independence from royal authority in the settlement of 167bc.In
practice this was merely a preliminary gambit before the creation of
provincial status for the region. The propagandist claims of the new
imperial authorities must be stripped away if we are to gain any under-
standing of how these communities were constituted prior to 167bc.
The 17poleislisted in theInventoryconstitute only the best-docu-
mented and the most intensely investigated sites: Aiane, Aigeai, Alebaia,
Allante, Aloros, Beroia, Dion, Edessa, Europos, Herakleion, Ichnai, Kyr-
rhos, Leibethra, Methone, Mieza, Pella, and Pydna. Although much of
the documentary evidence pertaining to some of these sites post-dates
the Roman conquest of Macedonia, there are significant exceptions.
Aigeai (Diod. 16.3.5; Theophr. Fr 5.27);^38 Alebaia (Hdt. 8.137.1); Al-
lante/Atalante (Thuc. 2.100.3); Aloros (Ps.-Skyl. 66); Dion (Thuc.
4.78.6); Europos (Thuc. 2.100.3); Herakleion (Ps.-Skyl. 66); Ichnai
(Hdt. 7. 123.3); Kyrrhos (Thuc. 2.100.4); Leibethra (Aesch. Fr. 83a.9);
Methone (Thuc. 6.7.3); Mieza (Plut. Alex. 7.4); Pella (Hdt. 7.123.3; Thuc.
2.99.4); and Pydna (Thuc. 1.61.2), have a respectable pedigree as civic
foundations.^39 The very idea of a historical pedigree reflects the self-
conscious manipulation of community identities, a process that was
continuously evolving throughout classical antiquity.^40
One of the difficulties that we have in understanding and evaluating
the kinds of sites that are not explicitly namedpoleis,or are acknow-
ledged to have had their decision-making powers restricted in some way
(according to Hatzopoulos’s theory of Macedonian state administration),
is the absence of any clear conceptual model for what the alternatives
might be. For the editors of theInventory, there is only one model,
namely the‘Hellenic’polis. The absence of an explicit strategy for sites
that are not obviously Hellenic is clear in ethnically mixed areas, such as
Sicily, where there are‘twenty-nine noteworthy settlements which
cannot be shown to have been Greek or“Hellenised”poleis’.^41 There is
a lack of coherence in scholarly debates between the concept of regions as
institutional units—with certain sites enjoying the privileges of consti-
tuting councils, sending out ambassadors, and concluding agreements
with other, similar bodies in different regions—and the assumption that
(^38) Inventory, 798–9 no. 529 with further references.
(^39) Inventory, 797–806, no. 528 (Aiane); no. 530 (Alebaia); no. 531 (Allante); no. 532
(Aloros); no. 533 (Beroia); no. 534 (Dion); no. 535 (Edessa: attested on a 3rd centurybc
inscription from Delphi); no. 536 (Europos); no. 537 (Herakleion); no. 538 (Ichnai); no. 539
(Kyrrhos); no. 540 (Leibethra); no. 541 (Methone); no. 542 (Mieza); no. 543 (Pella); no. 544
(Pydna).
(^40) Clarke 2008 esp. 169–230, 245–303. (^41) Inventory, 176.
Herdsmen with golden leaves—narratives and spaces 61