By Shpetim AlimetaFollowing the meeting of European ministerial troika in Luxembourg with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday 23rdApril few people captured the real symbol of the event. All the newspapers reported that Russia is still resisting the calls to back Ahtisaari’s plan for Kosovo.
EU ministerial troika, including German foreign minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and EU enlargement commissioner Olli Rehn, did not confirm that any agreement was reached over the fate of Kosova, which according to Joschka Fischer the Germany's Foreign Minister (1998 – 2005) in an article, just a week earlier, is “In fact, intertwined with the EU's own fate”.
Also, one week before this meeting, the PM of Albania called on President Putin to “see that the Russia is responsible for all the injustice done at the beginning of the XX century in the Balkans…It will be better if those injustices are recognised now...“ meaning an end to their unpopular support towards their Balkan protégé - Serbia.
During the post -Tito era, through out the Kosova there were more then enough folk songs and political-mythical stories which connected the Serbian occupation with that of the Dragon which caused suffering and pestilence on the land of the Dardans for most of the 20th century
Even for those who do not believe on the metaphorical politics or the politics of the symbol could not ‘resist’ the striking parallels between the dragon (from one side symbolising the invasion / the absence of freedom at the heart of Europe) and that of the liberator figure of St George riding a white horse.
Some even made parallels between the Cross of St George with the symbol of NATO Flag – The North Atlantic Alliance, during military intervention in year 1999.
The paradox is that; St George is the patron of arms, of chivalry and of the garter for England and other Western European states, but is also a patron saint for the city of Moscow where the Lavrov’s office seats.
In religious scriptures, St George is seen as “The liberator of captives, defender of the poor, physician of the sick, and champion of kings…”
Scholars, in the past, have had difficulty proving the existence or the rational of the Dragon in the story of the “Legenda Aurea” which tells the legend of St George who is celebrated as “ the dragon-slayer” who saved the King’s little daughter and all the people of Selena. St George is widely revered ever since the 4th Century AC in Illyria&Epir (modern Albania and Kosova) & Greece, Bithynia (Turkey), Armenia, Georgia etc., and later, after eleventh-century, in Montenegro, Serbia, Slovenia and other Orthodox and countries.
Thus, George from a soldier of the Roman Empire, become “The Great Martyr” from Cappadocia on 23rd April 303 AC and later was venerated as a Christian martyr across Europe every 23rd April..
The origin of the dragon, who had ravaged all the country called ‘Selena’ in Cappadocia, early 4th Century now modern day Turkey, remains very obscure. The episode of the dragon is in fact a very late development which might have been based on tales of the pre-Diocletian era.
There are some who make connections of that story with the earlier similar pagan sources such as of the Cadmus (From Illyrian / Pellasgic language “Ka Dem = ka dhemb” meaning “the powerful” or “has got bolls” (who also destroyed the spring’s dragon before he funded Thebe ( originally called Cadmeia ).
The legend goes; He was sent out, by his father – the Pelasgo-Phoenician King Agenor, to find his sister – Europa ( hence the name of our continent – Europe).
Europa had been carried off to Crete by Zeus in the form of a bull. ( Zeus = Zevs, Zae, Zee or Zë –ës : in Albanian signifying “Voice” or “gjemues” meaning “loud voice” or “thunder sound” . In which other language do we have a better meaningful translation of the word Zeus-God of all Gods in pagan religion?)
Unsuccessful in his search, Cadmus came in the course of his wanderings to Delphi where he consulted the oracle. He was ordered to give up his quest and follow a special cow, with a half moon on her flank, which would meet him, and to build a town on the spot where she should lie down exhausted.
The cow was given to Cadmus by Pelagon, King of Phocis, and it guided him to Boeotia, where he founded the city of Thebes. It is to be noted that still Albanian call “the bull’ as “Buall-tia” resembling the location’s name ‘Boeotia’ where the stage of the story takes place.
Robert Graves (The Greek Myths) suggested that the cow was actually turned loose within a moderately confined space, and that where she lay down, a temple to Seléne, Se - Léne / The Moon Goddess, was erected . ‘Lene’ in Albanian / illyrian signifies ‘to be born’ or ‘the birth’. And we know very well that; Seléne presides over births.
We noted above that; Selene was also called the country where the dragon of the St George story does his did. Yet, another striking similarities. Also one of his four daughters was later called Semele (which might have a meaning in Pelasgic / Illyrian language “Se-me-Lé” probably meaning “pse–më- lé” which signifies probably a person who has or is given / having a sudden birth )
Intending to sacrifice the cow to Athena [ in albanian means “A-thana” / “A-thena” or in English “the verb of God”, or in a better translated ‘the destiny’ ], Cadmus sent some of his companions to the nearby spring, called Spring of Ares(Kroi i Ariut) for water . (Ares was “The God of War”. In Albanian ‘Ari–u means “the Bear” which was and still is, a scary figure for all).
They, his companions, were slain by the spring's guardian water-dragon which was in turn destroyed by Cadmus, who become a major culture hero throughout the antiquity .
By the instructions of Athena, he sowed the Dragon's teeth in the ground, from which there sprang a race of fierce armed men, called Spartes (" the sown man" or the “scatter” from Illyrian / pelazgic language “sparthan / shparthes”).
By throwing a stone among them, Cadmus caused them to fall upon one another until only five survived, who assisted him to build the Cadmeia or citadel of Thebes, and became the founders of the noblest families of that city. These five ‘spartoi’ were named with illyrian names. Echion( in albanian “e-ki- ion” meaning ‘he who is ours”), Udaeus (Uda-e-us’ here the root word ‘uda / udha-e-ngus’ in albanian means “tight foot road’ or “the tiring road”), Chthonius ( from albanian ‘kthoniu’ meaning ‘he who came back’, Hyperenor (‘hyp-ere-nor’ probably from albanian meaning “the one on the winds”) and Pelorus ( from albanian ‘pellori / pjelloru’ meaning ‘the fertile one’)
Cadmus, however, because the dragon was sacred to Ares, had to do penance for eight years by serving that god (Just as Kosova status for eight long years under UN Resolution ‘1244’ since the NATO intervention in 1999).
At the expiration of this period, the gods gave him as wife Harmonia, daughter of Ares (Ari – in Albanian meaning: The Bear) and Aphrodite ( in albanian ‘Afër-dita’ signifies the ‘dawn of the day’, or ‘the morning star’), by whom he had a son Polydorus, and four daughters, Agave, Autonoe, Ino and Semele.
At the wedding, all the gods were present; Harmonia received as bridal gifts a ‘peplos’ worked by Athena and a necklace made by Hephaestus . Notwithstanding the divinely ordained nature of his marriage and his kingdom, Cadmus lived to regret both: his family was overtaken by grievous misfortunes, and his city by civil unrest.
Cadmus finally abdicated in favour of his grandson Pentheus, and retired with Harmonia to Illyria among Enchelates(alb:Enkelejded) whose inhabitants welcomed and proclaimed him as their king. It was said that a son, Illyrus, was born to him, personifying the love for his country and his ancestors. At the end of their lives both Cadmus and Harmonia were transformed into snakes, as an honour, in line with the Illyrian tradition which thought that the soul of the heroes lived on in the bodies of benevolent snakes. They were sent to Zeus to live for ever in the Elysian Fields. Their tomb could be seen still in Illyria.
To this day, some contend that Cadmus was originally a Illyrian hero from Boeotia that is, a Epirot hero. In later times, throughout Europe, his name became current, to whom was ascribed the introduction of the alphabet, the invention of agriculture and working in bronze and of civilization generally. But the name itself is Illyrian / Pellasgic one and the version of Cadmus who came from a illyrian / pelasgos migrant family in Phoenicia is more probable one. The name Cadmus’s wife Harmonia means "order," and may be used to characterize one who introduces order and civilization in our continent.
But the ‘harmony’ or ‘the order’ (meaning “the statuesque”) in today’s Europe means lot of things depending to whom you speak. Sometime for some, it means even ‘compromise’ (?!) at the expense of someone else, or even at the expense of the whole a nation(Kosova).
Especially, for Russians, that even means ‘the continuation of the occupation’ or ‘the preservation of the slavery”
From the dawn of the European Civilisation to the birth of the legend of St George (Legenda Aurea) at Diocletian’s reign, early IV ce
ntury and up to NATO’s intervention in Kosova lots of waters have passed under the bridge.
In Prishtina, the capital of Dardania (Kosova) another’s George bronze statue is installed, of another kind of George. He is not the same George who is revered in London, Lisbon, Ljubljana and Moscow, but probably, he is of the same line of genes; that of George Kastriot-Skenderbeu ( ‘Iskander’ it is a title given by Ottomans - The Son of the Alexander the Great). The name and the figure of George Castrioti Skanderbeg is tied with the symbol of freedom of all Albanians although he did not cut off any mythical dragon’s head he and his followers bravery resisted the hordes of the Ottomans, then, when few would even contemplate the idea.
Was it on purpose or not, the arrangement of the meeting of European ministerial troika in Luxembourg with Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Monday 23rd April, probably we might never know for sure, but the truth is that Europe, hopes that ‘the harmony’ (reading ‘the statuesque’) within Europe will be saved.
Is Europe seriously to face, or confront, the dragons of today’s world with courage, or, is it just trying to look like it cares? Is Europe, driven by the same principles of freedom, like not long time ago, self-determination, having pity on the poor and the oppressed, just as St George? Will the Europe draw the final act, of the best thing that Europe & NATO Alliance ever has done, after the Cold War Era in Balkans, on the year 1999 and recognise Kosova, as a sovereign state, eight years later? Or will the “1244” will bee seen as a dragon on the fields of Dardans waiting for another George?
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First published on 'The Albanian' May '07
