, the limbs straight, the extremities well made. The head is of middling size, and moves very easily; the neck is strong, the hair somewhat fair, and soft, and a little curly; the face is rectangular, the lips narrow, the nose straight, and the eyes bright, piercing, and full of light; for of all nations the Greek has the fairest eyes." [Günther (1927) 157.]
This quote is interesting as it shows that even then – some 800 years after the end of Hellenic Classical period – some Nordic Greek elements had survived. These elements can, of course, still be seen today as well, although much reduced in numbers.
For more literary descriptions of pigmentation in ancient Greek poetry and prose, as well as craniological evidence, the following works are recommended: De Lapouge (1899), Jax (1933), Myres (1930), Reche (1936) and Ridgeway (1901).
References: - Jax, K. (1933) "Die weibliche Schonheit in der griechischen Dichtung." (Innsbruck: Universitats-Verlag Wagner). Articles
Chapter 10 : "The Hellenes: Classical Greece" All material (c) copyright Ostara Publications, 1999. Re-use for commercial purposes strictly forbidden. | |||||||||||||
Above: The hair coloring on these two people speak volumes - a detail from a Grecian pot dating from the second half of the 4th Century BC.
