Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- A note on the use and transliteration of Greek
- Abbreviations
- Reference works
- Introduction: The Frankish conquest of Greece
- 1 Ethnic identity?
- 2 Byzantine identities
- 3 Niketas Choniates
- 4 The thirteenth century: ambition, euphoria and the loss of illusion
- 5 The nightmare of the fourteenth century
- 6 Meanwhile, a long way from Constantinople …
- 7 The long defeat
- 8 Roman identity and the response to the Franks
- Glossary
- Map 1 The Aegean region
- Map 2 The Peloponnese
- Appendix 1 Key content items
- Appendix 2 The origins of the Chronicle of the Morea
- Bibliography
- Index
1 - Ethnic identity?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 November 2009
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of illustrations
- Acknowledgements
- A note on the use and transliteration of Greek
- Abbreviations
- Reference works
- Introduction: The Frankish conquest of Greece
- 1 Ethnic identity?
- 2 Byzantine identities
- 3 Niketas Choniates
- 4 The thirteenth century: ambition, euphoria and the loss of illusion
- 5 The nightmare of the fourteenth century
- 6 Meanwhile, a long way from Constantinople …
- 7 The long defeat
- 8 Roman identity and the response to the Franks
- Glossary
- Map 1 The Aegean region
- Map 2 The Peloponnese
- Appendix 1 Key content items
- Appendix 2 The origins of the Chronicle of the Morea
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
This study of the Byzantine Roman response to the Franks relies on a nuanced understanding of the phenomenon of ethnicity within social groups, and requires that this be seen as applicable to societies of the premodern era. A preliminary working definition of ethnicity will help to set the scene for this discussion:
Ethnicity, or ethnic identity, is a property of a group. It is a faith on the part of the members of the group that they are in some sense the same, and that this sameness is rooted in a racial kinship stretching into the past. Further, this act of faith is inherently defensive – it arises and gains its strength from a contrast with another group (or groups), who are seen as not the same, and as presenting a threat to the survival or at least prosperity of one's own group.
The key features which emerge from my first definition are that
ethnicity is a group identity with strong associations with race and with the past;
ethnicity requires the existence of a contrasting other and is a feature of conflict situations rather than of stability; and
ethnicity is a subjective act of faith by members of a group, rather than an objective and quantifiable aspect of a group.
These aspects are broadly discernible in the everyday understanding of ‘ethnic’ in the English-speaking western world, for instance in familiar uses like ‘ethnic clothing’, or ‘ethnic music’, which have clear connotations of being minority-related.
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- Being ByzantineGreek Identity Before the Ottomans, 1200–1420, pp. 11 - 26Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2008
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