The Richmond Virginian. (Richmond, Va.) 1910-1920, 1919-08-04
THRACE

washington IL - July Oh All
Leaent-T.aca ono OF the morning lands
of the worlds history, for parts Of
which Greece has presented claims 10
the peace conference, Affords a
parallel to the difficulties of self-de-
termination already experienced
along the eastern shores Of the
Washington headquarters of the Ma
tfohal Geographic Society.
1T will be recalled that the spirited
dispute between J~ugo-Slayia and Italy
arose from The fac: that Italians were
predominant in coastal cities while
the hinterland Was u~ndeniabiy Slavic.
The Latin peoples of Italy had gone
across the Adriatic in past centuries.
settled along the east Adrtatic shores,
but were pushed , ell out to islands
n peninsulas by the influx of Slavic
tribes.
'tln much the same way his pheno-
menon was duplicated, In an earlier
aGe,~on the eastern side Of the Balan
peninsula, where lay the extremely
mobile Trace. The Greeks ~colonized
the coast cities OF Thrace. on what
now are the Marmora. Black and
Aegean Seas. not for settlement so
much as for trading stations. They
did not seek to impinge upon the
Tracians of the interior.
Thus Constantinople was founded.
and thus Greece early canne into pos
sesston OF tha peninsula now called
tlafhpolt, building A wall across the
I'VE mile neck of The isthrnus to keep
the Thracians within bounds
shrinking and expanding. and
changing its conformation time and
time again as Darius invaded It.
ferxes abandoned IT, Philip III united
part of it with Macedonia and gar
r40nnnd Yhn yAEt thA ..~,-- --,
lied II as a province. Thrace dropped
At last into the capacious NAV of the
Turks with the fall Of Constantinople
In 1853, that historic date from which
some historians mark the beginnings
OF modern history.
Later the western part. that Philir
5otnted to Macedonia. feH within the
limits OF pre-war Serbia, ana she
northern part herame eastern Ru-
meiia, which was gwen TO Bulgaria at
the London settlement. of I2I@. The
rest remained with European Turkey
until the world-war exploded that
domain and left the pieces to he thc
step children of til" allied nations.
Adrianopie. once the Paris of
Thrace, and later The Versailles of the
Turkish s~uitans, Is a picturesque. if
unkept, reminder OF the
ancient days, But more familiar.
perhaps. is the name of phllippi. in
tho center OF the rich gold mine dis
trict. of Thrace, and near the hill of
D~ianysius. which ewes its fame Il
Is, neither Of those facts so much as 70
the visits of Paul, who wrote letters
10 his converts that were ncorpo-
rated. in the Bible as the book oi
Philippians.
"Dionysius, or Bacchus. ~ III Ro-
mans call the god. typined the loose
morality OF the wild and harbarous
Inhabitants OF Thrace originally, for
the Thracians OF historic times al
ready we're a con posite people.
Every girl passed through 2
period when she was the common
property OF the male community be.
fore she married one of them. Ever
in Grecian days the worship OF Dion
ystls consisted OF wild nocturnal
orgies. There Is the story that thres
women who declined TO join in the
revelries were translated into doves
and a king al Thrace was reputed to
have resisted a visit of Uionysius tc
his domain The god escaped by a
e plunge into the sea but the king was
stricken with A blindness and a
r frenzy, so the myth relates, that
v caused him to hew down his son, be-
feeing him TO be a tree.
Al one period Trace had an afli-
nnce with Greece; hut the relation OF
the two nations a. other periods il
IN moot question, Certain it is that
the cultured Greeks regarded the
Iraclans as II rugged and semi-bar-
harous people, Just as they regarded
the climate OF Trace as severe, and
believed II TO be the home of Boreas,
the north wind"