that they called kingdoms. During Caesar’s time they took
control of southern Scandinavia, forming many small king-
doms. It was Caesar and Rome who introduced the concept of
fi xed borders to central and northern Europe.
Th e Germanic tribes that lived outside the Roman Em-
pire were constantly at war with each other, and they some-
times banded together in small kingdoms for self-defense.
Along the southern coast of the Baltic Sea there were several
kingdoms that became fairly stable in the 500s c.e., but in
the modern Ukraine they had diffi culty establishing stable
borders because of attacks from nomads such as the Scyth-
ians and from displaced peoples such as the Huns, who had
been forced out of central Asia by the Chinese. Some Ger-
manic tribes wanted to settle in Roman territory because
behind Roman defenses they would be protected from in-
vaders from Asia, but within the empire’s borders Germanic
tribes swept through Europe, looting and killing. By 395
c.e. borders in Roman Europe had lost most of their mean-
ing and the new Germanic overlords struggled to establish
clearly defi ned national borders. Much of the history of Eu-
rope aft er 476 c.e. involves almost unending wars to create
and protect national frontiers.
GREECE
BY JEFFREY S. CARNES
Until the time of Alexander the Great (356–323 b.c.e.), an-
cient Greece was not a single political entity but was instead
composed of a large number of individual city-states (po-
leis)—well over one thousand of them, according to the best
modern estimates. As such, Greece may have had more bor-
ders than any other known civilization. Th ese borders may
be classifi ed broadly as internal (with other Greek-speaking
poleis) and external (with non-Greek civilizations).
Borders between Greek poleis were typically defi ned by
the natural features of the landscape: rivers, mountains, and
coastlines. (In addition to the numerous poleis on islands,
cities in mainland Greece were oft en on the coast, as were v ir-
tually all of the numerous Greek colonies spread throughout
the Mediterranean.) Borders between cities could also change
in accord with political developments. For instance, as Athens
took over the surrounding smaller communities in its region
of Attica (including Piraeus, which became Athens’s seaport,
and the village of Marathon, site of a famous battle against
the Persians in 490 b.c.e.), they were incorporated as political
divisions known as demes rather than as independent cities,
usually maintaining their former boundaries.
When it was necessary to mark borders, boundary
stones known as horoi were used. Some still exist and are
similar in size and form to the boundary markers used
to delineate the space of a public place, such as the agora
(marketplace) or temple precincts. As with many aspects of
Greek life, boundaries had a minor religious signifi cance:
Boundary stones were under the protection of Zeus Horios,
or Zeus of the Boundaries. (Such epithets were common for
Dedication by Alexander the Great to Athena Polias, around 330
b.c.e., from Priene, Asia Minor; this was one of several dedications
Alexander made in the course of his travels while extending the
boundaries of the Greek world. (© Th e Trustees of the British Museum)146 borders and frontiers: Greecethe major Greek gods; hence, Zeus Xenios, responsible for
protecting xenoi, or strangers.) Given the general competi-
tiveness of Greek culture, border disputes must have been
fairly common, but little direct evidence of them remains.
On some occasions disputes were serious enough to re-
quire the appointment of neutral commissioners, known as
horistai, to settle them.
Borders were not normally guarded except in times of
war: Th e ancient world lacked the elaborate system of routine
border controls found in modern nations. Since war, howev-
er, was a more or less constant threat during certain periods,
fortresses might be established at certain key points to con-
trol access to one’s territory. Warfare was oft en directed at
depriving one’s enemies of the materials necessary to conduct
a war, so cross-border raids were extremely common. During
the Peloponnesian War (431–404 b.c.e.), Spartan incursions
forced the Athenians from outlying districts to retreat behind