HIS31940 Inventing Medieval Identities

Academic Year 2015/2016

The fall of the Western Roman Empire was followed by an explosion of new identities, many of which contributed to the formation of present-day ethnic and linguistic diversity of Europe. This process of identity formation started already in the last throes of the Empire, from as early as the fourth century, when both Romans and the peoples that had recently migrated into Europe were busy constructing their own discrete sense of self: some did this with recourse to history, language, and religion, but others highlighted more superficial traits like table manners or even the shape of one’s skull. While Romans strove primarily to reinforce their link to a glorious first- and second-century Imperial past, the so-called Barbarian newcomers spun a more complex web of identities for themselves, drawing on myth, legend, Christianity, but also on a sense of historic shared destiny with the Roman people.

In this module we will explore the way that Romans and Barbarians Successor Kingdoms — which were the distant precursors to modern states like France and Germany — consciously developed their identities over time. We will examine concepts of Medieval time, ethnicity, and historiography, all of which fed into the making of early European polities. We will be reading a good deal of primary sources, including myth, saga, histories, ecclesiastical texts, and medieval law. The stories that these sources have to tell will also help you to familiarise yourselves with major events and phenomena of the period, like the great migration period, the fall of the Empire in the West, the foundation of the Carolingian Empire, and the unique fate of peoples that were never a part of the Empire, like the Scandinavians and the Irish.