Whats Olympia's ethnic background

Question

Alexander the greats mother was born in Epirus now apart of southern albania.the albanians claim alexander the great through demography like shes born in epirus but it doesnt say whats her ethnic background.is she epirotan like shes neither greek,macedonian or albanian.and what is the majority of the people of ancient epirus.i want to know whats alexander the greats mother ethnic background to show if alexander the great is albanian or greek.albanians take this seriously and i want to know if the albanians are right or their not.

Answer 1

She was a Molossian. The Molossians were a people who settled in Epirus around the time of the Trojan War, and, coincidentally, traced their ancestry back to Achilles. The Molossians were one of 14 different groups living in ancient Epirus, and they made up the royal family.

Hundred of thousands of them were enslaved when the Romans took Epirus in 167 BC. At that point, Epirus becomes part of the Roman Empire. I imagine at this point, the different ethnicities of Epirus blended, and eventually, they all saw themselves not even as Epiriots but as Romans. Epriote ethnicity all but disappeared. The modern day Albanians are generally of Slavic stock, and the Slavs only settled in the region in the 6th century AD.

Oddly, I've never heard of the Albanians trying to claim credit for Olympia and Alexander. They're most frequent claim is a connection to the ancient Illyrians (the Illyrians were pushed into Epirus by the Slavs during the dark ages). What makes this bizarre is that the Illyrians and Epirotes were enemies, and fought many wars against each other.

All of this, of course, is just silliness. Modern day Greeks, Albanians, Macedonians, ect. probably all have some genes from ancient Makedonians, ancient Greeks, Slavs, ect. as well as many other groups like Turks, Celts, Bulgars, ect. ect. ect. Humans are always moving around and procreating, the result being that everyone, unless their ancestors were living in isolated mountain villages or something, has a little bit of everything in their blood. Trying to claim ethnic parity with Alexander the Great or anyone else is just nationalistic silliness and means nothing, and serves only to get people mad at each other.  

Answer 2

Wouldn't he just be from Epirus? Not Macedonia, Albania, nor Greece?

Think of it like this, if I were to be born in the time of charlemagne in the region now know as Germany,would I be German?  NO, I would technically have an ethnic background of whatever Empire I was born in