Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from C. 1000 to the Present, I 9782503588902, 2503588905

Citation preview

Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies

EARLY EUROPEAN RESEARCH Volume 15 Series founded by Andrew Lynch and Claire McIlroy with the Australian Research Council Network for Early European Research, and now directed by The University of Western Australia Centre for Medieval and Early Modern Studies. General Editors Susan Broomhall, University of Western Australia Kirk Essary, University of Western Australia Editorial Board Tracy Adams, University of Auckland Emilia Jamroziak, University of Leeds Matthias Meyer, Universität Wien Fabrizio Ricciardelli, Kent State University Florence Center Juanita Feros Ruys, University of Sydney Jón Viðar Sigurðsson, Universitetet i Oslo Nicholas Terpstra, University of Toronto Previously published volumes in this series are listed at the back of the book.

Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I

Edited by Przemysław Wiszewski

F

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

© 2020, Brepols Publishers n. v., Turnhout, Belgium. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher. D/2020/0095/91 ISBN 978-2-503-58890-2 E-ISBN 978-2-503-58891-9 DOI 10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.119740 ISSN 2295-9254 E-ISSN 2295-9262 Printed in the EU on acid-free paper.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations

9

Preface: Cohesion of Multi-Ethnic Societies in Medieval and Early Modern Europe Przemysław Wiszewski11 Introduction: Multi-Ethnicity and Memory in Medieval and Modern Societies Przemysław Wiszewski19 Part I Opening a Perspective: Ethnic Diversity and Visions of the Past The Meaning of the Past and the Creation of Early Medieval Ethnic Communities: The Case of Carolingian Italy Aneta Pieniądz33 Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary: The Thirteenth Century Gestas of Master P. and Simon of Kéza Dániel Bagi55 Multi-Ethnicity and Memory in Medieval Transylvania Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu73 Religion and Ethnicity in the Humanist Historiography of the Czech Region Jan Zdichynec93 The Crown of Aragon on the Border: From Conflict to an Ideology of Cohesion in a Multi-Ethnic Society Isabel Grifoll115 Multi-Ethnicity or the Network of Local and Regional Identities in Silesian Medieval Historiography Przemysław Wiszewski139

6

ta bl e o f co nt e n t s

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic in the Fifteenth Century and the Problem of Implicit Understanding Luís Adão da Fonseca161 Part II Ethnic Groups within One Political Body Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433): From Administrative Practices to Official Royal Narrative Paula Pinto Costa and Maria Cristina Pimenta185 The Creation and Administration of a Multi-Ethnic State: The Case of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė211 Myth as a Means of Coexistence: The Karaite Community of Lithuania from the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Centuries Dovile Troskovaite237 Portraying the People and Lands of Eastern Europe in Polish Writings up to the Union of Lublin (1569) Andrzej Pleszczyński259 Value Orientation and the Image of the Orbis Gentium in Medieval East European Societies Aleksandr Musin289 Part III The Interethnic Exchange of Ideas and the Building of Identities Catalans and Sardinians: Opposing Identity Discourses and Fluctuating Political Relationships from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Centuries Luciano Gallinari329 Catalan Identity Discourse in the Late Medieval Mediterranean: Creation and Contrast with Neighbouring Identities Flocel Sabaté349

tab le o f co nt e nt s

Three Languages, One Town: Linguistic Aspects of Written Communication between the King and Bohemian Royal Towns in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries Tomáš Velička369 Part IV Multi-Ethnicity in the Twentieth Century Visions of the Past and their Role in Shaping the Polish American Identity, as Seen in Ethnic Festivities Joanna Wojdon409 Index

421

7

List of Illustrations

Przemysław Wiszewski Map 8.1. Silesia, as a land of the Crown of Bohemia (1348-1740). Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license.140 Figure 8.1. The meeting of Henry I the Bearded with his future father-in-law, Bertold, count of Andechs, giving him his daughter, Hedwig, in marriage 151 Figure 8.2. A meeting of Duke Henry I the Bearded with his wife, Saint Hedwig, and the miracle of the reappearance of Hedwig’s shoes 152 Figure 8.3. A meeting of Duke Henry I the Bearded with his wife, Saint Hedwig, who assisted the poor and sick 153 Figure 8.4. The Battle of Legnica, Silesian knights led by Duke Henry II the Pious against Mongols (above), beheading of the duke by Mongols (below) 154 Paula Pinto Costa And Maria Cristina Pimenta Figure 10.1. Minority groups ( Jews and Muslims) in João I’s Chancery Figure 10.2. Documents from the reign of João Figure 10.3. Contents of chancery documents focused on Jews and Muslims Figure 10.4. Laws about Jews and Muslims Figure 10.5. Jews and Muslims — Royal legislation

190 191 193 195 197

Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė Map 11.1. The Lithuanian State in the Thirteenth-Fifteenth Centuries. Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a CC BY-SA 2.5 generic license.

212

Dovile Troskovaite Map 12.1. Historical Lithuanian borders. Public domain. 

238

Andrzej Pleszczyński Map. 13.1 Poland and Lithuania in 1526. Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.

260

10

l is t o f i l lus t r at i o n s

Luciano Gallinari Map 15.1. A political map of Sardinia in 1326 after the Aragonese conquest of the Sardinian territories of the Republic of Pisa . Information taken from: Francesco Cesare Casula, La Storia di Sardegna (1994). Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.

330

Tomáš Velička Map 17.1. Germany and central Europe, including Bohemia, at the death of Emperor Charles IV, 1378. Source: H.F. Helmolt, History of the World, Volume VII, Dodd Mead 1902. Plate between pages 170 and 171. Revised by Karl Wolf, printed by the Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig.Image in the Public Domain.  374 Figure 17.1. Royal documents categorized by content and language in 1346–1378377 Figure 17.2. Royal documents and their language in 1378–1419 378 Figure 17.3. Royal towns divided according to the royal documents received between 1378 and 1419 379 Figure 17.4. Royal documents divided by content and language in 1378–1419 381 Figure 17.5. The language of royal documents addressed to royal towns in the pre-Hussite era 381 Figure 17.6. Royal documents issued by King Sigismund addressed to towns divided by language 382 Figure 17.7. Royal documents issued by King Sigismund addressed to towns divided by content and language 383 Figure 17.8. Documents issued by George of Poděbrady addressed to towns divided by language 384 Figure 17.9. Documents issued by George of Poděbrady addressed to towns divided by content and language 386 Figure 17.10. Documents issued by Vladislaus II (until 1481) addressed to towns, divided by content and language 387 Figure 17.11. Documents issued by Vladislaus II addressed to towns, divided by language 388 Figure 17.12. Royal documents addressed to towns in the Hussite and post-Hussite era, divided by language. 389

Przemysław Wiszewski

Preface Cohesion of Multi-Ethnic Societies in Medieval and Early Modern Europe

Is it possible, in the first quarter of the twenty-first century, for societies that are conflicted as a result of growing nationalistic emotions to learn anything from medieval and modern political communities? Although this question may sound more like a rhetorical phrase than a scientific problem, it remains a fact that the multi-ethnic communities that populated polities from the early Middle Ages to the eighteenth century did not live in a state of constant internal conflict. On the contrary, despite disputes that occasionally broke out (usually in the context of recent military conquests and/or on a religious basis,1 and, from the sixteenth century, on a denominational rather than an ethnic basis), they functioned quite efficiently, and through acculturation processes they sought to create nations.2 These multi-ethnic organisms guaranteed a stable framework for cultural and economic transformations which allowed Europe a long-lasting global political domination in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. A drastic change in the perception of multi-ethnicity was observed due to the emergence of nationalisms, for which ethnicity provides the basic ideological content. The use of such content in order to gain political advantage within a functioning community had to take place through that community’s division, polarization, and conflict. However, ethnic myths in politics, the aim of which is the domination of a part of a society over its other elements, was not an invention of thinkers and activists of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Their accomplishment was rather a creative extension of the tendencies that had previously had a limited application, but since the ‘revival of nations’ of the nineteenth century the idea of their natural and permanent character in social life became commonly accepted as a practice that had stable, scientific foundations.3 As a result, today we are facing the frequent and automatic association of ethnicity with xenophobia, exclusion, and striving to subjugate the ‘Other’. This in turn suggests that the functioning of political societies composed of various ethnic groups is impossible because — according to these

1 See, for instance, Tieszen, Christian Identity, pp. 265–66, 270–73. 2 Davies, ‘Nations and National Identities’, pp. 570–71. 3 Geary, The Myth of Nations. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 11–17 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120054

12

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

assumptions — they must slide into conflict once the optimistic vision of a pluralist society has been overshadowed by one of powerplays, clashes, and internal conflicts.4 Yet, is this an inevitable result? Finding examples of ethnic conflicts is an easy task. For over a century, studies on the history of political life, as well as national historiographies, have focused on ethnic and national conflicts as moments that formed political or national communities.5 A major shift in the meaning of research was caused by the interest in the very nature of an ‘ethnicity’ and its difference from a ‘nation’. This discussion was broached among medievalists by Reinhard Wenskus and it was continued by his disciple Walter Pohl.6 The chronology under study broadened (extending well past the year 800), studies crossed the borders of history and archaeology, and came to include peoples far remote from Germans. Scholars focused mainly on the problems and mechanisms of the beginning of an ethnicity, the formation of post-Roman states, historiographical narratives, and other communicative phenomena supporting the creation or continuance of ethnicity and conflicts of ethnically diverse groups.7 However, at the end of the twentieth century Piotr Górecki, through a case study of the inhabitants of Silesia, or more precisely a small area around the Cistercian abbey of Henryków (Heinrichau), posed the question of whether ethnic differences invariably tend towards internal conflicts inside a specific regional body.8 Although his answer is not clear, the question was valid and has changed our perspective. I acknowledged how important this change of perspective was during my participation in the project ‘Cujus Regio: An analysis of the cohesive and disruptive forces determining the attachment and commitment of (groups of) persons to and cohesion within regions’ (a project funded by the European Science Foundation, part of the EuroCORECODE project). Discussing the genesis of European regions with researchers from different European research schools, I was struck by the common belief that the multi-ethnic character of a political body necessitated conflict and the disruption of social cohesion in a given region. Yet, this assumption was not so obvious when confronted with sources, in which one can find examples of both conflicts and long-lasting cooperation of different ethnic groups living inside one polity during both the Middle Ages and in modern times.9 If so, why have we focused on conflicts, while neglecting traces of mutual help, or at least of peaceful coexistence? 4 Winter, Us, Them and Others, pp. 33–39. 5 An instructive insight into this tendency is seen in the recent historiography of medieval Scotland, where the population supposedly lived in the constant shadow of tensions between ‘Celtic’ and ‘Norman’ in social, religious, cultural, and political life: Hammond, ‘Ethnicity and the Writing of Medieval Scottish History’. However, researchers specializing in the history of violence have stressed that its appearance was regulated by a complicated system of social norms which changed over time. Moreover, the problem of ethnicity was of little importance to them: see Brown, Violence in Medieval Europe, pp. 288–95. 6 See Pohl, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Distinction’, or more recently Pohl, ‘Ethnicity in the Carolingian Empire’, for further literature. 7 Gillet, ‘Introduction: Ethnicity, History, and Methodology’. 8 Górecki, ‘Assimilation’. 9 Wiszewski, ‘The Multi-Ethnic Character’.

pre face

Is this connected with our troubled European history of the twentieth century and recent tendencies to oversimplify the nature and role of ‘ethnicity’ and ‘nation’ in the history of the Continent or the whole of mankind? Without doubt, it will be easy to enumerate examples of disruption or open conflicts in ethnic relations during a complicated European past. However, within the framework of the project Cohesion Building of Multi-Ethnic Societies, 10th–20th c.,10 a group of researchers from various European countries and research schools have tried to trace interethnic relations inside given polities to pose the reverse question: when and under what circumstances has the ethnic diversity of a community functioning within a single political entity led to an increase in the social cohesion of all members of the given society without the complete assimilation and disappearance of their multi-ethnic character?11 Looking for factors that determine the specificity of ethnicity and which could affect relationships between different ethnicities within one political community, we decided to focus on three issues and devote one volume of study to each. The first issue, which is covered in the present volume and is crucial for the existence of ethnic communities, is the use or misuse of narratives about the past in a context of interethnic relations. The chapter authors focus on stories that defined or reshaped the specificity of a given ethnicity. The researchers turn their attention away from analysing the sources themselves and instead look at how people were using these stories to create or reshape actual interethnic relations. For that purpose the authors have analysed narratives about the common past of a particular ethnicity, the modes of communication used to create or strengthen ethnic identity, and the values contained in messages (mostly written) constituting the unity and distinctiveness of the community (see further details in my Introduction that follows this Preface). The next volume, Social Groups and Relations in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, II, deals with social interactions that led to the strengthening or weakening of the ties of a multi-ethnic political community. The last book of the project, Political Play in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, III), will be devoted to analysing the legal foundations of ethnic interactions and political life — actions of individuals and groups striving to control the societies in order to give it a certain shape. For the purpose of this project as a whole, we have selected European political communities which are characterized by a substantial and lasting degree of ethnic diversity during both the Middle Ages and early modernity. We deliberately focused on those political communities from the Iberian Peninsula and Central and Eastern 10 The project ‘Cohesion Building of Multi-ethnic Societies, 10th–20th c.’ is financed within the framework of the National Programme of the Development of Humanities established by the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education and carried out in the Historical Institute of the University of Wrocław, agreement no. 12H 13 0446 82. 11 Ian Wood praised ‘integration’ as one of most important characteristics of the post-Roman, early medieval period of Europe, Wood, ‘Conclusio: In Praise of Uncertainty’, pp. 304–05, 307, 311–12.

13

14

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Europe that functioned outside the areas recognized as the ‘centres’ of Europe. We have intentionally put the word ‘centres’ in quotation marks. While the universally functioning metaphor of ‘centre and periphery’ is applied in specific contexts, and although it is widely used in public discourse — including scientific ones — it is impossible to use it in respect to all phenomena affecting the cohesion of political communities. However, with regard to the selection of the communities subjected to examination within the framework of this project, this conventional ‘peripherality’ was important. The focus on communities developing on the geographical peripheries of (conventionally understood) European civilization is aimed at capturing the processes occurring in a situation of a constant flow of new cultural trends and both peaceful and forced migrations, as well as a constant redefinition of identity in relation to the content brought by newcomers and assimilated by local actors who influence relations within society through their deeds, speech, and negligence.. A few words need to be devoted to the definitions adopted within this project.12 By ‘ethnicity’ we understand a community whose cohesion is ensured by a sense of a common past, especially the beginning of its functioning as a distinct group and the identification of common symbols which evoke content that defines characteristic values for this group as a whole as well as the units co-creating it. Therefore, in our study we are focusing on the actual ‘ethnic communities’ that manifest community awareness in action and reflection.13 Out of the four features of the natio mentioned by Regino of Prüm — origin, customs, law, and language — we treat the first in terms of an ‘imagined past’, and the latter not only as a communication tool but also as a feature constituting an ethnic community.14 Following Regino’s observation, we treat religious issues together with customs within an ethnic community — for, as the chronicler pointed out, just as nationes differed in moribus, so the Churches had different customs.15 Ethnicity is not necessarily associated with a particular economic activity or social position, although in certain circumstances it may result in an acquisition of privileges connected with the community’s political organization. Nor is ethnicity based on administrative structures, although its duration may be connected with the cultivation of symbolic behaviours which engage specific leading actors (priests, political leaders, professional groups). An ethnic community can feel a special bond with a certain territory as a carrier of values, an element that generates narratives about origins and events, the memory of which strengthens the sense of unity. Ethnicity is a community of awareness that changes historically, encompassing those who feel the connection with the narratives that convey values embedded in specific historical frameworks — including religious or historical and

12 When addressing the issue of ethnicity, we have relied primarily on the thoughts of Anthony D. Smith (Smith, The Ethnic Origins) and the volume summarizing his reflection on the relationships between ‘ethnicity’ and the functioning of ‘nations’ (Smith, The Nation in History). 13 See Smith, National Identity, pp. 20–21. 14 Bartlett, The Making of Europe. 15 ‘[…] sicut diversae nationes populorum inter se discrepant genere, moribus, lingua, legibus, ita sancta universalis ecclesia toto orbe terrarum diffusa, quamvis in unitate fidei coniungatur, tamenn consuetudinibus aecclesiasiticis ab invicem differt’.

pre face

topographic ones. The size of an ethnic community is restricted by the specificity of the information flow and the related phenomenon of the development of separate versions of narratives and ethnic traditions.16 We believe that the problem of the relationships within a community based on the awareness of a common history, the meanings of symbols, and its material culture is open for debate.17 Due to the lack of certainty about the credibility of these types of relationships, we have limited our reflections to the cultures that supported and developed their functioning with the use of written records. While this considerably reduces the horizon of our research, it does enable us to avoid an anachronistic transfer of the concepts developed within literate communities onto the depths of the past. We would like to compare the results obtained with the realities of the functioning of communities living in the proto- and national period in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Only in this way will we be able to verify whether it is possible to use these results in the different context of the political and social organization of contemporary European communities. But to compare these two dimensions of European past — pre- and modern history — we first have to propose conclusions covering medieval and early modern period. Only after they are accepted can we try to go further in comparison, replacing generalities built on large-scale models of the past and the imagination of an author with knowledge founded on sources and rational discourse. Is it true — for example — that in the case of pre-modern societies the assimilation of ‘others’ by dominant cultures or segregation and exclusion of minorities were the only options in contrast to contemporary societies that respect cultural and ethnic differences (even if they do not accept multiculturalism)? It does not seem so obvious in the recent political climate. The results of studies carried out within the project also point to more various ways of coexistence of different ethnicities in one political body than suggested. But for now it has to be enough to compare or contrast what we can deduce from the medieval and early modern sources with chosen examples of how multi-ethnic societies functioned during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries in an attempt to establish the merits of our studies. This will allow readers to reflect on the contemporary state of our own cultures and societies.

16 In defining ethnic groups as I have done above, I do not pretend to solve decades of lasting quarrels about what ethnicity is and was: see, in the context of medieval identities, Webber, The Evolution of Norman Identity, pp. 2–9. Rather, the outcome of this current research is valuable for the subject I am examining. 17 See Brather, ‘“Slavische Archäologie” und “ethnische Interpretation”’, and the much more optimistic Gąssowski, ‘Is Ethnicity Tangible?’, as well as the discussion of the concepts of material expressions of ethnicity in the early Middle Ages in Gillet, ed., On Barbarian Identity.

15

16

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Works Cited Primary Sources Regino, Reginonis abbatis Prumiensis Chronicon cum continuatione Treverensi, ed. by Friedrich Kurze, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Series Scriptores Rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi, 50 (Hannover: Hahn, 1890) Secondary Studies Bartlett, Robert, The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization, and Cultural Change 950–1350 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993) Brather, Sebastian, ‘“Slavische Archäologie” und “ethnische Interpretation” - Zur Rekonstruktion des frühen Mittelalters in Ostmitteleuropa’, in The European Frontier: Clashes and Compromises in the Middle Ages: International Symposium of the Culture Clash and Compromise (CCC) Project and the Department of Archeology, Lund University, held in Lund October 13–15 2000, ed. by Jörn Staecker (Lund: Almqvist & Wiksell International, 2004), pp. 59–71 Brown, Warren C., Violence in Medieval Europe (London: Longman, 2011) Davies, Rees, ‘Nations and National Identities in the Medieval World: An Apologia’, Revue Belge d’histoire contemporaine/Belgisch Tijdschrift voor nieuwste geschiedenis, 34.4 (2004), 567–79 Gąssowski, Jerzy, ‘Is Ethnicity Tangible?’, in Inventing the Pasts in North Central Europe: The National Perception of Early Medieval History and Archaeology, ed. by Matthias Hardt, Christian Lübke, and Dittmar Schorkowitz, Gesellschaften und Staaten im Epochenwandel, 9 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2003), pp. 9–17 Geary, Patrick J., The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002) Gillet, Andrew, ‘Introduction: Ethnicity, History, and Methodology’, in On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Andrew Gillet (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002) pp. 1–18 ——, ed., On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002) Górecki, Piotr, ‘Assimilation, Resistance, and Ethnic Group Formation in Medieval Poland: A European Paradigm?’, in Das Reich und Polen: Parallelen, Interaktionen und Formen der Akkulturation im Hohen und Späten Mittelalter, ed. by Alexander Patschovsky and Thomas Wünsch, Vorträge und Forschungen, 59 (Stuttgart: Jan Thorbecke, 2003), pp. 447–76 Hammond, Matthew H., ‘Ethnicity and the Writing of Medieval Scottish History’, The Scottish Historical Review, 85.1 (2006), 1–27 Pohl, Walter, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Distinction’, in Strategies of Distinction: The Construction of Ethnic Communities, 300–800, ed. by Walter Pohl and Helmut Reimitz (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 1–15

pre face

———, ‘Ethnicity in the Carolingian Empire’, in The Abbasid and Carolingian Empires: Comparative Studies in Civilizational Formation, ed. by Deborah Gerber Tor, Islamic History and Civilization, 150 (Leiden: Brill, 2017) pp. 102–22 Smith, Anthony D., The Ethnic Origins of Nations (Malden: Blackwell, 1986) ———, National Identity (Reno: University of Nevada Press, 1993) ———, The Nation in History: Historiographical Debates about Ethnicity and Nationalism (Cambridge: Blackwell, 2000) Tieszen, Charles Lowell, Christian Identity amid Islam in Medieval Spain (Leiden: Brill, 2013) Webber, Nick, The Evolution of Norman Identity, 911–1154 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2005) Winter, Elke, Us, Them and Others: Pluralism and National Identity in Diverse Society (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2011) Wiszewski, Przemysław, ‘The Multi-Ethnic Character of Medieval Silesian Society and its Influence on the Region’s Cohesion (12th–15th Centuries)’, in The Long Formation of the Region (c. 1000–1526), ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, Cuius regio? Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of Silesia, vol. 1 (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo eBooki.com. pl, 2013), pp. 167–92 (online version: http://www.bibliotekacyfrowa.pl/dlibra/ publication/46981/edition/49790) Wood, Ian, ‘Conclusio: In Praise of Uncertainty’, in Integration und Herrschaft. Ethnische Identitäten und soziale Organisation im Frühmittelalter, ed. by Walter Pohl and Maximilian Diesenberger, (Wien: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2002), pp. 303–12

17

Przemysław Wiszewski

Introduction Multi-Ethnicity and Memory in Medieval and Modern Societies

In the present volume we focus on issues related to the functioning of memory about ethnic groups within medieval and early modern multi-ethnic societies from the Iberian Peninsula to the Ural Mountains. This could be a memory which conflicted with discourses of other ethnic societies within one political body, but which also absorbed themes included in these narratives and changed so as to become a part of larger, politically dominant narratives. Obviously these analyses belong to the wide range of works labelled as ‘memory studies’.1 But their main aim is not to reconstruct mechanisms of social remembering and forgetting. The authors begin by analysing artefacts of cultural memories but then shift to learn about mechanisms of strengthening the social cohesion of ‘remembering societies’. The aim of these reflections is to analyse on the one hand processes of building strong, cohesive versions of a common past accepted by members of all ethnic groups which make up a given political society, and on the other hand, endeavours of minorities to secure ethnic, cultural identity by shaping their own narrative of a past, diverse even if merged with the dominant vision of common history of a given polity/state. The multitude of themes, the broad chronological horizon, and (at the same time) the currently ‘hot’ topic of the volume might provoke us to ask if the set of stories presented here leads a reader to any kind of general answer or at least a credible picture of mechanisms that triggered the appearance of a recurring problem — how to live together despite ethnic differences? How to present different sides of the past — brought to light by ethnic interests — as parts of one cohesive grand narrative circulating within one political body? Thus, we may ask whether the memory of the past, the creation of a community of values that binds an ethnic group, can work for the benefit of cooperation in a multi-ethnic political community? Or must it

1 Erll, Memory in Culture. Przemysław Wiszewski  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at the Institute of History, University of Wrocław, with special interest in medieval and early modern history of social relations, values’ structures within medieval societies and regional history. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 19–28 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120055

20

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

inevitably lead to conflict resulting from the desire to dominate over the ‘Other’ created by the distinctiveness of ‘Ours’? Basic methodological issues are important when answering these questions — to what extent do the sources allow a historian to propose a credible outline of the processes associated with the functioning of ethnic groups in their relationship with their environment? The specificity of medieval and modern sources causes the answer to this question to be rather approximate and developed mainly on the basis of voices of elite members, and addressed to this elite (Aneta Pieniądz). It is clear, however, that the examples presented here show the polyphony of identities of contemporary societies and the moments when this multiplicity of identities is visible — and the attempt is made to overcome or accept it.2 At the same time, the sources allow us to capture a clear changeability in the expression of particular types of identification, depending on political and cultural circumstances (Aneta Pieniądz, Przemysław Wiszewski). The moments of decision related to the communication process are particularly intriguing — how to define oneself in relation to the ‘Other’? Which identification to choose for oneself and which to assign to the one whom we want to identify and understand (Luís Adão da Fonseca)? This changeability in the use of ethnic identification in the perception of the world has transferred onto the interpretation of political events, especially of conflicts. This phenomenon can be seen in the case of Transylvania which was inhabited by Hungarians (nobility), Saxons (burghers and peasants), and a rural population of diverse ethnicity. There, Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu has observed a transition in the stories about the community’s past from accentuating the hostility of the newcomers (Saxons) towards local hierarchies and symbolic places (for example, the chapter in Alba Iulia), to their gradual ‘taming’ and emphasizing their positive attributes in relationships with their environment, as when the chapter in Alba Julia developed economic cooperation with the Saxons. Responsibility for the traumatic events experienced by the chapter recorded in memory was transferred from the ethnic community (Saxons) to an individual — the leader of the alleged rebellion. Ethnicity in the event of the intensification of internal political tensions may lose its significance and disappear from the sight of the authors of the sources. Conflict and its resolution, a central concern of Maria Bonet’s reflection, had practically no ethnic dimension in the case of twelfth-century Catalonia. In the recollections about the history of the community and the application of solutions resulting from the past, the references related to the continuance and development of power structures and the relations between the followers of the religion were dominant. However, there are no testimonies about the influence of ethnic identity or hostility built on this basis. On the other hand, ethnic identity was an element in building a political advantage by people deprived of a privileged position in disputes with the authorities. Flocel Sabaté emphasizes the dynamics of self-reflection and self-creation of the Catalan community. Since the thirteenth century, but especially in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, historiographers have emphasized not only its distinctiveness within the

2 See McGuire, ‘Afterword’, pp. 354–56.

i nt ro d u ct i o n

scope of political events, but also the personal characteristics of the members of the community, different from other inhabitants of the Iberian Peninsula and Europe. All this was happening in the shadow of the battle for the political independence of cities and rural communities, and — more broadly — of the entire political community from the royal court. In this case, the ethnic discourse is combined with the desire to establish the political autonomy of the inhabitants — especially the members of the nobility and the urban residents. This model was questioned and rejected in public discourse in the sixteenth century due to the imposition of the new Spanish identify on the inhabitants of the peninsula by the Catalan court, which was to dominate distinct regional ties of identity. The question arises as to whether an ethnically based conflict was the result of bottom-up community movements against the ruling elites. An interesting phenomenon pointed out by Jan Zdichynec is the radical definition of Czech identity by humanists. During the sixteenth century, in the still relatively (until 1618) non-peaceful political community of the Bohemian Crown, the linguistic and denominational (after the Reformation) criterion of the community division was the starting point for accentuating the ethnic identity of the inhabitants. The change in the political context combined with this sense of distinctiveness led to a rebellion against royal authority in Prague, and this gave rise to the beginning of the Thirty Years’ War. In this context, the vision of the multi-ethnic political community of Poland was shaped in a completely different way in the writings of Polish historiographers from the thirteenth to sixteenth centuries (Andrzej Pleszczyński). Historiographers, stressing their belonging to the Polish ethnic community during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, emphasize with increasing frequency the common features and positive values represented by all the inhabitants of the Jagiellonian monarchy, irrespective of their ethnicity. The Polonocentric way of describing the past ceased to exist, as the myth of the elite community — the nobility — is created above ethnic and religious divisions. A ‘political nation’ is created as a community of a more important character for society than ethnic communities, and this ‘political nation’ will be the main opponent of royal power in the subsequent era of the history of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The motif of political pragmatism and the strength of law as the guarantor of the functioning of a multi-ethnic community in the eyes of the royal court had already appeared in twelfth-century Hungarian historiography. However, this is only one approach for perceiving the complicated ethnic structure of the Kingdom of Hungary. A radically different way — but still guaranteeing a peaceful existence of the community — was to reject the awareness of the existence of a multi-ethnic community, and to stress the power of the dynasty, which was to shape social bonds based on identification with the dynasty and its traditions (Dániel Bagi). Despite all the pragmatism of the historiographical visions of the past of the new dynasty of Portugal rulers, initiated by King João I (1385–1433), which included condemnation of Muslims and a cautious evaluation of Jews, the interdependence of the ruler and various ethnic groups in the kingdom is clear (Paula Pinto Costa, Maria Cristina Pimenta). The Jews escaping to Portugal from the pogroms in Castile financially supported João during the conflict with the Castilian king, and were held in high esteem at the royal court and in the official image and accounts of the reign of

21

22

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

the ruler in the fifteenth century. They were not considered to be ‘strange’ — on the contrary they were seen as an integral, though separate part of society. Interestingly, and with regard to Muslims also, there is a tendency to accept some of their traditions and characteristics, but in this case the traditional mutual violence did not allow for far-reaching tolerance of behaviour. Nevertheless, at the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in Portugal, a vision of the past of a multi-ethnic community that grew out of the political needs of the ruler’s court emerged. A radically different process is presented in the history of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, later the Russian Empire. From the beginning of the sixteenth century, the rulers of Moscow had been propagating the idea of uniting under their rule one ethnic community — the Russians. The previously emphasized acceptance of the multi-ethnic origin of the Principality of Kiev or Novgorod the Great and the related strengthening of the potential of the rulers fell into oblivion. The goal of the rulers of Russia was to transform the multi-ethnic memory of their subjects into accepting the narrative of a coherent Russian past for all the inhabitants of the Empire (Aleksandr Musin). Supporting or undermining the emphasis on ethnic identities was not just a bottom-up movement, as it often arose from the political needs of the central authorities. Tomáš Velička’s study demonstrates how flexibly and pragmatically the issue of creating communication habits that consolidated or disregarded ethnic identities of subjects was treated in the Czech court. To a certain extent, the language of the recipient decided the language used for writing princely and royal documents in the Czech/Bohemian Crown. This, however, happened only when the receiving community was a strong partner in the political game also played by the Crown community. Otherwise, the ruler’s specific goals were decisive, and these changed over time. Even use of a vernacular language in the sources should not be automatically accepted as sign of domination of one ethnic group inside a given political body,3 as it was rather a symptom of change in the political balance characteristic of multi-ethnic polities. In the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, in addition to Latin, German quickly appeared as a language of law, which is not surprising in the face of the then developing social and legal revolution — the emergence of chartered cities and villages using the German-language acquis, and sometimes founded by German settlers. The German language was then a ‘fashionable’ carrier of legal content, a determinant of the rulers’ modernization efforts. But already in the fifteenth century, after the Hussite revolution, the royal chancery often imposed the Czech language in correspondence with the subjects. The ethnic — national? — revival of the Czechs in the fifteenth century was used by the authorities to win political support for the advocates of Hussite ideas and, as a result, royal power supported the bottom-up struggle for the Czechs’ cultural domination over the other ethnic communities which were subject to the Crown of Bohemia. This dominance strategy in multi-ethnic communities also had another side — the reaction of ethnic minorities. Dovile Troskovaite has pointed out that one of the mechanisms guaranteeing the survival of communities with a different culture than 3 Clanchy, From Memory to Written Record, pp. 202–06.

i nt ro d u ct i o n

the dominant Christian one in the early modern Grand Duchy of Lithuania was to link their own past with the past of the dominant group. The Karaites tried to strengthen their position by adopting positive stories from the narratives of other minority groups, recognizing them as their own and playing the role of heroes supporting the functioning of the duchy. In this way, they avoided confrontation — and at the same time preserved their sense of individuality. A similar approach was described by Luciano Gallinari with regard to the inhabitants of Sardinia who, politically divided and without a specific ethnic identity, and under the influence of Catalan expansion and as a result of fighting against them, developed a sense of strong insular distinctiveness. However, the long-lasting political dependence contributed to the inclusion of elements of Catalan culture and tradition into their narratives of identity. In view of the clearly pragmatic character of the references to ethnic identities in narratives about the past of political communities, the role of central authorities is limited to the function of a manipulator who used the modelling of social emotions to their own advantage. However, in the example of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė has shown the other side of the coexistence of multi-ethnic communities — the dominant role of state power as the guardian of cooperation between ethnic groups. Yet, even in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with its quite ethnically diverse society, this did not mean equal opportunities for all participants in public life. The factor determining the possibility of participation in public life and the scope of power assumed within the related activities was not ethnicity — but rather, religion and denomination. It was the relationship with the Roman Catholic Church, or with Christianity in general, which opened up opportunities for a political career, with ethnic issues of secondary importance. In her chapter on the mechanisms of confirming the ethnic identity by the Polish minority in the US in the twentieth century, Joanna Wojdon points to two elements in common with those that can be observed in earlier times. The most important issue is religion, but above all the religious practices specific to the ethnic community as decisive for building and maintaining identity. Belonging to a religious community in a broad sense — Christianity — or even a religious subgroup — Roman Catholicism — in a multi-ethnic and multi-faith American society was not enough to create a symbolic system that would allow for the construction of a narrative defining the essential ‘points of resistance’ against the blurring of ethnic identity. These are symbolic behaviours which engage the entire community for their fulfilment, and their value is determined by the tradition of their implementation dating back to the pre-migration era from Poland to America and the relationship with the vision of the religious order, appropriate for the ethnic community. The political and cultural content which rebuilds this identity are grounded around these symbolic and group actions. The secondary nature of political issues causes the possible conflicts with the environment to be emotional and prestigious, but they do not threaten the structure of social order. The values important for an ethnic minority do not contradict, but rather complement the basic framework of the multi-ethnic community’s values. The considerations presented in this volume do not bring about a general, optimistic solution to the problems of coexistence in a multi-ethnic society. They clearly show how

23

24

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

various memory policies that support ethnic distinctiveness have been intentionally used to achieve current political goals since the Carolingian period. And although this phenomenon was usually initiated by the elites of power, this picture may be created by the limitations of the written sources. Above all, we must remember that the acceptance of these practices by the communities could not take place if the communities themselves were not ready to recognize their own superiority over other ethnic groups on the basis of the communication modes, historical traditions, and values they held. Nevertheless, we do not see a far-reaching readiness to engage entire societies in a physical ethnic (not religious!) conflict which exposes the historical traditions and the sphere of values. Ethnicity served as an argument in a dispute over cohesion of a given society, but where a community of faith or religion existed, ethnicity rarely appeared as the official reason for armed attack on the members of another ethnic group inside the same political community. It was not that problematic to absorb the theme from the traditions of other ethnic groups in order to assume part of the prestige these groups enjoyed. That was possible because, as S. J. Harris stated, ‘ethnicity is also a narrative phenomenon’.4 Ethnicity was a hallmark and one had to make sure to combine it with desirable members’ traits and values cultivated by the community. It did, however, not arouse aggression — ethnicity appeared more frequently as an argument for resistance against the central authorities which did not respect the political autonomy of well-established ethnic communities. The cooperation of various ethnic groups was a frequent and natural phenomenon since an ethnic identity was not so important, it was equal with other identities.5 A pragmatic approach to these identities as well as their intentional strengthening and weakening depending on the political situation was possible due to a specific flow of information. The relative slowness of, and above all, the selectivity of the information flow required the constant openness of entire communities to unexpected changes in external stimuli — and it was the openness, pragmatism, and awareness of the interdependencies of individual actors in the political arena in the fragile world of war and peace that provided more value to the cooperation than to the struggle for domination within a political community. Where the ethnicity-based struggle for domination appeared, it continued as long as the temporary need for power was conducive to it. Only in the modern period, does the reference to ethnicity as an element of the authorities’ internal politics begin to take on a more stable character. It did not, however, overshadow the building of a higher than ethnic level of identity of multi-ethnic political communities — an identity based on long-term symbolic content: the religion and local tradition of past deeds, gestures, signs, and values. Such a set consisting of elements coming genetically from various ethnic groups supported both the identities of ethnic groups and the political community they co-created. The question arises as to whether we can learn anything from our ancestors in the field of resolving ethnic disputes. Each reader should evaluate it on their own,

4 Harris, Race and Ethnicity, p. 1. 5 See Pohl, ‘Tradition, Ethnogenese und literarische Gestaltung’, p. 24.

i nt ro d u ct i o n

paying close attention to the dialectical relationship between the clear willingness to cooperate, the openness and pragmatism of ethnic groups, and the acceptance of ethnic conflict and elimination of dispersed ethnic traditions favouring the application of one — however syncretic — narrative as a way of strengthening state power. What is most clearly apparent from the cases described is the relative weakness of universal categories in the unification of multi-ethnic communities. If terms like ‘Europe’ and ‘Christianity’ had the power to convince in the discussions of the narrow intellectual elites of the continent, political communities were created and strengthened above all by the stories of cooperation and conflicts between local ethnic groups.6 History does not repeat itself — but topoi in narratives do and they cause similar emotions easily used by those who wanted to build and strengthen their power over members of a given society. The studies presented here show how fragile a delicate fabric of interethnic cooperation is when facing conscious manipulation of history by men of power. The volume begins with a set of reflections on the way multi-ethnic communities and ethnic diversity within a society were presented in medieval and modern historiography — a crucial starting point for further considerations. Aneta Pieniądz (University of Warsaw) presents a discussion on the formation of ethnic communities in the era of the Carolingian monarchy. She emphasizes the importance of historical traditions for the processes of formation of these communities within the Germanic societies both before and after the emergence of the Carolingian monarchy. She introduces us not only in chronological, but also methodological terms to the scale of the basic problem — the mechanisms that strengthened both the distinctiveness and the cooperation of various ethnic groups in the Middle Ages. Dániel Bagi (University of Pécs) analyses twelfth-century Hungarian historiography associated with the royal court in order to examine how the relationships between different ethnic communities living in the Kingdom of Hungary were depicted. He stresses the pragmatism of these visions, which were constructed in accordance with the ruler’s political interests and did not include permanent, universally accepted assessments of the multi-ethnicity of the subjects’ communities. Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu (Alba Julia University) focuses on juxtaposing the visions of the role of relationships between groups forming a multi-ethnic community in Transylvania from the twelfth to the fourteenth century included in chronicle sources, with today’s realities of conflict and cooperation — in strictly defined spheres and to a limited extent — of the clergy, the Hungarian nobility, and Saxon settlers. Jan Zdichynec (Charles University, Prague) uses examples of the works of geographers and historiographers from the end of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries to study how the problem of the (multi) ethnicity of the Kingdom of Bohemia was treated in humanist culture. He examines the development of the lively and radicalizing Czech ethnic awareness when confronted with the sense of distinctiveness claimed by the German-speaking inhabitants of the Kingdom. Isabel Grifoll (Universitat de Lleida) stresses that the occupation of the Balearic Islands (1229–1235) and the Kingdom of Valencia (1232–1238/1245) opened

6 See Bartlett, ‘Patterns of Unity and Diversity’, p. 42.

25

26

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

a new period in the history of the Crown of Aragon. A multi-ethnic, multireligious society emerged. The paper explores the values promoted in these circumstances by the main centres of power — the Crown and the Church — for maintaining the cohesion and transformation of this new society. The need for coexistence leaves behind the previously dominant ideology of the Crusade. Instead, two programmes arose: military colonization, and religious conversion with an associated sets of promoted values. Przemysław Wiszewski (University of Wrocław) focuses on the dynamics of relations between various forms of identification of the inhabitants of medieval Silesia. He emphasizes the changing nature of ethnic identification and the inadequacy of using categories derived from the functioning of modern nations during dynamic changes in the study of the levels and range of identification of Silesian inhabitants (the region on the border area of the Czech Republic, Germany, and Poland), using the same elements of the historical past as arguments for the importance of the functioning of the communities, varying in coverage and content (Germans, Poles, inhabitants of Silesia, inhabitants of individual Silesian duchies). Luís Adão da Fonseca (University of Porto) addresses the issue of the consequences which arose at the end of the late Middle Ages and early modernity, after the contact of Spanish and Portuguese sailors with peoples whose culture and political history was entirely unfamiliar to them. He emphasizes that in having contact with the multiplicity of total ‘Strangers, Others’ the crucial role was played by a well structuralized, and rooted in an educated culture, image of past encounters with ‘Others’. The author noted that in making an effort to understand other ethnic communities the key was an awareness of previous multi-ethnic contacts of European societies and knowledge about the past of their own, respective states. Even, if the past did not provide clear analogies for contemporary problems. The next part of the volume is devoted to memorial practices, education, and the sustaining of narratives about the past, which were supposed to shape ethnic identity in close connection with the interest of the political communities’ ruling elites. In this part of the book chapters are devoted to the ways of preserving ethnic distinctiveness through the use of historical reflection and descriptions of the surrounding world. Paula Pinto Costa (University of Porto) and Maria Cristina Pimenta (University of Porto) highlight the manner in which the vision of the past of the Kingdom of Portugal in King João I’s (1385–1433) environment was formed, which was supposed to justify the importance of political ties that bound his subjects in harmony despite ethnic differences, including religious ones. Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė (University of Vilnius) discusses the ideological conditions for the construction of the administration of the vast area of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, whose rulers were aware of the multi-ethnicity of their subjects. Not only did they adapt the language and form of communication to their subjects, but they also resorted to arguments related to the notion of ethnic ties for the needs of ad hoc politics. Nonetheless, they avoided the role of advocates of the dominance of one ethnic group over the others. Dovile Troskovaite (Vilnius University) presents a narrative about the past, existing among modern Karaite communities. She indicates how they shaped their attitude towards other ethnic communities in the political society of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, as well as how their presence in the flow of information in the duchy affected the perception of this ethnic group by non-Karaite communities. Andrzej Pleszczyński

i nt ro d u ct i o n

(Maria Skłodowska-Curie University, Lublin) outlines the main themes shaping the vision of the past of the multi-ethnic mosaic of people inhabiting areas located to the east of the Kingdom of Poland in the works of Polish historiographers, written up to the emergence of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1569). Emphasizing the dominance of Polish ethnic myths in these narratives, he also draws attention to the presence of themes taken over and adapted from the traditions of the described ethnic communities. Alexander Musin (Russian Academy of Science, St Petersburg) points to a entire set of visions about the past, which was officially popularized by the Moscow rulers from the thirteenth to the eighteenth century in order to justify the reliance of the political community of the Grand Duchy of Moscow, and later of the Russian Empire, on a sense of Russian ethnic identity. This identity evolved from the development of local Slavic communities which shared linguistic, religious, and denominational characteristics, as well as the same view on the geopolitical situation. Following this, authors from Spain, Italy, and Czechia discuss how the exchange of information and ideas between different ethnic groups inside one polity may create, strengthen, or disrupt medieval identity discourse. Luciano Gallinari (Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea — Centro Nazionale della Ricerche, Cagliari) presents the picture of the confrontation of two political communities — the Sardinians and the Catalans — the result of which was the presentation of this dispute as a clash of ethnic communities. However, the political conflict was not presented unanimously throughout its entire duration. Even among the inhabitants of the island, the narrative showing a cohesive community of Sardinians as fighting the Catalan invaders was not met with universal acceptance. The ethnic perspective was even less frequently presented in the Catalan narratives, where the political situation understood as the dynamically developing play of actors motivated by individual interests was a more important issue. Flocel Sabaté (University of Lleida) outlines the process of the formation of the Catalan ethnic community. He emphasizes the importance of real political conflicts within the Iberian Peninsula, and their narrativization and transmission as part of the general vision of the world in order to strengthen ties with the Catalan community of the past — as well as strengthening emotions related to it. Tomáš Velička ( J. E. Purkyně University, Ústí nad Labem) presents the pragmatic nature of the use of Latin and the vernacular languages (Czech and German) by the royal chancery in communication with their subjects. The choice of language was not only related to the importance and content of the specific case, but also to the habits of the royal chancery during any particular period of time. The prevailing differentiation of the language of documents suggests the acceptance of the multi-ethnicity of the subjects’ communities and the consolidation of it through the official acceptance of people’s language in the communication of the ruler with his subjects. The reflections presented in this volume conclude with the presentation by Joanna Wojdon (University of Wrocław) of the forms of constructing and preserving ethnic distinctiveness by the twentieth-century Polish community in the United States. Despite a completely different civilizational and political situation, the mechanisms of cultural self-identification presented in this chapter contain the same elements as those presented by the authors who trace the history of medieval and modern Europeans.

27

28

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Works Cited Secondary Studies Bartlett, Robert, ‘Patterns of Unity and Diversity in Medieval Europe’, in The Birth of Identities: Denmark and Europe in the Middle Ages, ed. by Brian Patrick McGuire (Køpenhavn: Reitzel, 1996), pp. 29–45 Clanchy, M. T., From Memory to Written Record: England 1066–1307 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1993) Erll, Astrid, Memory in Culture, trans. by Sara B. Young (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011) Harris, Stephen J., Race and Ethnicity in Anglo-Saxon Literature (New York: Routledge, 2003) McGuire, Brian Patrick, ‘Afterword: An Embarrassment of Identities’, in The Birth of Identities: Denmark and Europe in the Middle Ages, ed. by Brian Patrick McGuire (Køpenhavn: Reitzel, 1996), pp. 345–60 Pohl, Walter, ‘Tradition, Ethnogenese und literarische Gestaltung: eine Zwischenbilanz’, in Ethnogenese und Überlieferung. Angewandte Methoden der Frühmittelalterforschung, ed. by Karl Brunner and Brigitte Merta, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung, 31 (Wien: Böhlau, 1994), pp. 9–26

Part I

Opening a Perspective: Ethnic Diversity and Visions of the Past

In this section, the authors analyse historical sources to find how representations of the past were created and presented by agents in order to strengthen ethnic identity, whether their own, or the ‘projected recipients’ of their stories. It is not uncommon in medieval studies that contemporary cultural and political dilemmas influence or even predetermine an outcome of a research project. It is especially easy when a subject of study is poorly documented and researchers have to build their reasoning on general theories rather than actual sources. Aneta Pieniądz’s article is therefore vital for the volume and the entire project because it shows how the central narratives on ethnicity in the Middle Ages were constructed by medievalists in recent decades. But equally important is that she tests both the limits and possibilities of studies on medieval foundations of ethnic identities by applying these theories to the source materials. In her chapter she focuses on the problem of the fluidity of ethnic identities built on the reconstruction of an ‘own’ past by the elites of one of the early medieval kingdoms: the kingdom of Lombardy. Dániel Bagi’s discussion of the reality of high medieval Hungary continues this reasoning. He showed how both multi-ethnicity and multiculturalism were seen and interpreted by the first chronicle writers of the Hungarian dynasty in the thirteenth century (Master P. and Simon of Kéza). He analyses both chronicles from the point of view of their authors — or creators of narratives memorized in chronicles — regarding foreigners, multi-ethnicity, and the relationship of ‘us and them’. He goes on to criticize common opinions about the attitude of Hungarian rulers towards the multi-ethnic character of their realm. Both chapters thus show how cultural memory was shaped by the ruling elites to influence both ethnic identities and relations between ethnicities. Conversely, Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu presents a reverse aspect of the interdependency between memory and ethnicity. He analyses several examples of sources that originate from an ethnically and socially diverse Transylvanian society and shows how political and social changes altered the shape of cultural memory regarding the characteristics of ethnically ‘other’ neighbours. Further, such fluidity of memory was not restricted to less educated social groups based on an oral tradition in their reflection on the past: changes of narratives and attitude towards ‘others’ also took place in the well-established and educated circles of Church officials. Jan Zdichynec draws our attention to different territories but a relatively similar — at least in its relationship with written culture — social group: the lands of the Crown of Bohemia and Czech humanists. In his essay the problem of interdependence between changes in the social and political situation and a promoted vision of the ethnically conditioned past — skilfully presented in the previous chapter on a local community by Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu — looked crucial for understanding results — truly continental in scale — of memory practices promoted by humanist historiographers in Czech lands. Here, we can observe three stages in relations between political movements — the creation of an ethnic past — and ethnic identity: 1) the change in political and cultural/religious conditions of the ethnic consciousness of the inhabitants of the Czech Basin during the second half of the fourteenth to fifteenth centuries that 2) altered the meaning of the traditional representation of the past, and that 3) led to a sharpening of ethnic awareness and major political change. In correspondence with that scheme Isabel Grifoll took us slightly back in time, into thirteenth- and

fourteenth-century Catalonia, to show us how deep political change could produce surprising results for multi-ethnic societies. She stressed that massive inclusion of Muslims within the Christian community of the Crown of Aragon — as the result of victorious wars — forced the elites of the polity to produce new concept of an ‘other’ and new practices in dealing with these ‘others’. The promising concept of peaceful ‘coexistencia’ originated in the context of the vision of global history of Christians. But soon it began to be replaced by attempts to build ethnically homogenised society. Through military colonization and religious conversion ethnically diverse society was intended to become purely Christian. And for that reason another twist in the use of the past’s narrative picture was needed too. At the beginning of this section, Aneta Pieniądz stated, that ethnicity was one of the many elements which shaped the historical imagination of the early medieval elites. For them ethnic identity was of fluid character, secondary to political needs. But further on the authors of the subsequent chapters analysed various cases of medieval and early modern intersections of ethnic identities and social memories and accentuated growing importance in the sources of ‘ethnicity’ and interethnic relations as elements of pictures of the imagined past. In the next chapter Przemysław Wiszewski followed this line of reasoning but tried to look under different angle at the problem. Namely, if an ethnic identity was perceived and memorized by medieval authors as an entirely different fact than other types of affiliations — local and regional — did that help to ensure the cohesion of society? Was multi-ethnicity a perceptible phenomenon for the inhabitants of the region of Silesia in the Middle Ages and, if so, did medieval Silesians attempt to specify its impact on the history of the region? The main issue for the author was to address the key question whether the obviously multi-ethnic past of the region was the cause of divisions and conflicts experienced by multi-ethnic Silesian society in high and late medieval times? The answer is not unequivocal. Although ethnicity was acknowledged by the Silesian elites its importance for the history of their society varied deeply and depended on the pragmatic representation of the past. Both the importance and complicated dependencies of ethnic interpretation of the past within medieval societies became clearly visible when Europeans started to experience the New World. Earlier in the section the authors focused on the consequences of the use of knowledge about the multi-ethnic past for shaping relations between ethnicities living in the same political community. At the end of this part of the book Luís Adão da Fonseca wondered how the knowledge about the past was used when Europeans — aware of the multi-ethnic character of their own world — encountered the representatives of an absolutely new society, new in every aspect — physical features, culture, creed. Were they open to experience ‘otherness’ or to interpret it in the context of their own, well-known ethnic past? After seven hundred years between Carolingian Italy and the shores of America we were brought back to the initial problem: how strongly were Europeans tied to their ethnic identity built on the ethnic interpretation of the past? When maritime expeditions were sent to find both new trade routes and to conquer new lands, were explorers ready to accept new subjects on the grounds of common Christian history as another ethnic minority within one political body?

Aneta Pieniądz

The Meaning of the Past and the Creation of Early Medieval Ethnic Communities The Case of Carolingian Italy

It is not uncommon in medieval studies that an author’s contemporary cultural and political dilemmas influence or even predetermine an outcome of a research project. It is especially easy when a subject of study is poorly documented and researchers have to build their reasoning on general theories rather than actual sources. Thus it is vital for the volume and the entire project to show how dominant narratives on ethnicity in Middle Ages were constructed by medievalists in recent decades. But it is equally important to test both the limits and the possibilities of studies on the foundations of ethnic identities by applying these theories to a source material. Therefore, we focus here on the problem of the fluidity of ethnic identities built on the reconstruction of an ‘own’ past by the elites of one of the early medieval kingdoms — in this case: the kingdom of Lombardy.

Early Medieval Ethnicity as a Historiographical Question The past twenty-five years of scholarship have shown that the problem of the categorisation of ethnicity and, more widely understood, ethnic relations in the early Middle Ages appears more complex than could be perceived at the beginning of the 1990s, when such ground-breaking projects as The Transformation of the Roman World were initiated. To date, there has been no agreement regarding the definition of such basic concepts as ‘ethnos’ or ‘ethnic identity’, which also remains a problem for researchers in other social science disciplines. Historians are divided by fundamental questions about the possibility of reaching this abstract and intangible notion of a method of group and individual self-definition through the analysis of the available sources. Contemporary discussion around the concept of ethnic

Aneta Pieniądz  •  is Assistant Professor at History Faculty, University of Warsaw. With interests in the social history of early medieval Europe, her publications include Więzi braterskie we wczesnym średniowieczu. Wyobrażenia i praktyka społeczna (Kraków 2014) [Fraternal Bonds in the Early Middle Ages — English edition in preparation], and a book and articles on Lombard and Carolingian Italy. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 33–53 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120056

34

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

identity in the early Middle Ages can also be an interesting topic for analysis for a historian of historiography. It is an example of how, in the history of historiography, a methodological dispute inspired by findings of other social sciences (especially cultural anthropology) and also involved in ideology can contribute to a permanent change in the field of research, and affect (not necessarily in a positive way) the scope of questions that are explored. Studies of ethnic identification in the early Middle Ages have been determined by a dispute between the representatives of two methodological orientations which, to put it simply, are identified with the Viennese school and the supporters of a deconstructive approach to the sources.1 The Viennese school, with its currently best-known representative in Walter Pohl, who follows the work of Patrick Geary,2 treats ethnic identity not as an objective characteristic of human communities, but as a subjective, dynamic variable constructed by groups, depending on their needs. In this paradigm, ethnos, understood as a cultural category, not really is, but constantly becomes in a never-ending process of reinterpretation of memory about the common past, conducted together with transformations of political conditions, social relations, etc.3 The research orientation developed in Vienna is founded on Reinhard Wenskus’s and Herwig Wolfram’s studies (though Pohl tried to relativize the influence of these researchers on numerous occasions) on shaping the ideological foundations of barbarian hereditary monarchies created in the areas of the former Roman empire.4 Wenskus’s, and later Wolfram’s, point of reference (and the subject of criticism) was the classical theories of the primordialists, according to which ethnic identity was an immanent feature of individuals and groups acquired in the process of socialization, and not the subject of negotiation. This position — though currently still valid — was marginalized in the discussion of the 1990s, and the main opponent of the Viennese school was a group of rather dispersed historians who questioned the realism that dominated the applicable method of studying ethnic identity, and opted for a narrativist approach to messages that were traditionally used in these studies. The most frequently mentioned name here is Walter Goffart.5 At the centre of the dispute, there is a basic question about the epistemological status of a historical source. While Goffart and his supporters, in the spirit of postmodern scepticism, were eager to see a source message as an intransgressible reality only of a text, the researchers from Pohl’s group see text (with all reservations) as a key to understanding social practices — in this case, methods and strategies of building ethnic identities.

1 Examples of both approaches are in studies collected in Gillet, ed., On Barbarian Identity. The development of studies on ethnic identity from the perspective of the Viennese school has been discussed in Pohl, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity’. 2 Geary, ‘Ethnic Identity’; Geary, The Myth of Nations. 3 For the characteristics of theoretical assumptions accepted in Walter Pohl’s circle see Kujawiński, ‘Sociological and Anthropological Inspirations’. 4 Wenskus, Stammesbildung und Verfassung; Wolfram, Geschichte der Goten; Pohl, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity’; Pohl, ‘Ethnicity, Theory, and Tradition’. 5 Goffart, The Narrators; Goffart, Barbarian Tides; Amory, People and Identity.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

In Goffart’s opinion, late antique and early medieval historiographical messages — treated by some as a foundation for the reconstruction of ‘German’ roots of Europe — should be analysed only as works of literature, narrations about the past that are constructed within genre models and topoi determined by rhetorical measures available to the authors. It is impossible to say anything about the strategies of identity formation using these texts, as they do not provide any insight into past ideas of barbaric ethnicities or shared visions of a group past, but only a literary matter shaped in the context of the Roman culture. Even basic and stable concepts, such as the names of individual ethnic groups, are no evidence of the continued existence of a given group as a stable whole, because, in spite of their lexical similarity, the importance of ethnic denominations changes and must be analysed in accordance with the logical meaning of the source text and not with the reasoning of the researchers who build their own narrations by comparing texts that are created independently. According to Walter Pohl, ‘ethnic discourse became the key to political power’6 in the era of shaping hereditary monarchies. It was actually this usage of uniqueness, based on the category of ethnicity as a factor that integrates the community, which was supposed to be the most important novelty brought in by barbarian people, and a basis for an imagined political order of the post-Roman world. Ethnos, power, and kingdom are combined in Pohl’s work into one inseparable whole.7 The task of a researcher is then mostly to establish a mechanism of how this trio functions, and the way to do this would be, primarily, to analyse narrative texts, their transmission, and transformations of the motifs referring to ethnicity in time. It was relatively recently when the interest in such a tension between ethnic identity and power started to shift, at least on the level of methodological suggestions, towards the analysis of relations between Foucault’s (ethnic) discourse and (political) power.8 At the turn of the 1990s, the reflection upon the role of traditional distinctive features considered as characteristic for a particular ethnic group, such as language, appearance, habits, etc. encouraged the Viennese group to formulate an argument about the constructivist and relational character of ethnic identities, and to appreciate the phenomenon of social memory-building in the process of identity creation. Within the twenty years which had passed from the publication of texts which were compliant with his research orientation in Strategies of Distinction, Walter Pohl nuanced his stand, mostly by his valorization of categories and factors other than ethnic ones in assessing the integration of communities in the early Middle Ages.





6 Pohl, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity’, p. 2; see also Innes, ‘Land’. 7 Pohl, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity’, p. 5. It seems that this accentuation of the functional relations between power, state (monarchy), and people (ethnos), more than the problem of his understanding of ‘German’ characteristics, provoked Walter Pohl’s opponents to accuse him (openly or indirectly) of transferring ideology-laden concepts of German historiography — as well as the history of philosophy of the nineteenth to early twentieth centuries — to contemporary research. See in particular Murray, ‘Reinhard Wenskus on “Ethnogenesis”’. 8 Pohl, ‘Introduction — Strategies of Identification’, pp. 29–30.

35

36

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

In his article published in 2013, presenting a methodology that could be followed by historians studying the concept of ethnic identity, he wrote: Ethnicity can also serve as a conceptual metaphor by which to underline the deep-rooted character of a religious, civic, or political community — a use that is not always easy to distinguish from straightforward ethnic language when working with texts from a distant past. Our concept of ethnicity, therefore, requires no sharp distinctions between ethnic and other social groups, but should allow us to assess degrees and salience of ethnicity in a given social landscape.9 Such a presentation of the problem, with a discussion of ‘ethnicity’ incorporated into cognitive language models, complicates attempts to define what ‘ethnicity’ is as a research category, and what it certainly cannot be. It is unclear what should be the basis of this distinction between a ‘metaphoric’ and ‘ordinary’ or ‘straightforward’ usage of the concept of ethnicity. What is more, the question emerges of how Pohl understands this conceptual metaphor of ethnicity; after the turn initiated by Lakoff and Johnson,10 the question is whether a researcher speaks about a linguistic phenomenon (in the semanticist’s area of interest) or about a cognitive process encoded in a language. It is a key difference, important not only for the method of analysis and source text interpretation, but also for the question of studying ethnicity in general. In spite of a recently noticeable tendency to extend the research field as a way to avoid traps hidden in the methodology of studies on ethnicity developed in the 1990s, several permanent concepts commonly supported by historians and referring to theoretical assumptions developed in Walter Pohl’s circle can be listed. They are primarily connected by a belief in the existence of consciously executed strategies, changing over time, for building group identities. These assumptions refer to the concept of the ethnos of group identities which are mostly reflected in historiographical texts. Helmut Reimitz calls these actions ‘the politics of identity’.11 It was believed that elites identifying in various ways — with a dynastic circle or with different groups of influencers (the lay and clerical elites, certain intellectual centres, etc.) — are a causative factor creating these strategies. Historians representing this tendency in research assume that in the period analysed and among the elites mentioned, there was an awareness of the importance of a group identity built on a foundation of a common origin in the process of the integration of political communities, and thus the tools of manipulating this identity were developed. Building this sense of an ethnic community, the representatives of elites consciously and creatively used the set of instruments inherited from Ancient Rome (the topic of nations’ description and the rhetoric of ethnicity), the Biblical imaginarium and, finally, their own oral traditions. Thus, according to this concept, ethnicities must be studied by using methods appropriate for the history of culture, because the creations of culture belonged to that

9 Pohl, ‘Introduction — Strategies of Identification’, pp. 25–26. 10 Lakoff and Johnson, Metaphors. 11 Reimitz, History, p. 359.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

sphere of imagination. A written text serves as a medium in and through which the (re)construction and transmission of these community self-imaginations takes place. However, there is another debatable question: whether such a presentation of these messages is not anachronistic, and if the political culture of the area studied is not seen in a too presentist way (if, in the context of the ninth century, there was, in fact, any awareness analogous to the present awareness of what ethic identity is and what function it may have in the political project; if what we are dealing with is a planned manipulation of competing images of the past — a kind of ‘history politics’ aiming at producing a specific reaction in a wider social group, etc.). Having said that, we inevitably approach the question of relations between ‘ethnicity’ and ‘nationalism’ which, when raised in the context of studies on the early Middle Ages, involves numerous dangers, and especially the risk of teleological interpretation of the remote past. The subject of controversy is also the inclination in research to concentrate on attempts to recognize the dominant way a group perceives their own ethnic past/identity at a given moment or, to be more precise, the way the power elite interprets it for their purposes, mostly in relation to other ethnic groups. In studies on the collective identities of ethnic groups in the early Middle Ages, the problem of interior divisions visible in communities which were traditionally considered as more or less homogenous social and cultural wholes has only recently started to be analysed. Reimitz’s work, using the example of the Franks, shows how complex and diversified a concept the term ‘Franci’ was, and how many mutually opposing ways of perceiving one’s own ethnic identity (many definitions of ‘frankishness’) could be included in this ethnonym.12 The awareness of a seemingly obvious fact that, at the same time and in the same territory, the same ethnonym (for example ‘Franci’) may refer to groups which can differ in terms of their own vision about one another, leads to a reconsideration of the key category of ‘the Other’ in relation to which identity is constructed, since ‘the Other’ can include not only the one who stays outside the group, but also the members of the same ethnic group. This situation has far-reaching consequences, as it is again necessary to raise the question about the way ethnic groups are distinguished and defined. The subject of reflection should then include not only the interactions between different ethnic groups in the classical anthropological depiction (F. Barth), decisive in the construction of their identity, but also the problem of how their internal diversity affects this process. In other words, the analysis should be directed outside and inside the group at the same time. However, it should be noted that the research orientation shown here is rather focused on looking for tension, moot points, and ground-breaking moments, as well as on hierarchizing different ethnic discourses. It does not attach much importance to consequences resulting from the coexistence of many parallel, mutually non-exclusive identifications referring to historical narrations, but not necessarily connected with ethnos. A sense of identity can be built up simultaneously with respect to a place/space, 12 Reimitz, History.

37

38

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

local tradition, and religion, as well as to gender or status, etc. Identity markers can interact and influence each other to create a complex whole that cannot be described in terms of cause and effect relations. In recent years, critics have emphasized that the role of ethnic identity as a factor integrating early medieval communities had been overestimated, and that privileging this criterion has negative consequences for the way early medieval collective identities are perceived in historiography. Under the influence of these opinions, the interests of the Viennese circle also shifted towards searching for complementary components of collective identities, and, especially, the integrating role of the process of Christianization that came together with the process of creating ethnic identities.13 Following Chris Wickham, we want to emphasize that ethnicity is neither the only nor the most important factor that integrates groups/ communities. Further, the generalizing use of the category of ethnos as a key to understanding the processes of forming self-awareness of early medieval societies may have negative consequences, especially if, more or less consciously, the concept of ethnos is attributed to modern meanings that are not confirmed by the sources.14 This problem can be encountered, for example, while studying ethnic identifications in areas with overlapping traditions and values related to these traditions, equally important for the cohesion of local communities. These are both frontier areas (where there are intensive contacts between ethnic groups, with the accompanying flow of goods and ideas) and the territories where, in spite of human groups migrating, there has been a continuity of memory about the earlier history of the area. If the identity (not only the ethnic one) is to be perceived as a never-ending, complex process in which certain elements are relegated or exposed depending on the context that changes, noting and characterizing this multiplicity of co-existing elements in this process seems key for such cases.

The Case of an Imperial City: Verona The example of complex local identities of the communities within the kingdom of the Lombards/ kingdom of Italy after the Frankish conquest in 774 shows how deceptive it can be to concentrate a discussion of collective identity formation on purely ethnic factors. Verona can serve as a case study here. It is a town with Roman roots which, during the whole period of the early Middle Ages starting from the invasions of the Goths, played an important role as one of the monarchs’ residences, an economic centre, a strategic communication node, and, finally, an important religious centre. Shortly after 774, the most distinctive secular and clerical positions in Verona were occupied by nominees from across the Alps (three subsequent bishops of Verona in

13 See the following recent collections of studies: Pohl and Heydemann, eds, Strategies of Identification; Pohl, Gantner, and Payne, eds, Visions of Community. 14 Wickham, Framing the Early Middle Ages, pp. 83, 829: [Ethnic difference] ‘seems to me of insignificant importance when the main lines of social and economic structures are considered, and was hardly visible even in cultural terms in many post-Roman regions’; see also Wickham, ‘Conclusions’.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

780–844 — Egino, Ratold, and Noting — were Alemanni, just like the local counts). This fact, and especially the existence of the court of Pepin, king of the Lombards, located in Verona, encouraged foreigners to come to Verona from quite an early date, and contributed to the creation of the Veronese multi-ethnic elite.15 A rich and generically diverse collection of sources that allows the tracing of the transformations of collective identifications among the authors from Veronese and regional elites has fortunately been preserved to today. The considerations in this article shall be limited only to an analysis of one special source created at the turn of the ninth century — a poetic encomium on Verona entitled Versus de Verona (more widely also known as Rhythmus Pipinianus). This piece is one of the most interesting examples of late antique models of poetic works for the authors of the early Middle Ages. It combines the characteristics of ode and Roman itinerarium; it is also presented as an early example of a genre that dynamically developed in later centuries, known as laus civitatis.16 This text was directly modelled upon Versus de Mediolano civitate (c. 740), though, in comparison to this work, Versus de Verona has many original characteristics. It is interesting not only as a detailed description of the early medieval (also sacral) topology of Verona, but also as a testimony of the complex historical memory of the Church and secular elite who were connected with the town, and the ways of using this memory to build Verona’s tale about itself. Picturing and praising Verona, the author combines the tradition of Roman, pagan glory of the town, the history of the local Church that reaches back to the beginnings of Christianity, and the Lombard royal past and praiseworthy presence of the victorious Franks. The poet constructs the description of the history ab urbe condita, referring indirectly to the archetypal model of Rome (Roma quadrata, compare: Verona per quadrum est compaginata). A topographical description of this ideal town of Verona directly refers to the antique model of urban spatial organization with a centrally located forum surrounded by the temples of the most important gods. Awareness of pagan roots does not restrict pride in the town’s greatness in the Roman past. The author of this poem claims that such a perfect town was founded by evil people who did not know God’s law and who worshipped stones and wooden figures. The new religion breathed life into the stone walls. Thus, after a description of the greatness of ancient buildings, we see a list of Verona’s bishops with a figure of Saint Zeno in the foreground. The description of the pagan town is organized according to a sacral topography of places of worship related to the relics of the saints. This is the moment in the poem when we encounter an interesting detail. Among the saints who protect Verona, the author lists two martyrs, Saints Firmun and Rusticus. It is said that their remains were translated to Verona by Bishop Anno during the reign of the two last Lombard kings, Desiderius and his co-reigning son Adelchis. The times of these two rulers, whom the poet mentions by name, mark the period of greatness of the Church in Verona. This is when other relics of saint

15 Castagnetti, Minoranze etniche dominanti; see also Hlawitschka, Franken, for foundational prosopographic work on immigrant elites in Italy after 774. 16 Pighi, Versus de Verona; Picard, ‘Conscience urbaine et culte des saints’.

39

40

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

martyrs and believers come to the town, and their sanctuaries turn into a new town wall protecting Verona from visible and invisible dangers and ensuring God’s special care and guardianship over the town. Erected by pagans, this town is then sanctified with its bishops’ piety, and, blossoming with the help of the Lombard kings, it becomes a final residence of Pepin, a young Frankish ruler. For a priest writing a praise of his town, all these elements come one after another, creating an inseparable whole that suits God’s plan. In this tale, there is no caesura of Frankish conquest, traditionally considered a breakthrough. Subsequent Lombard rulers and the Frankish king are listed one by one; the relations of the town with these monarchs are the reasons for the town’s pride and glory. It is particularly important because only twenty years had passed from the last Lombard rebellion against the reign of Charlemagne to the moment of writing down Versus de Verona. In the ode that praises Verona, the poet (re)constructs its history in a way aimed at eliminating the traces of conflict — this reconstruction is organized according to the memory not of one ethnic group or through the ethnos of an identified elite in power, but to the memory of a local Christian community, for which the point of reference is the town as a real and symbolic space. With this logic, subsequent changes of authorities and the flow of immigrants were not crucial, and the only and ultimate turning point is marked by the introduction and triumph of Christianity. A question may arise about whose memory of the past is expressed in the text analysed — whether it is the memory of the clergy, related to the Alemannic bishop of Verona; a widely understood local elite, combining the local element and the immigrants from across the Alps coming to these territories after 774; a limited group of clergymen focused around the bishop’s cathedral; or, perhaps, the circles gathered around the court of the young Carolingian king of the Lombards. It is difficult to answer this question, but the most important point is the message that results indirectly from this text, and the essence of the critique directed towards the ethnocentric way of perceiving collective identity in the early Middle Ages. In the discussion about collective identity of these societies, the concept of ethnicity, though useful, is clearly insufficient. Although places of memory may have greatly varying affiliations for different ethnic groups, they can serve as points of reference for constructing the sense of belonging and self-identification, and making such places common becomes a foundation of a territorial bond. In the case of Verona, such places of memory that are common to groups based on different, and potentially difficult to reconcile, traditions include both remains of Roman greatness and sanctuaries with relics of saint patrons. The elements that constitute these places of memory and allow for a self-identification of the community can be categorized to all orders: the material, symbolic, and religious, from walls and cobbled streets, through ruler’s residences, to an invisible chain of saint guardians that protect people related to the town. The category of ethnicity, if it shall even be mentioned here, is of minor importance. The community of this Christian town included the representatives of all ethnic groups co-existing in Verona — the representatives of the old, local Lombard elite, Franks immigrating from across the Alps, and Alemanni. According to the above presented concepts established in the Viennese school, in this situation we could find a consciously executed strategy of constructing a common identity

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

in a multi-ethnic community that goes beyond ethnicity, among others in order to weaken potential conflicts and, at the same time, create the conditions for the execution of political objectives. Other sources for this period present a similar mechanism of re-evaluating local identification constructed around the events and figures that were important for Verona from pagan to Carolingian times, and around the society of worship and religion (as well as local bishops). The same motifs are repeated in hagiographic tales about the translations of relics of Veronese saints and in historical collections created among the town’s intellectual elites in the early Middle Ages and analysed recently by young Italian researchers.17 They also become an important element in local identification in subsequent centuries.18 A question which remains unanswered is whether this sense of identification with the town, or rather hand in hand with particular ethnic identifications of Verona’s inhabitants, was a literary construct, and to what extent it translated into social practice. Similarly, it is impossible to provide an unequivocal answer to the question of whether it is appropriate here — according to the methodology proposed and presented at the beginning of this article — to speak about the existence of a consciously executed strategy of building identification as a political tool (either within the politics of Veronese bishops or a politics that constitutes part of a wider plan of creating common identification for ethnically mixed elites, executed by the Carolingian dynasty in the kingdom of Italy).19 However, it can be claimed that Versus de Verona illustrates a phenomenon that is characteristic for group historic memory — the reconstruction of the past in a situation of actually breaking a political continuity. The conquest of Italy by the Franks, their analogous victory over the Saxons, or the end of Bavaria’s political autonomy forced not only a new order of social relations in local (ethnic) communities — especially crucial in the circles of political elites — but also a new version of their own history. This process is particularly interesting because it sheds some light on parallel mechanisms of denial and, at the same time, of coming to terms with traumatic events that undermine the values around which the whole system of self-imagery and the reality of the community used to be organized. As a consequence, the tales about the past of a given community that are created in new conditions are hybrid in character: on the one hand, they are rooted in the tradition of the given group; on the other hand, this tradition is subject to transformations which justify the need for change — the most visible examples of such work with memory are related to the tales in which a military failure or even the loss of political autonomy is rationalized as God’s just deed leading to the subsequent elevation of one’s own group. An example of this phenomenon is the Saxon reinterpretation of the history of their defeat in

17 See these unpublished PhD theses by Tondini, ʻUn modello per il regno dei Carolingi in Italia’, Veronese, ʻReliquie in movimento’, and Vocino, ʻSanti e luoghi santi’. 18 La Rocca, Pacifico di Verona; La Rocca, ‘A Man for All Seasons’. 19 For a review of different research concepts see Vocino, Santi e luoghi santi; Vocino ‘Under the Aegis of the Saints’.

41

42

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

the war with Franks, in which the main concept is the motif of accepting the light of faith,20 and which was a foundation of the idea of Saxon translatio imperii, or where negative consequences are understated (the motif of a harmonious coexistence of Franks and Lombards in Italy).The most carefully studied examples for the early Middle Ages of the process of reconstructing memory depending on the situation of a given group are the motifs related to Charlemagne. This figure was gradually included in the narrations about the past on the peripheries of Frankish dominion, also by the heirs of those defeated by the great emperor. The most important point in these tales is where the combining and connecting of seemingly mutually exclusive motifs, figures of the defeated and the victorious are valued positively at the same time. From the perspective of local communities, these narrations could also have another, perhaps even more important meaning, as they explained and legitimized the appearance of new ethnic groups in a given area. This is what happened in the kingdom of Italy where, at the beginning of the ninth century, local elites in the major cities were clearly of a multi-ethnic character, with all consequences of such a state: internal tensions, rivalry for power, transformations of local hierarchies, the need to establish the rules of coexistence, etc. The transformations of motifs presenting the circumstances of creating a new order, in which different traditions and ethnic groups were forced to organize mutual relations from scratch, were not definitive; they continued for a long time — for several generations from the events described. This is the source of difficulties in interpretation, resulting from a dynamic character of tales about the past that gradually underwent modifications together with changing circumstances. This situation can be illustrated by one of the few preserved historiographical sources created in the ninth century in Italy — the History by Andrew of Bergamo. This work, preserved in a manuscript dating back to the end of the ninth century, was stored in the collections of the monastery in St Gallen.21 Unfortunately, the codicological context in which this text functioned (which was rebound in the fifteenth century) is unknown. However, its content shows that its author aimed at creating a continuation of Paul the Deacon’s History of the Lombards, covering the reigns of the Carolingian dynasty to the death of Ludwig II, whose funeral Andrew attended. This text was later discussed by readers in subsequent years, which is visible in the preserved copy from the thirteenth century.22 Andrew of Bergamo perceived the history of the kingdom of the Lombards from his local perspective — which is, however, a peculiar one. As a continuator of the Lombard tradition, he tries to synthesize it with a positive image of the Frankish kings’ rule. This approach results in using a series of measures aimed at whitewashing the memory of the Frankish monarchs, removing elements that show these figures in a bad light. The fragment about the fall of the Lombard monarchy in 774 has a special meaning. In his narration, Andrew presents the defeat of the Lombards as

20 Widukindi Monachi Corbeiensis, lib. I, cap. 15, p. 25; Poeta Saxo, Annalium, pp. 1–71. 21 St Gallen, Kantonsbibliothek, Vadianische Sammlung, VadSig MS 317, pp. 78r–86v. 22 St Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 620, pp. 253a–272b.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

a consequence of an unfortunate series of events and actions of third parties: the intrigues of Charlemagne’s wicked brother Carloman, who is said to have caused his brother to dismiss his Lombard wife, leading to the pope exerting his pressure. What is more, the Franks (gens Francorum) and their ruler are shown as the pope’s instruments and, at the same time, the executors of God’s judgement on the Lombards, who, however, tried to live in peace with their neighbours (though not necessarily with the pope). Andrew criticizes Charlemagne’s decision to organize a mission against the Lombards; he sees this action as a proof of the lack of gratitude for the Lombard king’s acts of kindness. In general, though, the Franks are presented as a noble and cunning people. In Andrew’s tale, the fall of the Lombards is not a shameful failure; the rebellious Lombards from Friuli fought for their honour and dignity though, quite obviously, their resistance to God’s will was futile. However, the conquest of Italy by Charlemagne is not only the end, but also a new beginning in the history of a people whose next flourishing would come under the rule of his great-grandson, Ludwig II. The chronicler presents Franks and Lombards as the foremost from among the peoples (gentes) controlled by the empire. This conviction about the equality of both peoples and their superiority over other nations was expressed in the descriptions of battles with a danger of pagan attacks from the south. It is also worth analysing in detail how the ethnonym ‘Franks’ (Franci) is used in this part of the chronicle (in which the chronicler presents his contemporary times). In his description of Emperor Ludwig II’s mission against the Saracens in 870, Andrew wrote about the army led south by the ruler using terms referring to ethnic categories: ‘Franci et Longobardi et ceteri nacionum suorum fidelium’.23 The awareness of ethnic differences that divide the emperor’s subjects seems obvious here. However, when we analyse the description of military operations performed around Bari which was besieged by Christians and in the Duchy of Benevento, we may notice that, in this part of the story (cap. 14 and 15), the chronicler uses only the ethnonym Franci concerning the troops performing military operations. Yet there is an interesting question about the sources used by Andrew to describe the events in the southern part of the Apennine Peninsula. Certainly, he was not familiar with this history from his own experience, though he could have had access to the informers from the circles of Otto from Bergamo (‘de finibus Bergomensis’24), who was one of the emperor’s trusted people sent to the rescue of Calabrian cities attacked by Saracens. It seems quite obvious that in this case Andrew uses the ethnic name of Franci as a pars pro toto figure, meaning simply the whole emperor’s army with its internal diversity. The question may arise about the source of this changeability of terminology. Having ignored the hypothesis about borrowing this part of the text from other sources presenting wars in the south (as there are no detailed studies on this topic), we may offer a two-fold explanation. The simplest one suggests that, in Ludwig’s army, Franks and Lombards were organized into two separate groups, and only the troops including Franks were involved in military operations. This explanations seems

23 Andreae Bergomatis Historia, cap. 12, p. 227, por. cap. 15, p. 228. 24 Andreae Bergomatis Historia, cap. 14, s. 227.

43

44

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

possible based on what we know of the organization of the mobilization system in the kingdom and of the participation of immigrants from across the Alps in the general number of free people subject to the obligation to provide military service. Also, it is rather unlikely that Andrew, representing the Lombard or, perhaps, the local point of view, wanted to attribute all victories to Franks. However, a definitely more convincing idea suggests that the chronicler used a method similar to south-Italian authors who contrasted Lombards from the south with Franks from the north, including in the group of Franks all subjects of a ruler of the kingdom of Italy.25 Thus, when Andrew wants to show the way immigrants from the north were perceived in duchies in southern Italy, he refers to them as Franci, but when he goes back to write from the perspective of his own group, he uses an extended formula of Franci et Longobardi vel ceterae nationes. What is especially interesting in this context is the fragment of chronicles about the conspiracy of a Lombard duke of Benevento against Ludwig II. When the duke foments subjects against the emperor, Andrew presents him as speaking about the Franks’ power (potestas Francorum) and the people from Benevento who suffer under Franks’ yoke. It is quite significant that the chronicler never calls Lombards from the south by the name ‘Lombards’, but always uses their local name (Beneventani). He reserves the ethnic name of Longobardi only for the citizens of the kingdom of Italy under the rule of Ludwig II. At the same time, it should be noted that Andrew of Bergamo consistently and precisely uses ethnic terms as identifiers of different peoples (gentes) inhabiting or invading Carolingian kingdoms (he mentions not only Franks or Lombards, but also Aquitani, Burgundians, Normans, or Slavs (Sclavi)). It can be alleged that the measure used by the chronicler was to emphasize that — in Andrew’s opinion — the only ‘true’ Lombards were the inhabitants of the northern kingdom under the control of Frankish successors of the Lombard kings. What can be observed here is a process which is parallel to the one visible in autonomous Lombard duchies of the south, where the name ‘Lombards’ (with all the consequences of this situation, including the exclusive right to refer to the Lombard past) referred only to the inhabitants of these duchies, denying this honourable title to their fellow countrymen from the north (and, consequently, calling them Franks). The above example clearly shows that early medieval authors were aware of the ambiguity of terms considered ethnonyms and used them with different meanings in mind, depending on the context and reaction they wanted to evoke from the reader.

The Intricate Problem of Ethnonyms Finally, we shall also briefly analyse the problem of ethnic identification elements (mostly ethnonyms) in legal practice related to everyday social and economic activity, which is, in the case of the period of interest, visible mostly in court documents and protocols. The choice of these sources is motivated by the fact that these are the only sources apart from a literary form of historiographical narrations in which we can 25 Kujawiński, ‘Sociological and Anthropological Inspirations’.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

find references to ethnic identification of specific entities in social relations. The problem of relations between ethnic identity with law excites fierce controversies, and thus it becomes impossible to address it without mentioning the main contentious points. However, this article shall concentrate only on the period of interest, with full awareness that different interpretations of the role of a country are rooted in disputes on the ethnogenesis of European peoples in the long post-Roman period. Historians long ago noted differences in clerical practice in various parts of the Carolingian area, related to the use of different types of ethnic terms. In most provinces, documents do not contain any elements specifying the ethnicity of people involved in legal actions. There is, however, one example — Italy, where, from the turn of the ninth century, authors used ethnonyms relatively often or described specific persons through their applicable law (professio legis). In historiography, evidence of that type was used as an argument in several key disputes: these differences were primarily at the centre of the debate on the principle of legal personality, which, in the classical history of law, was considered an immanent characteristic of legal systems of early medieval kingdoms, and, in the second half of the twentieth century, became a subject of radical critique.26 One of the main accusations against the historians of law who specialized in this topic was that they failed to include a complete set of diverse sources and evidence (as they focused on normative sources, i.e. the lists of laws) and arrived at conclusions about specific times in the past based on the analysis of sources from a later period. The lack of ethnic identifiers in the Merovingian area and in other pre-Carolingian state organisms, as well as a clear increase of frequency in the usage of such terms in Italy after the Frankish conquest, led to the formulation of a thesis that the principle of legal personality in the Carolingian empire is a derivative of social changes resulting from transformations in understanding and defining identity.27 The lack of the professio legis formula in diplomatic sources and of an unequivocal ethnic specification of a recipient of the legal norm in the earlier period were used as an argument decreasing the significance of the relation with law as a self-identification factor. A perfect example of a clash between two extreme views on the identity-related role of law is the dispute between Stefano Gasparri and Karol Modzelewski, primarily regarding transformations in the society of Lombard Italy.28 Modzelewski holds the opinion that customary law (before and after it has been written down) is a basic factor distinguishing ethnic groups in the early Middle Ages, and, as a foundation of legal order and an element connecting the community, it needs to be exclusive (in accordance with the principle of legal personality), as on this condition the whole community can survive as a clearly defined whole. At the same

26 For example, in Anglo-Saxon historiography, the most recent extensive studies on the early medieval principle of legal personality were conducted around the middle of the twentieth century: see Guterman, From Personal to Territorial Law. The results of Guterman’s studies from the 1950s and 1960s on the personality of law, presented in several articles, were published as a book in 1990 (Guterman, The Principle of Personality); almost all researchers studying early medieval legal systems refer to this work. For one of the critiques of this research orientation, see Amory, People and Identity. 27 Pohl-Resl, ‘Legal Practice and Ethnic Identity in Lombard Italy’. 28 Modzelewski, Barbarian Europe; Gasparri, Prima delle nazioni; Gasparri, ‘Identità etnica e identità politica’; Gasparri, ‘Le molteplici identità etniche’.

45

46

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

time, in his opinion, law is a collective memory of a community, thus it remains the main element on which a collective identity is constructed. This view can be seen as static and synchronic, belonging to the trend of structuralist historiography. Gasparri, in turn, denies the role of a country as a factor of the Lombards’ ethnic identification before the Carolingian conquest. For him, a written ‘barbaric’ law is a construct created at the legislator’s request by scribes educated in Latin culture, formed by combining different elements under a dominant influence of Roman tradition. Such an understanding of Lombard law de facto meant that it was a territorial law. Thus, it was inclusive in nature, and it could not have any significant function as a factor preserving ethnic separatisms in the society. The situation changed only during the first years of Carolingian rule, when a flow of new ethnic groups to the Apennine Peninsula created the need to distinguish between laws applied at the same time in the same area, and emphasizing legal differences led to the building of a sense of ethnic distinction. In Gasparri’s view, codes of law that are known to us cannot be perceived as either a record of legal tradition dating back to a distant past or as a point of reference for the group ethnic memory. The weaknesses of the two research orientations presented in the above examples result mostly from an impassable barrier of sources. The theory that questions the significance of law as a factor in ethnic identification is based mostly on ex silentio arguments, i.e. the lack of references in the source material on connecting legal standards with ethnos, and the way in which the parties engaged in legal actions used ethnonyms is treated as a rationale for drawing negative conclusions. The other theory — a structuralist one in nature, based primarily on the analysis of normative sources — states that law, understood as a collection of regulations ensuring order in social life, has a static character, its core is stable in time and space, subject to minor changes, depending on social or political circumstances. Currently, in the interpretation of the role of law as a factor allowing for ethnic identification of individuals and groups, one of the predominant models is definitely a constructivist one, in which early medieval leges are treated as one of tools to execute changeable strategies of building identity. In this sense, the relation between law and ethnos is a result of changes in the way this ethnos is understood, and law is not treated as a specific medium of collective memory. Leaving theory aside, we can analyse the content of source texts from the period of interest of the eighth and ninth century, which the supporters of constructivism considered crucial in the process of strengthening legal and ethnic distinctiveness in the societies of Carolingian empire. The change in document forms, e.g. in Italy, which led to the creation of formulas identifying ethnic affiliation, is strongly connected with the change of social situation. To put it simply, there had to be an impulse which forced the interested ones to ensure clear determination of who is who. As researchers consistently note, such an impulse had to be the appearance of ‘the other’ for whom previously used terms no longer sufficed.29 If we look closely

29 Dupreux, La loi et le droit, pp. 57 ff. Jakub Kujawiński notes the relationship between the use of ethnonyms in documented sources and contacts between ethnic groups, a relationship which is visible in the example of southern Italy, a frontier where various groups — which were different

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

to discover where this flow of ‘the other’ was the most dynamic, it occurs that — not accidentally — this region is the kingdom of the Lombards, and especially its northern part. None of Charlemagne’s successful actions could be compared to the conquest of the Lombards’ country, and none introduced such radical changes in the political game for power. In a relatively short time, new elites related to the Frankish monarch (‘Reichsaristokratie’) are formed in Italy, and, around its political centres, new hierarchies are created with a significant role for immigrants. The first quarter of the century after the Carolingian conquest is a period of an unusually intensive cultural contact between local elites fighting to keep their positions, and immigrants coming from across the Alps, hoping to make a career and gain property, who are forced to define their distinctness clearly in relation to the local majority. Such a redefinition of local relations also led to the need for a clear definition of mutual relations between different groups. The difference between them was especially important in situations in which specific legal actions took place: to ensure action efficiency, it was necessary to reconcile legal practices typical for different groups in a way to ensure that none of the parties had grounds for questioning the new state of affairs. This reconciliation applied to both contested (with court sentences) and uncontested cases, and required clear determination of the parties’ status by listing differences which were important for a given case — by indicating which law was used daily by the parties, and in the case of court proceedings, also with which law the parties involved in proceedings (including the members of the court committee) identified themselves. Including this information in the documents was important for these documents’ later value as evidence, which is even more significant if, following Warren Brown, we accept that law(s) in the Middle Ages did not have an absolute character but constituted a collection of norms which could be used in different ways, depending on specific circumstances.30 There was, perhaps, a need which enforced the change of clerical practices. It should also be remembered that both locals and the immigrants from across the Alps had been accustomed to using writing in legal actions for a long time, so establishing mutual relations also took place on the level of a conscious creation of new forms of written communication. In this sense, the situation was rather different from the one which followed the settlement of the Lombards in Italy and where, with the process of growing literacy, they learned old, existing, late antique patterns. That is why it seems risky to compare them based on the analysis of diplomatic sources in the relations of Romans and Lombards of the sixth century with the relations between the inhabitants of the kingdom of the Lombards and the incoming element in Italy after 774, and, all the more, to draw conclusions on the sense of ethnic identity in a long period between the sixth and the ninth century. On another note, it would also be necessary to reconsider the prevailing conviction in historiography about justified usage of conflicting, theoretical categories of legal personality and territorialization created by historians to describe a complicated early

with regard to their ethnic identities, but also to their religion — lived side by side. See Kujawiński, ‘Sociological and Anthropological Inspirations’, pp. 49 ff. 30 Brown, ‘The Use of Norms’.

47

48

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

medieval legal reality. An attempt to fit a complex reality of sources into an abstract order of a dichotomic division not only fails to facilitate understanding, but also unnecessarily engages a researcher into reflections beyond the sources. I obviously do not question the value of documentary sources in the studies of ethnic relations. When at the turn of the tenth century in Siena, in the peripheries of the former Carolingian empire, a noble widow from an affluent Frankish family of Berardenga granted a property to a monastery, she did it ‘per fistum nodatum, cultellum pletatum, uuantone seu uuasone terre et ramis arboribus’, pursuant to the Salic law.31 In a document prepared for this occasion, the donor used the term Saliga, similarly to the people who bore witness on the document — this term, referring both to ethnos and to law, unequivocally confirmed the presence of families originating from immigrants from across the Alps, living in the area, and their legal distinctness understood here as a distinctness of legal procedures used by them to grant the validity of law to a performed transaction. It should however be noted that in order to ensure the integrity and security of this donation made in accordance with the Frankish customs and before witnesses who declared themselves as Salic Franks, Berta accepted a launegild (countergift) from the monks in the form of their prayers for intercession. Launegild was a typically Lombard legal institution which researchers often treat as a basis for ethnic identification of parties in legal procedures found in documents.32 However, in our document, launegild is not emphasized as an element of a legal procedure within a tradition different than the concept of legal personality applicable for Berta due to her origins. Drawing conclusions ex silentio is always risky; it should then be asked whether the scribe was aware that launegild is a Lombard institution and was used in a legal action because the monastery applied Lombard law. But how can one reconcile this thesis with the fact that Church institutions are subject to their own law based on Roman law which did not include the concept of launegild? Perhaps, a grantor, a donee, and a judge acting as an intermediary in this action failed to notice any conflicts between institutions borrowed from two different legal systems? And if the boundary between the two legal systems became blurred, how was the term saligus understood in Italy at the end of the eighth century and at the beginning of the ninth century? The awareness of legal and ethnic distinctness between parties making settlements with each other seems obvious, but such legal traditions which were referred to, mutually affected one another, intermingled, and changed. The Siena document, selected from many other sources as an example, illustrates a basic problem which must be confronted by a researcher who tries to define ethnic identity with the use of this type of sources: even if they include a confirmation of an existing ethnic diversity, defining how these differences were perceived is difficult, if not impossible. Based on diplomatic and normative sources, it is not possible to say more on the topic of ethnic awareness of the parties to legal actions than that

31 Codex Diplomaticus Amiatinus, ed. by Kurze, no. 179, pp. 374–77; on the family of Berardenga and the genealogical relation of Berta, widow of the comes Berard, see Hlawitschka, Franken, pp. 111, 308. 32 Wickham, ‘Compulsory Gift Exchange’.

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

they understood the distinctness of legal solutions used by their groups of origin, and the scribes of documents identified them with a specific ethnic term. It seems so little, and yet so much.

Conclusion The summary of the above reflections should then be limited to several methodological claims which seem important when starting research on the problem of ethnic identity and relations between different ethnic groups. Primarily, it is necessary to analyse ethnic identities in a wider context — as one of numerous forms of collective identification in a society. Identity is a multiform phenomenon — it takes different (parallel) forms which mutually affect one another and are often inseparable. It is necessary to renounce a conviction which dominated the historiography for a long time — a claim about a privileged role of ethnic identity and perceiving it as an arbitrarily separated category. In such a perspective, collective identity (or rather ‘collective identities’, as it is difficult to limit the discussion to one individual identification) is a conglomerate of many overlapping, distinctive characteristics, and the key to their hierarchic organization should be determining which characteristics are valid for a given community in its own opinion. This finding which, in fact, is a repetition of theoretical propositions formulated half a century ago by Frederik Barth,33 is only seemingly obvious, as it was not so long ago when medievalists working on the problem of (ethnic) identity started to use it to draw more far-reaching conclusions, departing from the practice of concentrating on ethnos as a dominating category, and noticing the inseparable connection between ethnos and other co-existing identifiers such as religion or a territorial bond. A problem which should be more widely recognized in the studies, but which may perhaps be impossible to overcome, is a relation between a discourse of a collective identity reconstructed mostly on the basis of historiographical sources and (poorly) discernible traces of individuals’ self-awareness. To be more precise, it is important to avoid the risk of mechanically transferring the conclusions drawn based on narrative sources to the practice of social life. What is meant here is not questioning all the value of these sources in the recognition of identity in accordance with the spirit of postmodernist scepticism, but rather directing research towards the questions about the transmission of ideas expressed there outside the circle of the authors of these sources and their ordering parties. In this sense some concepts that are frequently used by researchers, such as ‘the politics of identity’, require precise definitions. Finally, what is especially interesting in research on identity are studies of sources coming from areas which in postmodern sociology we would categorize as borderlands, understood as a ground for cultural, but also ethnic and religious contact, as well as a symbolic category. In these areas, we can observe the richness of practices and experience related to the creation of identification and the usage of 33 Barth, ‘Introduction’.

49

50

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

the category of difference, resulting, among others, from different cultural baggage of actors participating in social interactions. In the case of studies on the Carolingian era, such operations require us to leave the dominating, Frankocentric perspective and stop perceiving phenomena and institutions from outside the political and civilizational centre of those times, located between the Meuse and the Loire, as peripheral (valued eo ipso as ‘the other’ or even ‘worse’ than the model). It is perhaps a special task for researchers coming from this ‘borderland’ who can refer both to the original theoretical reflection (e.g. a dynamically developing sociology of the borderland in the countries of Eastern Europe, breaking fixed schemes of research on the boundaries, originating primarily from Anglo-Saxon anthropology and sociology), and to the achievements of their home historiography which has studied these problems in reference to different eras.

Works Cited Manuscripts St Gallen, Kantonsbibliothek, Vadianische Sammlung, VadSig MS 317 ———, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 620 Primary Sources Andreae Bergomatis Historia, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum et Italicarum saec. VI–IX, ed. by Georg Waitz (Hannover: Hahn, 1878), pp. 220–30 Codex Diplomaticus Amiatinus, ed. by W. Kurze, vol. 1 (Tübingen: Niemeyer, 1974) Poeta Saxo, Annalium de Gestis Caroli Magni imperatoris libri quinque, ed. by P. Winterfeld, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Poetae latini aevi Carolini, 4 (Berolini: Weidmann, 1899) Widukindi Monachi Corbeiensis Rerum gestarum Saxonicarum libri tres, ed. by P. Hirsch, and H.-E. Lohmann, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi, 60 (Hannover: Hahn, 1935) Secondary Studies Amory, Patrick, ‘The Meaning and Purpose of Ethnic Terminology in the Burgundian Laws’, Early Medieval Europe, 2.1 (1993), 1–28 ———, People and Identity in Ostrogothic Italy, 489–554 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997) Barbero, Alessandro, Carlo Magno. Un padre dell’Europa (Roma: Laterza, 2000) Barth, Fredrik, ‘Introduction’, in Ethnic Groups and Boundaries, ed. by Fredrik Bart (Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 1969), pp. 9–38 Brown, Warren, ‘The Use of Norms in Disputes in Early Medieval Bavaria’, Viator, 30 (1999), 15–39

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

Castagnetti, Andrea, Minoranze etniche dominanti e rapporti vassallatico-beneficiari. Alamanni e Franchi a Verona e nel Veneto in età carolingia e postcarolingia (Verona: Libreria Universitaria Editrice, 1990) Corradini, R., R. Meens, C. Pőssel, and P. Shaw, eds, Texts and Identities in the Early Middle Ages, Forschungen zur Geschichte des Mittelalters, 12 (Wien: Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2006) Dupreux, Philippe, La loi et le droit. La part des échanges culturels dans la référence à la norme et les pratiques juridiques durant le haut Moyen Âge, in Les échanges culturels au Moyen Âge, ed. by Patrick Boucheron, Actes des Congrès de la Société des historiens médiévistes de l’enseignement superiéur public, 32e congrès (Dunkerque: Éditions de la Sorbonne, 2001), pp. 41–70 Gasparri, Stefano, Prima delle nazioni. Popoli, etnie e regni fra Antichità e Medioevo (Roma: La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1997) ———, ‘Identità etnica e identità politica nei regni barbarici postromani: il problema delle fonti’, in Civis-civitas. Cittadinanza politico-istituzionale e identità socio-culturale da Roma alla prima età moderna. Atti del Seminario internazionale Siena-Montepulciano, 10–13 luglio 2008, ed. by C. Tristano, and S. Allegria (Montepulciano: Thesan & Turan, 2009), pp. 153–64 ———, ‘Le molteplici identità etniche dei Longobardi in Italia. Linguaggi politici e pratiche sociali’, Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts. Römische Abteilung, 118 (2012), 493–504 Geary, Patrick, ‘Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct in the Early Middle Ages’, Mitteilungen der anthropologischen Gesellschaft in Wien, 113 (1983), 15–26 ———, The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002) Gillet, Andrew, ed., On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002) Goffart, Walter A., The Narrators of Barbarian History (A.D. 550–800): Jordanes, Gregory of Tours, Bede, and Paul the Deacon (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988) ———, Barbarian Tides: The Migration and the Later Roman Empire (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2006) Guterman, Simeon L., From Personal to Territorial Law: Aspects of the History and Structure of the Western Legal-constitutional Tradition (Metuchen: Scarecrow, 1972) ———, The Principle of Personality of Law in the Germanic Kingdoms of Western Europe from the Fifth to the Eleventh Century (New York: Peter Lang, 1990) Hlawitschka, Eduard, Franken, Alemannen, Bayern und Burgunder in Oberitalien (774–962). Zum Verständnis der fränkischen Königsherrschaft in Italien (Freiburg im Breisgau: Albert, 1960) Innes, Matthew, ‘Land, Freedom, and the Making of the Medieval West’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 16 (2006), 39–74 Kujawiński, Jakub, ‘Sociological and Anthropological Inspirations to Research into the Identity of Early Medieval European Societies: Around the Works of Walter Pohl’, Acta Poloniae Historica, 94 (2006), 173–88 ———, ‘Strategie budowania tożsamości zbiorowych wśród Longobardów z Italii Południowej (VIII–XI wiek)’, in Scripta minora, vol. 4, ed. by Bogdan Lapis (Poznań: Instytut Historii UAM, 2006), pp. 8–198

51

52

a n e ta p ie n i ądz

La Rocca, Cristina, Pacifico di Verona: il passato carolingio nella costruzione della memoria urbana, (Roma: Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medioevo, 1995) ———, ‘A Man for All Seasons: Pacificus of Verona and the Creation of a Local Carolingian Past’, in The Uses of the Past in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Y. Hen, and M. Innes (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 250–79 Lakoff, J., and M. Johnson, Metaphors We Live By (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980) McKitterick, Rosamond, The Carolingians and the Written Word (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989) Modzelewski, Karol, Barbarian Europe (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2015) Morrissey, Robert, L’Empereur à la barbe fleurie: Charlemagne dans la mythologie et l’histoire de France (Paris: Gallimard, 1997) Murray, Alexander Callander, ‘Reinhard Wenskus on “Ethnogenesis”, Ethnicity and the Origin of the Franks’, in On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Andrew Gillet (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002), pp. 39–68 Picard, J.-C., ʻConscience urbaine et culte des saints: de Milan sous Liutprand à Vérone sous Pépin Ier d’Italie’, in Évêques, saints et cités en Italie et en Gaule, Études d’archéologie et d’histoire¸ Collection de l’École française de Rome, 242 (Roma: l’École française de Rome, 1998), pp. 349–65 Pighi, Giovanni Battista, Versus de Verona. Versum de Mediolano Civitate (Bologna: Zanichelli, 1960) Pohl, Walter, ‘Conceptions of Ethnicity in Early Medieval Studies’, in Debating the Middle Ages: Issues and Readings, ed. by Lester K. Little and Barbara H. Rosenwein (Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 1998) pp. 13–24 ———, ‘Introduction: Strategies of Distinction’, in Strategies of Distinction: The Construction of Ethnic Communities, 300–800, ed. by Walter Pohl and Helmut Reimitz, The Transformation of the Roman World, 2 (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 1–15 ———, ‘Ethnicity, Theory, and Tradition: A Response’, in On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by Andrew Gillet (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002), pp. 221–39 ———, ‘Introduction — Strategies of Identification: A Methodological Profile’, in Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe, ed. by Walter Pohl and Gerda Heydemann (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013), pp. 1–64 Pohl, Walter, and Gerda Heydemann, eds, Strategies of Identification: Ethnicity and Religion in Early Medieval Europe (Turnhout: Brepols, 2013) Pohl, W., C. Gantner, and R. Payne, eds, Visions of Community in the Post-Roman World: The West, Byzantium and the Islamic World, 300–1100 (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012) Pohl-Resl, Brigitte, ‘Legal Practice and Ethnic Identity in Lombard Italy’, in Strategies of Distinction: The Construction of Ethnic Communities, 300–800, ed. by Walter Pohl and Helmut Reimitz, The Transformation of the Roman World, 2 (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 205–20 Reimitz, Helmut, History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity, 550–850 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015) Tondini, Giovanna, ʻUn modello per il regno dei Carolingi in Italia. L’Epitome Phillipsiana e l’identità urbana di Verona dopo il 774’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Università

T he M e a ni n g o f t h e Pas t an d t h e C re at i o n o f Co mmu ni t i e s

degli studi di Padova, Dipartimento di storia, 2011); http://paduaresearch.cab.unipd. it/3544/1/Tondini.pdf (accessed 20 April 2016) Veronese, Francesco, ʻReliquie in movimento. Traslazioni, agiografie e politica tra Venetia e Alemannia (VIII–X) secolo’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Università degli studi di Padova, 2012); http://1.static.e-corpus.org/download/notice_file/2522568/ VERONESE.pdf (accessed 20 April 2016) ———, ‘Foreign Bishops Using Local Saints: The Passio et translatio sanctorum Firmi et Rustici (BHL 3020–3021) and Carolingian Verona’, in Saints and the City. Beiträge zum Verständnis urbaner Sakralität in christlichen Gemeinschaften (5.-17. Jh.), ed. by M. C. Ferrari (Erlangen: FAU University Press, 2015), pp. 85–114 Vocino, Giorgia, ʻSanti e luoghi santi al servizio della politica carolingia (774–877). Vitae e Passiones del regno italico nel contesto europeo’ (unpublished doctoral thesis, Università Cà Foscari Venezia, 2010); http://dspace.unive.it/bitstream/ handle/10579/958/GIORGIA%20VOCINO%20TESI%20DOTTORATO%20 ELETTRONICA%202010.pdf?sequence=1 (access date 20 April 2016) ———, ‘Under the Aegis of the Saints: Hagiography and Power in Early Northern Italy’, Early Medieval Europe, 22.1 (2014), 26–52 Wenskus, Reinhard, Stammesbildung und Verfassung. Das Werden der frühmittelalterlichen gentes (Köln: Böhlau, 1961) Wickham, Chris, Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400–800 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005) ———, ‘Compulsory Gift Exchange in Lombard Italy, 650–1160’, in The Languages of Gift in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by W. Davies and P. Fouracre (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010), pp. 193–216 ———, ‘Conclusions’, in Visions of Community in the Post-Roman World: The West, Byzantium and the Islamic World, 300–1100, ed. by W. Pohl, C. Gantner, and R. Payne (Farnham: Ashgate, 2012), pp. 551–58 Wolfram, Herwig, Geschichte der Goten. Entwurf einer historischen Ethnographie (München: Beck, 1979)

53

Dániel Bagi

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary The Thirteenth Century Gestas of Master P. and Simon of Kéza

In this paper I will give a short summary of the subject of multi-ethnicity and multiculturalism in medieval Hungary as seen and interpreted by the first chronicle writers of the Hungarian dynasty in the thirteenth century. In this way I would like to supplement the reflections on ethnic identity and relations between different ethnic groups in the early Middle Ages presented by Aneta Pieniądz in the previous article. Medieval narrative texts, as narratives generally, were primarily of a literary nature,1 and therefore performed special functions.2 Furthermore, it is hardly questionable that medieval historiography in Hungary, as in the whole of the East and Central European world, could never make itself independent from the royal and ducal courts, thus providing a mirror of the practice and course of changes of royal/ducal politics. Secondly, there is a rather theoretical question discussed by both earlier and more modern research about the exact relationship of reality and fiction in narrative texts. Despite postmodern approaches which — hopefully not only in my opinion — offer no answers to scholarly questions in their positivistic sense (except, perhaps, for the never-ending discussion within a closed circle of researchers about their ideas), there has been no doubt since the pioneering studies of H. Beumann, H. W. Goetz, and recently G. Althoff3 that medieval narrative works can often describe the reality of the ‘Zeitgeist’ through fictive or fictional devices. Therefore, literary works of this kind depict reality not necessarily through their factual narratives, but rather through fictions or fictional

1 Adamska, ‘The Study of Medieval Literacy’. 2 See a general discussion in Schmale, Funktion und Formen. 3 Beumann, Die Historiographie; Althoff, ‘Genealogische’; Goetz, ‘Vorstellungsgeschichte’. Dániel Bagi  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of Medieval History, Department of Medieval and Early Modern History, University of Pécs. His main research interests are the medieval history of East-Central Europe, especially of Hungary, and the historiography of high medieval period. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 55–71 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120057

56

dá n i e l bagi

stories, which, however, say more about the reality of the historical environment of the authors themselves.4 Thus, in this paper I will attempt to analyse narrative texts from the point of view of their narratives regarding foreigners, multi-ethnicity, and the relationship of ‘us and them’ — specifically Master P.’s famous Gesta Hungarorum from the beginning of the thirteenth century, and Simon of Kéza’s Gesta Hungarorum from the last decades of the same century — posing the following questions. First, how did these authors present and judge the coexistence of Hungarians and Others under the rule of Hungarian kings. Second, did their presentations demonstrate, in the context of the society of the Kingdom of Hungary, either cohesion, or a lack of cohesion that resulted in conflict? The question of multi-ethnicity and its cultural, indeed collective, memory in historical consciousness has for a long time been one of the preferred research subjects of Hungarian medievalists.5 To understand the efforts to explain and understand ethnicity and multi-ethnicity in the medieval period of Hungarian history, we need to review the last three centuries of Hungarian history, and to take a brief look at events that influenced the ethnic character of the country. In the eighteenth century, mainly as a result of re-settlements after the decline of Ottoman power in the Carpathian Basin at the end of the seventeenth century, the Kingdom of Hungary became a multilingual and multi-ethnic country which. Until 1867 — when the Hungarian elites made a final political agreement with the Habsburg dynasty to recover Hungary’s political autonomy which had been lost after 1526, 1711, and 1848 — Hungary was ruled by the nobility; their language of political communication was, independent of their ethnic origin, Latin.6 Using Latin as the official language in the kingdom could bridge ethnic and linguistic differences between elite groups, while also providing protection against attempts by the Habsburg dynasty to introduce German as the common language of communication and culture in the entire Habsburg empire (one such attempt was made by Joseph II (1780–1790), who tried to force the German language onto the entire empire). Fundamental changes in this structure occurred in the first half of the nineteenth century: in 1844, the official and political language of the Kingdom of Hungary became Hungarian, and according to the European trends of the day, modern statehood ideas elaborated among Hungarian intellectuals required the unification of language, culture, law, and everything else. However, this model was almost inoperable, which convinced the Hungarian elites to make their own agreement with the ethnic minorities in the Kingdom of Hungary after 1867.7 This agreement affected all ethnic groups in the Kingdom of Hungary, mostly Slovaks, Romanians, Serbians, Croatians, etc., and also affected the juridical status of the Jewish minority in Hungary, leading to the so-called



4 See the classic study by Beumann, Widukind. 5 Kristó, ‘Oroszok’, Györffy, A magyarság keleti elemei, Berend, At the Gate of Christendom. 6 Katus, A modern magyarország születése. 7 Katus, A modern magyarország születése, pp. 134–56.

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

Emancipation Act of 1868, which made it possible for Christians and Jews to coexist in the new society. Without doubt, the so-called Minority and Emancipation Acts were well regarded by supporters of liberal reforms in Europe, and despite the fact that their spirit was neglected and rejected by political elites two generations later, in 1868 they theoretically gave everyone the right to use their own language and culture within the Kingdom of Hungary. The multi-ethnic and multilingual character of the nineteenth-century Kingdom of Hungary begs the question of whether this was the nature of the country at the beginning of Hungarian history and in the earliest periods of the Kingdom of Hungary, or did multi-ethnicity begin later, in the late Middle Ages, or even after the Ottoman period? Moreover, was there multi-ethnic coexistence in the Middle Ages, and if so, how did it function? Was it based on cohesion and cooperation and illustrated by peaceful everyday life, or was it just the opposite, consisting rather of conflicts?8 It should be added that this issue affected not only multi-ethnic aspects of Hungarian history, but also the problem of the origin of the dynasties ruling during the Middle Ages in Hungary. The Age of the Arpads was treated by scholars as an ‘age of the independent national dynasty’, in contrast with later dynasties, such as the Angevins, who regarded themselves as descendants of the Arpads, or even the Luxemburgs and the Habsburgs;9 however, not even the Arpads represented a ‘clear’ Hungarian blood line, descending since the middle of the eleventh century from Piast, Rurikid, and other marriages.10 These questions, posed by historians of generations active after the decades of the Habsburg-Hungarian agreement, were more than natural: many of the historians themselves were of non-Hungarian origin,11 and were interested in questions of multi-ethnic cohesion and coexistence. Obviously, the answers to these questions could be found first of all in narrative historiographical sources written in the environment of the medieval royal dynasty, concerning the earliest periods of Hungarian history.12 However, for many reasons it is difficult to find the answer in these literary works. One of the largest issues in medieval historical research in Hungary is the paucity of narrative texts about the earliest periods of national history.13 Although the oldest narratives are preserved in the so-called Hungarian Chronicle Composition of the fourteenth century14 (composed twice during the fourteenth century and containing texts from the second half of the eleventh century),15 the first chronicles written by a single hand



8 For a summary of the discussion among historians from the latter decades of the nineteenth century, see Romsics, Clio bűvöletében, pp. 243–56. 9 Pór and Schönherr, ‘Az Anjou-ház’, pp. 2–3. 10 On the genealogical bonds of the Arpads, see Wertner, Az Árpádok családi története. 11 Romsics, Clio bűvöletében, p. 245. 12 Kristó, Magyar historiográfia, pp. 33–44. 13 On this matter see Kristó, Magyar historiográfia, p. 35, and Veszprémy, Árpád-kori, p. 13. 14 Chronici Hungarici compositio, ed. by Domanovszky. 15 On this topic see Kristó, Magyar historiográfia, pp. 22–29, and Kristó, A történeti irodalom Magyarországon, pp. 8–14. For a summary see Bagi, ‘Problematik’.

57

58

dá n i e l bagi

and representing the author’s intentions appeared in the thirteenth century. The first of them is the so-called Gesta Hungarorum written by Master P., notary of the late King Béla, commonly called ‘Anonymus’.16 The other is another Gesta Hungarorum, written by Simon of Kéza, the notary of King Ladislas IV, referred to as the Cuman, about the origin and deeds of the Hungarians.17 It would not be an overstatement to say that these two historical works influenced the national consciousness, and not only of Hungarians: both Master P. and Simon of Kéza remain beloved texts of Slovak and Romanian intellectuals to the present day as well.18 Beginning our analysis with Master P.’s Gesta: in the last two centuries, historical research has made serious efforts to determine the identity of Master P., the date of his work, and his intention in writing. Despite all efforts, there are still only theories about his identity, as from the time of the first edition of the sole manuscript of Gesta Hungarorum from the thirteenth century, only the initial of his name has been known. He might have been called Peter, Paul, or even Pósa, and may have held a high position in the Hungarian Church.19 Scholars have been more successful in ascertaining the date of composition of Master P.’s work. In medieval Hungary there were four kings called Béla, the first of whom lived in the eleventh century, the second and third in the twelfth century, while the fourth one ruled in the second half of the thirteenth century.20 One of the most important results of philological research on the text of the Gesta that could be convincingly verified is that the work must have been written after the death of King Béla III (1176–1192), but before the Mongol invasion of 1241.21 Furthermore, today it seems clear that Master P., whoever he was, was one of the proponents of the new social and economic policies of King Andrew II (1205–1235); we can therefore presume that the work was written somewhere around 1210, when the so-called institutiones novae of the king were developed and propagated among the Hungarian nobility. These new measures by the king had one overarching goal: to change fundamentally the ancient social and economic system based on the administration of goods coming from the counties (comitatus) controlled by the king.22

16 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais. See also its modern bilingual edition, The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed. by Rady and Veszprémy. 17 Simonis de Keza Gesta, ed. by Domanovszky and The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed. by Veszprémy and Schaer. 18 See, for example, Madgearu, The Romanians; Steinhübel, Nitrianske kniežatstvo. 19 For the latest summary of the historiography of the Gesta Hungarorum see Thoroczkay, ‘Az Anonymus-kérdés kutatástörténeti áttekintése’. 20 Kristó and Makk, Az Árpád-házi, pp. 56–197. 21 Kristó, A történeti irodalom, p. 26. 22 For a summary of the issue see Engel, The Realm of Saint Stephen, pp. 83–101. For specific studies devoted to this topic see Nógrády, ‘“Magistratus et comitatus tenentibus”’, Kristó, Early Transylvania, and Zsoldos, ‘II. András Aranybullája’.

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum presents at first sight the following subjects: the origin of the dynasty of the Arpads (that is, the birth of Duke Álmos23), the emergence of the Hungarian principality, the creation of the so-called ‘Blood contract’ between the seven Hungarian tribes which created legal bonds between the dynasty and the seven tribes,24 the conquering of the Carpathian Basin led by the Arpads along with the subjugation of foreign rulers and their people found there, and finally the donation of different parts of the country to those who had accompanied the leaders of the tribes in the conquering of the Carpathian Basin.25 Furthermore, Master P. is also the first ‘historian’ of the Hungarian nobility, which began to argue for its own historical memory and special political and economic privileges even in this time, partially supported by Andrew II.26 Master P. created, sometimes fictively, genealogical bonds between the first ‘land-taker’ generation of the Hungarian nobility and the noble clans familiar to him in his lifetime. His work is therefore, as one of the most noted researchers of the Gesta Hungarorum has put it, a kind of ‘Gesta regum, gesta nobilium’,27 setting out the memorial history of both the dynasty and the nobility. Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum is also a narrative of great importance regarding the issue of the multilingual and multi-ethnic character of medieval Hungary; moreover, he was the first author in Hungarian history who connected the seizure of land by the Hungarian tribes with the suppression of others. His vision — the territory of the later Kingdom of Hungary, conquered by the Hungarian tribes — inspired many scholars to see real events in Master P.’s narratives, and to accept that such figures

23 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, edited by Jakubovich and Pais, p. 38: ‘Anno dominice incarnationis DCCC-o XVIIII-o Vgek, sicut supra diximus, longo post tempore de genere Magog regis erat quidam nobilissimus dux Scithie, qui duxit sibi uxorem in Dentumoger filiam Eunedubeliani ducis, nomine Emesu, de qua genuit filium, qui agnominatus est Almus. Sed ab aventu divino est nominatus almus, quia matri aius pregnanti per somonium apparuit divina visio in forma asturis, que quasi veniens eam gravidavit et innotuit ei, quod de utero eius egrederetur torrens et de lumbis eius reges gloriosi propagarentur, sed non in sua multiplicarentur terra. Quia ergo sompnium in lingua Hungarica dicitur almu et illius ortus per sompnium fuit pronosticatum, ideo ipse vocatus est Almus. Vel ideo vocatus est Almus, id est sanctus quia ex progenie eius sancti reges et duces erant nascituri. Quid ultra!’. See Spychała 2011. 24 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, pp. 40–41: ‘Primus status iuramenti sic fuit: Ut, quamdiu vita duraret, tam ipsis quam etiam, posteris suis semper ducem haberent de progenie Almi ducis. Secundus status iuramenti sic fuit: Ut, quicquid boni per labores eorum acquirere possent, nemo eorum expers fieret. Tertius status iuramenti sic fuit: Ut isti principales persone, qui sua libera voluntate Almum sibi dominum elegerant, quod ipsi et filii eorum nunquam a consilio ducis et honore regni omnino privarentur. Quartus status iuramenti sic fuit: Ut, siquis de posteris eorum infidelis fieret contra personam ducalem et discordiam faceret inter ducem et cognatos suos, sanguis nocentis funderetur, sicut sanguis eorum fuit fusus in iuramento, quod fecerunt Almo duci. Quintus status iuramenti sic fuit: Ut, siquis de posteris ducis Almi et aliarum personarum principalium iuramenti statuta ipsorum infringere voluerit, anathemati subiaceat in perpetuum’. 25 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, pp. 50–95. 26 For the extensive literature on this topic see Zsoldos, ‘II. András Aranybullája’, pp. 1–4. 27 Győry, Gesta regum, pp. 39–40.

59

60

dá n i e l bagi

as Duke Ménmarót,28 Gelou/Gyalu,29 or even the cowardly Duke Salan30 were real rulers who had lived in the ninth century, and were themselves the ancestors of Romanians or even Slovaks. There is no place in this short paper to cite all of the earlier theories of primarily Czech, Slovak, and Romanian scholars arguing for the continuation and primordiality of Slavic or even Daco-Roman structures, language, and customs in the Carpathian Basin,31 which were frequently employed as historical arguments in border disputes after World War I. Rather, it is preferable to mention more recent studies which have changed our perspective in that they actually assert that the early Kingdom of Hungary was a state, with Slavic or even Daco-Roman roots.32 Hence, Master P.’s vision of history was accepted by non-Hungarian historians as well, but they drew opposing conclusions from it. For them, Master P. was the most important source of proof that the Hungarian tribes had found existing ethnic and social structures in the Carpathian Basin, which they had then suppressed, and whose remaining social structures were taken over by the conquerors. Thus, both Hungarian scholars and those from other nations deduced from Master P.’s vision

28 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, p. 70: ‘Tosu vero et Zobolsu adepta victoria reversi sunt ad ducem Arpad subiugando totum populum a fluvio Zomus usque ad Crisium et nullus contra eos ausus fuit manus levare. Et ipse Menumorout dux eorum magis preparabat vias suas in Greciam eundi, quam contra eos veniendi. Et deinde egressi descenderunt iuxta quendam fluvium nomine Humusouer et venerunt usque ad lutum Zerep. Et deinde egressi venerunt usque ad Zeguholmu et ibi volebant transire Crisium, ut contra Menumorout pugnarent, sed venientes milites Menumorout eis transitum prohibuerunt. Deinde egressi per diem unum equitantes castra metati sunt iuxta Parvos Montes et hinc iuxta fluvium Turu equitantes, usque ad Thysciam pervenerunt et in portu Drugma fluvium Thyscie transnavigantes, ubi etiam per gratiam Arpad ducis cuidam Cumano militi, nomine Huhot, magnam terram aquisiverunt quam posteritas eius usque nunc habuerunt’. 29 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, pp. 66–67: ‘Tunc Tuhutum audita bonitate terre illius misit legatos suos ad ducem Arpad, ut sibi licentiam daret ultra silvas eundi contra Gelou ducem pugnare. Dux vero Arpad inito consilio voluntatem Tuhutum laudavit et ei licentiam ultra silvas eundi contra Gelou pugnare concessit. Hoc dum Tuhutum audivisset a legato, preparavit se cum suis militibus et dimissis ibi sociis suis egressus est ultra silvas versus orientem contra Gelou ducem Blacorum. Gelou vero dux Ultrasiluanus audiens adventum eius congregavit exercitum suum et cepit velocissimo cursu equitare obviam ei, ut eum per portas Mezesinas prohiberet, sed Tuhutum uno die silvam pertransiens ad fluvium Almas pervenit. Tunc uterque exercitus ad invicem pervenerunt medio fluvio interiacente. Dux vero Gelou volebat, quod ibi eos prohiberet cum sagittariis suis’. 30 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, p. 71: ‘Dux vero Arpad transactis quibusdam diebus inito consilio et sui nobiles miserunt nuntios suos ad ducem Salanum, qui nuntiarent ei victoriam Thosu et Zobolsu nec non et Tuhutum quasi pro gaudio et peterent ab eo terram usque ad fluvium Zogea. Quod sic factum est. Missi sunt enim Etu et Voyta, qui, cum invenissent ducem Salanum in sabulo Olpar, mandata gaudia nuntiaverunt et terram ab eo usque ad fluvium Zogea postulaverunt. Salanus dux hoc audito in maximum irruit timorem et terram ab ipso postulatam timore percussus usque ad fluvium Zogeua duci Arpad concessit et legatis diversa dona presentavit. Septimo autem die Etu et Voyta accepta licentia ad dominum suum sunt reversi, quos dux Arpad honorifice recepit et audita legatione eorum factum est gaudium magnum in curia ducis et cepit dux donare suis fidelibus loca et possessiones magnas’. 31 See, for example, Pop, ‘De manibus Valachorum scismaticorum…’. 32 Steinhübel, Nitrianske kniežatstvo, pp. 301–02.

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

the origins and characteristics of the territorial administrative structure of the early Kingdom of Hungary. As is commonly known, King Stephen (saint) created both the ecclesiastical and administrative systems in Hungary, the bishoprics, and the so-called ‘comitatus’, which to the present day has remained as the basic unit of the civil administration system in Hungary.33 The origin, shape, function, and changes to the ‘comitatus’ have been discussed by scholars since the nineteenth century. Generally, there are two leading theories about their origin: they were appropriated either from an existing foreign (mostly Slavic34 or Carolingian35) structure, or they are described as part of the authentic Hungarian heritage. For some scholars who argue for the foreign origin of the structural elements of the Hungarian administrative structure, Master P.’s tale about the conquering of the Carpathian Basin often serves as the most important piece of evidence for the continuity of Great Moravian or other earlier structures there.36 However, in the eyes of those who argue for the autochthonous origin of the administrative and social structures of medieval Hungary, Master P.’s work is conversely read as the narrative of the blood contract, the creation of the first political bonds, and finally the conquering and dividing of the conquered lands, which has convinced certain scholars of the continuity of ancient Hungarian bonds brought forward and inherited from the times of the pagan principality.37 A reasonable question to address here is whether Master P.’s masterwork depicts real multi-ethnic relations at the time of the land-seizure by the Hungarian tribes. Classical philological and modern criticism of sources proves that Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum is one of the most remarkable sources for events of the ninth century. The text is a typical gesta,38 containing many epic and topological elements using widely known classical and medieval patterns.39 The author might have studied somewhere in Europe, as he himself confesses in the prologue of his work,40 and thus he adapted patterns of the literary tradition of his time period. Secondly, Master P., as has been mentioned above, 33 Engel, The Realm, pp. 31–45. 34 Léderer, Magyarország története, p. 78. 35 Marczali, ‘A vezérek kora’; Deér, Pogány magyarság, p. 35. 36 For example see Chalpupecký, Staré Slovensko, pp. 45–46; Steinhübel, Nitrianske kniežatstvo, pp. 31–47. 37 Györffy, Tanulmányok a magyar állam eredetéről; Györffy, King Saint Stephen, pp. 78–83. 38 On the classification see Plezia, Kronika Galla, pp. 22–26. 39 On Master P.’s sources from Latin literature see Thoroczkay, ‘Anonymus Latin’. 40 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, p. 33: ‘P. dictus magister ac quodam bone memorie gloriosissimi Bele regis Hungarie notarius N. suo dilectissimo amico, viro venerabili et arte litteralis scientie inbuto, salutem et sue petitionis effectum. Dum olim in scolari studio simul essemus et in hystoria Troiana, quam ego cum summo amore complexus ex libris Darethis Frigii ceterorumque auctorum, sicut a magistris meis audiveram, in unum volumen proprio stilo compilaveram, pari voluntate legeremus, petisti a me, ut, sicut hystoriam Troianam bellaque Grecorum scripseram, ita et genealogiam regum Hungarie et nobilium suorum, qualiter septem principales persone, que Hetumoger vocantur, de terra Scithica descenderunt vel qualis sit terra Scithica et qualiter sit generatus dux Almus aut quare vocatur Almus primus dux Hungarie, a quo reges Hungarorum originem duxerunt, vel quot regna et reges sibi subiugaverunt aut quare populus de terra Scithica agressus per ydioma alienigenarum Hungarii et in sua lingua propria Mogerii

61

62

dá n i e l bagi

was one of the followers of the new royal policy of Andrew II, who intended to change the ancient social and economic structures of the Kingdom of Hungary established by King Stephen, and which had determined the entire social composition of the country for over two centuries.41 The philosophy of the ‘new institutions’ introduced by Andrew II was to elevate the nobility to the level of a dynasty by funding it, even exorbitantly at times. Therefore, the image of ancient Hungarian society depicted in Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum closely reflects the reality of the turn of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, and delivers ‘historical evidence’ of noble clans, known to Master P., about the deeds of their ancestors, as well as about the ancient character of the donation by the rulers to noblemen. And finally, the presentation of the blood contract, the acceptance of the Arpads’ leadership by the other tribes, and the conquering and subjugation of the Carpathian Basin play their specific roles in Master P.’s approach. He tried to convince his audience that one of the most ancient customs in Hungary was the sign and source of land’s ownership for those who had worked together with founders of the Arpad dynasty.42 In other words: the ancestors of the dynasty and the nobility conquered the country by their own sweat and blood, and therefore it now should belong to their descendants, the kings and noblemen. This vision of history created by Master P. became the basic philosophical principle of the modus possidendi of the Hungarian nobility (to which we may add the East and Central European nobility as well). The idea of feudalism and feudal bonds was almost completely unknown and unacknowledged by them, and all donations were in force for eternity (‘in perpetuum’).43 This basic character of Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum also determines his narratives about the conquering people found in the country. As a result of many generations of research, it now seems clear that Master P.’s work refers to conflicts between the Byzantine Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary, which determined almost the entire ‘foreign policy’ of the Hungarian rulers from the middle of the twelfth century.44 The Byzantine Empire made territorial claims against the Hungarian rulers regarding the southern parts of the country. We can assume that one of the responses was Master P.’s narrative about the conquest of the entire Carpathian Basin by the Hungarians in the ninth century, and its continuous possession since those times. We should treat the people and the earlier rulers as found and conquered by the Hungarians in this light. Reading the text, we can assume that Master P.’s invocation of the multi-ethnic character of the Carpathian Basin was an argument directed at his contemporaries, to prove that territory whose ownership was being questioned had belonged since

vocantur, tibi scriberem. Promisi et enim me facturum, sed aliis negotiis impeditus et tue petitionis et mee promissionis iam pene eram oblitus, nisi mihi per litteras tua dilectio debitum reddere monuisset’. 41 Engel, The Realm, p. 94. 42 P. Magistri Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Jakubovich and Pais, p. 40: ‘Secundus status iuramenti sic fuit: “Ut, quicquid boni per labores eorum acquirere possent, nemo eorum expers fieret”’. 43 On feudal-like constructs as an honour introduced in Hungary by the Angevins in the fourteenth century, see Engel, The Realm, pp. 141–75. 44 Kapitánffy, ‘Der ungarische Anonymus’; Horváth, ‘Die griechischne (byzantinischen) Sprachkenntnisse’.

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

ancient times to the Hungarian kings and the nobility, as they had earned it from others by their own effort, through conquest, trade, or even by cunning. Therefore, to treat the Gesta Hungarorum as one of the more credible witnesses of the circumstances of the ninth century is fraught with danger. The Gesta Hungarorum of this anonymous notary of the late King Béla is a rather unsuitable source for understanding exactly how ninth-century ethnic and linguistic relations in the Carpathian Basin appeared. The author himself was concerned about this only as far as necessary to achieve his narrative or political goals at the beginning of the thirteenth century, and did not care for the real ethnic conditions of the Hungarian past. On the other hand, Master P. was interested in questions of multi-ethnicity, but he saw solutions to them in the subjugation of others. The text provides us with even less information about the origins of the later administrative and social structure of the country. Thanks to work by Gyula Kristó we know about the origin of the ‘comitatus’ of King (Saint) Stephen, that they were neither of a foreign nor of an autochthonic nature, but were rather a construct developed by the king himself, based on castles, illustrating a dualistic construction consisting of the ‘comitatus castri’ (the castle districts) overlapped by the ‘comitatus’ themselves.45 Even other territorial units such as the so-called royal duchy of the eleventh century — understood by scholars to have been either inherited or authentic Hungarian structures — seem rather to represent the circumstances of the second half of the eleventh century than the times of land-seizure by the Hungarian tribes. But despite everything mentioned above comprising the special characteristics of Master P.’s Gesta Hungarorum, there is no doubt that the Kingdom of Hungary, from its very beginning, was not a country of one language and culture.46 One of the earliest pieces of evidence in support of this assertion can be found in the so-called Libellus de institutione morum of King (Saint) Stephen to his son, Prince Emery (also called Admonitions).47 The Admonitions must have been written in the second decade of the eleventh century, before Emery’s death,48 and as a narrative it comprises one of the latest Carolingian Specula regia (king’s mirrors) preserved in Europe. The text, however, differs from the customary style of ninth- and tenth-century Carolingian Specula, the authors of which commanded the forthcoming ruler to maintain the usual royal virtues. In Libellus, the whole of royal power was deduced from the relationship of the ruler to the decors of the royal palace, the bishops, the noblemen, the royal council, and incoming guests, called hospites in the text.49 Even the last passage of this part of the king’s admonitions, declaring that ‘kingdoms of one language and of one custom are weak and feeble’,50 has caused much discussion

45 46 47 48 49 50

See Kristó, A vármegyék kialkulása Magyarországon, Zsoldos, ‘A megyeszervezés kezdetei’. For more on the topic see Berend, At the Gate of Christendom. Libellus, ed. by Balogh. See Szűcs, ‘Szent István intelmei’. Szűcs, ‘Szent István intelmei’, p. 278. Libellus, ed. by Balogh, p. 625: ‘Nam unius lingue uniusque moris regnum inbecille et fragile est. Propterea iubeo te fili mei, ut bona voluntate illos nutrias, et honeste teneas, ut tecum libentius degant, quam alicubi habitent. Si enim tu destruere, quod ego edificavi, aut dissipare quod congregavi

63

64

dá n i e l bagi

among scholars. Many of them argue that the text gave clear answers for dealing with the multilingual and multi-ethnic characteristics of the early Arpadian monarchy, and even modern journalists have followed in their footsteps, arguing in political debates for the existence of a minority policy of the kings of the Arpadian dynasty from as early as the thirteenth century.51 Others, such as K. Gouth, who tragically died young, asserted that this chapter of the Libellus supplies evidence of its later origin, because guests (especially from Germany) came at the earliest during the thirteenth century.52 However, as has been proven by Elemér Mályusz and later Jenő Szűcs,53 the Admonitions follows the formal and contextual requirements of the ninth- and tenth-century literary and political customs, and therefore the regnum does not literally mean the whole kingdom or the country in its political sense, but rather the royal court and power; the newcomer guests, moreover, were only members of the intellectual and military elites, bishops and knights invited by the king, who — as the text of the Admonitions proves — brought ‘documenta et arma’: knowledge and military force in the service of the ruler.54 Therefore, the Libellus de institutione morum gives evidence for the ‘multi-ethnic’ character of Hungary not in that the royal court and ecclesiastical positions were filled by foreign Church and military dignitaries, as can be observed everywhere in East-Central Europe in the eleventh century, but also because it shows a complete cohesion of many foreign ethnic newcomers with the king’s duty. For the multi-ethnic cohesion of the elites in the earliest times we have yet another piece of evidence: the first Hungarian king was gird with his sword by Hont and Pázmány, the founders of one of the earliest noble clans in Hungary of foreign descent;55 one of the earliest counties established by King Stephen was named after Hont. Beyond this, independent of the intellectual content of the Libellus de institutione morum and the multi-ethnic characteristics of the Hungarian elites at the beginning of the eleventh century, the Kingdom of Hungary had been inhabited by many foreign ethnic groups since the beginning of its history, coming both from the East and West of Europe. This process accelerated dramatically from the end of the twelfth century, when the immigration of Western and Eastern populations caused the ethnic and linguistic composition of the subjects of the kings of Hungary to begin to represent a new kind of conglomerate. In particular, Vallonian, Italian, and German ethnic groups of both rural and urban origin arrived in Hungary from the second half of the twelfth century onwards; they were followed in the thirteenth century by the

51 52 53 54

55

studueris, sine dubio maximum detrimentum tuum patietur regnum. Quod ne fiat, tuum quottidie auge regnum, ut tua corona ab hominibus habeatur augusta’. As first example see: Szekfű, ‘Még egyszer középkori kissebségeinkről’. Guoth, ‘Egy forrás két történetszemlélet tükrében’. Mályusz, ‘Az egynyelvű ország’, pp. 55–56; Szűcs, ‘Szent István intelmei’, p. 286. Libellus, ed. by Balogh, pp. 624–25: ‘Roma vero usque hodie esset ancilla, nisi Eneades fecissent illam liberam. Sicut enim ex diversis partibus et provinciis veniunt hospites, ita diversas linguas et consuetudines, diversaque documenta et arma secum ducunt, que omnia regna ornant et magnificant aulam et perterritant exterorum arrogantiam’. Chronici Hungarici compositio, ed. by Domanovszky, p. 312.

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

Teutonic Knights,56 as well as by Saxon communities, which were settled in the Kingdom of Hungary in the Zips and Transylvania.57 As for an oriental element, we can mention the massive settlement of the Cumans from the middle of the thirteenth century in the deserted territory between the Danube and Tisza rivers, although, Petchenegs, Ismaelits, and Jews had already appeared earlier. Thus, especially after the Mongol invasion in 1241, medieval Hungary became — if not a multi-ethnic country in its modern sense — surely a kingdom populated by many ethnic groups of diverse languages and social conditions whose rights were granted by privileges given by the kings of Hungary. It is not surprising, then, that the next dynastic chronicle after Master P., the Gesta Hungarorum by Simon of Kéza, had to provide answers to the question of why so many foreigners had come to Hungary, what their relationship was to the native Hungarians, how coexistence functioned, and what kind of legal status these newcomers had. The Gesta Hungarorum of Simon of Kéza was composed between 1282 and 1285. There is no medieval manuscript of the text extant, it is known only from later copies of the early modern era.58 The Gesta Hungarorum was — one could say — destined to be a study about ‘us and them’, since Simon of Kéza was the notary of a king, Ladislas IV, who was himself of foreign origin. Ladislas IV was the son of Stephen V and the grandson of King Béla IV — it was Béla who, before the Mongol invasion of 1241, had initiated the invitation of the pagan Cumans to come to Hungary, and who finally started settling their tribes after his return from his Dalmatian exile in 1241.59 Indeed, he made a pact with the Cumanian rulers, agreeing on a marriage between his son and the daughter of a Cumanian prince. Ladislas IV (called the Cuman), was born from this alliance, and — if we can trust the Hungarian chronicle — kept some Cuman customs, such as the uxores, which resulted in a visit by a papal legate around 1273.60 The Gesta Hungarorum composed by Simon of Kéza, long regarded among scholars as the oldest chronicle written about Hungarian history,61 has four main parts. Apart from the prologue, it first describes the history of the Huns, identifying them as the ancestors of the Hungarians. The second main part of the narrative is devoted to Hungarian history

56 Zimmermann, Der Deutsche Orden. 57 Kristó, Early Transylvania, pp. 57–98; Homza, ‘Dzieje’; Fügedi, ‘Das mittelalterliche Ungarn’. 58 For general literature on this issue see Veszprémy and Szovák, Krónikák, Legendák, Intelmek, pp. 739–49. 59 Szűcs, ‘Szent István intelmei’, pp. 387–445; Engel, The Realm, pp. 101–23. 60 Chronici Hungarici compositio, ed. by Domanovszky, pp. 472–73: ‘Iste enim rex Ladizlaus filiam regis Karoli de Apulia in coniugium habebat. Sed spreto thoro coniugali filiabus adhesit Cumanorum, Eduam/Cyduam Cupchech et Mandulam vocatas ac alias quamplures in concubinas habebat, quarum amore cor eius est merito depravatum et a suis baronibus et regni nobilibus odio habebatur. Pro insuper contra eum, quia Cumanice et non catholice conversabatur, Philippus Firmanus sedis apostolice legatus adinvenit, qui barbas radere, crines detruncare contra mores Hungaricos et pilleos Cumanicos, quorum usus in Hungaria iam in consuetudine habebatur, abicere demandabat, regem etiam anathematis vinculo feriens, ut paganos odiret, ritum Christianorum diligeret et thoro viveret coniugali. Sed nichil in rege proficiens repatriavit’. 61 Erdélyi, Krónikáink.

65

66

dá n i e l bagi

and the origins of the Hungarians. The Gesta Hungarorum also contains a so-called list of newcomers (advenae),62 classifying all of those who emigrated to the Kingdom of Hungary during the Middle Ages according to their social status. However, this advenae does not seem to be genuine, but is probably taken from a late thirteenth-century edition of the Hungarian Chronicle Composition, known and used by Simon of Kéza.63 Simon of Kéza’s intention in writing is more than clear. He had to find the causes of the fact that the newcomers — in this case the Cumans — had taken over the leadership of the Kingdom of Hungary, and he also had to answer the question of how cohesion between the ‘genuine Hungarians’ and the ‘newcomers’ worked. He must have had good reasons to try to depict a cohesive new Hungarian society in his work. As is commonly known, the integration of the Cumans was initially unsuccessful, due to their different ways of life.64 This is why Simon of Kéza took over the well-known topological commonplace of Western European Latin historiography — practised since Regino of Prüm and spread throughout the of whole Europe — that the Hungarians were descendants of the Huns themselves.65 However, he tried to describe the multicultural, multi-ethnic, and even multilingual character of the Kingdom of Hungary, and the cohesion among its components not by a purely ethnic approach, but from the perspective of their legal status. Simon of Kéza’s intellectual horizon is aligned with the tenets of the communitas theory of the second half of the thirteenth century, fundamentally based on the reception of Roman law and new ideas about social status spreading in the western part of Europe.66 Therefore, it is no wonder that the author treated the future destiny of the many foreign people coming to Hungary during the thirteenth century not as a question of ethnicity or linguistic characteristics, but as a matter of their social status and existing legal bonds. According to the ideas espoused by Simon of Kéza, even the Huns had social and legal structures compatible with Roman law, since they elected Attila as their king more Romano,67 after Roman customs, and the Hungarians inherited this legal and social construct directly from the Huns. Thus, for Simon of Kéza, multi-ethnicity meant first of all that there were and still are ‘them’ who came later and joined the Hungarians, but he imagined only one future for them: by learning and adapting to the social and legal structures of the Hungarians they could achieve the same level as the native inhabitants of the country. For this purpose, Kézai modified one of the passages of the advenae preserved in the Hungarian Chronicle Composition which, as mentioned above, he made use of. While according to the Chronicle Composition the newcomers possessed the

Simonis de Keza Gesta, ed. by Domanovszky, pp. 187–94. Chronici Hungarici composition, ed. by Domanovszky, pp. 295–304. Szűcs, ‘Szent István intelmei’, pp. 45–46. Reginonis chronicon, ed. by Kurze; also (for example) in Galli Anonymi chronicae, ed. by Maleczyński, pp. 7–8: ‘Igitur terra Sclauonica […] a Tracis autem per Ungariam (ab) Hunis, qui et Ungari dicuntur, quondam occupatam […] diffinitur’. 66 Szűcs, ‘Theoretical Elements’, pp. lxxxv–ic. 67 Simonis de Keza Gesta, ed. by Domanovszky, p. 151: ‘Postquam vero exercitus se dispersit, Romano more Huni super se Ethelam regem praeficiunt, ipseque Budam fratrem suum de flumine Tize usque Don super diversas exteras nationes principem constituit ac rectorem’. 62 63 64 65

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

same nobility as the Hungarians,68 in Simon of Kéza’s mind they could reach it only tempore processu, as time went by, after their acculturation.69 In conclusion, there is no doubt that from its beginning the Kingdom of Hungary was a multicultural country, based on the cohesive coexistence of different ethnic groups. The kingdom, founded and organized by the Arpads, lay at the crossroads of many peoples and cultures, and therefore its multi-ethnic characteristics were more than natural. However, the memory of multi-ethnic character of the state, as well as its interpretation, depended very strongly on the nature of the ‘national’ or, more precisely, dynastic historiography. The cultural tradition of the Middle Ages did not focus on the real conditions of foreigners (language, culture, etc.), but rather tried to measure them according to political and legal customs, as well as traditions of the Kingdom of Hungary. Master P. was the first to invoke the image of ‘us and them’, presenting the process of land-seizure by the Hungarian tribes and the conquering of the people found in the Carpathian Basin. Master P. himself must have known that in his lifetime — as well as before — Hungary was populated not only by Hungarians sensu stricto: since the eleventh century there had been a continual migration from the East and the West, and there were always communities of diverse confessional, cultural, or even linguistic natures. But Master P. paid no attention to this: his vision, with all of his rulers identified and conquered by the Hungarians, had only one goal, which was to reflect the circumstances of his own lifetime onto the beginnings of Hungarian history. So, Master P. created a non-cohesive image about the Hungarians and other people found in the Carpathian Basin, arguing mainly for the rights of the conquerors, and in this way founded a historical tradition which influenced many generations of scholars from the nineteenth century onwards. A different approach was chosen by Simon of Kéza. If there is someone in the medieval Hungarian dynastic historiography who had the capability of presenting the cohesion of many different ethnic groups in Hungary, it was him. His motivations are clear: he was the subject of a king who was regarded as a ‘product’ of the HungarianCuman alliance of the thirteenth century. However, although he must have been conscious of the many foreign social groups coming into Hungary, especially during the thirteenth century, he treated this process exclusively from the legal point of view, constructing a special social history of the thirteenth century and creating the idea of cultural and legal acculturation. Interestingly, in this way Simon of Kéza became the first ‘historian’ in Hungary to depict the ethnic cohesion of genuine and foreign

68 Chronici Hungarici compositio, ed. by Domanovszky, pp. 303–04: ‘Intraverunt autem in Ungariam tam tempore regis Geyse et sancti regis Stephani quam diebus regum aliorum Bohemi, Poloni, Greci, Ispani, Hismahelite sei Saraceni, Bessi, Armeni, Saxones, Cumani, Latini, qui diutius in regno conmorando, quamvis illorum generatio nesciatur, per matrimoniorum diversorum contractus Ungaris inmixti nobilitatem partier et descensum sunt adepti’. 69 Simonis de Keza Gesta, ed. by Domanovszky, p. 192: ‘Intraverunt quoque temporibus tam ducis Geichae quam aliorum regum Boemi, Poloni, Graeci, Bessi, Armeni et fere ex omni extera natione, quae sub caelo est, qui servientes regibus vel caeteris regni dominis ex ipsis pheuda acquirendo nobilitatem processu temporis sunt adepti. Quorum nomina comprehendere aestimavi in persenti libro onerosa’.

67

68

dá n i e l bagi

elements of the Hungarian ‘nation’; however, his vision of a Hungary of many nations was rather a cohesive construct of a legal nature. The Hungarian royal court was interested from the early thirteenth century onwards in learning its own history, but the missing data had to be replaced by retrospective fictional narrations. The two works presented in this short paper give clear evidence that they were written according to the contemporary literary tradition in Europe, but they also show that the authors themselves were interested in issues of multi-ethnicity, cohesion, and conflict between ethnic groups and communities, not as modern scholars are, but rather as part of their own cultural context.

Works Cited Primary Sources Anonymous notary of King Béla, The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed., trans., and annotated by Martin Rady and László Veszprémy, Central European Medieval Texts, 5 (Budapest: CEU Press, 2010) Chronici Hungarici compositio saeculi XIV, ed. by Alexander Domanovszky, in Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, vol. 1, ed. by Emericus Szentpétery (Budapest: Nap Kiadó, 1999), pp. 219–505 Galli Anonymi chronicae et gesta ducum sive principum Polonorum, ed. by Karol Maleczyński, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 2 (Kraków: PAU, 1952) Libellus de institutione morum, ed. by Iosephus Balogh, in Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, vol. 2, ed. by Emericus Szentpétery (Budapest: Nap Kiadó, 1999), pp. 613–27 P. Magistri, qui Anonymus dicitur Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Aemilius Jakubovich and Desiderius Pais, in Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, vol. 1, ed. by Emericus Szentpétery (Budapest: Nap Kiadó, 1999), pp. 33–117 Reginonis abbatis Prumiensis chronicon cum continuation Treverensi, ed. by Friedrich Kurze, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi, 50 (Hannover: Hahn, 1890) Simonis de Keza Gesta Hungarorum, ed. by Alexander Domanovszky, in Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, vol. 1, ed. by Emericus Szentpétery (Budapest: Nap Kiadó, 1999), pp. 131–94 The Deeds of the Hungarians by Simon of Kéza, ed. and trans. by László Veszprémy and Frank Schaer, with an introduction by Jenő Szűcs, Central European Medieval Texts, 1 (Budapest: CEU Press, 1999) Secondary Studies Adamska, Anna, ‘The Study of Medieval Literacy: Old Sources, New Ideas’, in The Development of Literate Mentalities in East-Central Europe, ed. by Anna Adamska and Marco Mostert (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 13–47 Althoff, Gerd, ‘Genealogische und andere Fiktionen in mittelalterlicher Historiographie’, in Gerd Althoff, Inszenierte Herrschaft. Geschichtsschreibung und politisches Handeln im Mittelalter (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 2003), pp. 28–51

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

Bagi, Dániel, ‘Problematik der ältesten Schichten der ungarischen Chronikkomposition des 14. Jahrhunderts im Lichte der ungarischen Geschichtsforschung der letzten Jahrzehnte — einige ausgewählte Problemstellen’, Quaestiones Medii Aevii Novae, 12 (2007), 105–28 Berend, Nora, At the Gate of Christendom: Jews, Muslims and ‘Pagans’ in Medieval Hungary c. 1000–1300 (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2001) Beumann, Helmut, Widukind von Korvei (Weimar: Böhlau, 1950) ———, Die Historiographie des Mittelalters als Quelle für die Ideengeschichte des Königtums, Historische Zeitschrift, 160 (1955), 449–88 Chalpupecký, Václav, Staré Slovensko, Spisy Filosofické Fakulty University Komenského, 3 (Bratislava: Filozofická fakulta univerzity Komenského v Bratislave, 1923) Deér, József, Pogány magyarság, keresztény magyarság, 2nd edn (Budapest: Holnap Kiadó, 1993) Engel, Pál, The Realm of Saint Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary 895–1526 (London: Tauris, 2001) Erdélyi, László, Krónikáink atyja, Kézai [Father all of our chronicles, Kézai] (Szeged: Prometheus, 1933) Fügedi, Erik, ‘Das mittelalterliche Ungarn als Gastland’, in Erik Fügedi, Kings, Bishops, Nobles and Burghers in Medieval Hungary, ed. by János Bak (London: Variorum, 1986), pp. 1–25 Goetz, Hans-Werner, ‘“Vorstellungsgeschichte”: Menschliche Vorstellungen und Meinungen als Dimension der Vergangenheit. Bemerkungen zu einem jüngeren Arbeitsfeld der Geschichtswissenschaft als Beitrag zu einer Methodik der Quellenauswertung’, in Hans-Werner Goetz, Vorstellungsgeschichte. Gesammelte Schriften zu Wahrnehmungen, Deutungen und Vorstellungen im Mittelalter, ed. by Anna Aurast and others (Bochum: Winkler, 2007), pp. 3–18 Guoth, Kálmán, ‘Egy forrás két történetszemlélet tükrében’ [The Same Source Mirrored by Two Views of History], Századok, 76 (1942), 43–64 Györffy, György, Tanulmányok a magyar állam eredetéről. A nemzetségtől a vármegyéig, a törzstől az országig. Kurszán és Kurszán vára [Studies on the Origin of Hungarian Statehood: From the Clans to the Counties, and from the Tribes to the Country. Kurszán, and the Castle of Kurszán] (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1959) ———, A magyarság keleti elemei [Oriental Ethnic Elements of the Hungarian Nation] (Budapest: Gondolat, 1990) ———, King Saint Stephen of Hungary (Highland Lakes: Atlantic, 1994) Győry, János, Gesta regum — gesta nobilium. Tanulmány Anonymus krónikájáról [Study on Master P’s Chronicle] (Budapest: Országos Széchenyi Könyvtár, 1948) Homza, Martin, ‘Dzieje wczesnośredniowiecznego Spisza’, in Historia Scepusii, vol. 1, ed. by Martin Homza and Stanisław A. Sroka (Bratislava: Avalon, 2010), pp. 126–329 Horváth jr., János, ‘Die griechischne (byzantinischen) Sprachkenntnisse des Meisters P.’, Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 17 (1969), 17–48; 18 (1970), 371–412; 19 (1971), 347–82 Kapitánffy, István, ‘Der ungarische Anonymus und Byzanz’, in Byzance et ses voisins: Mélanges á la memoire Gyula Moravcsik, ed. by Teréz Olajos, Acta Universitatis Attila József Nominatae. Opuscula Byzantin, 9 (Szeged: Jate, 1994), pp. 69–76

69

70

dá n i e l bagi

Katus, László, A modern magyarország születése. Magyarország története 1711–1914 [Birth of modern Hungary: A History of Hungary 1711–1914] (Pécs: Kronosz, 2009) Kristó, Gyula, ‘Oroszok az Árpád-kori Magyarországon’ [Russians in Hungary in the Age of the Arpads], in Gyula Kristó, Tanulmányok az Árpád-korról [Studies on the Age of the Arpads], (Budapest: Magvető, 1983), pp. 191–207 ———, A vármegyék kialkulása Magyarországon [The Making of the Counties in Hungary] (Budapest: Magvető, 1988) ———, A történeti irodalom Magyarországon a kezdetektől 1241-ig [Historiography in Hungary from its Beginnings up to 1241] (Budapest: Argumentum, 1994) ———, ‘II. András király “új intézkedései”’ [‘The so called “New Measurements” of King Andrew II’], Századok, 135/2 (2001), 251–300 ———, Early Transylvania (Budapest: Lucidus, 2001) ———, Magyar historiográfia, vol. 1: Történetírás a középkori Magyarországon [Hungarian Historiography, vol. 1: Historiography in Medieval Hungary] (Budapest: Osiris, 2003) Kristó, Gyula, and Ferenc Makk, Az Árpád-házi uralkodók [The rulers of the Dynasty of the Arpads] (Budapest: IPM, 1988) Léderer, Emma, Magyarország története a honfoglalástól 1526-ig [History of Hungary from the Conquest until 1526] (Budapest: Egyetemi, 1957) Madgearu, Alexandru, The Romanians in the Anonymous Gesta Hungarorum: Truth and Fiction, Bibliotheca Rerum Transsilvaniae, 34 (Cluj-Napoca: Centrul de Studii Transilvane, 2005) Mályusz, Elemér, ‘Az egynyelvű ország’ [The Country of One Language], in Elemér Mályusz, Klió szolgálatában. Válogatott történelmi tanulmányok [In the Duty of Clio: Selected Studies on History] (Budapest: MTA TTI, 2003), pp. 53–72 Marczali, Henrik, ‘A vezérek kora és a királyság megalapítása’ [The Age of the Hungarian Principality and the Foundation of the Kingdom], in A magyar nemzet története I. [History of the Hungarian Nation], ed. by Sándor Szilágyi (Budapest: Atheneum, 1895), pp. 3–319 Nógrády, Árpád, ‘“Magistratus et comitatus tenentibus”: II. András kormányzati rendszerének kérdéséhez’ [On the Question of the Government Reforms by King Andrew II.], Századok, 129. 1 (1995), 157–94 Plezia, Marian, Kronika Galla na tle historiografii XII. wieku (Kraków: PAU, 1947) Pop, Ioan-Aurel, ‘De manibus Valachorum scismaticorum…’: Romanians and Power in the Mediaeval Kingdom of Hungary, Eastern and Central European Studies, 4 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2013) Pór, Antal, and Gyula Schönherr, ‘Az Anjou-ház és örökösei (1301–1439)’ [The Angevins and their Successors], in A magyar nemzet története [History of the Hungarian Nation], vol. 3 (Budapest: Atheneum, 1895) Romsics, Ignác, Clio bűvöletében. Magyar történetírás a 19–20. században — nemzetközi kitekintéssel [Inspired by Clio: Hungarian Historiography in the 19–20th Century, with its International Background] (Budapest: Osiris, 2011) Schmale, Franz-Josef, Funktion und Formen mittelalterlicher Geschichtsschreibung, 2nd edn (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993)

Cohesion and Conflict between Ethnic Groups in Medieval Hungary

Spychała, Lesław, Studia nad legendą dynastyczną Arpadów. Między pulpitem średniowiecznego skryby a ‘warsztatem’ współczesnego badacza (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2011) Steinhübel, Ján, Nitrianske kniežatstvo: pociatky stredovekého Slovenska rozpravanie o dejinach násho uzemia a okilitych krájin od strahovania narodov do zaciatku 12 storocia (Bratislava: RAK, 2004) Szekfű, Gyula, ‘Még egyszer középkori kissebségeinkről’ [One More Time on the Question of our National Minorities in the Middle Ages], Magyar Szemle, 39/157 (1940), 169–77 Szűcs, Jenő, ‘Theoretical Elements in Master Simon of Kéza’s Gesta Hungarorum (1282–1285)’, in The Deeds of the Hungarians by Simon of Kéza, ed. and trans. by László Veszprémy and Frank Schaer, with an Introduction by Jenő Szűcs (Budapest: CEU Press, 1999), pp. xxix–cii ———, Az utolsó Árpádok [The Last Arpads] (Budapest: Osiris, 2002) ———, ‘Szent István intelmei: Az első magyarországi államelméleti mű’ [The Admonitions of King Saint Stephen: The First Work of Political-Philosophical Nature in Medieval Hungary], in Szent István és az államalapítás, ed. by László Veszprémy (Budapest: Akadémiai, 2002), pp. 271–89 Thoroczkay, Gábor, ‘Az Anonymus-kérdés kutatástörténeti áttekintése (1977–1993)’, Part I: Fons (1994), No. 2, 94–149, Part 2: Fons (1995), No. 2, 117–73 ———, ‘Anonymus latin nyelvű külföldi forrásai. Historiográfiai áttekintés’ [The Foreign Latin Literary Sources of Master P: Historiographical Overview], Turul, 72.3–4 (1999), 108–17 Veszprémy, László, Árpád-kori történeti elbeszélő forrásaink (11–13. század) nyugat-európai kapcsolatai [West-European Connections of our Narrative Sources for the Age of the Arpads] (MTA Doktori értekezés:, 2007) Veszprémy, László, and Kornél Szovák, Krónikák, Legendák, Intelmek. Utószó, in Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum, vol. 2, ed. by Emericus Szentpétery, (Budapest, 1938), facsimile edition (Budapest: Nap Kiadó, 1999), pp. 721–99 Wertner, Mór, Az Árpádok családi története [The Genealogy of the Arpads] (NagyBecskerek: Pleitz, 1892) Zimmermann, Harald, Der Deutsche Orden in Siebenbürgen. Eine diplomatische Untersuchung (Köln: Böhlau, 2011) Zsoldos, Attila, ‘A megyeszervezés kezdetei a Magyar Királyságban (Az óriás és az ‘átlagos’ nagyságú megyék kérdése)’ [The Beginning of County Organization in Hungary: On the Phenomenon of the ‘Giant’ and Average Sized Counties], in Megyetörténet. Egyház — és igazgatástörténeti tanulmányok a Veszprémi Püspökség 1009. évi adománylevele tiszteletére, ed. by István Hermann and Balázs Karlinszky (Veszprém: Veszprém Megyei Levéltár, 2010), pp. 299–318 ———, ‘II. András Aranybullája’ [The Golden Bull of King Andrew II], Történelmi Szemle, 53.1 (2011), 1–38

71

Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu

Multi-Ethnicity and Memory in Medieval Transylvania

Previous chapters in this volume show how cultural memory influenced both ethnic identities and relationships between ethnicities. This article presents a reverse aspect of the interdependency between memory and ethnicity — how political and social changes altered the shape of cultural memory in medieval Transylvania. Multi-ethnicity is defined as the situation in which different ethnic groups living together in a given territory are forced to cooperate. Without cooperation between ethnic groups, there is just ethnic diversity. Transylvania fits such a description, as this region underwent a process of ethnic diversification from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries and, from the fourteenth century onwards, the gradual creation of instruments of cooperation between the main privileged groups. Transylvania’s incorporation into the Kingdom of Hungary began to take place from the eleventh century. In the long process of territorial and ecclesiastical organization of the province, peoples of various ethnic identities, such as Romanians, Hungarians, Szeklers, Saxons, and Pechenegs, came to live side by side in this region.1 The formation of privileged estates, which was developing from the thirteenth century, led to the organization of three main privileged groups in the voivodate of Transylvania: the Hungarian nobles, the Saxons, and the Szeklers. Although Romanians were mentioned sporadically as participating in provincial assemblies of the voivodate in 1288 and 1291, thereby seeming to be on their way to being organized into an estate, they failed to organize their own privileged group. One explanation offered for this failure identifies their Orthodox/ Schismatic confession which hindered them from being accepted in a kingdom that strove to achieve confessional uniformity.2 The upwardly mobile Romanian elites, namely ‘knezes’ and ‘voivodes’, were absorbed into the estate of the nobility during the process of ennoblement that lasted roughly from the fourteenth to mid-fifteenth 1 See Nägler, ‘Transylvania’. 2 Papacostea, Between the Crusade and the Mongol Empire, pp. 263–70. Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu  •  ([email protected]) is a Lecturer in Medieval History and director of the Center for Scientific Research at ‘1 Decembrie 1918’ University of Alba Iulia, in Romania. He has published on the history of medieval nobility, regional identities, and medieval Transylvanian history. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemysław Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 73–92 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120058

74

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

centuries.3 This early development partially explains why Romanians had no political representation in the sixteenth-century Diet of the principality of Transylvania. Cooperation between the three privileged Transylvanian groups took place in an organized setting in provincial congregations presided over by the voivodes of Transylvania, but their relationship was not regulated by any code or treaty before the fifteenth century.4 Each group was governed by a royal dignitary, such as the voivode in the territory of the seven Transylvanian counties, or the count of the Saxons, or the count of the Szeklers in their respective territories. All groups enjoyed the right to use their own customs in delivering judgements and in organizing their lives.5 The incentive for closer, legally defined collaboration, and joint efforts between the three Transylvanian estates was created by the ever-growing threat of Ottoman raids and the rebellion of tenant-peasants from north-western Transylvania in 1437–1438.6 Those were the years when the deputy of the voivode of Transylvania, Loránd Lepes of Varaskezy, worked out the first treaty of union (fraterna unio) between the three privileged estates.7 A new treaty of union was signed in 1459 in Mediaș at the initiative of the Transylvanians themselves.8 The purpose of this treaty was to provide mutual military help against any external attacks and to boycott the activity of royal appointees trying to exact new taxes. In the summer of 1467, representatives of the three privileged estates joined in a rebellion against King Matthias Corvinus and signed another treaty taking an oath of fealty towards the leaders of the rebellion.9 Based on meeting customs of the congregations of the province dating back to the late thirteenth century, and on their fifteenth-century treaties, these three groups developed traditions of cooperation which provided the premises of the constitutional system of the principality of Transylvania, founded on the principle of the union of the three nations (unio trium nationum). In this paper I will focus on the way that the memory of ethnic groups was preserved or communicated in narrative and other written sources. My analysis of Hungarian thirteenth-century chronicles has yielded little to reflect upon concerning the question of cooperation between the ethnic groups of Transylvania. But one particular instance of creating and manipulating memory in Transylvania from 1277 to 1346 is provided by the conflict between the Saxons and the bishopric of Transylvania culminating in the burning of the cathedral church in Alba Iulia and the killing of a great number of people in February 1277. This exceptionally violent event intrigued me because of the conflicting claims regarding the identity of the perpetrators and the way in which the community of the Saxons was held responsible for those acts at

3 See Popa-Gorjanu, ‘From Kenezii to Nobiles Valachi’; Drăgan, Nobilimea românească, pp. 113–23. 4 Sălăgean, Transilvania, pp. 165–235; Sălăgean, ‘“Regnum Transilvanum”’. 5 Pop, ‘Transylvania’. 6 Pop, ‘Transylvania’, pp. 267–68; Mályusz, Az erdélyi magyar társadalom, pp. 38–44. 7 The text of the union agreement of 1437 is in Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 4, ed. by Gündisch, pp. 638–40; the text of the agreement from 1438 is in Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 5, ed. by Gündisch, pp. 2–3. 8 The text of the union agreement is in Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 6, ed. by Gündisch, pp. 64–68. 9 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 6, ed. by Gündisch, pp. 292–95.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

certain stages.10 There are indications that an official version of the events was created, promoted, and employed (for its own advantage) by the bishopric of Transylvania. This version was challenged by another version of the events articulated by the representatives of the Saxons in 1309, who placed the blame for the destruction of the bishopric on a certain nobleman named Gyan (also Gaan, Gianinus), the son of Alard of Ocna Sibiului/Vízakna. The preservation of the cultural memory of the Saxons’ responsibility for the events of 1277 seems to have ceased after 1346, when the last reference to that episode appeared. The analysis of this event and the way its memory was articulated, modified, and communicated offers a complex case to reflect upon the cohesive or disruptive role of memory in the relationship between the Transylvanian ethnic groups. Collective memory refers to the set of information held by two or more people which can be passed, construed, and used for certain purposes. Cultural memory refers to information about the past that is expressed and distributed officially as well as supported and accepted by the group source of power — it is shared inside the group as the official, unchangeable vision of the past, and projected to the present and future. Communicative memory refers to the private memory of the members of society, and is shared but not supported or disseminated by the source of power. Jan Assmann has outlined the features of the concept of ‘communicative memory’, which consists exclusively of everyday communications. It is characterized by non-specialization, thematic instability, formlessness, wilfulness, and disorganization. The same author estimated that the duration of collective memory does not extend more than three or four generations, that is, eighty to one hundred years into the past.11 Communicative memory lacks the fixity which can be achieved through cultural development.12 In contrast to communicative memory, cultural memory has fixed points in time which could be ‘events of the past, whose memory is maintained through cultural formation (texts, rites, monuments) and institutional communication (recitation, practice, observance)’.13 Cultural memory, according to Assmann, has an important role in preserving and providing the knowledge from which groups derive their identity — and transmission of this knowledge depends on a need for identity.14 Another characteristic feature of cultural memory is its capacity for reconstruction of the past from fixed knowledge in flexible ways, which allow criticism or transformation according to needs or context.15 An Egyptologist interested in cultural history and anthropology, Assmann’s contributions to the definition of the concept of cultural

10 11 12 13 14 15

Popa-Gorjanu, ‘Conflict și memorie’. Assmann, ‘Collective Memory’, pp. 127–28. Assmann, ‘Collective Memory’, p. 127. Assmann, ‘Collective Memory’, p. 129. Assmann, ‘Collective Memory’, p. 130. Assmann, ‘Collective Memory’, p. 130: ‘Cultural memory exists in two modes: first in the mode of potentiality of the archive whose accumulated texts, images, and rules of conduct act as a total horizon, and second in the mode of actuality, whereby each contemporary context puts the objectivized meaning into its own perspective, giving it its own relevance’.

75

76

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

memory are extended broadly, beyond the scope of this study which seeks to examine the role of memory as a cohesive or disruptive factor in multi-ethnic societies. As we will see below, during the late thirteenth and the first half of the fourteenth centuries, communicative memory and elements of what could be called cultural memory were involved in the interactions of Transylvanian groups in a process that can be deemed as identity formation. Not all the ethnic groups inhabiting Transylvania were involved in this process, rather only two of them: the Saxons and the Hungarians. Several different moments of remembrance of the violent event which took place in Alba Iulia on 21 February 1277 allows for the identification of divergent memories regarding the perpetrators. The clergy of Alba Iulia were not only victims of the violent actions, they were also in charge of the creation and preservation of cultural memory. How was Transylvania’s multi-ethnic character represented in the communicative and cultural memory of the age? Can it be ascertained whether any of those types of memory generated cohesion or disruption? Which ethnic groups were mentioned/ described/assigned any role? The first textual products that can be registered as pertaining to the concept of cultural memory are medieval narratives. The earliest narrative source mentioning the population of Transylvania is the Gesta Hungarorum, by Anonymus, the notary of King Béla. This chronicle is considered to be literary fiction by some historians and was declared a toponymic romance by the most recent editor of the English translation, Martyn Rady, because the author wrote stories of heroes who gave their names to various places or rivers, or because the toponyms were employed in order to create fictional individuals. The credibility of the account as a source for ninth- and tenth-century political history has been rejected by modern and contemporary critics because it mentions Slavic or Vlach leaders defeated by Hungarians, whose existence could not be corroborated by references in other sources. However, it was conceded that the description might have projected the ethnic situation of the thirteenth century back into the ninth and ten centuries.16 Transylvania’s ethnic situation was described in chapters XXIV and XXVII of the chronicle, when a certain chieftain called Tuhutum/Tétény explored ‘terram Ultrasilvanam’, where a certain Vlach named Gelou ruled (‘ubi Gelou quidam Blacus dominium tenebat’). The inhabitants of this region were described as ‘the basest people in the world because they were “Blacis” et “Sclavi” and they had no other weapons than bows and arrows’. Their prince was not steadfast and had no good warriors who could dare to withstand the Hungarians’ audacity because they had suffered many injuries from the Cumans and Pechenegs.17 After receiving permission from Prince Árpád, Tuhutum crossed the forest with his army and went against ‘Gelou ducem

16 Rady and Veszprémy, eds, The Deeds of the Hungarians, pp. xxvii–xxxi; for a different assessment of this source see Madgearu, The Romanians; see also Dániel Bagi’s article in this volume where he assesses the virtues and drawbacks of these two narrative sources for the discussion of multi-ethnicity in the context of the medieval Kingdom of Hungary. 17 Rady and Veszprémy, eds, The Deeds of the Hungarians, p. 60, ‘et habitatores terre illius viliores homines essent tocius mundi, quia essent Blasii et Sclavi, quia arma non haberent, nisi arcum et sagittas et dux eorum Geleou minus esset tenax et non haberet circa se bonos milites ut auderent stare contra audatiam Hungarorum, quia a Cumanis et Picenatis multas iniurias paterentur’.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

Blacorum’. In the battle, the latter lost his life and his people swore allegiance to Tuhutum whose heirs ruled ‘terra Ultrasilva’ until the time of King Stephen. Much ink has been spilled over the real existence or fictional character of this ‘dux Blacorum’. Since so many issues regarding the chronicle are still problematic, it should at least be agreed that writing sometime during the thirteenth century (no exact date of the gesta has been accepted so far) about the conquest of the region, the author believed that Romanians (Blaci) and Slavs inhabited the area before the arrival of the Magyars. By the early thirteenth century, Romanians appeared in the written records of Transylvania, while the Slavs had vanished. The account also mentioned Pechenegs and Cumans. A forest of Romanians and Pechenegs (‘silva Blacorum et Bissenorum’) located in southern Transylvania was recorded in the 1224 charter of privileges granted by King Andrew II to Transylvanian Saxons.18 To what extent the description of the Romanians and Slavs from Transylvania as the ‘basest people in the world’ reflected reality is a matter of conjecture. From the point of view of those who proclaimed Anonymus to be a fairytale writer, this does not matter since the story was fictional. It matters, however, for the question of the building of cohesion and the contribution of memory to this process. That description could have referred to the status or to the material standing of Romanians from Transylvania at the moment of writing. Concerning military activities, Romanians were mentioned as participants in a campaign led by Joachim, count of Sibiu, to Vidin in Bulgaria at the beginning of the thirteenth century, with an army consisting of Saxons, Romanians, Szeklers, and Pechenegs.19 Whether they used only bows and arrows or were equipped with other weapons as well is again difficult to ascertain. The use of these weapons was not exceptional to Romanians as such weapons were typical for the light cavalry of the Szeklers or Pechenegs as well.20 A deeper analysis of this instance of memory would require many components that are absent. The extent to which this writing was read in that age or could have influenced attitudes towards those described like that, or could have been a factor of cohesion or disruption in the multi-ethnic environment is impossible to answer.

Simon of Kéza on Szeklers and Romanians (Blacki) The author Simon of Kéza is much better known than the previously mentioned writer. He wrote his gesta in 1282, and gave little attention to Transylvania and its inhabitants in his work. While Anonymus used the Hun/Scythian origin of the Hungarians, thus allowing his heroes to claim the inheritance of Attila, Simon developed and extended the fictional narrative of Attila and that of the Huns. Although he did not deal with

18 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, pp. 20, 23, 27, 35. 19 ‘Iwachino comiti Scibiniensi […] rex ipse comitem Iwachinum associatis sibi Saxonibus, Olacis, Siculis et Bissenis in subsidium illi transmisit’, Szentpétery, Az Árpád-házi királyok okleveleinek, p. 277; Vásáry, Cumans and Tatars, p. 59. 20 Berend, Urbańczyk, and Wiszewski, Central Europe, p. 257.

77

78

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

Transylvania, he added a description of the Szeklers and Romanians (Blackis). Thus, according to his narrative, after the death of Attila, 3000 Huns remained in campo Chigle until Árpád’s arrival; however, they were not called Huns, but Szeklers (Zaculos). As the Hungarians came back to Pannonia, the Szeklers joined them at the margins of Rus’ and participated in the conquest of the country. However, they were not settled in the plains but on the border of the mountains where they shared the fate of the Romanians (Blackis) and used their alphabet.21 These narrative sources failed to record the process of settlement of various populations in Transylvania, offering no information about the arrival of Saxons, one of the important ethnic groups of this region from the twelfth century onwards. An explanation for this situation is that the settlement of various groups in Transylvania was still recent in the thirteenth century and the knowledge of the origin and moment of arrival of each group was part of communicative memory. Waves of settlers arrived during the twelfth century and the process of colonization continued during the thirteenth century. This dynamic process is attested in charter sources and was used by modern and contemporary historians in order to reconstruct its stages. The cultural memory of the ethnic groups of Transylvania crystallized in much later writings, such as the descriptions of the province written in the sixteenth century by Nicolaus Olahus. This author presented each population and offered descriptions of their qualities, standing, and whereabouts, including approximations regarding their origins. Nicolaus Olahus recorded the surprising idea that it was no other than Charlemagne who was responsible for the settlement of the Saxons in Transylvania, an inference he drew based on linguistic similarities. In the case of Hungarians and Szeklers, the author mentioned that both groups used the same language, with some peculiar words employed only by the latter. Language similarity was also used to buttress the explanation of the Romanians’ origin in the ancient Roman colonies.22 Such examples of the combination of ethnographic observations and components of cultural memory might be amplified by an analysis including other contemporary writings, such as those left by Georg Reicherstorffer or Anton Verancsics. However,

21 Simon of Kéza, The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed. by Veszprémi and Schaer, p. 70: ‘Remanserunt quoque de Hunnis virorum tria millia ex praelio Crimhildino erepti per fugae interfugium, qui timentes occidentis nationis in campo Chigle usque Arpad permanserunt, qui se ibi non Hunnos, sed Zaculos vocaverunt. Isti etenim Zaculos Hunnorum sunt residui, qui dum Hungaros in Pannoniam iterato cognoverunt remeasse, redeuntibus in Rutheniae finibus occurrerunt, insimulque Pannonia conquestata partem in ea sunt adepti non tamen in plano Pannoniae sed cum Blackis in montibus confinii sortem habuerunt, unde Blackis commixti litteris ipsorum uti perhibentur’. 22 Nicolaus Olahus, Ungaria. Atila, trans. by Antal, pp. 92, 94: ‘In hac sunt quattuor genere nationes: Hungari, Siculi, Saxones, Valachi; inter quos ineptiores bello putantur Saxones. HUNGARI, et SICULI, eadem lingua utuntur; nisi quod Siculi quaedam peculiaria gentis suae habeant vocabula: de quibus, in fine operis latius dicemus. SAXONES, dicuntur Saxonum Germaniae esse coloniae, per Carolum Magnum traductae: quod verum esse arguit, linguae utriusque populi consonantia. Valachi, Romanorum coloniae esse traduntur. Eius rei argumentum est, quod multa habeant communia cum idiomate Romano […]’. For an in-depth analysis of the ideas regarding the origin of Romanians in medieval and humanist writings, see Armbruster, Romanitatea românilor, and also Almási, ‘Constructing the Wallach ‘“Other”’.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

this article will now focus on a case of preserving the memory of a Transylvanian event at the end of the thirteenth century to the mid-fourteenth century.

Memories of the Attack on the Bishopric of Transylvania 1277–1346 This section considers the place of memory as a cohesive or disruptive factor for a multi-ethnic society, based on a case study of the way the destruction of the cathedral church in Alba Iulia in 1277 was remembered and used by Transylvanians. The analysis concentrates on the context and the actors who used the memories regarding that event in response to the current needs of those who shaped them. Authorized to issue legal documents for various lay beneficiaries,23 the cathedral chapter of Alba Iulia acted as a place of authentication. Moreover, it was also the place of preservation of authentic copies of legal documents guaranteeing the property rights of lay landowners. The unfolding of a tense relationship between the Saxon community of southern Transylvania and the bishopric of Alba Iulia during the last decades of the thirteenth century and the first decades of the fourteenth century provided the circumstances in which the interplay of collective and cultural memory of the event from 1277 became instrumental. The Saxons of Transylvania were the descendants of various groups of western settlers, predominantly Germans, who started to settle in the province from the midtwelfth century. Although during the colonization process various ethnic names were employed, such as Flandrenses, Theutonici, Latini, or Saxones, during the thirteenth century the generic name of Transylvanian Saxons became dominant.24 The roots of the conflict between the Saxon community and the bishopric of Alba Iulia date back to 1189–1191, when the collegiate church of Sibiu (‘ecclesia Theutonicorum Ultrasilvanorum in libera prepositura sit constitutam’) was established for the Flandrenses settled by King Géza II.25 The foundation of this church created a separate ecclesiastical structure to which several Saxon communities in the area of Sibiu belonged, while other Saxon communities remained under the jurisdiction of the bishop of Transylvania. Thus, from 1224 the unified community of Saxon guests lived in two different ecclesiastical structures, one depending on the bishop of Alba Iulia and the other on the collegiate church of Sibiu, which came under the jurisdiction of the archbishop of Esztergom. Sibiu grew to become the leading town of the Saxons of Transylvania, and after the turn of the thirteenth century played an important role in coordinating the activities of other Saxon groups in their disputes against the cathedral chapter of Alba Iulia. Several scholars specializing in the history of Transylvania have attempted to identify the causes and to reconstruct the course of actions leading to the violent

23 Vekov, Locul de adeverire. 24 Nägler, Die Ansiedlung, pp. 206–07. 25 Turcuș, ‘Fondarea prepoziturii sașilor’.

79

80

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

destruction of the Alba Iulia cathedral in 1277.26 Recently, Tudor Sălăgean has integrated this event into a series of clashes between aristocratic parties competing for political power in the kingdom of Hungary in the 1270s.27 The destruction of the bishopric of Transylvania in 1277 resembled a similar event, which took place in 1276, when the bishopric of Veszprém in western Hungary was attacked and destroyed. Thus, the weight of external factors, that is political alliances between opposite aristocratic parties competing violently for power and involving the Transylvanians, received due attention. The Transylvanian circumstances explaining the motivation of the attack point to the intention of Count Gyan, son of Alard of Ocna Sibiului, the leader of the Saxons, to take revenge against Peter, bishop of Transylvania, and some archdeacons of the cathedral chapter who had instigated the murder of Alard. In dealing with the remembrance of the attack led by Gyan, the son of Alard, I have tried to look at the moments, contexts, and individuals who remembered him and his deeds and the significance and motivation of recollecting those facts. The most significant cases of remembrance did not occur in historical writings, but in judicial contexts, when Transylvanians, either members of the cathedral chapter, Saxons, or noblemen invoked or employed the memory of Gyan’s deeds for different purposes. Of course, there are several short accounts of this event in royal documents which recorded benefits granted to the bishopric and cathedral chapter from Alba Iulia with the purpose of mending the losses suffered in that attack.28 There are also references to the destruction and loss of the seal of the cathedral chapter, which functioned as a place of authentication (‘locus credibilis’), and the subsequent requirement affecting all possessors of authentic documents to present their charters to be sealed with the new seal. These early references to consequences of the attack are less significant for the investigation of the question of memory as a cohesive or disruptive factor than later examples of recollection that we find in 1308–1309, 1344, and 1346. The earliest account of the violent event was produced on 30 May 1277, and was perhaps inspired by Bishop Peter of Transylvania, who was participating in an assembly of the prelates of Hungary gathered in Buda, in order to find a solution to the political crisis and to request the support of the pope in pacifying the country. This letter, issued by Stephen, archbishop of Kalocsa, offered the most detailed description of the events and could be regarded as the first attempt at constructing the memory of the facts. The importance of this document is that it offers a set of data against which later versions of Gyan’s deeds can be compared. It was a report destined for the pope and is one of the most detailed accounts as it offers information on Gyan and the attack against Alba Iulia and its consequences. The document was issued in an assembly summoned by the bishops of the main churches of Hungary with the aim of putting an end to the quasi-anarchical situation of the kingdom. 26 Teutsch, Geschichte der Siebenbürger Sachsen, pp. 59, 66; Temesváry, Erdély középkori püspökei levéltári, pp. 58–65; Velescu, ‘Der Aufstand der Sachsen’, p. 46; Göllner, Geschichte der Deutschen, pp. 61–62; Gündisch, Siebenbürgen, pp. 54–55; Papacostea, Between the Crusade and the Mongol Empire, pp. 253–54; Vekov, Locul de adeverire, pp. 137–40. 27 Sălăgean, ‘“Regnum Transilvanum”’, pp. 177–81. 28 Documente privind istoria Romîniei, vol. 2, ed. by Roller and others, pp. 189–91.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

The first lines of the letter reported the destruction affecting churches in Hungary, particularly the calamities suffered by the bishop and clergy of the Transylvanian Church, caused by the shrewd deeds of wicked men. The perpetrators and their acts were indicated collectively as the ‘accursed Saxons’ living in the province, whose tyranny had caused the ruin of the Church.29 The blame assigned collectively to the community of Saxons from Transylvania indicates an imprecise identification which is at variance with later versions of the events. Concerning the main protagonist of the disturbances from Transylvania, the text only contains an allusion to the unceasing persecution and systematic plunder of Church revenues performed (together with accomplices) by a certain Saxon, Gyan (Gaan), the son of Alard, an execrable man.30 Most likely, this formulation referred to holding back church revenues, possibly from Ocna Sibiului, the place of his residence. Given the geographical proximity between this salt-mining town and Sibiu, it may well have been that Alard and Gyan effected a de facto submission to the prepositura Cibiniensis, thus refusing the payment of ecclesiastical dues to the bishop of Alba Iulia. Over the first decades of the fourteenth century, the payments of tithes by the Saxon priests to the bishopric of Alba Iulia continued to be one of the key problems dominating the relations between the Saxon community and the Church. The report goes on to describe how Gyan had gathered a mob of Transylvanian Saxons, who assaulted and occupied the cathedral on Reminiscere Sunday (21 February). The attackers desecrated and divided holy relics, objects, books, and vestments among themselves. Afterwards, the church was set on fire with a savagery typical of Tartars.31 Eight canons, four archdeacons, and many clerics, together with almost 2000 lay Hungarians who took refuge in the church, were killed.32 Moreover, the attacks extended to other churches as well and the Hungarians in Transylvania were slaughtered wherever they were caught. The bishop and the clerics were driven away like exiles and outlawed. Archbishop Stephen’s letter concludes by requesting

29 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 242: ‘Inter alia varia orrenda et enormia ecclesiarum vestrarum de regni Vngarie pericula crebris hominum versutiis malignorum fluctuantia destructiones indicibiles seu clades nefandissimas ecclesie Transsilvane, episcopi et totius cleri de eadem per crudelem tyrannidem Saxonum scelestissimorum inibi habitantium perpetratas quamquam ex toto propter nimiam sue factionis congeriem valeam minime, in parte aliqua compellor vestre sanctitati non modica cordis amaritudine propalare’. 30 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 242: ‘Videlicet quod quidam Saxo, vite detestabilis, nomine Gaan filius Alardi, cum suis complicibus, quasi episcopibus nequioribus adeo ipsam ecclesiam Transsilvana continuis persecutionibus et rapinis frustratim suis dilaniavit redditibus, quod ad exinanitionem devenerat iam finalem’. 31 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 242: ‘Qua nec dum contentus, congregata multitudine sue natione novissime de partibus Transsilvanis, elevato vexillo ecclesiam obsidens Kathedralem expugnavit et ea optenta seu occupata dispersis sanctuariis et reliquiis in plateis, calices, libros, cruces, vasa, sigilla capituli, indumenta sacerdotalia et omnia ornamenta ipsius ecclesie, proh dolor, in usus suorum immundissimorum distribuit sociorum et feritate demum usus tartarica ipsam combussit’. 32 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 242: ‘octo canonicos, quattuor archidiaconos et alios quamplures sacerdotes ac clericos de choro et circa duo millia Vngarorum utriusque sexus, qui causa defensionis in gremium ecclesie confugerant, in ipsa ecclesie flamme incendio concremavit’.

81

82

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

the pope to offer support for the restoration of order in the kingdom.33 The last details concerning the violent actions targeting Hungarian churches and population from the province raise questions regarding the nature of this conflict. The attacks may have concentrated on villages belonging to the bishopric and chapter of Alba Iulia, which might have been inhabited by Hungarians, but a large-scale interethnic conflict, as suggested by the passage of the letter, is difficult to prove. This particular detail regarding the targeting of Hungarians of Transylvania was dropped from later instances of remembering the events of February 1277. On the same day, the archbishop of Kalocsa and the bishops of Pécs, Vác, Györ, Oradea, Zagreb, and Transylvania notified the clergy of Transylvania about the excommunication of the Saxons participating in the violent actions of Gyan. In contrast to the previous description of the events, in this letter the term ‘Christians’ was used instead for Hungarians when mentioning those killed by the Saxons after the attack on the cathedral. The charter was preserved by the chapter of Alba Iulia, thus the reference to the excommunication of the Saxons made in 1309 could have been supported by the written memory accumulated in the archive of the chapter of Alba Iulia.34 More important for this investigation are the judicial circumstances, and the events that occurred three and even six decades later in which the issue of remembering Gyan was a matter of debate, public inquiry, or referred to as a model of anti-ecclesiastical action. The first example of using the recollection of Gyan’s destruction of the bishopric of Alba Iulia as an argument against the Saxon community appeared in 1309 in a judgement between the chapter of Transylvania and a group of priests from several Saxon deaneries, led by the dean of Sebeș. In 1308 the chapter of Alba Iulia, as plaintiff, summoned thirty-two priests from seven Saxon chapters and deaneries under the jurisdiction of the chapter to Buda to appear before the court of the papal legate, Cardinal Gentile.35 These were held to respond to accusations of ‘injuries, offences, 33 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 242: ‘Aliasque basilicas omnes Vngarorum, ad quas homines fuge presidio se receperant, combussit similiter plenas hominibus et confregit, hominesque universis gentis Ungarice in ducatu commorantes in quibuscumque latibulis, insulis seu munitionibus deprehendere potuit indiferenter gladio interemit et loci episcopum, canonicos superstites ac clericos, qui vix suam rabiem evaserant deo propitio tamquam proscriptos et exules profugavit’. 34 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 1, ed. by Jakó, p. 243; the letter dated 4 June 1279; Diplomatikai Fényképgyűjtemény, No 277184 (https://archives.hungaricana.hu/en/charters/ view/9675/?pg=0&bbox=-46%2C–2548%2C3781%2C-471); Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, pp. 130–32, dated 19 June 1278: ‘Cum itaque Gaan filius Alardi et suae sequaces malitiae ac inquietatis complices, Saxones partium Transiluanarum ecclesiam beati Mychaelis cathedralem rabie diabolica inducti et replete enormiter combusserit, archidiaconos, canonicos, sacerdotes, clericos et magnam multitudinem Christianorum in eadem et in aliis ecclesiis concremaverint aliosque innumerabiles ubicumque locorum deprehensos interfecerint, reliquias, cruces, calices, indumenta sacerdotalia et omnia ornamenta ecclesiarum cum libris ac aliis rebus necnon thesauro ecclesiae memoratae rapuerint, in ususque suos immundissimos usurpaverint, et ideo sententiam excommunicationis inciderint ipso facto […]’. 35 These were the deaneries of Sebeş, Şpring, the chapter from Coşdu, the community of priests from the archdeaconate of Târnava Mare, the chapter from Saschiz, Criş, and the archdeaconate of Târnava Mică.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

violations, dues, debts, tithes, revenues and others’.36 Due to the threats made by the voivode of Transylvania, who sided with the cathedral chapter of Alba Iulia in this matter, the legal representative of the Saxon priests was unable to reach the court in due time and as a consequence the representative of the chapter requested the sentencing of the Saxons for absence from court. It was during the following litigation, lasting six months, in which the legal representative of the Saxons attempted to demonstrate that there existed a reasonable impediment justifying their absence that Gyan’s story recurs. To achieve this goal of justifying their absence, the advocate of the priests presented several letters issued by the community of Saxons of Sibiu testifying that the voivode of Transylvania had threatened the Saxon priests and for this reason the community decided that it was better to avoid crossing the voivode’s territory for the preservation of peace between their province and the voivode.37 Confronted with this evidence, the advocate of the chapter invoked in his argumentation the old enmity that the Saxon community nurtured against the bishopric and chapter of Transylvania. He strengthened the argument by reporting the story of the attack from 1277, but omitted to mention Gyan.38 It seems that Philip of Cingoli, the advocate of the chapter, was well informed about the fact that, in 1277, Gyan and his companions were excommunicated, yet the blame for those deeds was extended to the community of the Saxons of Sibiu, who, as he argued, had remained excommunicated for three decades, and therefore their letters should carry no legal weight.39 This accusation was rejected a few days later by the legal representative of the Saxon priests, Berthold, dean of Sebeș, whose testimony sheds more light on the events of 1277 and at the same time makes clear that there existed a different recollection of those events. Berthold stated that the perpetrator of those deeds was a certain

36 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 240: ‘[…] quibusdam iniuriis, offensionibus et excessibus necnon censibus, debitis, decimis, redditibus et rebus aliis […]’. 37 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 252: ‘Nos Gobolinus, Nicolaus comites sedis Cybiniensis atque universitas eiusdem […] Quo percepto et audito nostrae discretione nobis visum est, quod iidem procuratores in terra permanent, ne forte per captivitatem eorum, quam in ipsis dominus vaivoda facere posset, robur firmum amicitiae et pacis inter dominum voivodam et provinciam rumperetur’. 38 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 254: ‘[…] dicit idem Philippus procurator substitutus, quod dicti Gobolinus et Nicolaus ac universitas Cibiniensis sunt capitales inimici capituli et ecclesiae Transsiluane predicte, et sic eorum testimonium et litera seu scriptura contra dictum capitulum non debet. Cum ipsa universitas anno domini M.CC.LXXVII. in dominica Reminiscere super eandem ecclesiam cathedralem manu armata irruentes, ipsam hostiliter invaserunt comburentes in eadem ecclesia bene ad duo milia hominum utriusque sexus, et specialiter Agabitum archidiaconoum eiusdem ecclesie, Michaelem archidiaconum de Ozd, Bartholomeum archidiaconum de Kukullu, Racham plebanum et canonicum Albensem Transsilvanum et quam plures alios sacerdotes et clericos comburendo et auferendo omnia ornamenta, libros et instrumenta dictae ecclesiae et alia que dicta ecclesia inibi habebat’. 39 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 254: ‘Propter quod dicta universitas et singulares personae eiusdem excommunicationis sententiam incurrerunt, a qua nondum relaxati fuerunt, prout de praedictis est et fuit in regno vngariae publica vox et fama inter archiepiscopos, episcopos et praelatos ac barones et alios dicti regni’.

83

84

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

nobleman, Johannes, count of Ocna Sibiului (Salis Forio), who sought vengeance for the murder of his father, Alard, which, as rumour had it, had been arranged by Bishop Peter and three archdeacons. Johannes had gathered his relatives and friends, killed some people, and caused some fires. From Berthold’s report one can extract the Saxons’ view of the events from 1277, a view which completely excluded the responsibility of the community of the Saxons, as implied in the version of Philip of Cingoli.40 By saying that Gyan (here the Latin version of his name was recorded, he appeared variously in sources as Gaan, Gyan, Geaninus, and Johannes) was a nobleman, Berthold was not wrong because, indeed, Ocna Sibiului was not in the territory of Saxon jurisdiction, but in that of the noble counties. The way that he was identified in various recollections, either as a Saxon, or as a nobleman, was part of the ongoing debate concerning the responsibility for the events of 1277. He also diminished the number of perpetrators of violence by referring to relatives and friends. Berthold’s testimony ended by reproaching the advocate of the chapter for having used the remembrance of a closed disagreement (‘sopita discordia’).41 A brief conclusion points to the importance of the interpretation of the 1277 events for both the chapter of Alba Iulia and for the advocate of the Saxons. At the same time, his reproach raises the question of the selectiveness of memory. Obviously, invoking the events of 1277 in order to weaken the opponent’s arguments by attacking the moral capacity of the Saxon community of Sibiu was perceived as a decisive argument for dismissing the defendants’ proofs. But at the same time, the reproach for bringing the deeds that the Saxons probably disavowed back to memory suggests an approach that sought to maintain a good relationship in the complex situation of the province. The enmity held by the Sibiu community against the chapter of Alba Iulia, asserted by Philip of Cingoli, became the subject for the cross-examination of various witnesses. Questions were formulated as to whether there was peace between the Sibiu community and the chapter for the previous two years, if the Saxons of Sibiu had been enemies of the chapter before that, if they hated (odiant) the chapter and if the witnesses believed that the Sibiu community had helped the opponents of the chapter with letters and envoys out of hatred against the chapter, and if they were secretly injuring the chapter.42 Several prelates and clerics were summoned to

40 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 255: ‘Et quod dicitur de invasione Albensis ecclesiae et combustione hominum et quorundam canonicorum et de aliis, quae in exceptione sunt, non obstat. Nam si quid de praedictis factum est, hoc factum est per quondam nobilem nomine Johannem filium Alardi comitis de Salisforio, qui Johannes voluit ulcisci mortem dicti patris sui, quam procurasse dicitur episcopus Albensis, collectis consaguinis et amicis aliqua incendia et hominum caedes fecit, hoc faciens contra episcopum Petrum et tres canonicos, qui ipsam mortem procuraverunt. Et praeterea quidquid fuerit, hoc non obstat, nam facta fuit pax plena, et post haec dictus episcopus per dictam provinciam pluries ut ubi placebat ivit consecrando ecclesias et altare et alia faciendo cum canonicis Albensis ecclesiae et sine eis, ut pater inter filios facere consuevit’. 41 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 256: ‘Et certe salva pace procuratoris capitulo indecens reputo, ut scintilla sopite discordie ad memoriam reducatur’. 42 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 267: ‘Super VII articulo de pace, quaerantur, quomodo sciunt, quod a duobus annis citra fuerit pax, et nunc sit etcetera et quis illam pacem fecit, et si prius errant dicti Cibinienses inimici praedicti capituli, et interogentur, si

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

respond not only to these questions but also to other doubts raised by the advocate of the chapter of Alba Iulia regarding the validity of sealed letters issued by the Saxons. Only one of the various witnesses testifying before the court could offer answers regarding the relationship between the Saxons and the chapter in the past, while others focused in their responses on the legal procedures and the acceptance of various types of official letters in courts. The witness who offered important clues about the relationship between the Saxons of Sibiu and the chapter of Alba Iulia was a certain canon named John, born in Vințu de Jos, and a member of the chapter of Alba Iulia. By 1309 he was fifty years old, and thus could speak about aspects that other documents hardly reveal. Although he affirmed that he wished his chapter to win the litigation, his answers did not support the claim regarding the hostility of the Saxon community of Sibiu against the chapter of Alba Iulia. On the contrary, his responses described a peaceful and even friendly relationship between the Saxons of Sibiu and the members of the chapter, whom he saw conversing in the market of Sebeș. According to Canon John, the Germans were those who brought the peace by demolishing the towers and strongholds of some noblemen who caused disturbances.43 To some extent, his testimony echoes the reproach Berthold made to the advocate of the chapter for recalling a settled disagreement back to memory. Asked whether there was enmity between the Saxons of Sibiu and the chapter, he admitted that thirty years earlier there was some discordia, which is a mild way of referring to the 1277 events in Transylvania.44 Given his origin in a Saxon town, one may consider that despite being a member of the chapter of Alba Iulia, he was less favourable towards the condemnation of the Saxons of Sibiu. A line of attack that the advocate of the chapter of Alba Iulia had used in his argumentation concerned the role of Voivode Ladislas Kán in impeding the Saxon legal representatives to reach the judicial court

credit, quod inter se odiant, scilicet Cibinienses contra dictum capitulum et e contra, licet nunc in personis non offendat eos, et si credunt quod dicti Cibinienses propter odium, quod in corde habent contra dictum capitulum foveant adversarios dicti capituli cum literis et nunciis, et si ipsi Cibinienses libenter occulte damnificarent dictum capitulum, si possent, et etiam in publico, si non timerent’. On the demolition of illegal fortifications in the 1280s–1290s, see Rusu, Castelarea Carpatică, pp. 407–08. 43 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 277: ‘Interrogatus quomodo scit, dixit quia vidit illos de Cibinio conversari cum dictis de capitulo Transsiluano et e converso dictos de capitulo cum hominibus de Cibinio in pace et tranquillitate tamquam amicos a dictis duobus annis citra et ante dictos duos annos. Interrogatus in quibus locis, dixit quod in Millenbach et in aliis locis […] Interrogatus quis fecit dictam pacem inter eos, dixit quod Theotonici. Interrogatus quomodo scit, dixit quod scit tali modo, quia Theotonici de partibus illis destruxerunt turres et fortalitia quorundam nobilium de partibus illis, quae impediebant bonum statum et pacem provinciae, et hoc facto ex tunc fecerunt proclamari, quot omnes libere et secure irent, redirent et starent per totam illam provinciam et sic postea securitas viguit ibi usque modo et adhuc viget. Et ista constant ipsi testi tamquam uni de partibus illis, qui vidit et sensit’. 44 Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte, vol. 1, ed. by Zimmermann and Werner, p. 277: ‘Interrogatus si ante dictam pacem errant inimicitiae inter eos, dixit quod iam sunt triginta anni, quod fuit quaedam discordia, sed benedictus dictus, sopita fuit et est. Interrogatus si est modo odium inter dictum capitulum et dictos Cibinienses, dixit quod nullum odium est, quoniam videt eos invicem conversari tamquam veros amicos’.

85

86

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

of the papal legate in Buda. The Saxon chapters claimed this impediment in order to justify their failure to attend the court at the time of summoning and brought several letters supporting this claim. John’s deposition again weakened the argument of the advocate of the chapter of Alba Iulia that the voivode had secured safe travel to the Saxon representatives by stating that at the beginning the voivode had forbidden Saxon representatives to cross his territory and that he learned about this from hearsay while he was at Vințu de Jos. The next instance of recalling the events of 1277 occurred in 1344 in a judicial setting. The place was the congregation of the Transylvanian estates, convoked by the new voivode of Transylvania at Turda. These assemblies had a primarily judicial role and all nobles, representatives of the Szeklers and of the Saxons, participated, as well as people of any other origin and condition. Six jurors from each of the seven Transylvanian counties were elected from among the nobles. Their role was to listen to the allegations of litigants and to confirm or reject them based on their knowledge and a sworn oath of speaking the truth. At this assembly the archdeacons of the chapter of Alba Iulia were required to respond to the claims of a young man, called Blasius, who presented an old document issued in 1269, based on which he affirmed that the chapter was illegally holding a landed property that was his by right of inheritance. The archdeacons examined the charter of the young man and indicated that its writing and the seal were not the ones used by the chapter of Alba Iulia, but an old and obsolete one. The recollection of the story about the attack and destruction of the bishopric and its sacristy was thus invited by the necessity of explaining why the document presented by the young man was invalid. The participants in the assembly, nobles and jurors, listened to the response of Alba Iulia archdeacons and had to confirm the assertions of the representatives of the bishopric, having been asked three times. The story recorded in the document did not mention the year of the attack, it only said that once upon a time, Gyan the son of Alard the Saxon, ‘by then the strongest among the Saxons, had associated with many other similar companions in evilness and in his bloodthirsty and savage outburst’, and had destroyed the church by fire and ordered seven canons and many other clerics be burned inside it. In those events their old seal was lost together with the old deeds, privileges, and copies of privileges of the nobles kept in their archive. Then, the king had asked the nobles from Transylvania to bring their charters for confirmation under the new seal of the chapter from Alba Iulia, within three years.45 This historical digression was built and

45 Erdélyi Okmánytár, vol. 3, ed. by Jakó, p. 103; Original in Batthyáneum Library: ‘[N]os Stephanus woyuoda Transiluanie… premisso woywodatus honore sublimate primam nostram congregationem in partibus Transilvanis universis nobilibus et Syculis trium generum Saxonibus ac aliarum quarumlibet nationum eiusdem partis hominibus pro compesscendis furibus, latronibus raptoribus et qualibus nociturnitatis arte suos victus querentibus ac pro reformatione status eisdem partis ut huiusmodi malefactorum generibus…, nullius esset firmatis pro eo maxime, quia Gyan filius Alardy Saxo tunc potentissimum Saxonum adiunctis sibi quampluribus suis complicibus Saxonibus, sua seva et tiranicali potentia olim ipsam Albensem ecclesiam Transsilvanam comburreret et in eadem septem canonicos, cum aliis clericis et laicis cremari fecisset diversas alias predationes incendia,

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

presented in the form of a pleading in order to demonstrate the lack of validity of Blasius’s document. According to the customs of the congregation, the allegations of the archdeacons were to be confirmed by the jurors, who were asked three times whether the events unfolded as the story of the defendants showed, and they duly confirmed it. Whether it was only the argumentation that persuaded participants of what happened, or a simple repetition of well-known facts, is difficult to discern. According to Assmann, communicative memory lasts three or four generations; thus knowledge of the events of 1277 could still have been remembered by the nobles, or at least by the oldest of them. This historical discourse recalled the legal consequences affecting all Transylvanian landowners whose charters had been sealed with the former seal of the chapter. The language of the story maintained negative epithets when referring to Gyan and his companions, but failed to mention the year of the attack. Apart from its effectiveness in winning the case for the bishopric (Blasius’s claim was turned down), the recollection of the events worked at several levels. The remembrance was structured in the terms proposed by the chapter. On hearing the deposition of the clerics, the participants had the possibility of verifying its veracity against the background of what was considered public knowledge. We have no possibility of knowing whether the nobles present had a break for discussion or for establishing whether what was told was similar to what was known to everyone in the assembly. Finally, by recounting the story of the loss of the old seal, the clerics succeeded in rejecting Blasius’s claim, but they also seem to have obtained another unintended effect, that of bringing the violent action against the bishopric of Transylvania back into public knowledge. A document written on 28 August 1346 by the chapter of Oradea is preserved in the Batthyáneum Library in Alba Iulia. Ladislas, archdeacon of the bishopric of Transylvania and lector of the chapter of Oradea, recorded a complaint on behalf of the chapter of Alba Iulia against the vice-voivode Peter of Iara. Archdeacon Ladislas had been the legal representative of the chapter of Oradea, and was to supervise a procedure of introduction in possession of Peter of Iara. The vice-voivode had obtained the royal donation for Oarda village, which according to Peter of Iara belonged to the royal right of donation. That allegation proved wrong when the representative of the chapter of Alba Iulia countered the king against donating that village, asserting that it belonged to the Transylvanian bishopric. Being visibly vexed by the opposition of the church, according to the document recorded by the chapter of Oradea, the vice-voivode responded furiously: this church of Transylvania should be destroyed and burned down together with its canons and servants, that is the chapter, with all its possessions and inheritances, as it was in the time of Gyan the son of Alard, who commanded that the church and some of its canons be burned so that there will remain nothing at all. And spolia, et devastationes eidem ecclesie suisque Canonicis inferendo. Quo etiam tempore Sigillum ipsius Capituli cum diversis privilegiis et paribus privilegiorum nobilium in eorum sacristia seu conservatorio ad servandum repositis et relictis, amissum extitisset et crematum […]’.

87

88

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

then he said that if something like this would happen, he would be the first and the foremost who would participate in such a destruction, burning and razing that church and its canons, and if he will live, he will cause many tenants of this church to cry and pour down tears on account of that prohibition.46 Whether vice-voivode Peter had indeed uttered the words as recorded in the charter of the chapter from Oradea is impossible to know. The record is in Latin, while most probably the language of the verbal anger was Hungarian. Thus, besides remembering the discourse, a translation of it was also made. Archdeacon Ladislas, who recorded the complaint on behalf of the chapter of Alba Iulia, participated in the procedure and was probably one of the victims of the vice-voivode’s verbal tirade. From the insults and threats said on the occasion, a selection was made between the less serious and the incriminating elements. Thus, the cleric chose to record the threats of the destruction of the bishopric and the accompanying oppression of the church’s tenants. What importance did Peter’s reference to Gyan’s deeds play? Were the clerics impressed with the mention of his name? If they decided to have a record of the fact, the answer is positive. Thus, a different dimension of the remembering of Gyan emerges: that of a catalyst of hostility towards the Church. In this case, the efforts of the Church to build a negative image of the Saxons and of their deeds from 1277 onwards are understandable.47 Its evocative potential was probably dangerous. It is impossible to follow how the clerics of Alba Iulia responded to this outcome, or if they connected the outburst of Peter of Iara with the historical digression presented by their colleagues to the nobles of Transylvania two years earlier. The memories of the attack on the bishopric of Transylvania were recorded in judicial contexts and they were therefore framed and used as arguments for winning various litigations. Most of the records were produced by the victims of the attack or representatives of the institution which suffered the losses. Certainly, not only the Church was affected, although it seems that the Saxons led by Gyan in 1277

46 Documente privind istoria Romîniei. Veacul XIV C. Transilvania, vol. 4: (1341–1350), pp. 313–14, no. 445. Batthyáneum Library, Box. I, Doc. no. 134: ‘[…] Ibidem ipse Petrus viceuoyvoda ingente furore repletus inter ceteras et multas alias comminationes et verba oprobria dixisset fulminando: O utinam ipsa ecclesia Transilvana et ministri eiusdem Canonici videlicet et Capitulum cum omnibus possessionibus et hereditatibus cremari et succendi deberet et incineri sicut tempore Gyany fily Alardy qui ipsam ecclesiam et plures Canonicos in eadem igne fecerat concremari in tantum ut nec lapis supra lapidem remaneret in eodem et si hoc fieri deberet primus ipse principalis capitaneus in destructione concrematione ac interemptione earundem ecclesie et canonicorum fieri vollet atque interesse. Et quod ipsam prohibicionem si viveret per plures et multos jobagiones ecclesie defleri facere, atque lacrimari […]’. 47 Peter was an important official in Transylvania, although in 1346 he was at the beginning of his political career. He was vice-voivode during the office holding by three voivods, all members of the Lackfi family. He started under Stephen Lackfi, who received the office in 1344. Although Peter was mentioned only in 1345, he probably held the job from the beginning until 1350 and then again under the voivode Dennis Lackfi (1359–1367) and in 1368, under Nicholas Lackfi. He died in Wallachia in 1368. See Engel, Magyarország világi archontológiája, p. 12; for a genealogy of Peter of Iara’s family see Lázár, ‘Járai Péter alvajda és maradékai’.

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

have targeted the possessions of the bishopric and the chapter of Alba Iulia. In the context of disputes between Saxon chapters under the jurisdiction of the bishopric of Transylvania and the chapter of Alba Iulia after the turn of the thirteenth century, the Saxons of Sibiu were blamed for the deeds committed by Gyan and his forces after they lent legal support to the Saxons of the Sebeș chapter. The legal representative of the chapter accused the Saxons of Sibiu of enmity against the chapter, but unlike the letter sent to the pope in 1277, no mention was made of the Hungarians who were put to the sword by the Saxons. This is not surprising since memory is an act of continuous reconstruction which depends on the interests and circumstances of an act of recollection. In 1309, it was no longer relevant to point to the damage inflicted by the Saxons on other inhabitants of the province, but to show that the chapter of Alba Iulia was the victim of Saxon vexations. During the litigation, the advocate of the chapter also accused the Saxons of various other drawbacks, such as being excommunicated for three decades or even that of receiving the penalty of excommunication for supporting Otto of Bavaria in his bid for the throne of Hungary. The version of the 1277 events produced by the representative of the Saxon chapters attempted to remove the blame from the Saxons of Sibiu, showing that Gyan was a nobleman. All other sources called him a Saxon. In 1344, he was pronounced the most powerful Saxon of his time. While earlier records mentioned the relatively vague multitude of people from the same place as participating in the violent actions, later recollections limited this to the relatives and friends of Gyan. Slowly, the collective responsibility of the Saxons in memories of the events of 1277 gave way to responsibility assigned to Gyan and his close circle. In public discussion of the past in 1344, he was the main person responsible for the burning of the church and the killing of several archdeacons. In 1309, the testimony of Canon John affirms that there was a peaceful relationship and even friendly communication between the Saxons of Sibiu and the members of the chapter. Moreover, the latter could travel safely through Saxon territory. What survived in the cultural memory of Transylvania was preserved by the members of the chapter of Alba Iulia regarding the burning of the cathedral of Alba Iulia by Gyan the Saxon. The memory of the archdeacons and the clerics killed was also preserved. The multifaceted issue of remembrance of the violent 1277 events has also touched upon the importance of oblivion of the same. Berthold of Câlnic’s reproach for recalling the memory of ‘extinguished’ disagreements was certainly in the interest of the Saxons in that context. Ironically, the verbal tirade and the threats proffered by the angry vice-voivode Peter of Iara against the chapter of Alba Iulia in 1346 seem to justify Berthold’s view. Remembering the burning of the cathedral could be interpreted by noblemen not only in the terms proposed by the chapter, but also as an example of anticlerical action to be replicated. Was that dimension at work at all after 1346, when the mentions of Gyan ceased altogether?

89

90

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

Works Cited Primary Sources Diplomatikai Fényképgyűjtemény [Collection of Photographs of Documents at the National Hungarian Archives]: https://archives.hungaricana.hu/en/charters/ Documente privind istoria Romîniei. Veacul XIII C. Transilvania, vol. 2: (1251–1300) [Documents concerning the History of Romania: Thirteenth Century. C. Transylvania, vol. 2], ed. by Mihail Roller and others (București: Editura Academiei R.P.R., 1952) Documente privind istoria Romîniei. Veacul XIV C. Transilvania, vol. 4: (1341–1350) [Documents concerning the History of Romania: Fourteenth Century. C. Transylvania, vol. 4] ed. by Mihail Roller and others (București: Editura Academiei R.P.R., 1955) Erdélyi Okmánytár. Oklevelek, levelek és más írásos emlékek Erdély történetehéz I. 1023–1300 [Transylvanian Calendar: Charters, Letters and Other Written Documents regarding the History of Transylvania. Vol. 1, 1023–1300], ed. by Zsigmond Jakó (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1997) Erdélyi Okmánytár. Oklevelek, levelek és más írásos emlékek Erdély történetehéz III. 1340–1359 [Transylvanian Calendar: Charters, Letters and Other Written Documents regarding the History of Transylvania. Vol. 3, 1340–1359], ed. by Zsigmond Jakó (Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 2008) Nicolaus Olahus, Ungaria. Atila, trans. by Gyöngyvér Antal (Iași: Institutul European, 1999) Notary of King Béla, The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed., trans., and annotated by Martyn Rady and László Veszprémy (Budapest: CEU Press, 2010) Simon of Kéza, The Deeds of the Hungarians, ed. and trans. by László Veszprémi and Frank Schaer (Budapest: CEU Press, 1999) Szentpétery, Imre, Az Árpád-házi királyok okleveleinek kritikai jegyzéke (Budapest: Magyar Tudományos Akadémia, 1927) Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Deutschen in Siebenbürgen, vol. 1: 1131–1342, ed. by Franz Zimmermann and Carl Werner (Hermannstadt: Krafft, 1892) Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Deustchen in Siebenbürgen, vol. 4: 1416–1437, ed. by Gustav Gündisch (Hermannstadt: Krafft & Drotleff, 1937) Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Deustchen in Siebenbürgen, vol. 5: 1438–1457, ed. by Gustav Gündisch (Wien: Böhlau, 1975) Urkundenbuch zur Geschichte der Deutschen in Siebenbürgen, vol. 6: 1458–1473, ed. by Gustav Gündisch and others (București: Editura Academiei, 1981) Secondary Studies Almási, Gábor, ‘Constructing the Wallach “Other” in the Late Renaissance’, in Whose Love of Which Country? Composite States, National Histories and Patriotic Discourses in Early Modern East Central Europe, ed. by Balázs Trencsenyi and Márton Zászkaliczky (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 91–130 Armbruster, Adolf, Romanitatea românilor. Istoria unei idei [The Roman-ness of Romanians: The History of the Idea] (București: Editura Enciclopedică, 1993)

m u lt i - e t h n i c i t y an d m e m o ry i n me d i e val t ransy lvani a

Assmann, Jan, ‘Collective Memory and Cultural Identity’, trans. by John Czaplicka, New German Critique, 65 (1995), 125–33 Berend, Nora, Przemysław Urbańczyk, and Przemysław Wiszewski, Central Europe in the High Middle Ages: Bohemia, Hungary and Poland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2013) Drăgan, Ioan, Nobilimea românească din Transilvania între anii 1440–1514 [The Romanian Nobility of Transylvania from 1440 to 1514] (București: Editura Enciclopedică, 2000) Engel, Pál, Magyarország világi archontológiája 1301–1457 [The Secular Archontology of Hungary 1301–1457], vol. 1 (Budapest: MTA Történettudományi Intézete, 1996) Göllner, Carl, ed., Geschichte der Deutschen auf dem Gebiete Rumäniens, Erster Band 12. Jahrhundert bis 1848 (București: Kriterion, 1979) Gündisch, Konrad, Siebenbürgen und die Siebenbürger Sachsen (München: Langen Müller, 1988) Lázár, Miklós, ‘Járai Péter alvajda és maradékai’ [Peter of Iara and his Descendants], Turul, 4 (1884), 152–56 Madgearu, Alexandru The Romanians in the Anonymous Gesta Hungarorum. Truth and fiction (Cluj-Napoca: Romanian Cultural Institute, 2005) Mályusz, Elemér, Az erdélyi magyar társadalom a középkorban [Hungarian Transylvanian Society in the Middle Ages] (Budapest: MTA Tudomány Intezét, 1988) Nägler, Thomas, Die Ansiedlung der Siebenbürger Sachsen (București: Kriterion, 1992) ———, ‘Transylvania between 900 and 1300’, in History of Transylvania, vol. 1: Until 1541, ed. by Ioan-Aurel Pop and Thomas Nägler (Cluj-Napoca: Center for Transylvanian Studies, 2010), pp. 208–16 Papacostea, Șerban, Between the Crusade and the Mongol Empire: The Romanians in the 13th Century (Cluj-Napoca: Center for Transylvanian Studies, 1998) Pop, Ioan-Aurel, ‘Transylvania in the Fourteenth and the First Half of the Fifteenth Century (ca. 1300–1456)’, in History of Transylvania, vol. 1: Until 1541, ed. by Ioan-Aurel Pop and Thomas Nägler (Cluj-Napoca: Center for Transylvanian Studies, 2010), pp. 267–80 Popa-Gorjanu, Cosmin, ‘From Kenezii to Nobiles Valachi: The Evolution of the Romanian Elite of the Banat in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries’, Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU, 6 (2000), 109–28 ———, ‘Conflict și memorie în Transilvania secolelor XIII–XIV. Episcopia Transilvaniei și Gyan fiul lui Alard’ [Conflict and Memory in Thirteenth and Fourteenth Century Transylvania: The Bishopric of Transylvania and Gyan son of Alard], in Secolul XIII pe meleagurilor locuite de români [The Thirteenth Century in the Romanian Inhabited Territories], ed. by Adrian Andrei Rusu (Cluj-Napoca: Mega, 2006), pp. 143–77 Rusu, Adrian Andrei, Castelarea Carpatică. Fortificații și cetăți din Transilvania și teritoriile învecinate (sec.XIII–XIV) [The Carpathian Castellation: Fortifications and Fortresses in Transylvania and Adjacent Territories (Thirteenth–Fourteenth Centuries)] (ClujNapoca: Mega, 2005) Sălăgean, Tudor, Transilvania în a doua jumătate a secolului al XIII-lea. Afirmarea regimului congregațional [Transylvania in the Second Half of the Thirteenth Century: The Development of the Congregational Regime] (Cluj-Napoca: Center for Transylvanian Studies, 2003)

91

92

co s m in p o pa- g o r j an u

———, ‘“Regnum Transilvanum”: The Transylvanian “Congregatio Nobilium” and its Role as a Legal Community at the End of the Thirteenth Century’, in Government and Law in Medieval Moldavia, Transylvania and Wallachia, ed. by Martyn Rady and Alexandru Simon (London: School of Slavonic and East European Studies UCL, 2013), pp. 21–28 Temesváry, János, Erdély középkori püspökei levéltári kutatásai alapján [The Medieval Bishops of Transylvania based on Archival Research] (Cluj-Kolozsvár: Ny. Minerva Irodalmi és Nyomdai Műintézet Részv.-Társaságnál, 1922) Teutsch, Georg D., Geschichte der Siebenbürger Sachsen für das sächsischen Volk, vol. 1: Von den ältesten Zeiten bis 1699 (Hermannstadt: Krafft, 1925) Turcuș, Șerban, ‘Fondarea prepoziturii sașilor ca proiect transilvan al Sfântului Scaun’ [The Establishment of the Saxons Collegiate Church as a Transylvanian Project of the Holy See], Anuarul Institututului de Istorie ‘G. Barițiu’ din Cluj-Napoca, 49 (2010), 21–37 Vásáry, István, Cumans and Tatars: Oriental Military in the Pre-Ottoman Balkans, 1185–1365 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005) Vekov, Károly, Locul de adeverire din Alba Iulia [The Place of Authentication of Alba Iulia] (Cluj-Napoca: Centrul de Studii Transilvane, 2003) Velescu, Oliver, ‘Der Aufstand der Sachsen aus dem Jahr 1277’, Forschungen zur Volks-und Landeskunde, 17.1 (1974), 41–52

Jan Zdichynec

Religion and Ethnicity in the Humanist Historiography of the Czech Region

The problem of the interdependence between changes in a social and political situation on the one hand, and an endorsed vision of an ethnically conditioned past on the other (a problem presented in the previous chapter by Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu in terms of a local community), is crucial for understanding the practices of memory promoted by humanist historiographers in Czech lands. Czech humanist historiography is the subject of this article, which shows three stages of a process of historiographic change: political and cultural/religious changes impacting the ethnic consciousness of the inhabitants of the Czech Basin, leading to an alteration in the traditional meaning of historiography, which leads to a sharpening of ethnic awareness and a major political change. In the late Middle Ages and in the early modern era, individual population groups often defined themselves according to both religion and ethnicity. This is true for the lands of the Crown of Bohemia as well, which was an intricate complex of historic regions: the Kingdom of Bohemia, the Margraviate of Moravia, Upper and Lower Lusatia, and the Duchy of Silesia. Each of these lands had their autonomous, independent estate community; they were joined by the person of the king and by other institutions, as was the general diet, the king’s deputies in particular lands (called mainly ‘Landvogt’, ‘Hauptmann’, or ‘capitaneus’; in English ‘sheriff ’ or ‘vicegovernor’), and from the sixteenth century onward, by several central offices established by Ferdinand I of Habsburg (1526–1564). There was above all the Chancellery of Court, Chamber of Court, or the Court of Appeals (‘Appellationsgericht’), but their influence was yet to be strengthened and advanced.1 There were also numerous unofficial relations between



1 Unfortunately, the most recent publications of Czech research on the Crown of Bohemia are published mainly in Czech. We can, however, refer to Bahlcke, Regionalismus und Staatsintegration. For the structure of the Crown of Bohemia there is still the very useful Peterka, Rechtsgeschichte der Böhmischen Länder. For the crown in the context of the Monarchy of Habsburgs see Evans, The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy. Jan Zdichynec  •  ([email protected]) is a Lecturer in Early Modern History at the Institute of Czech History in the Faculty of Arts of the Charles University, Prague. His main research areas are the history of the Crown of Bohemia in the Early Modern Era and the history of Church institutions. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 93–114 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120059

94

j a n zd i c hyn ec

the particular lands of the Crown of Bohemia, above all on the social, economic, and cultural planes, especially between the elites (nobility, clergy, burghers). Several languages were spoken in the space of the Crown of Bohemia in the Middle Ages and in the early modern era: Czech, German, Polish, Sorbian, and of course Latin.2 In each of the lands of the Crown, Germans lived alongside the Slavs, as did Jews. From the 1430s onward, another distinguishing element appeared alongside language diversity: different Christian denominations. Side by side with Roman Catholics were the Utraquists (Calixtines), who were officially accepted by the Church as they recognized the papal succession. Yet in contrast to the Roman Catholics, who accepted the celebration of communion under one ‘kind’, the bread/ body of Christ only, the Utraquists served communion strictly and consistently under both ‘kinds’, bread/body and wine/blood of Christ. Moreover, they used Czech as their liturgical language. More complicated was the position of the Unity of the Brethren, founded in 1457 — a radical and oft-persecuted Christian sect that adhered strictly to the Hussite doctrine. Later, at the beginning of the 1520s, the Lutheran faith spread and became dominant, especially among the German inhabitants of Bohemia and Moravia.3 This paper will review the preliminary research by some current Czech scholars (myself included) on this subject, which is part of a wider project. It will then briefly describe the ethnic development of the lands of the Crown of Bohemia, which shall be the basis for my own research — that is, the interpretation of selected works of humanist historiography. During the first phase of the project, our goal is to use individual studies to find out whether the cohesion of the lands of the Crown was in part caused by official historical memory, and by shared values and traditions. Owing to the specific nature of the preservation of sources in Central Europe, we will be able to trace answers to these questions to as early as the thirteenth century.4 We will focus on the important theme of the unity of the Crown of Bohemia, the relationship of the Crown to the Holy Roman Empire, the definition of the Crown in opposition to its neighbours (Crown of Hungary, Crown of Poland), dynastic continuity (later transferred in part to the estate level), and the need to maintain order and hierarchy in the society of that period. Very briefly, we can summarize the issue of the early history of Czech lands by saying that at the end of the period of migration of the sixth century, German tribes in (current) Bohemia and Moravia were replaced by Slavs, who then dominated until the thirteenth century. The Slavic population was decisive in the area of both Lusatias





2 See also the article by T. Velička in this volume. 3 On the religious and ethnic rapport between the Lands of the Crown of Bohemia in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, there are not many relevant studies even in Czech; in English see e.g. Doležalová, ‘National and Religious Aspects’; Kaminsky, A History of the Hussite Revolution; Šmahel, Die hussitische Revolution; Gindely, Geschichte der Gegenreformation in Böhmen; Bosl, Handbuch der Geschichte der böhmischen Länder; Eberhard, Konfessionsbildung und Stände in Böhmen. 4 This part of the project has been carried out by Prof. Lenka Bobková, Ph.D. and Tomáš Velička, Ph.D. Lenka Bobková collaborated on this paper, and Tomáš Velička provided his own paper on the use of languages in the municipal chancelleries.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

in the early Middle Ages, as well as in later Silesia, where the Slavic tribes were present very early. In the following remarks, I will deal only with Bohemia and Moravia. According to previous research by František Šmahel,5 the gradual formation of Czech linguistic and national solidarity, the predecessor of the Czech nation, took place in the high Middle Ages. The first decisive element was the stability of Czech territory, surrounded by mountain ranges that defined boundaries still largely unchanged even today. The fact that the territory belonged to a single state was of remarkable significance. The specific evolution that can be linked to the Hussite movement was very important, as was the centralizing role of the metropolis. The Czech political nation originated mostly in Prague, and Czech nationalism centred and frequently still centres around that very city. The existence of opposition — most often German — in the self-definition process is always significant, as is the religious aspect of national identity. Prague and the other urban agglomerations of the Czech lands had always been inhabited not only by Slavs, but also by merchants from other ethnic groups, such as Germans from different parts of the Holy Roman Empire, Italians, Flemings, and Jews; nevertheless, their numbers were negligible for a long time. Only at the very beginning of the thirteenth century did a significant wave of German colonists began to settle in Bohemia and Moravia — not only did they come to the older towns and obtain new urban charters from the King, but they also founded new towns and established new villages in the countryside.6 At the end of the thirteenth century a dense network of towns had in fact been created, where the elites were mostly German. The five-year guardianship of Otto V of Brandenburg (Otto der Lange, 1246–1299) over the minor King of Bohemia Wenceslas II strengthened the self-consciousness and inner cohesion of the Bohemian (Czech) aristocracy and clergy against the German ‘occupants’; at the very beginning of the fourteenth century, a strong antagonism between the Czech aristocrats and German burghers appears in the rhymed Chronicle of Dalimil, the first chronicle of Bohemia written in Czech.7 The language has already been often identified with the nation, language being thus the most important distinctive feature of various ethnic groups. For example, language acted as a marker to designate delegations to the Council of Constance, through which the Czech vernacular was indirectly launched on its ecclesiastical career.8 The period of the reign of kings from the House of Luxembourg was, in the proper sense of the word, significant for its international influences on the Kingdom of Bohemia. On the one hand, the Bohemian elites were confronted with continuing influences from the German parts of the Holy Roman Empire and new ones from Italy and France; on the other, the Czech language developed rapidly, becoming 5 Šmahel’s views are summarized in his book Idea národa v husitských Čechách. 6 Cf. Klápště, The Czech Lands. 7 Bláhová, ‘Dalimil’. For a recent edition of the chronicle, see Kronika tak řečeného Dalimila, trans. by Krčmová and Vrbová; for an old German translation, see Die alttschechische Reimchronik des sogenannten Dalimil, ed. by Daňhelka, which is recently analysed by Adde-Vomáčka, La chronique de Dalimil. 8 Evans, ‘Language and Politics’, p. 157.

95

96

j a n zd i c hyn ec

another literary language in Bohemia (including translations of the Bible), breaking the monopoly of Latin and German. R. J. W. Evans and other authors stress the precocity of this development, also in comparison with other Slavic nations.9 The Czechs began to feel themselves jeopardized by foreign elements, and they developed an awareness of their own specificities as well. We can observe the beginnings of a definition of boundaries between the two great language communities in Bohemia around 1350.10 The king, above all the polyglot and multicultural Charles IV, acted of course as a universal monarch in the high Middle Ages, aware of the multi-ethnicity of his lands, which were of great importance at the eastern frontier of the Holy Roman Empire. Nevertheless, he promoted the core of his domains, the Kingdom of Bohemia, its Slavic language, and its political function as well. In his Golden Bull for the Empire (1356), Charles IV ordained that all Electors should make their sons learn the four languages of the Empire: German, Latin, Italian, and Slavic.11 The Czech language was probably used as a second language of communication in the framework of the Crown of Bohemia; its knowledge appears to be a criterion for choosing royal deputies in the lands of the Crown. In some monasteries such as those of the Canons Regular of St Augustine, Charles IV supported the acceptance of Czechs by birth and language; he founded the famous Benedictine Abbey of Emmaus for the celebration of the Old Slavonic liturgy; he established benefices for priests of Czech origin in newly gained territories, and supported chronicle writing detailing the Crown of Bohemia as well. Very interestingly, one of the court chroniclers of Charles IV, Přibík Pulkava of Radenín, developed two — ultimately incorrect, but very influential — etymologies suggesting that the Czechs are from a mystically chosen nation: ‘Slavs’ deriving from ‘slovo’ (word), ‘Bohemia’ from ‘Bůh’ (God), alluding to the beginning of the Gospel of John.12 Similar linguistic divisions are evident in the shaping of towns, especially those of Prague (the Old Town was mainly German, the New Town mainly Czech); the monasteries of several Church orders — above all the Cistercians — were strictly reserved for people of German origin. The nobility seems to be, at that time, mainly bilingual, with the exception of new families from neighbouring German territories.13 In spite of all these factors, ethnic diversity probably did not lead to serious conflicts in the late Middle Ages, up until the beginning of the fifteenth century. Nevertheless, both ethnic groups lived quite separately which is attested to, for example, by the small number of mutual linguistic borrowings between Czech and German. Tensions intensified greatly during the Hussite era, from the very beginning up until the war years. These tensions are prefigured in the decree of Kutná Hora 1409, with which King Wenceslaus IV changed the relation of votes of the university 9 10 11 12

Evans, ‘Language and Politics’, p. 158. Hlaváček, ‘Dreisprachigkeit’; Čornej, ʻCizí, cizozemec a Němec’. See Bobková, ‘Die Goldene Bulle’. See Pynsent, ‘Czech Nationalism’, p. 13. Quotation: ‘Dicitur enim Boemia a boh, quod Deus interpretatur in lingua slouanica. Hac itaque interpretacione a nomine Dei Bohemi dicti sunt’, in Przibiconis de Radenin dicti Pulkavae Chronicon Bohemiae, ed. by Emler, p. 4. 13 Boháč, ‘Národnostní poměry’; Graus, Die Nationenbildung, pp. 89–110, 170–81.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

nations in favour of the Czech nation,14 resulting in the exodus of German patricians from Prague, the partial exchange of inhabitants in the country, etc. In this period, ‘ethnicity’ received an added component of faith (a true Czech had to be a true Hussite, or alternatively, a true Catholic), and it required several generations of truly Czech ancestors, as Jerome of Prague (d. 1416) postulated in his famous university speech in the framework of quodlibet.15 In this context, it is important to note the distinction between ‘our’ Germans (who lived in Bohemia) and ‘stranger’ Germans (mainly Germans from the Holy Roman Empire), a distinction which is present in late medieval and early modern narrative sources. Important political communication began to be written in Czech (Hussite declarations — Manifestos, records of diets and of other negotiations), and the famous Hussite chant and autonomous liturgy was developed in Czech. In the 1420s and 1430s, interestingly, Bohemia came politically closer to Poland, during the time of the interregnum when the Czechs were trying to find their new king in Poland or Lithuania (Zygmunt Korybut of Lithuania, or rather King Władisław II Jagiello of Poland).16 At the same time the Hussites were seeking allies in the Orthodox Church of Byzantium, and were aware of the old tradition of Slavonic liturgy. By the first half of the fifteenth century, the Czech language acted indisputably as a language of Church and state, and remained a stable component of the political scene through the 1620s. The sixteenth century then saw the development of humanist literature in the Czech language and repeated legislation on the use of Czech in public spaces: several language laws stipulated that judicial proceedings, records of diets, and boards of the land should be written only in Czech, with some limitations and reliefs for foreigners (that is, Germans). The diet appears to have been conducted solely in Czech, but German and bilingual documents were generated as well. Language created more of a problem at the general diets, which from time to time brought together representatives of all the lands of the Crown of Bohemia — it sometimes led to marked friction, such as in 1611, when Bohemia and Moravia insisted that all business ex praesidio be promulgated in Czech, with translations for other provinces. The latter were allowed to use German from the floor, as long as an official translation was read out in full session.17 Royal coronation privileges were issued in Czech and Latin; the estates despatched their external correspondence in Latin or, more reluctantly, in German.18 The non-Czechs were obliged to pursue their actions before the court in Czech as well — if they were not acquainted with this language, they had to hire interpreters, as early as under the Vladislavské zřízení zemské (The Land Constitution of Władysław of Jagiello) from 1500. These principles were also confirmed in municipal

14 In summary, we can refer to the recent anthology: Zilynská, Universitäten. 15 For this personality, see Fudge, Jerome of Prague. 16 On the other hand, we can already observe symptoms of misopolonism by Přibík Pulkava: see Pynsent, ‘Czech Nationalism’, p. 29 (Poles are considered to be worse Christians than the Czechs). 17 Evans, ‘Language and Politics’, p. 160; Novák, ‘Jazyková prakse’. 18 Evans, ‘Language and Politics’, p. 160; see Sněmy české od léta 1526 až po naši dobu, ed. by Gindely and others.

97

98

j a n zd i c hyn ec

law. All translations in the Czech language had to be duly supervised and approved according to this legislation. There is not yet any statistical evaluation of the ethnic situation in sixteenth-century Bohemia and Moravia. Considering our possibilities for demographic analyses of an era which recorded so few statistics, it seems impossible to ever have one, but after the strong ‘Czechization’ of Bohemia in the post-Hussite era the number of Germans seemingly grew again.19 Many Italians — artisans and artists — and some Spaniards (nobles, diplomats) came as well; the last decades of the sixteenth century were typical of growing national and religious tensions, especially in the Kingdom of Bohemia. We can mention a theatre play from 1594, which expresses fears of a German (and Lutheran, both aspects are strongly interconnected) minority in a confrontation in the manner of the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre, or mentions of Germans as snakes or hornets in the contemporary Czech literature.20 The conclusion of this evolution is the language law of 1615,21 which declared the exclusivity of the Czech language. It draws on an older regulation from the end of the fifteenth century, but is much more radical. Having or not having active knowledge of Czech implied significant legal and political consequences; for example, lords, knights, and burghers who did not have an active command of Czech were supposed to be effectively excluded from public life, and their descendants (unless they assimilated) were to enjoy a very restricted right of inheritance. Likewise, the freedom of association for foreigners living in Bohemian towns was to be limited; people of Czech descent who would hesitate to use their mother tongue should be severely punished. However, these sanctions were not sufficiently supported by judicial and executive powers — in the ethnically diverse society of the post-Rudolphian era, the whole project remained unfeasible. Furthermore, in the religious space language differences were more and more relevant. Thus, the Utraquists in Bohemia and Moravia identified themselves with their faith and native Czech language, as did the Unity of Brethren (although they communicated with Martin Luther and Uldrych Zwingli, and had several German people in their ranks). The Catholics were either universal adherents of Rome and the pope, or Czech rather than German; the Lutherans were connected strongly with the German language, so much so that their construction of the Lutheran temple of St Salvator in Prague Old Town was at the same time a demonstration of the force of German Lutheranism in the imperial metropolis.22 The uprising of the estates (1618–1620) was everything but national, although the older Czech historiography understood it as a clash between ‘national’ elites of Bohemia and imperial, universal Catholic Habsburgs;23 a significant portion of the

19 These changes were not so visible in Moravia, which was not as affected by the Hussite wars. See Míka, ‘Národnostní poměry’; Klik ‘Národnostní poměry’. 20 See Pánek, ‘Nation and Confession’, p. 141. 21 Evans, ‘Language and Politics’, comparing the political role of languages, mainly in the Holy Roman Empire, Rzeczpospolita, and France; Pánek Pánek, ‘Nation and Confession’, pp. 139–40. 22 See Das Spenderbuch, ed. by Schreiber. 23 This opposition is very strongly expressed in the work of a French historian dealing with the Czech history, Denis, La Fin de l’indépendance Bohême.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

rebels were German in origin. However, their defeat opened the way to the forced re-Catholization which was embodied, with Catholicism as the sole permitted religion, in the new Land Ordinance of Ferdinand II (Erneuerte Landesordnung, 1627 for Bohemia, 1628 for Moravia).24 It meant the end of the coexistence of several denominations in the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Margraviate of Moravia. As concerns the language situation, this ordinance instituted quite new conditions as well: German was equated with Czech in official communications. This did not prevent the development of Baroque patriotism in Bohemia and Moravia. The identity of Bohemia, especially among elites, remained strong, and was always based on language — but this is not the central issue of this paper.25 With the exception of the previously mentioned Chronicle of Dalimil, the chronicle of Pulkava, and the open dissatisfaction of Peter of Zittau (d. 1339) with the new fashions and customs established at the Luxembourg court, the national diversity of the lands of the Crown of Bohemia is not reflected in detail in most medieval chronicles. Instead, they reflect the differences and conflicts of the time from the perspective of Czechs.26 More telling in terms of minorities and relations between them are the humanist chronicles and histories, which are the subject of my analysis below. I analyse Czech national historiography, with a focus on the perception of ethnic (or national) differences in various types of texts: in works of historic and literary fiction, in Church histories, in encyclopedic ‘home studies’, as well as texts popularized for a broad audience. To be sure, my analysis of the historiography represents only one side of various discourses about ethnicities. But my scope can be justified by various points: firstly, the historic narratives form an attempt at a complex view on ethnicities which was relatively accessible and which influenced intellectuals and other populations in the Czech lands as well as in Europe (we see traces of the influence of historiography in other types of texts as well). Secondly, in the early modern era, other sources like official documents (charters, records of diets, correspondence) are already abundant and they can only partially be taken into consideration, which several historians have attempted and which I will attempt as well in further analyses. Thirdly, historiography — the historical consciousness — determined other layers of local identities, as studies in the framework of the Cuius regio project have shown for example,27 although the notion of local identity is quite complex and very differently understood in research.28 And finally, it is well

24 See further in Gindely, Geschichte. Alessandro Catalano has recently published some interesting studies on the topic, see Catalano, ‘E. A. von Harrach (1598–1667)’, Catalano, ‘Das temporale wird schon so weith extendiret’. 25 Many recent studies deal with a baroque patriotism in Bohemia: see Maur, ‘Pojetí národa’; Ducreux, ‘Der heilige Wenzel’; Mikulec, ‘Der böhmische Himmel’. For the Enlightenment national consciousness in the Czech lands, we can refer to Kutnar, Obrozenské vlastenectví. 26 For a summary see Bláhová, ‘Dalimil’. Interesting conclusions about the historiographical consciousness of the medieval Czech Lands are shown by Fantysová-Matějková, ‘The Virtual Region’. R. B. Pynsent, as I have already shown, also works with narrative sources. 27 For the early modern era see Harc and Wąs, eds, The Strengthening of Silesian Regionalism. 28 See Wünsch, ‘Anmerkungen zum Identitätsbegriff ’.

99

1 00

j a n zd i c hyn ec

known how important a role history played in the system of humanist education — so the models transmitted by historiography had to act in identities ex definitione. In my research, I refer partly to earlier studies, namely essays by Eduard Maur and Zdeněk Beneš dedicated to early modern Czech historiography.29 Beneš in particular dealt repeatedly with narrative strategies about the coexistence of Czechs and Germans on the soil of Bohemia, just as with a discourse about the oldest origins of the Czech lands in humanistic historiography.30 Lucie Storchová’s theoretical studies as well as her analysis of the humanistic discourse of the Czech past also inspired my reflections.31 Some aspects of her research are complemented with my own analysis of selected works of historiography. Historians from Bohemia of the sixteenth and first half of the seventeenth century were usually ethnic Czechs; the views of ethnic Germans are much less well represented. Most of the humanist writers were members of the ‘national’ community formed a century or two beforehand, and in many ways they reflected this in their work. The writers were adherents of various religions: Catholics, Utraquists, and members of the Unity of Brethren. Out of the wealth of historiographical works written in Bohemia in the humanist era, I will focus on the most important examples. We must begin with a collection of texts by several unknown authors, later called the Staré letopisy české / Old Annals of Bohemia.32 The collection was gradually put together beginning in the 1430s, at the end of the Czech Middle Ages. Mentally, it reflects the burgher environment, and is a lively, natural narration with quite weak links to classical humanist education. The Annals are sometimes dubbed ‘The National Chronicle’ of the humanist and Podebrad era, written from the viewpoint of more or less radical Hussites. They deal neither with ancient Czech history nor with the origins of the Czech nation, so important for later humanist authors. Some events of the fifteenth century particularly invite a heated, nationally biased interpretation: for example, the struggles that followed the Decree of Kutná Hora. The narration clearly favours Czechs against foreigners (that is, Germans), blaming them for overpowering the Czechs and oppressing the Czech language.33 Czechs, much the same as their land, Bohemia, are not clearly defined in this narrative, and typically for the writing of the period they are indistinguishable from Prague burghers. According to the Annales, Czechs are all true Hussites, and both ethnic groups are often defined by what divides them; a more general characteristic and geographic definition of ethnicity is missing here. Along with Germans, other enemies include Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg and the pope’s Curia. Similarly, the Kalendář historický / Historical calendar by Daniel Adam of Veleslavín is written from the viewpoint of the burgher middle class. For us, it is a popularizing, 29 See Maur, ‘Der Begriff ’; Beneš, Historický text a historická skutečnost; Beneš, Historický text a historická kultura. 30 See Beneš, ‘Humanistický obraz dějin vlasti’; Beneš, ‘Regionalisierung und die Darstellung’. 31 Storchová, ‘A Late Humanist Treatise’; Storchová, ‘The Role of (Trans)National (Meta)Narratives’. 32 They circulated in various versions: I mention only two here: Staré letopisy české, ed. by Šimek and Kaňák; Staří letopisové čeští, ed. by Charvát. 33 Staré letopisy české, ed. by Šimek and Kaňák, pp. 40–41.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

didactic work. It was first published in 1590, and later it was often used and commented upon,34 up to at least baroque historiography — for example, Bohuslav Balbín, the Jesuit baroque historian, used it many times, as did many town chroniclers of the seventeenth and eighteenth century. According to the title, it is a short overview of histories that happened either in ‘other nations and lands, or especially in the great nation and Kingdom of Bohemia’.35 So as we read about nation and land, the author refers to the Czech nation and ethnicity, but he does not spell it out specifically. Also, the Czech country is defined rather vaguely — is it the Crown of Bohemia or the Kingdom of Bohemia to Veleslavín? There are some noteworthy epigrams in the introduction to Veleslavín’s work that celebrate the Czech virtues, in particular bravery, which is symbolized by the Lion in the Bohemian coat of arms. Bohemi are valiant (again, it is not clear whether he means speakers of the language or the territorial community),36 and are a natural component of the Germanic parts, relating to the heritage of the ancient Boii. In Veleslavín’s calendar, the legitimization element is represented by the interpretation of the history of Czech/Bohemian37 royal families, clearly linked to the Forefather Czech, the ancient forefather of Czech ethnic unity, associated with changes of regiment and administration in the Kingdom of Bohemia. The Duke of Croatia and Bohemia is clearly a Czech, the elder brother of Lech who later ruled Poland (this tradition goes back to medieval chronicles).38 He is said to have arrived to Bohemia around 644. This Bohemia, however, is part of the Roman Empire — although Czechs fight against the Empire, they still belong to it. On many occasions, Veleslavín focuses on critical moments of history where the Czechs and Germans clashed in the territory of Bohemia. Notoriously, the same moments are quoted in the works of other writers as well. Here we may mention Duke Spytihněv the Just, the ‘true lover of the Czech nation and language’, who ruled Bohemia in 1055–1061; he was installed by the Roman emperor Henry III, as was the custom of the day. Immediately after Spytihněv assumed power, he ‘expelled all

34 This text was printed more often: see Danyel Adam z Weleſlawjna, Kalendář Hyſtorycky Krátké, with an abbreviated modern edition: Daniel Adam z Veleslavína, Kalendář historický národa českého. See also Kubů and Picková, ‘Historické kalendáře’. 35 w ſlawném Národu a Králowſtwj Cžeském, title of the edition from 1590. 36 ‘Tam magnæ virtus cognita Gentis erit. / Bojemis validum pectus, proceráq; pulcrè / Forma, oculorum acies ignea, frónsq; patens. / Bojemis veſtita comis & Martia cervix, / Belligeræq; manus, intrepidiq; pedes. / Bojemis mens eſt audax, ſublimis, […] Vnde Leo, huic tantæ tua vis eſt inſita Genti? / […] Dvm varias peragrare plagas, & quærere ſedem / Cura fuit populo, qui tibi CZECHE comes: […] Sed poſtquam ſtatuit medijs Germanidos oris / Imperium, populi fortis & acris opus: / Mutatam volucrem ſubijt LEO fortis & acris, / Nec fruſtra: ſimiles Génsq; Leóq; ſibi. / Magnanimus, pugnax, & nulli cedere conſtans / Scit LEO, ſubjectis mitior eſse ſolet. / Iisdem etiam Bojûm donis gens aucta relucet, / Et plus virtutis quàm feritatis habet. / […] O magnum, quem Gens exornat tanta, LEONEM! O magnam Gentem, cui decus iſte LEO…’, unpaginated introduction of Danyel Adam z Weleſlawjna, Kalendář historický národa českého. 37 In the Czech language, there is only one word ‘český’, ‘Čech’ which does not allow us to distinguish between ‘Bohemian’ (rather land-oriented) and ‘Czech’ (rather language-oriented). 38 See Bláhová, ‘Tercius Lech… plantavit totam Silesiam’.

101

102

j a n zd i c hyn ec

Germans from the country under the threat of capital punishment, not excluding even his own mother’, who herself had German ancestors.39 Another traumatic moment of the Czech-German relationship is the battle of Domažlice (14 August 1431) — Veleslavín explains it rather as a national clash, although the religious motivation, the context of crusade, was much more relevant: both factors are typically mixed. Thus, Pope Eugenius declared the Cross and the Anathema on Czechs, because of the differences in religion, so that he set the Empire and the Germans against the Czechs.40 We must also mention that Veleslavín borrows many motifs from the chronicle of Václav Hájek, which will be described later. Prokop Lupáč of Hlaváčov, in his biography of Charles IV, displayed a similar ability to Veleslavín to spread historical knowledge to a wider audience in a very readable, vivid way.41 In his introduction, the author defends the role of history, of an ‘ars liberalis’ which is often derided by other disciplines, using such examples as that of Bohemian dukes who read — again according to the humanist fantasies of Václav Hájek — old chronicles and memoirs at the table. Then he begins his genealogy of the Bohemian sovereigns. He speaks anachronistically about the estates of Bohemia, who, in 1310, elected John of Luxembourg as the king of Bohemia (we cannot treat the estates as an established political power before the fifteenth century); in fact, he confused the Crown and Kingdom of Bohemia. Obviously, the dynastical and land concerns are the primary focus; the only ethnic issue to appear in his work is that of the Jews. Religious motivation is clear in the work of the conservative Utraquist preacher Bohuslav Bílejovský, published in Nuremberg in 1537 with the title Czech Chronicle, containing the way of Christian faith of communion under both kinds.42 Although Bílejovský wrote history and stories of Bohemia and of Czechs, and in Czech, his main aim was to present the history of the communion under both kinds (bread and wine), one significant specific of the Czech Utraquist movement. Historically, he considered it to be older and truer than the communion under one kind (bread). The work is clearly a polemic, it rails against those who serve communion under one kind — the Catholics — but also against a variety of Christian sects, namely the Unity of Brethren, and partially against Lutherans. Those who do not follow the true religion should be converted, because they are ‘Czechs by blood’. The traditional messianic ideas of Czech Hussites resound here, reminding us of their idea of the Chosen Nation. ‘Czechs are the faithful followers of God’s blood and God fights for them same as for the sons of Israel’.43 Bílejovský systematically shows when and how ‘our predecessors’ accepted the Christian faith and strives to prove that, from the very beginning, they served the

39 Danyel Adam z Weleſlawjna, Kalendář historický národa českého, unpaginated introduction: ‘Spitihněw přigmjm Sprawdliwý […] Byl prawý milownjk národu a yazyka Cžeſkého.Jakž na Knjžetſtwj doſedl / hned wſſecky Němce do třetjo dne pod hrdlem wypowěděl a w tom ani matky ſwé nevſſanowal…’. 40 Danyel Adam z Weleſlawjna, Kalendář historický národa českého, p. 40: [14 August]: ‘Léta MCCCCXXXI. Papež Eugenius wydaw na Cžechy, pro rozdjl w náboženſtwj, Křjž a Klátbu poslal legáta swého Juliána Kardynála, aby Ržjſſe a Němcůw proti Cžechům popudil’. 41 Lupacius, Hyſtorya. 42 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska. 43 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska, unpaginated introduction.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

Eucharist under both kinds, as they have continued to do so ever since the days of Saints Cyril and Methodius (ninth century).44 The heirs of this tradition are, according to Bílejovský, Utraquists, not Catholics, Lutherans, or Czech Brethren, competition among whom was quite fierce in Bílejovský’s day. Bílejovský also stresses the continuity of liturgy served in a Slavic language, again ever since the days of Great Moravia. He does not at all doubt that in the tenth century, Christianity was accepted by Czechs, that is by the Czech nation or tribe, and he sees no problem in the fact that sometime in the 970s the bishop of Prague was Dětmar, ‘a Saxon by family’.45 Interestingly, Bílejovský writes about the mission of the second bishop of Prague, Saint Vojtěch (Adalbert), to Hungary and Poland, but fails to mention the baptism of the Polish duke Měšek motivated by his marriage to Doubravka from the Přemyslid dynasty. For Bílejovský, the Benedictine monastery with Slavic liturgy founded by the Czech duke Oldřich at Sázava sometime around 1032 is very important. Similarly, he stresses that Charles IV, ‘lover of the Czech language’, founded the Prague Slavic (Emmaus) monastery, where the liturgy was recited in Old Church Slavonic, originally laid out by St Jerome. Typically (for Bílejovský), the communion under both kinds (bread and wine) was first doubted by Germans (although the author does not deal much with when and where those Germans in Bohemia came from); at the beginning of the fifteenth century ‘the Germans multiplied in Bohemia tremendously’, particularly at the university, and ‘were helping ecclesiastics opposing the truth’. Here, Charles IV plays an interestingly ambiguous role, as a founder of a Slavic monastery and at the same time of a university which supported Germans.46 Bílejovský informs us with imprecision about events after the death of M. John Hus: Queen Sophia is said to have declared war against Prague and introduced Germans into the Prague Castle47 (yet in reality, she supported Hus until his death and was not very active politically). Even Emperor Sigismund of Luxembourg was helped by the Germans in his struggle against Czechs — those Germans, however, along with other crusaders met the Czechs in the previously mentioned battle near Domažlice and ‘they were so scared that they messed in their pants and ran in fear’.48 Obviously, the confessional factor is more important than the national difference for Bílejovský: Sigismund is supported above all by the pope, cardinals, and crusaders, and the enemies of the Hussites are pagans.

44 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska, I, pp. 6–7. 45 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska, p. 9. 46 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska, p. 14: ‘Než zatoho počali niekteřij diwnie vwoditi aby pod obogi zpuſobú lehce rozdáwáno nebylo zwláſſtie čaſto a owſſem každy den wuobec. […] Mieli take niemcuo pomocz nebo ti giž podgednú byli. A Cyſarz Karel tehdaž do prahy včenij zřidil a nato přiſſlo niemcuo mnoho a ti pomáhali’. 47 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska: ‘Po ſmrti pak geho kralowa Zoffia [Václava] s niekterymi pany nayprwe walku zwlaſſt proti Praze zdwihla a niemce nahrad vwedla a weliku neſnaz a překažku činila až mala ſtrana wſſecka pohubena wypalena a zkažena namiſto byla’. 48 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeskaI, p. 20: ‘že prwe než čeſke woyſko male Božij ſtadečko opatřyli až kakagicz za nohawice ſtrachē bieželi. A tak v Domažlic mily Buoh (Papežowy ne ſwe) kardynaly legaty biſkupy y sgich kaplany y kantory a woyſky s křiži newinne krwe prolewače naſylnijky žhaře zaplaſſyl a zahnal a niektere wiernym čechō wſmrt poddal’.

103

104

j a n zd i c hyn ec

Many biblical parallels are present here, with a clear connection between the Czech Hussites and the ‘people of Israel’, for God was fighting for Czechs, for his truth.49 Another chronicle printed in Czech was published two years after Bílejovský, in 1539, by the Utraquist burgher Martin Kuthen of Šprinsberk (d. 1564), the Chronicle About the Foundation of the Czech Land.50 Kuthen interprets Czech history in the tone of the conservative Utraquists, yet he is more cautious than Bílejovský and purposefully leaves out the present conflicting events. He passes judgement very carefully even on the burning of M. John Hus. He knows the classical authors well, and is the first of the Czech chronicle writers to adopt the classical idea that Slavs were not the first inhabitants of Bohemia. Kuthen clearly refers to ‘our forebearers’; he stresses the continuity of Czech dukes and kings, and advocates for the Czech nation against ‘its greatest enemies’. These are the authors (such as A. S. Piccolomini) who consider Czechs, discredited by their different faith, to be a ‘swine nation […] that does not know God’s word and law’.51 Kuthen’s work is also clearly patriotic and apologetic — but we should mention that at the same time it is dedicated to the council of Prague Old Town. It is thus very oriented on the events in Prague, which is often identified with the whole (Czech) nation. Two other important points should be noted: he begins his exposition with Noah, as medieval authors did, and he considers the dukes and kings of Bohemia as holders, governors of the Czech nation. Interestingly, he deliberately takes less notice of the German inhabitants of Bohemia and Moravia and has an interesting thesis on the two nations, that Czechs from Croatia and Germans, who lived in these lands, mixed in the seventh century, and were later separated again. Otherwise, he accepts the ancient idea of Bohemia belonging to Germania. Kuthen mentions very briefly the baptism of Duke Bořivoj from Moravia (the Great Moravian tradition is not as important for him as it was for Bílejovský); Duke Spytihněv is the lover of the Czech language (as for Veleslavín), and the battle at Domažlice is described as a purely national conflict between Czechs and Germans. An answer to Kuthen’s book came from aristocratic Catholic circles — from the Catholic priest Václav Hájek of Libočany (d. 1553), who published his Kronika česká

49 Bílejovský, Kronyka czeska, p. 20: ‘Cyſař pak Zygmund nabadan gſa od papeže martina páteho aby čechy pogich wuoli připrawil a přinutil mage mnoho národuow křižowanych s legaty biſkupy y sgich kaplan. s niekoliko ſtran dozemie wtrhli negednú a mnohe zamutky y zahuby čynili ohniem mordem mužuo y žen ſtarych y mladych y dijtek newinných gedine pro krew božij yako pohanee. A toho toto ſmutnieyſſy ti narodowee ctnym pannam ymanželkam náſylee tak čynili až ge mořyli. A pro ohyzdu tiech naroduow a mrzkoſt neſtydatú kteraž nynij muož ſpatřena byti timto zawřijna bud. Praawie yakoby mieſſtianee Sodomſſtij a ſauſedee gich Gomorſſtij přytahli z nayhhlubſſyho pekla / takowe ſwatoſti gich woyſka byla. Patř toho papeže neſmyſlu protiwnika kriſtowa odhaniegiciho odkrewe kryſtowy w nijž založeno odpuſſtinij a očyſſtienij hřijchúw y muk zbawenij. Nebo ſam Buoh mocný pro prawdu ſwú boyowal yako niekdy za ſyny Yzrahelſke dawage nanie hruozu s nebe…’. 50 This work has also been re-published many times: the first edition is Kuthen, Kronyka o Založenij Zemie cžeſke; the second edition was published by D. A. Veleslavín, together with the Czech translation of the Chronicle of Bohemia by Piccolomini, Historia Bohemica. 51 Kuthen, Kronyka o Založenij Zemie cžeſke, unpaginated introduction: ‘zhowadilý národ’.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

[Czech chronicle] in 1541.52 His work is rather subjective and of a popular character. Just like the others, Hájek stresses the importance of the Czech or rather Slavic people and nation — after all, his goal is to ‘cultivate our Czech homeland’. Also similarly to Kuthen, he advocates for the Czech nation against belittlement and insults. Hájek is patriotic, and therefore, again, mostly anti-German. Worthy of note is Hájek’s take on the mythical history of pagan Czechs. Hájek presents it as an integral part of Czech history and fills it with exact data. This is why Libuše, the fortune teller, is a true Czech duchess for him, the grandmother of the Czech tribe which, according to Hájek’s story, truly contributed in the mid-eighth century to the building of the Czech state, its power structures, its castles and towns, its economy, and its legal system. It should be mentioned that the constant reference to law and order is a fixed element of Czech humanist thinking about history. Order is provided by the ruling power; after all, according to early modern thought, the Forefather Czech left Croatia because there was no order there. Hájek puts together various myths about the origin of Czechs, and he disputes the idea that Bohemia is in fact German land. Furthermore, he tries to distinguish between the terms Boemia and Czech land. Hájek arrives at an interesting compromise, saying that ‘we Czechs have our land from Germans, and our kin and language from Slovaks’,53 that is Slavs. In Hájek’s narration, many events have a sharp national edge. We may mention the battle of Brůdek in Šumava from 1040, when the Czech duke Břetislav conquered the Roman-German king. This event was cherished by many generations of Czech nationalists — throughout history, a victory of Czechs over Germans was a rare occurrence. The story was first presented, quite matter-of-factly, by the medieval chronicle scribe Kosmas. Hájek painted the event in the bright colours of his imagination — according to him, German warriors struggled through a thick forest, ‘fat, thirsty and breathing heavily’. To Hájek, the Roman emperor is the king of the Germans, even the representative of German nationalism, while, quite differently, Duke Břetislav supposedly encouraged his reluctant soldiers with these words: ‘Do not let Germans scare you. The German emperor must soon learn what my sword can do’, etc. Hájek’s chronicle worked on many subsequent generations of Czech historians. He influenced Veleslavín and Lupáč, and the baroque historians, too. It is worth noting that his work was also translated into German, quite early in 1596,54 and it influenced the whole of Europe also through the Latin history of John Dubravius, bishop of Olomouc, who assumed most of Hájek’s theses and stories.55 It is important for our topic that the works of Hájek and Dubravius criticize the Hussites, standing clearly on the side of Catholicism. They try to find examples of Czech martyrs, of true Catholics — but they do not avoid admiration for the heroic deeds of the Hussites also.

52 For a modern edition, see Hájek, Kronika česká. 53 Hájek, Kronika česká: ‘my Čechové máme naší vlast od Germánův a rod i jazyk od Slovákův’. 54 Böhmische Chronica Vvenceslai Hagecii. 55 First edited in 1552, a very interesting and more accessible version is the edition of Dubravius, Historia Bohemica.

105

1 06

j a n zd i c hyn ec

Less well known is the view of the Silesian native Martin Boregk. His Česká kronika [Czech chronicle] (1587)56 written in German expresses his gratitude to the land where he lived and worked for several years. In his work, land-based patriotism dominates the language-based one that was, at the time, typical for Czech authors. The fact he attempted to present the history of Bohemia in German is worthy of note. He is also heavily influenced by Hájek. He follows dynastical principles and is again very focused on Bohemia. Around 1600, fears of Germans were strengthening — confrontation with the foreign element helped to raise awareness of one’s own identity. Memoirs of the day, such as those written by Mikuláš Dačický of Heslov and Pavel Skála of Zhoř,57 often complained that Czechs live in discord and are unconcerned, while Germans and some other foreigners are bossy and expansionist. The increasing number of Germans and the decline of the Czech language were perceived as God’s punishment for Czech sins. These authors reacted to their contemporary situation, being strongly anchored in the discourse of the authors previously described above. The work by Jan Matyáš of Sudet is very scientific for its time.58 He tries to avoid old criticisms and conflicts, and to collect all possible testimonies about the peoples inhabiting the Czech lands. It was not easy; his work is full of contradictions, and often based on ancient authorities. Other national voices began appearing, especially Okřik (The Shout), written by the Utraquist Pavel Stránský in 1618. These relate to the ‘grand Slavic past’ and to the relations between the Slavic nations and tribes of today. They are defensive, growing out of an awareness of a numerical majority and the political dominance of the German element over the Czech one within the framework of Central Europe. They also reflect the fact that the Czech lands were unable to separate themselves from the Holy Roman Empire and often were considered to be the ‘best region of Germania’. Stránský reacts to the current influence of Germans, which was becoming stronger above all in Church life. He then developed the very important conception of the Czech state in his work De re publica bohema, written in exile after 1620 and published in the famous series of the Elsevier publishing house in Leiden.59 Stránský understands nation to encompass both ‘culture’ and ‘state’ at the same time. Singular nations are distinguished by several features, at first by language, but they must have their own territory as well: that is why Moravians are, for Stránský, a different nation than Czechs. Other characteristics are formed by customs and traditions: Czechs have their own constitution, their own language and customs, and law (thus the municipal law of towns of Bohemia, indeed of German origin, is for Stránský an old Czech law), their own currency: ‘confusing of language and coin wipes out the differences between nations and states […] so the ruler has to take care 56 Boregk, Behmische Cronica. 57 Dačický, Paměti [Memoirs]; Skála, Historie česká. The vast work of Skála was never published as a whole. 58 Matthias, De Origine Bohemorum. 59 First edition from 1634; the second was completed in 1643. See Stránský, Respvblica Bojema, and more in Maur, ‘Pojetí národa’.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

of preserving language as currency’.60 Linguistic purity is very important: Stránský interprets the germanization of some Czech towns in his time as the negligence of our government. He stresses the importance of the Czech language in history, also in contact with other lands of the Crown of Bohemia, which is not fully accurate. Stránský thought, as did the Hussite scholars and Komenský, that the common origin of the members of one nation gives it its force. He develops the older thesis of Czechs who came into a deserted land, and occupied it according to the common law. He distinguishes ‘state nation’ and ‘guests’ in Bohemia, the Czech state being a state of Czechs. These are, however, often mixed with the political estates. In Silesia, he speaks about an ethnic cluster of various Slavic and Germanic peoples, but not about nation; in Lusatia, the language differentiation has a social dimension, as its inhabitants are Slavs and Germans, the people who want to be more educated speak German, while the people of the countryside speak Slavic.61 As for foreigners, these are — again — for Stránský mostly Germans, with the famous quotation: ‘Všude lidé, v Chomutově Němci’ (‘there are people everywhere, in Chomutov there are Germans’). And in another part: Czechs are used to living more freely than people of the world’s southern regions. Poles are brothers, because of the linguistic proximity. Stránský thinks in Pan-Slavic categories and he tries to prove that Bohemia belongs to Sarmatia, not to Germania, not to the Holy Roman Empire, because it was not included in its systems of Machrionates and does not have its feudal system. It does not mean that the Czechs would be without defects: above all, they too easily adopt other influences, do not respect traditions, and are volatile.62 We can complete the very complex perspectives on Bohemian lands with the remark that, during the same time, the Czech Catholic scholars Jiří Pontanus and Kašpar Arsenius tried to invent a Catholic discourse of Czech history and re-people the Czech heaven with martyrs, thereby rehabilitating the heretic land in the eyes of Europe.63 The texts mentioned here resonated mostly in the local environment. I shall conclude my notes with the view of the Czech nation and land as it may have been available to educated readers outside the Czech borders: in the first place, there was the Czech History by Aeneas Silvio Piccolomini, who later became Pope Pius II (d. 1464).64 Piccolomini sees the Kingdom of Bohemia unquestionably as part of the Holy Roman Empire. His argument is not based on state, law, or history; rather, he refers to the notes of classical historians, beginning with Tacitus. Because the original inhabitants of Bohemia were Germans, the region was German from the dawn of time and belonged to the lands of barbarians. Bohemia is one of the lands of ‘new Germania’, land mostly located to the east of the ‘old, original’ Germania. For example, both Silesia and the Wrocław region belong here — Wrocław is considered to be a 60 Stránský, Respvblica Bojema, Chapter 18: coins and money. 61 Stránský, Respvblica Bojema, Chapter 8. 62 Stránský, Respvblica Bojema: ‘S opicemi stejné mravy, / mají líté české davy: / po novinkách vždy se honí, / starý kroj jim málo voní’. 63 See Mikulec, ‘Katolický zemský patriotismus’. 64 Piccolomini, Historia Bohemica, see Bartoš, Eneáš Silvius.

107

1 08

j a n zd i c hyn ec

town with many beautiful buildings, and long ago the ‘golden diocese’ — alas, it lost its fame owing to Czech Hussites. In Bohemia a Slavic language is spoken, but many Germans live there as well (‘sermo genti mixtus’, the language is mixed there). The land is ruled by Germans, respects German customs, and among Czech aristocrats there are very few who would not speak both languages. Piccolomini’s image of Czechs is not at all favourable — it is a nation of superstitious, fickle drunkards inclined to gluttony, and its aristocrats crave power and like to fight. These stereotypes date back to the medieval era, when they were used in connection with the Slavic barbarians. Besides, Czechs are the heirs of Forefather Czech who had to leave his fatherland, Croatia, because he had committed murder. Apart from that, Piccolomini speaks about the Hussites, but he paints them in completely different colours than Czech authors do: ‘Hussites are an untrustworthy sect of lunatics, they are a plague that swept almost the whole of Germany’. We can find a similar picture in the cosmographies of the time as well. I must at least mention a work of Sebastian Münster which was published in various German versions, then in Latin and Czech.65 And finally, we cannot forget the work of Melchior Goldast, a fruit of this long humanist tradition of historiography about the Czech space, written from a quite different perspective from that of Stránský.66 Goldast wanted to prove that which Stránský wished to refute: the allegiance of the Bohemian Crown to the Holy Roman Empire. The concurrence of Czechs and Germans seems to be very strong throughout his work, nevertheless, his motivations are political rather than ethnic or religious. Czechs are shown as a nation of rebels, quite understandably in the 1620s, with many examples in history, especially Hussitism. It would be very useful to study at a further stage of my research other views on the lands of the Crown of Bohemia from the outside. Preliminary studies indicate that authors — such as Matthäus Merian in his topography — repeated many of the commonplaces described here. It also seems to be the case of influential works of humanist authors from the neighbourhood of Bohemia, thus of Albert Crantz (Saxony), Antonio Bonfini (Hungary), and Marcin Cromer (Poland), as well — but we must get more detail of their picture of Czechs, their ethnicity and their religion, and the sources which they used. An analysis of works of humanist writing looking at the Czech space from various viewpoints shows how the Czech ethnic group gradually radicalized, often in confrontation with the neighbouring German element. The definition of nation via language is closely interconnected with that based on religion: a true and faithful Czech must belong to either one or the other religious group, and views on the same historic events may be radically different depending on the author’s faith. An important role in the legitimization process of Czech humanists is played by the era

65 Münster, Coſmographey oder beſchreibung aller Laender; Münster, Cosmographiae universalis libri VI; Münster, Kozmograffia Cžeſká (interestingly, in the title of the Czech version, which was prepared by Czech Catholics trying to purge Bohemia of odium from heretic lands, there is an explicit attribute, ‘Czech’). 66 Goldasti, De Bohemiae Regni.

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

of the ancient history of Bohemia, a time when either Slavs or Germans occupied the space. The conflicts and clashes are important, and thanks to humanist historians, the history is full of previously unknown stories and figures. At the same time, it finds a place in the discourse of European history, looking for its roots in classical Rome. It is clear that, much more than historic truth, its image and interpretation is important over time. I have focused on works by extremely educated humanists as well as on polemical texts made to order for the nobility or king. Examinations were made of popular, educational pamphlets aimed at a broad audience, and it seems that the tendencies described above are to be found across all these types of texts dedicated to history. The above-mentioned works may also be perceived as an expression of cultural memory, an attempt to create a common present and future based on a past with which one may identify. It remains unclear, however, how ‘official’ these works are. I am aware that I give a rather complex mosaic of different approaches and motives which repeat, overlap, or are in contrast, as the humanist historiography is very eclectic. It is clear, however, that most important for the definition of the nation was its language (which should be pure, as Stránský showed), its history, state, culture, common culture, and faith which divided at the time. The role of the national-based perception of Czech history throughout the humanist era, and later the Baroque era, continued to strengthen. Many stereotypes which were created in the analysed works survive up to the present day. The Crown of Bohemia, however, remained a conglomerate of several politically autonomous lands, and up until the beginning of nineteenth century the territorial principle was much more important in the political praxis than the definition of a nation based on ethnicity.

Works Cited Primary Sources Bílejovský, Bohuslav, Kronyka czeska Zpuosob wijry křestianske pod obogi zpuosobu tiela a Krwe pana Gezu kryſta. y take podgednú w ſobie obſahuge. Opiet Waldenſkych naboženſtwij. Tež y ginych ſektařuow v wijře zplecenych obyčege vkazuge wſſe porzadnie I–III [Czech Chronicle containing the Way of The Christian Faith under Both Kinds, Body and Blood of Sir Jesus Christ as well as under One Kind. With the Religion of Valdenských and Other Sects …] (Nürnberg: Jan Chosenský, 1537) Böhmische Chronica Vvenceslai Hagecii. Von Vrsprung der Boehmen von irer Hertzogen vnd Konige Graffen Adels vnd Geschlechter Ankunfft / von ihren loeblichen Ritterlichen Thaten / Item von der Staedte vnd Schloesser Fundation vnd Anfang vnd wan sich sonsten an Geistlichen vnd Weltlichen Enderungen in vnd ausser der Kron Boehmen Denckwuerdigen allenthalben in 883. Jahren begeben vnd zugetragen. Jetzt aus Boehmischer in die Deutsche Sprache (welches zuuor niemahls geschehen) mit stetß tranßferiret vnd mit einem ordentlichen Register in Druck verfertigen, durch Johannem Sandel Zluticensem, jetzo der Koeniglichen Stadt Cadan in Boehmen Notarium, Anno M. D. XCVI (Prag [Praha]: Nicolaus Strauss, 1596)

109

110

j a n zd i c hyn ec

Boregk, Martin, Behmische Cronica […] (Wittenberg: Zacharias Krafft, 1587) Dačický z Heslova, Mikuláš, Paměti [Memoirs], ed. by Josef Janáček and Jiří Mikulec (Praha: Akropolis, 1996) Danyel Adam z Weleſlawjna, Kalendář Hyſtorycky Krátké a Summownj poznamenánj wſſechněch dnůw gednohokaždého Měſyce, přes celý rok. K nimžto s doloženjm let buďto od Stwořenj Swěta, aneb od Narozenj Božjho, přidány gsau wjry a paměti hodné history o rozličných proměnách a přjhodách ſſtiaſtných y neſſtiaſtných, weſelých i ſmutných, obecných y oſobnjch, yak w giných Národech a zemjch, tak obzwláſſtně w ſlawném Národu a Králowſtwj Cžeském, zběhlých… [Historical Calendar, or Short and Brief Record of all Days of each Month during the Whole Year. To this, with Singular Years since the Creation of the World or since the Birth of God, various Trustworthy Histories … are Appended …] (Praha: Daniel Adam z Veleslavína, 1590) ———, Kalendář historický národa českého, to jest souhrn všech pamětihodných dat, jubileí i výročí událostí ze slavných dějin země České i Moravské, na památku slavného díla Mistra Daniela Adama z Veleslavína z roku 1590 znovu po třistapadesáti létech pro potěšení a k užitku národa českého [Historical Calendar of the Czech Nation, a Summary of all Memorable Dates, Anniversaries […] Published Again for the Delight and Use of the Czech Nation], ed. by Antonín Pokorný (Praha: Národní nakladatelství, 1940) Das Spenderbuch für den Bau der protestantischen Salvatorkirche in Prag (1610–1615), ed. by Rudolf Schreiber (Salzburg: Otto Müller, 1956) Die alttschechische Reimchronik des sogenannten Dalimil, hrsg. im Jahre 1620 von Pavel Ješín von Bezdězí, reprint and introduction by Jiří Daňhelka (München: Otto Sagner, 1981) Dubravius, Ioannes, Historia Bohemica, a Thoma Jordano, medico […] ornata et illustrata (Basileæ: Petrus Perna, 1666) Goldasti Heiminsfeldii, Melchioris, De Bohemiae Regni, Incorporatarvmqve provinciarvm, ivribvs ac priuilegiis; necnon de hereditaria Regiae Bohemorum familiae succeßione, Commentarii, in libros VI. diuisi, & inde a prima vsqve origine ad praesentem aetatem quam diligentissime & accuratissime deducti (Francofordiae: Apud Ioannem Iacobum Porsium, 1627) Hájek z Libočan, Václav, Kronika česká, ed. by Jan Linka and Petr Voit (Praha: Academia, 2013) Kronika tak řečeného Dalimila [The Chronicle of so-called Dalimil], trans. by Marie Krčmová and Hana Vrbová, ed. by Marie Bláhová, 2nd edn (Praha: Paseka, 2005) Kuthen, Martin, Kronyka o Založenij Zemie cžeſke a prwnijch obywatelijch gegich tudijž o Knijžatech a Králijch y gich činech a přijbězých welmi kratce z mnohých Kronykářůw ſebraná [Chronicle about the Founding of the Czech Land and of its First Inhabitants, as well as about the Dukes and Kings and their Deeds and Stories very briefly picked up from many Chronicles] (Praha: Pavel Severýn z Kapí Hory, 1539) Lupacius, Procopius, Hyſtorya o Cÿſaři Karlowi toho gména Cžtwrtém Králi Cžeſkém krátce ſepſaná [History of the Emperor Charles, the Fourth of this Name, the King of Bohemia, briefly written] (Praha: Jiří Nigrín, 1584) Matthias a Sudetis, Johannes, De Origine Bohemorum et Slavorum (Lipsiae: Laurentius Cober, 1615) Münster, Sebastian, Coſmographey oder beſchreibung aller Laender […] (Baſel: Henrichus Petri, 1545)

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

———, Cosmographiae universalis libri VI (Basileae: Henricus Petri, 1552) ———, Kozmograffia Cžeſká (Praha: Jan Kosořsky z Kosoře, 1554) Przibiconis de Radenin dicti Pulkavae Chronicon Bohemiae, ed. by Josef Emler, Fontes rerum bohemicarum, 5 (Praha: Nákladem Musea Království Českého, 1893) Staré letopisy české z rukopisu křižovnického [The Old Annals of Bohemia from the Manuscript of the Knights of the Cross with the Red Star], ed. by František Šimek, and Miloslav Kaňák (Praha: SNKLHU, 1959) Stránský, Pavel, Respvblica Bojema â M. Paulo Stransky z, z. descripta, recognita, et aucta, Lvgd. Batavorvm, Ex Officina Elzeviriana (Leide: Elsevier, 1643) Piccolomini, Aeneas Silvius, Historia Bohemica, vol. 1: Historisch-kritische Ausgabe des lateinischen Textes,, ed. by Joseph Hejnic, trans. by Eugen Udolph (Köln: Böhlau, 2005) Staří letopisové čeští od roku 1378 do 1527 čili pokračování v kronikách Přibíka Pulkavy a Beneše z Hořovic z rukopisů starých vydané [The Old Annals of Bohemia from 1378 to 1527; or the Continuation of the Chronicles of Přibík Pulkava and Beneš z Hořovic Edited from Old Manuscripts], ed. by Jaroslav Charvát (Praha: L. Mazáč, 1941) Skála ze Zhoře, Pavel, Historie česká, od defenestrace k Bílé Hoře [Czech History, from the Defenestration to the Battle of White Mountain], ed. by Josef Janáček (Praha: Svoboda, 1984) Sněmy české od léta 1526 až po naši dobu = Die Böhmischen Landtagsverhandlungen und Landtagsbeschlüsse vom Jahre 1526 an bis auf die Neuzeit, ed. by Anton Gindely and others, vols 1–12 (Praha: Zemský výbor, 1877–1954) Secondary Studies Adde-Vomáčka, Éloïse, La chronique de Dalimil. Les débuts de l’historiographie nationale tchèque en langue vulgaire au XIVe siècle (Paris: Éditions de la Sorbonne, 2016) Bahlcke, Joachim, Regionalismus und Staatsintegration im Widerstreit. Die Länder der böhmischen Krone im ersten Jahrhundert der Habsburgerherrschaft (1526–1619), Schriften des Bundesinstituts für ostdeutsche Kultur und Geschichte, 3 (München: Gruyter, 1994) Bartoš, František Michálek, Eneáš Silvius: jeho život a jeho Česká kronika [Aenea Silvio: His Life and his Czech Chronicle] (Praha: Volná myšlenka československá, 1925) Beneš, Zdeněk, Historický text a historická skutečnost. Studie o principech českého humanistického dějepisectví [Historical Text and Historical Reality: A Study on Principles of Czech Humanistic Historiography] (Praha: Karolinum, 1993) ———, Historický text a historická kultura [Historical Text and Historical Culture] (Praha: Karolinum, 1995) ———, ‘Humanistický obraz dějin vlasti (Češi a Němci na hranicích Imperia Romana)’ [Humanist Image of the History of the Homeland (Czechs and Germans on the Border of Imperium Romanum)], Folia Historica Bohemica, 18 (1997), 7–18 ———, ‘Regionalisierung und die Darstellung des Altertums in der humanistischen Historiografie’, in Terra — Ducatus — Marchionatus — Regio. Die Bildung und Entwicklung der Regionen im Rahmen der Krone des Königreichs Böhmen, ed. by Lenka Bobková and Jana Fantysová-Matějková, Die Kronländer in der Geschichte des böhmischen Staates, 6 (Praha: Casablanca, 2003), pp. 62–71

111

112

j a n zd i c hyn ec

Bláhová, Marie, ‘Offizielle Geschichtsschreibung in den mittelalterlichen böhmischen Ländern’, in Die Geschichtsschreibung in Mitteleuropa. Projekte und Forschungsprobleme, ed. by Jarosław Wenta (Toruń: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Mikołaja Kopernika, 1999), pp. 21–40 ———, ‘Dalimil’, in Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, ed. by Graeme Dunphy (Leiden: Brill, 2010), vol. 1, pp. 504–05 ———, ‘Tercius Lech… plantavit totam Silesiam. Die Widerspiegelung des Wissens um die Zusammengehörigkeit der Schlesier zur Böhmischen Krone in der Historiographie des Spätmittelalters’, in Geschichte — Erinnerung — Selbstidentifikation. Die schriftliche Kultur in den Ländern der Böhmischen Krone im 14.–18. Jahrhundert, ed. by Lenka Bobková and Jan Zdichynec, Die Kronländer in der Geschichte des böhmischen Staates, 5 (Praha: Casablanca, 2011), pp. 14–26 Bobková, Lenka, ‘Die Goldene Bulle und die Rechtsverfügungen Karls IV. in den Jahren 1346–1356’, in Die Goldene Bulle. Politik — Wahrnehmung — Rezeption, vol. 2, ed. by Ulrike Hohensee, Mathias Lawo, Michael Lindner, Michael Menzel, and Olaf B. Rader (Berlin: Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2009), pp. 713–36 Boháč, Zdeněk, ‘Národnostní poměry v zemích České koruny v době předhusitské a do třicetileté války’ [The Ethnic Situation in the Lands of the Crown of Bohemia in the Pre-Hussite Era until the Thirty Years War], in Husitství — reformace — renesance. Sborník k 60. narozeninám Františka Šmahela, ed. by Jaroslav Pánek, Miroslav Polívka, and Noemi Rejchrtová (Praha: Historický ústav, 1994), pp. 123–32 Bosl, Karl, Handbuch der Geschichte der böhmischen Länder, vols 1–2 (Stuttgart: Anton Hiersemann, 1967–1971) Catalano, Alessandro, ‘E. A. von Harrach (1598–1667), la controriforma in Europa centrale e la riconquista dello spazio boemo’, Bollettino dell’Istituto Storico Ceco di Roma, 4 (2004), 115–24 ———, ‘Das temporale wird schon so weith extendiret, dass der Spiritualität nichts als die arme Seel überbleibet’. Kirche und Staat in Böhmen (1620–1740)’, in Die Habsburgermonarchie 1620 bis 1740: Leistungen und Grenzen des Absolutismusparadigmas, ed. by Thomas Winkelbauer and Petr Maťa (Stuttgart: Franz Steiner, 2006), pp. 317–43 Čornej, Petr, ‘Cizí, cizozemec a Němec’ [Foreign, Foreigner and German], in Petr Čornej, Světla a stíny husitství. Sebrané stati (Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2011), pp. 253–64 Denis, Ernest, La Fin de l’indépendance Bohême, vol. 2: Les Premiers Habsbourg (Paris: Colin, 1890) Doležalová, Eva, ‘National and Religious Aspects of the Czech Reform Movement in the 14th and 15th Centuries and of the Hussite Revolution in the Mirror of Western Historiography’, in Confession and Nation in the Era of Reformations: Central Europe in Comparative Perspective, ed. by Eva Doležalová and Jaroslav Pánek (Praha: Institute of History, 2011), pp. 63–76 Ducreux, Marie-Elizabeth, ‘Der heilige Wenzel als Begründer der Pietas Austriaca: Die Symbolik der Wallfahrt nach Stará Boleslav (Alt Bunzlau) im 17. Jahrhundert’, in Im Zeichen der Krise. Religiosität im Europa des 17. Jahrhunderts, ed. by Hartmut Lehmann and Anne-Charlott Trepp (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1999), pp. 597–636 Eberhard, Winfried, Konfessionsbildung und Stände in Böhmen 1478–1530 (München: Oldenbourg, 1981)

religion and ethnicity in the humanist historiography of the czech region

Evans, Robert John W., The Making of the Habsburg Monarchy 1550–1700 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1984) ———, ‘Language and Politics: Bohemia in International Context, 1409–1627’, in Confession and Nation in the Era of Reformations: Central Europe in Comparative Perspective, ed. by Eva Doležalová and Jaroslav Pánek (Praha: Institute of History, 2011), pp. 155–82 Fantysová-Matějková, Jana, ‘The Virtual Region of the Conglomerate State and Its Communitas: The Discourse of Cohesion of the Land Communities in the Historiography of the 14th Century, Especially in the Chronicle of Zbraslav’, in Terra — Ducatus — Marchionatus — Regio. Die Bildung und Entwicklung der Regionen im Rahmen der Krone des Königreichs Böhmen, ed. by Lenka Bobková and Jana FantysováMatějková, Die Kronländer in der Geschichte des böhmischen Staates, 6 (Praha: Casablanca, 2013), pp. 110–41 Fudge, Thomas A., Jerome of Prague and the Foundations of the Hussite Movement (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016) Gindely, Anton, Geschichte der Gegenreformation in Böhmen (Leipzig: Duncker & Humblot, 1894) Graus, František, Die Nationenbildung der Westslawen im Mittelalter (Sigmaringen: Thorbecke, 1980) Harc, Lucyna, and Gabriela Wąs, eds, The Strengthening of Silesian Regionalism (1526–1740) (Wrocław: Publishing House eBooki.com.pl, 2014), vol. 2: Cuius regio? Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000), oai: www. bibliotekacyfrowa.pl:73766 (open access) Hlaváček, Ivan, ‘Dreisprachigkeit im Bereich der Böhmischen Krone: Zum Phänomen der Sprachenbenutzung im böhmischen diplomatischen Material bis zur hussitischen Revolution’, in The Development of Literate Mentalities in East Central Europe, ed. by Anna Adamska and Marco Mostert (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 289–310 Kaminsky, Howard, A History of the Hussite Revolution (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967) Klápště, Jan, The Czech Lands in Medieval Transformation (Leiden: Brill, 2012) Klik, Josef, ‘Národnostní poměry v Čechách od válek husitských až do bitvy bělohorské’ [The Ethnic Situation in Bohemia from the Hussite Wars to the Battle of White Mountain], Český časopis historický, 27 (1921), 8–62; 28, (1922), 31–73 Kubů, Naďa, and Dana Picková, ‘Historické kalendáře v českém humanistickém dějepisectví’ [Historical Calendars in Czech Humanist Historiography], Historický obzor. Časopis pro výuku dějepisu a popularizaci historie, 3 (1992), 286–91 Kutnar, František, Obrozenské vlastenectví a nacionalismus. Příspěvek k národnímu a společenskému obsahu češství doby obrození [The Enlightenment Patriotismus and Nationalismus. A Contribution to the National and Social Content of Czech Identity in the Enlightenment Era] (Praha: Karolinum, 2003) Maur, Eduard, ‘Pojetí národa v díle M. Pavla Stránského O státě českém’ [The Concept of Nation in the De republica bohema of M. Pavel Stránský], in K poctě profesora Miroslava Hrocha, ed. by Jan Pelikán, Acta universitatis Carolinae pragensis — Historica 3, 1996, Studia historica, 44 (Praha: Karolinum, 1998), pp. 41–52

113

114

j a n zd i c hyn ec

———, ‘Der Begriff der Nation in der böhmischen Historiographie der Aufklärung’, in Patriotismus und Nationsbildung am Ende des Heiligen Römischen Reiches, ed. by Miroslav Hroch, Johannes Koll, and Otto Dann (Köln: SH, 2003), pp. 171–89 Míka, Alois, ‘Národnostní poměry v českých zemích před třicetiletou válkou’ [The Ethnic Situation of the Czech Lands before Thirty Years War], Československý časopis historický, 20.2 (1972), 207–33 Mikulec, Jiří, ‘Katolický zemský patriotismus Harantovy doby’ [Patriotism in the Catholic Lands in the Time of Harant], Historie — Otázky — Problémy, 1.1 (2009), 49–57 ———, ‘Der böhmische Himmel und die böhmische Staatlichkeit. Die katholische Dimension des Landespatriotismus im 17. Jahrhundert’, in Konkurrierende Ordnungen. Verschränkungen von Religion, Staat und Nation in Ostmitteleuropa vom 16. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert, ed. by Johannes Gleixner and others (München: Frank & Timme, 2015), pp. 203–26 Novák, Jan Bedřich, ‘Jazyková prakse na generálním sněmu 1611’ [Language Praxis at the General Diet of 1611], in Od pravěka k dnešku: sborník prací z dějin československých k šedesátým narozeninám Josefa Pekaře, vol. 2 (Praha: Melantrich, 1930), pp. 30–38 Pánek, Jaroslav, ‘Nation and Confession in the Czech Lands in the pre-White Mountain Period’, in Confession and Nation in the Era of Reformations: Central Europe in Comparative Perspective, ed. by Eva Doležalová and Jaroslav Pánek (Praha: Institute of History, 2011), pp. 139–54 Peterka, Otto, Rechtsgeschichte der Böhmischen Länder, vol. 2: Geschichte des öffentlichen Rechtes und die Rechtsquellen von der hussitischen Zeit bis zum theresianischen Zeitalter (Reichenberg: Gebrüder Stiepel, 1928) Pynsent, Robert B., ‘Czech Nationalism after Dalimil and before Hus’, in Confession and Nation in the Era of Reformations: Central Europe in Comparative Perspective, ed. by Eva Doležalová and Jaroslav Pánek (Praha: Institute of History, 2011), pp. 9–34 Storchová, Lucie, ‘A Late Humanist Treatise on the Origin of the Bohemians, the Academic Polemics and their Potential to Perform the Other: De origine bohemorum et Slavorum by Johannes Matthias a Sudetis’, Acta Comeniana (International review of Comenius Studies and Early Modern Intellectual History), 22–23 (2009), 149–206 ———, ‘The Role of (Trans)National (Meta)Narratives in Representations of Cultural Transfers: The Case of European and Bohemian Renaissance Humanism(s)’, in Processes of Cultural Exchange in Central Europe, 1200–1800, ed. by Veronika Čapská, Robert Antonín, and Martin Čapský (Opava: Silesian University, 2014), pp. 35–76 Šmahel, František, Idea národa v husitských Čechách (The Idea of Nation in Hussite Bohemia), 2nd edition (Praha: Argo, 2000) ———, Die hussitische Revolution, vols 1–3 (Hannover: Hansche, 2002) Wünsch, Thomas, ‘Anmerkungen zum Identitätsbegriff ’, in Radices Silesiae — Silesiacae Radices. Śląsk: kraj, ludzie, memoria a kształtowanie się społecznych więzi i tożsamości (do końca XVIII wieku), ed. by Marie Bláhová, Stanisław Rosik, and Thomas Wünsch (Wrocław: Chronicon, 2011), pp. 17–33 Zilynská, Blanka, ed, Universitäten, Landesherren und Landeskirchen: Das Kuttenberger Dekret von 1409 im Kontext der Epoche von der Gründung der Karlsuniversität 1348 bis zum Augsburger Religionsfrieden 1555, Acta Universitatis Carolinae: Historia Universitatis Carolinae Pragensis, 49, fasc. 2 (Praha: Karolinum, 2009)

Isabel Grifoll

The Crown of Aragon on the Border From Conflict to an Ideology of Cohesion in a Multi-Ethnic Society

Introduction The occupation of the Balearic Islands (1229–1235) and the Kingdom of Valencia (1232–1238/1245) opens a new period in the history of the Crown of Aragon. A multi-ethnic, multireligious society emerges. The massive incorporation of Muslims inside a Christian society, with the consequent demographic imbalance, it introduces the conflict within the political community. But this conflict can no longer be resolved with the exclusion or extermination of the Other. It forces local intellectuals to rethink the idea of Christianitas understood as a closed unit in itself that, paradoxically, can only be affirmed in struggle and expansion against non-Christians, as well as the ideology of the Crusades that legalizes it. It also necessitated the modification of the distorted image of the Other, forged by Western intellectuals in previous centuries. This distorted image was created far away from where Muslims lived; it was not based on empirical knowledge and had a highly ideological foundation. Intellectual irrationality gives way to a huge literature of religious controversy and apologetics, interreligious dialogue, and the creation of school infrastructure to address the problem of relations with non-Christians. Effective programmes to regulate conflicts with the aim of organizing a political community were based on the innovative idea of coexistence. This paper explores the values promoted in these circumstances by the main centres of power — the Crown and the Church — for maintaining the cohesion and the transformation of this new society in a state of coexistence. Instead, two programmes arose: military colonization, and religious conversion with an associated sets of promoted values. The one can not be carried out without the other. The religious conversion, and the acculturation of the Other, is only possible with colonial and military subjection.

Isabel Grifoll  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of Medieval Literature at the University of Lleida. She has published on medieval romance literatures and the cultural traditions of the Crown of Aragon. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 115–138 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120060

116

is a be l gr ifo l l

Historical Context On 31 December 1229, the troops of James I assaulted the island of Majorca, an event which would underpin the beginning of a new cycle in the history of Catalonia and Aragon. For centuries, due to the origins of the Catalan Counties within the Gallia Narbonensis, the policy of the house of Barcelona (and the counties of Besalú, Urgell, and Pallars) had been focused beyond the Pyrenees, towards the Occitan territories. Feudal practices had been the vehicle by which the house of Barcelona exerted its influence. The Catalan Counties deployed a policy of marriages with counts and viscounts from Occitan lineages in order to strengthen bonds, submitted to a feudal vassalage of independent lordships and urban communities, gave oaths of allegiance in exchange for military protection, and additionally acquired income provided by the opening of trade routes. The counts of Barcelona attained a zone of influence that extended from the Ebro River to the Italian Alps, comprising the territories of the Languedoc and Provence. Since the second decade of the thirteenth century, the Occitan lordships had been progressively taken over by the French Crown with the support of the Church that, in turn, was interested in the eradication of the Albigensian and Cathar heresy, as well as regaining the spiritual hegemony of the region. Yet, the Occitan fragmentation into independent and highly unstable feudal territories had also favoured Catalan influence in the area. The Roman-French crusade ended this historical conflict of power, and erected an insurmountable border between the territories of France and Catalonia-Aragon. At the same time, the Almohad Empire began to fracture on the south of the Ebro River. The traditionally inhospitable Muslim border became easy to cross, and the Almohad Empire experienced an unusual power vacuum. Two battles mark this 180-degree turn — firstly, the major setback inflicted to the Almohad by the Christian cavalry at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212), and secondly, the defeat of the Catalan-Occitan forces by the French crusading contingent, led by Simon de Montfort at the Battle of Muret (1213), where the Catalan king Peter the Catholic died on the battlefield. Given its emblematic and elegiac character, this event signals the end of a historical cycle — Catalonia brought the Occitan dream to an end. The seizure of Majorca (1229) was, in part, a natural consequence of this change of borders. The Catalan influence within the Occitan territories favoured Mediterranean expansion, accomplished by military and trade (market) conquests — a geographical, political, and cultural change. A crucial time in the history of the Crown of Aragon lay ahead, both for the new model of society, necessarily organized by the authorities (the monarchy and the Church), and for the intellectual performances invested in its construction. This period would also be of great importance for the Catalan language and culture, which would become a reference model in both the court and the royal chancery. The new Mediterranean dream, despite its fragility, had already become a reality by 1348, when the Black Death struck. The conquests of the Balearic Islands (1229–1235) and subsequently of the Kingdom of Valencia (1232–1238/1245) were determined by temporary factors — the

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

speed of the events — which in turn had fundamental structural implications: the sudden integration of a substantial Muslim population. While a great number of native inhabitants of the island of Majorca were killed, in the Kingdom of Valencia this level of killing was not possible due to the extent of the territory and population density, as well as because Catalan-Aragonese chivalry was not militarily (technically) prepared to carry out such an enterprise. Furthermore, the mass migration of poor Christians towards the recently occupied territories made this initiative impossible. Instead, the military campaigns in the Kingdom of Valencia were accompanied by a policy of pacts and fiscal compensations exacted from the conquered population as an instrument of domination. Moreover, the annexation of the new territories led to a noticeable increase of the non-Christian population. Before the conquest the combined population of Catalonia and Aragon was approximately half a million. With the incorporation of the Kingdom of Valencia, 150,000 Muslims were integrated into the Crown, which, added to the 50,000 inhabitants of the Balearic Islands, amounted to a 40% non-Christian foreign population compared to that of the original territories.1 The demographic collapse occurred in only a decade, from the seizure of Majorca (1229) to the surrender of the city of Valencia (1238), or in the course of fifteen years if we take into account the elimination of the last Muslim resistance to the Kingdom of Valencia (1245).2 The Muslims were a minority in Catalonia and Aragon, and were often confined to rural areas. However, the imbalance between the Christian and Muslim population in the conquered territories would be maintained for centuries, with significant differences between the Balearic Islands and the Kingdom of Valencia. Christian inhabitants surpassed Muslims in Majorca, with the latter estimated as not exceeding 40% of the population. This situation occurred not only because of the initial killings, but also due to the ease with which the Christian settlers, mostly from Catalonia, became acclimatized to the island, whereas the Muslim minority was oppressed by the imported colonial structures, becoming more submissive to the Christians. In contrast, within the Kingdom of Valencia the changes in population were quite lengthy and complex, as well as involving a greater population density. In 1270, Christian inhabitants totalled scarcely 30,000, and were in the minority compared to the Muslims — ‘awash on a sea of Muslims’ in the words of Robert E. Burns.3 This imbalance would endure until the expulsion of the Moors (1609).



1 The numbers were not so striking in the Kingdom of Castile, which added 300,000 Muslims from Andalusia to the original population of three million. This led to a 10% increase in the non-Christian population. Regarding the extension of territory, it should be noted that due to the Castilian and Catalan-Aragonese conquests, the Muslim dominion over the Iberian Peninsula was reduced, by the mid-thirteenth century, to the Kingdom of Granada. 2 For the demographic survey in Valencia, see in particular Burns, ‘Christian-Islamic Confrontation’, chap. 4: ‘The Human Geography’. Concerning the Balearic Islands and the Iberian Peninsula, see Hillgarth, Los Reinos hispánicos, pp. 44–53. 3 Burns, Muslims, Christians, and Jews, p. 13.

117

118

is a be l gr ifo l l

Jews and Muslims in the Crown of Aragon Conversely, the Jews had been established in the Catalan and Aragonese lands for centuries, long before the conquests of James I. We have records of Jewish communities in Barcelona and Girona since the Carolingian period,4 although the Diaspora had made them into a minority within the Iberian Peninsula and in other parts of Europe. Dispersed throughout the world, they had settled of their own free will in the territories that hosted them. The estimated Jewish population in the Crown of Aragon in the period under examination is quite conjectural, with estimates ranging between 2% and 3%, that is, around 20,000 or 30,000 inhabitants.5 It is interesting to note that the Jewish community established in the Catalan-Aragonese territories was in part due to the recent immigration from al-Andalus, where the Jews had fled the persecution unleashed by the intolerance of the Almohads. While the collective identity of the Jewish people has historically been at risk as a result of the fragmentation and geographical dissemination caused by the Diaspora, this handicap has been compensated for throughout history with an active spiritual life, in which religion became a nexus and means of unity for maintaining the cohesion of identity. This cohesion explains, in turn, the belligerent attitude of the Church towards the Jews. The Church had always been uncomfortable with the presence of the ‘other’ minorities within Christian society. The inconvenience, however, developed into conflict when these minorities were perceived as seriously threatening the doctrinal (theological) system of Christianity, as in the case of Judaism and, especially, the Cathar heresy, widely spread throughout the Languedoc territories. The Lateran Councils had already ordered several measures excluding Jews: the Third Lateran Council (1179) proscribed separate neighbourhoods and the Fourth Lateran Council (1215) imposed distinctive dress. These conciliar regulations are probably the starting point of the masses’ hostilities against the Jews in the late fourteenth century. In this sense, the Church repeatedly put pressure on the European monarchies to pursue extraordinary social and political measures against the Jews. However, the Jewish minority was under the royal patronage of the Crown of Aragon, at least until the end of the thirteenth century — the Jews were linked directly to the crown as servus regi, ‘the Jews of the King’ and did not belong to any town.6 They paid their taxes directly to the monarchy and, as such, were a crucial source of income, as well as providing them with essential cash loans. Consequently, they were allowed to occupy civil service positions at the court, performing a wide range of duties, from tax collecting to diplomatic missions. Their language skills, including Arabic, made them indispensable as interpreters and translators,7 while their cultural background in specialized fields such as medicine was

4 Romano, ‘Els jueus a Barcelona’, pp. 123–30. 5 Hillgarth, Los Reinos hispánicos, pp. 52–53. 6 Concerning the situation of the Jews in the Crown of Aragon from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, see Baer, Studien zur Geschichte, Pons, ‘Los judíos del reino’, Baer, A History of the Jews, Romano ‘Les juifs de la Coronne d’Aragon’, Romano, Judíos al servicio de Pedro, Companys i Huguet, La Cataluña judía. 7 Romano, ‘Judíos escribanos’.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

also very useful within the court.8 The Jews contributed a nearly irreplaceable qualified staff to the crown. The Jewish quarters were centres of royal power penetration; redoubts where the centralization efforts performed by the monarchy were sustained, in conflict with the aristocracy and municipalities. This situation lasted at least until the foundation of the Consell de Cent of Barcelona (1274) and the realization of the shared interests between the monarchy and the city of Barcelona. Consequently, throughout his reign James I granted privileges to the Jews, a minority that supported the monarchy by performing a number of functions in various fields. The dual network of loyalties was the result of political interests, and not an exhibition of cultural tolerance. Finally, it is worth recalling the extraordinary cultural vitality of the Catalan Jewish communities from the thirteenth century. They were closely related to other centres of Occitania, such as Lunel or Narbonne, and had a decisive role in the history of the Kabbalah as well as within the development of Jewish mysticism. In this sense we ought to highlight the circle of Girona and the figures of Sagi-Nahor (Isaac the Blind), Esdres, Azriel,9 Jacob ben Shéshet, and Nahmanides, who we return to a little later. Simultaneously, in the core of Barcelona the first manifestations of the ecstatic Kabbalah under the person of Salomon ben Abraham ben Adret would be developed, followed by Abraham Abulafia in 1270.10 We also have a remarkable body of extant poetry produced by the Catalan Jewish communities.11

The New Ideology for Coexistence: The Crown and the Church Due to the military expansion towards the south and the subsequent absorption of this huge Muslim population, both the monarchy and the Church had to deal with the problem of Islam, which would also determine their relationship with the Jewish minority. There was a need to promote policies in order to tackle a serious demographic imbalance, as well as major social and religious issues. The strategies followed by the Crown and the Church diverged, although both agreed on the formulation of an initial question: what if there was no choice other than to ‘coexist’ with the Muslims? In order to provide an affirmative and pro-active response to the new society, the Crown followed a colonialism policy (repartiment)12 while the Church, through the Order of Preachers, instituted a Christian mission.



8 Significantly, Ramon of Penyafort prescribes that Christians eschew the service of Jewish doctors, which indirectly yet clearly indicates the prestige and monopoly achieved by the Jews in this field (Summa de paenitentia, I. 4); translation to Catalan in the volume of Penyafort, Summa de penitència, trans. by Fàbregas p. 53. 9 Azriel de Girona, Cuatro textos cabalísticos. 10 Idel, ‘La història de la càbala’. 11 Poemes hebraics de jueus catalans, trans. by Feliu i Mabres. 12 On the colonial history of the Crown of Aragon, see Burns, The Crusader Kingdom, Burns, Islam under the Crusaders; Burns, Medieval Colonialism; Burns, Muslims, Christians, and Jews. Concerning the Balearic Islands, see Abulafia, A Mediterranean Emporium.

119

1 20

is a be l gr ifo l l

The assimilation of foreign groups into the universality of Christianitas by an acculturation process involved a shift away from the idea of crusade and extermination, resulting in measures closer to the notion of ‘coexistence’. A precise assessment of these policies requires consideration of two determining factors. The period beginning with the conquest of the Balearic Islands established an era of relative political calm and economic prosperity. The ravages in the Occitan territories caused by the Roman-French crusade had also involved extremely high expenses for the Aragonese Crown, a circumstance coinciding with the minority of James I, when rebellious nobles were questioning the very legitimacy of the monarchy. The military expeditions to the south had managed to pacify the nobility in part, uniting them around the figure of the young king and, ultimately, helping to redirect the internal conflicts towards an external enemy, with the immediate promise of war booty and the expected economic benefits of new territories. The foreign war was beneficial for the internal peace, and it thereby strengthening the figure of the sovereign. The first stage of expansion led to the conquest of Majorca, a key island for Catalan trade in the Mediterranean Basin, and which had been coveted since the Catalan-Pisan conflict (1113/1114) in which Ramon Berenguer III participated. The definitive occupation by James I not only compensated for the loss of the ‘family’ strategic ports from maritime Provence, which had come under the control of Anjou in 1245, but it particularly optimized the Catalan trading system. Majorca, located in the heart of the western Mediterranean, became the essential naval base for Catalan vessels en route to the ports of North Africa, where the Catalans had long established their businesses with their own funduq, and was also halfway to the coast of the Italian Republic. The incorporation of the Kingdom of Valencia greatly increased the freight of the Catalan vessels. The Valencian territories were extensive and fertile, devoted to the cultivation of various products by means of sophisticated and highly productive irrigation systems, which, in turn, were imported to Catalonia. Manufactured goods contributed to agricultural productivity, especially those workshops in the main urban centres. All of this contributed to the high taxes that the conquered paid to the conquerors, one-fourth of which went directly into the coffers of the monarchy. It is not surprising that, given the economic prospects, the main concern of the monarchy was to find Christian settlers for the new territories to share the land to ensure productivity, as well as to guarantee the military presence essential for controlling the Muslim population and, ultimately, to organize the new realms politically and legally. Therefore, the monarchy’s policies were not about tackling economic misery, but rather were addressed at preventing the Arab labour population from fleeing, as well as making the best use of the migration coming from Christian territories. Economic booms tolerate diversity, and it is only when resources are scarce, with famine and hunger, that ‘otherness’ — namely faith, belief, geographic origin, or social/cultural differences — becomes a scapegoat, a sacrificial victim of a systemic crisis. However, the traditional relations of Catalonia and Aragon with al-Andalus, along with the commercial vocation of the Catalans and the mixed Mediterranean element, had created over centuries both a space and a mental dimension in which understanding and acceptance of the other was tolerated, or at least ‘familiar’. People were accustomed to different languages, diverse religious practices, and a variety of

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

artistic expressions (music, literature, etc.), or just to the diversity of customs and habits. Nonetheless, we must take into consideration the military subjugation of the Muslim population of the conquered territories, requiring the adjustment of any notion of ‘coexistence’ or ‘tolerance’, and in particular, of any attempt to apply modern parameters. The conquered Muslims were forced to ‘coexist’ and, eventually, to be ‘converted’. The attitude of the Church concerning the large presence of Islam in the Crown of Aragon could not match mutatis mutandis the political interest or economic pragmatism of the crown. The Church approached the problem from a position of faith and the preservation of an ideal and unique monolithic Christianity. While James I also professed the Christian faith, as did the aristocratic and military elites, the civil servants, and the colonial representatives of the monarchy, the difference consisted in the fact that the Church preserved the faith through a doctrinal system along with the necessary tools of the conciliar legislation. We have already mentioned how both the Third and Fourth Lateran Councils enacted exclusion measures against Jews, demonstrating that doctrine and legislation were effective weapons in ensuring orthodoxy. As a result, in order to disseminate the faith the mendicant orders of Franciscans and Dominicans were founded, including the Order of Preachers who had defended the faith through the bloody battles against the Albigensian heresy which extended throughout Occitania. The most categorical combination of doctrine and legislation was the creation of the Inquisition (1231). James I was reluctant to establish the Order of the Preachers within his kingdom, as the order closely reminded him of the fate of the Occitan territories, lost by the House of Barcelona. However, the strong personality of Ramon of Penyafort, of Catalan origin, an eminent jurist, pastor, penitentiary, and confessor of Pope Gregory IX, as well as General Master of the Order of Preachers, and a formidable man of action, influenced the king’s decision.13 In 1240, Ramon of Penyafort resigned 13 Ramon of Penyafort was born around 1185 in Penyafort Castle (residence of kings), located in the municipality of Olèrdola (now the town of Santa Margarida i els Monjos), near Vilafranca del Penedès. The lands of the Alt Penedès were under the dominion of the county of Barcelona and had historically been a border area with the Muslims. His family belonged to the Catalan Gentry, hardened in the battles against the Saracen raids. Ramon studied at the capitular school of Barcelona, and was subsequently educated at the University of Bologna (1210–1218), where he became a professor (1218–1221) specializing in canon law. He displayed enormous legal knowledge, writing several essays and compilations on canon law. At Viterbo he encountered Dominic of Guzman, who began to undertake the expansion of the Order of Preachers within the Iberian Peninsula. Ramon joined the project with great enthusiasm and assumed the Dominican habit on his return to Barcelona (1222). In Arles (Provence) and Narbonne he preached the crusade of James I to conquer Majorca (1229). Pope Gregory IX promoted the battle against the Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula and granted mercy to the soldiers of the crusade. He wrote the Summa de casibus (1225) for the formation of the friars of the Order, a kind of manual for the preachers to administer the sacrament of penance correctly. Subsequently he wrote the Summa Paenitentia (1229) commissioned by Gregory IX, a major work on theoretical and practical issues concerning sacramental penance. He was soon appointed chaplain, penitentiary, and confessor of Gregory IX (1230), a position from which he combatted heresy. During his stay at the papal court he compiled and wrote the Decretals or Liber extra, which would become a standard work of canon law, which he introduced to the

121

122

is a be l gr ifo l l

from the position of General Master of the Order of Preachers, and established himself in the convent of Santa Caterina of Barcelona, becoming the counsellor and personal confessor of James I.14 The king would grant royal protection to the Dominicans, who spread throughout the Crown of Aragon, together with the Inquisition tribunal. The religious ‘inquisitio’ was traditionally performed by bishops, who asked, when necessary, for the cooperation of the civil powers. Innocent III, sheltered by Roman canon law, had brought heresy to the level of a royal offence, which could result in the death penalty (Decree Vergentis in senium, 25 March 1199). The Fourth Lateran Council (1215) reaffirmed this papal doctrine. Pope Honorius III, on the occasion of the coronation of Emperor Frederick II, presented a series of religious regulations against heretics to the emperor, including the sanctions that had to be applied in case of default or disobedience.15 The ecclesiastical regulations became state law, while civil authorities also strengthened coercive measures against heresy. By the Treaty of Paris (1229), Raymond VII, Count of Toulouse, submitted to the king of France, and the Pope’s legate, Romano Frangipani, Cardinal of Sant’Angelo, committed himself to the persecution of heretics. Finally, bishops, Dominicans, and doctors and students of Paris, and would be promulgated by the pope himself (1234). The general chapter of the Preachers which gathered in Bologna appointed him as General Master, a position he enjoyed for several years (1238–1240). He composed the constitutions of the order, which had grown very quickly and substantially within a few years. After he gave up teaching (1240), he nonetheless remained a figure of prestige within the order. He returned to Catalonia, where he established himself in the convent of Santa Caterina in Barcelona, centre of the Dominican Order in Catalonia, where he devoted himself to the battle against heresy and the management of the missionary program of the preachers for the Crown of Aragon. He continued to perform many delegations for the papacy or the Order: the provision of dioceses (Barcelona and Lleida), chapter reforms (Vic), arbitrator in many conflicts and disputes, etc. Ramon of Penyafort died on 6 January 1275. His funeral was presided over by the monarchs of the Crown of Aragon and Castile, accompanied by the royal children, bishops, the clergy, and a fervent crowd of people. For more on the figure of Ramon of Penyafort, see Valls i Taberner, San Ramón de Peñafort; Batllori, Sant Ramon de Penyafort; Mas i Solench, Ramon de Penyafort. The diplomatic records are found in Valls i Taberner, ‘Diplomatari’, Feliu, ‘Diplomatari’, Rius i Serra, Diplomatario, Penyafort, Summa de penitència. 14 There was a close relationship between James I and Ramon of Penyafort, especially from the 1240s. He took part in the Peace and Truce of the Court of Monzón (1236) which, in turn, allowed the campaigns for the conquest of Valencia to continue. The following year (1237), Pope Gregory IX delegated him to absolve the king, who had been punished with excommunication. He was a witness to the will of James I (1241), advising him on several modifications (and the kingdom’s distribution) included in the Monarch’s first draft. He intervened several times in conflicts arising from the restoration of the bishoprics of the conquered territories. The Church of Majorca was important in the dioceses of La Seu and Girona. As for Valencia, the dispute between Toledo and Tarragona was more complicated. He arbitrated on the problem of Andorra (1258). He took part in the oath of Prince Peter to refuse to obey the will of James I if it risked an unnatural division of the kingdom (1260), and he was ambassador to the Holy See for the marriage of Prince Peter and Constance of Hohenstaufen (1260). He also managed proceedings for the stability of the currency (1269), and interceded in the appointment of the archbishop of Toledo, among many other activities. 15 Frederick II published the regulations against the heretics within the constitution Cum ad observandum (1224), subsequently in the Liber augustalis (1231) and eventually, as king of Germany (1232), he promulgated a death sentence edict for rebel heretics.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

Franciscans, as well as the civil authorities cooperated under papal direction to act against heresy and heretics. In 1235, James I agreed to the inquisitorial reform and its regulations.16 It should be noted, however, that Ramon of Penyafort never occupied the position of inquisitor of the Crown of Aragon, although he was committed to the eradication of heresy. He was consulted several times concerning the various heretical views held by some individuals in Catalonia, and also in reference to the treatment that the heretics should receive. In 1235, he wrote the Nota Raymundi in response to a request of the archbishop of Tarragona concerning measures that ought to be undertaken for dealing with heretics.17 Due to the avalanche of inquiries he received from the Catalan bishops on this issue, in 1242 he published a practical manual or directory for inquisitors. However, Ramon of Penyafort always kept in mind the desire to convert the dissidents, a belief that he would extend to the Muslims as well. The anti-heretical struggle was the background of the several ‘missions’, a task that Ramon of Penyafort took up after his return to the territories of the Crown of Aragon.18

The ‘Mission’ and this Programme All data places this innovative phenomenon — the ‘mission’ — within the Iberian Peninsula, and not before the thirteenth century. Several studies undertaken aiming to trace previous similar attempts elsewhere agree that these were sporadic and marginal — for example, the attempt of Peter the Hermit to convert Kerbogha, commander of the Turkish army, during the siege of Antioch in 1098. While we cannot rule this out as a missionary attempt, in any case the implementation was anecdotal, with no transcending organization.19 One of the first attempts at evangelization is documented in Seville, after the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212), when a group of fanatical Franciscan friars burst into the mosque of the city with missionary zeal, and were immediately arrested and deported.20 Similar actions, although scattered, occured with increasing frequency. Therefore, when Ramon of Penyafort returned to the convent of Santa Caterina of Barcelona (1240) he decided to organize the missions rationally and systematically, implementing his programme among the Moors of the Kingdom of Valencia, recently conquered and in the midst of a feudal colonization process. The project would be undertaken throughout the thirteenth century, and the necessary infrastructure was provided to ensure its accomplishment.

16 James I had asked Pope Gregory IX to appoint some inquisitors. The pope responded to the king’s petition with a bull, dated 26 May 1232, issued in Spoleto. 17 Rius i Serra, Diplomatario, pp. 29–32; Catalan translation in Penyafort, Summa de penitència, trans. by Fàbregas, pp. 142–45. 18 Burns, ‘Christian-Islamic Confrontation’, pp. 1386–1411, 1432–1434; reprinted with modifications in Burns, Muslims, Christians, and Jews, pp. 80–108. 19 Waltz, Western European Attitudes; Cutler, ‘The First Crusade’; Kedar, Crusade and Mission. 20 Burns, Muslims, Christians, and Jews; Catalan translation in Burns, Moros, cristians i jueus, p. 139.

123

1 24

is a be l gr ifo l l

The studia linguarum

One of the first initiatives pursued was the foundation of schools for the training of missionaries (studia linguarum). Their main goal was the teaching of languages — Arabic and Hebrew — which were necessary for the monks to undertake their conversion work. It was a unique and Catalan-inspired project performed mainly by Catalan preachers.21 While Ramon of Penyafort had proposed the study of the Arabic language within the general chapter of the Dominicans in 1236, the first recorded existence of a school for the learning of Arabic is in Majorca c. 1232, only three years after the conquest of the island in 1229. One of the teachers was a convert, Miquel de Bennàssar, son of an Arab-Balearic defeated by the Christians. In 1250, the Majorcan studium must have already acquired a certain prestige, as the provincial chapter of Toledo (1250) sent eight Friars Preachers to study there, including a young Ramon Martí. In 1256, the school was still open, although it began to decline two years later.22 The chapter of Toledo (1250) had imposed the study of languages as a matter of holy obedience and for remission of sin. At an uncertain date, the Arabic studium of Tunis was founded, which was favoured by the good relations that King James I kept with the local sovereign, and the Dominicans (and Franciscans) had established a convent in Tunis, from where they performed their apostolic tasks. The documentation does not indicate if the school of oriental languages existed from the time of the foundation of the convent or if it was founded later23 — but in any case, the will of the preachers was to promote ecumenical dialogue between the representatives of the different faiths. However, neither the expectations nor the efforts invested were satisfied. In the territories of the Crown of Aragon other studia linguarum were created, led by some of the prominent intellectual figures of the time. The convent of Santa Caterina in Barcelona had its own language school, at least since 1259, and was directed by Ramon Martí. In 1265, the Studium of Murcia, probably transferred from Tunis, taught Hebrew and Arabic, and therefore expanded its scope to include Jews. The Studium arabicum in Valencia (1281) was directed by Joan de Puigventós, while another similar institution was subsequently opened in Xativa. The decline of the Majorcan centre drove Ramon Llull to enquire about a similar new school foundation with Prince James of Majorca (1276), and on 17 October of that 21 Coll, ‘Escuelas de lenguas orientales’, Coll, ‘S. Ramón de Peñafort’, Formentín Ibáñez ‘Funcionamiento pedagógico y proyección cultural’, Cortabarría, ‘S. Ramón de Peñafort’, Cortabarría, ‘L’étude des langues’. 22 Based on the studies of José M. Coll, cited in the previous note, it was established that the first studium linguarum was founded by the Dominicans in Tunis. However, it is currently thought that the school of Majorca was the first of its kind. See Garcías Palou, El Miramar, pp. 269–80; Robles, ‘El Studium Arabicum’; and especially Bonner, ‘L’aprenentatge intel-lectual de Ramon Llull’. It is unclear, however, if the records on the Balearic institution of 1250 refer to an extension of the previous establishment of 1232 or rather to a newly created foundation. 23 It has been established, based on the studies of José M. Coll mentioned above, that the language school of Tunis founded by Ramon of Penyafort was already operational in 1245. However, this information should be contrasted with the several studies referenced above.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

year, a bull of Pope John XXI confirms the constitution of the monastery of Miramar (Majorca), where thirteen Franciscan friars were engaged in the study of Arabic and prepared for their next mission, studying the Llull conversion methodologies.24 James II of Majorca ( James I had died on 26 July 1276) endorsed the monastery with an annual income of 500 golden florins. The foundation of Miramar fit perfectly within the Dominican language school project. The novelty of the project consisted of the special training received by the friars: the Art,25 a system conceived by Llull for the mission. However, the Dominican programme did not fulfil the ideals proposed by Llull. It should be noted, in particular, that the creation of the Miramar monastery was a lay initiative, bestowed by a king and entrusted to Franciscan friars, but closer to Llull than the Dominicans. Miramar was gradually abandoned, burdened by political affairs. Pere II of Catalonia-Aragon stripped his brother James II of Majorca of the Balearic Islands, and consequently Llull abandoned the island.26 Only twenty years after its creation, the Miramar Monastery had ceased to exist. However, Ramon Llull would continue to seek from the support of popes and Christian princes for the establishment of Oriental language schools for missionaries. This intention had already guided him during his first visit to the papal court in 1287, although his enterprise was frustrated by the death of Honorius IV on 3 April of that same year. Shortly afterwards, he approached Philip IV the Fair of France27 as well as the University of Paris during his first stay in the French capital (1287–1289).28 He would pursue this goal throughout his life, and eventually see it fulfiled in the Council of Vienne (1311–1312), at the age of eighty. Ramon Llull managed to build local or regional missionary infrastructures of an international character, created by the preachers within the territory of the Crown of Aragon.

24 Rubió, Documents per l’història, vol. 1, p. 4; Garcías Palou, El Miramar. 25 During the year of the Miramar foundation, Ramon Llull had already written several essays, such as the monumental Llibre de contemplació en Déu (c. 1273–1274), which contains the basis of his thinking, or his first apologetic work, the Llibre del gentil e dels tres savis (c. 1274–1276). After the so-called enlightenment of Randa (1274), Llull wrote the first version of the Art, the Ars compendiosa inveniendi veritatem that begins (according to modern Lullism) the quaternary phase of his ‘artistic’ production. 26 Due to the war between Aragon and Catalonia and the triple alliance formed by France, the House of Anjou, and the papacy (1285), and because of the unexpected Catalan victory, Pere II the Great took the Balearic Islands away from his brother James II, who had backed the French. For thirteen years the king of Majorca lived in Perpignan, occasionally visiting Montpellier. He did not recover the Balearic Islands until 1298, as an indirect result of the Treaty of Anagni (1295). Ramon Llull, who always maintained a close relationship with his patron James II of Majorca, left the island and settled (mainly) in Montpellier. These political events are the probable cause of the decay of the Miramar Monastery. Alfons II and James II of Aragon tried to protect Miramar during their occupation of Majorca. However, by around 1300, or even earlier, it had disappeared. 27 Llull’s contacts within the French court were probably due to the fact that the mother of Philip IV the Fair was Isabel, daughter of James I, sister of Pere II the Great and James II of Majorca, although Isabel had already died (d. 1271) by then. 28 An Epistola ad regem Franciae, an Epistola ad quendam amicum and an Epistola ad Universitatem parisiensem are extant. In these letters addressed to the king of France, certain friends and the University of Paris, Llull asked the relevant authorities to create schools for missionaries.

125

1 26

is a be l gr ifo l l

The Apologetic and Polemic Literature

The Dominicans also felt the need to write apologetic literature — to anticipate the reactions of the other faiths’ believers, to refute their errors and provide content for the conversion programmes, and ultimately to train missionaries in the art of preaching. The anti-Jewish polemical literature has remarkable precedents in the Iberian Peninsula that can already be found in the Visigothic period (Isidore of Seville, Ildefonso, Julian of Toledo, and Álvaro of Cordoba). In the early twelfth century, Mosé Sefardí, a converted Jew of Huesca, baptized under the name of Peter Alfonso (1106), wrote the work Dialogus contra iudaeos (c. 1115) in memory of King Alfonso I of Aragon, for whom he also served as a physician. The work is a dialogue and debate between two interlocutors, the Jew Moisés and the Christian Peter Alfonso, which correspond with two personifications of the same author, before and after his conversion. The work also contains an attack on Islam (Dialogue V).29 We can also find apologies of Judaism, such as Kuzari, written in Arabic by Yehudá ha-Leví, a Jew born in Tudela c. 1075, who spent much of his life in al-Andalus, Cordoba, and Seville. The author sets forth the main aspects of the three monotheistic religions, and although he concludes by declaring the superiority of Judaism, his aim is to bond the three beliefs organically.30 In 1167, Judá ibn Tibbon translated the work into Hebrew. This interreligious spirit of dialogue cannot be found in the Dialogus inter philosophum, iudaeum et christianum of Peter Abelard (1079–1142),31 written in the last years of his life in retreat in Cluny under the protection of Peter the Venerable. The basis for producing anti-Islamic polemic literature can be found precisely within the Cluny region. In 1142, Peter the Venerable (1092–1156), abbot of Cluny, travelled to the Iberian Peninsula as part of a review of the monasteries of the order.32 The border location of the Hispanic centres had facilitated the transfer of books and cultural exchange between Christianity and Islam, and places such as Ripoll or Rueda de Jalón attracted scholars of the Latin West, eager to access Arabic culture. Meanwhile, intellectual Muslims from al-Andalus and Baghdad had, for almost two centuries, possessed Arabic translations of the Christian Scriptures.33 Peter the Venerable felt the need to learn Islamic theology in order make it available to those challenging it. Therefore, he ordered the Latin translation of a series of doctrinal texts of Islam and related writings, known to us as the Corpus Toletanum sive Cluniacense, or more correctly as Corpus islamolatinum, since the translations were not made in Toledo, but within the area of the Ebro Valley (Zaragoza, Tudela) and León. Among these translations is found the first Latin version of the Koran, prepared by Robert of

29 Pedro Alfonso de Huesca, Diálogo contra los judíos. 30 Ha-Leví, Cuzary, Millàs Vallicrosa, Yehudá Ha-Levi. 31 Abelardo Diálogo entre un filósofo, ed. and trans. by Silvia Magnavacca, here the Latin text follows the Latin edition by R. Thomas: Abaelardus, Petrus, Dialogus inter philosophum. 32 Bishko, ‘Peter the Venerable’s Journey to Spain’, Van den Eynde, ‘Les principaux voyages’, Kritzech, Peter the Venerable, Martínez Gázquez, ‘Los Santos Padres’. 33 Al-Bâyî asserts that he had read the gospels translated into Arabic: see Turki ‘La lettre du “moine de France”’, p. 140, re-edited in Turki, Théologiens et juristes, pp. 233–81, especially p. 268 and note 130.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

Ketton (or of Chester). Nevertheless, the translation was not a literal version, but a biased one with a strong polemic aim against Islam, often abridging the main texts. Nonetheless, this translation became an essential tool for subsequent anti-Islamic polemics.34 Peter of Toledo,35 in turn, prepared a translation of the Arabic-Christian polemic text Risālat al-Kindī (Apology of Christianity), a writing of uncertain date, probably from the ninth century, and attributed to Abd al-Masîh ibn Ishâq al-Kindî, a figure from the court of the Caliph of Baghdad Al-Mamûn (786–833). The first part is a call to Christians to convert to Islam (Epistola sarraceni ad suam sectam christianum invitantis), and the second part is the Christian response (Rescriptum christiani ad maurum suam legem nichil esse merito rationis ostendentis). It is a summary of the main points of Islamic doctrine, hence the strong anti-Islamic polemics: defending the integrity of the Scriptures and the Trinitarian mystery, and a frontal attack on Muhammad for his lust for violence (jihad or holy war). Additionally, a series of works providing information about Muhammad’s life must be noted, such as De doctrina Machumeti quae apud sarracenos magnae auctoritas est, translated from Arabic by Hermann of Carinthia (or Dalmata), and written in dialogue form. More extensive and detailed is the life of Muhammad titled De generatione Machumeti et nutritura eius, also translated by Hermann of Carinthia. Robert of Ketton summarized his life in the work Chronica mendosa et ridiculosa sarracenorum. These literary treatises provided sufficient material for Peter the Venerable (and his secretary Peter of Poitiers) to compose his polemics against Islam, such as Contra sectam siue haeresim Saracenorum. The abbot of Cluny had already inveighed against Judaism in his work Adversus Iudeorum inueteratam duritiem.36 This initial nucleus would subsequently be expanded. The Liber Schalae Machometi or Kitab al-Mihray introduces the story of Muhammad’s night journey to heaven with a detailed description.37 The archbishop of Toledo, Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada (c. 1170–1247), compiled a Historia arabum with interesting contributions on ArabIslamic culture.38 Within the archbishop’s milieu, Marcos of Toledo made the second Latin translation of the Koran,39 and was also the probable translator of the Aquīda by Ibn Tumart of Morocco (1077–1130),40 a work of Islamic theology, as well as the Liber denudationes (or Contrarietas alfolica), a Mozarabic text on religious controversy.41 All this work certainly laid the necessary foundations for the knowledge of Judaism and Islam in the Latin West, and its subsequent rebuttal. It is characterized by

34 d’Alverny ‘Deux traductions’; Cruz Palma, La trascendencia; Martínez Gázquez, ‘Finalidad de la primera traducción del Corán’. 35 Published in Muñoz Sendino, ‘La apología’. See also González Muñoz, La versión latina de la ‘Apología’ de Al- Kindī. 36 Kritzech, Peter the Venerable and Islam, Iogna-Prat, Ordonner et exclure, Tolan, ‘Peter the Venerable’, Martínez Gázquez, ‘Los Santos Padres’. 37 La Escala de Mahoma, ed. by Muñoz Sendino. 38 Jiménez de Rada, Historia arabum. 39 Petrus i Pons, ‘Marcus de Toledo’; Tolan, ‘Las traducciones’. 40 d’Alverny, ‘Marc de Toledo’. 41 Burman, ‘The Influence’, Burman, Religious Polemic, pp. 38–62.

127

1 28

is a be l gr ifo l l

displaying an extremely simplistic image of Judaism and Islam, especially the texts of the Corpus Toletanum. The Jews are almost always introduced as God killers; Muslims as deluded followers of an impostor (the false prophet). This image prevailed among European Christians well into the thirteenth century — a deformed and monstrous image preventing any kind of dialogue or cultural confluence. Interreligious dialogue was therefore impossible, void, and pointless — as useless and absurd as talking to animals. This biased view of the other through Cluny and Cîteaux was introduced into the texts concerning the Crusades. Out of necessity this distorted reality needed to be readjusted, which did not, however, preclude the continuation of disputes. The religious literature of the Catalan Dominican Order was particularity defined by its ‘scientific’ character. The dominion of the opponent’s languages (Hebrew and Arabic) allowed them access to a direct, qualified, and deepened knowledge of the Talmud and Koranic authorities. The introduction of Jewish and Arabic scholastics, which additionally transmitted Greek knowledge, placed the theological controversy within the framework of philosophy and logic. The image of the other was therefore modified, or at least made more complex. Ramon Martí, born in Subirats (near Barcelona) around 1230, is one of the most outstanding representatives of the Catalan Dominican school. Martí took the Dominican habit in the convent of Santa Caterina, and was educated in Paris with Albert the Great, where he discovered Thomas Aquinas.42 Around the year 1254, he wrote De secta Mahometi,43 a controversial anti-Islamic treatise, subsequently completed by the Explanatio symboli Apostolorum,44 in which, invoking the Apostles’ Creed, he introduced an apology of Christianity. These are two parts of the same work, although traditionally they have been considered two different treatises.45 The first part corrects the errors of Islam, focusing on the falseness of the prophet Muhammad (an impostor who does not perform miracles, who does not promote a holy law but a harmful one, etc.). The second part displays the fundamentals of the Christian faith, which have to be accepted and believed. The duality between the fight against Islam and the apology and exhibition of Christianity became exemplary within the anti-Islamic Iberian literature, and forged models for preaching among Muslims. From the conclusion of the dispute of Barcelona (1267), Ramon Martí focused his energies exclusively on the fight against the Jews. That same year he wrote Capistrum iudaeorum a work of anti-Jewish polemics to be used by Dominican friars in their relations with the Jews. The work furnished materials to Thomas Aquinas and the writing of his Summa contra gentiles,46 created by the Italian Dominican at the request of Ramon of Penyafort and designed as a manual of Church orthodoxy, establishing

42 This information cannot be stated categorically, because it is provided by seventeenth-century sources: see Colomer, El pensament, pp. 194–95, and notes 35 and 36; similarly some unauthorized sources identify him as a converted Jew. 43 For an edition see Hernando i Delgado, ‘Ramon Martí. “De Seta Machometi”’. 44 March, ‘En Ramon Martí’. 45 Hernando i Delgado, ‘Le “De Seta Machometi”’, Hernando i Delgado, ‘De nuevo sobre la obra antiislámica’. 46 Huerga, ‘Hipótesis’.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

the Christian definition of unity from a systematized legal, philosophical, and spiritual point of view. In turn, the Summa of Aquinas would provide arguments to the major work of Ramon Martí, the Pugio fidei contra iudeos (1278).47 Ramon Martí is also the author, among other works (De erroribus philosophorum),48 of several pamphlets and handbooks for the use of preachers, and probably of Vocabulista in arabico, an interesting and unusual Latin-Arabic/Arabic-Latin Dictionary. The Religious Controversies

The third aspect promoted by the preachers in the service of conversion was religious controversies. These had different origins or features based on the interlocutors’ religion ( Jews or Muslims), as their status or position differed greatly within the territories of the Crown of Aragon. The theological disputation with Jews derived from the university technique of disputatio, belonging to the dialectics field, and transformed into a tool for conversion. The common frame of reference, the Old Testament, shared between Jews and Christians, allowed the debate. Disputations with the Jews were not new to the medieval West — the 1240 disputation of Paris established an important precedent for the religious controversies within the Crown of Aragon.49 In 1263, a public dispute against Judaism was organized in Barcelona instigated by Ramon of Penyafort and chaired by James I.50 The contenders were the Jewish convert Pau and Nahmanides, rabbi of Girona. Concerning the former we know very little — he was of Provençal origin, and had entered the Dominican Order when he converted to Christianity, a fact which certainly supported his intellectual and theological preparation — otherwise, the Order would not have chosen him to compete with a figure of such prestige as Nahmanides, coupled with the opportunity to display his sincere apostasy publicly. It seems that, years later, he was the instigator of the edict of Louis IX of France (1269), in which the French Jews were required to wear the distinctive yellow star.51 We may assume, therefore,

47 This is the title of the work in the oldest manuscripts. However, printed editions refer to it as Pugio fidei adversus mauros et iudeos. See Martini, Pugio fidei adversus mauros et judaeos . 48 Summarized title of the Tractatus de erroribus philosophorum, Aristotelis, Avicennae, Algazelis, Alkindi et Rabbi Moysis. 49 In 1239, Nicolau Donin, a converted Jew who had entered the Order of Preachers, denounced the Talmud before Pope Gregory IX, who addressed a bull to the bishops and kings of France, England, Castile, Aragon, etc., to requisition copies of the Talmud to examine their contents. Only France complied with the papal requirement. A public debate was organized in Paris between Nicolau Donin and four French rabbis, among them Rabbi Yehiel of the Paris synagogue. The Talmud was condemned and its copies were confiscated and burned in Paris in 1242. See Millàs Vallicrosa, ‘Sobre las fuentes documentales’, Katz, Exclusiveness and Tolerance, pp. 106–13, Maccoby, Judaism on Trial, Cohen, The Friars and the Jews. 50 Roth, ‘The Disputation’. For a translation of the Hebrew text of the debate see Shaw Rankin, Jewish Religious Polemic. Chazan, ‘The Barcelona “Disputation”’, Chazan, Barcelona and Beyond, Nahmanide, La Dispute de Barcelone, Riera i Sans and Feliu, Disputa de Barcelona, Riera i Sans, ‘Literatura antijueva’, Tostado Martín, La Disputa de Barcelona de 1263. 51 Nahmanide, La Dispute de Barcelone, p. 16.

129

130

is a be l gr ifo l l

an extraordinary zeal against his former co-religionists, which made him a prime contributor to the Church. We also know that he enjoyed the confidence of James I, because he played an intermediary role between the king and Pope Clement IV in matters related to the Jews. We know more detail about Nahmanides, otherwise known as Rabbi Bonastruc ça Porta. He was one of the great figures of Hispanic Judaism in the thirteenth century, a Kabbalist, and a renowned commentator of the Torah. His writings demonstrate his status as an authority in halakha (jurisdiction). He had intervened as peacemaker in numerous conflicts with the Jewish communities, including the controversy that, in Provence, opposed the supporters of Maimonides to his detractors (1232), or the dispute between the Jewish quarters of Catalonia, Aragon, and Navarra with the rabbis of northern France, which threatened to create division. Furthermore, James I recognized his authority, and requested his advice and mediation on numerous occasions. Hence, the Dominican interest in a figure such as Nahmanides is understandable, and similarly, the resistance of the latter to accept this proposal, which did not occur until ‘freedom of speech’ was guaranteed to him by James I. The disputation was probably developed in Catalan, due to the royal presidency and the presence of the audience, and has been preserved in two different manuscript traditions — the Latin version of the royal chancery, with an affidavit authorized by James I, and this official version favours Pau the Christian; and a Hebrew version of the text favouring Nahmanides, which is, however, a late fifteenth-century copy. It has been established that this Hebrew version reveals the existence of an earlier Hebrew text, which, in its Latin version, would be the one Nahmanides sent to the bishop of Girona and, in turn, circulated within the ecclesiastical and papal curia circles.52 This version, displaying how Nahmanides clearly won the debate, must have triggered the letter that Pope Clement IV sent to James I in 1265. Therefore, the dispute did not end in a draw, and Pau must have performed badly, clearly defeated by Nahmanides. This was a considerable setback for the Christian position and particularly for the Dominicans, whose reaction was not long in coming. On 29 August 1263, a royal order was issued to examine and censor the rabbinic texts. A commission of Christian theologians, chaired by Ramon of Penyafort, was established by prominent figures of the time, such as Ramon Martí, Arnau of Segarra, or Brother Peter of Genoa. Pau the Christian was entrusted with the task of purging the Talmud’s passages. An evaluation of this radical turn needs to be made because of the innovation observed in the techniques of Christian apologetics, raised by the disputation of Barcelona. The dispute of Paris of 1242 ended with a condemnation and the public 52 Josep Perarnau i Espelt has proved the existence of a Jewish protocol concerning the dispute, demonstrating the success of the rabbi of Girona against Pau the Christian. It provides two indirect witnesses: a dispute in Majorca in 1286 in which the polemics of Barcelona of 1263 are quoted, claiming that the author personally had the records which he had distributed worldwide; and the Speculum Hebraeorum from a brother João, a monk from Alcobaça, who also mentions the writings. See Perarnau i Espelt, ‘Sobre el protocol hebreu de la Disputa de Barcelona’, Mutius, Die ChristlichJüdische Zwangdisputation von Barcelona, Tostado Martín, La Disputa de Barcelona de 1263.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

burning of the Talmud. In contrast, the disputation of Barcelona sent no volumes to the inquisitorial fire. Rather, the Dominicans confiscated their adversary’s books and subjected them to review. It was not about removing the other’s blasphemies, but about demonstrating that the enemies’ books contained within them the truths of Christianity. The problem was not to be found in the texts; it was the Jewish scholars who were incapable of interpreting them correctly. Therefore, the Christian theologians had to adapt them to the truth. Up to then, the Christian apologists had devoted themselves to identifying and condemning the errors of their opponents, which, in turn, allowed them to display their theological and intellectual superiority. Now, instead, it consisted of demonstrating, for example, how the coming of the Messiah Jesus Christ could already be found in the Talmud. The book was not mistaken: the interpreter was. The Jewish scholars were liars who manipulated tradition and fooled their own people, whose rejection of a Christian interpretation evolved into the discredit of their spiritual guides — Nahmanides is therefore an impostor. Moreover, something serious must have happened, because the disputation of Barcelona was not definitively over until Nahmanides emigrated to Palestine in 1267. The interreligious controversy, maintained until then within the boundaries of high-level theology, now acquired a political and social dimension. The attacks were no longer merely directed against a doctrine, but against the people, the Jews. It is symptomatic that the first popular violent outburst against the Jews occurred in Xativa in 1268, forcing the king to take measures to protect the Jewish communities. The first sign, however, of an incipient intrusive campaign into the Jewish quarters came from papal bulls and royal decrees. Kings should allow compulsory preaching within synagogues and Jewish quarters,53 while the papacy ordered kings to forbid the Jews to be advanced into public positions. By the time James I was dead, and definitely by the end of the thirteenth century, all privileges protecting the Jewish quarters had disappeared and Jews no longer held public positions within the Crown. The Order of Preachers would undertake, under the shelter of the crown, a systematic policy of forced conversion. The anti-Jewish campaign did not end for some time; on the contrary, it culminated with the expulsion of the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula in 1492. The consequences of the disputation of Barcelona explain the performance of the Pugio fidei contra iudeos (1278), the major anti-Jewish polemic work of Ramon Martí. In its second part the author engages in a vivid battle against Judaism, focusing mainly on the Jewish position that did not conceive of Jesus as the promised Messiah in the Old Testament, who had yet to come. Ramon Martí displays a huge array of evidence and authorities (quoted in Hebrew). The obsession with Judaism was more important than the concerns about Islam. The Messiah issue, or the meticulous deconstruction of the Jewish textual tradition, probably responded to the fear that the ‘enemy within’ (the Jews) would wreck and cause doubts to arise in Christian faith.54 Judaism had to be defeated in order to save Christianity.

53 Riera i Sans, ‘Les llicències reials’. These permissions were granted to Dominicans and Franciscans, and also to lay people such as Ramon Llull (1299). 54 Bonner, ‘L’apologètica’.

131

13 2

is a be l gr ifo l l

The anti-Muslim controversies had a different nature. The Muslims had arrived in the Iberian Peninsula as conquerors or, at least, as a result of the conquests. They departed from a dominant political situation, which, in contrast, did not need religious cohesion. Furthermore, Muslims and Christians did not share any texts of reference, there were no ‘authority arguments’ commonly accepted by both parties. The Christian preachers, therefore, had to leave aside disputes concerning authority based on sacred texts, and instead use ‘rational arguments’. Therefore, in addition to the aforementioned Cluniac contestation precedents (Peter the Venerable), the Dominicans steered the religious controversies about Islam to the philosophical field. Rational arguments replaced the authorities of the Old and New Testaments, which Muslims could not accept, and provided a common basis for discussion. Attributed to Ramon Martí is an unsuccessful attempt to convert a Tunisian soldier, al-Mustansir,55 when travelling to this country in 1268–1269. This attempt deeply struck Ramon Llull, who recounts this event repeatedly in several passages of his work,56 as in his Llibre de meravelles (Book I, Ch. 7).57 Ramon Llull’s Alternative Project

The last passage of this work contains an implicit criticism of the Dominicans’ conversion methods. Ramon Llull concludes that their tactics had two fundamental flaws: preachers’ arguments based on authorities (against Judaism), in which they had expert and extensive knowledge of their opponents’ sacred texts, and their ability to deconstruct them resulted in endless discussions on hermeneutics. The rational arguments (against Islam) even looked for the opponents to abandon their faith, but in return offered no logical reasoning persuading them to take refuge in the Christian faith. The Dominicans, as was commonplace for scholasticism of the thirteenth century, defended meritum fidei. The Christian theologian might argue the truth of religion, but the Muslim must convert to Christianity, not from a rational conviction but by an act of faith. Ramon Llull realized that in waiting for the illumination of faith (God’s grace), millions of souls were lost. The objective can be summarized in a sentence that became emblematic of his new apologetics: ‘Non dimittere credere pro credere sed pro intelligere’. Thus it was necessary to search for ‘raons demostratives i necessàries’ (demonstrative and necessary reasons). These new solutions had already emerged in Llibre del gentil e dels tres savis (c. 1274–1276), his first piece of apologetical writing. These demonstrative reasons had to be integrated within a common philosophical and theological background, accessible to the three monotheistic religions. He built

55 It is traditionally accepted among scholars that the failed missionary was the Dominican Ramon Martí: see Longpré, ‘Le B. Raymond Martí’. Josep Maria Ruiz Simon has suggested, however, the figure of André de Longjumeau, also Dominican, who probably accompanied Saint Louis in his Tunisian expedition in 1270: see Ruiz Simon, L’Art de Ramon Llull, pp. 361–62, n. 501. 56 These events, besides being recounted in Llibre de meravelles, can also be found in Romanç d’Evast e Blaquerna, in Liber de fine, in Llibre dels cinc savis, in Disputatio fidei et intellectus, and in Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sanctae, among others. 57 Llull, Llibre de meravelles, vol. 1, pp. 117–18.

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

this model of cultural syncretism from the two major Mediterranean heritages: monotheism and the legacy of Greek philosophy and science. Both legacies were shared by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Meanwhile, he undertook research on an abstract operating language, so abstract that it could be universal. This was a radical innovation: the language of scholastic logic, based on the syllogism and quaestio, gave way to algebraic formulations that render it similar to mathematics. Obviously, the dogmas of the Trinity and the Incarnation structure the system, so that the new method could be a tool for conversion. It is what we know as ‘Art’. It underwent revisions and substantial changes, from the Ars compendiosa inveniendi veritatem (c. 1274) to the Ars generalis ultima (1305–1307), which he considered closed. Llull was absolutely convinced of the effectiveness of his new method. A blind faith in it led him to reformulate various fields of knowledge, in order to adapt them to the ‘Art’: medicine, astronomy, geometry, jurisprudence, psychology, pedagogical manuals and encyclopedias, rhetorical treatises applied to preaching, as well as works on chivalry or electoral methods, and literature in general — more than two hundred works. Ramon Llull was optimistic, but also a pragmatist. Mission and Crusade always coexist in his writings, although in his works prior to 1285 he was more clearly in favour of the former than the latter. However, the fall of Acre and Tyre (1291) renewed his interest in the subject of the Crusade. The Liber de fine (1303–1307), addressed to James II of Aragon, is a more important political and military treatise. The Liber de acquisitione Terrae Sancte (1308–1309) follows it. He proposed plans to crusade in North Africa, as well as the need for unification of the military orders. James II was attacking the Muslims of Granada and Morocco, and undertook an unsuccessful crusade to Almeria. At the same time, Llull’s missionary tactics were changing. In his second mission to North Africa, at Bejaia (1307), he no longer looked so much for dialogue, but for Muslims’ adherence to the Christian faith by exemplary martyrdom, which the most Franciscan extremists were putting into practice during these years. Muslims pulled Llull’s long beard out, and he was stoned and imprisoned for six months, where, however, he wrote the Disputatio christiani et Homer sarraceni. It is as if ‘Art’ had ceased to be operative in communicating with non-Christian societies.

Conclusions The occupation of the Balearic Islands (1229–1235) and the Kingdom of Valencia (1232–1238/1245) opened a crucial historical period in the Crown of Aragon. A multi-ethnic society, multicultural, multilingual, and with different religious beliefs emerged. The incorporation of a large Muslim population into a previously almost entirely Christian society forced local intellectual elites to rethink the idea of Christianitas, built ad extra during times of expansion and fighting against non-Christians (the ideology of Crusade). The Christians thinkers are for the first time confronted with the problem of Islam as an internal problem. Reality prevails — in new circumstances there was no escape from ‘living together’ with Muslims inside one political society. This fact influenced at the same time the relations with the Jewish minority, that had been present in Catalonia from Carolingian times. The centres of power — the

133

134

is a be l gr ifo l l

monarchy and the Church — developed political projects and intellectual programmes for building the cohesion and transformation of this new society, and to correct the demographic imbalance. The Crown led a policy of colonialism (repartiment), whereas the Church, through the Order of Preachers, propagated a conversion program (the mission). The action lines were divergent, but agreed on the initial premise of the coexistence of different ethnic and religious communities. The dream of conversion, conceived from intellectual presuppositions and to serve religious coexistence, and considered valuable in social life, crumbled at the end of the thirteenth century. Both Dominican conversion methods and the Llullian alternative were possible only in a hegemonic Christian society as evangelization projects for a conquered people. The new social (ethnic) reality in the Crown of Aragon changed everything.

Works Cited Primary Sources Abaelardus, Petrus, Dialogus inter philosophum, iudaeum et christianum, ed. by Rudolf Thomas (Stuttgart: Friedrich Frommann, 1970) Abelardo, Diálogo entre un filósofo, un judío y un cristiano, bilingual edition, ed. and trans. by Silvia Magnavacca, Biblioteca de Obras Maestras del Pensamiento, 30 (Buenos Aires: Losada, 2003) Azriel de Girona, Cuatro textos cabalísticos, ed. and trans. with an introduction by Miriam Eisenfeld (Barcelona: Riopiedras, 1994) Ha-Leví, Yehudah, Cuzary: Libro de la prueba y de la demostración en defensa de la religión menospreciada, trans. by Núria García Amat y Albert Soriano Blanco, Biblioteca del Tiqún (Barcelona: Ediciones Indigo, 2001) Hernando, Josep, ‘Ramon Martí. De Seta Machometi o De origine, progressu et fine Machometi et quadruplici reprobatione prophetiae eius. Introducción, transcripción, traducción y notas’, Acta Historica et Archaeologica Mediaevalia, 4 (1983), 9–63 Jiménez de Rada, Rodrigo, Historia arabum, ed. by José Lozano Sánchez, intro. by Juan Gil, Filosofía y Letras, 21 (Sevilla: Secretariado de Publicaciones de la Universidad de Sevilla, 1993) La Escala de Mahoma: traducción del árabe al castellano, latín y francés, ordenada por Alfonso X el Sabio, ed. by José Muñoz Sendino (Madrid: Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores, Dirección General de Relaciones Culturales, 1949) Llull, Ramon, Llibre de meravelles, 2 vols, ed. by Lola Badia and others, Nova Edició de les Obres de Ramon Llull, 10, 13 (Barcelona: Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 2011–2014) March, Josep M., ‘En Ramon Martí i la seva Explanatio Simboli Apostolorum’, Anuari de l’Institut d’Estudis Catalans (1908), 443–96 Martini, Raymundi, Pugio fidei adversus mauros et judaeos (Lipsiae: Sumptibus haeredum Friderici Lanckisi, 1687; reprinted in facsimile, Farnborough: Gregg, 1967) Muñoz Sendino, José, ‘La apología del cristianismo de al-Kindi’, Miscellanea Comillensis: Revista de Ciencias Humanas y Sociales, 7/11–12 (1949), 337–460

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

Nahmanide, La Dispute de Barcelone suivi du Commentaire sur Ésaïe 52:53, trans. from Hebrew and Latin by Éric Smilévitch and Luc Ferrier (Paris: Verdier, 1984; reprinted, Paris : Lagrasse, 1996) Pedro Alfonso de Huesca, Diálogo contra los judíos, intro. by John Tolan, Latin text ed. by Klaus-Peter Mieth, trans. by Esperanza Ducay, scientific editor M.ª Jesús Lacarra, Larumbe, 9 (Huesca: Instituto de Estudios Altoaragoneses, 1996) Penyafort, Ramon de, Summa de penitència. Cartes i documents, intro. by Llorenç Galmés, trans. by Jaume Fàbregas, Clàssics del Cristianisme, 75 (Barcelona: Edicions Proa, 1999) Poemes hebraics de jueus catalans (Segles XI–XV), trans. by Eduard Feliu i Mabres, intro. by Jaume Riera i Sans (Barcelona: Fundació Salvador Vives Casajuana, 1976) Rius i Serra, José, Diplomatario. Documentos, Vida antigua, Crónicas, Procesos antiguos (Barcelona: Edición de Mons, 1954) Rubió i Lluch, Antoni, Documents per l’història de la cultura catalana medieval, vol. 1–2, Memòries de la Secció Històrico-Arqueològica (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2000) (Facsimile edition of Barcelona: 1908–1921) Shaw Rankin, Oliver, Jewish Religious Polemic of Early and Later Centuries: A Study of Documents Here Rendered in English (New York: Katv, 1970) Secondary Studies Abulafia, David, A Mediterranean Emporium: The Catalan Kingdom of Majorca (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) d’Alverny, Marie-Thérèse, ‘Deux traductions latines du Coran’, Archives d’Histoire Doctrinale et Littéraire du Moyen Âge, 48 (1947), 69–131 ———, ‘Marc de Toledo, traducteur d’Ibn Tumart’, Al-Andalus, 16 (1951), 99–140, 259–307 Baer, F., Studien zur Geschichte der Juden Königreich Aragonien während des 13. und 14. Jahrhunderts (Berlin: Ebering, 1913) Baer, Yitzhak, A History of the Jews in Christian Spain, vol. 1: From the Age of Reconquest to the Fourteenth Century (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1961) Batllori, Miquel, Sant Ramon de Penyafort en la història político-religiosa de Catalunya-Aragó, in Miquel Batllori, A través de la història i la cultura, Biblioteca ‘Abat Oliba’ (Barcelona: Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 1979), vol. 16 : pp. 37–60 Bishko, Charles Julian, ‘Peter the Venerable’s Journey to Spain’, in Petrus Venerabilis, 1156–1956: Studies and Texts Commemorating the Eight Centenary of his Death, ed. by Gilles Constable and James Kritzech, Studia Anselmiana Philosophica Theologica, 40 (Roma: Pontificium Institutum S. Anselmi, 1956), pp. 163–75 Bonner, Anthony, ‘L’aprenentatge intel-lectual de Ramon Llull’, in Studia in honorem Prof. M. de Riquer, vol. 2, (Barcelona: Quaderns Crema, 1987), pp. 11–20 ———, ‘L’apologètica de Ramon Martí i Ramon Llull davant de l’islam i del judaisme’, Estudi General, 9 (1989), 171–85 Burman, Thomas E., ‘The Influence of the Apology of Al-Kindi and Contrarietas alfolica on Ramon Llull’s Late Religious Polemics, 1305–1313’, Medieval Studies, 53 (1991), 197–228 ———, Religious Polemic and the Intellectual History Old the Mozarabs, c. 1050–1200, Brill’s Studies in Intellectual History, 52 (Leiden: Brill, 1994)

135

1 36

is a be l gr ifo l l

Burns, Robert Ignatius, The Crusader Kingdom of Valencia: Reconstruction on a ThirteenthCentury Frontier (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967) ———, ‘Christian-Islamic Confrontation in the West: The Thirteenth-Century Dream of Conversion’, The American Historical Review, 76 (1971), 1386–1434 ———, Islam under the Crusaders: Colonial Survival in the Thirteenth-Century Kingdom of Valencia (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973) ———, Medieval Colonialism: Postcrusade Exploitation of Islamic Valencia (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975) ———, Muslims, Christians, and Jews in the Crusader Kingdom of Valencia: Societies in Symbiosis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1984) ———, Moros, cristians i jueus en el regne croat de València: Societats en simbiosi (València: Eliseu Climent, 1987) Chazan, Robert, ‘The Barcelona “Disputation” of 1263: Christian Missionizing and Jewish Response’, Speculum: A Journal of Medieval Studies, 52 (1977), 824–42 ———, Barcelona and Beyond: The Disputation of 1263 and its Aftermath (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992) Cohen, Jeremy, The Friars and the Jews: The Evolution of Medieval Anti-Judaism (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1982) Coll, José M., ‘Escuelas de lenguas orientales en los siglos XIII y XIV’, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, 17 (1944), 115–38; 18 (1945), 59–89; 19 (1946), 217–40 ———, ‘S. Ramón de Peñafort y las misiones del Norte Africano en la Edad Media’, Missionalia Hispanica, 5 (1948), 417–58 Colomer, Eusebi, El pensament als Països Catalans durant l’Edat Mitjana i el Renaixement, Scripta et Documenta, 54 (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 1997) Companys i Huguet, Mariona, ed., La Cataluña judía (Barcelona: Àmbit, 2002) Cortabarría, Ángel, ‘S. Ramón de Peñafort y las escuelas dominicanas de lenguas’, Escritos del Vedat, 7 (1977), 125–54 ———, ‘L’étude des langues au Moyen Âge chez les Dominicains: Espaigne, Orient, Raymond Martin’, MIDEO: Mélanges de l’Institut d’Études Orientales, 10 (1977), 189–248 Cruz Palma, Óscar de la, La trascendencia de la primera traducción del Corán (Robert de Ketton, 1142–1143) (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2010 ; http://www. hottopos.com/collat7/transcoran.pdf) Cutler, Allan, ‘The First Crusade and the Idea of “Conversion”’, The Muslim World, 58.1 (1968), 57–71; 58.2 (1968), 155–64 Feliu, Lluís, ‘Diplomatari de sant Ramon de Penyafort’, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, 8 (1932), 101–12 Formentín Ibáñez, Justo, ‘Funcionamiento pedagógico y proyección cultural de los Estudios de árabe y hebreo promovidos por S. Ramón de Peñafort’, Escritos del Vedat, 7 (1977), 155–76 Garcías Palou, Sebastián, El Miramar de Ramon Llull (Palma de Mallorca: Diputación Provincial de Baleares — Instituto de Estudios Baleáricos, CSIC, 1977) González Muñoz, Fernando, La versión latina de la ‘Apología’ de Al- Kindī y su tradición textual, in Musulmanes y cristianos en Hispania durante las conquistas de los siglos XII y XIII, ed. by Miquel Barceló and others (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2005), pp. 25–40

T h e C row n o f Arago n o n the Bo rd e r

Hernando i Delgado, Josep, ‘Le “De Seta Machometi” du Cod. 46 d’Osma, oeuvre de Raymond Martin (Ramon Martí)’ in Islam et chrétiens du Midi (XIIe–XIVe s.), Cahiers de Fanjeux, 18 (Toulouse: Édouard Privat Éditeur, 1983), pp. 351–71 ———, ‘De nuevo sobre la obra antiislámica atribuida a Ramon Martí, dominico catalán del siglo XIII’, Sharaq al-Andalus, 8 (1991), 97–108 Hillgarth, Jocelyn Nigel, Los Reinos hispánicos, 1250–1516, vol. 1: Un equilibrio precario, 1250–1410 (Barcelona: Grijalbo, 1979) (first edition: Jocelyn Nigel Hillgarth, The Spanish Kingdoms, 1250–1516, vol. 1: 1250–1410: Precarious Balance (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1976)) Huerga, Alvaro, ‘Hipótesis sobre la génesis de la Summa contra gentiles y la Pugio fidei’, Angelicum, 51 (1974), 533–57 Idel, Moshé, ‘La història de la càbala a Barcelona’, in La càbala, De Set a Nou, 26 (Barcelona: Fundació Caixa de Pensions, 1989), pp. 59–74 Iogna-Prat, Dominique, Ordonner et exclure: Cluny et la société chrétienne face a l’hérésie, au judaïsme et à l’islam, 1000–1150, Historique (Paris: Aubier, 1998) Katz, Jacob, Exclusiveness and Tolerance: Studies in Jewish-Gentile Relations in Medieval and Modern Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1961) Kedar, Benjamin Z., Crusade and Mission: European Approaches toward the Muslims (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984) Kritzech, James, Peter the Venerable and Islam, Princeton Oriental Studies, 23 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1964) Longpré, Éphrem, ‘Le B. Raymond Martí, O. P.’, Butlletí de la Societat Arqueològica Lulliana, 24 (1933), 269–71 Maccoby, Hyam, ed., Judaism on Trial: Jewish-Christian Disputation in the Middle Ages (London: Associated University Press, 1982) Martínez Gázquez, José, ‘Los Santos Padres, modelo de Pedro el Venerable en la refutación del Islam’, Cuadernos de Filología Clásica. Estudios Latinos, 15 (1998), 347–61 ———, ‘Finalidad de la primera traducción del Corán’, in Musulmanes y cristianos en Hispania durante las conquistas de los siglos XII y XIII, ed. by Miquel Barceló and others (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2005), pp. 71–78 Mas i Solench, Josep, Ramon de Penyafort, Episodis de la Història, 327 (Barcelona: Rafael Dalmau, Editor, 2000) Millàs Vallicrosa, José María, Yehudá Ha-Levi como poeta y apologista, Biblioteca Hebraicoespañola, 2 (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, Instituto Arias Montano, 1947) ———, ‘Sobre las fuentes documentales de la controversia de Barcelona en el año 1263’, Anales de la Universidad de Barcelona: Memorias y Comunicaciones (1949), 25–43 Mutius, Hans-Georg von, Die Christlich-Jüdische Zwangdisputation von Barcelona nach dem hebräischen Protokol des Moses Nachmanides (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1982) Perarnau i Espelt, Josep, ‘Sobre el protocol hebreu de la Disputa de Barcelona, del 1263’, Arxiu de Textos Catalans Antics, 6–7, (1988–1989), 272–75 Petrus i Pons, Nàdia, ‘Marcus de Toledo y la segunda traducción latina del Corán’, in Musulmanes y cristianos en Hispania durante las conquistas de los siglos XII y XIII, ed. by Miquel Barceló and others (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2005), pp. 87–94

137

138

is a be l gr ifo l l

Pons, A., ‘Los judíos del reino de Mallorca durante los siglos XIII y XIV’, Hispania, 20 (1960), 3–54 Riera i Sans, Jaume, ‘Les llicències reials per predicar als jueus i als sarraïns (segles XIII– XIV)’, Calls, 2 (1987), 114–31 ———, ‘Literatura antijueva en català’, Estudi General, 9 (1989), 215–36 Riera i Sans, Jaume, and Eduard Feliu, Disputa de Barcelona de 1263 entre mestre Mossé de Girona i fra Pau Cristià, Estudis i Assaigs, 2 (Barcelona: Columna, 1985) Robles, Laureano, ‘El Studium Arabicum del capítulo dominicano de Toledo de 1250’, Estudios Lulianos, 24 (1980), 23–47 Romano, David, ‘Judíos escribanos y trujamanes de árabe en la Corona de Aragón reinados de Jaime I a Jaime II’, Sefarad, 38 (1978 [1980]), 71–105 ———, ‘Les juifs de la Coronne d’Aragon avant 1391’, Révue des Études Juives, 141 (1982), 169–82 ———, Judíos al servicio de Pedro el Grande de Aragón (1276–1285) (Barcelona: Universidad de Barcelona, Facultad de Filología, 1983) ———, ‘Els jueus a Barcelona i Girona fins a la mort de Ramon Borrell’, in Symposium Internacional sobre els orígens de Catalunya (Segles VIII–IX), vol. 2, Memorias de la Real Academia de Buenas Letras de Barcelona, 24 (Barcelona: Real Academia de Buenas Letras de Barcelona, 1991) pp. 123–30 Roth, Cecil, ‘The Disputation of Barcelona (1263)’, Harvard Theological Review, 43 (1950), 117–44 Ruiz Simon, Josep Maria, L’Art de Ramon Llull i la teoria escolàstica de la ciència (Barcelona: Quaderns Crema, 1999) Tolan, John, ‘Peter the Venerable on the Diabolic Heresy of the Saracens’, in The Devil, Heresy and Witchcraft in the Middle Ages: Essays in Honor of Jeffrey B. Russell, ed. by Alberto Ferreiro, Cultures, Beliefs and Traditions; Medieval and Early Modern Peoples, 6 (Leiden: Brill, 1998), pp. 345–67 ———, ‘Las traducciones y la ideología de la reconquista: Marcos de Toledo’, in Musulmanes y cristianos en Hispania durante las conquistas de los siglos XII y XIII, ed. by Miquel Barceló and others (Barcelona: Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, 2005), pp. 79–86 Tostado Martín, Alfonso, La Disputa de Barcelona de 1263: controversia judeocristiana, Fuentes Documentales, 4 (Salamanca: Universidad Pontificia de Salamanca, 2009) Turki, Abdel Magid, ‘La lettre du “moine de France” à al-Muqtadir Billâh, roi de Saragosse, et la réponse d’al-Bayi, le faqih andalou’, Al-Andalus, 31 (1966), 73–153 ———, Théologiens et juristes de l’Espagne musulmane: Aspects polémiques, Islam d’Hier et d’Aujourd’hui, 16 (Paris: Maissonneve et Larose, 1982) Valls i Taberner, Ferran, ‘Diplomatari de sant Ramon de Penyafort’, Analecta Sacra Tarraconensia, 5 (1929), 249–304 ———, San Ramón de Peñafort, Coleccion Pro Ecclesia et Patria, vol. 16 (Barcelona: Editorial Labor, 1936) (updated Catalan edition: Ferran Valls i Taberner, Sant Ramon de Penyafort, (Barcelona: Ed Labor, 1998)) Van den Eynde, Damien, ‘Les principaux voyages de Pierre le Vénérable’, Benedictina, 15 (1968), 58–110 Waltz, James Calvin, Western European Attitudes toward the Muslims before the Crusades (Ann Arbor: Michigan State University, 1963)

Przemysław Wiszewski

Multi-Ethnicity or the Network of Local and Regional Identities in Silesian Medieval Historiography

At the beginning of this section, Aneta Pieniądz stated that ethnicity is one of many elements that shaped the historical imagination of early medieval elites. Ethnic identity was fluid in nature, and secondary to political needs. The other authors in this part have analysed various cases of the interactions between ethnic identity and memory in both the Middle Ages and the early modern period, these cases show the growing importance of ‘ethnicity’ and interethnic relations as elements of the vision of the imagined past. Here, focusing on the case of Silesia, we will try to look at the problem from another perspective: whether an ethnic identity was perceived and memorized by our medieval ancestors as different from other types of affiliations that helped to build cohesive (local and regional) societies. Was multi-ethnicity a perceptible phenomenon for the inhabitants of Silesia in the Middle Ages and, if so, has anyone attempted to examine its impact on the history of the region? How was it described and assessed when constructing narratives about the past? The answers to those questions will allow us to address the key issue of whether the multi-ethnic past of the region was the cause of divisions and conflicts experienced in those times. Furthermore, can any historical solutions to conflicts caused by disputes between ethnic communities be identified? The concepts of ‘ethnicity’ as well as ‘multi-ethnicity’ are difficult to be deemed precisely defined and commonly accepted in contemporary scholarship. Even in a relatively narrow area of historical — or even narrower, medievalist — research, there is no agreement among scholars regarding a single definition of either of these concepts.1 If, however, we dare to omit specific features of ‘ethnicity’, what remains



1 See the chapter by Aneta Pieniądz in this volume, and Bartlett, ‘Medieval and Modern Concepts of Race and Ethnicity’. Przemysław Wiszewski  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of Medieval and Early Modern History at the Institute of History, University of Wrocław, with special interests in medieval and early modern history of social relations, values’ structures within medieval societies, and regional history. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 139–160 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120061

140

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Map 8.1. Silesia, as a land of the Crown of Bohemia (1348–1740). Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a CC BY-SA 4.0 license.

is a common ground for dominant views on the essence of the matter. Specifically, it refers to a group of people sharing the feeling of a strong relationship with members of their own ‘ethnic community’ on the basis of using a common language, sharing tales about the past embracing that community as the main protagonists, and affirming the same system of values which could be attributed to shared religious beliefs. An ethnic community may, but need not necessarily, be connected with a specific territory — there are no precisely defined borders, as the main elements are the union of culture and affirmation of its members. Community understood in such a way may include all, or almost all, members of some state body, but it may also include groups and individuals comprising political bodies which encompass various ethnic groups. The last situation may be described as the existence of a political ‘multi-ethnic community’. However, it must be asked whether members of such communities accepted in the same measure belonging to an ethnic community and

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

cooperating in harmony with other ethnicities? Or did they eventually stress their ethnic identity as a feature that defined their place in the society, as well as through conflict with other ethnicities within society? Or was that feature acknowledged but most frequently pushed aside by other identifications more strongly affecting the current situation of groups and entities?2 In other words, in the case of medieval Europeans, was ‘multi-ethnicity’ a dominating perspective, the key for seeing the structures of societies in which people belonging to different ethnic communities lived alongside one another? Let us leave aside for a moment the most obvious situation — that of religious otherness (Christians, Muslims, Jews).3 In this case, the affiliation to an ethnic group should be addressed in relation to eschatological issues. Let us look instead at a situation in which members of two Christian communities — German-speaking and Polish-speaking — lived alongside each other within one political organism. Both communities accepted the same political and administrative control, as well as holding shared religious beliefs. What differentiated them was their language and — at least for some time — everyday life and holiday customs.4 We can see such a split situation from the end of the twelfth century in medieval Silesia. Silesia was located on the border of Czech, German, and Polish lands, spreading along the upper and middle reaches of the Oder river. From the end of the tenth century it was ruled by the Piast Dynasty which governed Poland. At that time, it was inhabited almost exclusively by Slavic people, but the situation changed from the close of the twelfth century when an increasing number of newcomers primarily from Latin countries, but then mostly from Germany, started to settle here. They were settled in villages and towns co-formed by them and granting them the right to live in accordance with a collection of legal customs not previously applied, commonly known as ‘ius Theutonicum’. From the mid-thirteenth century the number of German migrants belonging to the group of knights was growing, but rarely exceeded 25% of the entire population of warriors. In the course of the fourteenth century the local elites basically assumed the culture of the migrants to such an extent that the Polish language was excluded from written communications, although its use was reported in peasant circles and by some townsmen. A certain cohabitation by the inhabitants of the region who belonged, theoretically at least, to the German and Polish communities and this lasted till the end of the Middle Ages. The forcing of the acculturation of local people who spoke Polish in such a way that they assumed





2 Facing a lack of ‘pure’ ethnic polities, Patrick Geary rejected ethnic identity as a useful tool for the analysis of medieval societies as one body, focusing instead on the identification of individuals with specific social — but not ethnic — groups and the process of building political/national identifications: Geary, The Myth of Nations, pp. 19–20. However, in this way we leave untouched the phenomenon — clearly visible in the sources (written and material alike) — of the co-existence of different ethnic cultures inside one political body. 3 See Leshock, ‘Religious Geography’. 4 Such features defined ‘nationes’, according to numerous medieval intellectuals and administrators: see Davies, ‘Nations and National Identities’, p. 571.

141

142

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

the culture of German-speaking Silesians as their own can be observed as late as the modern period.5 Even in the second half of the thirteenth century, when the presence of German migrants was relatively new and thus differences between newcomers and locals were clearly visible, the duality and coexistence of Poles and Germans in the region’s past was not commonly perceived or evaluated by Silesian elites. A view on the history of Silesia favourable to German-speaking newcomers is presented in the Chronica Polonorum, probably written in the late thirteenth century in the Cistercian abbey of Lubiąż (German: Lubens).6 It described the alleged battle of Studnica (Rothkirch) between the sons of Duke Henry I the Bearded, who was the duke and the founder of the entire Silesia region, as well as being an arduous promotor of ‘melioratio terrae’ — economic and cultural changes in the region.7 According to the author of Chronica Polonorum, two sons of the old duke, Henry II the Pious and Conrad, became enemies at a certain point in time. Conrad ‘hated Germans’ and wanted to expel the few living in Silesia, but his brother opposed him, so they met at the village of Studnica (Rothkirch) to settle the dispute. Henry II is said to have fought together ‘cum Theutinicis advenis, tam agricolis quam militibus, quos aliunde congregaverat’, while Conrad fought the battle ‘congregatis ex diversis provinciis Polonis’. Henry won and countless Poles, allies of Conrad, died on the battlefield.8 The story demonstrates, without a doubt, that the ethnic difference inside the Silesian society was perceived not only at the end of the thirteenth century by some members of the regional elite, but that ethnicity or, more precisely, a different approach to the Silesian ‘ethnic question’ — Conrad ‘hated Germans’, but Henry II obviously did not — was perceived as one of the key political problems during the period of the birth of this region. While historians agree that the whole story is completely fictitious, the moment chosen for the placing of the narrative and the protagonists of the story were of peculiar importance for Silesian society. Henry I was perceived as both the true founder of Silesia as a political entity, and a generous host and protector of German migrants there. Henry II, son of Henry I and Saint Hedwig of Andechs, was a tragic character — he ruled for only four years, dying in 1241 in the battle with the Mongols. Yet, thanks to his final deeds, he was acclaimed as a sainted defender of all Christians, and especially of all Silesians. His battle with Conrad during their father’s rule was — according to the Chronica Polonorum — in fact a ‘founding dispute’ of the regional society, a quarrel that in the past defined Silesians’ faith in the future. It is probable that the shape of the story showed dislike and fear felt by people of German origin, outnumbered in Silesia by the Poles during the major part of the thirteenth century. A certain averseness of the author of Chronica Polonorum towards the Poles and his attempt to emphasize the importance of the Germans and the imperial

5 For detailed information about the medieval and early modern history and the cohesion of Silesian society, see Wiszewski, The Long Formation of the Region Silesia; Harc and Wąs, The Strengthening of Silesian Regionalism. 6 Mrozowicz, ‘Chronica Polonorum’. 7 See Zientara, Heinrich der Bärtige und seine Zeit. 8 Kronika polska, ed. by Ćwikliński, p. 647.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

power is also visible in other parts of his work.9 Yet, it would be far too easy to assume that the author offered his readers a picture of Silesian society divided along ethnic identities, with Germans as absolutely positive characters contrasted with the feral Poles. According to the story, Henry II the Pious was supposed to have fought at the head of only a few Germans of varying status — whether they all came from Silesia is unclear, as they were ‘gathered from different places’ — against Conrad who led the Poles gathered from ‘various provinces’ — not only (if at all) from Silesia. The chronicler fails to mention what Germans and Poles living in Silesia would have been doing at that time. It is possible that the first version of the story — not written, but spoken and circulated among German newcomers — clearly described Germans and Poles from both dukes’ troops as originating from Silesia. That would give the story a certain logic, and eliminate ambiguities of the written version’s meaning caused by the lack of precision about the origin of both dukes’ warriors. This primordial version of the story could reflect fear of German newcomers and its consequence: hostility toward the ‘Others’ — Poles living in Silesia and a concept of their (that is, German Silesians) own superiority over local Poles rooted in this key moment of the region’s past. But according to the author of Chronica Polonoroum, those feelings had no right to shatter the peace in the region. For his hatred, Conrad was punished with defeat, but the defeated ones were not the Poles from Silesia, as the victorious troops did not consist of Silesian Germans.10 The story that could have accentuated the ethnic dualism of early Silesian society was replaced by a story of a more universal character. At the centre of the written version exists a political conflict between brothers for control over their father’s land. And here, ethnic issues are accentuated, although without a direct link to the composite ethnic structure of Silesian society at that time. A little less than a century after this account, another interpretation of the past was written by Canon Peter of Byczyna, author of Chronica principum Poloniae, composed in the second half of the fourteenth century.11 Peter was clearly aware of ethnic differences among Silesians in the past, as well as in his own times. His attitude towards the presence of the Poles in Silesia was favourable. According to his version of the story, victorious and just Henry II relied on the Germans, but gathered his army from all the inhabitants of Silesia, including the Poles.12 In contrast, Conrad led the army of the ‘Poles’ without specifying their territorial affiliation. Poles from the outside could have posed a threat to the regional community which in fact consisted of both Germans and Poles living in Silesia. Naturally, the outcome of the battle was unchanged, but the implications of the Peter’s story was slightly different than in the earlier work. Here, the sanctity of regional unity was emphasized more strongly, with a clear emphasis on the dual ethnic nature of Silesian society on the one hand,

9 10 11 12

See Wiszewski, ‘Dlaczego cesarz został kuchcikiem’. Zientara, ‘Konrad Kędzierzawy’ and further in Jurek, Obce rycerstwo na Śląsku, p. 121. Classen and Mrozowicz, ‘Bitschin, Peter’; Mrozowicz, ‘Die Polnische Chronik’. ‘Henricus cum Theutonicis tam advenis quam eciam Polonis militibus et aliis, de locis quibus potuit recollectis’, Kronika książąt polskich, ed. by Węclewski, p. 487.

143

144

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

and the decisive role played by Duke Henry II the Pious as a keystone of its fragile structure on the other.13 The existence of various versions of the story with key elements unchanged, but with differences in regard to ethnic issues, accentuates the siginificance of ethnicity for medieval Silesians, but nonetheless, unity of the regional political body was esteemed more highly than any ethnic questions. Written versions of the story of the battle of Studnica (Rothkirch) comprise a clearly formulated message: in the formative period of regiogenesis the ethnic division in Silesian society was a fact — but at the same time this division was not allowed to destroy the cohesion of the region. On the contrary, only people from the outside or evil characters among Silesians might try to make use of mutual lack of trust between Germans and Poles to disrupt peace and cooperation inside the multi-ethnic society. The holy duke of Silesia — Henry II the Pious — prevented such disruption from occurring at the crucial moment of building the foundations for the future of Silesia. Even if the original meaning of the story was different, it did not survive in the collective memory of medieval Silesians, at least among elites associated with the ducal courts. Nevertheless, if an official version of the past, promoted by the ducal courts, focused on the cohesive forces that strengthened Silesian society, local versions of cultural memory accentuated a different role played by mutiethnicity in building a new society at the end of the twelfth century and the beginning of the thirteenth century. In the second half of the fourteenth century, monks from the Cistercian monastery in Lubiąż (Lubens) created a vision of the difference between the German newcomers and the Polish local residents in the foundational times for Silesia at the end of the twelfth century. An anonymous monk wrote the so-called Versus Lubenses in which he described the beginnings of the abbey founded c. 1170 by Duke Boleslav I the Tall, father of Duke Henry I the Bearded.14 The Cistercians who had come from their home abbey in the German town of Pforta to the Silesian village of Lubiąż were said to have encountered local people participating in pagan cults and who were unfamiliar with the basic amenities of civilization. This situation was changed immediately through the activities of the Cistercians, who civilized the feral population of local Poles. The juxtaposition concerns the relationship between the monks, who were newcomers, and the generally recognized ‘gens Polonie’ who ‘pauper fuit haut operosa’. There is no further indication of whether the changes that transformed Lubiąż into an economically thriving landed property took place due to the settlers brought by the duke-founder or the Cistercians from Germany. It was solely the monks who created these changes through their own effort and labour, which is to say, together with the local people.15 Generations of historians since the nineteenth century (up to contemporaries such as Robert Bartlett) have emphasized that the category of ʻethnicity’ was crucial for understanding and deciphering the

13 Wiszewski, Henryk II Pobożny, pp. 85–87. 14 Mrozowicz, ‘Versus Lubenses’. 15 Versus lubenses, ed. by Wattenbach, p. 15.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

meaning of the story.16 Even those who set aside the naïve vision of Versus as a mirror of the twelfth-century social and economic situation in Silesia still focused on an ethnic conflict between Silesians supposedly present in the poem — although that is not as obvious as it seems. We do not know whether the monk intended the phrase gens Polonie to carry ethnic content. It is just as likely that he was trying to use this expression to emphasize geographical differences between the newcomers from Pforta and the local inhabitants. The phrase gens Polonie is very similar to the term Polonia populus, known from the foundation document for the abbey, which was treasured there throughout the abbey’s existence. This document was issued in 1175 by Boleslaus I the Tall, duke of Silesia. According to its author, the Cistercians who had settled in Lubiąż had the right to bring settlers from Teutonia where their mother house of Pforta was located (‘quod est in Theotonia super Salam fluvium’) to their properties. These ‘Teutons’ were to be eternally exempt from all burdens iuris Polonici. Conversely, Poloni who did not belong to any other estate, and became the peasants (coloni) subject to the abbot, were to pay tribute to him alone.17 The charter’s analysis is complicated by the fact that next to the ‘Germans’ and ‘Poles’ it mentions a third term to define the population living in a certain area. The witnesses of the document issued by Boleslaus, ‘Duke of Silesia’, were ‘Misico dux maximus et princeps cum clero et populo Polonie’. These ‘clerus et populus’ were not qualified in terms of ethnicity, but rather were identified by their relationship with Poland as a political entity. The social and political hierarchy suggested by the charter was clear: Boleslaus, duke of Silesia, was subordinate to the great Duke Mieszko, the princeps and most supreme duke ruling Poland. Everyone who was connected with Poland was subject to the latter, regardless of differences in social status. In this context, the names Theotoni and Poloni were determinants of the autonomy of the groups of people who were equally dependent on the ruler, who determined their way of living under his rule. The keystone of this dual community structure remained Boleslaus, the lawmaker who specified the place of all subjects in his duchy. To him, and within his duchy, they were all equal as the residents of Silesia, regardless of whether they were migrants (Thoeotni) or locals (Poloni). The concept meshes with the vision of the coexistence of different ethnicities in the Duchy of Silesia known from Chronica Polonorum, but it remains necessary to question whether it influenced the picture of the cloister’s past in the poem Versus lubenses. In this context, it is worth noting that the author of Versus lubenses did not contrast the monks as Germans with local residents as Poles. Apparently, however, from his

16 German historiography has used Versus lubenses to emphasize the importance of German ‘Kulturträgern’ in civilizing the primitive Polish population in Silesia. From the 1970s, some medievalists from the DDR developed research that pointed to the topical nature of the themes used in the work and the lack of archaeological evidence for the image presented in the text of how backward the areas transferred to the abbey at the time of the foundation were (see notes in Epperlein, ʻZur Mittelalterforschung’, pp. 65–66). Polish researchers often treated the work as an example of German chauvinism, which was biased and discredited the Poles (see review of the literature in Jażdżewski, Lubiąż. Losy, pp. 113–14). 17 Schlesisches Urkundenbuch, ed. by Appelt, no. 45, p. 28.

145

146

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

point of view it was irrelevant to this perfect narrative whether inhabitants of Silesia were ethnically homogeneous or diverse (Poles and Germans). The practical objective of Versus was to prove that the monks owed their wealth to nobody but themselves. According to the author of Versus, the founder duke and his family only provided the abbey with a humble beginning, and civilizational, rather than ethnic, differences between the local inhabitants and newcomers are acknowledged and stressed in the story. The division of the community in Versus, so apparent, runs not along ethnic boundaries, but along social and religious ones, with an extreme emphasis on the rank of the group ‘we’, that is the Cistercians, as opposed to ‘they’, that is everyone outside the order and convent. It fits perfectly into the universal stories about the early days of monasteries, which were popular in Silesia. Written down centuries later, these stories emphasized the bravery of the first monks as well as the wildness of nature and the coarseness of people.18 As well, the author of Versus, by omitting ethnic issues while creating the official version of the abbey’s beginning, was justified in silencing the decisive role of Duke Boleslaus I the Tall in building the economic foundations of the Cistercian wealth. In the author’s vision of the Cistercian abbey’s past, ethnic issues were of secondary importance — Versus witnessed and perpetuated the belief that, at the moment of the cloister’s beginning, all Silesians were Poles of certain cultural and civilizational characteristics. These features of local inhabitants were believed to have been changed solely through the efforts of the Cistercian monks, whose ethnic character is never mentioned in the poem. For the author, much more important than ethnic questions — which might be dangerously close to the problem of ducal power and the role of the Piast dynasty in the abbey’s foundation — were social ties and the pride of belonging to the perfect community of the Lubiąż monks. In the vision of the abbey’s past, local identity prevailed over regional or ethnic ones for pragmatic purposes. This version of the past was created to secure freedom for the monks in two areas: the cloister’s economy and the internal life of the abbey against the danger of ducal intervention. The pragmatic nature of the perception of ethnic diversity in the Silesians’ past is brilliantly captured in the narrative of The Book of Henryków, a source written in two stages: shortly after 1268 and around 1310. Its authors, the abbots of the Cistercian monastery in Henryków (Heinrichau), a daughter house of Lubiąż (Lubens), had to be aware of the ethnic diversity of the people surrounding the monastery both during and prior to their time. The acknowledgement of this diversity was necessary to explain to the readers a peculiar and incoherent character of legal practices regarding real estate transactions, for The Book of Henryków was written largely with the aim of defining and protecting the monks’ rights to the properties of the monastery.19 Hence, the first of the authors, Abbot Peter (III), describing in the 1270s the way in which the monastery had obtained the village of Bobolice decades earlier, repeatedly indicates that it resulted from acting in the ‘more polonico’ of the duke and the

18 Epperlein, ʻZur Mittelalterforschung’. With regard to Silesia, see Wiszewski, ‘Zakonnicy i dworzanie’. 19 Górecki, A Local Society, pp. 13–15.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

contemporary owners of the property, as well as the members of the latter’s family.20 The legal custom of ius retractus, that is the primacy of family members in the sale of properties,21 well known from numerous testimonies from the lands under Piast rulership, was associated by Abbot Peter with the ethnic group. A strong emphasis on the connection with a particular ethnic group is clear, especially in the context of legal terminology known from other sources mentioning the same custom. These sources consistently used the phrases ‘ius propinquitatis, ius proximitatis’. Consequently, however, Abbot Peter treated this particular element of the law as a part of ‘ius/mos polonicum’,22 and even more importantly, he used the term for transactions done at different times. The past, when only Poles lived in Silesia, and the present, when both Germans and Poles lived together, did not differ greatly for the abbot when seen from the perspective of ethnic and legal order. The Book of Henryków offers many examples of the complex mechanisms behind the reception of ethnic-based multiculturalism by the inhabitants of Silesia. A man named Michał, the son of Dalibór, who — as the Slavic name of the father shows — was very familiar with the culture of the Polish ethnic group, owned a landed property at the boundary of the monastery gardens. As, according to the writings of Abbot Peter, Michał ‘studebat sepius claustrum gravare’, he settled Theutonicos in this land, which became a huge problem for the monks, since the result of this ‘corizabant sacris diebus mulieres et puelle in pomerio nostro’. The dances of these German women posed a threat to the monks’ morality, and the monks’ consent to these frivolous activities could result that they eventually ‘in consuetudinem senescunt’, bringing the most terrible danger to the souls of the monastery’s residents. Therefore, Abbot Bodo urged Michał to change landed properties, giving him other properties in exchange. The abbot bought the lands from the Germans and removed them from the disputed area.23 In the ducal document of 1254 — quoted in The Book of Henryków — confirming the exchange and purchase of land from the hands of Germans, there is no mention of the dances in the garden. This was probably an element of the oral tradition cherished in the monastery, justifying a not entirely beneficial deal in the eyes of posterity. This tradition is important from the point of view of the issue discussed here, because it sustains the memory of 1) the distinctiveness of the Theutonicos from the rest of the local population, 2) the novelty of the customs brought in by them, and 3) the gradual change in the nature of these customs: from novelties brought

20 Liber fundationis claustri sancte Marie Virginis, ed. by Grodecki, I,4, p. 124. This ‘Polish custom’ required that four men, who were imprisoned for their crime by the Duke, had to pay a fine if they wanted to avoid execution. If these owners wanted to sell their village in order to obtain money to purchase remission from their death sentences, by ‘Polish custom’ they had to ask their relatives for permission beforehand. 21 See the classic study by Rymaszewski, Prawo bliższości krewnych, for whom The Book of Henryków was one of the most important sources. 22 On ‘ius polonicum’ in The Book of Henryków see Rymaszewski, Prawo bliższości krewnych, pp. 10–12. 23 Liber fundationis claustri sancte Marie Virginis, ed. by Grodecki, I, 7, pp. 132–33.

147

1 48

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

in by strangers into the local habit typical for the local residents.24 What should be stressed is that Abbot Peter, in his opinions and evaluation of events, did not suggest taking into account the ethnic character of the discussed elements. While he did mention the ethnic affiliation of people, things, or abstract ideas (laws), he never focused on this feature in his stories. Abbot Peter (III) was closely linked to the German-language culture.25 However, in the context of his work he apparently did not identify himself and his fellow monks with ‘Germans’ in general, nor did he treat them in any special way in comparison to his narratives about the economic and legal life of the locality with the group of local Polish residents.26 He skilfully used Polish toponyms and legal terms in his narrative following the course of events concerning small parts of the monastic landed properties. Accurately recording the specific character of Silesian multiculturalism, Abbot Peter indicated the processes of assimilation and persistence of the cultural traditions of distinct ethnic groups. However, he neither evaluated this situation in any way, nor did he emphasize the moments in which the ethnic background of the diversity of cultures could lead to conflict. For the chronicler, the significance of the culture of a given group of people was defined only by the context of their relationship with the abbey. As in the case of the narrative of Versus lubenses, ethnic issues were of secondary importance when confronted with the needs of the most immediate social group. At the same time, problems arising from ethnic differences between the cultures were identified and resolved by referring to the supra-local structures, such as ius polonicum and its regional context, presented by experts in that law. Ethnic differences were therefore inconvenient for the local community, but through their identification in the context of the history and characteristics of the region they could not only be overcome, but actually be used for the good of the author’s own group. We shall note, however, that between the fourteenth and the first half of the fifteenth centuries, not everyone perceived cultural diversity as a fact that did not require evaluative comment. Ludolf, abbot of the monastery of canons regular in Żagań (Sagan), writing about the convent at the time of his predecessors, mentioned scandalous habits developed by the brothers.27 Living at first in a rural monastery in Nowogrodziec (Naumburg am Queis), they were subsequently transferred to the abbey in the town Żagań, the capital of the local duchy, but ‘fratres […] de campis silve in medium populi translati, silvestres adhuc in moribus erant’. Their numerous trespasses against monastic morality also stemmed from the fact that ‘nam et plures

24 On this passage of The Book of Henryków, in the context of Abbot Peter’s narrative referring (pragmatically) to moral values, see Cetwiński, ‘“Corizabant mulieres et puelle in pomerio nostro”’. 25 Górecki, A Local Society, pp. 17–19. 26 On the contrary, Abbot Peter sometimes pointed to the problems of the monastery that resulted from the activity of the Germans in Silesia, despite a clear treatment of German in the Book as the language which was commonly used by Peter himself, and by the recipients of his work, the monks of Lubiąż. See Górecki, ‘Assimilation, Resistance, and Ethnic Group Formation’, pp. 458–59. 27 Proksch, Klosterreform, pp. 51–57.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

fratrum Poloni erant in Newinborg, quorum proprium est plus bibere quam orare’.28 This allusion concerning a distinguishing characteristic of the Poles (proprium est) and Polish monks could be expected to have meaning for the further beliefs of canons from Żagań, because Ludolf placed this sentence in the description of his abbey’s beginnings, but further on in his Catalogus it did not have any more impact on the narrative. Can we assume, then, that ethnicity issues play no part in Ludolf ’s description of the past of the canons of Żagań? That observation is only partially correct. On the one hand, the evaluation of the canons from the rural provostry, as lacking some specific characteristics of civilized people, was based to a limited extent on ethnic grounds. It was principally a comparison with the residents of a city, who were more civilized than the rural population in general.29 On the other hand, the sentence in question had one clear aim: to justify the transfer of the cloister from the village of Nowogrodziec into the town of Żagań. The identification of the city population at the time of Abbot Rudolf with German culture and the countryside population with Polish culture, led the reader to the realization that the only well-organized and culturally advanced religious community had to consist of German members living in a German town, because the Poles living in the provostry of Nowogrodziec were really so different in their habits that they could be perceived as ‘silvestres in moribus’. The only cure for the decline of the foundation was to change its location. But it is necessary to be cautious: this ethnic issue was only on the margin of the general story. Although the author occasionally mentioned the poor state of the cloister and irregular discipline among canons, he never returned to the topoi of ‘barbarian Poles’ as a cause of the cloister’s deterioration. While one sentence included in an account about the formative period of the abbey’s history is meaningful, it does not prove that ethnic differences were of crucial importance for the author in his creation of the past and present world of the canons regular in Żagań. Multi-ethnicity was a close reality for him and his brothers — the potential readers of the Catalogue. If Ludolf decided to use the ethnic stereotype to justify the transfer of the cloister — the decisive moment in the history of the abbey — then apparently ethnic animosities and differences had to be moving for readers and clearly decoded from the text. However, it is also perfectly clear that the value of these stereotypes as rhetorical tools was of a limited nature. Once again — the author never used them in further passages on the abbey’s history, although there were numerous occasions for connecting the poor state of religious observance in the cloister with the allegedly dangerous Polish or Czech influences. The ethnic differences perceived by Ludolf and his contemporaries were only in very specific situations and contexts. Miniatures adorning the so-called Schlackenwerth Codex from the second half of the fourteenth century, which presents scenes from the life of Saint Hedwig of Silesia, perfectly illustrate how difficult it is to separate representations of Silesians’

28 Catalogus, ed. by Stenzel, VIII, p. 184. 29 See Pobóg-Lenartowicz, ‘“Silvestres in moribus erant”’.

149

150

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

multi-ethnicity in Silesian sources from those representing the multicultural and socially diverse structure of Silesian society itself. At first glance, the specific ethnic features of hairstyles and clothing of the Silesian Poles were revealed on the miniature depicting the meeting of Henry I the Bearded with his future father-in-law, Bertold, count of Andechs, giving him his daughter, Hedwig, in marriage (fig. 8.1). An unknown artist has shown knights and courtiers accompanying Bertold alongside the representatives of Henry’s court. The differences are striking — Duke Henry the Bearded’s court members are different from Bertold’s courtiers in every respect — in hair, dress, and type of arms. Henry and his family, who are presented by the standards of the Andechs’ court, stand out against them. These differences were commonly explained in terms of the different ethnic origins of those depicted: Germans around the count and Poles standing with the duke. Indeed, the appearance of Henry’s courtiers is similar to numerous other iconographical representations from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries of Polish knights and magnates, who have, for example, similar hairstyles. We also know that a wooden club — clearly seen on the analysed miniature — was in use by Polish warriors, rather than German, in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries.30 The only problem is that the artist of the miniatures never suggested that he wanted to focus on ethnic, rather than merely cultural, differences. Undoubtedly, he stressed that the people of Henry I were different than those surrounding the young countess before her marriage. Several pages — and some years of life of the ducal marriage — later the author presented a meeting of the duke with his saint wife and the miracle of the reappearance of Hedwig’s shoes (fig. 8.2). Henry I was surrounded by courtiers who were presented in the same fashion as their peers around Count Bertold on the earlier miniature. We can assume that this change of the Silesian courtiers’ presentation might be consciously applied by the artist to illustrate a result of the process of acculturation of the Poles and their acceptance of Western — or even German — standards of courtly life. This looks probable when we compare both of the above-mentioned images with a third picture which is placed in the manuscript in between the first two images. This third image depicts another meeting of the duke and his wife (fig. 8.3). Here, Silesian knights standing by their duke look similar to those accompanying the duke during his visit to the court of Count Bertold. Perhaps the author is suggesting that the process of change in the ethnic — and cultural — character of the region was completed at the time of Henry I’s reign. While this interpretation is possible, miniatures illustrating the battle of Legnica (1241) in the same Codex still present the vision of Silesian society as diverse in terms of culture and — possibly — ethnic character. The knights on the battlefield accompanying Henry II the Pious, son of Henry the Bearded, were clearly divided into two categories. One — portrayed as more the traditional group — consisted of men with the same hairstyle and clothing, and holding the same type of weaponry (bludgeons, lances, perhaps swords) as the Silesian courtiers from the earlier miniature with the image of the meeting of Duke Henry I and Count Bertold. The second group were portrayed

30 See Jurek, Fryzura narodowa; Wiszewski, ‘Dlaczego Henryk syn Bolesława Wysokiego został Brodatym’.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

Figure 8.1. The meeting of Henry I the Bearded with his future father-in-law, Bertold, count of Andechs, giving him his daughter, Hedwig, in marriage. Los Angeles, Getty Museum, MS Ludwig XI 7, fol. 10v. Digital image courtesy of the Getty's Open Content Program.

15 1

152

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Figure 8.2. A meeting of Duke Henry I the Bearded with his wife, Saint Hedwig, and the miracle of the reappearance of Hedwig’s shoes. Getty Museum, MS Ludwig XI 7, fol. 38r. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

15 3

Figure 8.3. A meeting of Duke Henry I the Bearded with his wife, Saint Hedwig, who assisted the poor and sick. Getty Museum, MS Ludwig XI 7, fol. 18r. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.

154

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Figure 8.4. The Battle of Legnica, Silesian knights led by Duke Henry II the Pious against Mongols (above), beheading of the duke by Mongols (below). Getty Museum, MS Ludwig XI 7, fol. 11v. Digital image courtesy of the Getty’s Open Content Program.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

wearing Western-style armour with swords and lances, fighting according to the standards of Western knighthood (fig. 8.4). However, that is not the end of the confusion. The coats of arms of the knights clearly indicate that all the families taking part in the battle, without exception, descended from local Silesian elites of Polish origin and culture,31 although the use of coats of arms was certainly a cultural novelty assumed from Western cultures with the help of knights migrating into Silesia from German countries. During the second half of the fourteenth century, when the Codex was made for the Louis II, duke of Brzeg (Brieg) of the Piast dynasty, more than a century had passed since the beginning of the migration of Germans to Silesia, and half a century since the assimilation of the newcomers was changed by the acculturation of the local community. Yet, the diverse nature of the Silesian community — divided along cultural, and perhaps ethnic boundaries, too — was clearly underlined in the analysed iconographical images. Even more importantly, the artists(s) of miniatures, which were intended to be seen by the elites closest to the centre of power — the dukes, their families, and magnates at court — focused attention on a) firstly, the contrast between the Silesian and Western elites, b) changes in the cultural behaviour of the Silesian elites aiming to emulate Western courtly culture, but c) at the most crucial moment of Silesian and Piast dynastic history, that is the battle against pagan invaders, the joint appearance of both cultural and ethnic traditions and new practices of behaviour and dress. Iconographical narrative, which in the same measure reflected and created the dukes’ and knightly elites’ vision of Silesian society, passed a complicated but readable enough statement: one which acknowledged that Silesian society had changed, and during the reign of the founder of the Duchy of Silesia it had become less traditional and more westernized. Nevertheless, although it was still and would be diverse, at moments of trial all Silesians should be united. Again, the regional past was intended to teach the value of the acceptance of diversity as one of the cultural foundations of Silesians. Tolerance and cooperation were put forward as the foundations and keystones of the society, sealed by the blood of knights of both cultures killed on the Legnica battlefield. In the story told in the Codex through colourful images, the pride of being Silesian, heir of great dukes and warriors, dominated over possible ethnic issues. At the end of the fifteenth century Caspar Borgeni, a clergyman from Głogów (Glogau), wrote a long work called the Głogów Annals.32 With 360 entries, he described the history of Silesia from the beginning of the thirteenth century until 1493.33 The Annals were divided into several parts. The history of the whole region was presented very synthetically and was included in the notes devoted to the lives of the dukes of individual branches of the Silesian Piast dynasty. However, Borgeni also described in detail the events which took place in the second half of the fifteenth century in Głogów, especially during the life of Duke Johann ( Jan) II the Mad (1435–1504). In the whole work, the narrative contains many minute details, titbits from the lives of the inhabitants of Silesia, particularly those in the Duchy of Głogów. The author

31 Jurek, ‘Herby rycerstwa śląskiego’, p. 32. 32 Kümper and Mrozowicz, ‘Borgeni, Caspar’. 33 Annales Glogovienses, ed. by Markgraf; Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz.

15 5

156

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

precisely differentiates the behaviour and habits of individual social groups within a given political community (duchy). He clearly points to the decisions made by the knights and the townsmen of the middle class respectively, as well as mentioning specific types of activity undertaken by the peasants during political conflicts. Throughout his narrative, he also refers frequently to terms describing ethnicity as a feature determining belonging to the communities mentioned in the Annals. These general remarks pertaining to the narrative of the Annals are necessary for the analysis of the way in which he wrote about the inhabitants of Silesia. He never used the names ‘Poles’ or ‘Germans’ when referring to them. These names, like Czechs, Austrians, Hungarians, and other names, were used by him in relation to inhabitants of political bodies other than Silesia. However, he identified the people living in the region in question in two ways. Firstly, he often indicated their relationship with a particular duchy or town, and in the case of noblemen — the administrative district (weichbild, a unit below the level of duchy). Secondly, he used the term ‘Silesians’ to describe all inhabitants of the region. For him, that name was equivalent to typical ethnic names. When he wrote about the attack of the Hungarian king Matthias Corvinus on Bohemia in 1470, he enumerated his allies one after another in one line: ‘the king of Hungary Matthias [Corvinus] with many men, namely Saracens, Hungarians, Moravians, Croatians, Silesians […] entered Bohemia’.34 At the same time, the author was aware that the local people spoke German. In his work, written in Latin, he often quoted terms, sayings, and even extensive quotations in German — as he wrote: folk language.35 Moreover, he also quoted the words spoken in folk language by Duke Johann II the Mad referring to a certain dispute with clergymen.36 He did not, however, in a single instance explicitly refer to Silesians as Germans, though he happened to use the name in relation to hired Austrian soldiers (in other places he called them Austrians).37 It does not seem that the inhabitants of Głogów and nearby areas, that is lands located by the border with the Kingdom of Poland, did not use Polish in the fifteenth century. The information pertaining to the modern period indicates that the local Polish-speaking communities was numerous and strong. The Annals also contain names and surnames connected with the Polish-language tradition. Therefore, it seems that the author raised in the German-speaking environment thought it natural to insert sentences in his mother tongue into the learned work — yet, it did not mean that he thought Silesians belonged to the German ethnic group only. On the contrary, he considered them as members of the community that was separate, in terms of ethnicity, from Czechs, Germans, and Poles. Thus, he presented their history, omitting the problem of the ethnic diversity of the Silesian community. Clearly, it was of so

34 Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, p. 62, no. 115. 35 For example, an extensive note from 1473 pertaining to weather conditions (Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, pp. 87–89, no. 204), or sayings (Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, pp. 144–45, no. 329 and pp. 152–53, no. 350). 36 Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, pp. 115–16, no. 265. 37 Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, p. 134, no. 303, about the dispute of Czech solders and ‘Germans’, and another note more precisely about Czech and Austrian soldiers: Borgeni, Rocznik głogowski, ed. by Mrozowicz, pp. 135, no. 304.

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

little significance for him, unlike the connection with the political and administrative bodies (duchy, town, or a court of a specific ruler), that he thought it unnecessary to mention. It seems that at the end of the Middle Ages regional and local identifications completely covered the significance of ethnic change and ‘primeval’ multi-ethnicity of their society in the memory of educated Silesians. For Borgeni, Silesians were simply a separate ethnicity in terms of a community which was united by a shared past, values, and political order no matter how many languages they were speaking. *** The analyses presented above pertain to the words aimed at specific groups — the elites of duchies, towns, or abbeys. The visions of Silesia included in them were not only to commemorate the days past, but also to serve as models of perception of the surrounding, contemporary reality and, as a consequence, the sources of knowledge necessary to make current decisions. Each presents the issue of the coexistence of various ethnic groups in Silesia in a slightly different way. Combining those different perspectives with the chronology of the creation of these narratives and the nature of the ethnic group to which they were addressed, we can note the process that was included in them — that of decreasing ethnic tensions by increasing the significance of regional or local identification. That phenomenon was already visible in the texts forming the mentality of dynasties and knightly elites — Chronica Polonorum; Chronica Ducum Poloniae, and miniatures from the Schlackenwerth Codex. Dukes had a special place in them as they appeared in the role of heroes building a community, uniting it and preventing its disintegration. At the same time, the ethnic differences of the inhabitants of the region were clearly seen, but after the close of the thirteenth century they were not pointed out as the source of conflicts. In the sources written in the second half of the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries describing the beginnings of two Cistercian monasteries — abbeys in Lubiąż and Henryków — one can observe a similar phenomenon. Here also ethnic diversity and its civilizational, cultural, and legal consequences were observed. Yet, these consequences did not break the unity of the local community. The unity that was needed for the pragmatic aim of writing down those works for monastic communities: proving that the monasteries had a stable hold over their landed properties. From that perspective, ethnic divisions seemed to be of less importance, overshadowed by the construction of the vision of the dominant position of abbeys as the guarantors of order and development in these societies. Suppressing internal conflicts, which lasted for two centuries, for the purpose of preserving internal cohesion within the duchies, towns, and landed properties, resulted in a new phenomenon at the moment of building the structures of Czech kings’ administration in the course of the fifteenth century encompassing the whole province, with respect to the separate traditions of the individual duchies. The Głogów Annals by Casper Borgani point to the consolidation of the view of a general unity of the community of Silesians which, for him, was like an ethnic group at the same level he assigned to Czechs, Poles, or Hungarians. In principle, only Jews were excluded from that community. What was significant for him in determining ‘ethnic’ affiliation was not the language or customs, but a connection with a political community or a social group at various levels.

15 7

1 58

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

The question remains of whether such a vision was not the vision of the dominant, German-speaking elite of Silesia. Did fear of and reluctance toward ‘the Other’ that we assigned to the first narratives about the Silesian past created in the circle of German migrants in the thirteenth century not spread to the Polish-speaking community in the fifteenth century? It is impossible to answer that question today, because we do not know the narratives of Silesians created in that circle. We can only hope for the verification of those observations in the future on the basis of the Polish-speaking community in the modern period. For now it is enough to state that close to the early modern period Silesians considered themselves as a united society despite political (duchies) and administrative (weichbilds) boundaries, language differences, and a variety of traditions describing their past. Silesians narrated stories which demonstrated the clearly multi-ethnic character of their past, but this was only one of a number of aspects of the regional reality, and thus it was one perspective (corresponding with local and regional angles) under which they can be characterised. The final question which remains to be answered is whether such a society evolved into (or almost into) a multi-ethnic nation?

Works Cited Primary Sources Annales Glogovienses bis z. J. 1493. Nebst urkundlichen Beilagen, ed. by Hermann Markgraf, in Scriptores rerum Silesiacarum, vol. 10 (Breslau [Wrocław]: Max und Co., 1877), pp. 1–66 Borgeni, Kaspar, Rocznik głogowski do roku 1493 (Annales Glogovienses bis z. J. 1493), ed. by Wojciech Mrozowicz (Głogów: Towarzystwo Ziemi Głogowskiej, 2013) Catalogus abbatum Saganensium, ed. by Gustav Adolf Stenzel, in Scriptores rerum Silesiacarum, vol. 1 (Breslau [Wrocław]: Max und Co., 1835), pp. 173–528 Kronika książąt polskich, ed. by Zygmunt Węclewski, in Monumenta Historica Poloniae, vol. 3 (Lwów: Akademia Umiejętności w Krakowie, 1878), pp. 423–578 Kronika polska, ed. by Ludwik Ćwikliński, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, 3 (Lwów: Akademia Umiejętności w Krakowie, 1878), pp. 578–656 Liber fundationis claustri sancte Marie Virginis in Heinrichow czyli Księga Henrykowska, ed. and trans. by Roman Grodecki (Wrocław: Muzeum Archidiecezjalne, 1991) Schlesisches Urkundenbuch, vol. 1, ed. by Heinrich Appelt (Köln: Verlag Hermann Böhlaus Nachf., 1963–1971) Versus lubenses, in Monumenta Lubensia, ed. by Wilhelm Wattenbach (Breslau [Wrocław]: Max und Co., 1861), pp. 14–16 Secondary Studies Bartlett, Robert, ‘Medieval and Modern Concepts of Race and Ethnicity’, Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, 31.1 (2001), 39–56 Cetwiński, Marek, ‘“Corizabant mulieres et puelle in pomerio nostro”. Księga henrykowska o słabościach natury ludzkiej’, in Mundus hominis — cywilizacja, kultura, natura. Wokół interdyscyplinarności badań historycznych, ed. by Stanisław Rosik and Przemysław

Mu lti -E thn i c i ty o r t h e N e t wo r k o f Lo c al and Regi o nal Id e nt i t i e s

Wiszewski, Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis, No. 2966, Historia 175 (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2006), pp. 221–29 Classen, Albrecht, and Wojciech Mrozowicz, ‘Bitschin, Peter’, in The Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, vol. 1: A-I, ed. by Graeme Dunphy and others (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 182–84 Davies, Rees, ‘Nations and National Identities in the Medieval World: An Apologia’, Revue Belge d’histoire contemporaine/Belgisch Tijdschrift voor nieuwste geschiedenis, 34.4 (2004), 567–79 Epperlein, Siegfried, ‘Mit fundacyjny niemieckich klasztorów cysterskich a relacja mnicha lubiąskiego z XIV wieku’, Przegląd Historyczny, 58 (1967), 587–604 ———, ‘Zur Mittelalterforschung in der DDR — eine Reminiszenz’, in Mittelalterforschung nach der Wende 1989, ed. by Michael Borgolte, Historische Zeitschrift, Beiheft 20 (München: Gruyter, 1995), pp. 43–73 Geary, Patrick, The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002) Górecki, Piotr, ‘Assimilation, Resistance, and Ethnic Group Formation in Medieval Poland: A European Paradigm?’, in Das Reich und Polen: Parallelen, Interaktionen und Formen der Akkulturation im Hohen und Späten Mittelalter, ed. by Alexander Patschovsky and Thomas Wünsch, Vorträge und Forschungen, 59 (Stuttgart: Jan Thorbecke, 2003), pp. 447–76 ———, A Local Society in Transition: The ‘Henryków Book’ and Related Sources, Studies and Texts, 155 (Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 2007) Harc, Lucyna, and Gabriela Wąs, eds, The Strengthening of Silesian Regionalism (1526–1740), trans. by Katarzyna Hussar and Aleksandra Lis, Cuius regio?: Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000), 2 (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo, 2014), http://www.bibliotekacyfrowa.pl/publication/75529 Jażdżewski, Konstanty Klemens, Lubiąż. Losy i kultura umysłowa śląskiego opactwa cystersów (1163–1642) (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 1992) Jurek, Tomasz, ‘Herby rycerstwa śląskiego na miniaturach Kodeksu o św. Jadwidze z 1353 roku’, Genealogia. Studia i Materiały Historyczne, 3 (1993), 9–36 ———, Obce rycerstwo na Śląsku do połowy XIV wieku, Prace Komisji Historycznej, Poznańskie Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Nauk, 54 (Poznań: Wydawnictwo Poznańskiego Towarzystwa Przyjaciół Nauk, 1998) ———, Fryzura narodowa średniowiecznych Polaków, in Scriptura custos memoriae, ed. by Danuta Zydorek, Publikacje Instytutu Historii UAM, 44 (Poznań: Instytut Historii UAM, 2001), pp. 635–51 Kostowski, Jakub, ‘Książę Henryk II Pobożny i bitwa legnicka w ikonografii (XIII–XX w.)’, in Bitwa legnicka. Historia i tradycja, ed. by Wacław Korta (Wrocław: Oficyna Wydawnicza Volumen, 1994), pp. 277–304 Kümper, Hiram, and Wojciech Mrozowicz, ‘Borgeni, Caspar’, in The Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, vol. 1: A-I, ed. by Graeme Dunphy and others (Leiden: Brill, 2010), p. 192 Leshock, David B., ‘Religious Geography: Designating Jews and Muslims as Foreigners in Medieval England’, in Meeting the Foreign in the Middle Ages, ed. by Albrecht Classen (New York: Routledge, 2002), pp. 202–25

1 59

1 60

p r ze m ys ł aw w i s z e w s ki

Mrozowicz ,Wojciech, ‘Chronica Polonorum’, in The Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, vol. 1: A-I, ed. by Graeme Dunphy and others (Leiden: Brill, 2010), p. 395 ———, ‘Versus Lubenses’, in The Encyclopedia of the Medieval Chronicle, vol. 2: J-Z, ed. by Graeme Dunphy and others (Leiden: Brill, 2010), pp. 1476–77 ———, ‘Die Polnische Chronik (Polnisch-Schlesische Chronik) und die Chronik der Fürsten Polens (Chronica principum Poloniae) als Mittel zur dynastischen Identitätsstiftung der schlesischen Piasten’, in Legitimation von Fürstendynastien in Polen und dem Reich. Identitätsbildung im Spiegel schriftlicher Quellen (12.-15. Jahrhundert), ed. by Grischa Vercamer and Ewa Wółkiewicz, Deutsches Historisches Institut Warschau, Quellen und Studien, 31 (Wiesbaden: Harrasowitz, 2016), pp. 249–62 Pobóg-Lenartowicz, Anna, ‘“Silvestres in moribus erant”. O wyższości miasta nad wsią na przykładzie kanoników regularnych z Żagania’, in Człowiek, sacrum, środowisko, ed. by Sławomir Moździoch, Spotkania Bytomskie, 4 (Wrocław: Instytut Archeologii i Etnologii PAN, 2000), pp. 235–42 Proksch, Constance, Klosterreform und Geschichtsschreibung im Spätmittelalter, Kollektive Einstellungen und sozialer Wandel im Mittelalter, N.F. 2 (Köln: Böhlau, 1994) Rymaszewski, Zygfryd, Prawo bliższości krewnych w polskim prawie ziemskim do końca XV w. (Wrocław: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1970) Wiszewski, Przemysław, ‘Zakonnicy i dworzanie — tradycje fundacji klasztorów w średniowiecznym dziejopisarstwie śląskim (XIII–XV w.)’, in Origines mundi, gentium et civitatum, ed. by Stanisław Rosik and Przemysław Wiszewski, Acta Universitatis Wratislaviensis, no. 2339, Historia CLIII (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wrocławskiego, 2001), pp. 179–98 ———, ‘Dlaczego Henryk syn Bolesława Wysokiego został Brodatym, czyli wokół różnych znaczeń brody księcia’, in Wędrówki rzeczy i idei w średniowieczu, ed. by Sławomir Moździoch, Spotkania Bytomskie, 5 (Wrocław: Instytut Archeologii i Etnologii PAN, 2004), pp. 41–59 ———, ‘Dlaczego cesarz został kuchcikiem, a Piastowie przestali być królami? Przyczynek źródłoznawczy z historii mentalności i polityki XIII-wiecznych Ślązaków’, in Klio viae et invia. Opuscula Marco Cetwiński dedicata, ed. by Anna Odrzywolska-Kidawa (Warszawa: Wydawnictwo DiG, 2010), pp. 91–98 ———, Henryk II Pobożny. Biografia polityczna (Legnica: Muzeum Miedzi, 2011) ———, The Long Formation of the Region Silesia (c. 1000–1526), trans. by Katarzyna Hussar, Cuius regio?: Ideological and Territorial Cohesion of the Historical Region of Silesia (c. 1000–2000), 1 (Wrocław: Wydawnictwo, 2013), http://www.bibliotekacyfrowa.pl/ publication/46981 Zientara, Benedykt, ‘Konrad Kędzierzawy i bitwa pod Studnicą’, Przegląd Historyczny, 70 (1979), 27–55 ———, Heinrich der Bärtige und seine Zeit: Politik und Gesellschaft im mittelalterlichen Schlesien, trans. by Peter Oliver Loew, Schriften des Bundesinstituts für Kultur und Geschichte der Deutschen im Östlichen Europa, 17 (München: Oldenbourg, 2002)

Luís Adão da Fonseca

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic in the Fifteenth Century and the Problem of Implicit Understanding

Earlier chapters in this volume have focused on the consequences of using knowledge about a multi-ethnic past in order to shape relations between ethnicities living in the same political body. But how was such knowledge of the past used when Europeans — aware of the multi-ethnic character of their own world — encountered representatives of an absolutely new society, genuinely ‘new’ in every aspect — physical features, culture, creed? Were they open to the experience of ‘otherness’, or did they interpret it in the context of their own, well-known past? Towards the end of the Middle Ages, the Portuguese navigators who crossed the Atlantic Ocean came into contact with very different cultures and societies. Some texts of that time, when describing these contacts, highlight the difficulties that the Europeans had in perceiving these new experiences and, at the same time, revealing the strength of their cultural constraints. The goal of this chapter is to frame the information found in the chronicles and travel narratives (published in both Portuguese and Italian) in various situations of cultural encounters in a particular historical context: the first relationship of the Europeans with the African and Brazilian local communities during the fifteenth century. This analysis will be achieved by considering three standard situations: in the African West coast, South Africa, and Brazil.1 In trying to define a dialectic between the identity of the observer and the perception of the other — the importance of what might be called an ‘implicit understanding’ — it



1 This article draws on some of my earlier studies — Fonseca, Pedro Álvares Cabral; Fonseca, O sentido da novidade; Fonseca, Dal Mediterraneo all’Atlantico — reformulated here in relation to the topic of implicit understanding. Luís Adão da Fonseca  •  is a Professor emeritus of Medieval History at the University of Porto, former president of the Scientific Council of CEPESE (Centre for the Study of Population, Economy and Society), University of Porto. He specializes in the medieval history of Portugal and its maritime past. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 161–180 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120062

162

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

is important to compare different views (literary and anthropological). At the same time, we can not fail to distinguish the role played by both the literary tradition and previous historical experiences. We will thus analyse those standard situations where there have been experiences of multi-ethnic socialization and where it is possible to detect a process of understanding. Given the limitations of space, I will only briefly refer to the first two situations (Guinea and the Cape of Good Hope), to leave space for further development when addressing Brazil.

On the West Coast of Africa, Near Guinea The first standard situation corresponds closely to the middle of the fifteenth century, when the Portuguese navigators went beyond the coast of Morocco and Mauritania, and reached Cape Verde and the Gulf of Guinea waters. There are several texts where this maritime experience is described, mostly written by non-Portuguese authors (like the German Munzer or the Venetian Cadamosto). There is, however, a text entitled Itinerarium Antonii Ususmaris civis jauuensis, found in Genoa University Library, which is of great importance to the topic addressed here. This is a well-known manuscript because it reproduced the letter of Antoniotto Usodimare, dated 12 December 1455, which has been published several times. However, in our case, the importance of the manuscript extends beyond that missive. This manuscript was transcribed by an unknown hand and includes several texts related to the letter of the Genoese merchant: geographical descriptions (Oriental and African) with references to rivers, as well as Italian historical expeditions. The inspiration is clearly Isidorian, particularly the book 14 of the Etymologies.2 This miscellany is very enlightening, as Italian news about the journeys undertaken by the Portuguese begins to appear here. It is fragmentary information, most likely poorly articulated, and certainly, in the eyes of many, having little credibility. Thus, the organizational process of information was not linear. Rather, through a miscellany of works and summaries of texts referring to the traditional culture (the use of St Isidore of Seville being the most obvious example), the reader is invited to associate the imaginary dimension with the historical reality, or conversely, is asked to insert some element of reality into the imagined world of Atlantic voyages. This is accomplished through the projection of the ocean onto a horizon of islands and rivers. This is important because in the near future, Atlantic maritime knowledge would come to distinguish the references to rivers from interest in the coast. In fact, in the mid-fifteenth century, when the letter of Antoniotto Usodimare would have been read — probably in Genoa — Atlantic navigation was experiencing rapid evolution. The world of medieval navigation (that is, the world of portolan charts) was progressing to navigation of the high seas, where rivers and capes were important spatial references. It was the beginning of navigation in the Gulf of Guinea, 2 Fonseca, O Itinerário de Usodimare.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

an area of transition to a new maritime experience, as was outlined by Cadamosto who understood and described better than anyone what these central Atlantic seas were like.3 The Portuguese sailing in the Atlantic (an ocean still relatively small in range) along the African coast reached the seas of Guinea where, reflecting on all the information that characterizes these seas, the Europeans perceived the contradictions of their new situation. The texts of Usodimare’s manuscript reflected these new experiences, and the fact that they were produced in Italy, in this context, shows the underlying problem of implicit understanding in which Mediterranean inspiration is decisive. It creates a natural framework of intelligibility giving meaning to this circulation of ideas and sensibilities. Later, in the sixteenth century, this will explain the enormous movement of Portuguese knowledge in the Mediterranean countries, especially in Italy.

In South Africa The second standard situation is St Helen’s Bay on the west coast of Africa, very close to the Cape of Good Hope, reached by the small fleet under Vasco da Gama’s command on 8 November 1497 on its way to India. The following is based on the report of Vasco da Gama’s travels, known as the Journal of Álvaro Velho.4 The text begins by describing the characteristics of men and animals, interspersed with brief notes comparing similarities in Portugal. The Journal reveals the concern for establishing comparative links that, by stressing the resemblance of nature, allows its inhabitants to be humanized and, consequently, the establishment of codes of conduct: The inhabitants of this country are tawny-coloured. Their food is confined to the flesh of seals, whales and gazelles, and the roots of herbs. They are dressed in skins, and wear sheaths over their virile members. They are armed with poles of olive wood to which a horn, browned in the fire, is attached. Their numerous dogs resemble those of Portugal, and bark like them. The birds of the country, likewise, are the same as in Portugal, and include cormorants, gulls, turtle doves, crested larks, and many others. The climate is healthy and temperate, and produces good herbage.5 The following day Vasco da Gama passes to a second level of analysis. In current terms, we could formulate it this way: If there is similarity in the land, will human relationships be the same? It is as if the captain is convinced that, in the balance of ecosystems, the identity of nature also affects the identities of humans inhabiting the

3 Fonseca, Dal Mediterraneo all’Atlantico, pp. 61–81. 4 Manuscript of the Municipal Library of Porto, published in English in Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, pp. 1–93. On the problem of the text’s authorship, see Radulet, ‘Il diario della navigazione’. 5 Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, p. 6.

163

1 64

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

same space. On a particular day, they had captured a man of that land who resembled one of the sailors of the fleet. On the day after we had cast anchor, that is to say on Thursday, we landed with the captain-major, and made captive one of the natives, who was small of stature like Sancho Mexia. This man had been gathering honey in the sandy waste, for in this country the bees deposit their honey at the foot of the mounds around the bushes. He was taken on board the captain-major’s ship, and being placed at table he ate of all we ate. On the following day the captain-major had him well dressed and sent ashore.6 It is important to emphasize the parallelism. First, the dogs are not only equal to those of Portugal, but also bark in the same way. Then the captured man — who resembled Sancho Mexia — was eating at the table in the same way as the Portuguese. Therefore, continues the text, the chief captain dressed him well and sent him ashore. However, this description is not entirely naive, as it then moves on to the third level of investigation — the possibility of exchange of goods, of trade. This question was critical for the Europeans, going beyond the level of natural identification (of fauna, flora, and men), and proceeding to civilizational identification. To which world do the inhabitants of St Helen’s Bay, between Africa and India, belong — the world of Indian spices, or the world of small material objects which the Europeans of that time thought characteristic of equatorial African society? The inhabitants did not react to being offered cinnamon and cloves, or seed-pearls, and gold, among other things. They then offered them round bells and tin rings, as we read in the source: On the following day, fourteen or fifteen natives came to where our ships lay. The captain-major landed and showed them a variety of merchandise, with the view of finding out whether such things were to be found in their country. This merchandise included cinnamon, cloves, seed-pearls, gold, and many other things, but it was evident that they had no knowledge whatever of such articles, and they were consequently given round bells and tin rings.7 From this description it appears that the conclusion drawn by the Portuguese was that, in terms of culture and civilization, the inhabitants were Africans, like those from Guinea. Thus, in the subsequent paragraph, the words used and the considerations made with regard to this population no longer convey the relative naivety of the preceding paragraphs. While previously it was noted that we ‘made captive one of the natives, who was small of stature like Sancho Mexia’,8 it now states: On Sunday about forty or fifty natives made their appearance, and having dined, we landed, and in exchange for the çeitils9 with which we came provided, we obtained shells, which they wore as ornaments in their ears, and which looked 6 Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, pp. 6–7. 7 Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, p. 7. 8 Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, p. 6. 9 Ceitil was a low-value Portuguese currency created at the end of the reign of King John I (d. 1433).

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

as if they had been plated, and fox-tails attached to a handle, with which they fanned their faces. I also acquired for one çeitil one of the sheaths which they wore over their members, and this seemed to show that they valued copper very highly; indeed, they wore small beads of that metal in their ears.10 It is difficult to read this last description without comparing it to the descriptions of black Africans in sources reporting the first contacts in the seas of Guinea11 — that is, whether the awareness of otherness is necessarily accompanied by the spatial location of the place in which the other is. For the Portuguese of Vasco da Gama’s fleet, St Helen is still, in terms of an ocean taxonomy, a land of the Guinea sea. This particular model of ocean taxonomy thus created, although it had already existed in nautical thought, would thenceforth become a defining concept for a specific civilization. For example, decades later, the chronicler João de Barros, referring to the African people contacted during a journey into the Zambezi region, wrote that all of them ‘were black barbarians like those who are from Guinea, neighbours of Portugal’.12 Below, we will examine as the third standard situation how this model would be transplanted — and modified — with the Portuguese arrival in Brazil.13

In Brazil In the spring of 1500, Pedro Álvares Cabral, heading a fleet on the way to the Indian Ocean, makes a stop at a Brazilian beach in the modern-day state of Bahia. Bartolomeu Marchioni, a Florentine merchant who had partly financed one of the ships of Cabral’s fleet (and thus, was directly involved), states that it is a new world where it is dangerous to navigate. The Portuguese, he wrote, have brought back many kinds of birds and animals unknown to us, and often such as are described by Pliny in his history. They had been believed to be fictions, but in these days what he relates is seen to be true.14 Pedro Vaz de Caminha, a citizen of Porto and knight of the royal house, having been appointed to a clerkship in India, embarks on Cabral’s fleet. Although he later died in the East,15 he authored a letter addressed to the king of Portugal, in which he describes the voyage. Dated 1 May 1500, this letter is the most significant document of the Brazilian stay of Pedro Álvares Cabral. Because of the literary quality of the narrative, the details reported, and the descriptions of the various actors, this text is an important witness to the great meetings of civilizations that followed the arrival of

10 Journal [A] of the first voyage, ed. by Ravenstein, p. 7. 11 Horta, ‘A representação do Africano’. There is also ample information in Thomas, ʻReprésentations européennes’. 12 Barros, Ásia, p. 139 (my translation). 13 For further information see Marques, ‘A escrita de um olhar primeiro’. 14 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 149. 15 For Pedro Vaz de Caminha, see the bibliography quoted in Fonseca, Pedro Álvares Cabral, pp. 63–64, notes 220–28.

165

166

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

the Europeans on the American continent.16 These meetings took place on a number of occasions, and are almost always problematic from an intellectual point of view because the extreme novelty of the European arrival in America made it difficult for them to take in exactly what was happening, as Caminha’s letter amply demonstrates. For example, although the first contacts are easy and peaceful, neither side understands the language of the other. Thus, they are limited to the exchange of some gifts: a bonnet, a cloak, and a hat from the Portuguese, and another hat, a small cloak made with bird feathers, and a ‘large shell necklace, small’ from the Indians. Another letter written from Brazil at this same time, the Anonymous narrative, summarizes these first contacts: [T]hey found that they were people of dark colour, between white and black, and well built, with long hair. And they go nude as they were born, without any shame whatever, and each one of them carried his bow with arrows, as men who were in defence of the said river. On the aforesaid armada there was no one who understood their language.17 Unsure of whether the place was an island or part of a continent, the Anonymous narrative writes ‘we do not know whether it is an island or mainland, but on account of its size we believe that it is terra firma’.18 Caminha, who signs his letter ‘from [the] island of Vera Cruz’, may have favoured an island identification.19 Naturally, the captain of the fleet would have questioned what sort of people he was dealing with. Part of the Carta describes, with great precision, the first attempts to identify the Indians: In appearance they are dark, somewhat reddish, with good faces and good noses, well shaped. They go naked without any covering; neither do they pay more attention to concealing or exposing their shame than they do showing their faces, and in this respect they are very innocent. He also notes that they have a bone in their lower lips, with white bonnets, the hair shaved above the ears, and that one of them carried on his head a sort of wig with yellow bird feathers.20 This unusual description accentuates the strangeness of the Indians, thus conveying two things to the king of Portugal: firstly, they are a strange people and are not Africans.21 However, this further confuses the possibility of identification because, 16 A detailed analysis of the Carta and of the scale of the Cabral fleet in Brazil can be found in several texts, for example: Castro, La lettera di Vaz de Caminha, pp. 13 ff.; Cortesão, A Carta, pp. 65–81 and 177–225; Dias, História da Colonização Portuguesa, pp. 75–154; Fonseca, Pedro Álvares Cabral; Fonseca, O sentido da novidade; Pereira, Vocabulário da Carta; Silva, ed., A carta de Caminha. 17 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 58. 18 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 60. 19 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 33. 20 Greenlee, The Voyage, pp. 10–11. 21 For the meaning of the word brown [in Portuguese: pardo] as a way to say they are not black Africans, see Margarido, ‘La vision de l’autre’, pp. 517–20, and Thomas, ʻReprésentations européennes’, p. 74. Similar descriptions can be found in the chronicles. For example: ‘they are naked people, not black and with twisted hair, like the people of Guinea, but all of spleen colour and long and runny

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

as they are not Indian Africans, and the Europeans having little knowledge of the American continent, the otherness becomes even more problematic. Figueiredo Jorge has already stressed this point: What the letter [of Caminha] says, masterfully and with little margin for doubt, is that the desired object does not match any previous information. In addition, he says that the Indian is not part of any [existing] knowledge about otherness, much of which is included in the encyclopedia of Western navigators. The Indian, contrary to expectation, is not Eastern (the name is a misnomer) and that all knowledge about exotic Africans, even the most familiar, or (as reported) stranger Eastern people, does not conform to this newly discovered people.22 Suddenly, it seems that everything is tenuous and reversed — as if the news from Brazil has situated the problem of the two parts of the world beyond the ocean in a dialectic in which the lands of Vera Cruz, a land appearing out of the sea as a horizon of incredible possibilities, threatened to destroy traditional certainties located in Africa and in the East, which until then had been a horizon of all credible impossibilities.23 We can explain this dichotomy in the following way — and I closely follow other scholarship here — in effect, the possible but incredible things [in the consensus of ordinary judgement] which happened on those Brazilian beaches was, in the eyes of the Portuguese, more difficult to perceive and understand than impossible but credible things [that is, credible in the sense of ordinary judgement], which depended on the knowledge accumulated by the Portuguese in recent experiences in the discovery of African lands.24 The Caminha report then describes various situations that basically recall the episode of Vasco da Gama in St Helen’s Bay, referred to above. This must be understood according to this psychological situation — that is, the astonishment caused by the novelty of the creatures encountered by the Portuguese. The situation is clearly theatrical: Cabral (the chief captain) is sitting, surrounded by people of his vessel, and some other captains. There is no spoken communication, only gestures. When the Indians step onto the vessel, one of them, pointing to the gold necklace that the captain wears around his neck and to a silver candlestick, hair, and the figure of the face a very new thing. Because it was so crumpled and without the common likeness of other people that they had seen’ (Barros, Ásia, p. 183) [my translation]. On nakedness see Pellegrin, ʻVêtements de peau(x) et de plumes’. In accordance with another source, the Anonymous narrative, these people are dark, they go nude without shame, their hair is long, and they pluck their beards. Their eyelids and the area over their eyebrows are painted with figures of white, black, blue, and red. They have the lip of the mouth (that is, the lower lip), pierced. In the opening some put a bone as large as a nail, and others wear a long blue stone, or a green one, which hangs from their lips. Women likewise go nude without shame and they are beautiful of body, with long hair (Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 59). Soon after, he describes the housing, fauna, and landscape. 22 Jorge, ‘A conflitualidade do saber’, p. 332 [my translation]). See also Jorge, ‘O saber e o poder’; Castro, ‘Alteridade e conquista espiritual na “Carta” de Pero Vaz de Caminha’; Margarido, ‘La vision de l’autre’. 23 Vitorino, ‘Convenção e ficção’. 24 Carvalho, ‘Caminhos literários da Carta’, p. 8; Ideias, ʻA Carta de Pêro Vaz de Caminha’.

1 67

168

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

makes several gestures that the Portuguese interpret as indicating that there is gold and silver in their land. It is a typical example of how European desires drive a particular interpretation of other people’s behaviour. At this time, the Portuguese showed them several animals: when they see a parrot, the reaction is positive, but they are not interested in a sheep, let alone a chicken, to which the Indians express amazement. Then, after the sailors offer them food and drink, which the Indians refuse, and completely at ease they lie down and fall asleep.25 In my opinion, this episode is significant, as it is much more than a mere description of an encounter, and should be read in light of the similar situation experienced by Vasco da Gama some years previously in St Helen’s Bay. In both reports, despite the descriptive simplicity, a fundamental aspect stands out to the contemporary reader: the inexperience of the Europeans and the total absence of familiar coordinates by which they can organize social relations with the local populations. These Indians are not the Moorish or black Africans with whom the Portuguese had coexisted for a long time. There, in Africa, they can distinguish the different borders: of reality, of likelihood, and of fable. As discussed above, it is possible to distinguish the boundaries between the incredible possibilities and the credible impossibilities because they already exist for understanding codes of conduct. It seems that both Vasco da Gama and Pedro Álvares Cabral, as well as their companions, are not able to situate geographically each of the bays where they have just arrived. They only know that these bays are outside of Cape Verde and on the Ocean route, the way to India, a situation which echoes the eternal problem of the identification of otherness. The problem of dealing with the otherness of persons is made more difficult because it is directly related to the poorly conceptualized issue of geographical alterity because they had not yet defined the true contours of the other side. At that time, this lack of factual geographic knowledge is not so evident from their point of view as they were still informed by a potent imaginary geography with late ancient and medieval roots. This imaginary geography, with the burden of information it carries, works on two levels simultaneously: on the one hand, it affects the ability of the narrator to interpret the reality he is experiencing; and on the other hand, it feeds and shapes the rhetorical procedures used by the author to describe this reality and to transmit it to an addressee who is not present. In the case of Caminha, his rhetorical approach should be studied in conjunction with the discourse of other navigators and explorers of that time who reported first European contact with these regions. There is an excellent corpus of material which scholarly research has repeatedly highlighted.26 With this in mind, a comparison between Caminha and Vespucci will always be fruitful. For example, as noted by Silvano Peloso, aside from the question of the

25 Greenlee, The Voyage, pp. 12–13. 26 Fonseca, ‘“Caminha e a Carta de Achamento” do Brasil’. Other studies comparing Caminha and Columbus can be found in Unali, La ‘Carta do achamento’, pp. 25 ff.; Vitorino, ‘Caminha e Colombo’; Williams, ‘Early Images of America’. Formisano, ‘Tra racconto e scrittura’, is also of interest.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

authenticity or falseness of the Vespuccian texts, they have an explicitly significant value concerning the perception of certain European sectors to the voyages to the West: Yet beyond all, with their unique mixture of scientific truth and literary invention, of livid experiences and fictitious data, these […] texts remain a valuable record of the way a certain audience of the sixteenth century looks to the discoveries by placing the new worlds within specific cultural parameters, already emblematic preannouncements of the proliferation of interpretative universes that from now on will concern Brazil and the new world.27 That is, returning to the problem of the two captains (Vasco da Gama and Cabral), it can briefly be said that they addressed the following issues: are the Indians — in culture and civilization — black people of the African continent already known to the Portuguese? Or, in these southern seas in the direction of India, are the inhabitants Indians (in the sense of what medieval heritage knew about Indians)? And if they are neither, how should they be classified? It is worth reiterating that both da Gama and Cabral were going to India, as St Helen and the island of Vera Cruz are both the ‘balance point’ of the route of the East. It may be coincidental that the common symbolism of both place names remains significant, as in Christian tradition there is a strong connection between St Helen and Vera Cruz. This is a typical example of how implicit understanding determines cultural dialogue.28 In both situations the search for the identification of otherness, and sometimes the discouragement arising from the inevitable difficulties, stands out. Caminha, at some point, points precisely to the lack of communication that remains in spite of the apparent familiarity: ‘Then for a time there was no more speech or understanding with them, because their barbarity was so great that no one could be either understood or heard’.29 What model did the Portuguese have to decrypt such remarks? This is not a unique problem, being similar to the experience of the Castilians in relation to the West Indies.30 In Brazil the continuity of this experience is defined from Guinea (in the broad scope of the area which then embraced this name), as had already happened in the Bay of St Helen. This is quite important, as it is a clear example of the intellectual process of implicit understanding. It is interesting to note that, even in the transition from the fifteenth to the sixteenth century, a Guinean paradigm endures which projects itself to the South and West Atlantic — that is, this model goes back to the first Portuguese African experiences of the third quarter of the fifteenth century.31

27 Peloso, ‘Dal Paradiso terrestre’, p. 399 (my translation). 28 I use the title of the important book edited by Schwartz, Implicit Understandings. On the same topic, see also Douglas, Implicit Meanings. 29 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 15. Greenlee uses here the word barbarity to translate the original word barbaria, which, in the context of the letter of Caminha, means uproar. 30 I appeal here to the words of Schwartz, Implicit Understandings, p. 11, on Hulme, ‘Tales of Distinction’, pp. 157–97. 31 On this topic see Russell, ‘Problemas Sócio-linguísticos relacionados’, Russell, ‘White Kings on Black Kings’, Russell, ‘Some Portuguese Paradigms’, Russell, ‘Veni, vidi, vici’. There are other aspects where this African paradigm is present, as in the case of gold, explicitly mentioned by Caminha (Greenlee,

169

170

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

This is an aspect that, in previous studies, I have stressed when I examined diplomatic treaties between Portugal and Castile concerning the division of the Atlantic Ocean (the treaties Alcáçovas-Toledo [in 1479–1480] and Tordesillas [in 1493]). As can be seen, this reference to Guinea, which in most historiography is accepted as unproblematic, has strong cultural roots — that is, it is a paradigm for an understanding of the reality, a pattern that allows implicit understanding to function. There are many other points to consider, but given the limitations of space, I will mention only one final topic that, in my view, clarifies the issue — the question of the naivety and innocence of the Indians. As Caminha wrote: ‘They seem to me people of such innocence that, if one could understand them and they us, they would soon be Christians, because they do not have or understand any belief, as it appears’.32 This association is often underlined in historiography, linked to what is frequently considered a positive view of the Brazilian Indian and the kind and peaceful relations between the Europeans and these indigenous peoples. But what does it mean? Apparently these comments are made for a specific purpose, that is, they must be understood in terms of their interest in identifying — in human and civilizational terms — the local population. In this connection, if Caminha’s letter highlights the ease of contact, despite the difference of customs, it is precisely to show the humanity of those people, in spite of the issue of their nudity. It is therefore interesting to note that this author, immediately after describing the naturalness of contacts — where innocent nudity is repeatedly emphasized — allows frankly negative judgements.33 How can this apparent contradiction be resolved? Throughout the fifteenth century, the Portuguese cultural tradition had firm opinions about indigenous nudity — Zurara, half a century earlier in his Chronicle of Guinea, described the nudity of the women of Guinea, and explains that ‘this is one of the things by which one may discern their great bestiality…’.34 Comparing Zurara’s and

The Voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil and India, pp. 12 and 32). This should be compared with the cases studied by Unali, ‘L’oro nei primi due viaggi’, Unali, ‘Aspettative economiche’, Unali, Alla ricerca dell’oro. This topic has also been studied with regard to Columbus. See Philips, ‘Africa and the Atlantic Islands’, where the author emphasizes the importance of the personal experience of the Genoese navigator in the Portuguese voyages to the Atlantic islands or on the West African coast. Finally, the comments about the Mediterranean and Canary paradigm by Fernández-Armesto, Antes de Colón, pp. 243–66, are of interest. 32 Greenlee, The Voyage, pp. 29 and 31. 33 For example: ‘It suffices to say that up to this time, although they were somewhat tamed, a moment afterwards they became frightened like sparrows at a feeding-place […], from which I infer that they are bestial people and of very little knowledge; and for this reason they are so timid’ (Greenlee, The Voyage, pp. 22 and 23). Vespucci is, in this respect, even more radical: see for example his letter about the new world (Vespucci, Cartas de viaje, pp. 93–95). 34 The complete sentence is: ‘this is one of the things by which one may discern their great bestiality, for if they had some particle of reason they would follow nature, and cover those parts only which by its shewing ought to be covered, for we see how naturally in each one of these shameful parts it placeth a circle of hair in proof that it wished to hide them’ (Zurara, Chronicle of the Discovery and Conquest of Guinea, chapter 76, pp. 231–32). The attitude of the Portuguese in the early Atlantic expeditions along the African coast and their changes can be seen in Unali, ‘Gli indigeni delle coste dell’Africa’; Fonseca, ‘“Caminha e a Carta de Achamento” do Brasil’; and Godinho, Mito e mercadoria, pp. 106–09.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

Caminha’s texts, while total nudity is a manifestation of bestiality to Zurara, for Caminha this bestiality is not monstrous only because it is naive. Columbus also wrote in a similar vein.35 In the Carta, when innocence is emphasized, that is, the indigenous people’s unawareness of their nakedness, one may think — as readers in Lisbon would likely have done — of Genesis 3.7, where Adam and Eve ‘opened their eyes and realized that they were naked’ after their sin of eating the apple. In other words, in the Carta innocence is proof that there was no sin, and it is this that redeems the bestiality of the Brazilian Indians. In my opinion, the author of this letter echoes Columbus in that innocence of nakedness is a sign of moral otherness, but he adds an explanation to account for this.36 The implications arising from this argument are important. I believe we can see, behind these allusions, the first appearance of the Renaissance debates about the unity and plurality of worlds (and hence of the oneness of humanity), as well as about the borders of the natural, a debate that will be developed during the sixteenth century.37 All of this has important cultural, theological, and philosophical implications, which unfortunately cannot be developed here. Joan-Pau Rubies, among others, has drawn attention to this topic: This takes us to the […] point concerning the plurality of worlds, namely, that this ‘empirical’ human diversity began to be framed in new ways because the old universalist classificatory schemes had become themselves an object of debate. What was to be human, what was to be Christian, and what constituted law were controversial issues. Therefore, the plurality of human worlds was not simply a consequence of the production and circulation of more travel accounts and histories dealing with ancient and foreign peoples. It was perhaps, more crucially, an acknowledgement that the theological and philosophical assumptions that had framed the understanding of human life in terms of providential history and revealed law were insufficiently precise, to say the least.38 In any case, it seems here to be a back-projection for a more authentic humanity, although lost. In this sense, obedient to the medieval concept that time and space

35

36 37 38

Regarding some statements about the goodness and the peaceful nature of the Indians, Lisa Voigt writes: ‘If both the canonical and comparative readings have underplayed Caminha’s selective interpretations of events or the interested nature of his representations, these readings are themselves based on tellingly selective interpretations of Caminha’s text’ (Voigt, ‘“Por Andarmos Todos Casy Mesturados”’, p. 420). She then mentions the author’s observations about the bestiality of the Indians and, later, their barbarism. Letter to Luis de Santangel, dated 15 February 1493: ‘In these islands, where all go naked, men and women, as well their mothers gave birth to them’; but, he adds, ‘until now I have not found monstrous men as many thought, but on the contrary all these people have a very beautiful abidance’ (Columbus, Cristóbal Colón, pp. 141, 144 [my translation]). See Peloso, ‘Sistemi modellizzanti’, pp. 53–54. For Columbus see Todorov, La conquête de l’Amerique, pp. 40–55. In this respect, Randles, De la terre plate is important. Duhem, ‘The Problem of the Plurality of Worlds’, and Simek, Erde und Kosmos can also be recommended. Rubiés, ‘New Worlds and Renaissance Ethnology’, p. 161. Related to this problem we must consider the topic of decentralized space. See, among others, Finazzi-Agro, ‘Il mondo a dismisura’.

17 1

172

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

are dimensions of reality that can only be experienced unitarily, pointing to the discontinuity of time is possibly the best way to emphasize the discontinuity of space; in other words, it reinforces the idea of the profound novelty of the discovery. We have here an underlying idea very typical of that time: the ‘personalization’ of space, which clearly contrasts with the belief of modernity, for which space is an impersonal coordinate.39 As Paul Zumthor has written, ‘the experience of space is, it is evident, one of the pillars on which the human being conceptually organizes other areas of “reality”’,40 but the figure ‘that man makes in space, the structure of the discourse he holds concerning it, became altered in the fifteenth century without return’.41 Thus one can say that the Carta introduces a much deeper temporal dialectic in the relationship of alterity experience than the apparent [mis]understanding of different cultural and civilizational spaces. What was particularly derived from the American Encounter was a temporal confrontation, as the Europeans believed they were faced with Indians living in an earlier era of the world (whether a generation of original innocence or not). When the texts emphasize the virginal primitiveness of these people, they highlight precisely the awareness that there is an evolutionary difference between European and American societies. In this sense, this awareness makes it impossible to formulate the separation between us and them, whereas here the relationship is established between now and before. That is, on the western shores of the Atlantic, the abrupt and unexpected awareness of the existence of an unknown space provokes the perception that the old era of the world still exists. As Pierre Chaunu has rightly highlighted, with the adventure of the Genoese Columbus — and I would add that of the Portuguese Cabral — it is necessary to unite the unreal time of past spaces which no longer exist.42 Indeed, the very ambiguity of the names used to designate the new continent and its inhabitants expresses the discomfort of the European culture facing an unforeseen situation. As Michele Duchet has called to our attention, that circumstance shows that ‘the names of peoples are not lexical evidences, but conceptual tools that change, with their status, the image of the Other’.43 This is not the only conceptual domain in the world of alterity where this ambiguity is constant — for example, the concept of barbaric/barbarism should be remembered.44 The problems raised by the Carta do not end here as although we could also consider the political problem raised by the association of the expectation of a

39 Barca, ‘L’Estado da Inocência’, p. 294. 40 Zumthor, La Mesure du Monde, p. 27. 41 Zumthor, La Mesure du Monde, p. 33; also Zumthor, La Mesure du Monde, pp. 20, 35, and 45. 42 Chaunu, L’axe du temps, p. 44 (‘il faudra désormais ajouter le temps irréel des espaces aux passés qui n’existent pas’). Further along, this author — linking Columbus to Mandeville — says that the juxtaposition of these two men ‘montre un espace traditionnel qui incorpore le temps, entendez le passé et un espace nouveau qui s’essouffle à la quête d’un introuvable passé’ (Chaunu, L’axe du temps, p. 46). 43 Duchet, ‘Les deux Indes’, p. 201. 44 Droit, Genealogía.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

quick and easy Christian evangelization of these people in respect to the innocence of nakedness of indigenous women. Indeed, the affable and peaceful way in which such contacts took place created in the spirit of the Portuguese a belief that once they could understand the others’ language, their Christianization would be effected more quickly.45 In fact, Caminha points out that the Indians easily imitated the behaviour of the Portuguese.46 Addressing the king, he writes that in the discovered land, ‘the best profit which can be derived from it […] will be to save this people, and this should be the chief seed which Your Highness should sow there’.47 As can be seen, this optimism functions on two different levels. Firstly, it is believed that the success of evangelization would be immediate, and secondly, the ultimate result of this would be that the Indians would be admitted to heaven. It is important to note that in this letter of the Portuguese clerk, these two plans eventually appeared together as it was considered that both could be feasible, given the innocence of the Indians. The Portuguese seem to be extending to the Western Atlantic the successful experience promised by the missionary work in Black Africa at this time — because the Brazilian natives were like ‘gentiles’ of Guinea in their purest state. In my view, this reference to the kindly motivation and apparent ease of evangelization can be the object of two parallel readings. On the one hand, the above-mentioned African evangelization in the late fifteenth century was not yet perfectly clarified. It is true that the expectations in the Congo could be high at that time, although in the Mina, after promising contacts in the time of King John II, results were delayed. Considering this, and in line with my interpretation corresponding to the reality of the situation, Caminha’s highlighting of the possibilities of evangelization was not as naive as it first seems. I believe he expresses the hope that the difficulties encountered by the Portuguese in some regions of the West African coast will not exist where he is. On the other hand, there is a conviction that may correspond to a certain kind of compensation that the author of the Carta, indirectly, continues to support. Indeed, in this simultaneous dialogue between different plans that intersect the missive, one can go further, underlining passages of the Carta where the reference to a purity (considered as the innocence of human feelings) is evident, and which the Portuguese do consider to be quite heavenly. Perhaps here the Portuguese conviction relies on the facility of the missionary work. Thus, the two parallel readings, already mentioned, can be explained: the underlying messianism in the Carta means an expectation in the near future. At the same time, it is also a reference to an earlier stage of the world. Hence, paradise is simultaneously both in the after and the before.48 45 Greenlee, The Voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil and India, pp. 29 and 31–32. 46 Greenlee, The Voyage, pp. 30–31. 47 Greenlee, The Voyage, p. 33. 48 This issue opens the door to a set of reflections related to navigation at that time, to the rhetoric of the island dimension of Brazil, and to the political intentions of the Carta. But these reflections are beyond the scope of this text. The bibliography in which I analysed these issues is indicated in note 1.

17 3

1 74

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

Concluding Remarks As we have seen from the above examples about the social experiences of multi-ethnic socialization, and after closely observing the consequent multi-ethnic cultural relations, we can see that the contacts are mediated by representations, by the go-between referred to by Stephen Greenblatt,49 and that they depend upon previous cultural presuppositions much more than has previously been taken into account. In this sense, there is an implicit ethnography which it is important to disassemble so that we can understand the true meaning of the descriptions and statements of this kind of sources. In a volume edited by Stuart B. Schwartz, this body of cultural presuppositions has been termed implicit understandings.50 Taken together, they constitute a corpus of concepts, beliefs, and information that condition, more or less consciously, the understanding of the reality. It concerns a form of knowledge which is based on a sort of confidence resulting from an inability to understand concepts, beliefs, and alternative information. In the examples analysed in this paper, that incapacity is primarily the result of the novelty of the situation. It must be asked why the protagonists of such situations are not able to find alternatives. Precisely because of the uniqueness of the situation, they resort to concepts, beliefs, and information which are part of their inherited assets. Thus, a significant part of that heritage works on a level of which they are fully aware, because both individually and collectively, such heritage is stated as an implicit reality rather than an explicit one. In practice it works as an instrument mediator of horizons, making it possible to understand a reality that is radically plural, even in the case of an incomplete or partial comprehension. This implicit understanding is not restricted only to cross-cultural contacts taking place for the first time. In an interesting study dedicated to the Ceremonies of Possession in Europe’s Conquest of the New World, Patricia Seed has considered several examples of how different European traditions affect the implications of significance given to various concepts — as, for example, the word discovery/discovering.51 While it is true that she recognizes the reasonableness of the arguments in the debate between different European nationalities, she also notes that this reasonableness exists only in the context of the cultural history of each one of these same nationalities. Therefore, there can be difficulty in reaching agreement.52 Thus, if this situation occurred within a European society where, in addition to ‘differences’, there is a strong common cultural heritage, it is perfectly acceptable that in areas outside Europe, such as Africa and America as analysed in this paper, there would be even greater difficulties of understanding. In that case, we should not forget that implicit ethnography works on both sides, through which it has an interactive effect because each society is always on the other side of each side. This paper has considered one side only. In any case, there are previous experiences, inherited

49 Greenblatt, Marvelous Possessions, pp. 119–51. 50 Schwartz, Implicit Understandings. 51 Seed, Ceremonies of Possession, pp. 17–19 and 143 ff. 52 Seed, Ceremonies of Possession, p. 23.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

concepts, ideologies, and cosmologies, although solidified by time, which are still generators of understanding structures that, at every moment, affect the vision of reality.53 As Mary Douglas writes ‘[m]eaning is part of a constructed world, the problem of understanding symbols is how to take a grip on a whole world. What is actually said in words is only the tip of the iceberg. The unspoken understandings are essential’.54 In fact, if there are always implicit meanings about social life that are fundamental, in these early relationships between the Europeans and other spaces, cultures, and societies, even more important are the implicit communications and the related interpretations. Stuart B. Schwartz writes in the introduction of the volume quoted above: But the process was complicated and unstable. Whatever the previous understandings and expectations, however generalized the common understanding of ‘others’, the contacts themselves caused readjustments and rethinking as each side was forced to reformulate its ideas of self and other in the face of unexpected actions and unimagined possibilities. Thus a dynamic tension between previous understandings and expectations and new observations and experiences was set in motion with each encounter, and modified as the encounters changed over time. Both sides might be convinced that their interpretations of the situation were correct, and sometimes cultural similarities caused more confusion than did differences.55 Clearly we are in a situation where we must depend solely on texts that have survived the ravages of time. Because of a lack of transparent texts, which are often complex in this case, the extant texts are narratives which have no previous nor parallel texts for comparison, resulting in them having acquired considerable authority. In this regard, quite rightly, Anthony Pagden wrote that, the challenge in these circumstances is ‘how to create a text where none had existed before’,56 a text that, once created, would be authoritative.57 This is the challenge to which Caminha’s Carta, among other texts reporting the impact of the first landing of the Europeans in America, provides revealing answers. The above-mentioned phrase about the Journal de Columbus can be applied to this text: it is ‘in some sense at least, a “beginning text”’.58 The matrix character of these texts make them, moreover, difficult for interpretation in so far as there is within them a permanent fluctuation between the content of the arguments and the narrative dimension.59 Michel de Certeau has written fair words in this regard about what he called ‘heterology’, when he organized a discourse about otherness that is simultaneously a discourse on the other and a discourse in which the other speaks.60 It was created in

53 Phillips, ‘The Outer World’; Grafton, Shelford, Siraisi, New Worlds, Ancient Texts. 54 Douglas, Implicit Meanings, p. vii. 55 Schwartz, Implicit Understandings, p. 3. 56 Pagden, ‘Ius et factum’, p. 88. 57 Pagden, ‘Ius et factum’, p. 89. 58 Hulme, Colonial encounters, p. 16. 59 Hart, ‘Images of the Native’, p. 56. 60 Certeau, ‘Montaigne’s “Of Cannibals”’.

17 5

176

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

such a way to incorporate the horizon of intelligibility that it can help us understand the speech of the other side.61 In the case of the texts analysed above, especially that of Caminha, the discourse of otherness is profoundly radical in the sense that it is enveloped in a great silence filled with gestures.62 The interesting challenge lies in the fact that in all these episodes the European interlocutor is required to unravel the language and the meaning of the other side. Here, the European needed to become involved with all the strength of his existing cultural assumptions. In this sense, it is necessary to proceed prudently, without deconstructionism, exaggeration, or simple empiricism.63 Thus, in this paper I have engaged in an intermediate approach seeking to combine the importance of the information provided by the sources with the meaning of interpretations that we can articulate. In the background, I have attempted to navigate through all the possible implicit understandings which can be identified.

Works Cited Primary Sources Barros, João de, Ásia, ed. by Hernâni Cidade, Manuel Múrias, vol. 1 (Lisboa: Agência Geral das Colónias, 1945) Caminha, Pedro Vaz de, Letter to King Manuel, in The Voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil and India, ed. by William Brooks Greenlee (London: Hakluyt Society, 1938), pp. 3–33 Columbus, Christopher, Cristóbal Colón. Textos y documentos completos, ed. by Consuelo Varela (Madrid: Alianza, 1984) Journal [A] of the first voyage of Vasco da Gama, ed. by Ernest George Ravenstein (London: Hakluyt Society, 1898) [accessed 24 March 2016] Vespucci, Amerigo, Cartas de viaje, ed. by Luciano Formisano, (Madrid: Alianza, 1986) Zurara, Gomes Eanes de, Chronicle of the Discovery and Conquest of Guinea, ed. by Charles Raymond Beazley and Edgar Prestage, vol. 2 (London: Hakluyt Society, 1899) Secondary Studies Barca, Daniele, ‘L’Estado da Inocência’ degli ‘Índios’ brasiliani in alcune relazioni di viaggio del XVI secolo’, in Il Portogallo e i Mari: un incontro tra culture, ed. by Maria Luisa Cusati, vol. 1 (Napoli: Liguori, 1997), pp. 285–95 Carvalho, Alberto, ‘Caminhos literários da Carta de Pêro Vaz de Caminha’, Mare Liberum, 11–12 (1996), 7–28

61 See Giard, ‘Epilogue’, p. 318. 62 The comment about Columbus: ‘The image of the Native is translated as well as ventriloquized’ (Hart, ‘Images of the Native’, p. 62), can also be applied to these texts. 63 Schwartz, Implicit Understandings, p. 7.

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

Castro, Sílvio, La lettera di Vaz de Caminha sulla scoperta del Brasile (Padova: Università di Padova, 1984) ———, ‘Alteridade e conquista spiritual na “Carta” de Pero Vaz de Caminha’, Cultura: História e Filosofia, 5, (1986), 179–99 ———, A carta de Pero Vaz de Caminha: O descobrimento do Brasil, Introdução, atualização e notas de Sílvio Castro (Porto Alegre: Descobertas, 1996) Certeau, Michel de, ‘Montaigne’s “Of Cannibals”: The Savage “T”’, in Heterologies: Discourse of the Other, chapter 5 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1986), pp. 67–79 Chaunu, Pierre, L’axe du temps (Paris: Julliard, 1994) Cortesão, Jaime, A Carta de Pero Vaz de Caminha (Lisboa: Imprensa Nacional-Casa da Moeda, 1994) Dias, Carlos Malheiro, ed., História da Colonização Portuguesa do Brasil, vol. 2 (Porto: Litografia Nacional, 1923) Douglas, Mary, Implicit Meanings: Selected Essays in Anthropology (London: Routledge, 2001) Droit, Roger-Pol, Genealogía de los bárbaros. Historia de la inhumanidad, (Barcelona: Paidós, 2007) Duchet, Michèle, ‘Les deux Indes ou l’étrange ‘baptème’ des Américains’, in As dimensões da alteridade nas culturas de língua portuguesa — o Outro, Proceedings of the ‘1º Simpósio Interdisciplinar de Estudos Portugueses’, Lisbon, 1985, vol. 2 (Lisboa: Universidade Nova de Lisboa, n.d.), pp. 193–202 Duhem, Pierre, ‘The Problem of the Plurality of Worlds in Peripatetic Philosophy’, in Pierre Duhem Medieval Cosmology. Theories of Infinity: Place, Time, Void and Plurality of Words, ed. and trans. by Roger Ariew (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985), pp. 431–510 Duhem, Pierre, Medieval Cosmology: Theories of Infinity, Place, Time, Void and Plurality of Words, ed. and trans. by Roger Ariew (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1985) Fernández-Almesto, Felipe, Antes de Colón. Exploración y colonización desde el Mediterráneo hacia el Atlántico, 1229–1492, (Madrid: Cátedra, 1992); first edition Fernández-Almesto, Felipe, Before Columbus: Exploration and Colonization from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic, 1229–1492 (Philadelphia, University of Pennsylvania Press, 1987) Finazzi-Agro, Ettore, ‘Il mondo a dismisura. Il senso dello spazio nei primi documenti sul Brasile’, in Il Portogallo e i Mari: un incontro tra culture, ed. by Maria Luisa Cusati, vol. 1 (Napoli: Liguori, 1997), pp. 311–21 Fonseca, Luís Adão da, ‘O Itinerário de Usodimare: inspiração livresca, experiência mediterrânica e navegações atlânticas em meados do século XV’, in Actas do II Colóquio Internacional de História da Madeira (Lisboa: CNCDP, 1990), pp. 963–71 ———, ‘A Experiência da viagem de descoberta, in O Atlântico: a memória de um Oceano’, in A descoberta do Oceano: saga e memória (sec. XI–XVI), ed. by Luís Adão da Fonseca and José Adriano de Porto Carvalho, vol. 2 (Porto: Banco Português do Atlântico, 1996), pp. 301–28 ———, Pedro Álvares Cabral. Uma viagem (Lisboa: Edições INAPA, 1999), pp. 63–85 ———, ʻO sentido da novidade na Carta de Pero Vaz de Caminha’, Revista USP (S. Paulo), no. 45 (2000), pp. 38–47

17 7

1 78

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

———, Dal Mediterraneo all’Atlantico. Le scoperte e la formazione del Mare Oceano nel secoli XIV–XIV (Pisa: Edizioni ETS-Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, 2004) Fonseca, Pedro, ‘“Caminha e a Carta de Achamento” do Brasil: ideário e estratégias narrativas confrontados em Colombo’, Luso-Brasilian Review, 33 (1996), 99–120 Formisano, Luciano, ‘Tra racconto e scrittura: la scoperta dell´America nei viaggiatori italiani del primo Cinquecento’, Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studi Colombiani, Genoa, 4.1 (1987), pp. 199–230 Giard, Luce, ‘Epilogue: Michel de Certeau’s Heterology and the New World’, in New World Encounters, ed. by Stephen Greenblatt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), pp. 313–22 Godinho, Vitorino Magalhães, Mito e mercadoria, utopia e prática de navegar. Séculos XIII– XVIII (Lisboa: Difel, 1990) Grafton, Anthony, April Shelford, and Nancy Siraisi, New Worlds, Ancient Texts: The Power of Tradition and the Shock of Discovery (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1992) Greenblatt, Stephen, Marvelous Possessions: The Wonder of the New World (Chicago: University of Chicago Press & Oxford University Press, 1991) ———, ed., New World Encounters (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993) Greenlee, William Brooks, The Voyage of Pedro Álvares Cabral to Brazil and India (London: Hakluyt Society, 1938) Hart, Jonathan, ‘Images of the Native in Renaissance Encounter Narratives, Ariel’, Review of International English Literature, 25.4 (1994), 55–76 Horta, José da Silva, ‘A representação do Africano na Literatura de Viagens, do Senegal à Serra Leoa (1453–1508)’, Mare Liberum, Revista de História dos Mares, 2 (1991), 209–339 Hulme, Peter, Colonial Encounters: Europe and the Native Caribbean, 1492–1797 (Cambridge: Methuen, 1986) ———, ‘Tales of Distinction: European Ethnography and the Caribbean’, in Implicit Understandings: Observing, Reporting and Reflecting on the Encounters between Europeans and Other Peoples in the Early Modern Era, ed. by Stuart Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 157–97 Ideias, José António, ‘A Carta de Pêro Vaz de Caminha: contribuição para uma tipologia do encontro’, Mare Liberum, 6 (1993), 165–69 Jorge, Carlos Jorge Figueiredo, ‘O saber e o poder. Estruturas de significação na Carta, de Pêro Vaz de Caminha’, Mare Liberum, 6 (1993), 171–77 ———, ‘A conflitualidade do saber ou a luta pela informação perante a alteridade inesperada’, in Il Portogallo e i Mari: un incontro tra culture, ed. by Maria Luisa Cusati, vol. 1 (Napoli: Liguori, 1997), pp. 331–42 Margarido, Alfredo, ‘La vision de l’autre (africain et indien d’Amérique) dans la Renaissance portugaise’, in Humanisme portugais et l’Europe (Paris: Fundação C. Gulbenkian, 1984), pp. 505–55 Marques, Maria Lúcia Garcia, ‘A escrita de um olhar primeiro: uma re-leitura do Roteiro da Primeira Viagem de Vasco de Gama de Álvaro Velho e da Carta do Achamento do Brasil de Pêro Vaz de Caminha’, in O Olhar do viajante. Dos Navegadores aos exploradores, ed. by Fernando Cristóvão (Coimbra: Almedina and Centro de

The Portuguese Experience of Multi-Ethnic Sociability in the Atlantic

Literaturas de Expressão Portuguesa da Universidade de Lisboa, 2003), pp. 45–87 Pagden, Anthony, ‘Ius et factum: Text and Experience in the Writings of Bartolomé de Las Casas’, in New World Encounters, ed. by Stephen Greenblatt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), pp. 85–100 Pellegrin, Nicole,‘Vêtements de peau(x) et de plumes: la nudité des indiens et la diversité du monde au XVIe siècle’, in Voyager à la Renaissance. Actes du Colloque de Tours, 1983, ed. by J. Claude Margolin and Jean Ceard (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 1987), pp. 508–30 Peloso, Silvano, ‘Sistemi modellizzanti e opposizioni culturali nella “Carta” di Pero Vaz de Caminha’, Letterature d’America, 2.8 (1981), 45–59 ———, ‘Dal Paradiso terrestre all’isola di utopia: immagini del Brasile nel rinascimento italiano ed europeo’, in Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Studi Colombiani, Genoa, IV.2 (1987), pp. 395–405 Pereira, S. B., Vocabulário da Carta de Pero Vaz de Caminha (Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, 1964) Phillips, Seymour, ‘The Outer World of the European Middle Ages’, in Implicit Understandings: Observing, Reporting and Reflecting on the Encounters Between Europeans and Other Peoples in the Early Modern Era, ed. by Stuart B. Schwartz (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), pp. 24–63 Philips, William D., ‘Africa and the Atlantic Islands Meet the Garden of Eden: Christopher Columbus’s Views of America’, Journal of World History, 3.2 (1992), 149–64 Radulet, Carmen M., ‘Il diario della navigazione di Vasco da Gama’, in Vasco da Gama. La prima circumnavigazione dell’Africa. 1497–1499 (Reggio Emilia: Edizioni Diabasis, 1994), pp. 31–57 Randles, W. G. L., De la terre plate au globe terrestre. Une mutation épistémologique rapide 1480–1520 (Paris: Armand Colin, 1980) Rubiés, Joan-Pau, ‘New Worlds and Renaissance Ethnology’, History and Anthropology, 6.2–3 (1993), 157–97 Russell, Peter E., ‘Problemas Sócio-linguísticos relacionados com os Descobrimentos Portugueses no Atlântico Africano’, Anais da Academia Portuguesa de História, 26.2 (1980), pp. 225–50; English translation: ‘Some Socio-Linguistic Problems Concerning the Fifteenth-Century Portuguese Discoveries in the African Atlantic’, in Portugal, Spain and the African Atlantic, 1343–1490, ed. by Peter E. Russell (Aldershot: Variorum, 1995) ———, ‘White Kings on Black Kings: Rui de Pina and the Problem of Black African Sovereignity’, in Medieval and Renaissance Studies in Honour of Brian Tate, ed. by Ian Michael and Robert A. Cardwell (Oxford: Dolphin, 1986), pp. 151–63; republished in Peter E. Russell, Portugal, Spain and the African Atlantic, 1343–1490 (Aldershot: Variorum, 1995) ———, ‘Some Portuguese Paradigms for the Discovery and Conquest of Spanish America’, Renaissance Studies, 6.3–4 (1992), 377–90 ———, ‘Veni, vidi, vici: Some Fifteenth-Century Eyewitness Accounts of Travel in the African Atlantic before 1492’, Historical Research, 66.160 (1993), 115–28

17 9

1 80

lu í s a dão da fo n s ec a

Schwartz, Stuart B., ed., Implicit Understandings: Observing, Reporting and Reflecting on the Encounters between Europeans and Other Peoples in the Early Modern Era (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) Seed, Patricia, Ceremonies of Possession in Europe’s Conquest of the New World, 1492–1640 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995) ———, Cerimônias de posse na conquista européia do Novo Mundo (1492–1640) (São Paulo: Editora Unesp, 1997) Silva, Rosa Virgínia Mattos e, ed., A carta de Caminha testemunho linguístico de 1500 (Salvador: Editora da Universidade Federal da Bahia, 1996) Simek, Rudolf, Erde und Kosmos im Mittelalter. Das Weltbild vor Kolumbus, (München: C. H. Beck, 1992); English edition: Heaven and Earth in the Middle Ages: The Physical World before Columbus (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1996) Todorov, Tzvetan, La conquête de l’Amerique. La question de l’Autre (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1982) Thomas, Vanessa, ʻReprésentations européennes des corps africains au cours des premiers contacts sur les rives atlantiques (1341–1508). Le passage du mythe à la construction du réel par l’expérience vécue’, (unpublished MA thesis, University of Lisbon, 2013) Unali, Anna, La ‘Carta do achamento’ di Pero Vaz de Caminha (Milano: Istituto Editoriale Cisalpino — La Goliardica, 1984) ———, ‘L’oro nei primi due viaggi di Cristoforo Colombo nelle Indie’, in Scritti in onore del Prof. Paolo Emilio Taviani, 3, Annali della Facoltà di Scienze Politiche, XI–XIII (Génova: E.C.I.G., 1983–1986), pp. 317–43 ———, ‘Aspettative economiche nelle relazioni di viaggio in rapporto all’esplorazione dell’Africa occidentale: il commercio dell’oro’, in Actas do Congresso Internacional Bartolomeu Dias e a sua época, vol. 3, Porto, 1988 (Porto: CNCDP, 1989), pp. 45–58 ———, ‘Gli indigeni delle coste dell’Africa occidentale negli scritti di un mercante veneziano del XV secolo: Alvise da Ca´da Mosto’, in Actas do Congresso Internacional de História Missionação Portuguesa e Encontro de Culturas, vol. 1 (Braga: Universidade Católica Portuguesa and CNCDP, 1993), pp. 483–500 ———, Alla ricerca dell’oro. Mercanti, viaggiatori, missionari in Africa e nelle Americhe (secc. XIII–XVI) (Roma: Bulzoni, 2006) Vitorino, Clara de Macedo, ‘Convenção e ficção — ensaio sobre a Carta de Pêro Vaz de Caminha’, Mare Liberum, 6 (1993), 155–63 Vitorino, Clara de Macedo, ‘Caminha e Colombo: duas visões do mundo Americano’, in Literatura de Viagem. Narrativa, história, mito, ed. by Ana Maria Falcão, Maria Teresa Nascimento, and Maria Luísa Leal (Lisboa: Edições Cosmos, 1997), pp. 285–95 Voigt, Lisa, ‘“Por Andarmos Todos Casy Mesturados”: The Politics of Intermingling in Caminha’s “Carta” and Colonial American Anthologies’, Early American Literature, 40.3 (2005), 407–39 Williams, Jerry M., ‘Early Images of America in Two Letters of Discovery’, Brasil-Brazil. Revista de literatura Brasileira. A Journal of Brazilian Literatura, 5.4 (1991), 5–22 Zumthor, Paul, La Mesure du Monde. Représentation de l’Espace au Moyen Âge (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1993)

Part II

Ethnic Groups within One Political Body

The problem of how imagined pasts were used in order to justify ethnic domination and ethnic divisions and how they influenced relationships between various ethnicities living side by side in one political entity is the first key theme which runs through this second section of the book. The second is how minorities adapted their narratives about their ethnic past to a tradition of the dominant ethnicity. Here, Paula Pinto Costa and Maria Cristina Pimenta focus on practices that belonged on the edge of cultural and communicative memory — the communication policy of the court of the king of Portugal, João I (1357–1433). Through analysis of sources reflecting administrative practices of the royal court (charters, sets of laws), they identify the origins of narratives, which were created at the highest level of royal power, about the characteristics of various ethnic groups present in Portuguese society. In this way they approach the problem of the formation and dissemination of ideas on the identification, separation, and relations between the three major ethnicities in the realm (Christians, Jews, and Muslims) in the context of the stability of the royal power and the cohesion of society. Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė deals with a very similar problem — but thousands of kilometres eastwards. The history of Grand Duchy of Lithuania was akin to that of medieval Kingdom of Portugal in one aspect: in both cases the dominant ideological narratives were created at the royal courts in order to strengthen both rulers’ power and the cohesion of ethnically diverse societies. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was dominated demographically and economically by political ‘minorities’ — Orthodox Ruthenians, as well as Jews, Karaites, and Armenians. They were politically subject to a ruler who represented the politically privileged, yet small in number, ethnicity of Roman Catholics — Lithuanians and Ruthenians. Nevertheless, across the centuries one metanarrative was built about the Grand Duchy as a state of relative tolerance between various ethnicities built upon a common history. The story was a result of a long and variable discourse between various ethnic versions of the past ultimately controlled by the royal power. As a result, the multi-ethnic community subject to the Grand Dukes of Lithuania was bound together by a shared metanarrative, an official version of the history of the Grand Duchy, with many versions belonging to the separate ethnic groups. Dovile Troskovaite demonstrates that this syncretism of ethnic memories was possible under one condition — diverse ethnicities incorporated certain plots from the metanarrative into their own tradition. Then, after the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1772–1795) the state itself disappeared but the differences between the ethnic groups and their traditions survived. The chapter shows how the elites of one ethnicity, the Karaites, created their past and their identity upon various elements of both a once-dominant narrative about the shared past of all inhabitants of the Grand Duchy and the traditions of other ethnicities living in the former Grand Duchy. And that this patchwork of plots and ideas was consciously built to secure for the ethnic community a safe place among neighbouring, dominant groups of different creeds and ethnic identities. In her chapter Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė analyses how the court of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania secured the stability of the Grand Duchy by providing a historical metanarrative that encompassed all the ethnicities in the Duchy. Andrzej Pleszczyński tries to present another side of the coin, namely how the Poles, who were political leaders in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, perceived

their eastern neighbours. The time limit for reflection is 1569, i.e. the conclusion of the Polish-Lithuanian Real Union. There is a striking parallel between the historical metanarrative of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and development of cultural memory within the entire Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. In both cases the multi-ethnic character of these societies was not denied but in the same moment society’s general political bonds, very often created by a community of values, were emphasized by the authors of the sources. For a classic example of this mechanism, Pleszczyński points to an invented history that the Polish, Lithuanian, and Ruthenian nobility of the Commonwealth had all originated from the ancient Sarmatians. The noble characteristics of the latter were shared by their descendants — despite their ethnic differences. The authors of these chapters trace ways of building cohesive versions of the past for multi-ethnic, late medieval and early modern societies. Alexandr Musin, in his closing chapter, examines the role of historical memory, places of memory, and national or collective myths in the formation and evolution of a community’s values from the early to late Middle Ages in Eastern European societies. He tries to reveal and explain these ‘medieval values’ as part of the mechanisms which ensured, or ought to have ensured, the cohesion of multi-ethnic societies and the organization of their relations with neighbouring countries. If Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė and Andrzej Pleszczyński show us a constant multitude of ethnicities united by variable political characteristics and dependant on these political changes, Aleksandr Musin accentuates the creative role of the latter as carriers and propagators of values. He also emphasizes that the relative unity of various ethnicities would be possible thanks to shared sets of values.

Paula Pinto Costa and Maria Cristina Pimenta

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433) From Administrative Practices to Official Royal Narrative

The chapters in the previous section of this book display how cultural memory of medieval and early modern European societies was dependent on ethnic identities and interethnic relations. Here we want to focus on practices relating to cultural and communicative memory: namely, the communication policy of the court of the King João I. By analysing sources that reflect the administrative practices of the royal court (the issuing of charters and sets of laws on Jews and Muslims in medieval Portuguese chanceries from Afonso II to Afonso V), we want to identify the origins of narratives circulating in Portuguese society that originate from the highest level of royal power. We thus address the formation and dissemination of ideas on the relationship between three major ethnicities (Christians, Jews, and Muslims) in the context of the stability of royal power and the cohesion of society.

Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Late Medieval Kingdom of Portugal The triumph of the new dynasty of the Avis by the end of the fourteenth century in Portugal allowed the development of different social divisions leading to interesting interpretations, as so often happens when we are dealing with moments of visible change. For an understanding of this framework, it is important to remember the severity of social and economic problems, as well as the dynastic question which had to be resolved. In fact, the death of King Fernando in 1383 and the marriage of

Paula Pinto Costa  •  ([email protected]) is Associate Professor of Medieval History in the Faculty of Arts and Humanities of the University of Porto (FLUP) and a Researcher at CITCEM (Transdisciplinary Culture, Space and Memory Research Centre). Her main research areas are Medieval History and the Military Orders, especially the Hospitallers and Templars. Maria Cristina Pimenta  •  ([email protected]) is a Senior Researcher of CEPESE (Centre for the Study of Population, Economy and Society), University of Porto. She has published on Portuguese Medieval History, mainly the Military Orders. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 185–210 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120063

186

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

his only daughter to the king of Castile, Juan I, did not bring promising times in the medium term. The extent of the forthcoming loss of Portuguese identity values unsurprisingly resulted in social reactions. João, an illegitimate son of King Pedro I (1357–1367) and Master of the Military Order of Avis, was progressively involved in the resolution of this situation. He eventually agreed to administer and defend the kingdom. Having become king of Portugal after legal procedures in the Cortes of Coimbra in April 1385, he still had to prove that he was going to be able to fulfil his role as the defender of the realm. As is well known, his decisive victory at the battle of Aljubarrota, ably advised by the active command of Nuno Álvares Pereira, is the best example of this.1 All these kind of actions required the possibility of the collaboration of society which the king could then reward and retain. Proceeding from the viewpoint that this was true in respect to most sectors of Portuguese society at that time (and this theme is quite popular in several aspects of Portuguese historiography2), we will present here some ideas on how King João I dealt with the Portuguese multi-ethnic society (in Portugal, based only on Jews and Muslims or Moors, the word used in medieval Iberia to designate the latter). The two communities had their own identities, laws, skills in work and production, various levels of culture, distinct religions, and different motivations and interests in the realm.3 For example, in the case of Jews, particularly in light of their expulsion from Castile and Aragón after the pogroms of 13914 and their search for refuge in Portugal, then the positive motivation they would have had to contribute to the development of the realm which had welcomed them is obvious. Moreover, by the second decade of the fifteenth century, a Portuguese fleet sailed to Ceuta with the king of Portugal and his sons in command. The so-called African ‘conquest of Ceuta’ in 1415, precisely at João I’s reign, allows us to focus on this multi-ethnic approach from an even more compelling perspective. Although it is quite difficult to identify through the contemporaneous written sources the impact of this cultural encounter and its reflection in the administrative practices of the Portuguese Crown (and even within the territory), the expedition to Africa makes the reign of João I a very significant period for study. It is true that this is a very well-known period of medieval Portuguese history. The changing of a dynasty — Dinastia de Avis (1385–1580) — and the nature of this process, means that one of the principle issues is connected with the identity and the legitimacy of the new king. Nevertheless, academic studies





1 For a detailed overview of João I’s reign see Coelho, D. João I. A synthesis of Portuguese medieval history can be found in Sousa, ‘Portugal’ (English version in The New Cambridge Medieval History, vol. 7, ed. by Allmand, pp. 627–36; Portuguese version in O parlamento medieval português, ed. by Duarte, Amaral, and Marques, pp. 553–67). 2 Mattoso, Rosa, Vasconcelos e Sousa, and Branco, eds, The Historiography of Medieval Portugal. 3 See Barros, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’. 4 The violence of those times was reported to King João I by the Jews of the commune of Lisbon and, as a result, the monarch issued a more protective law, Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXVII. See Moreno, ‘As Pregações’, pp. 139–40. For a broader perspective of the theme see Valdeón Baruque, Los Conflictos Sociales, pp. 125–39.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

about ethnicities have not, for a long time, systematically included these groups as part of the process. In 2011 the book The Historiography of Medieval Portugal, c. 1950–c. 2010 was edited in Portugal, a collection of of twenty-eight thematic papers comprising an overview of the scholarly research on diverse subjects related to medieval Portugal. The chapter by Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros focuses on the ethno-religious minorities.5 According to Barros, the heuristic question has been limited by certain concepts of minorities, marginality, alterity, and segregation, among others. Most of these concepts are ambiguous, meaningless, and much influenced by the ideological issue of national identities. It has been increasingly difficult to understand through this classic framework the role performed by Jews and Muslims in medieval Portugal. Until the 1990s, ʻthe ethnoreligious minorities do not appear to bring about (unlike Spain) any centrality in the discourse on Portuguese identity’.6 Portuguese historiography has also had some remarkable developments on this topic. Thus, it is possible to identify a path from the ‘closed paradigm’ to the ‘rediscovery’7 of these ethnicities. In an academic context, two names should be highlighted: Maria José Pimenta Ferro Tavares, an authority on medieval Jews in Portugal; and Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros, a well-recognized researcher on Muslim society. Tavares concluded her doctoral thesis about Jews in 1969, edited in 1970.8 This research, which she continued in many other publications, represents a new cycle and provides a comprehensive and innovative overview, which she has extended up to late medieval and early modern times.9 As already noted, our knowledge of religious ethnic minorities has benefited from Barros’s research, who has focused her efforts on Muslims since her 1993 Master’s thesis10 and her 2004 Ph.D.11 These two researchers have contributed to enlarging the body of new data and to the renovation of interpretation surrounding medieval and early modern ethno-religious groups. In general, as pointed out in the book mentioned above, studies about Muslims arose later than those on Jews, and the Jewish community has been studied more than the Muslim community.12 More recently, several important initiatives have been taken, such as Cátedra de Estudos Sefraditas ‘Alberto Benveniste’13 at University of Lisbon and the edition of a dictionary about Judaism.14 With a diverse scope, some contributions provided different approaches which enhanced the study of both communities: these included Campo Arquológico de Mértola (CAM), which

5 Barros, ‘Mourarias e Cidade’. 6 Barros, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, p. 574. 7 Barros, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, pp. 574–75. 8 Tavares, Os judeus. 9 For examples, see Tavares, Os judeus (1982), Os judeus (1984). 10 Barros, A comuna muçulmana. 11 Barros, Tempos e Espaços. 12 Barros, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, pp. 574–75. 13 . 14 Mucznik, Dicionário.

187

188

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

has a strong focus on medieval Islamic History,15 and Rota dos Judeus,16 that aimed to preserve Jewish heritage. From a historical perspective, the roots of the constitution of the Portuguese territory as an independent state have to be envisaged as having a large set of different components within which the relations with ethnic minorities play an important role. In respect to this, it is evident that there are significant differences between Moors and Jews as part of a society that helped the first monarchs to establish Portugal as a kingdom. In other words, the Reconquest presented the challenges to Christians of various types — namely, those who intended to ward off the progression of the royal armies to the south and others who had been installed in the territory for a long time and had occupied urban centres, the Atlantic coastline, and the border with Castile. Since the early Middle Ages (as the Muslims had arrived on the Iberian Peninsula at the beginning of the eighth century) an inverse situation had prevailed, as is demonstrated by the existence of intermediate social groups like the Mozarabs (Christians who had submitted to Moorish rule) and mudéjares (Muslims under Christian dominion). Also, the existence of several Reinos Taifa (various kingdoms constituted after the breakup of the Caliphate of Cordoba) are a good example of the necessary military coexistence when protagonists are placed on opposite sides. Similarly, in the case of the Jews, the fact that the Portuguese Crown accepted them after their conversion, giving the conversos a privileged status, eventually disrupted the already delicate balance between the two religious groups.17 It was, thus, an awkward situation for the first Portuguese medieval rulers who had to cope with disparate situations: social forms of solidarity (sometimes adjusted to addressing linkages between populations) and the coexistence of different beliefs sharing the same space, as well as violent conflicts alternating with peaceful daily life. Nonetheless, it is accepted that there was, indeed, a ‘a long distance between what canon or public law enacted and the evolution of everyday life in society’.18 Both ethnic groups, Moors and Jews, expected from the Portuguese reasonable solutions which were not always easy to achieve and were inevitably different for each group. For example, Moors could even be legitimized as free individuals ‘(mouros forros), with its own fiscal identity and the implicit recognition of the practice of a different religion’, as noted by Filomena Lopes de Barros.19 An important and decisive moment to stress in this regard is the well-known concession of a carta de foral (117020) to the mouros forros of Lisbon, Almada, Palmela, and Alcácer do Sal, enacted by Afonso Henriques, first king of Portugal. This concession may indicate an attentive understanding by the monarch of the different categories that began to emerge from initial contacts with prisoners of war (mauri). Indeed, in the case of both ethnicities, they were all subject to political dominance and were compelled 15 . 16 . 17 Tavares, Os judeus (1982), p. 432. 18 Tavares, Os judeus (1982), p. 398. 19 Barros, ‘Os Muçulmanos de Portugal’, pp. 99–108 (especially p. 101). 20 Portugaliae Monumenta Historica. Leges, I, pp. 396–97.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

to occupy specific areas of the cities or villages — even if, in the case of Jews, their presence in the territory had an even more ancient tradition. Mourarias and Judiarias, today easily identified (and much studied in the case of the latter), constitute the urbanistic expression of many of the characteristics of the relationship enacted between royal power and these minorities. Perhaps the connection which, more than any other, stands out in their relationship with the monarchs may have resulted from their financial status which facilitated a greater proximity to the crown and, in return, placed them in a favourable situation to be rewarded and favoured by the monarchs. Nevertheless, in their specificity, all the relations between these groups (the most important elements of which will be discussed below) certainly helped to prepare Portugal for future challenges, namely those overseas, where the Portuguese were culturally more prepared to accept other ethnicities and more alert in dealing with the dichotomy of the encounter.

Royal Charters on Ethnic Minorities Through the historical evolution of these two communities in Portugal, their mutual relations are very interesting, as well as their relationships with the Church,21 local governments (municipalities, towns, and villages),22 or other institutions, and would demand different research approaches not suitable within the scope of this paper. Our aim here is to examine the royal image of each group and their extent of their friendly relations with the monarchy. To accomplish this examination of multi-ethnic society under João I, we have selected a set of written texts which testify to royal memory. We have not dealt with sources from Jews or Moors, and indeed, this paper is based only on material from João I’s chancery, that is the chronicles from that period and the royal legislation (Ordenações). This royal chancery contains 5155 registers within which about 160 are related to Jews and Moors, that is 3% of the entire collection. The most well-known representative (138?–1459/146?) of the narrative sources is Fernão Lopes,23 who was in charge of the royal archive (Torre do Tombo) and was the first official chronicler chosen by King Duarte, son of João I, to write the history of the royal family. This famous medieval writer was responsible for a consistent work which was intended to enhance the image of the new ruling dynasty. Not surprisingly, under these circumstances, his legacy has been enormous and other chroniclers followed his path, particularly Zurara who succeeded him in Torre do Tombo. Later in the Iberian Peninsula, the Catholic rulers Fernando and Isabella (1492) and Manuel I (1496) of Portugal enacted a decisive policy against the above-mentioned 21 Tavares, ʻO difícil diálogo’, pp. 53–54. 22 Duarte, ‘Marginalidade e marginais’, p. 185: ‘At least between 1390 and 1395, in the few meetings of the town council of Porto, reserved for higher spheres of people, there was always present one Mestre, one Jani, and one Jew; in Loulé, in the most critical moments and tough decisions, representatives of the Jewish and Moorish communes are summoned’ (our translation). 23 Amado, ‘Crónica do Condestabre’.

189

1 90

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta Minority groups (Jews and Muslims) in João I’s Chancery

120 100 80 60 40 20 0

Jews

Muslims

Jews and Muslims

Figure 10.1. Minority groups ( Jews and Muslims) in João I’s Chancery Source: Chancelarias portuguesas: D. João I. Lisboa: Universidade de Nova Lisboa. Centro de Estudos Históricos, 2004–2006.

ethnic minorities, expelling them from their territory. Although this took place at the end of the fifteenth century, it is important to consider them in the light of the cultural environment of that epoch, namely the discourse of the royal chronicles written at that time but focusing on the reign of João I. Duarte Nunes de Leão (1530?–1608) is a good example of demonstrating this perspective, as we will discuss later. As we seek here to present the crown perspective in dealing with these delicate matters, it is necessary to consider another typology of significant sources for the study of Portuguese history, that is the sources of the Cortes. This institution, a kind of parliament, was a space meant to give voice to the demands of the towns and villages, as well as to the political discourse of the monarch. In this sense, what is known about the ethnic groups in the Cortes corresponds to their significance to the municipalities; that is to say, with this type of source we never have direct access to the voice of the minorities, nor to their ability to intervene with respect to the king. Armindo de Sousa has studied and made an inventory for the general chapters of the Portuguese Cortes for the years 1485–1490, showing that King João I assembled the Cortes twenty-eight times. A distinct source is the royal chancery, which includes around 160 documents about minority groups. Among the two ethnicities, Jews have a much more meaningful representation, as is demonstrated by Figure 10.1, reflecting the international prestige of the Jewish community. There are some other elements, such as the location of their quarters in the villages, which were better situated than the Muslim quarters, which confirm this tendency. The timing of the issue of the documents is also an important clue to understanding some of the royal objectives. The king had assumed the Portuguese Crown in 1385, after eighteen months of interregnum. At the beginning of his government, the king promoted a policy of attracting allegiance to support his position — an approach, among many other examples, which was also applied to Jews and Moors, as can be seen by the more than eighty relevant documents issued throughout the first decade of his reign (see Figure 10.2), a substantial number made particularly noteworthy in

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433) Documents from the reign of João I 1431-1433 1421-1430 1410-1420 1401-1410 1391-1400 1384-1390 0

20

40

60

80

100

Figure 10.2. Documents from the reign of João Source: Chancelarias portuguesas: D. João I. Lisboa: Universidade de Nova Lisboa. Centro de Estudos Históricos, 2004–2006.

that we are considering only seven years (1384–1390). In fact, in 1384, when João was still the Master of the Military Order of Avis and Regedor e Defensor do Reino (that is, governor in charge of the realm’s defence), twenty-five registers of his chancery already concerned these social groups. Within this last set, different themes can be discovered, but the main purpose was to take advantage of certain properties, incomes, and jurisdictional rights of Jews and Muslims in order to privilege other people. The monarchy received some incomes — serviço real; serviços e cabeças dos judeus — from these minorities. Using these values, the amount of which is unknown, the king waived and donated them to his political supporters. The Judiarias ( Jewish quarters) affected were situated in Montemor-o-Novo,24 Elvas,25 Covilhã,26 Penamacor,27 Porto, Monchique e Gaia,28 Serpa,29 Beja,30 Viseu,31 Lagos,32 Castelo Branco,33 Évora and Redondo,34 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34

Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 7, p. 14. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 29, p. 26. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 446, p. 235. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 376, p. 195. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 219, p. 111. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 317, pp. 164–65. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 316, pp. 163–64. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 232, pp. 117–18. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 439, pp. 231–32. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 292, p. 153. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 285, p. 148.

191

1 92

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

Torres Vedras,35 Covilhã,36 and Tomar;37 and the Mourarias (Muslims quarters) were Tavira,38 Serpa,39 and Évora.40 In this policy of rewarding loyalty, the king also donated to the Jew Judas Navarro, his servant, some houses in the old Jewish quarter of Lisbon.41 With the same objectives in mind, João understood the need to punish those who had chosen to support the Castilian side in the dynastic dispute which occurred after the death of King Fernando I between 1383 and 1385. There are several examples which illustrate this situation.42 Traditionally historical studies identify some Jews who played an important role at the royal court especially in dealing with financial affairs and medical skills.43 The royal chancery, although an essential register of administrative practices, does not reflect the entire range of royal officials. One of the most interesting examples is illustrated by the case of David Negro, tax officer (almoxarife) of Lisbon or Yuda, former treasurer of the late king Fernando and member of the King’s Council, who lost his properties in Santarém, because he had been a follower of the Castilian king (the Portuguese king’s enemy).44 Due to the nature of their functions, these officials were often the favourite target of the population’s hatred.45 In the context of the social and political conflicts which arose in 1383, some people tried to rob wealthy Jews such as Yuda and David Negro.46 Therefore, the town of Santarém asked the king to forbid Jews and Moors from either playing any official role or collecting any income on behalf of the king.47 It would be expected, even if less noticably, that the monarch also aimed at gaining control over the Moorish community. For example, Moors could not go to Africa without a previously obtained licence. Arising from this, João I gifted to the squire Lopo Álvares some properties which until then had been owned by certain Moors who had disobeyed this rule (‘se foram pera terra de mouros sem licença’).48

Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 477, p. 251. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 517, p. 272. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 514, p. 271. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 33, p. 28 & doc. 180, p. 90. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 317, pp. 164–65. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 503, p. 264. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 42, p. 32. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 73, p. 46; vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 375, p. 194; vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 225, p. 114; vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 368, p. 192. 43 Tavares, A Herança Judaica, pp. 91–105, dedicates a chapter to ‘The Jews and the Crown’ where some important data can be found; Coelho, D. João I, p. 238, identifies Moisés de Leiria as the king’s physician. We can also add Isac, a surgeon of the king (Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 4, tomo 2, doc. 568, p. 102). 44 Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 71, p. 45. Crónica de D. João I, vol. I, Cap. 76, p. 147. Leão, Crónica, Cap. 19, p. 477 and Cap. 21, pp. 481–82. 45 Tavares, ‘Revoltas’, p. 164. 46 Crónica de D. João I, vol. I, Cap. 14, pp. 33–35. In chapter 16 (p. 37), this Yuda was afraid of being recognized while travelling with the Portuguese Queen, so he uses a covering to change his appearance. 47 Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 2, doc. 666, pp. 76–77. 48 Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 1, doc. 86, pp. 51–52. 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

193

Contents of chancery documents focused on Jews and Muslims Receipt (‘Quitação’) Rabbi regiment Privileges to Jews and Muslims Rabbi’s confirmation Jurisdiction of Jews Institution and endowment of Jewry Donations to Muslims Donations to Jews Determination against Jews and Muslims Municipal charter (‘Foral’) Donation of goods, income and rights of Jews and Muslims Privileges to Muslims Privileges to Jews Donation of goods, income and rights of Muslims Administrative form Property contract Donation of goods, income and rights of Jews 0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Figure 10.3. Contents of chancery documents focused on Jews and Muslims Source: Chancelarias portuguesas: D. João I. Lisboa: Universidade de Nova Lisboa. Centro de Estudos Históricos, 2004–2006.

This policy, among other similar measures, set the tone for the reign, which although officially beginning in April 1385, already had a well-defined strategy of behaviour. The analysis of the contents of chancery documents constitutes another way to achieve a better understanding of the administrative practices developed in the reign of João I (see Figure 10.3). The most frequent subject with more than one hundred documents deals with the management of property, incomes, and jurisdictional rights. Also worth mentioning are the privileges given by the monarch which benefitted the communities of Beja (namely enlarging their headquarters as the inhabitants would not oppose this decision),49 Lisbon,50 Santarém,51 Loulé,52 Tavira,53 and Estremoz.54 In the case of the Jews, the privileges were reduced to Miranda do Douro. The king addressed the local judges of Miranda declaring that the Jews were free from town duties because they had already served the kingdom through specific tasks. This decision included

49 50 51 52 53 54

Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 4, tomo 1, doc. 367, p. 244. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 2, doc. 661, p. 75. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 2, doc. 619, p. 55. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 1, tomo 3, doc. 1245, p. 158. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 2, tomo 1, doc. 97, p. 58. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 2, tomo 1, doc. 507, p. 268.

1 94

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

all the Portuguese Jewish communities, which all together paid a tribute (‘o serviço’) to a total of 300,000 pounds.55 Lastly, some documents about the management of properties, although their content is not related to Jews and Muslims, include a unique determination/ administrative form (‘cláusula’), which seems to be meaningful. The new owners or renters of property were forbidden to sell it to a knight, lady, squire, friar, Moor, Jew, man, or woman with a religious vote.56 In fact, in the quoted form these ethnicities appear at the same level of other social categories because the monarchy was wary of property moving to certain privileged groups, including the Church.

Royal Legislation on Jews and Muslims To achieve the objectives set out in this paper, it is crucial to examine the perspective provided by the legislation, as well as the ideology associated with it. Considering the huge amount of data, we will analyse only the royal laws; not those from Jews and Muslims themselves,57 as well as synodal legislation58 or the texts/proceedings provided by the local municipalities (‘vereações’). In the reign of João I there are no ‘corpora’ officially organized in Portugal with systematic rules related to Jews and Muslims. João I only disposed of the Laws from 1211 (Afonso II) and of a book known as Leis e Posturas (Laws and Postures) concerning the Lisbon local government. The first king who promoted the first ‘corpora’ was his son, Duarte, who collected the laws enacted by previous kings, classified as Ordenações de D. Duarte.59 This compilation unsurprisingly reflects his father’s policy, as Duarte had been associated with his father’s government since 1412, although his actual reign was brief (1433–1438). Thus, this created a kind of model which was developed by the subsequent king, Afonso V (1449–1481, after an interregnum between 1438 and 1449), known as Ordenações Afonsinas, edited in five volumes.60 There is a huge difference between the ‘corpora’ organized by Duarte and the one that would be created by Afonso V, mainly in the amount of data and in the different ways of displaying the information on many topics already dealt with by João I. Besides these laws, the five edited volumes also comprise other laws from previous kings and others up to Duarte, the father of Afonso V. The above graphic contains the information about Jews and Muslims together because almost all of the laws were about the first group and only four of them concern the two ethnicities jointly. The reign of Dinis is the richest in information for two main reasons. He had a particularly long reign (1279–1325) and, at the same time, it was a significant period 55 56 57 58 59 60

Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 3, tomo 1, doc. 225, p. 137. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 3, tomo 3, doc. 914, pp. 67–69. Barros, ‘Direito islâmico no reino português’. Marques, ‘As minorias na legislação sinodal portuguesa medieval’. Ordenações del-rei Dom Duarte. Ordenações Afonsinas.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

195

Laws about Jews and Muslims (Ordenações D. Duarte) Afonso IV Dinis Afonso III Afonso II 0

2

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

Figure 10.4. Laws about Jews and Muslims Source: Ordenações del-rei Dom Duarte, ed. by Martim de Albuquerque, and Eduardo Borges Nunes (Lisboa, Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1988).

in medieval Portuguese history. Scholarly research has produced considerable information about this epoch, considering it entirely as a turning point.61 The ethnic groups were also crucial for this monarch.62 In the middle of the thirteenth century, particularly during the government of Afonso II (1211–1223) and Afonso III (1248–1279), some rules were already defined. This can be easily explained by the role performed by these two types of ethnic communities in the territorial occupation and its economic dynamics. Afonso II forbade Jews and Muslims to occupy high posts in the administrative and fiscal spheres (‘ovençais’). Christians were not allowed to perform domestic services in the houses of Jews and Moors.63 Thus, the king assumed a hierarchical level between these communities. This kind of attitude will be maintained throughout the medieval period, and the Portuguese legislative ‘corpora’ will reflect this. Afonso III seemed to strengthen his stance concerning Jewish and Moorish people. From his reign onwards, the involvement of Jews in financial and contractual matters was have increasingly visible. The same applies to the definition of their position when dealing with legal questions. As an example, we should remember that Afonso III had limited the extent of usury practised by the Jews, adopting the initial amount as a reference value. The king cited the malice of the Jews (‘pola maliçia dos Judeus’) as the reason for such a decision.64 Moreover, whenever a Christian argued against a Jew or a free Moor (Mouro forro) in court, he should be accompanied by Christians,

61 Homem, ‘A Dinâmica Dionisina’, and Pizarro, D. Dinis. 62 Tavares, Os judeus (1970). 63 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 26, pp. 52–53. 64 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 89, p. 105.

196

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

Jews, or free Muslims as witnesses to a maximum of thirty.65 This can be interpreted as an evolution of the judicial institutions as a result of the university’s influence, as well as the historical circumstances of the country in the aftermath of the territorial Reconquest. Finally, it should be stressed that Jewish rituals continued to be allowed by the king, at least in the judicial context, once Portuguese law had authorized Jews to testify according to their synagogical practices.66 As we can observe in Figure 4, King Dinis also dedicated great effort to these matters, with fifteen laws enacted concerning the minorities, some of them very paradigmatic. The king decreed that whenever a Christian enters a contract with a Jew, representatives from each community should be present.67 Although we do not find in the legislative texts common examples of violent episodes, the recommendations of the law mentioned above highlight the difficult spaces of interaction which required royal attention. In the famous Concordat of the forty articles agreed between the Portuguese king and the Holy See in 1289,68 one imposed on the Jews the use of distinctive signs and the payment of the tithe69 and other taxes.70 A long tradition of their presence in the Portuguese territory gradually caused Jews and Muslims to become ‘too familiar, and hence dangerous because “the other” was not “other” at all’, as Filomena Lopes de Barros noted recently. The complexity of the daily life of Christians and other minorities who lived in medieval Portugal found several solutions within the legislative texts. Some of these difficulties could be found at the business level in which all of them were fully interested. Thus, the contracts (loans, commitments, payments, among others) arranged between Christians and Jews should be enacted before judges — otherwise, these documents would not be considered valid.71 Dinis provided special attention to the administrative practices at a time when writing was a government instrument and assumed an increasing value. Therefore, the king decided that the financial documents related to the Jews should also be written in their books so that they could be compared with the crown administrative registers. This measure included the royal service (‘serviço régio’72) that Jews were obliged to pay to the crown each year.73 Through these practices, the monarch could more easily control these social groups. Afonso IV (1325–1357) reinforced, above all, the old framework he had inherited from his father. In fact, Ordenações de D. Duarte takes up a set of laws from the first half of the fourteenth century, and there is no evidence of rules focused on new topics. To sum up, when João I assumed the crown, he inherited this ancient tradition of laws applicable to Jews and Muslims known since the reign of the first Portuguese

65 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 13, p. 131. 66 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 29, p. 138. 67 Ordenações de D. Duarte, pp. 174–75. 68 Dicionário de História Religiosa de Portugal, ed. by Azevedo, p. 425; Pizarro, D. Dinis, pp. 102–03. 69 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 27, p. 239. 70 Ordenações de D. Duarte, Const. 37, p. 244. 71 Ordenações de D. Duarte, pp. 295–96. 72 Tavares, Os judeus (1982), pp. 159–67. 73 Ordenações de D. Duarte, p. 308.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

197

Jews and Muslims - Royal legislation (Ordenações Afonsinas) Duarte (king, 1433-1438) Duarte (‘Infante’, son of the king, 1412-... João l (1385-1433) Fernando (1367-1383) Pedro (1357-1367) Afonso IV (1325-1357) Dinis (1279-1325) Afonso III (1248-1279) Afonso II (1211-1223) Afonso I (1128-1185) 0

2 Muslims

4

6

8

10

12

14

16

18

Jews

Figure 10.5. Jews and Muslims — Royal legislation Source: Ordenações Afonsinas, reprodução fac-simile da edição feita na Real Imprensa da Universidade de Coimbra no ano de 1792, 5 vols (Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1984).

king. Yet, all these rules seemed to be insufficient or, at any rate, some of them were not adequately adjusted to his strategy. Accordingly, João I enacted seventeen further laws concerning these two ethnicities (sixteen for Jews and one for Muslims). To this, should be added twelve laws (five for Jews and seven for Muslims) subscribed by his son Duarte, with whom the king shared the government of Portugal as stated above. The above graphic represents the timing of the enactment of laws. We should stress that the royal Ordenações show a similar trend to the chancery, meaning that these legislative ‘corpora’ have much more information for Jews than for Muslims. Most likely, the great importance of certain Jews at the royal court or the considerable income of some of their communities attracted the monarch’s attention. When the Ordenações Afonsinas were written (concluded in 1446 and perhaps already in use from 1448 onwards74), the Jews — or at least some of them — were very important in the context of Iberian political and economic history. The Castilian Jews who arrived in Portugal after the ‘pogroms’ of 1391 belonged to wealthy families and may have brought a new dynamic to this community’s activities in Portugal.75 Keeping in mind a number of documents displayed in this collection of laws, it seems that João I was more focused on the Jewish community and Duarte, his son, on the Moorish people. Although this is not an easy matter to resolve, there are some ideas we can present, although merely as a hypothesis. Firstly, the strong relation of João I with the Jews is not surprising. It is enough to remember that he 74 Homem, ‘Central Power’, pp. 179–207 (especially p. 198). 75 Tavares, Os judeus (1982), pp. 281–82.

198

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

was not expected to succeed as king as he was a natural son of Pedro I of Portugal and was the Master of a Military Order — Avis. After the dynastic/political crisis that led him to the throne, the Portuguese kingdom continued to be affected by several military campaigns against Castile. The crown needed to augment its income and the former king kept the finances of the realm in the hands of a well-known Jew, the royal treasurer Yuda. Moreover, the war continued throughout the 1390s and with it the constant need for money and subventions. In this context, the role of the Jewish community was increasingly important, both because of their financial capacity and the position of some of their communities close to the frontier with Castile, crucial to guaranteeing territorial defence. In contrast, it is more difficult to explain why Duarte apparently dedicated more time to dealing with Moorish affairs. Although this decision may only correspond to a mere separation of tasks between father and son, we cannot forget that he and his brothers were knighted in Africa where the Portuguese had settled since 1415 (Ceuta). A synthesis of the contents of the laws taken up in the Ordenações Afonsinas provides evidence of the Portuguese monarchs’ policy and the diverse situations they had to envisage when dealing with both ethical communities. Regarding Jews and Muslims, through all the laws enrolled in the Ordenações, there are two main topics to be underlined. The first category comprises about half of the documents, and concern group identity, religious beliefs, social behaviour, and jurisdictional profile; while the second category is organized around taxation, incomes, debts, judicial procedures, and inheritances. Concerning the first category — group identity, religious beliefs, social behaviour, and jurisdictional profile — the segregation measures were reaffirmed during João I’s era.76 The king insisted on the Jewish77 and Muslim quarters78 being kept apart, which significantly contributed to the urban design of several Portuguese towns and cities, although their habits and practices were tolerated.79 In fact, space reflects the discourse and the group consciousness,80 and academic research on this urban topic had contributed to deepening our knowledge on this subject. Pedro I (1357–1367), during the ‘Cortes de Elvas’ (1361), endowed these communities with a legal system which decreed that Jewish and Muslim quarters would exist in large towns/villages with ten Jews or Moors (‘nas villas grandes […] ata a dez judeus ou mouros’); they should also live away from the surrounding urban space, as Filomena Barros has stated,81 stressing the oppositional effect that this policy or ‘segregation of the central government’ sometimes had in fostering approaches of the Christians towards these communities. João I, in the Cortes of 1390, reaffirmed this decision to confine the Jews in Jewish quarters and the Moors in proper quarters (‘Mourarias’), 76 Tavares, Os judeus (1982), p. 397. 77 Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXVI. 78 Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título CII. 79 Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXI. 80 Barros, ‘Mourarias e Cidade’. 81 Barros, A comuna muçulmana, pp. 220–21 and 224; Azevedo, História Religiosa, p. 110. Cf. Cortes de D. Pedro I, p. 52.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

thus satisfying the requests submitted by towns and villages.82 Two years later, the king confirmed the Jewish quarter of Vila Real de Panóias, providing the commune with a street located in the suburbs, where they would live forever ‘em que morasem para sempre’.83 However, and despite their spatial location, their relations with the Christian communities and the central administration were quite common. For example, in the royal documentation several instructions are known that contracts should be made to bear record of how Jews were conducting business. This means, ultimately, that despite living in ghettos and having their own private officials and administrative practices, the Portuguese king still exerted a well-defined power over these communities and was concerned about controlling them. One striking example is the law of João I issued in May 1402, through which the jurisdiction of the Rabbi and of all his subordinates is defined. It is, indeed, a very long document extending over thirty-seven paragraphs.84 In its sequence, and only three years later, the king promulgates the Regiment of the Arrabiado Mor of the Jews.85 As shown by the above cases, issues related to the Jewish quarters, while welcoming spaces well differentiated in the urban context, were recurrent and attracted the interest and attention, not only of the Jews and of the monarchs themselves, but of the bishops as well86 and of local government bodies. With the latter, coexistence was not always peaceful, as they repeatedly disputed common interests. King Duarte, in the first Cortes he assembled after his father’s death in 1433, received a request from representatives of the municipalities for them to be allowed to change the location of current Jewish quarters so that the Jews would not live among Christians, nor occupy the best areas of the city.87 At this same meeting, the king was asked to prohibit Jews from acquiring movable property;88 and, similarly, that he would prevent the possibility of Jews and Moors being tenants of Crown rights.89 To all three demands, the king replied evasively, showing that he did not want to compromise or to come into conflict. This meant that it was always the municipality (from whose men the king hears the complaint) that had the initiative to limit the power of the minorities because it was the sharing of urban and social space that was at stake. Keeping this in mind, it seems that this Cortes was a space to improve segregation practices. The Ordenações Afonsinas also contains some references of a similar sense. Although compelled to pay toll (‘portagem’), a clear sign of their commercial and financial

82 83 84 85

86 87 88 89

Sousa, ‘As Cortes’, p. 236. Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 3, tomo 1, doc. 314, pp. 194–95. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, título LXXXI. Chancelaria de D. João, vol. 3, tomo 1, doc. 320, pp. 197–99, dated 16 July 1405. This Regiment establishes all the conditions foreseen for the Jews to take care of their judicial processes, assuring the validity of the documents only if issued through this institution, and also that their crimes should be judged only by Jewish law, etc. Saraiva, ‘Metamorfoses’. Sousa, ‘As Cortes’, p. 298. Sousa, ‘As Cortes’ (1982), p. 122. Sousa, ‘As Cortes’, p. 305. Sousa, ‘As Cortes’, p. 291.

199

200

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

commitment in Portuguese society, Jews and Muslims were never expected to achieve the privileged status of being considered ‘vizinho’, a full citizen with all the privileges attributed to the more distinguished men of the local communities.90 This determination demonstrates that segregation was also qualified as a protective measure towards the municipal communities on which the kings relied for a large part of their power. The need to maintain public order and the prevention of certain conflicts caused João I to set penalties for Jews found outside the Jewish quarters after the ringing of the bell. Up to his reign, this practice had been severely punished by prison and the loss of personal property on behalf of the king. Responding to a request, João I accepted the substitution of this heavy penalty with a system of monetary fines.91 Similarly, the king forced the closing of the doors of the ‘Mourarias’ after Trinity, which Afonso V (1438–1481) would also extend to the Jewish quarters.92 Judging from the legislative decrees issued by the king, the Jews were associated with violent social behaviour and were blamed for causing several disturbances. Violence seemed to characterize these communities all the more in the Ordenações Afonsinas where both Jews and Moors are prohibited from using weapons near the king or when playing certain games. In the king’s own words, they were responsible for racial riots, wounds, deaths, and murders.93 Similar behaviours can be detected among the Muslim community, which is also affected by this policy.94 In this context, they were all expected to live segregated in specific areas of the cities, forbidden to go out at night, and were also obliged to use distinctive signs on their clothing. Social segregation existed not only because of the separation of reserved spaces for the living of ethnic groups, where many houses had identification symbols which can still be seen today, but these ethnic groups also appreciated the right to certain differences regarding eating and religious and cultural habits.95 João I forced the use of red signs, placed visibly on the clothes of Jews so that those people were distinguished from Christians to avoid great dangers.96 In fact, it is known that since the time of Afonso IV Jews were required to wear distinctive signs on their clothing, namely yellow six-pointed stars. These signs were to be used on outerwear, in a visible place on the stomach ‘uma estrela amarela de seis pontas[…]. O sinal devia ser usado no exterior do vestuário, em local bem visível, sobre o estômago’.97 In the case of the Moors, they had proper clothing, as prescribed by the Fourth Lateran Council.98 The existence of these separate spaces that resembled ghettos favoured the preservation of the cultural identity of Jews and Moors99 and did not prevent them

90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99

Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXVIIII. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXX. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título CIIII and Título CXII. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXV. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título CXVII. Duarte, ʻMarginalidade e marginais’, pp. 184–89. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXXVI. See as examples Tavares, ‘Revoltas’, p. 162, and Azevedo, História Religiosa, p. 68. Macedo, ‘Os sinais’. Tavares, ‘Proselitismo’.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

from receiving royal protection, as well as a certain social respectability or even ensuring equal social status of some members of these communities with that of Christians. For the Jews, it is important to stress the case of a long letter from João I to the Lisbon Jewish quarters in which the monarch responds in a very balanced way to a series of questions.100 Muslims were protected by the king on several occasions — for example, according to a specific law by João I, it was forbidden to kill, wound, or rob a Moor, to pillage their graves, or to disturb their ceremonies.101 Yet, this remained a complicated and unstable issue: in the Cortes of Coimbra of 1390 the king agreed with the municipalities and prohibited the Moors from invoking the name of Muhammad, even in mosques.102 Concerning judicial procedures, the royal administration also promoted several items to enforce their integrity, in keeping with their religious customs. In this respect, Jews were not required to appear in court on Saturdays.103 Regarding some issues, Jews and Muslims could only be judged after having a properly organized judicial process. This requirement affected, for example, Jews charged with having become Christians in Castile,104 or having minted a false coin, or buying gold or silver.105 Another example is the prohibition of arresting free Moors (Mouros forros) for having allowed some captive men to escape.106 The issue of currency and precious metals used in its coinage were, as is easily understood, very delicate. In this respect, in the Ordenações there are indications that there could be a kind of pursuit of or greed for the assets of the Jews. In a law of João I, the king states that certain members of the royal court, along with others, had come to him asking for the assets of the Jews, claiming that they belonged to the monarch and that he could dispose of them in the light of law, whenever the Jews had bought gold, silver, or currency in disregard of the royal ban. To address this problem, the king created a draft (a model of the donation charter) that had once belonged to the Jewish offender.107 As a final remark, by analysing specific cases of the laws enacted by João I, we can verify the same trend already noted for the full in written sources mentioned above. For this monarch, the less important issue is that of incomes and judicial procedures. In fact, by reading the Ordenações Afonsinas, it seems that no law was enacted about taxation and incomes, which is in the remit of the royal chancery. On the contrary, the questions about the group identity, religious beliefs, social behaviour, and jurisdictional profile continue to remain in the spotlight.

100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107

Chancelaria de D. João I, vol. 4, tomo 1, doc. 371, pp. 246–50. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título CXX. Sousa, ‘As Cortes’, p. 238. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXXX. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXVII. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXXII. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título CXVIII. Ordenações Afonsinas, Livro 2, Título LXXVIII.

201

202

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

Ethnic Minorities and Narratives on Foundations of Royal Power In the scope of a reign where questions like identity and legitimacy are crucial, it is important to connect the assessment based on consideration of administrative practices (jurisdiction and finances) with the elements found within the royal discourse. In general, it is known that the historiographical tradition did not focus on the inclusion of religious ethnicities present in Portugal in the context of the discourse about the royal power. Likewise, it is important to know to what extent this exactly happened so that we can complete this approach. Indeed, the royal discourse despite never being accessible in a direct way, is transmitted to us through texts, which were, in their time, validated by the Crown who even commissioned them. Furthermore, we should not forget that the chronicles are often narratives elaborated a posteriori and, when this happens, the information is subject, among other things, to the evolution of events in subsequent times.108 In this sense, our survey takes into account the fact that during the reign of João I two texts may have been written: the Chronicle of 1419, which is limited by the reign of King Afonso IV and thus is excluded from this paper; and, possibly, the Crónica do Condestável,109 written before 1440,110 which does not include references to the matter under consideration, except as a unique episode which is quite interesting. Nuno Álvares Pereira, ‘Condestável’ of Portugal (the man in charge of the military strategies and operations during João I’s reign) trusted an alfageme (a Moor) to repair his sword for him, an episode where, in our opinion, the symbolic dimension of his choice is notorious.111 As well, it is inevitable that we must consult the most emblematic text conveying the official royal discourse, composed later, already in the reign of his son Duarte. In 1434 this king invited Fernão Lopes to write the history of the kings of Portugal. In this regard, it should be noted that the Crónica de D. João I112 is part of a trilogy that, including the Chronicles of Pedro I and Fernando I (the first was the father and the latter the brother of João I), presents one discourse consistently as a whole in order to arrive at the exaltation of the founder of the dynasty, a man known for having a legacy of ‘good memory’ (‘boa memória’).113 Finally, we should yet consider two more chronicles, both written much later: the Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta114 by Gomes Eanes de Zurara (1410/1420–1473

108 Sousa, ‘Os Cronistas’. See also Fonseca and Costa, ‘Historiography and Portuguese Identity’. 109 Chronica, ed. by Mendes dos Remédios. 110 Amado, ‘Crónica do Condestabre’. 111 Chronica, ed. by Mendes dos Remédios, cap. LII. 112 Lopes, Crónica. 113 The distribution of the chapters through the three chronicles is symptomatic of the interest of the Chronicler (despite the difference in years of each reign), as noted by Monteiro, Fernão Lopes, pp. 82–83: 44 chapters for the Chronicle of Pedro I, 178 chapters for the Chronicle of Ferdinand, and 397 chapters for the Chronicle of João I. 114 Zurara, Crónica.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

or 1474); and, the Crónica dos Reis de Portugal115 by the Duarte Nunes de Leao (1530?–1608). Beginning with the Crónica de D. João I by Fernão Lopes and keeping in mind its purpose — to exalt a dynasty initiated in this reign — it is obvious that the author was not remotely preoccupied with telling the history of the presence of either Jews or Muslims in Portugal, but only the role of certain men from those communities as they represented essential characters in explaining the path of the Master of Avis to the throne. Within an epoch that was mostly dominated by the expected turbulence of a political crisis, it is only natural that the image of these social bodies appears to be designed by official discourse, either positively — that is, expressing its support for the new dynasty — or negatively — that is, supporting the opposite party which, as we know, was led by the King Juan I of Castile. The recounted episodes are illustrative of these things and, in any case, are the image of a new monarch who it is important to praise. Thus, it is known through the writing of Fernão Lopes that some people from the city of Lisbon, wishing to help João, Master of Avis, on his way to the throne, decided to rob the ‘[…] rich Jews from the Judiaria of Lisbon, as Yuda, the former Treasurer of King Fernando and David Negro […]’. The future king did not allow this offensive behaviour by personally appearing in the Jewish Quarter and ordering that no one should dare to harm the Jews.116 It is not surprising, though, that Lopes also registered a financial contribution given by the city of Lisbon to the future king for 100 hundred pounds gathered from Christians, Moors, and Jews, the latter increasing their support by sixty silver marks more.117 From a different perspective, it is interesting to quote an episode characterized by pronounced religious symbolism where Moors also participated side by side with Christians and were considered by this discourse to be reliable witnesses: when the city was preparing its defence against the Castilian fleet en route to Portugal, some seven galleys were put under the command of a knight Gonçalo Rodrigues de Sousa. The Master of Avis followed by several supporters took part in a religious procession to meet this knight; he handed him the Portuguese banner to be hoisted in one of the galleys. During the night, Moors and Christians guarding these defensive preparations saw twenty men dressed as clerics praying in the Church of the Martyrs close to the river and, after their disappearance, the tips of the lances lit up for an hour ‘pontas das lanças acesas por uma hora’,118 thus helping to guard the galleys. Considered as a miracle, it functions perfectly as providential encouragement to support the cause of the future King João I. In opposition to what has so far been possible to present, we can add some disruptive behaviours expressed by these ethnic groups (mainly Jews) in a similar

115 Leão, Crónica. 116 Lopes, Crónica, vol. 1, Cap. 14, pp. 33–35. Tavares, Os judeus (1982), p. 419. 117 Lopes, Crónica, vol. 1, Cap. 48, pp. 98–99. See Coelho, D. João I, p. 42. 118 Lopes, Crónica, vol. 1, Cap. 111, pp. 212–13.

203

2 04

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

practice to what happened within other sectors of Portuguese society, even in the case of important and influential families (e.g., the Pereira family). Nevertheless, the royal discourse does not provide many examples, although an interesting situation can be found precisely in the scope of this family: one of Juan I’s supporters (Gonçalo Vasques de Azevedo) became aware of the lack of financial funding that Nuno Álvares Pereira had to organize the defence of the realm adequately. Yet, he was also aware that other members of the Nuno Álvares family were already collaborating with the Castilian party. So, with the consent of the foreign monarch, he addressed the Jew David Alguaduxe, asking him for money to offer to the Portuguese Constable, who, of course, refuses the offer.119 Other manifestations can also be found in some narratives concerning the way Castilian Jews helped their king Juan I in this long-lasting conflict with Portugal, but of course this must be viewed with quite a different interpretation. For example, there is the case of the support received by the Jew David from Coruña, who arrived in Lisbon to serve his king with galleys full of supplies to feed the Castilian troops.120 But the main episode that stands out from this chronicle is the outstanding role of one of the best-known Jews of those times: Yuda. Lopes confers on this man a quite remarkable centrality in his writing, certainly due to his prominent role in the royal court. The roots of this protagonism may be found in a well-known episode about the vacancy of the position of Arrabiado mor dos Judeus in Castile. Leonor Teles, widow of the late king of Portugal Fernando and mother of Beatriz, heir to the throne and married to Juan I of Castile, asked her son-in-law to appoint a new person to occupy that vacancy. She suggested Yuda, former treasurer of her husband, Fernando. The king of Castile, however, did not accept that recommendation and turned the final decision over to his wife, Beatriz, who chose another Jew, David Negro. It would not be easy to perceive any hidden intention behind this episode if Lopes had not added that Leonor Teles, not at all pleased with her son-in-law’s refusal, urged the people to follow and support João, Master of Avis (‘natural’, as he was their countryman), rather than Juan I of Castile.121 After Fernão Lopes, our written record relies on another fundamental contribution, this time by Gomes Eanes de Zurara (1410/1420–1473 or 1474). His work Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta, accepted as if it were an extension of Lopes’s Crónica de D. João I, was prepared between 1449 and 1450, thirty-five years after 1415, the date of the Portuguese expedition to Ceuta. As Luís Miguel Duarte has recently pointed out, it is crucial to keep this aspect in mind to understand the appropriate timeframe in which the discourse registered by this Chronicle evolves, intended for a kingdom deeply committed politically to failures related to the expansionist policy and deeply hurt by the mid-fifteenth-century political crisis. Besides all these constraints, Zurara was, indeed, a man accustomed to very close proximity to the royal court, fully esteemed

119 Lopes, Crónica, Cap. 127, pp. 247–48. 120 Lopes, Crónica, Cap. 69, p. 135. 121 Lopes, Crónica, vol. 1, Cap. 76, p. 147, and also Leão, Crónica, Cap. 19, p. 477.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

by the king with several financial distinctions, and he did not hide his contempt towards social groups with less respectability.122 But perhaps the main aspect to note in this chronicle is the fact that we are facing a specific genre of discourse, namely the description of a military conquest. As this episode is in the north of Africa, it would be expected for the text to have many references to the Moors. As already stated, in Portugal this was a long-established community and this fact allowed the chronicler to deal with their daily life in Ceuta, even allowing comments like one where the Moors’ abstinence during Ramadan is considered as equivalent to Christian fasting during the Lenten Season.123 It, therefore, seems natural that the text reveals judgements, understandable at a time when mutual coexistence was already pronounced. But we think it is more important to stress that this official discourse was obliged to present the Moors as the enemy, as it is dealing with a military conquest. Furthermore, in this specific context, Moors are doubly enemies of the Portuguese: first, because they occupy a territory that, in the logic of the Portuguese, should belong to them, and second, because they do not profess the same creed. In the intersection of these mentioned attitudes, we may find the reason why there are both many examples denigrating them and others unhesitant in praising them. Zurara speaks, through the characters involved in the conquest, at the same time of Moors who are ‘less than animals’ (‘pouco menos de bestas’)124 and of Moors who, ‘cried mournfully after losing their city, Ceuta’ (‘Do grande pranto que os mouros faziam sobre a perdição da sua cidade’).125 When describing this last episode, it is easy to feel the respect of the discourse regarding the loss expressed by the Muslim people. Precisely in this context, the same occurs when Sala-ben-Sala, wandering through Ceuta before abandoning it, inspired Zurara (or his informant) to write: ‘As far as I know, although his sadness was immense, he never showed it as he was a nobleman of great wisdom and authority whose grief he endured inside himself ’ (‘Mas tanto sei eu que pero seu nojo fosse grande, que nunca o muito mostrou em sua contenença ca ela era homem fidalgo e de grande siso e autoridade e o nojo que tinha suportava-o entre si mesmo’).126 The dichotomy of the discourse is not surprising as we are facing quite a fascinating text about a Portuguese conquest in a land about which the Portuguese knew nothing but the essence of the people. The chronology requires that we conclude these remarks with a brief mention of the work of Duarte Nunes de Leão (1530?–1608). Once again, the perspective is one of a laudatory discourse on João I’s reign (since this chronicler uses the model of the Chronicles of the Kings of Portugal). In this sense, his contribution does not

122 Duarte, Ceuta 1415, pp. 34–35 and 39. 123 Zurara, Crónica, cap. 58, p. 195. 124 Zurara, Crónica, Cap. 93, p. 268. Duarte, ‘Marginalidade e marginais’, p. 43, explains that Zurara could often be offensive and even brutal when describing the Moors … but this judgement is a modern viewpoint. Back then — continues this historian — the image of his words was not the same, either for the Moors, or for the Christians. 125 Zurara, Crónica, Cap. 89, p. 258. 126 Zurara, Crónica, Cap. 83, p. 247.

205

206

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

add any meaningful data to what Fernão Lopes had already written — but perhaps we may dare to consider one single detail that he expresses in the Chronicle. Juan I of Castile crossed the border and decided to demand the throne. On his way through the territory, he is said to have committed many atrocities which our author classifies as ‘not even expected from the Moors’ (‘nem de Mouros se puderão esperar’).127

Conclusions The topic of this chapter is a challenging one which discusses some contributions to the body of knowledge about building cohesion in multi-ethnic societies. Regarding administrative practices, our work stresses the way the royal chancery, as well as royal laws, deals with the two ethnic minorities in the scope of a reign which inaugurated a dynasty — the Dynasty of Avis — seeking legitimization through several aspects. Jews and Muslims have a long history in Portugal, a documented presence in the territory since the very origins of the kingdom. The Iberian Peninsula, and Portugal in particular, is a very interesting case study on the possibility of enhancing a comparative perspective between the two groups. In this overall approach, the Jews always have a higher representation in written sources and a position that benefits from its international recognition as a group. On the other hand, the Muslims, because they represented the opposition in the context of the Reconquest along with a marked religious alterity, would not reach the status enjoyed by the Jews. The bylaws of some members of the Jewish elite and their position in the royal court, as men linked to financial affairs and medicine, shows their commitment to the real power and their close collaboration. At this level, the case of the Muslims was not at all comparable, though some Muslims belonged to higher hierarchical society levels.128 In this sense, when it comes to segregation concerning these minorities and, even in anti-Semitic movements, it is necessary to distinguish between hostility towards these groups as a whole and the remarkable role and respectful recognition of some figures near the royal court. The policy of the monarch and the strategy he developed are quite visible in the legislation enacted, as well as in the official royal narrative presented by the chronicles. Thus, we have focused on the royal chronicles sponsored and commissioned by the monarchy, and above all on those by Fernão Lopes and Gomes Eanes de Zurara. These texts are very different from each other, and none of them addresses the issue of ethnic and religious minorities as an object in itself; not even as elements associated with the necessity of legitimizing the dynasty. So while the references to the Jews mainly consist of narratives about the role played byYuda, a prominent figure in the royal court, the Moors, especially in the text of Gomes Eanes de Zurara, are presented as the people who ruled a territory that the Portuguese wanted to conquer.

127 Leão, Crónica, Cap. 55, p. 569. 128 Barros, Tempos e Espaços.

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

In these circumstances, the latter chronicle, although written after João I’s reign, can be expected to emphasize some negative comments on the Moors. Interpreting the medieval minorities in Portugal requires, in recent trends of historiography, that we not situate the question between two extremes nor assume a radical position between segregation versus integration. Portuguese medieval society was a multicultural one, characterized by a rich social dialectic, which can support a new narrative on Jewish and Muslim communities. Thus, it is important to achieve a deeper reflection on the role of the minorities in the very construction of the identity model of the Portuguese kingdom.129

Works Cited Primary Sources Chancelaria de D. João I (Lisboa: Universidade de Nova Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Históricos, 2004–2006) Chronica do Condestabre de Portugal Dom Nuno Alvarez Pereira, ed. by Mendes dos Remédios (Coimbra: F. França Amado, 1911); http://purl.pt/14411/5/ Cortes portuguesas. Reinado de D. Pedro I (1357–1367) (Lisboa: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1986) Leão, Duarte Nunes de, Crónica de D. João I, in Tesouros da Literatura e da História, Crónicas dos Reis de Portugal (Porto: Lello & Irmãos, 1975), pp. 437–779 Lopes, Fernão, Crónica de D. João I, 2 vols (Porto: Livraria Civilização, 1983) Ordenações Afonsinas, 5 vols (Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1984); e-edition ed. by Ivone Susana Cortesão Heitor, Anabela Maia, Liliana Ventura, José Carlos Marques, and Duarte Freitas http://www1.ci.uc.pt/ihti/proj/afonsinas/ Ordenações del-rei Dom Duarte, ed. by Martim de Albuquerque and Eduardo Borges Nunes (Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 1988) Portugaliae monumenta historica: a saeculo octavo post Christum usque ad quintumdecimum, Leges et consuetudines, vol. 1 (Olisipone: ivssv Academiae Scientiarvm Olisiponensis, 1856–1873) Zurara, Gomes Eanes de, Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta, ed. by Reis Brasil (Mem Martins: Publicações Europa-América, 1992) Secondary Studies Amado, Teresa, ‘Crónica do Condestabre’, in Dicionário da Literatura Galega e Portuguesa, 2nd edn (Lisboa: Caminho, 2000), pp. 186–88 ———, ‘Fernão Lopes’, in Dicionário da Literatura Galega e Portuguesa, 2nd edn (Lisboa: Caminho, 2000), pp. 271–73

129 Barros, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, p. 584.

207

208

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

Azevedo, Carlos Moreira, História Religiosa de Portugal, vol. 2 (Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores, 2000) Barros, Maria Filomena Lopes de, A comuna muçulmana de Lisboa nos séculos XIV e XV (Porto: Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto, 1993) ———, ‘Os Láparos: uma família muçulmana da elite comunal olisiponense’, in Lisboa Medieval. Os rostos da cidade, ed. by Luís Krus, Luís Filipe Oliveira, and João Luís Fontes (Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, 2007), pp. 322–34 ———, Tempos e Espaços de Mouros: A minoria muçulmana no reino português (sécs. XII– XV) (Lisboa: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian, 2007) ———, ‘Direito islâmico no reino português’, in VII Estudios de Frontera, Islam y Christian dad. Siglos XII–XVI, ed. by Francisco Toro Ceballos ( Jaén: Diputación de Jaén, 2009), pp. 461–71 ———, ‘Ethno-Religious Minorities’, in The Historiography of Medieval Portugal, c. 1950– c. 2010: A Collective Book and a Collaborative Project, ed. by José Mattoso, Maria de Lurdes Rosa, Bernardo Vasconcelos e Sousa, and Maria João Branco (Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2011), pp. 571–89 ———, ‘Os Muçulmanos de Portugal: a lusofonia como metáfora (sécs. XII–XV)’, in TOPICOS TRANSATLÂNTICOS. Emergência da Lusofonia num Mundo Plural, ed. by Silvério da Rocha-Cunha, Noémi Marujo, Cláudia Teixeira, Marco Martins, Paulo Rodrigues, and Maria do Rosário Borges (Évora: Universidade de Évora, 2012), pp. 99–108 ———, ‘Judeus e Muçulmanos no Portugal Medieval’, in Entre Portugal e a Galiza (Sécs. XI a XVII). Um olhar peninsular sobre uma região histórica, ed. by Luís Adão da Fonseca (Porto: CEPESE and Fronteira do Caos, 2014), pp. 266–70 ———, ‘Mourarias e Cidade: Discursos e Espaços’, in Evolução da paisagem urbana. Paisagem e periferia, ed. by Maria do Carmo Ribeiro and Arnaldo Sousa Melo (Braga: CITCEM and IEM, 2014), pp. 271–83 Coelho, Maria Helena da Cruz, D. João I (Rio de Mouro: Círculo de Leitores, 2005) Dicionário de História Religiosa de Portugal, vol. A-C, ed. by Carlos A. Moreira Azevedo (Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores, 2000–2001) Duarte, Luís Miguel, ‘Marginalidade e marginais’, in História da vida privada em Portugal. A Idade Média, dir. by José Mattoso, coord. by Bernardo Vasconcelos e Sousa, Temas e Debates (Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores, 2011), pp. 170–96 ———, Ceuta 1415. Seiscentos anos depois (Lisboa: Livros Horizonte, 2015) Fonseca, Luís Adão da, and Paula Pinto Costa, ‘Historiography and Portuguese Identity: How in Medieval Portugal the Kingdom is Seen Through the Eyes of the Iberian Peninsula’, in Catalonia and Portugal: The Iberian Peninsula from the Periphery, ed. by Flocel Sabaté and Luís Adão da Fonseca (Bern: Peter Lang, 2015), pp. 269–93 Homem, Armando Carvalho, ‘A Dinâmica Dionisina’, in Nova História de Portugal. Portugal em definição de fronteiras (1096–1325), ed. by Joel Serrão and A. H. de Oliveira Marques, coord. by Maria Helena da Cruz Coelho and Armando Luís de Carvalho Homem, vol. 3 (Lisboa: Editorial Presença, 1996), pp. 144–63 ———, ‘Central Power: Institutional and Political History in the Thirteenth–Fifteenth Centuries’, in The Historiography of Medieval Portugal, c. 1950–c. 2010: A Collective Book and a Collaborative Project, ed. by José Mattoso, Maria de Lurdes Rosa, Bernardo

Multi-Ethnic Portuguese Society in the Reign of João I (1385–1433)

Vasconcelos e Sousa, and Maria João Branco (Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2011), pp. 179–207 Macedo, José Rivair, ‘Os sinais da infâmia e o vestuário dos mouros em Portugal nos séculos XIV e XV’, Bulletin du centre d’études médiévales d’Auxerre. BUCEMA, Horssérie, n° 2 (2008); URL: http://journals.openedition.org/cem/9852; DOI: https:// doi.org/10.4000/cem.9852 Marques, Maria Alegria Fernandes, ‘As minorias na legislação sinodal portuguesa medieval’, in Minorias étnicas e religiosas em Portugal. História e Actualidade, ed. by Guilhermina Mota (Coimbra: Instituto de História Económica e Social da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, 2003), pp. 33–48 Mattoso, José, Maria de Lurdes Rosa, Bernardo Vasconcelos e Sousa, and Maria João Branco, eds, The Historiography of Medieval Portugal, c. 1950–c. 2010: A Collective Book and a Collaborative Project (Lisboa: Instituto de Estudos Medievais da Universidade Nova de Lisboa, 2011) Meyerson, Mark V., and Edward D. English, eds, Christians, Muslims and Jews in Medieval and Early Modern Spain (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame, 1999) Monteiro, João Gouveia, Fernão Lopes. Texto e Contexto (Coimbra: Minerva, 1988) Moreno, Humberto Baquero, ‘As Pregações de Mestre Paulo contra os Judeus Bracarenses nos fins do século XV’, in Exilados, Marginais a Contestatários na Sociedade Medieval Portuguesa. Estudos de História (Lisboa: Presença, 1990), pp. 139–48 Mucznik, Lúcia Libra, and others, Dicionário do Judaismo Português (Lisboa: Presença, 2009) Pizarro, José Augusto Sottomayor, D. Dinis (Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores, 2005) Saraiva, Anísio Miguel de Sousa, ‘Metamorfoses da cidade medieval. A coexistência entre a comunidade judaica e a catedral de Viseu’, Medievalista [on line], Nº11 ( Janeiro – Junho 2012), access date 07.09.2015]; http://www2.fcsh.unl.pt/iem/medievalista/ MEDIEVALISTA11\anisio1106.html Sousa, Armindo, ‘As Cortes de Leiria Santarém de 1433’, Estudos Medievais, 2 (1982), 71–224 ———, As Cortes Medievais Portuguesas (1385–1490), vol. 2 (Porto: Centro de História da Univ. do Porto. INIC, 1990) ———, ‘Os Cronistas e o Imaginário no Século XV (Breve reflexão sobre a crónica enquanto discurso)’, Revista de Ciências Histórias, 9 (1994), 43–47 ; reprinted in O parlamento medieval português e outros estudos, ed. by Luís Miguel Duarte, Luís Carlos Amaral, and André Evangelista Marques (Porto: Fio da Palavra, 2014), pp. 509–13 ———, ‘Portugal’, in The New Cambridge Medieval History, vol. 7: c. 1415–c. 1500, ed. by Christopher Allmand (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 627–36 ———, ‘Portugal’, in O parlamento medieval português e outros estudos, ed. by Luís Miguel Duarte, Luís Carlos Amaral, and André Evangelista Marques (Porto: Fio da Palavra, 2014), pp. 553–67 Tavares, Maria José Pimenta Ferro, Os judeus em Portugal no século XIV. 1st edn (Lisboa: Instituto de Alta Cultura, Centro de Estudos Históricos, 1970; 2nd edn: Lisboa: Guimarães Editores, 1979) ———, Os judeus em Portugal no século XV, vol. 1 (Lisboa: Universidade Nova, Faculdade de Ciências Sociais e Humanas, 1982) ———, Os judeus em Portugal no século XV, vol. 2 (Lisboa: Instituto Nacional de Investigação Científica, 1984)

209

21 0

paul a p i n to co s ta an d m ar i a c r i s t i n a pi me nta

———, ‘Revoltas contra os judeus no Portugal medieval’, Revista de História das Ideias, 5 (1984), 161–73; https://www.uc.pt/fluc/ihti/rhi/vol. 6/pdfs/03_mtavares.pdf ———, ‘O difícil diálogo entre judaísmo e cristianismo’, in História Religiosa de Portugal, ed. by Carlos Moreira Azevedo, vol. 1: Formação e limites da cristandade, coord. by Ana Maria Jorge and Ana Maria Rodrigues (Lisboa: Círculo de Leitores, 2000), pp. 53–89 ———, ‘Proselitismo, segregação e apologética: a convivência entre cristãos, judeus e muçulmanos no Portugal medievo’, in Minorias étnicas e religiosas em Portugal. História e Actualidade, coord. by Guilhermina Mota (Coimbra: Instituto de História Económica e Social da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra, 2003), pp. 53–60 ———, A Herança Judaica em Portugal, Clube do Coleccionador dos Correios (Lisboa: CTT Correios de Portugal, 2004) Valdeón Baruque, Julio, Los Conflictos Sociales en el Reino de Castilla en los siglos XIV y XV, 5th edn (Madrid: Siglo XXI, 1986), pp. 125–39

Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė

The Creation and Administration of a Multi-Ethnic State The Case of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania

In the previous chapter, Paula Pinto Costa and Maria Cristina Pimenta have shown how the economic and political interests of the Christian elites of the Kingdom of Portugal shaped ideological discourse promoted by the royal court regarding ethnic minorities. In this context, it is useful to compare the situation with one from another European ‘periphery’: the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The history of the Grand Duchy was similar to the medieval Kingdom of Portugal in one aspect: a dominant narrative was created at the royal court in order to strengthen the rulers’ power and the cohesion of a diverse society. In Lithuania we see a new demographic, and the economic domination of political ‘minorities’ — Orthodox Russians, but also Jews, Karaites, Tatars and Armenians. They were politically subdued to a ruler representing a population of Roman Catholics — Lithuanians — who were fewer in number but were politically privileged. Nevertheless, over the centuries one metanarrative was built about the Grand Duchy as the state of relatively peaceful coexistence of various ethnicities built on a common history. Yet this story was a result of a long and variable discourse between various ethnic versions of the past ultimately controlled by a royal power. The entrenched perception of the societal atmosphere in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (hereinafter Grand Duchy), where coexistence in the culturally and religiously diverse state is typically discussed and assessed as frictionless, and thus possessing the potential of a role model of tolerance for present-day societies, encourages a critical approach towards this prevalent contemporary attitude. This attitude resulted in Lithuanians romanticizing the Grand Duchy as a powerful country from sea to sea — that is, the Baltic and Black Seas where, according to popular imagination, the horse of the Grand Duke Vytautas (Witold, 1350–1430) the Great rinsed its tired legs after the campaigns against the Golden Horde. Tatar and Karaite imaginations have continued this fabled story, the acceptance of which is much more relevant than the circumstances for the emergence of it. It is alleged

Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of History in the Faculty of History at Vilnius University. She has published on the socio-cultural history of non-Christian groups in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 211–235 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120064

212

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

Map 11.1. The Lithuanian State in the thirteenth-fifteenth Centuries. Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a CC BY-SA 2.5 generic license.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

that immediately after these campaigns Vytautas led or — to use the wording of a more favoured narration — invited Tatars and Karaites to Lithuania at the end of the fourteenth century. Furthermore, chronologically earlier letters1 sent from Vilnius by Grand Duke Gediminas (Gedimin, c. 1275–1341) invited artisans and urban dwellers subsisting on other activities, as well as farmers, to emigrate from Germany,2 promising the freedom to practice Christianity. It is important to note that these romanticized mythological stories3 did not originate by accident. For Lithuanians they constitute the origins of the multicultural, multi-ethnic, multiconfessional, and presumably tolerant state. For the ethnic and confessional groups these narratives served to justify their immigration, their choice of Lithuania, and their usefulness to society at large. The Grand Duchy where everyone was forbearing towards others (common descriptions prefer the words tolerance and tolerant) became a country where it was good to settle and reside. However, during the Grand Duchy period, if we are precise, it is possible to discuss only the state’s multi-ethnic and multiconfessional values, but not a multicultural state. This fact — notwithstanding modern and post-colonial multiculturalism in particular, which objectively could not have materialized in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania — became very important in the formation and perception of the set of values of present-day society. The idea that the cultural and religious diversity in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania constitutes the origins of multiculturalism, emerging as the prototype for contemporary aims and values,4 is the first paradox concerning the Grand Duchy being culturally and politically relevant to the present. The second paradox lies in the conception of multiculturalism as articulated in Lithuanian academic discourse around the second half of the last decade of the twentieth century.5 It was anachronistically applied to define the cultural tradition of the Grand Duchy, rather than to modern Lithuania. At that point in time, the concept of heterogeneous Lithuania and its history representing cultural diversity amounted to a sensation, or at least a discovery, while ethnic and confessional minority studies have not yet achieved proper attention and quality. The interpretation of the situation of the ethnic and confessional groups in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania could refer to research carried out at the end of the nineteenth and the very early twentieth century, since in Soviet Lithuanian historiography these topics were non-existent. In other words, these topics constitute a sort of organized amnesia. The third paradox, or the entirety of attitudes which are proving difficult

1 These letters are associated with the first mention of the capital city Vilnius in 1323. For the publication of these sources, see Chartularium Lithuaniae, ed. by Rowell. 2 A number of letters — to the citizens of Lübeck, Zund, Bremen, Magdeburg, Cologne, and to the citizens of other cities — had been sent on 25 January 1323, while on 26 May 1323 letters were sent to the citizens of Lübeck, Rostock, Zund, Greifswald, Sztetin, and Gotland. 3 For more on the legends of Jewish settlement, see Weinryb, ‘The Beginning of East-European Jewry’. 4 As this approach is now the main trend in Lithuanian historiography and in the public sphere, it is too difficult to give the most representative examples. 5 For the first use of the definition of multiculturalism in Lithuanian historiography see Nikžentaitis, ‘LDK kultūrinės tradicijos praradimas’. For an analytical review about using the definition of ‘multiculturalism’ in Lithuanian historiography, see Potašenko, ‘Istorijos kultūra šiuolaikinėje Lietuvoje’.

213

21 4

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

to rehabilitate, concerns the identification of multiculturalism — attributed to the state of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania which existed until the end of the eighteenth century — with tolerance (although the misleading usage of the definition of multiculturalism in the historiography, as well as in the cultural and political discourse, is beyond the scope of this article). That is to say, if a society is multicultural then it is also tolerant, and vice versa. However, given the multiconfessional and pre-modern state of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which made an effort to belong to Christian European civilization, the question of tolerance is an important issue. Christian civilization, at least during the period in question, cannot be described as forbearing, and thus tolerance was hardly possible. Furthermore, the relationships and forms of coexistence with non-Christians in the Grand Duchy, as well as in the rest of Europe, do not attest to the modern idea of tolerance. The regulation of coexistence, living together or side by side, and the consistent and sustained development and maintenance of this condition is the subject presented in this article. I seek to challenge the under-researched matter of the frequent perceptions of a natural or self-sustained forbearance, and aim to identify the means and steps of the consistently implemented state policy that evoked and maintained the status quo within the society. In this research, coexistence is not perceived as a given or natural trajectory of societal development, but rather as a consistent effort and occupation, an integral part of internal state policy. This approach differs from that of mainstream historiography, or at least of Lithuanian historiography, where the multi-ethnic and multiconfessional Grand Duchy of Lithuania is perceived as the locus of forbearance and coexistence. German historian Mathias Niendorf has accentuated the mutual adaptability based on the knowledge about others as a characteristic societal coexistence trait.6 As will be proven later in this chapter, the minimum of this knowledge had been moulded into the confines of law. Here we are concentrating upon the processes of conflict resolution, appeasement, and the search for compromises — all of which secured a more or less smooth functioning of the complex societal model. Pursuing this model has been complicated by the predominant religious thinking incidental to the dominant Christians, but also to the followers of other religions. The second complication directly related to the first, or even substantially conditioned by it, is the wide spectrum of negative stereotypes and myths.7 Existing historiography seldom notes both sides of this process — not only did Christians negatively assess the non-Christian communities, fearing them and avoiding their influence, but Jews and Muslims also reservedly judged their neighbours and their habitable environment as possibly dangerous and capable of harm and negative influence. In the period of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, the animosity and acrimony towards each other abounded on both sides of the dispute.8 6 Niendorf, Lietuvos Didžioji Kunigaikštystė, p. 185. 7 See Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, ‘Who is Better’. 8 One prominent dispute — Chizzuk Emunah (written in Hebrew) — was created in Troki by the Karaite Issaak ben Abraham Troki (from the town of Trakai) at the end of the sixteenth century. This polemical work against Christians of different denominations is translated and published in English translation as Faith Strengtheneth.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Developing forms of coexistence and managing this multi-ethnic and multiconfessional society thus, of necessity, spread over a long period of time and never truly reached completion due to the shifting socio-cultural and economic, as well as geopolitical, situation. This process was directly linked to the development of the society and changes within it. Bearing in mind the arrangement of the state and social strata, it is evident that the development of coexistence and its management was implemented throughout the few interlinked levels: the state level (in this instance particularly the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, rather than the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) and the local level, that is the towns and townships. Admittedly, sources only provide for the establishment and regulation of the relationships within towns (state or private), and we know very little of the situation in small towns or villages. Even though the communal and internal means for settling disputes were envisioned legally, the state and its institutions remained one of the most important loci for the resolution of such conflicts between two members (natural and/or legal persons) of the same community who found themselves in a deadlock. Moshe Rosman has drawn our attention to the involvement of the non-Jewish authorities in the resolution of internal community disputes in the seventeenth- and eighteenth-century Jewish milieu.9 A long chronological period is taken into account within the framework of this research: from the first document arranging the interethnic and inter-confessional relationships between the Christians and the Jews, that is the privilege which Vytautas the Great granted to the Jewish community of Brest (granted in 1388, and extended in 1507 to apply to all Jews of the Grand Duchy), to the Four-Year Sejm (1788–1792). During the latter the questions of integration of the non-Christians were discussed simultaneously with resorting to actions aimed towards disintegration. Here we have in mind the discussions about the so-called Jewish Reforms (Polish: Reforma Żydów) that were initiated during this Sejm, and which had, as one of its main goals, the development of models for the integration of the marginalized groups, and at the same time the adoption of two foundational laws for the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth: the Constitution of 3 May 1791 (Polish: Ustawa Rządowa), and a couple of days earlier the ‘Towns’ Law’ (Polish: Prawo o miastach) than included into the Constitution (Article III). While conceding that due to the love for one’s neighbour, inherent to Christians, we have to grant the tranquillity of worship and protection of the government to all the people regardless of their faith, thus we grant the freedom to all of the religions and rites in the regions of Poland10



9 Rosman describes groups of conflict between Jewish people when the participation of the state institution was indispensable: ‘supra-communal disputes, intra-communal struggles between the community establishment and rival factions over institutional legitimacy, conflicts between communal institutions and powerful individuals and disputes between individual Jews’ — for more see Rosman, ʻThe Role of Non-Jewish Authorities in Resolving Conflicts within Jewish Communities’, 53–64. 10 1791 m., ed. by Raila, p. 14.

215

21 6

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

nonetheless the Constitution, for the very first time, officially declared the Roman Catholic religion as ‘reigning’.11 The ‘Towns’ Law’, with regard to the active operation of burghers, managed to entrench the traditional and, until then, applied conception of civis — a particular conception of town burghers,12 which meant that only Christians could be burghers, consequently eliminating the great part of non-Christian town residents. This law, especially when coupled with the above-mentioned Constitutional provision, allows us to consider the issue of forbearance relevant to the present research. In other words, it allows us to question which ethnic, or even more so, confessional groups warranted forbearance and obtained it, and which groups did not and why this was so. The only non-Christian groups in the Grand Duchy that differed from the majority both in terms of ethnic origins and professed religion were the Jews following Judaism (also Karaites) and the Tatar Muslims. The various compositions of religion and ethnicity (the issue of language is not taken into consideration here) for all the other groups of society, especially nobility and burghers, could have been highly diverse, that is a particular religion could have been professed by different ethnicities. The only Christian group that found itself in similar circumstances as non-Christians was the Russian Old Believers, who fled to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the second half of the seventeenth century due to disagreements concerning reforms in the Orthodox Church introduced by the Moscow patriarch Nikon (although not all the Old Believers who settled in the Grand Duchy were of the same denomination, as their practices differed).13 The present research refers predominantly to two groups of sources. The first group consists of state-wide privileges and other legislation which introduced new forms of coexistence, and corrected the already established forms. The aforementioned legislation was a means to develop and manage the model for the functioning of the multi-ethnic and multiconfessional society, and also to sustain the stability of the society characterized by complicated and heterogeneous composition. The second group of sources consists of local level documents of diverse natures mostly aimed at ensuring the stability of the local community and resolving conflicts introduced by the collision of the Commonwealth and local laws. In addition to these two groups of documents of a legal nature, the sources conveying the opinion of diverse social groups concerning the coexistence and its regulation are referred to contiguously.

Historical Context A distinctive feature of the socio-cultural development of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania is particularly the late official acceptance of the Catholic branch of Christianity (1387), which become a state religion at a time when the larger part of the population, or

11 In this way the Church provision was confirmed in secular law: ‘The transition from the dominant faith in any other is prohibited and punished as apostasy’, 1791 m., ed. by Raila, p. 14. 12 On the genesis of the Magdeburg Law in the Grand Duchy, see Karpavičienė, ‘Magdeburgo teisė’. 13 For more about Old Believers in Lithuania see Potashenko, Staroverie v Litve.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

even a considerable part of the ruling elite, was Eastern Orthodox (and from the late sixteenth century, after the Brest union, Unitarians). To compare, when Martin Luther (1483–1546) proclaimed his famous ‘Theses’, Catholicism had been dominant in Western Europe for eight to nine hundred years; in contrast only 266 years had passed since the successful Christianization of King Mindaugas (Mindowg) (Christianized in 1251, crowned in 1253), while the Grand Duchy of Lithuania had officially become Christian 130 years earlier, and the bishopric of Medininkai (Medininki, in Samogitia) had been established only a hundred years earlier.14 A slower (or more delayed) social and cultural development as compared with other Eastern European states, and the particularly radical and dynamic Reformation and Counter-Reformation inevitably influenced the particularities of coexistence and created the preconditions for the introduction and adoption of pan-European traditions. A diverse approach allows us to notice that the adopted schemes of coexistence were adapted to the local conditions, and thus the majority of the forms and regulating relationships were similar to the ones applied in other European Catholic states, though the content differed. We could term the purposeful and focused establishment and management of the multi-ethnic society as a culture of coexistence, but not only that, it is also a policy of coexistence, belonging to the sphere of internal politics. The gradual Christianization of the different layers of society (particularly relevant with regard to the Catholic part of society) shall now be discussed. Becoming a conscious Christian was accompanied by a gradual assimilation of the stereotypes and perceptions directed towards the Jews, or in general, towards other non-Christians, through Christian theological interpretation. The importance of religion in the formation of consciousness and mentality is not questioned in historiography, while it is equally important in all periods of the society’s development. In the period of the Counter-Reformation, the balance between Christians and non-Christians had shifted and, with the emergence of the concept of ‘non-Catholic’, the distribution of the confessional groups assumed new forms and new hierarchical relationships: Catholic → other Christian denominations → non-Christians. Precisely this confessional stratification of society was established in the provision of ‘Reigning Religion’ in the 3 May Constitution of 1791, quoted above in the introductory part of this chapter. Incidentally, this provision was the first one in that Constitution. Even though Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania constituted one state, the situation in the Grand Duchy itself was somewhat different. The number of Uniates in the Grand Duchy — a congregation, which in essence follows the Orthodox rites, but is in full communion with the pope — was greater than that of the Catholics. With the lapse of time, the proportions shifted in favour of Catholicism due to the decision of the Orthodox nobility to adopt Catholicism instead of the intermediary Uniate version. This especially holds true for the youth of the nobility, who either experienced the influence of Western European culture or ended up in the Jesuit educational system. 14 These tendencies were noted by Ivinskis, ‘Krikščionybė Lietuvoje’, pp. 395–96.

217

21 8

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

Additionally, the descendants of the Orthodox nobility were encouraged to adopt Catholicism owing to the beneficial policy of secular office. The prestige of the Uniate Church was not strengthened, while the weakening of the Orthodox positions had not translated into a stronger standing of the Uniate Church. It is very likely that a more influential group of the Uniate nobility did not form in Poland or in Lithuania.15 If we refer to the first census of the Commonwealth Jews in 1764–1765, we see that in the second half of the eighteenth century Jews accounted for 8 per cent of the population, that is 157,000 Jews.16 It is peculiar that just slightly over half of the Jewish population resided in the towns, and the proportion of Jews settled in village-type localities was relatively high, and is not characteristic of Jewish communities residing in the societies of Western Europe. The proportion of Tatars, or the number of Tatars, is difficult to determine: the whole community, as opposed to separate groups,17 was not included in the census until 1790–1791, and researchers have only focused on the incomplete data of this census. Based on the above-mentioned census there were fewer than 2000 Tatar men and women (the majority resided in Novogródek powiat, that is 946 Tatars).18 The historiography abounds with diverse estimations, but most likely the number of Tatars in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania has never exceeded 10000. Language assimilation processes and the more frequent conversions to Christianity (compared to the Jews) adversely affected this community. If we compare the demographics of the Grand Duchy and present Lithuania, the proportions of the minorities are very similar except for the criteria used to determine the minorities. Ethnic minorities in present-day Lithuania constitute approximately 16 per cent of the total population; while in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania Jews, Tatars, and Roma (assigned to a marginalized group due to their way of life and possibly their ethnic origins, but not because of their religion) did not constitute more that 10–15 per cent of the total population. Yet another important point concerns the rapid spread and adoption of the image of the Jews in the society of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania — the forms of anti-Judaism that had appeared in Western Europe began gradually to arise in the Grand Duchy at almost the same time. Before the middle of the sixteenth century the Jews were already acknowledged as competitors in the economy, their negative image was formed, and the myth of the blood libel accusation had spread (in point of fact, only some manifestations of the myth of the profanation of the Holy Communion can be found). Furthermore, the non-Christianity of Jews was comprehended and Jews were accused of causing damage to Christians. Consequently it was decided that their segregation in society was necessary.19 On the one hand, the image of the Jew in different forms spread and took root in a very short, but dynamic period of the Reformation, lasting several decades, and was consolidated during the Counter 15 Sliesoriūnas, ‘Lietuvos istorija’, p. 305. 16 The Census of Lithuanian Jewry in 1764–65, ed. by Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, pp. 125–46. 17 Censuses of military service performed by Tatars took place periodically, but Tatars living in towns and villages were not calculated for a long time. 18 Jasas and Truska, eds, Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės, Tables pp. 30–82. 19 For more about the trends in the development of Jewish images in the Grand Duchy, see ŠiaučiūnaitėVerbickienė, Žydai Lietuvos, pp. 190–285.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Reformation (when Catholicism became a value, and the category for distinguishing people). The rapid assimilation of the phenomenon of anti-Judaism in society resulted in an often rather superficial understanding of some universal anti-Jewish stereotypes and the simplification of their contents. On the other hand, precisely these conditions determined the peculiarities and local variations of the image of the Jews, and its contents in the society of the Grand Duchy. The development of the assessment of Tatars, as Muslims first and foremost, was conveniently aided by the image of the Jews; it was a point of departure for the anti-Muslim and anti-Tatar images. This allows us to discuss the secondary and expedient adaptation of the Jewish image in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. In the beginning, the universal pan-European imagery of Jews and Judaism was adopted and went through local transformations. During the second phase, the anti-Judaism, adopted up to the second half of the sixteenth century, was readjusted to form the opinion about the other non-Christian group in the Grand Duchy — the Tatars.20 The development of the Karaite image is qualitatively opposite and is associated with the successful strategy of the Karaite identity transformation. Karaites made use of the negative image of the Jews and utilized the latter as a point of departure for the dissemination of their own more positive image. Karaites compared themselves with the negative image of the Jews in order to demonstrate their superiority, a strategic decision which can be defined as ‘we are better and more useful than the rabbinical Jews’.21 For the Grand Duchy society this method of image formation was comprehensible. The stratum of ‘non-Christians’ established in the legislation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania laws thus influenced the socio-cultural variations. We will return to this question later. While discussing the historical context in which the policy of coexistence was developed and maintained, it is important to note that the policy commenced at the end of the fifteenth century with minimal knowledge about non-Christians, and continued in an unfavourable atmosphere, that is by the dissemination of negative stereotypes and myths. In some instances, overcoming the stereotypical thinking, or neutralizing its social impacts, was a stimulus for the development and management of the coexistence. This factor was relevant in the diverse spheres of everyday life, in relationships as much as in economic engagements.

Reception of Western and Central European Models of Coexistence At the end of the fourteenth century, when the legal regulation of Jewish status began in Lithuania, variants of Jewish privileges had been spreading across Central and Eastern Europe for approximately one and a half centuries. The sources of these

20 For the tendency to build anti-Muslim and anti-Tatar stereotypes, see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, ‘The Image of the Infidelis’. 21 This thesis was represented in the Letter of Poland — Lithuanian Karaites to the Four Years sejm at the end of the eighteenth century — Materiały, ed. by Eisenbach, no. 102.

219

220

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

privileges were papal bulls, imperial decrees, and the traditions of both the Jews and the societies that had accepted them. Vytautas the Great’s privilege for the Jewish community of Brest (1388) was formed on the basis of the privilege issued by Casimir the Great and later confirmation of this privilege in Polish lands. In addition to certain stylistic differences in the formulation of the articles, and the replacement of official positions that did not exist in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania with their local equivalents, Vytautas the Great’s privilege contains some notable differences from the Polish privileges.22 The most important of them is a double compensation for a Jew beaten or injured by a Christian23 (the same as for a nobleman, Ruthenian: яко шляхтичу).24 In comparison with the Jewish privileges that were already in force in the neighbouring regions, Vytautas’s privilege was not an improved version, but it nonetheless served as the basis for defining the legal and social status of Jews. Based on their content, the articles of Vytautas’s privilege can be divided into two groups. The first consists of articles openly allowing Jews to practise Judaism, perform their rituals, and observe their customs, while protecting Jews from the interference and violence of their neighbours. The second group of articles addresses Jews’ relations with the Christian majority of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and the regulation of Jewish economic activity (about one-third of the articles discuss a new form of economic activity in the Grand Duchy — money lending with interest).25 However, besides the formulation of precedents, the privilege does not contain solutions to more complex civil and criminal cases (involving a Christian and a Jew), which therefore had to be substituted by the references to the local law (at first, customary law, and later, the Lithuanian Statutes — 1529, 1566, 1588). By accepting Jews into society it was particularly important to accommodate the granted privilege to the existing state law already in force. Therefore, the privilege sought to establish the application of general judicial procedures for the Jews. The accommodation of the Jewish privileges to the local law created favourable conditions for their legal and judicial integration. Due to this accommodation the issue of the priority of the source of law had been settled when the First Lithuanian Statute came into force (1529) — the tradition of combining the Statutes of Lithuania with the Jewish privileges had been implemented by this law of ours [The First Lithuanian Statute] we did not by any means restrict the power of the privileges that our ancestors had granted [to Jews] (1533);26 so that you would judge and manage them [ Jews] according to the tradition of state law and the Statute of the country, and rule them according to the letters of freedom as the old custom prescribes (1578).27 For a comparison of the contents see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Žydai Lietuvos, pp. 81–84. Articles 8 and 10 of the privilege, see Lazutka and Gudavičius, eds, Privilegija, p. 84. Lazutka and Gudavičius, eds, Privilegija, article 8. Out of thirty-three or thirty-four articles (depending on the edition of the privilege), twelve are dedicated to money-lending (with interest): Lazutka and Gudavičius, eds, Privilegija, articles 1–6, 23, 25, 27–29, 31. 26 Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 5, ed. by Golovackij, no. 511. 27 Akty, otnosjaschiesya k istorii zapadnoj Rossii, no. 92.

22 23 24 25

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

The general legislation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the special privileges to the ethno-confessional groups were applied to all non-Christian communities, admittedly prioritizing the former, whereas the sole source of law for settling the confessionally mixed cases was the Lithuanian Statute. Although confirmed as general by Grand Duke Sigismund (later dubbed ‘the Old’) in 1507, Vytautas’s privilege soon became insufficient to guarantee smooth coexistence between Jews and Christians. In the context of Jewish privileges, it was merely one of ten.28 Later privileges, such as the Lithuanian Statutes and the laws of the Sejm, specified and supplemented this privilege, as well as legitimizing changes in the legal and social status of the Jews. In addition to segregation on the basis of the professed non-Christian religion, the influence of the legal and social status of the Jews on the formation of the status of the Tatars and the Karaites can be analysed from several other viewpoints. The first is through the system of courts and appeals. The second is via the ranks and the functions of the state-appointed officials who interacted with these communities. The third is by following the consolidation of the legal position of these communities in the Lithuanian Statutes and specially granted privileges. The fourth is by examining the fines prescribed for the injuries or losses inflicted on the Jews, Tatars, or Karaites. The state’s influence in shaping the legal situation of non-Christians had been substantial because the legal standing of these groups had been formulated on the state level and only later adapted locally, or reformulated according to the necessities of private town owners. It is important to note that the fundamental forms and aspects of habitation had been developed and introduced by the state which had followed the examples of other countries. The central government assumed the functions of controlling and accommodating diverse traditions of law, an initiative to change or support the status that was in the hands of ethnic or confessional groups. The context of these discussions is conditioned by two key aspects. One is the starting point of the settlement of non-Christians in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which commenced with the privilege of Vytautas granted for the community of the Brest Jews. The other is the functioning of the legal-social status of non-Christians in Ruthenian communities — ‘besurmianin’ (exact translation ‘misbeliever’; in Latin ‘infidelis’), which was already established in the Second Lithuanian Statute (1566), but not yet legally consolidated. In distinguishing and generalizing the influences of the legal and social status of Jews on the position of other non-Christian or marginal (such as the Roma) communities, the number of documents regulating the legal position of the communities and the efforts of these communities themselves to consolidate their legal and social position poses an obstacle. As we have seen, well before 1646, when King Władysław Wasa formed a code of general privileges for the Jews of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, this community had been very active in seeking

28 The first general privilege was granted by Grand Duke Alexander in 1503, Sigismund the Old granted privileges for Jews in 1507, 1514, and 1533, Sigismund II August in 1564, Stephan Batory in 1576, Sigismind III Vasa in 1588 and 1629, and Władisław IV Vasa in 1633 and 1646, when the last special privilege for Jews of the Grand Duchy was issued.

221

222

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

to establish and consolidate its status.29 In the meantime, not only were the other non-Christian communities passive in comparison to the Jews, but the contents of the privileges that these communities had also managed to obtain remained unchanged. When the articles defining the position of the Jews and the Tatars were included in the Third Statute,30 special privileges granted to the communities (mainly to the Jews) tended to stress only those aspects that were important for their social coexistence; other aspects were irrelevant to the other societal groups. There is another obvious development in this process — in the seventeenth century, the privilege of Vytautas lost its significance and remained only as a symbolic relic.31 The protection of the rights of the Tatars and Karaites and their life in society had not become more complicated because the privileges issued to non-Christians had been integrated into local law at an early stage (despite the small numbers and underdeveloped content of such privileges granted to non-Christians). In contrast, the Jews basically tried to reconfirm the validity of the articles found in the Statutes for their special community by acquiring a large number of privileges, particularly those granted after the Statutes. In fact, these privileges (two in particular, issued by Kings Sigismund III Vasa and Władysław IV Vasa, in 1629 and in 1633 respectively)32 contained the provisions of the Statute’s articles adapted for Jews, and in which the predominant number of articles concerned property relations and wardship. Vytautas’s privilege of 1388 included yet another provision — punishment for injuring a Jew was equal to the one prescribed ‘for injuring a nobleman’, that is, it was twice as severe as could be prescribed for injuring the members of other social groups (Article 8 of the privilege). This provision later became a legal tradition and was never revoked, nor was it ever commented upon or questioned in the law of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.33 It should be noted that this sort of punishment for injuring a Jew was not established in Polish privileges for Jews which served as the

29 According to the established features of identifying general privileges — conferring validity for the entire Jewish community of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the creation or correction of a new legal status — ten privileges granted to the Jews of Lithuania have been identified (1503–1646). In this case, the privileges corresponded to the criteria mentioned above, but were in force for a very short time, or their granting was related to a specific event (such as King John Casimir Vasa’s permission for the Jews who were forcibly baptized during Bohdan Khmel’nytys’kyi’s rebellion to revert to Judaism — the privilege was published in Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 29, ed. by Dobrjanskij, no. 7), and as a result are not counted as general privileges. For more on the general privileges issued for the Jews of the Grand Duchy see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Žydai Lietuvos, pp. 74–99. 30 Statut Vialikaha Kniastva Litouskaha 1588, Articles 9, 10, Chapter XII. 31 Although the privilege (essentially, its confirmation for the entire Jewish community of Lithuania in 1507) was constantly mentioned when granting new privileges to Jews, its specific content was not detailed. Due to the intensive development of law and the granting of corresponding privileges to Jews, many articles of the Brest privilege lost their practical relevance. The privilege remained a proof of the early settlement of Jews in the Grand Duchy in the times of Vytautas. 32 The text of the privileges is published in Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 5, ed. by Golovackij, no. 13, pp. 297–306. 33 Lazutka and Gudavičius, eds, Privilegija, p. 46.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

basis for the privilege granted to the Brest Jews in 1388.34 Thus, the introduction of this provision should be regarded as one of the basic adaptations in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania of the analogous privileges. A peculiar fact was that this extraordinary formulation was established in the Third Lithuanian Statute of Lithuania and remained in force until the partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1795) and several decades into the Russian Empire. The tradition of this severe punishment introduced by Vytautas gradually came to be applied to all other non-Christians (except for the lower strata of the Tatar community, that is the punishment for the injury of the Tatars was the same as that prescribed for the injury of members of unfree families; the magnitude of the punishment previously prescribed for injuring Tatars remains unknown). The assignment of this double punishment for the injury of the non-Christians gave rise to the persistent historiographical myth of the noble or near-noble position of non-Christians in the Grand Duchy, particularly because of formulations like ‘as for noblemen’ and ‘equal to noblemen’, which are frequently encountered in the sources. This situation, as well as other similar provisions in the privileges granted for Tatar landholders, has given rise to discussions about the nobility of the Lithuanian Tatars. Conversely, authors in agreement with Sergei Bershadskii have assessed the status of the non-Christians somewhat differently — they have equated the status of the Jews with that of the municipal elite of a town under Magdeburg law.35 A key point in arriving at this conclusion is the compensatio provision for the injury of the Jews — ‘as for noblemen’.36 The legal analysis of this aspect, formerly predominant in historiography, was not broad enough and did not enable a solution to the problem. The inclusion of a wider social context enables us to interpret the descriptions of the status or possibilities of non-Christians ‘as for noblemen’ more neutrally and with greater regard to the vital issues of the time. The benefit of making this comparison through the social position of the groups, rather than by analogies based on the magnitude of punishment, is proved not only by the legal distinction of non-Christian strata in Lithuania, but also by the fact that the articles discussing the status of Jews and Tatars were included in the chapter ‘Common People’ of the Statutes. The definition of the status of the non-Christian Roma eloquently illustrates the arrangement of the social structure37 and its perception in Lithuanian society: in the Third Lithuanian Statute, the articles discussing the position of the Roma were included in Chapter 14, ‘On the Wrongdoings of People of Various Classes’.38 However, despite all the twists and turns of the social and legal status of non-Christians, the double reward for Jews legitimized in Vytautas’s privilege for the Brest community

34 For more on the sources of the privilege of 1388 and the adaptation of its statements and innovations, see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Žydai Lietuvos, pp. 80–85. 35 This view was held, for example, by the author of the first study on these Jews, the professor of law Augustinas Janulaitis; see Janulaitis, Žydai Lietuvoje, p. 25. 36 Bershadskii, Litovskie evrei, p. 410. 37 For the status of Roma in the Grand Duchy, see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, ‘The Social and Legal Status’, pp. 76–78. 38 Statut Vialikaha Kniastva Litouskaha 1588, p. 347, Article 35, Chapter 14.

223

224

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

was applied with respect to all non-Christians, thus distinguishing them among other social groups. By the end of the fourteenth century, mixed Jewish-Christian cases were already being assigned to the court of the local Grand ducal representative (Polish: starosta) or his deputy. Cases in which a Jew was suspected of having committed a crime were investigated by the Grand Duke himself, resulting in a specific system of Jewish courts being formed: cases among Jews were solved at the community’s own court, with a possibility of appeal to the starosta’s court, and the investigation of the mixed cases was argued in the starosta’s court. An analogous sequence of conflict settlement was established in the privilege granted to the Trakai Karaites: the court of the so-called Karaite wojt was prescribed as the community court, with a possibility of appeal to the palatine as one of the state officials, as in the case of the Jews. The end result of this scheme of legal and communal administration, applied to the Jews and the Karaites, allowed the latter communities, on the one hand, to retain their communal self-government, and on the other hand, to form a system of non-Christian courts which had been integrated at all levels with the state courts. The question of operation of the court structures inside the Tatar39 community has not yet been fully resolved. The opinion, prevalent in the historiography, is that the legal, administrative, and tax-collecting functions were performed by the heads of the Tatar military units (Polish: chorągwie), and that if their decisions were doubted, appeals could be lodged with the Grand Duke. In this order of litigation, the position of starosta or palatine as a state official, which also applied for noblemen attempting to resolve their conflicts, was ‘lost’. It seems, however, that such a structure was retained at least with respect to the Tatars living in towns: they could make an appeal to the Grand Duke’s representative — the starosta — in the same way as the town’s inhabitants who did not have the status of burghers. Similarly, at the time when Roma were settling in the Grand Duchy, a system of communal administration binding them more closely to the state was also formed. In the seventeenth century, with the aim of improving the collection of taxes from the Roma, ensuring the implementation of justice, and at least minimally controlling the community’s life in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the position of the ‘chief of the Gipsies’ — a kind of intermediary between the state and the Roma — was established. This position was usually held by a non-Roma — a nobleman who often hailed from the petty nobility. As the Roma did not possess any institutions of communal self-government inclined to make contact with the state (or at least any institutions similar to those established by non-Christians of the Grand Duchy), the appointment of a special official to manage the Roma living in the state’s territory may have been the sole possibility of controlling and influencing this group of transient residents of the state.40

39 For more about the history of the Tatar Muslim community in the Grand Duchy, see Zakrzewski, ‘Czy Tatarzy’; Sobczak, Położenie. 40 See further in Ficowski, Cyganie, pp. 15–17. Like non-Christian communities, the Roma paid poll tax (Polish: poglówne) as an alternative to military service.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Two indispensable components of daily life of the communities were consistently articulated only in the privileges granted to the Jews. The first concerned opportunities for economic activity, which in practice were even more diverse than prescribed in the privileges; in particular this concerns craftsmanship, which had not been even mentioned as one of the possible activities41 in the early privileges granted to the Lithuanian Jews (which were derived from analogous privileges elsewhere). Contemporary researchers of the Lithuanian Statutes have established that the conditions for credit and taking a mortgage defined in the privilege of Vytautas the Great became a reference point in creating the articles of the First Lithuanian Statute dedicated to activity of this nature.42 Thus, the significance of the privileges granted to the Jews was of wider importance than the influence of these privileges on the position of non-Christian communities. The second component concerned the legally established possibility for these communities to practice their religion and protect their cult buildings and cemeteries. This was essential for the communities’ quality of life. Such provisions were not mentioned either in the privilege to the Tatars, or in the Magdeburg law granted to the Karaites, but the validity of the general legal norms not defined anywhere was determined by the position of non-Christians. This understanding, which established the distinction between a Jew and a Christian, and later between a Christian and a non-Christian, was the basic category that defined the opportunities and duties, as well as the structure of administration of the communities attributed to it, and in some cases also of the Roma who were proclaimed unwanted in the state. The idea of social and legal segregation of Jews and Christians, which emerged through the introduction of the privilege of Vytautas the Great, became a reference point for segregating marginalized groups in a Christianizing society, as well as for the non-Christian strata and the Roma who refused to live a sedentary life. In both cases, the existing analogies from elsewhere in Europe were taken into account and adapted to the society of the Grand Duchy. The implementation of the idea of the segregation of ethno-confessional communities is not original — local adaptations of this idea are far more important. The privilege of Vytautas, which was confirmed as general in 1507, gradually helped to implement the system of operation and administration of the Jewish community in the state. On this basis, the legal and social position of all non-Christians was constructed. Flexibility in defining the position of non-Christians was determined by a mixed method of defining their opportunities and rights, when the features typical of different strata of society were attributed first to the Jews, and later to all non-Christians. This complied with and satisfied society’s needs, while the unification of the position of the communities facilitated their relations with the state. Contemplating the adaptation of traditions of coexistence with the Jews, prevalent in Central and Eastern Europe, the issue of the sources used to develop state policy

41 In Vytautas’s privilege, two forms of activity allowed for Jews were distinguished: trade (wholesale and retail), and money lending. Gradually, the Jews of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania took up and developed crafts, which were not specified as they were in analogous privileges in Western Europe. 42 Valikonytė, Lazutka, and Gudavičius, Pirmasis, p. 339.

225

2 26

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

is of particular relevance. In other words, what might have been the prototype of the developed system, and what was the basis for it? The paradox, which ensured the stability of a highly ethnically and confessionally diverse state, lies in the fact that the content of the strategy of non-Christian exclusion — adopted at the end of the fourteenth century — was mostly developed by embracing local traditions and legal resources. Already at the beginning of the fifteenth century the local traditions of law had been adapted for the Jews. At that time, Grand Duke Alexander (already King of Poland) allowed the Jews — whom he himself had earlier exiled — to return to the Grand Duchy, and on this occasion granted them a privilege. This particular privilege (1503) established the obligatory procedure concerning testimonies in the court, a procedure based on the customary law of the Grand Duchy and equally obligatory to Christians. This had been the onset of the required application of the general lines of the Grand Duchy’s legal rules to the Jews and Tatars; it was not an adaptation of the foreign practices to regulate the relationships with non-Christians. The chapters defining the legal standing of these communities had been incorporated into the Second and Third Statutes of Lithuania. Moreover, some chapters from the Statutes which applied to Jews had been incorporated into the privileges which they received, for example the articles discussing custody and inheritance. The articles of the Third Statute are frequently paraphrased in the privileges granted to the Jews by Sigismund and Władysław IV Vasas in the seventeenth century. This state strategy made sure that similar requests and procedures were being followed in ensuring justice in the fundamental spheres of everyday social life, and the unity of the legal system consolidated the subjects. It was a rational decision which had been upheld throughout the entire period of the existence of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and was a clear administration of justice based on a comparable means and similar source of law — the Statute. The provision ‘de non tolerandis christianis’ — a prohibition against Christians residing in the Jewish quarters — can be found in the privileges granted by the Vasas to the Grand Duchy Jews (1629, 1646).43 It is the antithesis to the well-known and more frequently applied provision of ‘de non tolerandis iudeis’44 which limited the dispersion of Jews throughout the countries or parts of the countries, and their settlement in towns. More than one of the towns in the Grand Duchy had secured the privilege of the ‘de non tolerandis iudeis’. The other extreme of such phenomena is the already mentioned exile of the Jews from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by Duke Alexander. The most curious case is the eviction of the rabbinic Jews from the stagnating town of Trakai, instigated by the Karaites in 164645 and motivated mainly by economic competition. The regulation of the extreme actions of expulsion, eviction, or exclusion incidentally belonged to the state-managed sphere of coexistence in the multi-ethnic and multiconfessional country.

43 For a published version of this privilege see Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 5, ed. by Golovackij, no. 13, pp. 297–306. 44 On the functioning of these privileges in Polish towns, see Goldberg, ‘“De non Tolerandis iudaeis”’. 45 Sbornik, pp. 24–29.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Limits of Forbearance and Their Dynamics The issue of what forbearance meant in the context of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania has not been fully accounted for in historiography, as the deliberations do not include the marginalized groups of society, that is non-Christians. The other shortcoming of the predominant approach is the practice of only discussing expressions of forbearance over a short period, usually encompassing the few radical decades of the Reformation in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The historiography examining the situation of the Reformation and Counter-Reformation frequently refers to the declaration of the Confederation of Warsaw in 1573. Its fundamental provision concerning the right to profess different Christian confessions appeared in the ‘Henrician Articles’46 which King Henry III Valois signed on 20 May 1573. It is well known that Janusz Tazbir named the declaration as an ‘act of tolerance’, while other historians were more moderate and interpreted the contents of the declaration as a reciprocal commitment of the nobility of diverse confessions to maintain the peace and abstain from religious wars.47 The content of the Warsaw declaration differed in the two countries unified by the Union of Lublin a few years earlier.48 However, within the scope of this research, the situation in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania is of greater relevance, since the nobility of Lithuania managed to secure the operation of the Statute of the Grand Duchy — which meant that there were distinct legislations in force up to the third partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1795). The Third Statute of the Grand Duchy (1588), approved by Sigismund III Vasa, established a separate legal system for the Grand Duchy in the first paragraph of the first chapter, indicating that the law of the Statute applied to all Grand Duchy subjects. The third paragraph ‘Concerning the maintenance of the peace among all the subjects and residents of the country who understand and profess Christian faith differently’49 (italics added) of the third chapter of the Third Statute was the most important one for the Grand Duchy evangelical Lutherans. The paragraph states: since there are many differences in the matters of Christian faith, […] to avoid harmful quarrels among people, that are clearly evident for us in other kingdoms, we vow for ourselves and for our descendants once and for the time eternal […] that those of us who profess different faiths, will among ourselves maintain the peace, and will not shed blood nor punish by confiscating property, depriving of honour, jail or deportation, for the reasons of diverse faith and differences of the church we […].50 Debating these provisions Ingė Lukšaitė — one of the most prominent researchers of Reformation in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania — came to the conclusion that 46 Volumina Legum, vol. 2, Ab anno 1550 ad annum 1609, pp. 150–52. 47 Kiaupienė and Lukšaitė, Lietuvos Istorija, p. 373. 48 Lukšaitė, Reformacija, p. 423. 49 Lukšaitė, Reformacija, p. 430. 50 Volumina Legum, vol. 2, Ab anno 1550 ad annum 1609, p. 124; Lappo, 1588 metų Lietuvos Statutas, pp. 120–21.

227

228

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

although the provisions included the rights of the evangelical Lutherans, it did not mean recognition of the evangelical Church. The right to profess a non-Catholic faith was granted to the nobility only, and not to the Church as an institution.51 The arrangement of Catholic and Protestant relations, as well as equal footing of their rights, was the object of a couple of treaties signed in Central and Western Europe. Admittedly, it was more common in the first half of the seventeenth century (the first such treaty was the 1606 agreement between the Hungarian king and the duke of Transylvania concerning the right of the Transylvanian minority to profess their faith), and the most prominent and most significant one on the international level is, undoubtedly, the Peace of Westphalia (1648) — a series of treaties that ended the Thirty Years’ War. In the context of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania the declaration of the Warsaw Confederation (1573) was not the first attempt to regulate the rights of the Christian confessional nobility. It was a new move, provoked by Protestantism, and based on the preceding practices that had been applied in the Grand Duchy to manage the relations between Catholics and Orthodox. If we take into account all confessions that were followed in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, then there were no fundamental changes in the arrangement of the social structure when the declaration of the Warsaw Confederation was adopted. The Catholic element became stronger after the Counter-Reformation whereas the non-Catholic group — although comprising three sections (Protestants and, depending on the period, Orthodox and/or Uniates) — had weakened. The balance of power had not shifted with the inclusion of Protestants into the group of non-Catholics, mainly because of the unequal standing of the Catholics and Orthodox (as well as Uniates after the Brest union in 1596). After the baptism of Lithuania the Catholic confession was adopted as the official and politically dominant religion, which always maintained a high status in society. Precisely due to this fact no one was shocked at the proclamation of Catholicism as the state religion and as a ‘reigning’ religion in the 3 May Constitution.52 Rather, it was a declaration of the practical situation which had longstanding traditions. The new state of affairs would only have caused a stir if everyone had considered themselves as equals up to the adoption of the Constitution. Yet another important moment in history is the First Lithuanian Statute (1529) where no one was determined to change the situation. The introductory part of the Statute appears to include the totality of the nobility of the Christian confession. However, it simultaneously notes that all preceding granted privileges relating to the confession are still in force. This legal contradiction merits attention, and it has been argued that the Second and the Third Statutes of Lithuania attempted to gloss it over.53 Yet overall, as we have already discussed, the Third Lithuanian Statute, which referred to the declaration of the Warsaw Confederation, had not recognized the evangelical Church as an institution within a state, although non-Catholics were granted similar

51 Kiaupienė and Lukšaitė, Lietuvos Istorija, p. 373. 52 See the first article of the constitution: ‘Dominant Religion’ in 1791 m., ed. by Raila, p. 14. 53 Valikonytė, Lazutka, and Gudavičius, Pirmasis, pp. 263–64.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

rights.54 Furthermore, the status of the Uniate section had not improved. For some time the power and political influence of the Protestants was determined by the strong state positions occupied by the Protestant Radziwiłł family. Careful analysis of the historiography allows us to identify clearly the limits of forbearance according to the usage of the definitions. The definition of ‘false believer’ usually applied to the Uniates/Orthodox and Protestants55 if the point of departure for such an evaluation is Catholicism. But if we account for the definitions of the sources and definitions of status, prevalent in the legislation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, yet another concept can be distinguished, namely, ‘misbelievers’ — all other non-Christians. Contrary to appearances, this conception is not a result of contemporary research, but is a historical conception — an element of the development of the social structure and legal practice of the Grand Duchy. As we have already discussed, in the 1388 Brest privilege, granted by Vytautas the Great to the Jewish community, the relationship between a ‘Christian’ and a ‘Jew’ had been formed. This privilege was locally modified and, in essence, transferred the relationship schemes developed in Central and Western Europe to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. There were no schemes in Western Europe for integrating Jews as non-Christians, neither were there means or forward planning in the Grand Duchy. Privileges applying a similar principle were continuously granted to the Jews: on the state level sorting relationships between Jews and Christians; on the local level between burghers, and also between Christians and a local Jewish community. What had been the regulation of relationships between Tatar Muslims and Christians is hard to state definitively, since Tatars had not been granted a single privilege that would apply to the whole community. What is clear, however, is that being a Muslim was a factor contributing to the legitimation of their social status.56 As discussed, the social exclusion of non-Christian communities — Jews, Karaites, and Tatars had been based on their religion and constituted the basis for their social and legal status. Starting from around the second half of the sixteenth century, documents of a diverse nature featured the ethnonym preceding the personal name, which signified not only religion, but also the social standing of the person. Later, in addition to the ethnonym, the note of ‘neverny’ (non-believer) emerged, indicating the segregation of persons falling into the category of ‘verny’ (believer), that is all the different confessions of Christians. It is important to remark here that all ethnic and confessional groups included in the non-Christian group had found themselves in a similar legal, social, and fiscal situation. Legally established separation between the categories of the ‘verny’ and ‘neverny’ — infidelis/besurmianin — had been of considerable significance, denoting a quite different situation than the one perceived if an ahistorical and unsophisticated approach is taken towards the coexistence of the distinct societal groups. Manifestations of forbearance were possible towards the persons who belonged to the societal groups

54 Lukšaitė, Reformacija, pp. 430, 422–35. 55 Lukšaitė, Reformacija, p. 430. 56 For more about the connection of Jews’ and Tatars’ legal status in the Grand Duchy, see ŠiaučiūnaitėVerbickienė, ‘The Social and Legal Status’.

229

23 0

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

of True Believers and non-Catholics, and the limits of forbearances, as we have seen, could be extended to include the new Christian confessions. However, forbearance had not applied and had not been practised towards the non-Christian groups which, in order to be embraced within the limits of tolerance, had to comply with the condition of baptism. Apart from this condition, to facilitate the integration, the ennobling had been offered by the Statutes of Lithuania for non-Christians of the Grand Duchy.57 Incidentally, there were no similar or comparable provisions in Poland. Therefore, the Polish nobility reacted to the increasing numbers of ennobled neophytes and undertook deliberations concerning this provision of the Statute during the two Sejms which had taken place in the eighteenth century (1764 and 1768).58 Eventually, the Polish nobility succeeded and the provision was revoked. Apparently the representatives of the Grand Duchy protested the intentions of the Polish nobility, however, such protests are not to be mistaken for the defence of the right of Jews to be ennobled, but rather a defence of the autonomous legal system that was secured with the Union of Lublin (1569) and established in the Lithuanian Statute. Thus far it has been demonstrated using various examples that non-Christians had not been included in the group of ‘us’ where forbearance was extended. I would like to reinforce this argument by referring to the ‘Towns’ Law’ of 1791.59 According to this law the status of burgher had been granted to all town residents who were Christians, regardless of their social strata or the economic activities in which they were engaged. Sentiments of intolerance and economic competition might have conditioned the refusal to include Jews and Tatars into the group of burghers, at least in line with this law. However, such a stance was first and foremost influenced by the limits of the comprehension which coincided with the limits of forbearance, that is Christian confessions. The very same mental scheme of comprehension governed the decision to exclude non-Christians from the society’s caste structure, which was reserved solely for Christians. However, it would be false to assume that the Jews and Tatars living in the town, constituting a separate non-Christian stratum of the Grand Duchy and not having the status of burghers, had experienced discomfort. Quite the contrary — for example, Jews made every effort to resist submitting to the town Magistrate and becoming burghers. Although it was contrary to the directives of the Towns’ Law, in 1792 a police commission of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth declared that all Jews were subject to the municipalities of the towns in which they resided. In other words, in a quite modern fashion and in spite of religious differences, they were recognized as burghers.60 Apparently, the Jews were displeased with such a course of events. Immediately after the third partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Jews addressed the Russian General-Governor Nikolaj Repnin (1734–1801), residing in Vilnius, with a plea to revoke their subordination to the 57 58 59 60

Statut Vialikaha Kniastva Litouskaha 1588. Volumina Legum, vol. 7, Ab anno 1764 ad annum 1768, pp. 39, 401. Towns’ Law, article 10: see 1791 m., ed. by Raila, p. 38. For a discussion of burghers’ and Jews’ reactions and conflicts connected with the Jewish situation between 1791 and 1792 and later (until the last partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth), see Glemža, Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės miestų sąjūdis, pp. 180–91.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Magistrates, arguing that it was a recently introduced novelty, which had never existed before.61 Their plea was granted, although in a short while the Jews were included in the caste system of the Russian Empire. If one approaches the totality of the phenomena, the cause of the Jews displeasure is evident. Subordination and litigation according to the Magdeburg Law, that is the Christian legal system of the towns, displeased the Jews more than the designation as burghers. This example clearly demonstrates that contemplations about historical situations might be misleading, if we take a Christian point of departure, when an alternative is present, namely, the particular position of Jews or Tatars themselves. In our opinion, the ideal corporate-township scenario had materialized with the emergence of the multiconfessional craftsman guilds in the Grand Duchy towns, from the second half of the seventeenth century onwards, when economic interests were accommodated alongside confessional ones. Admittedly, this scenario had not been a widespread phenomenon of coexistence and forbearance. These are sporadic instances when a limited number of Jews had become members of artisan workshops; the same conditions and obligations applied to Jews as well as to Christians. Two exceptions were made — Jews were not obliged to participate in the religious ceremonies of other guild members, and in the case of disagreement, Jews litigated in accordance with the Lithuanian Statute. A similar scheme had been adopted by some of the Grand Duchy nobility in their private towns,62 where membership in the multiconfessional guild was a precondition for economic development.

Conclusions To conclude, it can be argued that in the period leading up to the end of the eighteenth century, only Christian confessions were included within the boundaries of forbearance in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and even with respect to Christian confessions forbearance was exercised in varying degrees. Furthermore, it is evident that it was a Catholic domination which had been at times legally described in relation to the Orthodox, and later to Protestants and the representatives of the Uniate Church, or even the Old Believers who settled in the Grand Duchy after being prosecuted in Russia. Consequently, the lack of equal rights among the diverse Christian confessions made the non-Christian confessions second-rate, which entailed limitations on the activities possible within the society for non-Christians, for example the prohibition against testifying in land ownership disputes. However, there were situations where the specificity of a region and the particular perception of forbearance allowed for unconventional solutions. An example illustrating this statement is the circumstances of the Bohdan Khmelnytsky Cossack uprising (1648), where the by-products of this uprising were anti-Jewish attacks affecting the Jewish communities in the Grand Duchy and Poland, present Belarus and Ukraine

61 Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 29, ed. by Dobrjanskij, no. 244. 62 Some of these private towns include Kėdainiai, Biržai, Sluck, Kopyl.

231

23 2

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

accordingly.63 In addition to the outbreaks of violence, Jews had been also baptized into the Orthodox Church against their will. One year after the baptism, a privilege had been issued granting the right to return to Judaism for the forcibly baptized Jews.64 While in the eyes of Christianity this could have been regarded as an apostasy, the motives of the ruler for such a decision are unclear, and it is equally difficult to tell whether the decision would have been the same if the Jews had been forcibly and en masse converted to Catholicism. The latter example clearly demonstrates that the mechanisms of control and leverage were in the hands of the state, which developed and shaped the relationships between diverse confessions of Christianity, and the relationships of the latter with the Catholic majority, eliminating non-Christians from the zone where forbearance had been exercised. The state had been a decisive factor in the adaptation and regulation of the forms of relationships between diverse ethnic and confessional groups, and thankfully so. This prerogative of the state had been granted by the legislation concerning the patronage of the Grand Duke, and the perception of all state residents as subordinates whose guarantor of rights it was. It is not of particular relevance that the power of the Grand Duke, who was elected by the nobility, had been weak. More important is the fact that there has been a tradition to gain and secure the rights, among them the confessional ones as well, through the obtained privileges. To achieve the equality of rights, or a more rapid social mobility within one’s caste, had been possible in the caste society only if certain sacrifices were made, that is conversion to the other religion. This conditionality applied equally to non-Christians and nobility. As has been demonstrated, a rapid career in politics or administration was achieved by Catholics, the likes of which non-Christians had not even dreamed. The identification of the limits of forbearance and their dynamics is the surest way to answer the question of the parameters of the coexistence; equally it answers the question of what had actually been achieved by the state in its attempts to fashion the coexistence. Above all, the established system had functioned well.

Works Cited Primary Sources 1791 m. gegužės 3 d. Konstitucija, ed. by Eligijus Raila (Vilnius: Vilniaus Dailės Akad. Leidykla, 2001) Akty, izdannye Peterburgskoi archeograficheskoi kommisieiu otnosjaschiesya k istorii zapadnoj Rossii, vol. 3 (Saint Petersburg: v tipografii II otdelenia sobstvennoi E.P.V. Kanceliarii, 1848) Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu dlia razbora drevnikh aktov, ed. by Flavian Nikolajevich Dobrjanskij, vol. 29: Akty o evriejah (Vilnius: Tipografija ‘Russkij Pochin’, 1902)

63 Stampfer, ‘What Actually Happened’. 64 Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Archeograficheskoiu kommisieiu, vol. 29, ed. by Dobrjanskij, no. 7.

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Akty, izdavaemye Vilenskoiu Arkheograficheskoiu kommisieiu dlia razbora drevnikh aktov, ed. by Jakov Fiedorovich Golovackij, vol. 5: Akty briestskavo i gorodnienskavo grodskih sudov (Vilnius: Tipografija Gubiernskavo Pravlienija, 1871) Chartularium Lithuaniae res gestas magni ducis Gedeminne illustrans — Gedimino laiškai, trans. by Stephen C. Rowell (Vilnius: Vaga, 2003) Materiały do dziejów Sejmu Czteroletniego, ed. by Artur Eisenbach, vol. 6 (Warszawa: Zakład Narodowy im. Ossolińskich, 1969) Sbornik ctarinnich gramot i uzakonenii Rossiiskoi Imperii kasatel‘no prav i sostoiania russkopoddanich karaimov (Saint Petersburg: V.S. Ėttinger, 1980) Statut Vialikaha Kniastva Litouskaha 1588: teksty, davednik, komentaryi (Minsk: Belaruskaia Savetskaia Entsyklapedyia, 1989) The Census of Lithuanian Jewry in 1764–65 and Historical Family Demography: Structures, Categories and Contexts, ed. by Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė (Budapest: Austeria, 2015) Volumina Legum. Prawa, konstytucye y przywileie Królestwa Polskiego, Wielkiego Xięstwa Litewskiego y wszystkich prowincyi należących na walnych seymiech koronnych od Seymu Wiślickiego roku pańskiego 1347 aż do ostatniego Seymu uchwalone, vol. 2: Ab anno 1550 ad annum 1609 (Saint Petersburg: Jozafat Ohryzko, 1859) Volumina Legum. Prawa, konstytucye y przywileie Królestwa Polskiego, Wielkiego Xięstwa Litewskiego y wszystkich prowincyi należących na walnych seymiech koronnych od Seymu Wiślickiego roku pańskiego 1347 aż do ostatniego Seymu uchwalone, vol. 7: Ab anno 1764 ad annum 1768 (Saint Petersburg: Jozafat Ohryzko, 1860) Secondary Studies Bershadskii, Sergei, Litovskie evrei. Istoria ich iuridicheskogo I oschestvennogo polozhenia v Litve ot Vitovta do Liublinskoi unii (Saint Petersburg: tipografia M.M. Stasiulevicha, 1883) Ficowski, Jerzy, Cyganie w Polsce. Dzieje i obyczaje (Gdańsk: Tower, 2000) Glemža, Liudas, Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės miestų sąjūdis, 1789–1792 metais (Kaunas: Vytauto Didžiojo universitetas, 2010) Goldberg, Jacob, ‘“De non Tolerandis iudaeis” : On the Introduction of the Anti-Jewish Laws into Polish Towns and Struggle against Them’, in Studies in Jewish History, Presented to Professor Raphael Mahler on this Seventy-Fifth Birthday, ed. by Shmuel Yeivin (Merhavia: Sifriyat Po’alim, 1974), pp. 39–52 Ivinskis, Zenonas, ‘Krikščionybė Lietuvoje. Rinktiniai raštai’, vol. 4: Krikščionybė Lietuvoje (Roma: Lietuvių katalikų mokslo akademija, 1987) Janulaitis, Augustinas, Žydai Lietuvoje, bruožai iš Lietuvos visuomenės istorijos 14–19 a. (Kaunas: n. pub., 1923) Jasas, Rimantas, and Truska, Liudas, eds, Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės gyventojų surašymas 1790 m. (Vilnius: Lietuvos TSR mokslų akademijos, 1972) Karpavičienė, Jolanta, ‘Magdeburgo teisė: ištakos ir transformacijos’, in Lietuvos miestų istorijos šaltiniai, vol. 3 (Vilnius: LII leidykla, 2001), pp. 175–254 Kiaupienė, Jūratė, and Ingė Lukšaitė, Lietuvos Istorija, vol. 5: Veržli Naujųjų amžių pradžia. Lietuvos Didžioji Kunigaikštystė (Vilnius: Baltos lankos, 2013)

233

23 4

j u rgita š iauč i ū n ai t ė -ve r b i c ki e n ė

Lappo, Jonas, 1588 metų Lietuvos Statutas, vol. 1 (Kaunas: ‘Spindulio’ bendrovės spaustuvė, 1936) Lazutka, Stanislovas, and Edvardas Gudavičius, Privilegija evreiam Vitautasa Velikogo 1388 goda (Moskva: Evrejskij Universitet v Moskvie, 1993) Lukšaitė, Ingė, Reformacija Lietuvos Didžiojoje Kunigaikštystėje. XVI a. trečias dešimtmetis – XVII a. pirmas dešimtmetis (Vilnius: Baltos lankos, 1999) Niendorf, Mathias, Lietuvos Didžioji Kunigaikštystė. Studija apie nacijos formavimąsi ankstyvaisiais Naujaisiais amžiais, 1569–1795 (Vilnius: Mintis, 2006) Nikžentaitis, Alvydas, ‘LDK kultūrinės tradicijos praradimas: Vytauto kultas Lietuvoje XV–XX a.’, in Senosios raštijos ir tautosakos sąveika: kultūrinė Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės patirtis (Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas, 1998), pp. 324–34 Potashenko, Grigorii, Staroverie v Litve. Vtoraia polovina XVII – nachalo XIX vv. Issledovania, dokumenti i materiali (Vilnius: Aidai, 2006) Potašenko, Grigorijus, ‘Istorijos kultūra šiuolaikinėje Lietuvoje: daugiakultūriškumo samprata visuomenėje ir Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės tyrimuose’, in Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės tradicija ir tautiniai naratyvai (special issue of Lietuvos istorijos studijų leidinys, vol. 8) (Vilnius: Vilniaus universiteto leidykla, 2009), pp. 275–99 Rosman, Moshe, ‘The Role of Non-Jewish Authorities in Resolving Conflicts within Jewish Communities in the Early Modern Period’, Jewish Political Studies Review, 12.3–4 (2000), 53–64 Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Jurgita, Žydai Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės visuomenėje: sambūvio aspektai (Vilnius: Žara, 2009) ———, ‘The Social and Legal Status of Jews in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and its Influence on the Status of Tatars and Karaites’, Central Europe, 8.2 (2010), 68–85 ———, ‘Who is Better — Jew, Tatar or Gypsy? (Petr Czyzewsky); an Image of a Jew in the Comparative Context of the Society of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania’, in Galicia, Bukovina and Other Borderlands in Eastern and Central Europe: Essays on Interethnic Contacts and Multiculturalism, ed. by Wolf Moskovich, Roman Mnich, and Renata Tarasiuk, Jews and Slavs, 23 ( Jerusalem: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2013), pp. 401–22 ———, ‘The Image of the Infidelis in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania: A Comparison of the Trends in the Creation of Anti-Jewish and Anti-Muslim Stereotypes’, in Fear and Loathing in the North: Jews and Muslims in Medieval Scandinavia and the Baltic Region, ed. by Cordelia Heβ and Jonatan Adams (Berlin: Gruyter, 2015), pp. 329–46 Sliesoriūnas, Gintautas, ‘Lietuvos istorija’, in Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės XVI a. pabaigoje- XVIII a. pradžioje (1588–1733 metais), vol. 6 (Vilnius: LII leidykla, 2015) Sobczak, Jacek, Położenie prawne ludności tatarskiej w Wielkim Księstwe Litewskim, Poznańskie Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Nauk, Prace Komisji Historycznej, vol. 38 (Warszawa: PWN, 1984) Stampfer, Shaul, ‘What Actually Happened to the Jews of Ukraine in 1648?’, Jewish History, 17 (2003), 207–27 Valikonytė, Irena, Stanislovas Lazutka, and Edvardas Gudavičius, Pirmasis Lietuvos Statutas (1529 m.) (Vilnius: Vaga, 2001)

T he C r e at i o n an d A d m i n i s t r at i o n o f a Mu lt i -Et hni c Stat e

Weinryb, Bernard Dov, ‘The Beginning of East-European Jewry in Legends and Historiography’, in Studies and Essays in Honor of Abraham A. Neuman, President, Dropsie College for Hebrew and Cognate Learning, Philadelphia, ed. by Meir Ben-Horin, Bernard Dov Weinryb, and Solomon Zeitlin (Leiden: Brill, 1962), pp. 445–502 Zakrzewski, Andrzej B.,‘Czy Tatarzy litewcy rzeczywiście nie byli szlachtą? (w związku z artykułem Jacka Sobczaka, Czy tatarska ludność Litwy należała do stanu szlacheckiego?, PH, t. LXXVII, 1986, z. 3, s. 467–480)’, Przegląd historyczny, 79.3 (1988), 573–80

235

Dovile Troskovaite

Myth as a Means of Coexistence The Karaite Community of Lithuania from the Eighteenth to the Twentieth Centuries

The previous article shows how the multi-ethnic community of Lithuania, as subjects of a royal power, was united by a shared metanarrative, an official version of the history of the Grand Duchy. But that was possible only because diverse ethnicities incorporated certain discourses from the metanarrative into their own tradition. After the partitions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (1772–1794), the State itself disappeared but differences between ethnicities and their traditions survived. This chapter will show how the elites of one ethnicity in Lithuania, the Karaites, founded their past and their identity on elements of the once-dominant narrative about the shared past of all inhabitants of the Great Duchy, and also on the traditions of other ethnicities. This patchwork of plots and ideas, we will see, was consciously built so as to secure the ethnic community among neighbouring, dominant groups of different creeds and ethnic identities.

Introduction More often than not the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (hereinafter ‘Grand Duchy’) is presented as a place where many ethnic and religious groups could co-reside more or less peacefully, although this does not mean there were no tensions, conflicts, or hatred. In these circumstances, the power was in the hands of Christian noblemen, ruler, clergy, etc., while others were minorities in a sense of decision making. In this religious society, the non-Christian communities (excepting several individual cases) were even more of a minority. On the one hand, certain privileges defined their rights and kept them within society, while on the one other, their non-Christian religion pushed them away from it. What is more, these communities were, to use modern terms, stateless — diaspora was the only mode of their existence. They had to balance between maintaining their own identity and conforming to the dominant society —

Dovilė Troskovaitė  •  ([email protected]) is an Assistant Professor in the Faculty of History at Vilnius University. Her field of research focuses mainly on the history of East European Karaites and their relations with Rabbinite Jews. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 237–258 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120065

23 8

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

Map 12.1. Historical Lithuanian borders. Image in the Public domain.

the success of which partly resided in the community’s approach towards itself, in its identity and its ability to express this identity through means acceptable to the majority. One of these communities was that of the Karaites — a congregation within Judaism who were opposed to the dominant Rabbinic tradition.1 The community appeared 1 Karaite Judaism is a Jewish religious movement characterized by the recognition of the Tanakh alone as its supreme authority in Halakha ( Jewish religious law) and theology. It is distinct from mainstream Rabbinic Judaism, which considers the Oral Torah, as codified in the Talmud and

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania presumably from the south, and their arrival corresponded with the general influx of non-Christians to this area. They commence narrating their history in the Grand Duchy with a story about Vytautas (Witold), who, in 1398,2 after a campaign of war in the Crimea, brought about 380 Karaite families3 to his fatherland and resettled them there, entrusting the Karaites with the defence of Trakai Castle.4 This story of Karaite settlement — a certain cliché — is repeated frequently in the historiography5 as well as in popular literature. Many narratives of Grand Duchy history intertwine in this story, narratives which shaped the historical consciousness of this multiconfessional society for centuries, and constituted a particular universal field, where each and every community or ethnic group was able to develop a story of their splendid, glorious, and great past.6 The Karaites were not an exception, as their self-consciousness absorbed cultural sentiments prevalent in society and transformed these sentiments in a particular way to accommodate the Karaite community’s need to define its existence as a community in a certain territory in a meaningful way. The birth of the story, introducing the past of the Karaite community, had been conditioned by the need to conform and by the rudiments of the formation of the modern national consciousness during the second half of the nineteenth century. Admittedly, the emergence of stories that establish and promote the collective myth about the very old and glorious past of a particular community is a typical feature of nation-building.7 In the course of collective identity formation, the community elites engaged in the selection of cultural meanings and the legitimization of those meanings within the community itself, and, especially, amidst the dominant society. This article discusses one aspect of Karaite integration — the adoption and adaptation of images of the Grand Duchy in the pursuit of conformance with the

subsequent works, to be authoritative interpretations of the Torah. Karaites maintain that all of the divine commandments handed down to Moses by God were recorded in the written Torah without additional Oral Law or explanation. 2 It should be noted that the accepted date of Karaite settlement varied during different periods of history, while the story of the legend, on the contrary, was mostly supplemented rather than changed. According to the first records of the legend, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the prevalent opinion was that Vytautas brought Karaites into Lithuania twice — in 1218 or 1219 and in 1242–1243. It is unclear why these dates, so distant from the actual period of Vytautas’s time, are chosen. In the twentieth century, probably after recognizing this historical discrepancy, there was a chronological re-adjustment — a change of the date in the legend. The year 1398 was indicated, sometimes 1397, referring to the historiography and to the second influx of Tatars to the Grand Duchy mentioned in the Tatar tradition, and also referring to the time of Vytautas. Of course, a one-year margin of error does not carry a significant implication for the meaning or the entrenchment of the legend; however, the year 1398 is more frequently mentioned in the newest historiography and popular literature. 3 The number of families brought in varies from 380 to 483. 4 Kobeckaitė, Lietuvos karaimai, p. 42. 5 Gąsiorowski, Karaimi w Koronie i na Litwie w XV–XVIII wieku, pp. 161–80. 6 Not only Lithuanians, but also non-Christian communities emphasize the importance of Vytautas in the stories of their own Grand Duchy history. For more on the universality of Vytautas’ image, see Mickūnaitė, Vytautas Didysis. 7 Haig, The Invisibilisation of Kurdish, p. 131.

239

24 0

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

dominant society. Cultural meanings, which are well known and positively regarded in the dominant society, are adopted and adapted in order to improve the position and enhance the prestige of the community in the eyes of the majority. Eventually, these cultural meanings, which were merely a means to an end — to achieve a better social standing in the community — became significant for the community itself. This form of cultural adaptation, typical to the Karaites as well as other communities, supported (alongside other aspects) the integration of the Karaite community into the dominant society. This article aims to unearth the course of this process, contributing factors, and the results achieved by the Karaite community.

The Legend of the Karaites’ Arrival in the Grand Duchy: Context, Story, and Adoption As mentioned above, the prevalence of stories referring to the history of the Grand Duchy in the Karaite community, the integration of those stories into the collective historical narrative, and the presentation of the narrative to the Christian society, coincided with the urgency — imposed by the very same dominant society in the second half of the nineteenth century — to shape and strengthen ethnic identity. Paradoxically, these stories were popularized in the dominant society, but not by the Karaites themselves. Probably the first person to take an interest in the Grand Duchy Karaites was Tadeusz Czacki who, at the beginning of the nineteenth century, quite aptly noticed that ‘regarding the arrival or relocation of the Karaites to Poland — our records [in our possession] are silent’. Therefore, he identified the privileges granted to the Karaites — the 1441 privilege to the Trakai (Troki) Karaites by Casimir IV, the privilege to the Łuck Karaites by Sigismund I of Poland, and the privilege to the Halicz Karaite community8 by Stephen Báthory — as the first records. However, the deliberations by Tadeusz Czacki contain a story relevant to the present study: According to a story, well known in all the Karaite synagogues, Vytautas the Grand Duke of Lithuania brought 383 Karaite families from Crimea to Trakai, and during the second [campaign] established colonies in Łuck and Halicz.9 Nonetheless, in comparing the dates of the privileges and this legendary story, Czacki concludes that the Karaites must have arrived in the territory of the Crown from the Crimea, yet most likely not at the time indicated in the legend, though their arrival could have occurred earlier than the first known privileges granted to the Karaite community. It should be noted that none of the privileges discussed by the author contain even the slightest reference to any stories pertaining to the arrival of Karaites in the Grand Duchy or their military service.10 Nevertheless, this omission does not effectively refute

8 Czacki, Rozprawa o Żydach i Karaitach, p. 143. 9 Czacki, Rozprawa o Żydach i Karaitach, p. 143. 10 Except for one privilege which indicates that Karaites are dismissed from the duty to guard the castle.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

the legend about the Karaites being brought by Vytautas to his dominion; it is more likely that the emergence and proliferation of the legend in the Karaite community and beyond was influenced by the cult of Vytautas. Karaites, who in the seventeenth century spread to the northern territories of the Grand Duchy (that is to the landed properties of the Biržai branch of the magnates’ family of Radziwiłł in Biržai and Naujamiestis),11 might have experienced the cult of Vytautas more intensely due to the Radziwiłł family which considered themselves to be followers of Vytautas. No less important is the fact that Vytautas was praised not only in the Christian society of the Grand Duchy, but also among non-Christians. Tatars as well as Jews regarded this ruler positively due to his military and political activities: in 1388, Jews were granted the first privilege which allowed them to settle in the Grand Duchy under favourable terms, while for Tatars their niche in the military units of that time emerged. In the writings of that period, one segment of Vytautas’s biography — pertaining to the history of the Tatar community — was popular and had been known since the Chronicles of Jan Długosz. The history narrated by Długosz states that Vytautas, after the wars with the Golden Horde in the territory of the Crimea, brought Tatar prisoners of war to the Grand Duchy and presented some of them to the sovereign Jagiełło (Lithuanian: Jogaila; later Władysław II Jagiełło), while resettling the rest around Trakai, Vilnius, Kaunas, Lida, Navahrudak, and Grodno in order to strengthen the military defence of these territories from the Teutonic Order.12 This segment of history about the Tatars arriving in the Grand Duchy territory is found not only in the works of Długosz, but also in those of other authors. Rissalei Tatari Leh,13 published by Anton Muchlinski, recounts that, contrary to popular opinion, the Tatars were brought into the Grand Duchy not as prisoners of war, but rather came voluntarily.14 The author of Rissalei presumes that the first Muslims to reach the territory of the Grand Duchy had already arrived before the fourteenth century; however, he associates the greatest wave of migration with the name of Vytautas (Vattad) ‘whose memory survives until our times and who is annually remembered by Muslims residing in that country’.15 There were more works discussing the beginnings of the Tatar community in the Grand Duchy. It is especially worth examining the book of Stanislovas Kričinskis (Stanisław Kryczyński), Lithuanian Tatars.16 According to the author, the Tatars had settled in the lands of the Grand Duchy as early as the fourteenth century. S. Kričinskis suggested that Dukes Gediminas, Kęstutis, and Algirdas, in their battles against the Teutonic Order, made an alliance with the Tatars who could have settled in the lands governed by the former.17 As can be seen,

11 In the eighteenth century the migration of Karaites accelerated and they found themselves in the North. The community is mentioned for the first time in Biržai in 1602, in Pasvalys (1643), in Radziwiłł latifundium in Naujamiestis (1658), and in the neighbouring Panevėžys (1676). 12 Shapira, ‘Turkism, Polish Sarmatism and “Jewish szlachta”’, p. 39. 13 Muchlinski, ed., Zdanie sprawy o Tatarach Litewskich. 14 Muchlinski, ed., Zdanie sprawy o Tatarach Litewskich, p. 264. 15 Muchlinski, ed., Zdanie sprawy o Tatarach Litewskich, pp. 250–53. 16 Kričinskis, Lietuvos totoriai, pp. 15–58. 17 Kričinskis, Lietuvos totoriai, pp. 16–17.

241

242

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

both Kričinskis and Muchlinski associate the arrival of the Tatars with their military work. However, the possibility of the involuntary resettlement of Tatars as prisoners of war is only partially dismissed. According to Kričinskis, during the first military campaign of Vytautas in 1397, some of the Tatars, who were granted to Jagiełło and baptized (as recorded by Długosz), might have been prisoners of war, whereas the Tatars settled in the Grand Duchy most likely moved in voluntarily since they were permitted to preserve their faith and customs.18 Yet another widespread narrative pertaining to the Tatars shaped the cultural sphere of the Grand Duchy nobility. There was a conviction among the noblemen of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth about their Sarmatian descent, which gradually evolved into the ideology of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. This legend argued that the ancestors of the Polish nobility were descendants of Sarmatians who, during the period of the Roman Empire, resided beside the Black Sea and were later expelled to the north and west. These Sarmatians conquered the lands where the state of Poland was founded and essentially constituted the elites in power. ‘Gradually, Sarmatism encompassed the sphere of private life, becoming a style of Orientalist fashion, art, and dressing, even an adjective, describing a certain posture’.19 It was claimed up until the nineteenth century that these ancestors spoke Turkish or Tatar, and only later adopted a Slavic language.20 The Sarmatic atmosphere of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, most keenly felt by the Crown, did not bypass the nobility of the Grand Duchy, especially after the Union of Lublin, and successfully thrived alongside the image of Vytautas. Even though the legend did not spread widely, its resemblance to the Tatar version — which was recorded by Długosz and later became widely known — allows us to assume that the Karaites adopted this legend for their own benefit without altering its contents.21 However, it is more difficult to explain its chronological discrepancies — dates in the legend do not correspond to the times of Vytautas. It is possible that this discrepancy emerged as a result of the ignorance of the history of others that is the history of the non-Karaites, when a story does not exist as an organic part of the collective identity. This would attest to the hypothesis of legend adoption. Although the above-mentioned legend did not disseminate widely, it is obvious that the Christian milieu, stories popular within it, and the imagery employed by authors of these narratives were known to non-Christians residing nearby who 18 Kričinskis, Lietuvos totoriai, pp. 20–21, 28. 19 Vasiliauskas, Antika ir sarmatizmas, p. 26. 20 Shapira, ‘Turkism, Polish Sarmatism and “Jewish szlachta”’, p. 39. 21 Undoubtedly, this cultural atmosphere was recognized and very much felt by the Polish-Lithuanian Karaites, as is attested to in the legend recorded by the Karaite doctor of Biržai Radziwiłłs, Ezra ben Nissan (see Kizilov, ‘Karaite Joseph Ezra Dubitskii and King John III Sobieski’, pp. 45–64.). Ezra noted the legend of Vytautas, who brought the Karaites to the Grand Duchy from the Crimea for the first time in the seventeenth century. This legend differs slightly from the contemporaneous one propagated in Lithuania (see Kobeckaitė, Lietuvos karaimai, p. 42). It suggests that the Karaites were brought to the Grand Duchy and settled in the present territory of Lithuania by Vytautas already in 1218 (sic!), and in 1242 (sic!) a few hundred people were resettled from Crimea to Halicz (see Kizilov, ‘The Arrival of the Karaites’, p. 29; Mann, Karaitica, pp. 796, 815, 1022.).

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

often transformed these cultural clichés, adapting them according to their own mentality and to everyday realities of life. The first document of a more general format, reflecting the influence of the cultural ideas dominant in the society of the Grand Duchy about the Karaite community, was the appeal by Łuck Karaites to the delegates of the Four-Year Sejm22 (1788–1792). The first transcript of it was published by Meyer Bałaban and dated 1790–1792.23 The emergence of this document was a product of the reforms under debate in the Sejm at that time, which were intended to change the established tradition of granting privileges to non-Christian communities and to include these communities in the existing estates of the state. The appeal of the Łuck Karaites consisted of five points which they requested to be taken into consideration when discussing issues surrounding the legal and social standing of the Karaites. The fifth point is relevant for our discussion, as the representatives of the Karaites maintain that: we were brought in by Vytautas to Lithuania, and by Jagiełło to Poland, and for a few centuries we in Volhynia, the city of Łuck, the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Trakai, Panevėžys, and Naujamiestis, reside. This is the first known text where Karaites, although representing only one community of Łuck Karaites, associate their settlement in the Grand Duchy with Vytautas. Moreover, it is apparent from this quote that the roles of Vytautas and Jagiełło in the history of the Karaite resettlement in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth are of equal importance. Alas, this text does not reveal more details of the history, and thus we can only assume that the mention of the two rulers most likely had political significance. The delegates to the Four-Year Sejm represented the interests of both the Grand Duchy and the Crown,24 and therefore the reference to the two rulers might have served as an effort to please both sides. As it is known, the reforms of the Four-Year Sejm went unimplemented, and thus it is not possible to assess whether the Karaites would have succeeded — that is, whether they would have preserved the legal standing they enjoyed. However, it is important that, in seeking to make a sympathetic impression, the representatives of the Karaites employed arguments and stories which were not only well known in the dominant society but also regarded positively. To associate oneself with the most prominent and the most valued ruler25 meant an attempt to boost one’s importance to the state, to emphasize one’s usefulness, to develop a positive image, and thereby not only to achieve pragmatic goals, but also to adapt in the dominant society. The attempts of the Karaites to employ the image of Vytautas and the legend of the Tatars, although not completely integrated into one collective memory, created a sufficient basis for the further development of the community’s national narrative. It also conditioned the direction of adaptation in the dominant society.

22 ‘Sejm’ is a traditional name of a parliament of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. 23 Bałaban, ‘Karaici w Polsce’, pp. 337–39. 24 ‘Crown’ is a traditional name of lands of the former Polish Kingdom, united with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1569. 25 For more about the image of Vytautas in the Grand Duchy see Mickūnaitė, Vytautas Didysis.

243

24 4

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

The Legend of the Karaite Arrival in the Grand Duchy: Relevance in the Nineteenth Century As mentioned in the preceding section, the adoption of stories referring to the Grand Duchy — the cult of Vytautas and the legends of the Tatar arrival in the Grand Duchy — was conditioned by the intention to adapt to the dominant society and by pragmatic objectives in the face of reforms regarding the Karaites’ legal status. It was an attempt to present themselves using means that could be comprehended by the intended audience — the Christian elite of the Grand Duchy. However, in 1795, after the third partition of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, the Karaite community faced new social and cultural challenges: along with changes in political circumstances, their intended audience changed, and the Karaite community had to communicate with that new audience in order to adapt to developments. The Karaites enjoyed a relatively convenient legal and social standing within the Grand Duchy, where the community’s self-rule and self-reliance was secured. After the partitions, the Karaites found themselves in the Russian Empire where, up until the end of the eighteenth century, no institutionalized Jewish community that also included Karaites existed. Therefore, there was no law regulating their status. Together with the annexed territories, the first attempts at regulating the state’s relations with this community emerged. These attempts were hampered by negative attitudes, myths, and stereotypes towards Jews and their professed religion. In this context, in the Karaite community’s relations with the officials of the Russian Empire, and by extension with the entire Empire itself, the meaning of the above stories changed. It seems that there were no obvious grounds for the further existence and reiteration of the legend of the Karaites’ arrival and their military service to the ruler of the Grand Duchy. The Karaites were now subjects of the Russian Empire, thus the figures of the former Grand Duchy and the loyalty demonstrated to them would not have evoked positive sentiments among the new authorities. Moreover, the myth was a wholly local tradition, specific to the Karaites of the north-western region, and thus, the need for this kind of story did not arise in the community of the Crimean Karaites. The story about Vytautas’s initiative in leading the Karaites from this territory to the Grand Duchy would neither bolster the prestige of the Karaite community, nor have a positive impact on that community’s relations with the Muslim majority. The story about the relocation of their fellow countrymen to the Grand Duchy was unknown to the Crimean Karaites, as is indirectly attested to by the fact that none of the Karaite community members had mentioned this legend when the general-governor of New Russia, Mikhail Vorontsov, addressed the local Karaites in 1837 with a request to provide information about their past, even though it was directly related to the issue at hand.26 However, among Karaites

26 The request was presented to the community during the period of constant deliberations regarding the social and legal status of Karaites in the Empire. Owing to the diplomatic efforts of the community, Karaites — even though classed together with Jews — were at that point already exempt

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

descended from the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, this story was becoming increasingly popular. Already in the first half of the nineteenth century, Mordechai Sultansky from Łuck wrote about this,27 claiming that in 1218 (sic!) Vytautas brought 483 families from Solchat in the Crimea to the Grand Duchy: 330 families were settled in Trakai, and 153 in Panevėžys.28 The local Christian society knew this legend from the popular work of Syrokomla, Tours in Lithuania from Vilnius (1857),29 where the author retells the history of Karaite resettlement in the Grand Duchy, referring to the story narrated by the then prominent Karaite Abraham Firkovich, who resided in Vilnius in the middle of the nineteenth century.30 Before arriving in Vilnius, Abraham Firkovich had resided in Łuck, and later in the Crimea. He was a close acquaintance of the previously mentioned Mordechai Sultansky, whose ideas influenced Firkovich and are perceived in his works.31 While talking to Syrokomla, Firkovich probably referred to the texts of Ezra ben Nissan and Mordechai Sultansky. Firkovich reasoned that Vytautas’s privilege of 1388 was granted to the Karaites of Trakai who had been captured as soldiers of the Khan’s army (italics mine) during the battle.32 Abraham Firkovich attempted to embrace the centuries-old Tatar tradition and adapt it for the benefit of the Karaites in the nineteenth century. In this way the image of a brave soldier emerged, devoted to the interests of the state, and for this he was gifted with privileged status and land, thereby validating the settlement of the Karaites in Trakai. Abraham Firkovich even endeavoured to convince the society of a separate Karaite military unit in the Polish-Lithuanian state army.33 from paying double taxation and from military conscription, and the restriction of the Pale of Settlement did not apply to Karaites while it did to the rest of the Empire’s Jews. 27 Bałaban, ‘Karaici w Polsce’, p. 5. 28 Sultansky, quoted in Mann, Karaitica, p. 556. 29 Syrokomla, Iškylos iš Vilniaus po Lietuvą. 30 It seems that Syrokomla became influenced by Firkovich when he wrote about the Karaites of Trakai. He described Firkovich as ‘a world-renowned scientist whose works will popularise him further and whose literary talent surpasses the majority of his colleagues’, Syrokomla, Iškylos iš Vilniaus po Lietuvą, pp. 46–47. When describing the Karaites in his travel guide, Syrokomla indicates that he is not aiming ‘to critically and unhesitatingly solve the issue of this sect’s […] origins during the Biblical times’, but he was probably affected by the charisma of Firkovich, and uncritically retells what he had heard from him regarding the origins and arrival of Karaites to Trakai and their life there, all the while accentuating the scientific authority of Firkovich and the significance of his latest research. Save for the few references to Tadeusz Czacki, the stories of Firkovich were the sole source of information for Syrokomla, a source that shaped the views of the author as well as those of the readers of his popular work. 31 Shapira, Avraham Firkowicz in Istambul, p. 9. 32 Syrokomla, Iškylos iš Vilniaus po Lietuvą, p. 51. It seems that Firkovich was familiar with Tadeusz Czacki’s work Rosprawa o żydach (Vilnius, 1870) where Czacki was probably the first to discuss the problematic elements of Vytautas’s privilege of 1388. Unlike Czacki, Firkovich was inclined to assign the privilege to the Karaites of Trakai, thereby pushing their settlement in the city back to an earlier date, and strengthening the significance of Vytautas’s symbolic image. 33 Syrokomla recalls a meeting with Firkovich in his travel book Tours in Lithuania from Vilnius, and describes the deliberations of Firkovich on this matter — deliberations which were perceived by Dan Shapira as clearly expressed statements (for more, see Shapira, ‘Turkism, Polish Sarmatism and

245

246

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

Mister Firkovich spoke to us about the tradition — still alive among Karaites — of how armed Karaite knights (i.e. noble) every morning, after saying a short prayer in the Synagogue, would valiantly gallop towards the bridge stretched across Galvė lake to the Castle in the island where they would serve the ruler. […] We discussed the Karaite guards protecting the King.34 Thanks to Firkovich and Syrokomla, this story became more widely known, and what is more important, it was now associated not only with Tatars, but with Karaites as well. It seems paradoxical that the legend of the Karaite arrival in the Grand Duchy rose in popularity in the Karaite community and in the dominant society in the nineteenth century when the Grand Duchy itself no longer existed. This begs the question of whether the legend had lost its most essential function of integration. An answer should be sought in the guidelines of the Russian Empire towards non-Christians. As mentioned above, Jews experienced a significant number of restrictions, the abolition of which was the primary goal of the Karaite community. The next step this community took was probably encouraged by the precedent of legal status enjoyed by the Karaites while in the Grand Duchy. Their status was formed in separation from other estates and, in some cases, allowed Karaites to enjoy rights not available to other non-Christian members of the society.35 This community step was also stimulated by the standing of the other non-Christian community — the Tatars — some of whom were permitted to perform military service for the Russian Empire.36 For the greater part of the nineteenth century, both individuals and organized groups of Karaites strove for the removal of the restriction that applied to both Karaites and Jews prohibiting them from applying for the civil service. The perseverance of the Karaites on this matter was motivated by rational calculations — some of the Karaites led an urban lifestyle, where the main competitors in the sphere of economic activity were Jews who engaged in similar practices of handicrafts, trade, alcohol production, and commerce. The economic competition of these two groups had been taking place since the times of the Vaad (which had been dissolved in 1764), and to the detriment of the Karaites. Therefore, the right to apply to the civil service in the nineteenth century could have provided an opportunity for the social and cultural Karaite elite to ascend the social and economic ladder, and to minimize the negative consequences of their competition with the Jews. The Tatar community was exemplary in pursuit of this goal — the members of the Tatar community were allowed to reaffirm their nobility and thus gained the right to hold public office. Acceptable grounds for reaffirming nobility were not only the military ranks granted by the Empire, but the privileges of the former rulers of the PolishLithuanian Commonwealth were also acknowledged alongside the letters granting

“Jewish szlachta”’, p. 40). 34 Syrokomla, Iškylos iš Vilniaus, p. 53. 35 We can mention the privilege of Magdeburg law, issued in 1441 by the Great Duke Kazimir. In 1646 the Troki Karaite community gained a privilege from King Wladislaw IV Waza prohibiting Rabbanite Jews from settling in the town (reconfirmed several times in the nineteenth century). 36 Bairašauskaitė, Lietuvos totoriai, pp. 46–71.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

land and other testimonies of noblemen. As is known, in the letters affirming Tatar nobility, a significant part was occupied by legendary stories about the genesis of the families. One such letter regarding the nobility of a Tatar family, granted in 1819 for Duke Murza Dovgiala, is a typical example. It is stated at the beginning of the letter: In the times of Vytautas, when Lithuania was at war with its neighbours, Crimean Tatars were invited to the rescue. At that time, from the Crimean state land, called Adchysarai, the ancestors of Jaloir Murza Dogviala arrived in Lithuania; for their bravery, Duke Vytautas awarded them with lands.37 There were many similar stories referring to Vytautas like the one mentioned above. These stories were considered to be ideologically significant since they indicated the noble mentality of the claimants. It is possible that the legend of Karaite arrival in the Grand Duchy and the cult of Vytautas gained importance precisely because of this. A number of the newly rich Karaites of the north-western region strove for the removal of the restriction to perform public service by employing, among other things, these stories. ‘… and brought in the Karaites from the Crimea’ — with these words the legend of the Karaite’s arrival to the Grand Duchy begins. Did the Karaites themselves know this story, and did they manage to use it to their own benefit? Regrettably, sources verifying this could not be located. Even if this story was known, it was not ubiquitous. The fact that the arrival of the Karaites from the Crimea to the Grand Duchy was not known in the Crimea indicates that, most likely, the legend did not emanate from the Karaite community itself at the time when a fraction of its members departed from the Crimean Peninsula, and only emerged after their arrival in the Grand Duchy. It is interesting that, up until the middle of the nineteenth century, Crimean Karaites had no alternative story of a similar nature to substantiate their settlement and expansion in the Crimean Peninsula. It is held that there was no need for this kind of a story for the Crimean Karaites until the government of the Russian Empire introduced various restrictions pertaining to Jews and, by extension, to Karaites.38 The legal practice regarding Jews was shaped by negative attitudes prevalent in the Empire. In Russian society the Jewish community was accused of being parasitic in nature, a situation which emanated from the religious provisions laid down in the Talmud. This was perceived to be the cause of the unacceptable lifestyle and behaviour of the Jews, and their religious fanaticism. The Yiddish language employed by the community also evoked discontent.39 Abandonment of all of the above-mentioned characteristics could have potentially made Jews less adverse. The Karaites — who did not exhibit these traits which contributed to the negative image of the Jews — found themselves in a better position when struggling for a more favourable social status and a more hospitable attitude of the government towards them. This is illustrated in

37 I am grateful to Professor Tamara Bairašauskaitė for this reference. 38 For more on these restrictions see Miller, Karaite Separatism, pp. 3–34. 39 Staliūnas, Jewish Issue, p. 194.

247

2 48

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

comparisons of the two communities. At the beginning of the twentieth century, in the journal Karaimskai‘a zhizn (Караимская жизнь, English: Karaite Life), an article half a century old was republished from the journal of the Ministry of the Interior. In the text, the positive traits of Karaites in comparison to Jews are indicated — ‘without stubbornness accepted [wearing] the local costume’ — integrity, diligence, and lack of aspiration to convert Muslims or Christians to their own faith. Therefore, ‘the government of Russia has always demonstrated a correct assessment of them vis-à-vis Rabbanites’.40 This context allowed the Karaite community to pursue dissociation from the restrictions pertaining to Jews by way of exploiting negative attitudes prevalent in society towards the latter — in other words, by emphasizing those aspects which were not characteristic of the Karaite community but evoked discontent in society when referring to Jews. These were first and foremost the authority of Talmud, and the accusation against Jews of deicide. Therefore, deliberations about the past and the need for history in the Crimean Karaite community was not encouraged by the self-observance of the community, but by the policy makers and rulers of the Russian Empire. The task they formulated concerned the delineation of the chronology of Karaite residence in the Crimea and a definition of the religious and social characteristics of the community. Those characteristics — as the leaders of the Karaite community rightly perceived — were important in securing the Karaites’ social status and the government-acknowledged distinctness from the Rabbinical Jews. In 1837, the general-governor of New Russia, Mikhail Vorontsov, visited the Crimean Karaite community and gave oral instructions to present information about the origin of the Karaites and the circumstances of their arrival in the Crimea.41 In 1839, Taurida general-governor Muromtsev sent a letter to the Karaite spiritual board in which he formulated six specific questions regarding the origins of the Karaites, and the reasons and circumstances of their arrival in the Crimea among other issues.42 The previously mentioned Firkovich, who was instructed to prepare the answers, indicated that ‘due to the expressed interest, we, whatever happens, must find information for the answers’.43 He personally was not directly interested in issues of Karaite history — the most important thing was to satisfy the request made by the general-governor of Taurida, and to provide him with information about the community’s settlement in the Crimea. While paradoxical, this situation perfectly illustrates that the need to become familiar with the Karaite past 40 [Anonymous], ‘Ot kuda prishli karaimy v Rosiju’, p. 51. 41 Firkovicz, ‘Avnei Zikaron’ (1911), p. 83. 42 The questions were formulated in the following way: What is the nation of Karaites and where have they come from? When and under what circumstances did Karaites arrive in the Crimea? What are the customs and occupations of Karaites? Were there in the past or are there at present honourable individuals among the Karaites who are famous for their education, good deeds, or other merits? Are there any books in the Karaite community about their history, are there (accurate) stories inherited from their ancestors which could prove the long-lived character of the Karaite religion and religious customs? What is the reason for the Karaite separation from the Rabbinical Jews, and when did it happen? What is the difference between Karaites and Rabbinites in terms of religion? See Firkovicz, ‘Avnei Zikaron’ (1912), p. 17. 43 Firkovicz, ‘Avnei Zikaron’ (1912), p. 18.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

and history did not arise among the members of the community, but was conditioned by the dominant society. The tactics adopted by Firkovich to discover the answers to those questions — the analysis of gravestones and their inscriptions — attests to the fact that the community was not going to formulate answers about their history and settlement in the Crimea without advance preparation. It can be assumed that, even in the oral tradition of the community, stories regarding those matters were almost non-existent, and perceptions of the Karaite past were based on religious tradition and its stories. Eventually, based on documents located by Firkovich and on inscriptions from gravestones in the cemetery of Chufut-Kale — the authenticity of which are disputable — Firkovich formulated a story. According to that story, the Karaites are descendants of the early Jews. They converted the local Khazars, who had been pagans until then, to Karaism and adopted their Turkic language. Yitzhak ha-Sangari became a prophet of Karaism, and his figure assumed the role of prophet of the nation after Firkovich allegedly located his gravestone.44 It is held that this story appeased the curiosity of the local administration, since at the time when the Karaite Statute was adopted in 1863, the Karaites were recognized as a separate ethno-confessional group. The ‘Jews’ ethnonym no longer applied to the Karaites, and rights equal to those granted to Russian-Orthodox subjects45 were granted, while the restrictions imposed on Rabbinical Jews remained in force.

The Entrenchment of the Narrative in the Twentieth Century Notwithstanding the tight connections between the two distant community centres — in the Crimean Peninsula and in the north-western region — the two discussed narratives existed in parallel, but independent from one another up until the twentieth century. This situation was conditioned by the utilitarian character of these narratives — the aspiration to adapt to the dominant society — and by the lack of a unifying cultural force between these two centres. The relatively stronger orthodoxy of the Karaites and their attachment to religion in comparison to the Crimean Karaite community prevented the entrenchment of the Khazarian narrative in the north-western region. Moreover, with the change of the political environment after World War I and the emergence of a need to introduce themselves to newly independent Poland, traditional methods were employed, that is attempts to present and entrench the historical narrative of the Karaites with all the accompanying elements: a long history, heroic warriors, and loyalty to the old state (the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth) and its rulers. Only in the 1920s did Seraya Shapshal — the freshly elected highest spiritual 44 Miller, Karaite Separatism, p. 8. Today, after almost a century of research, more and more arguments emerge indicating the quasi-scientific origins of this theory. However, this article does not aim to prove or disprove the credibility or falsity either of this theory or of the one developed by Seraya Shapshal. These theories are important, within the scope of this research, as the pillars in the process of Karaite identity formation — pillars which secured the progress and success of this process. 45 1863 m. On the Issue of Karaite Rights Determination see Sbornik starinnych gramot i uzakonenii, pp. 1001–05.

249

250

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

leader and head of Poland’s Karaites — manage to combine those two narratives and finalize the formation of the national narrative of the Karaites. The election of Shapshal as the highest spiritual leader of the Karaites in Poland created a paradoxical situation which had repercussions for his activities when he arrived in Vilnius. Shapshal himself did not reside in Poland at that time, and was not a citizen of that country; many Karaites had heard of him, but were not familiar with him. Once in Vilnius, he engaged actively in politics by cooperating with the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and other state institutions, and also embarked upon composing the great narrative of Karaite history. These two activities conditioned each other to some extent — the need for knowledge about the Karaites in the state resulted in the growing number of works by Shapshal, a majority of which were directly addressed to the Ministry or to the governor of Vilnius. The appearance of Shapshal’s writings in the public sphere promoted the spread of the Karaite historical narrative and the legend of the Karaites’ arrival in the Grand Duchy; they also increased the chances of these narratives taking root in the society. The state legitimized this activity by Shapshal, and thereby expressed its approval of the contents of his writings. One of the first representational texts by Shapshal, A Short Review of Karaite History, was sent together with a draft law on the legal status of Karaites to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education on 29 November 1928.46 In the draft, Shapshal maintains that followers of Karaism (not Karaites, sic!) landed in the Crimean Peninsula at the end of the eighth century, the south of which belonged to the Byzantine Empire, and the north to the Khazar Khanate. According to Shapshal, a segment of Khazars had already adopted the Old Testament, and this persuasion had been spreading gradually until it reached the Khazars-Cumans, also known as Połowcy. Precisely due to the interaction of these tribes47 the Crimean Karaites emerged.48 Efforts to bestow historicity on the myth of the Karaites’ descent from the Khazars can be detected in this story. The myth approximates the actual date of Karaism’s formation as the seventh–eighth century, and the geopolitical situation of the Crimea is also correctly represented. It is visible in this short segment of the story that Shapshal, contrary to the opinion of Kizilov,49 did not present two theories of Karaite descent — Khazarian and Połowcy — but combined these two groups into one story. It must be noted that, in opposition to the above-mentioned deliberations of Firkovich, the myth formulated by Shapshal maintains that the Karaite community formed in the territory of the Crimea, and did not arrive as religious missionaries to the region — Shapshal contends that the Karaites descended from local Khazars who adopted Karaism. Thus Crimean Karaites are not residents in a diaspora, but are the Crimean autochthons to whom the territory, at least symbolically, belongs. In the Jewish milieu and in the historiography, Khazars are

46 1928, Seraya Shapshal, untitled, text addressed to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education (typescript), Lithuanian Central State archive (LCVA), F 51, Index 4, file 400, pp. 22–24v. 47 Seraya Shapshal uses the term naród (nation). 48 1928, Seraya Shapshal, untitled, text addressed to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education (typescript), l. 22v. 49 Kizilov, ‘Karaite Joseph Ezra Dubitskii and King John III Sobieski’, pp. 47–49.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

considered to be followers of Rabbinical Judaism.50 The ideological battle with regard to the Khazaric element is expressed in the texts of Shapshal through the development of the narrative which usurps the Khazars for the benefit of the Karaites, in the first text as well as in the article Kyrym karai… Shapshal indicates that: at the end of the eighth century or in the ninth century, Karaite missionaries led by Isaac Sangari (Yitzhak ha-Sangari)51 arrived in the Crimea which, at that time, except for the southern coast, belonged to the great Khazar state with, at that time, a highly developed culture. The teachings of the missionaries were favourably received by the court of their ruler Khagan, and the faith of Moses became the state faith and remained so up until the collapse of the Khazar state.52 Shapshal points to the gravestones of Sangari and his wife in the Karaite cemetery of Chufut-Kaleas as proof of the religion professed by Sangari.53 These same gravestones were mentioned by Firkovich as an argument demonstrating the Karaite presence in the territory of Crimea. At the same time, Tatar cultural meanings became familiar to the Karaites and were appropriated in the self-perception of Karaites, which conditioned the development of the myth of the Karaites’ descent. This allowed the Karaites to counterbalance the actual meagre size of their community with a symbolic increase, which in turn enhanced their symbolic cultural capital. In the 1920s, when Seraya Shapshal was installed as the chief hakham of the Karaites in Poland, this legend was already widely known in society. The legend assumed its clear, finished, and more or less historical form when Shapshal coupled the Karaites and Tatars as if they had been brought to the Grand Duchy by Vytautas after his campaigns against the Golden Horde.54 In one of his first public texts after he was elected the chief of Poland’s Karaites in 1928, Shapshal maintains in his letter to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs that: at the end of the fourteenth century, the great Duke Vytautas brought in the Karaites together with the Tatars from the Golden Horde which owned a part of the Crimea; [he] brought in around 500 families which were resettled in Trakai and other territories. Tatars on horseback and Karaites on foot served as soldiers and were gifted for their services with land possessions by the great dukes of Lithuania as well as by the rulers of Poland […] Today’s Karaites are

50 There are many studies on this topic. See for example Dunlop, The History, pp. 89–115. 51 For the first time, Isaac Sangari was included in the historical narrative of the Karaites, thanks to Firkovich. However, this figure is also known to the Jewish community — it is said that Isaac Sangari converted the Khazars to Talmudic Judaism. The latter legend was widely known, as is attested by the fact that it was published in the newspaper of Poland’s Jews, advocates of the Enlightenment, Izraelita. See ‘Państwo żydowskie Chazarów’. 52 Seraya Shapshal, Karai Türkeri, quoted after Kowalski, ‘Turecka monografia o Karaimach krymskich’, p. 3. 53 Seraya Shapshal, Karai Türkeri, quoted after Kowalski, ‘Turecka monografia o Karaimach krymskich’, p. 4. 54 1928, Seraya Shapshal, untitled, text addressed to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education (typescript), l. 1–6.

25 1

252

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

the descendants of those Vytautas brought in to this land, and who, being of the same origin as the Tatars, up until the present time use the granted lands.55 At this point, articles by Shapshal began spreading in the Karaite press: in the journal Myśl Karaimska his article Karaites in the Service of the Crimea Khan (Polish: Karaimi w służbie u chanów krymskich)56 was published. By the end of the 1930s, this journal had published around twenty articles by Shapshal discussing the history of the Karaites, as well as issues of their descent and language. A few other articles were published in another newspaper of the community, Karaite Voice (Turkic: Karay Awazy). In his text On the Issue of the Reciprocal Historical Ties of Lithuanian and Turkic Nations57 Shapshal introduced a new element into the story of the Karaite military service, maintaining that, thanks to Vytautas, Jalal al-Din, son of Khan Tokhtamysh who later became Khan himself, fought on the side of the Grand Duchy against the Teutonic Knights during the battle of Grunwald. In this way, Shapshal attempted to strengthen the impression of the legend and once again highlight the imagery of the Karaite soldiers.58 It is only natural that the focused and intense publicist activity of Shapshal formed a certain historiographical approach which developed and disseminated the legend of the Karaite arrival and settlement in the Grand Duchy. Shapshal himself perfectly embodied this story — he started using the word ‘Khan’ between his name and surname (Seraya Khan Shapshal) as if to highlight the Karaite connection to the Tatar origins, to the great past marked by military might. In this context, the content of Shapshal’s letter to Mikhail Fyodorov59 is highly important — there Shapshal indicates he has determined the date of Karaite entry into the Grand Duchy.60 The legend of Karaite settlement in the Grand Duchy was eventually consolidated as a historical fact in 1937 by the Karaite scientist Szyszman in his work Karaite Settlements in the Lands of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.61 According to the author, Vytautas invaded the Crimea in 1397 and brought Karaites and Tatars into the Grand Duchy, then resettled them in Trakai in the surrounding localities and other territories in 1398.62 The author continues the historiographical tradition started by Shapshal and discusses the issues of Karaite history in the Grand Duchy in the context of Tatars, frequently without making a distinction between the two ethnic groups. This viewpoint especially reveals itself in the stories of the Karaite settlement

55 1928, Seraya Shapshal, untitled, text addressed to the Polish Ministry of Religious Affairs and Public Education (typescript), l. 3. 56 Szapszał, ‘Karaimi w slużbie u chanów Krymskich’, p. 20. 57 S. Shapshal, K vaprosu ob istoricheskoi svi’azi Litvy c tiurkskami stranami i narodami, (typescript) 1935 m., Library of Lithuanian Institute of History (LIIB), F. 4, file 208. 58 S. Shapshal, K vaprosu, p. 2. 59 1950 m. Seraya Shapshal to Mikhail Fyodorovich, draft, Vrublevski library of Lithuanian Academy of Science (LMAB), Manuscript division (RS) F. 143, file 128. 60 ‘Karaites were brought in to Lithuania by Vytautas in 1398 (I determined this date myself)’, 1950 m. Seraya Shapshal to Mikhail Fyodorovich, draft, Vrublevski library of Lithuanian Academy of Science (LMAB), Manuscript division (RS) F. 143, file 128, p. 2. 61 Szyszman, Osadnictwo karaimskie. 62 Szyszman, Osadnictwo karaimskie, p. 22.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

in the Grand Duchy and their military service. For example, the author maintains that the Karaites were relocated to the Grand Duchy together with Tatars for the purpose of entrusting them with the defence of strategically important locations, castles, and roads, and even to guard the ruler (a century earlier this was recounted by Syrokomla to Firkovich).63 The joint activity of these two groups, their shared descent, history, and loyalty to the state is emphasized in the above-mentioned text. It can be presumed that it also reflects a certain emerging cultural and academic sentiment — Szyszman provides references to the historiography of that time and to earlier works from the nineteenth century. It is interesting that the story about the Karaites being brought together with the Tatars by Vytautas from the Golden Horde became known to the Tatars themselves — the previously mentioned Kričinskis refers to the works of Shapshal and Ananjaszo Zajączkowski when discussing the migratory flows of Tatars to the Grand Duchy. Kričinskis writes: In 1398, Vytautas organized a campaign to the steppes […] precisely then the Duke most certainly took a few hundred Crimean Karaite relatives whom he resettled in the residency of Trakai. […] The story that Vytautas brought them in remains to this day among the Karaites of Trakai and Łuck.64 At the end of the twentieth century the narrative of Kirčinskis was retold by other Polish researchers of Tatars.65 As can be seen, it took over a century — from the 1820s to the 1930s — for the Karaite legend of arrival, settlement, and integration to evolve from sporadic testimonies of an ethnographical nature to a fully finished historical narrative which corresponded to the needs and self-perception of the community. Gradually, this legend — with no historical sources of the Karaite relocation to the Grand Duchy — entrenched itself in the historiography and served as a point of departure for further research in Karaite studies.

Cultural Integration through the Formation of Historical Narrative: General Traits While this article presents the Karaite national narrative, the circumstances under which certain segments of it were developed and how the narrative was used and adjusted within the dominant society in different periods, it is likely that a similar scheme could have been employed by the other non-Christian communities of the Grand Duchy, that is the Jews and the Tatars. The Tatar community was in a convenient position — its arrival in the Grand Duchy coincided with Vytautas’s military campaigns and political activity, a part of the community successfully joined the military, and later, in the Russian Empire, used the opportunity to reaffirm their

63 Szyszman, Osadnictwo karaimskie, p. 8. 64 Kričinskis, Lietuvos totoriai, p. 21. 65 Borawski, and Dubinski, Tatarzy polscy, p. 44.

25 3

254

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

noble status, a possibility not available in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth without converting to Christianity. It is only natural that in such circumstances the Tatar community maintained the cult of Vytautas despite sporadic attempts by Vytautas himself to baptize the Tatar prisoners of war, or the Tatar rebellion against him in 1421.66 This might be the reason why, alongside the analogous Karaite legend of coming to the Grand Duchy, within the Tatar community there were other legends related to Vytautas, often with miraculous elements. For example, the legend of the founding of the Forty Tatars village in the Vilnius region claims that Vytautas, in the legend referred to as king, bestowed the land for the village.67 Another village — Studzianka (from Polish studnia — well) — is said to have been founded where Vytautas and his warriors drank water from a spring on his way back from yet another battle.68 Such similar legends were abundant within both the Tatar and Karaite communities. However, the best example of how the Tatar community employed the cult of Vytautas, widespread in the dominant society, is the construction of the Kaunas Tatar mosque in 1930, the year commemorating the 500th anniversary of the year of Vytautas’s death. The Tatars took the opportunity to name the mosque after Vytautas the Great and presented it as a memorial to the ruler. Certainly, the community could not afford to build and equip the mosque, therefore it used Vytautas’s name to receive support from the state. The community managed to acquire more than half of the necessary budget, and the mosque was built and equipped in three years. It was not by accident that the consecration of the mosque took place on 15 July — the date of the Battle of Grunwald.69 It must be noted, however, that the Tatar community barely needed to exploit the historical stories of the Grand Duchy for the community’s benefit. After all, a part of the Tatar community enjoyed a superior social status, which had formed already in the times of the Grand Duchy and expanded across most of the community during the nineteenth century, while the dominant society accepted the legend of Tatar settlement in the Grand Duchy as common knowledge without much encouragement. The most closed non-Christian community was, without a doubt, that of the Jews. Being the largest and highly religiously conservative, it exploited the historical stories of the dominant society for their benefit to a lesser extent than the Tatars and Karaites. The tight binding of religious and biblical stories to the history of the nation up until the end of the nineteenth century did not allow for the practice of integrating the Grand Duchy’s history into the representation strategies of the community. No less important is the well-rooted and negative perception of Jews in the dominant society, formed by anti-Semitic stances and stereotypes such as the blood libel, deicide, etc. Understanding Jews as the quintessential ‘Other’ (most commonly in a negative sense) also precluded effective adoption of the stories of the dominant society.

66 67 68 69

Miškinienė, ‘Lietuvos totorių padavimai’, pp. 169–70. Miškinienė, ‘Lietuvos totorių padavimai’, p. 170. Miškinienė, ‘Lietuvos totorių padavimai’. I am grateful to Tadas Janušauskas for the opportunity to use his study.

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

Nonetheless, Vytautas was significant to this community as well — he formed state policy towards Jews by issuing a privilege to the Brest Jews in 1388, which was extended to the Jews of the Grand Duchy by Sigismund the Old (Zygmunt I Stary) in 1507. The importance of the privilege in both legal and ideological terms is evident in the fact that the Jewish community strove to receive a confirmation of the privilege from every new ruler, as a sign of the community’s archaic nature and legitimacy, even though the privilege was losing its practical weight as the legal status of the Jews at the time was determined by the constitutions of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Lithuanian Statutes (which included key articles from the 1388 privilege).70 In the context of the imperial restrictions of the nineteenth century, Vytautas was perceived as the creator of Jewish well-being, while the period of his rule was seen as the golden age of the Jews in the Grand Duchy.71 As we can see, each of the non-Christian communities exploited in one way or another the historical stories of the dominant society in their attempts to improve their social status and/or image. The Tatar community had an advantage, as its history was fairly tightly bound with the history of the dominant society. This circumstance provided better opportunities for integration, thus there was almost no urgency to benefit from events in the history of the Grand Duchy while trying to adapt in Christian surroundings. There was an entirely opposite situation for the Jewish community — due to the stigmatized perception of them and the seclusion of the community, no favourable environment for exploitation of the Grand Duchy historical stories by incorporating them into the Jewish historical narrative presented itself. Thus, those stories were not used for representing the community, nor to increase its prestige or secure successful integration. In other words, the perception of the non-Christian communities within the dominant society allowed for a certain limit of tolerance up to which those communities could integrate socially and culturally by exploiting historical events of the Grand Duchy. The Karaite community balanced between the active Tatar and the passive Jewish cultural integration models. That community was also exceptional in its abilities to usurp the historical events of the Grand Duchy associated with another community, i.e. that of Tatars, and to present them to the dominant society as their own. Also outstanding is the fact that the legend of Karaite settlement in the Grand Duchy was at first used for utilitarian purposes by the community, that is, in order to secure higher social status within the Grand Duchy. Later, within the Russian Empire, supplemented with the theory of Khazarian origins, this legend became the core of the national narrative. The legend became significant not only among the dominant society, but also among the members of the community itself. The legend became inseparably united with the community — the epicentre of the historical narrative and a tool of representation, actively used by Karaites to this day.

70 For more on the privilege of Vytautas see Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Žydai LDK visuomenėje: sugyvenimo aspektai, pp. 74–99; Gudavičius, and Lazutka, Privilegi‘a evrei‘am Vitautasa Velikogo 1388 goda. 71 Mickūnaitė, Vytautas Didysis. Valdovo įvaizdis, p. 288.

25 5

2 56

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

Works Cited Primary Sources Czacki, Tadeusz, Rozprawa o Żydach i Karaitach (Kraków: Wydawnictwo Biblioteki Polskiej, 1860) Firkovich Avraam, ‘Avnei Zikaron’, Karaimskai‘a zhizn‘, 5–6 (1911), 83 ———, ‘Avnei Zikaron’, Karaimskai‘a zhizn‘, 10–11 (1912), 17–18 Karaitica: Texts and Studies in Jewish History and Literature, ed. by Jacob Mann, vol. 11, (Philadelphia: Hebrew Press of the Jewish Publication Society of America, 1935) Kobeckaitė, Halina, Lietuvos karaimai (Vilnius: Baltos lankos, 1997) Kričinskis, Stanislovas, Lietuvos totoriai (Vilnius: Mokslo ir enciklopedijų leidykla, 1993) Lazutka S., and E. Gudavichius, Privilegi‘a evrei‘am Vitautasa Velikogo 1388 goda (Moskva: Evreiskii universitet v Moskve, 1993) ‘Ot kuda prishli karaimy v Rosiju’, Karaimskai‘a zhizn‘, 5–6 (1911), 46–51 ‘Państwo żydowskie Chazarów’, Izraelita, 8 (1866), 58–59 Sbornik starinych gramot i uzakonenii Rosijskoi imperii kasatel‘no prav i sostoi‘ania rusko-podannych karaimov, ed. by Firkovich Zaria Abramovich (Saint Petersburg: Leshtukovskaia parovaia ckoropechatia, 1890) Shapshal Seraya (Szapszał Seraja), untitled text (typescript), Lithuanian Central State archive (LCVA), F 51, Index 4, file 400, pp. 22–24v Syrokomla, Vladislovas, Iškylos iš Vilniaus po Lietuvą (Vilnius: Mintis, 1989) Szapszał Seraja (Shapshal Seraya), ‘Karaimi w slużbie u chanów Krymskich’, Myśl Karaimska, 2.1 (1929), 5–22 Szyszman, Abraham, Osadnictwo karaimskie na ziemiach Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskiego (Wilno [Vilnius]: n. pub., 1936) Zdanie sprawy o Tatarach Litewskich przez jednego z tych tatarów złożone sułtanowi Suleinamowi w r. 1558, ed. by Antoni Muchliński (Wilno [Vilnius]: oddruk teki Wileńskiej, 1858) Secondary Studies Bairašauskaitė, Tamara, Lietuvos totoriai (Vilnius: Mintis, 1996) Bałaban, Meyer, ‘Karaici w Polsce’, Nowe Życie, 1 (1924), 1–23, 166–76, 323–40 ———, ‘Karaici w Polsce’, in M. Bałaban Studja historyczne (Warszawa: Korona, 1927) Belyi, Oleg,‘Obzor archivnych dokumentov po istorii karaimskoi obshchiny Kryma v pervoi polovinie 19 veka (po materialam fonda Tavricheskogo i Odeskogo Karaimskogo Duchovnago Pravlenija v GAARK)’, Karaimskij muzej, 2 (1995– 1996), 105–17 Borawski, Piotr, and Aleksander Dubinski, Tatarzy polscy. Dzieje, obrzędy, legendy, tradycje (Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Iskry, 1986) Dunlop, Dauglas Morton, The History of the Jewish Khazars (New York: Schocken Books, 1967)

M y t h as a Me ans o f Co e xi st e nce

Gąsiorowski, Stefan, Karaimi w Koronie i na Litwie w XV–XVIII wieku (Kraków: Austeria, 2008) Haig, Geoffrey, ‘The Invisibilisation of Kurdish: The Other Side of Language Planning in Turkey’, in Die Kurden: Studien zu ihrer Sprache, Geschichte und Kultur, ed. by Stefan Conermann and Geoffrey Haig (Schenefeld: EB, 2004), pp. 121–50 Hobsbawm, Eric, Nations and Nationalism Since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990) Kizilov, Mikhail, ‘The Arrival of the Karaites (Karaims) to Poland and Lithuania: A Survey of Sources and Critical Analysis of Existing Theories’, Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevi, 12 (2003/2004), 29–45 ———, ‘Between the Jews and the Khazars: The Formation of the Ethnic Identity and Historical Views of the East European Karaites in the General Context of European History from the Late Eighteen Century until Today’, Pinkas: Annual of the Culture and History of East European Jewry, 2 (2008), 45–64 ———, ‘Karaite Joseph Ezra Dubitskii and King John III Sobieski: On Jewish Physicians, Christianity, and Fifteenth-Century Illuminated Manuscript from Windsor Castle’, East European Jewish Affairs, 38.1 (2008), 45–64 ———, ‘Social Adaptation and Manipulation with Self-Identity: Karaites in Eastern Europe in Modern Times’, in Karaites in Eastern Europe in the Last Generations ( Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute and Centre for Research on the History and Culture of Polish Jews, 2011), pp. 130–53 Kowalski, Tadeusz, ‘Turecka monografja o Karaimach krymskich’, Myśl Karaimska, 2.2 (1929), 1–8 Mickūnaitė, Giedrė, Vytautas Didysis. Valdovo įvaizdis (Vilnius: VDA leidykla, 2008) Miller, Philip E., Karaite Separatism in Nineteenth-Century Russia: Joseph Solomon Lutski’s Epistle of Israel’s Deliverance (New York: Hebrew Union College Press, 1993) Miškinienė, Galina, ‘Lietuvos totorių padavimai: tarp mito ir realybės’ [The Stories of Lithuanian Tatars], in Tautinės mažumos Lietuvoje: virsmai ir atmintys, ed. by Aivaras Stepukonis, Lietuvos kultūros tyrimų institutas, (Vilnius: Lietuvos kultūros tyrimų institutas, 2014) pp. 165–73, 267–68 Rowell, Stephen Christopher, ‘Lietuva, tėvyne mūsų? Tam tikrų XVI a. LDK raštijų pavyzdžiai’, in Senosios raštijos ir tautosakos sąveika: kultūrinė Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės patirtis, ed. by Rita Repšienė, Senoji Lietuvos literatūra, 6 (Vilnius: Lietuvių literatūros ir tautosakos institutas, 1998), pp. 131–32 Safronovas, Vasilijus, Praeitis kaip konflikto šaltinis. Tapatybės ideologijų konkurencija XX a. Klaipėdoje (Vilnius: Lietuvos istorijos instituto leidykla, 2011) Shapira, Dan, Avraham Firkowicz in Istambul 1830–1832: Paving the Way for Turkic Nationalism (Ankara: KaraM, 2003) ———, ‘Turkism, Polish Sarmatism and “Jewish szlachta”: Some Reflections on a Cultural Context of the Polish-Lithuanian Karaites’, Karadeniz Araştırmaları (Black Sea Studies), 20 (2009), 29–43 Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, Jurgita, Žydai LDK visuomenėje: sugyvenimo aspektai (Vilnius: Žara, 2009)

25 7

258

d ov il e tro s kovai t e

Staliūnas, Darius, ‘Jewish Issue in the 19th century’, in Lithuanian Jews: Historical Study, ed. by Darius Staliūnas, Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickienė, and Vladas Sirutavičius (Vilnius: Baltos Lankos, 2012), pp. 191–204 Vasiliauskas, Artūras, ‘Antika ir sarmatizmas’, in Lietuvos didžiosios kunigaikštijos kultūra. Tyrinėjimai ir vaizdai (Vilnius: Aidai, 2001), pp. 13–31

Andrzej Pleszczyński

Portraying the People and Lands of Eastern Europe in Polish Writings up to the Union of Lublin (1569)

It is significant that one of the more dynamic political and cultural borders of Europe today runs through the middle of the former Polish-Lithuanian state. This border divides those whose ancestors chose to adopt Catholicism, who now live within the European Union, from those whose ancestors elected to join the Orthodox Byzantine Church and remain outside this community. It seems interesting to examine at what the coexistence of citizens of different confessions and different ethnicities was like in the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, because despite these differences dividing people today, this country has lasted, sometimes in good shape, for several centuries. The issue is very extensive. In one of the previous chapters Jurgita Verbickienė has showed how the court of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania secured the stability of the Grand Duchy by providing a historical metanarrative that bound together all ethnicities in the Duchy. In this chapter I will try to present another side of the coin, namely how Poles, who were political leaders in the former Polish-Lithuanian state, perceived their eastern neighbours. The time limit for reflection here will be 1569, i.e. the conclusion of the Polish-Lithuanian Real Union. This caesura is treated flexibly because, in essence, the Union did not change anything with respect to the question of ethnic relations discussed here. Such a change took only place at the end of the sixteenth century, when certain social processes launched as a result of the union, amongst other, transformed the Polish-Lithuanian state. It is surprising that the topic presented here has never been seriously explored. Polish scholars have shown little interest.1 Outside Poland, Polish issues have never

1 Only a few publications have been devoted to this issue: Gieysztor, ‘Obraz Rusi’, and Skomiał, ‘Polscy kronikarze’; a wider context of the case is Sielicki, Polsko-ruskie. For earlier Polish historiography see Dąbrowski, Dawne dziejopisarstwo polskie, Grabski, Dzieje historiografii; similarly, some earlier (obsolete) geographical studies are in Nowakowski, Historia; Buczek, The History of Polish Cartography. Andrzej Pleszczyński  •  ([email protected]) is a Professor of Medieval History, Marie Curie-Skłodowska University, Lublin. His main research interests are the early and high medieval history of Central and Eastern Europe, German-Polish relations during the Middle Ages, and medieval chronicles. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 259–287 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120066

26 0

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

Map. 13.1 Poland and Lithuania in 1526. Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.

been particularly popular. But the matter under examination here is important and worthwhile for many reasons, especially because until the time of the relative Europeanization of Russia and its rise in power, which took place in the first half of the eighteenth century, the views of Western European authors on matters of Eastern Europe were largely shaped on the basis of Polish texts.2 In this article I present the most important medieval and early modern texts, either Polish or originating in Poland, that express opinions on the people of Eastern Europe. Proceeding in a chronological order, I also try to establish the ideological basis of these accounts and analyse their cultural meaning. Generally speaking, out of all peoples of Eastern Europe with whom the Poles either neighboured or somehow had contact, the Rus’ occupied a special place. The ancestors of today’s Ukrainians and Belarussians have always been present in the history of Poland and its written accounts. Much less information — which appeared



2 As evidenced, for example, in the popularity of the work of Maciej Miechowita, Tractatus de duabus Sarmatiis Asiana et Europiana et de contentis in eis, published in Cracow (1517) and then translated into many European languages.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

later, starting in the thirteenth century — is provided in the old Polish literature about Lithuanians and other inhabitants of the region: nomadic peoples (especially Tatars), Russians (Moscow people),3 and Jews. This situation was mainly due to religious reasons and related political considerations: the Balts were pagans until the fourteenth century and the eastern nomads converted to Islam at the end of the thirteenth century. The Rus’, because of various dynastic marriages (entered into despite different confessions) and related political involvement in the neighbouring country,4 therefore appears in all writings about the history of Poland, almost from its beginnings. The method of their presentation depends on many different factors related not only to the character of the phenomena described, but also — somewhat obviously — to the message of the text. The oldest records made in Poland containing information about its eastern neighbours concern the activity of Bruno of Querfurt, a German missionary, a relative of Emperor Otto III, who cooperated with the Polish monarch Boleslav I the Brave. The missionary, later a saint, is the author of a short but valuable work, the so-called Letter of Bruno of Querfurt to King Henry II, written about 1008,5 in which the author tried to encourage the German ruler to break alliances with the pagan Veleti. He did this, among other means, by idealizing the figure of the Rus’ prince Vladimir the Great, who, in his depiction, was a truly Christian monarch, guardian, and protector of the Church.6 After all, the grand prince of Kiev supported Bruno’s mission to the Pechenegs — a Turkish nomadic people then occupying the steppes of the Black Sea.7 Another text confirming the activity of the Saxon missionary and containing information about Eastern Europe is Hystoria de praedicatione episcopi Brunonis (The story of Bishop Bruno’s sermon), written by Wipert — the only survivor of the last missionary expedition and witness of Bruno’s martyrdom, which took place in 1009 somewhere on the border of Poland, Prussia, Lithuania, and Rus’.8 The original text dictated by Wipert (he was blinded by the pagans, and his companions killed) did not survive and its content is known only from late medieval edited revisions.9 In this source we find the first appearance of the name of Lithuania, on the border of which the saint is said to have been killed.10 However, the above texts are quite concise. The first more extensive information about the peoples and countries of the east of the continent recorded in Poland comes



3 I will use the following terminology: old Russia/n = Kievian Rus’; Rus’, Ruthenia/n = eastern Slavic lands and people belonging to the Polish Lithuanian state; Russia/n = the State of Moscow. 4 Kuczyński, ‘Stosunki polsko-ruskie’; Włodarski, Polska i Ruś; Golovko, ‘Problema politicheskogo’. 5 Brunonis Querfurtensis Epistola, ed. by Karwasińska; Tyszkiewicz, Brunon z Querfurtu; Wiszewski, Domus Bolezlai, pp. 22–28. 6 Warner, ‘Saints, Pagans, War and Rulership in Ottonian Germany’. 7 The literature on this issue has been recently collected by Kollinger, Polityka wschodnia, pp. 61–86. 8 Kollinger, Polityka wschodnia, pp. 116–54. 9 Historia de praedicatione, ed. by Pertz; Zeissberg, ‘Die Kriege Kaiser Heinrich’s II’, pp. 361–62; Eder, ‘Die Schule des Klosters Tegernsee’, pp. 128–29. 10 Baronas, ‘The Year 1009’.

261

262

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

from the oldest historiographical work written in the Polish territory, the so-called Deeds of the Princes of the Poles of Gallus Anonymous,11 completed at the beginning of the twelfth century. The author of the work is unknown — the name Gallus was given to him in the nineteenth century on the wave of the Polish francophilia of the time.12 The work was written primarily with the aim of glorifying the ruler Boleslav III Wrymouth (1107–1138), as well as extolling the achievements of his ancestors, particularly Boleslav I the Brave (992–1025). Perhaps due to this intention, the work was made in the form of a res gestae — a history of warriors’ achievements.13 A significant part of the Piasts’ wartime fame written by Gallus was related to their wars against the Rus’ rulers, out of which the greatest interest was aroused concerning the conquest of Kiev by Boleslav the Brave in 1018 (lib. 1, c. 7, 10) and the expedition to the capital of Rus’ undertaken in 1069 by another Polish ruler, Boleslav the Bold (lib. 1, c. 23). The accounts of Gallus Anonymous about these two expeditions to the capital of Rus’ were heavily permeated with a specific style that was intended to demonstrate the advantages of the brave Polish warriors over the Rus’ people, who were depicted as being similar to peasants.14 We know, however, that the anonymous author was a foreigner, so in order to understand the context better his account should be compared with the judgements of the first native chronicler, Wincenty Kadłubek, who wrote the Chronica Polonorum (The Polish Chronicle), the most popular Polish medieval chronicle.15 Wincenty Kadłubek came from the family of the magnates of the Lesser Poland, and it has been noted that he obtained his university education in Roman countries, probably in Italy or France.16 He then became a secretary in the office of the duke of Kraków, Casimir II the Just, and later held the office of bishop of Kraków from 1208–1218. The content of his work is therefore suspended between the views of the Polish elite and a certain universal knowledge, which Kadłubek had acquired during his studies. As Lesser Poland was then strongly connected politically with the West Ruthenian principalities,17 we can find in Kadłubek’s chronicle many references to the interventions of the dukes of Kraków in Rus’ and the participation of Ruthenian rulers in Poland’s internal politics. Generally, they are described in a quite neutral tone, although the Poles were of course presented as morally better. In this chronicle we can also find descriptions of the wartime achievements of Boleslav I the Brave and Boleslav II the Bold and there we meet different tones of narration. In the case of Boleslav I’s expedition, the Polish chronicler, sharing the opinions of Gallus Anonymous’s

11 Galli Anonimi chronicae et gestae, ed. by Maleczyński; the Latin-English edition is The Deeds of the Princes, ed. by Knoll and Schaer. 12 The most recent works (with the new research method applied) attempting to determine the origin of the author have been published by Tomasz Jasiński ( Jasiński, Kronika Polska Galla Anonima). 13 Different opinions on the issue have been listed in Wiszewski, Domus Bolezlai, pp. 124–56. 14 Gieysztor, ‘Obraz Rusi’, p. 11; for more about the context of the narration of Gallus Anonymous see Banaszkiewicz, ‘Bolesław i Peredsława’. 15 Magistri Vincentii Chronica, ed. by Plezia; German edition: Die Chronik der Polen, ed. by Mühle. 16 Kürbis, ‘Mistrz Wincenty’. 17 Włodarski, Polityka ruska.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

presentation, introduced additional details about the battle with the armies of Yaroslav the Wise and it is probably the only time in Polish historiography that the term ‘barbarians’ is used to refer to the Rus’ people (lib. 2, c. 12).18 On the other hand, Boleslav II’s wartime episode was expanded by Kadłubek into a vast story, imbued with topical content that explained the conflict between the Polish king and the bishop of Kraków, Stanisław (lib. 2, c. 18, 20). According to the chronicler, the king fought for too long in Ruthenia which made him feel wild. After returning home, when the king found out that some wives of his warriors had betrayed their husbands, he punished them cruelly and, among other things, ordered puppies to be attached to their breasts. The bishop protested, and the king was in a frenzy to kill him himself. A new theme of the chronicle which was then included in the repertoire of topics addressed by successive Polish historiographical works was an adventure story about Piotr Włostowic,19 the voivode of Duke Bolesław the Wrymouth, who kidnapped and took the Rus’ prince Volodar to Poland.20 The publicity surrounding this event caused it to be preserved in the literary tradition of the monastery in Zwiefalten in Swabia, a centre quite distant from Poland, but associated with Princess Salomea, wife of Bolesław the Wrymouth (1102–1138).21 An important source of the history of Poland until the thirteenth century, which also documents Poland’s relations with Eastern European peoples, is The Chronicle of Greater Poland,22 written probably at the end of that century. This work, known only from the edited revision completed about a century after the time of its creation, is a compilation of many different sources. It is significant that the anonymous author — who certainly belonged to the Greater Poland elite — was well versed in the history of Poland23 and knew also much about Rus’ issues. For the first time in Polish historiography, the so-called chorography appears, creating imaginary protoplasts of nations from Noah’s offspring and distributing their settlements in the areas of the ecumene. Although these contents are in fact a complete invention — based, however, on an old literary tradition24 — they nevertheless reflect important ideological issues, a belief in the value of particular peoples, relationships between them, rights to occupied territories, and the like. Of the people of Eastern Europe, only the Rus’ appear in the chorography of this chronicle. The author had no doubts that they were the countrymen of Poles and Bohemians, claiming that all these peoples originate from Pannonia — their ancestor, whom he once calls the Lord, and once Slaus, was said to have lived there. The term ‘Slavs’ was supposed to have been derived from his name.25

18 Gieysztor, ‘Obraz Rusi’, p. 11. 19 For a brief discussion of Peter Wlostowic, with references, see Strzelczyk, ‘Peter Wlast/Wlostowic’. 20 Magistri Vincentii Chronica, ed. by Plezia, lib. 3, 20. 21 Wieczorek, ‘Die Schenkungen Bolesławs III’. 22 Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis. 23 Skibiński, ‘Kronika wielkopolska’; also Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis, pp. xxii ff. 24 Rott, Staropolskie chorografie, pp. 30–61. 25 Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis, pp. 10–12 (c. 4–5).

263

264

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

The Chronicle of Greater Poland has a large number of references to the Eastern peoples who are not present in other Polish historiography. These include the Lithuanians26 who formed the strong state and were grouped together as a politically significant people, especially after their conquest of large areas of western Rus’.27 The other group who merited inclusion were the Mongol-Tatars, who in the years 1238–1240 formed the so-called Golden Horde; at first they belonged to a semi-independent state within the great Mongol Empire for about two decades, and then, until the fourteenth century, they were a sovereign regional power which seriously threatened all peoples of Eastern and Central Europe.28 Even after the division into a series of smaller states at the beginning of the fifteenth century, the Tatars — especially the Crimean Tatars — constituted a significant political group in the region until the seventeenth century.29 Neither the Lithuanians nor the Tatars were included in the chorography composed by the author of the chronicle — it was reserved for the community with a long history, rooted in tradition. However, much attention in the chronicle is devoted to the description of the thirteenth-century Polish-Rus’ conflicts: especially the famous Battle of Zawichost of 1205 between the troops of the Duchy of Kraków and the Vladimir-Halychi army commanded by Prince Roman.30 Although the ruler of the Rus’ died on the battlefield, this episode heralded the period of the Rus’ expansion into Polish lands. Daniel, the son of Roman, managed to occupy the area between the Wieprz and Bug rivers as far as the town of Drohiczyn.31 Orthodox parishes were established in the conquered areas, arousing the concern of the Catholic hierarchy, and perhaps this is why this expansion was presented as a religious war in the Polish and Western European historiography (which used Polish texts as sources). Prince Roman would, therefore, have had a desire to destroy Catholicism, and his defeat constituted a divine judgement.32 The situation changed to the disadvantage of the Rus’ when, at the end of 1238, the western parts of the country were attacked by the Mongols, who in 1239–1240 made almost all Rus’ dependent on them. Although the invaders retained the existing political structure, the country was seriously damaged during the wars.33 While the chronicler of Greater Poland reported the Tatar incursions, his descriptions are relatively brief and do not especially refer to the cruelty of the nomads,34 as was later emphasized by the fifteenth-century chronicler Jan Długosz. 26 Sometimes, however, he is not well informed with regard to the state — for instance when he writes that Mendog was the king of Prussia — Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis, p. 114 (c. 132). 27 Rowell, Lithuania Ascending, pp. 82 ff.; Eidintas, Bumblauskas, Kalakauskas, and Tomašaitis, The History of Lithuania, pp. 34–40. 28 Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia; Pelenski, ‘The Contest’. 29 Kołodziejczyk, The Crimean Khanate, pp. 3–63. 30 Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis, p. 79 (c. 55); Subtelny, Ukraine, p. 61. 31 Włodarski, Polska i Ruś, pp. 45 ff.; Bartnicki, Polityka zagraniczna, pp. 33–47. 32 Albrici monachi chronica, ed. by Scheffer-Boichorst, p. 885. 33 Halperin, Russia and Golden Horde; Spuler, Die Goldene Horde, pp. 11 ff. 34 Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Kürbis, pp. 87–88 (c. 71), pp. 113–14 (c. 130) — here the Rus’ accusations about the betrayal in the interest of Tatars appear, and there is also information about the massacre of the inhabitants of Sandomierz.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

Another fairly significant and interesting Polish historiographical work of the fourteenth century, written by Jan from Czarnków, the deputy chancellor of King Casimir the Great, contains few references to the peoples of Eastern Europe. The author, in this relatively short work which only covered the years 1370–1384, devoted much of his attention exclusively to the Lithuanians.35 In general, these accounts are unfavourable, as they recounted either incursions into Polish lands or wars for Galicia, waged against them by Casimir the Great. However, the Lithuanians became a point of interest for the Polish political elite, because both countries had a dangerous common enemy — the Teutonic Order. As often happened in history, political agreements between Poles and Lithuanians were concluded with the support of family relationships. Initially, only Lithuanian princesses appeared at Polish courts36 — at that time there was already a relatively firm rule that a Christian could not marry a pagan, although it was not universally respected (or even at all) prior to this period.37 The most important of these marriages is the 1325 wedding of the daughter of the Lithuanian prince Giedyminas, Aldona (after baptism — Anna) with the Polish prince Casimir the Great.38 At that time, the Lithuanians strongly supported the then Polish king, Ladislaus (Polish: Władysław) I the Elbow-high, in the war with Brandenburg. The pagan troops attacked the March at the turn of 1326 and 1327, with the areas near Frankfurt on the Oder being said to have been especially badly damaged, which was widely echoed in Europe.39 The most diverse and extensive overview of information about Eastern Europe from among all Polish texts written in the Middle Ages can be found in the monumental work of Jan Długosz, Annals or Chronicles of the Famous Kingdom of Poland.40 Jan Długosz began the work in 1455, when as a Kraków canon he joined the group of collaborators of King Casimir Jagiellon, and he continued writing it until his death in 1480.41 In his twelve extensive books, he presents the history of Poland from its mythical beginnings to his own times, using Rus’ sources profusely — hence we can find much, only slightly modified, and sometimes even directly quoted information taken from the authors of old Russian chronicles.42 At the beginning of his work, Długosz placed an exhaustive chorography, which, as far as Slavic peoples are concerned, is consistent in general terms with what the

35 Joannis de Czarnkow chronicon, ed. by Szlachtowski. 36 The first was Gaudemunda, the daughter of Prince Trojden, who reinforced her father’s alliance with the Mazovian Bolesław II: Frost, The Oxford History of Poland-Lithuania, p. 28; Powierski, ‘Polityczne’. 37 Sághy, ‘Pious Women and Political Scapegoats’; Nolte, Conversio und Christianitas. 38 Rowell, ‘Pious Princesses or Daughters of Belial’, p. 47. 39 Petrus de Dusburgk, Chronica terrae prussiae, ed. by Wenta and Wyszomirski, p. 267 (lib. 3, c. 361); Assing, ‘Die Landesherrschaft’, pp. 137 ff.; Samsonowicz, ‘Ziemie polskie widziane z Lubeki’, p. 504. 40 Dlugossi, Ioannis Dlugossi Annales seu cronicae incliti Regni Poloniae, ed. by Budkowa and others (hereafter Ioannis Dlugossi Annales). 41 Perzanowska, ‘Wiadomości źródłowe’; also: Grzeszczuk, ed., Pisarze staropolscy, pp. 132–73. 42 This fact can be observed for instance in an extended section devoted to the beginnings of the Rus’ state, which shows some convergence with the text of the Russian The Tale of Past Years: Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 1, pp. 121–23; Perfeckij, Historia Polonica Jana Długosze a ruské dejopisectví, pp. 12-15; see also Grala, ‘Tradycja dziejopisarska o pobycie władcy Bizancjum’.

265

26 6

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

anonymous author of The Chronicle of Greater Poland had previously written, although it is much more extensive.43 There is, however, a significant difference between the two texts: one can see Długosz’s distance from the Rus’, which is revealed — more or less — in various parts of his work. In the chorography, this distance prompted Długosz to claim that the progenitor of the people, Rus, is not the brother of Lech and Czech, but only their nephew.44 The specific attitude of the chronicler to the Rus’ can also be seen, for example, in his way of describing the figure of Roman the Great. First, he was allegedly under the authority of the duke of Kraków, Leszek the White, and was required to pay him tribute — a situation which Długosz deemed appropriate.45 Then, however, when Leszek’s forces had weakened, Roman ceased to recognize his authority. What is more, he invaded the land of his former master, as Długosz wrote with indignation. Leszek — as the chronicler emphasizes — tried to settle the matter amicably, but this only emboldened Roman, who now organized a general incursion into Poland with the intention of ‘ravaging Catholic countries for three years’.46 This phrase is reminiscent of words already seen in the work of the Cistercian chronicler Alberic of Trois-Fontaines, who stated that Roman ‘the king of Rus’’ wanted to pass through Poland in 1205 in order to attack Saxony.47 Two brothers, Princes Leszek and Konrad, who stopped him on the Vistula River and defeated Roman by the will of God, thus became the defenders of Western Christianity against schismatics. In fact, Długosz’s attitude towards the Rus’ was quite ambivalent — as a high-profile Catholic priest, ‘officially’ he could not tolerate their schismatic faith,48 but he also praised the alleged refusal of the Orthodox bishop Wladimir to bless the army of Roman the Great marching against Poland — an incident which he probably fabricated, as this story is completely unknown in the Ruthenian tradition. Also noteworthy is the chronicler’s clear disgust when he described how Leszek the White, after strengthening his power in Lesser Poland, successfully attacked Rus’ and captured one of the local princes, Sviatoslav and several of his knights, and ordered them all to be hung. The historian wrote that the crime was the reason why Leszek had no offspring and was treacherously killed in Gąsawa in 1227.49 It seems that the above-mentioned heterogeneity of attitude in the work of Jan Długosz towards the Rus’ stems from the fact that it was written within a period of about twenty-five years. During the creation of this multi-volume work, the views

43 Aleksandrowicz, ʻZiemie Wielkiego Ksiestwa Litewskiego’. 44 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 1, pp. 121–23; see also Leciejewicz, ‘Legendy etnogenetyczne’ and Janeczek, Świadomość wspólnoty słowiańskiej. 45 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 6, pp. 191 ff. 46 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 6, pp. 192–97. 47 Albrici monachi chronica, p. 885; see Maiorov, ‘Pokhod Romana’. 48 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, p. 170. Generally, Długosz reproached the Rus’ for perversity and ill will — for example, he attributed to them the treason and surrender of Sandomierz to the Tatars in 1259: Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 7, pp. 124–26; p. 250; lib. 10, pp. 132 f.; on this event, see Krakowski, Polska, pp. 190–93. 49 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 6, p. 200.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

and opinions of the author also changed. In Długosz’s text, we also find information about the Rus’ bravely fighting against the Pechenegs and Cumans, nomads from the Black Sea steppes, and about the initial Rus’ advantage over the Lithuanians, who only in the thirteenth century managed to throw off dependence on the Rus’, and soon began to attack and conquer it themselves.50 Długosz also formulated ambivalent opinions in relation to the Lithuanians: on the one hand, he noted their combat values with some respect for them, but on the other, he did not trust them and very often tried to discredit their behaviour — and not only when he condemned the cruelty of the Lithuanians’ pagan incursions into Poland.51 In general, he tried to suggest that their military successes were associated more with cunning and deception used in combat than simply with bravery and their honest, chivalrous appearance in the open field, face-to-face with the enemy.52 Even Władysław Jagiełło himself, who was undoubtedly an outstanding king, was in the opinion of Długosz (who generally appreciated his merits) sometimes a ‘cunning Lithuanian’, superstitious, practising some questionable witchcraft, and was suspiciously committed to the Rus’ faith and Orthodox ‘schismatic’ paintings, with which he ordered the walls in several Polish churches to be painted, for example in Lublin.53 The chronicler even wanted to deprive Jagiełło of his merit in defeating the Teutonic Knights in the famous battle of Grunwald (1410), writing that after a powerful attack of German knights, a significant part of the Lithuanians fled the battlefield and it was the Poles who stayed who won the battle, assisted by warriors from Smolensk.54 In this situation, it is puzzling that Jan Długosz ascribed a noble origin from Latins to Lithuanians and Samogitians (he differentiates these two peoples). He even questioned whether they had come directly from the Romans. In any case, he twice repeats that the Lithuanian ancestors were supposed to have left Italia during the civil wars which ‘first broke out between Gaius Marius and Sulla, and then between Julius Caesar and Pompey the Great’.55 Each time he noted that the Lithuanian language is a variation of Latin, and the name ‘Lithuanians’ is derived from the distorted term ‘Italy’. He also claimed that the religion of Lithuanians was the same as that of the Romans, except for the custom of burning the dead. It is significant that Długosz did not include all this information in the chorography at the beginning of his work, but only after presenting the circumstances of the establishment of the Polish-Lithuanian Union of Krewo (1385), after the account of the marriage of Jagiełło (1386) with Queen Jadwiga of Poland, and after information about the baptism of his people. It is as if only then did the Lithuanians become worthy of a description of their origin, just like other civilized peoples. Długosz then also 50 51 52 53 54 55

Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 6, pp. 198, 224–25; Rowell, Lithuania Ascending, pp. 266–69. Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 7, pp. 100, 138 f., 151, 163, 183, 197. Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 7, pp. 217 f., 220; lib. 9, pp. 31, 331 f.; lib. 10, pp. 13, 166. Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 11, pp. 123–28; Różycka-Bryzek, Freski bizantyńsko-ruskie. Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 11, p. 106; see Kuczyński, Wielka wojna z Zakonem Krzyżackim, pp. 379 ff. Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, pp. 164 f.; see Eidintas, Bumblauskas, Kalakauskas, and Tomašaitis, The History of Lithuania, pp. 12–13.

267

26 8

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

included a short description of the Lithuanians as a people inherently silent, proud, prone to rebellion and lying, impetuous, and stingy. He also ascribed to them a passion for drunkenness and debauchery, as well as the tendency to practice divination.56 An important component of the reality of Eastern Europe were the Tatars, who led a nomadic life on the steppes of the Black and Caspian Seas. Długosz, of course, was not sparing in his condemnation of the cruelty of their incursions into Poland and Rus’. There is a great deal of such content in his work, and some of it, such as the account of the first incursion in 1241,57 is considerable. Presentation and analysis of his reports on the devastations wreaked by the Tatars could constitute a separate extensive article.58 On the other hand, Długosz also noted and respected the combat values ​​of the nomads, not ignoring their participation in the battle of Grunwald (1410) on the side of Jagiełło who opposed the army of the Teutonic Order.59 He was also proud that some of the Khans’ legations offered military assistance and alliance with Polish kings.60 The Moscow State is the last to be mentioned in Polish literature, in accordance with the chronology. Jan Długosz mentions it more extensively on the occasion of the liberation of Moscow from the dependence on the Tatars (1480). He, as if somewhat shocked, related the humiliating rituals of serfdom, in which the Moscow rulers had to participate previously, which were enacted not only before the Khan, but even before his envoys.61 Regarding the ruler of Moscow himself, the most characteristic mention by the chronicler was that the ruler felt in no way bound by the agreements with Novgorod, which he broke when, as a result of the Polish king Casimir Jagiellon’s passivity, this city-republic fell under the rule of Ivan the Great of Moscow (1478).62 It is worth mentioning one more people living in Eastern Europe, relatively frequently commented on by Długosz, although they did not have their own state or army, nor were they directly involved in politics. Jan Długosz probably disliked the Jews more than any other people living in the region, although this attitude was not underpinned by racist factors, as we could define them today, but by religious ones. The chronicler addressed this directly when he postulated: ‘Let the Poles take an example from the Spaniards who do not despise any human origin […] and entrust bishoprics and high dignities to neophytes from Jews or Saracens’.63 Długosz mentioned Jews for the first time when he related that Adalbert of Prague (997) opposed the sale of Christians as slaves.64 Most often, the historian stigmatized 56 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, pp. 167–69. 57 Labuda, Zaginiona kronika; see also Urbański, Tartarorum gens brutalis and Menache, ‘Tartars, Jews, Saracens and the Jewish-Mongol’. 58 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 7, pp. 11–26. 59 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 11, pp. 69, 72, 106; Teutonic Knights tried to use this fact as propaganda: Christiansen, The Northern Crusades, pp. 237–39. 60 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 11, p. 109; Tyszkiewicz, Tatarzy, pp. 110–43. 61 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 12, p. 183; Martin, Medieval Russia, pp. 288 f. 62 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 12, pp. 442 ff.; Fennell, Ivan the Great, pp. 29–65; Ostrowski, ‘The Growth of Moscovy’. 63 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. I, p. 108. 64 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 2, pp. 202, 210.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

the alleged hostility of Jews towards the followers of Christ, as in the passage describing the pogrom which took place in Prague in 1389,65 after the Jews threw stones in the direction of a priest who was walking with a viaticum through their district. Długosz does not doubt that ‘the slaughter and burning of Jews in Prague was made by letting the just judgement of God be implemented’.66 The chronicler also believed that the Jews wished to profane the host,67 which, after all, fell within their strong resistance to the faith of Christ, even when the divine power sent miracles to them in order to encourage their conversion.68 A measure of the historian’s prejudices against Jews is reflected well in a section of his work where he reports that at the Polish siege of Lutsk in 1431, during the civil war in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the commander of the defenders, the Lithuanian Jursza gave a young Polish prisoner to the Jews. They supposedly bled him, took out his heart and other viscera, and then burned him, filling the castle with smoke to ensure the success of the defence.69 In the aforementioned passage of the chronicle, of course, we can see a reflection of beliefs very popular in Europe about the so-called ritual murders committed by the Jews.70 It is no wonder then that the people who committed such atrocities must, according to the chronicler, have been treated badly,71 as revealed by his opinion that during the conflict between the Bohemian Przemysł I and the Prague bishop Ondřej, the monarch imposed such high taxes on the clergy that ‘the Christians and priests were humiliated by Bohemians more than the Jews’.72 The past repression of the Jews was also seen as natural, and Długosz wrote with satisfaction that ‘Titus sold Jews for 31 denarii because Christ was sold for 30 coins’.73 It is, nonetheless, interesting that the chronicler saw nothing inappropriate in the dignitaries of the Catholic Church often intensively collaborating economically with this people, so hated by him.74 The annals of Jan Długosz became the most popular and influential presentation of the history of Poland from the late medieval period up to the emergence of critical historiography in the nineteenth century, which questioned some of his theses. In fact, every compendium of the country’s past used the work of the Kraków canon, or at least referred to it in some way,75 as can be observed in the case of works written in the first half of the sixteenth century in Poland, which included historiographical content, and mixed geographical and historical contents.

65 Hanisch, Die Luxemburger. 66 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, p. 178. 67 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, p. 236; for more see Bell 2005. 68 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 7, pp. 359 ff., pp. 281 ff. 69 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 11, p. 43. 70 Rose, Ritual Murder; The Blood Libel Legend; also Biale, Blood and Belief, pp. 81–122. 71 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 12, pp. 171, 215; see Manikowska, ‘Więź narodowa i państwowa’, pp. 892 ff. 72 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 6, p. 281. 73 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 12, p. 303: [Titus], ‘qui Iudeos triginta uno denario vendidit proper Christum triginta nummis venditum’. 74 Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, p. 109. 75 Cynarski, ‘Uwagi nad problemem recepcji’; also Dymmel, Tradycja rękopiśmienna Roczników.

269

270

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

In particular, we should mention here the works of Bernard Wapowski — a high-profile scholar, geographer, and historian, and as well as being well versed in contemporary political relations, he was the secretary and official historiographer of King Sigismund I of Poland (1507–1548). While Wapowski is mainly known for his cartographic works,76 he also wrote a comprehensive history of Poland. Because he was busy with various matters, he did not publish it — and as a result, only a part of the work covering the years 1380–153577 was preserved. It is a valuable source of the history of Polish-Lithuanian and Polish-Russian relations, particularly the parts extending beyond the period covered by Jan Długosz’s chronicle, and contains evidence of the contemporary attitudes of the Polish elites to other Eastern European peoples. A novelty in Wapowski’s text is that we find, not explicitly but only indirectly stated (as if unconsciously), an express conviction that Poles, Lithuanians, and the Rus’ constitute one community. In this chronicle some formulations are also found which additionally confirm this concept. The source of this idea for the chronicler was primarily the union of Krewo, in which Jagiełło was to guarantee, as Jan Długosz had already written, that the entire Grand Duchy of Lithuania,78 consisting mostly of Rus’ lands, will be incorporated into Poland. In addition, however, Wapowski mentioned that in 1432, Sigismund Kęstutaitis, then the Grand Duke, again agreed that ‘Lithuanians, united and incorporated into the Kingdom of Poland, are to constitute one nation, one people with Poles for all ages’.79 The historical, or rather mythical, foundation of the belief expressed by Wapowski was the tradition of the habitation of one people in Central and Eastern Europe in antiquity, that is the Sarmatians.80 Although the concept of the origin of all the nobility of the nascent Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, regardless of ancestry and religion, from the ancient Sarmatians had not yet been developed in Wapowski, we still find its elements there. The author is undoubtedly proud of the politically and, to some extent, ideologically united peoples, and is even pleased that ‘only Sarmatia delivers so many noble animals’ that can be found in the Lithuanian forests.81 As well, he appears proud of the strength of countries united into one state when he wrote that ‘no force can undermine the bliss and power of the Kingdom resulting from joining with Lithuania, as long as the brotherhood of the two great nations continues’.82 These words apply only to Poles and Lithuanians, but it should be remembered that even then the Lithuanian elite spoke mostly Ruthenian (and less frequently Polish), and this language and writing were official in the Grand Duchy, which was the consequence of the mixing of Lithuanian and Ruthenian elites through

76 Buczek, The History of Polish Cartography, pp. 32–40. 77 The work has not been edited — it is only available in old Polish: Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej. 78 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, pp. 53 f., vol. 2, p. 72. 79 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, p. 168. 80 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, pp. 69, 77; for more about such phenomena, see Długosz and Scholz, Sarmatismus, especially Srodecki, ʻValidissima semper Christianitatis propugnacula’. 81 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, pp. 3, 14. 82 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, p. 59.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

dynastic marriages that occurred even in pagan times. Thus, the chronicler, when writing about the Lithuanians, also must have meant the Rus’.83 In another fragment of his work, Wapowski developed the concept of a certain community of Eastern European peoples in a different way. When he reported on the meeting of Jagiełło and Vytautas in Lutsk with the deputies of Sigismund of Luxembourg, he noted that they wanted to persuade the Jagiellonians to create an anti-Turkish coalition. Wapowski expressed his conviction that a covenant, if it was actually established and entered into, could expel the Muslims from Europe: ‘Poles, Lithuanians, Rus’ and Samogitians, Moskovits [Russians], and Vlachs’. Wapowski’s words seem to present the sphere of influence of the Kingdom of Poland; whereas ‘Hungarians and Bohemians’ were to stand by Sigismund of Luxembourg — making it possible to ‘banish the Turks from Greece with the help of the Thracians, Aetolians, Molossians, and other Greek peoples’.84 In fact, the chronicler outlined here the borders of eastern and south-eastern Europe, and, as he put it, when united, ‘these peoples will even free the Jerusalem’. These words indicate that the main element cementing all these peoples is, despite the differences of confession, Christianity. Later, Wapowski reported that Jagiełło sincerely desired a covenant, but Sigismund ‘treacherously wanted only the wrongs of Poland and Lithuania’. Thus, when the king of Poland in 1426 sent as a support to Sigismund, the ‘Roman king’, 5000 cavalry ‘chosen from the Ruthenian nobility, the Poles came to the Danube and waited there in vain for Sigismund’s army’.85 What is interesting — apart from the above-mentioned issue — is that the king chooses from among the Ruthenian nobility, but the army is collectively called Polish by Wapowski. The inclusion of the history of Lithuanians and Rus’ into Polish history and, in general, the inclusion of these peoples to the Polish ethnos, did not prevent Wapowski from condemning the flaws of the Rus’ and Lithuanians, while yet emphasizing the virtues of the Poles. In the time of the existence of traditional communities, one of the most important advantages of the people was its martial values. Therefore, when stating that — as the historian believes — the Lithuanians were very eager to fight, were impulsive, but quite easily gave way to the enemy, it is a grave accusation. Moreover, he said that they preferred plundering raids to a tough chivalrous fight.86 Similarly to Długosz, our author rebuked the Lithuanians for allegedly escaping from the battlefield in Grunwald, but praised their prince Vytautas for staying and motivating those who endured. Ruthenian regiments from Smolensk were supposed to be among them.87 In addition to lacking persistence in the war, another alleged failing of Lithuanians was drunkenness. However, in the same part of the text, Wapowski praises their

83 Krzyżaniakowa, and Ochmański, Władyław II, pp. 47–54; see also Mironowicz, ‘Kultura prawosławna’; Długosz emphasizes that even before Catholic baptism, Lithuanians and Rus’ mixed with each other: Ioannis Dlugossi Annales, lib. 10, p. 169. 84 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, p. 66. 85 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, p. 40. 86 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 82. 87 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, pp. 235 ff.; for more about Vytautas see Mickūnaitė, Making a Great Ruler.

27 1

272

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

women for their knowledge of the art of making fine carpets by hand.88 This kind of juxtaposition shows that the historian mixed older content taken from Długosz and some other stories he had heard with his own prejudices and distrust towards, in fact, all peoples of Eastern Europe. These opinions of Wapowski are clearly seen in his description of the convention of the Polish and Lithuanian-Ruthenian nobility in Parczew in 1446. He writes without distance and criticism, though in fact unjustifiably, that the Lithuanians had prepared an ambush for the Poles together with the Tatars,89 while also eagerly reporting that some Poles were reluctant to maintain an alliance with the Lithuanians. In the same year of the convention, one of the most noble Poles — Andrzej Tęczyński — was supposed to convince the nobility that it would be better to support Frederick, margrave of Brandenburg, in his attempts to obtain the Polish Crown, than to stand with the Jagiellonians.90 However, Wapowski later wrote that at the Lublin convention, the Lithuanian lords murmured about breaking the ties with Poland and occupying Podolia and other disputed lands, mainly Volhynia with Lutsk.91 In this atmosphere of mutual distrust, a war almost broke out in 1452 concerning the areas of Volhynia with Lutsk, which had been disputed for decades — Wapowski blames the king for the tensions, as he was appeared to favour the Lithuanians.92 Respecting Polish-Lithuanian disputes, in 1452 a great Tatar incursion befell Podole (also disputed), which was occupied by the Poles. The chronicler wrote that the Lithuanians sent one person from the Radziwiłł family with congratulations to the khan Sadakhmet, who was responsible for that deed. Meanwhile, however — as Wapowski notes with satisfaction — Sadakhmet (Sid Akhmet) was attacked and defeated by another Tatar khan Hajj-Girey,93 while his men seized and robbed the Lithuanian legation. The chronicler summed up the situation in the following way: ‘It was clear evidence of divine justice, clear condemnation of the unreasonable Lithuanian council, because Christians are forbidden to enter into any relationship with pagans for the loss of the faithful ones’.94 However, the above postulate was suspended when Wapowski wrote about alliances of Polish rulers with the Tatars. Therefore, he did not accuse Jagiełło of benefitting from the Tatars’ help in 1410 against the Teutonic Order,95 and a little later he even noted with some pride that Tatar tsar Zeladin had sent a legation to the king of Poland asking for a covenant, which in fact was concluded, and was supposed to terrify the ‘king’s enemies’, as the Tatars were outstanding warriors96 — they were

88 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 82. 89 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 3, p. 13. 90 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 3, p. 14. 91 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 3, pp. 37 ff. 92 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 3, p. 119. 93 Plewczyński, Wojny Jagiellonów, p. 19. 94 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 3, pp. 142 f. 95 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 226. 96 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 320.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

‘fantastic bowmen, presenting unrivalled agility in the battle’97 — so that there are no ‘braver warriors of our age’ than the Tatars. He also added that ‘they are toughest during hardships, cold, and hunger and even so ugly that they frighten their enemies with their look’.98 It should be noted that the attitude of the chronicler to the Rus’ is similar to those formulated about the Lithuanians — according to him, these two nations often cooperated with each other, also against the Poles. At least that is how Wapowski presented many episodes of the civil war (1432–1439) in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania between Sigismund Kęstutaitis, the king’s cousin, whom Władysław Jagiełło appointed as ruler, and Švitrigaila (the youngest brother of the king), the unsatisfied pretender to the Lithuanian throne. The latter was supported by some of the Lithuanians, but above all by the Orthodox Rus’, who felt like subjects of an inferior category — which Wapowski does not note — due to the issue of a number of regulations affecting the rights of Orthodox followers.99 The Poles, whose few misfortunes in the chronicler’s opinion could be explained by the betrayals of the Rus’ serving in their ranks, were on the side of Kęstutaitis.100 After several years of fighting, a decisive battle took place in 1435 at Ukmergė (on the Šventoji river). According to the chronicler, the opponents of Švitrigaila were commanded by Jakub Kobylański who led a considerable number of Polish troops. There were also Catholic Lithuanians, whom Wapowski assigned a subordinate role, commanded by Michal Kęstutaitis, son of the grand duke. Švitrigaila was supported by Sigismund Korybut, the king’s nephew, by Teutonic knights under the command of Kerskorff, the Livonian Grand Master, and by auxiliary Tatar forces. These troops, largely composed of Orthodox soldiers, were defeated, and the Teutonic master killed in the battle. Švitrigaila escaped, while Sigismund Korybut was seriously wounded as he was bravely fighting and fell into the hands of the Poles. The chronicler proudly emphasizes that Sigismund Korybut explained his refusal to leave the battlefield as Švitrigaila had done thusly: ‘I was brought up among you, spent so many years on the knight’s craft, that honour is more important to me than life, and I did not want to run away in disgrace’.101 In the light of some underestimation of the value of Lithuanians, it is quite puzzling that Wapowski, after Długosz, derives their origin from the Romans.102 He is inconsistent, however, because at another point in his work (only a page later), where he asserts that the Lithuanians came from the ancient Alans and Stavanoi,

97 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 135. 98 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 320. 99 However, some of them, although they were not respected everywhere, were formally in force until the reign of Sigismund Augustus, who removed them by means of edicts issued in 1549 and 1551: Chodynicki, Kościół prawosławny, pp. 88–90; Trajdos, Kościól katolicki; Halecki, From Florence to Brest, pp. 33–65. 100 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, pp. 132 ff. 101 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, pp. 244–46; for more about the battle see Kiaupa, Kiaupienė, and Kunevičius, eds, The History of Lithuania, pp. 205–07; Rowell, Lithuania Ascending, pp. 69 ff. 102 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, p. 78.

27 3

2 74

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

who once invaded Rome.103 Regardless of the nuances of the matter, each of these ancient people’s lineage ennobled their origin. Inconsistency in his approach to the assessment of Lithuanians is also revealed where he exaggerates the achievements of the Grand Duke Vytautas in the war against Edigu, the commander of Tamerlane. It is significant that at these points he calls Vytautas ‘Alexander’, without revealing that it is his baptismal name given to him by an Orthodox priest. So — as Wapowski emphasizes — the Lithuanian Alexander successfully fought against the armies of the Asian conqueror Tamerlane on the Dnieper, who wanted to join Europe to his empire.104 Here, we can clearly see the idea of Poland-Lithuania-Sarmatia as a Christian bulwark of Europe (‘antemurale’), a concept taken from Russian-Orthodox messianism.105 Other later Polish historiographers of the sixteenth century made use of the work of Wapowski: Marcin Kromer, author of De origine et rebvs gestis Polonorvm libri XXX [Thirty Books About the Origin and Deeds of Poles], published in Latin in 1555,106 and Marcin Bielski, who wrote in Polish, among other works The Universal Chronicle, published in 1551, from which his son Joachim selected Polish motifs, reworded them, and published them in 1597 as the Chronicle of Poland.107 The first of the above-mentioned authors, Marcin Kromer, belonged to a lower social sphere at that time — his father was a burgher, and only his mother was a noblewoman, but he obtained a comprehensive education at home and abroad and achieved a position similar to the above-mentioned historians — becoming secretary to King Sigismund I of Poland in the final years of his reign, and later performing the same service for the king’s son and successor, Sigismund II Augustus (1548–1572).108 The text of Kromer’s work duplicates all prejudices and distrust towards Eastern European peoples that Jan Długosz and Bernard Wapowski revealed in their works, with an even stronger religious overtone. Kromer alleged, for example, that since the baptism of Vladimir the Great (988) up to his times, the Rus’ ‘ghastly retain the Greek rituals’.109 He did not fail to emphasize the close relationship between Poles and Rome.110 He also describes with little objectivity the early medieval Ruthenian incursions into Poland as treacherous and unjust,111 although he saw nothing wrong in the insidious

103 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej. 104 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 1, pp. 135–40, 390; for more about historical context see Spuler, Die Goldene Horde; Grekov and Yakubovskiy, Zol’otaya Orda, pp. 374–405. 105 Weitraub, ‘Renaissance Poland’. 106 De origine et rebus gestis Polonorum libri XXX, also published in Polish in Kraków in 1611, and for the second edition see Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa (1857); I am using this second edition due to the lack of a critical edition. 107 I am using the following, Polish edition: Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego (1856); there is unfortunately no critical edition of this text. 108 For a discussion of this chronicler see Grzybowski, ‘Marcin Kromer’. 109 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa (1857), p. 97. 110 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 151. 111 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, pp. 270 ff., 372.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

abduction of Prince Volodar by the voivode Piotr Wlostowic.112 He also claimed that the Rus’, as well as the Lithuanians, ‘loved sorcery and superstition’.113 Nonetheless, he praised Casimir the Great, because after incorporating the Red Rus’ into Poland, he granted the local nobility the same rights enjoyed by the Polish nobility, all the while guaranteeing their freedom to practice the Orthodox religion.114 Due to the fact that in the times of Kromer the significance of the Grand Principality of Moscow had increased, and its rulers used the title of the tsar while clearly seeking to control all the lands of the Polish-Lituanian Commonwealth inhabited by the Orthodox, he includes the history of Kievan Rus’ more evidently than his predecessors, and clearly separates Moscow from this legacy. At the same time he rebukes strangers, for instance the Germans, for not seeing the difference between Rus’ and the state of the Tsars (Moscow).115 As far as the Lithuanians are considered, Kromer treats them similarly to the other previously mentioned chroniclers. Typically — although quite puristically — he describes their incursions into Poland carried out in pagan times: Lithuanians ‘committed murders, abused women and young ladies, violated, plundered, and burned churches’,116 yet all this ceased when Aldona, daughter of Duke Gediminas, married Casimir, the future king of Poland (1325).117 The Polish prisoners of war returned home at that time, and the Lithuanians sent reinforcements to fight against Brandenburg, whose atrocities inflicted on the Germans the chronicler did not specifically emphasize.118 Sometimes, the chronicler justified the Lithuanian incursions into Poland by the treacherous actions towards Poland of the Mazovian dukes or of the Poles themselves, fighting against each other.119 He also repeated after his predecessors that the Lithuanians owed their military advantages to the tricks they used, not to courageous prowess.120 He added to this, after Długosz, a condemnation of the Lithuanian passion for witchcraft and their preservation of superstitions.121 The chronicler similarly reproached other Eastern peoples. He therefore believed that the Tatars had achieved their victory over the Polish prince Henry the Pious in 1241 in the Battle of Legnica due to their ‘sorcery’.122 He also derived the name of the

112 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, pp. 269 ff. 113 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 336. 114 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, pp. 603–05; for more on this issue see Paszkiewicz, Polityka ruska, pp. 226–49; Janeczek ‘New Authority, New Property, New Nobility’. 115 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 30; see also Karnaukhov ‘Kontseptsiya ranney etnicheskoy istorii’. 116 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 572. 117 Rowell, ‘Pious Princesses or Daughters of Belial’, at p. 47. 118 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 574; Petrus de Dusburgk, Chronica terrae prussiae, ed. by Wenta and Wyszomirski, p. 267 (III, 361). 119 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, pp. 442, 509. 120 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 508. 121 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, pp. 717 f. 122 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 427.

27 5

2 76

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

nomads, Tatari, from the Greek name for the land of the dead ‘Tartarus’, identified with hell, explaining why the Tatars were so cruel.123 The next author who should be presented here, Marcin Bielski, collected and sorted the content recorded by his predecessors — there is no need to repeat it here since it includes no original matter. However, he also introduced new content to his work — accounts of contemporary events preceding the creation of the Union of Lublin in 1569. In addition, Bielski was the first significant historian to write in Polish, and is thus worth an examination here. Marcin Bielski had a different profile and life experiences to the other, aforementioned authors. He came from the middle nobility, and was born in the village of Biała (Sieradz region), although it is unknown whether he finished any school. In his youth, he stayed at the court of Duke Janusz III of Masovia (1502–1526). Later, he was a courtier of Piotr Kmita, one of the most powerful magnates of the then Poland, who was an educated man and had an extensive book collection at Nowy Wiśnicz castle — from which Bielski certainly benefited. However, he did so only during breaks in the numerous wars in which he took part alongside his employer. He fought against the Tatars in 1524 and 1534 and took part in the famous battle of Obertyn against Vlachs (1531). Later, Bielski served for several years in the constant conflicts of Podolia against the Tatars.124 He engaged in the activities of a writer and historiographer more intensively after his military service when he lived in Kraków, especially after 1540 when he settled in his native village.125 Therefore, Bielski’s texts reflect the world views of the middle Polish nobility and secular groups to a larger extent than the other authors presented here. His chronicle is unique because it contains a large amount of information about the wars waged in the eastern borderlands of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, mainly against Moscow and the Tatars. Apart from the battle accounts, Bielski recorded a lot of geographical information, sometimes illustrating in detail the nature and properties of the land on which he himself fought as a soldier or heard about from his companions. Due to the significant share of second-hand content and the author’s lack of scientific knowledge, the work is rather reportage-anecdotal in nature, lacking a thoughtful construction. It is, however, a very authentic text, since the author took part in some of the described events. What is most striking in Bielski’s narrative — his own, not that based on his predecessors’ work — is the blurring of ethnic and national differences. For him, all the military forces of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, those coming from Poland, Lithuania, or various parts of Rus’ (although he always mentions their origin) were ‘ours’, whether they were Cossacks, Vlachs, or even Tatars. When recording the Tatar incursions, he added the horde from which the invaders originated to distinguish them from the Polish troops. Even Livonia, after partial incorporation into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, quickly became part of it, though Bielski was aware that the simple people liked neither the previous

123 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 380. 124 Korolko, ʻPionier sarmackiego dziejopisarstwa — Marcin Bielski’. 125 Ziomek, Renesans, pp. 116–17, 153, 162, 164, 361, 395; Miłosz, The History of Polish Literature, p. 54.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

German or present Polish rule,126 but he stressed that immediately after the annexation, the nobles there became part of the Polish nobility.127 In Bielski’s own descriptions, no content is found that would negatively define the various ethnic groups living within the borders of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, including the disappearance of the excessively ostentatious denial of the ‘schismatic’ faith of Rurthenians. Only peoples living outside the Polish-Lithuanian state had always been more or less described as uncivilized, cruel, and barbarous. Their armies always appeared in huge clusters against the scant Polish-Lithuanian-Ruthenian troops. The enemies, especially the Moskals (Russians), were also regularly defeated by these miserable (but of great quality) numbers of armies of his comrades.128 The final author to be mentioned here is Maciej Miechowita. His path to education and his significance were slightly different from those of the aforementioned historians. Miechowita came from a peasant family, and we know that he finished his education at a parish school in his hometown of Miechów. After studying in Kraków, he went to Italy to continue his education, and after returning to Poland he became the court physician of King Sigismund of Poland, and was also repeatedly appointed as rector of the Kraków Academy.129 Apart from medical sciences, Miechowita was interested in history and geography. His most famous work, very popular in the modern period in Poland and also in Europe, was a relatively short treatise entitled Tractatus de duabus Sarmatiis Asiana et Europiana et de contentis in eis [The Treatise about two Sarmatias, Asian and European].130 This text, published in Kraków in 1517, is considered the first Renaissance work aspiring to describe the geography, history, and ethnography of the areas of Eastern Europe in a scientific way. Among the varied contents of the treatise, what is noteworthy are the fragments about the origin of the Slavs. The Kraków scholar, in compliance with the old manner of Christian writers, reached for the Bible and ancient tradition. Unlike fashions prevailing at that time, which derived the Slavs (especially the Poles) from the ancient Sarmatians, he adhered to their European origin. He claimed that they were the descendants of Javan, the son of Japheth (Noah’s grandson)131 — and so he placed the Slavs high in the then popular genealogical catalogues (also associated with categorization and valuation of nations), alongside peoples like the Hellenes and the Aeolians. According to Miechowita, the brothers, the elder Lech and the younger Czech, originally lived with their families and offspring in Croatia and Slavonia, lands treated as part of Pannonia. Our author, in accordance with the medieval manner, thought

126 Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego, 2, p. 1129. 127 Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego, 2, pp. 1129–133. 128 Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego, 1, pp. 395, 607 ff.; 2, pp. 850, 1068. 129 Stopka, ‘Maciej Miechowita’; for a collection of studies see Barycz, Maciej z Miechowa, especially pp. 15–166. 130 Tractatus de duabus Sarmatiis Asiana et Europiana et de contentis in eis. I am using the only critical edition of the text: Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji. 131 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 46.

27 7

278

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

that they left them was because of their reproduction and disputes over the land resulting from an excessive density of people. The brothers went north — the younger to Bohemia, whereas Lech and his offspring occupied the territory of Poland, with the Slavs who had occupied the areas of Polabia to the Elbe supposedly descending from them.132 It is significant that in the ethnogenetic legend of the Poles, the representative of Rus’ does not exist, and the Rus’ people appear only in the passage where the author enumerated all known Slavs.133 They were also, like the Lithuanians, separated from Poles, though in a different way from Bielski. The borders of Rus’ were outlined as running roughly from the Don in the east to the Vistula in the west. Whilst the Lithuanians and Moskals were situated in Eauropean Sarmatia. Further east, beyond the Caspian Sea was Asian Sarmatia which was inhabited by various Tatar tribes.134 In accordance with Miechowita, the territories of European, and to a larger extent also Asian Sarmatia, were shown as a transition zone — a permanent area of migration of nomadic peoples from east to west. At the same time, these peoples were said to be at a very low level of civilized development, but were quite warlike, numerous, and formidable. Reports from wars with the Tatars constitute a significant part of the treatise, as the author paid considerable attention to them. He writes about the first appearance of Genghis Khan’s troops in Europe and the battle of the Kalka river (in 1223, in Miechowita’s work in 1229) and about the Tatar incursions into the Rus’ which allegedly took place from 1229.135 Subsequently, the author dwells on the first Tatar incursions into Poland and Hungary (1241). The Tatars were always immensely more numerous in these wars than the Rus’, Poles, or Hungarians. According to this author, Rus’ was in constant threat of incursions of wild inhabitants of Asian Sarmatia, but this contrasts with the character of the country, which was extremely fertile and abundant in food.136 Interestingly, although Miechowita notes that the religion of the Rus’ was different from his own confession, he does not assess this fact negatively.137 He also writes neutrally about the other confessions in the east of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the peoples who followed them: he noted that the Armenians had their own episcopate,138 and reported that the Jews were not ‘exploiters’ (as, we guess, the Polish Jews were supposed to be according to him).139 When describing the Lithuanians, he wrote about their supposedly Roman origin, but he distanced himself from the issue — saying that it had been said to be so in the past.140 In general, he did not underline the Lithuanian primitivism. However, he regularly exhibits a considerable distance from the customs prevailing in Lithuania, Rus’, and Moscow. Describing the wolverine, which was supposed to live only in the

132 133 134 135 136 137 138 139 140

Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 47. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, pp. 50–51. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 28. These contents were reused from Długosz. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 29. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, pp. 61 ff. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 62. Leśniak, ‘Armenier in Lemberg’. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, pp. 62 ff.; see Janeczek 2008. Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, pp. 64 ff.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

Duchy of Moscow, he wrote that when it came across carrion, it would always eat it, even vomiting from consuming too much — a practice reflected in the celebrations of men in the areas of both Sarmatias, especially the Tatars. Neither did he like the slavery that prevailed there, which also concerned people born free, if they lost their fortune and had nothing to support them.141 In his treatise, much attention is devoted to Moscow,142 with this state being mentioned several times independently and also on other occasions, including when describing the Tatars or Lithuania — where he also wrote quite extensively about the Republic of Novgorod the Great and its ‘extortion from the hands of Casimir, the Grand Duke of Lithuania’ by Moscow.143 Like Długosz, Miechowita noted the despotism of the Moscow ruler and the fact that immediately after the conquest of the city Ivan III ‘emptied [its] treasury and sent to Moscow 300 wagons filled to the brim with gold, silver, and precious stones’.144 Miechowita devotes a separate chapter to the description of the Moscow state. What is most striking is the fact that the author described individual provinces, noting the large size of their armies. In no other case did Miechowita use this form of description and it seems that this passage in fact reflects the militarized character of that state. With great surprise, the author also reports that free people were controlled there by the ruler who ensured that they were not too drunk, and that ‘the Moscow land […] is guarded from everywhere, so that the slaves and prisoners, as well as free people and newcomers, cannot get out without a prince’s letter’.145 Despite a certain distance from Moscow due to its cultivation of the Tatars’ manner of governance, Miechowita and the other Polish authors of the late Middle Ages and the beginning of modernity emphasized the affinity of the language and origin of its inhabitants in relation to the Poles. If, when summarizing this sketch, we are to highlight the most important problems related to the values of the authors of the texts analysed here, associated with the communities they described and evaluated, then moral issues inevitably arise. For the authors, recruited mainly from the knightly class and later transformed into nobility, these issues were mainly connected with courage and military values. Therefore, these values were initially associated almost only with Poles, especially in respect to knightly face-to-face combat. However, on the eve of the Union of Lublin (1569), we will find the attitude of Lithuanians and Ruthenians, or even Tatars, to be no worse, especially those who settled in the area of the nascent Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and were part of its nobility. In the sphere of ideology, for example, the belief which emerged in the sixteenth century of a common origin for the entire nobility of the Polish-Lithuanian 141 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 73. 142 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, pp. 73 ff. 143 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 69; Birnbaum, Lord Novgorod the Great, pp. 82–100; Ianin, ‘Medieval Novgorod’. 144 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 69. 145 Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji, p. 75, see: Ostrowski, ‘The Growth of Moscovy’.

27 9

280

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

Commonwealth was very important and allowed them to eliminate religious differences and even tolerate Muslim subjects, recognizing them as full citizens, not to mention the Orthodox. An invented history lay at the root of the phenomenon — a myth that the Polish, Lithuanian, and Ruthenian nobility had originated from the ancient Sarmatians. This myth enabled the ideological integration of the elites of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and allowed the formation of one political nation from them, regardless of the language they spoke and the faith they followed. It is both important and interesting that, as this myth became more popular, a kind of ‘imperialist’ tone of Polish writing, a feeling of a certain superiority of Poles compared to the Eastern peoples, which was so strongly present in the work of Jan Długosz, disappeared. We should also mention another key element of a set of certain values which, ​​ according to Polish historiographers of the late Middle Ages and the beginning of modern times, was important for a common state of ethnically different nobles — the law. For Długosz, this issue was not yet very important, but the sixteenth-century writers Bernard Wapowski, Marcin Kromer, and Marcin Bielski devoted a great deal of attention to describing first the levelling of rights of the Rus’ and Polish nobility after the incorporation of Red Rus’ into the Kingdom of Poland by Casimir the Great, and then to awarding Polish coats of arms to the Polish-Lithuanian nobility by virtue of the Union of Horodło in 1413, thereby starting the process of equating the rights of the nobility of both nations.146 Then, in turn, a strong emphasis was placed on highlighting the fact that after defeating the Duke Švitrigaila (in 1435) and the Rus’ Orthodox noblemen who supported him, the victorious Poles and the Catholic Lithuanian nobility decided to equalize the legal status of the defeated with their own.147 This matter was so important that one more fact was emphasized: namely that the Tatars, who settled in the Lithuanian state, even though they were Muslims, had the same rights as the local nobility, but also the same duties. This issue recalls one more important element included in the literature analysed here, namely religion. As far as Islam is concerned, interestingly, we will not find phrases condemning the followers of Allah — probably too few people of this confession lived in the then Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and moreover they were valued for their martial qualities. In the work of Długosz, as indicated above, there are relatively many attacks on Jews, and even more of such attacks can be found in relation to the Orthodox — this is the effect of the constant tendency of the Catholic Church, leading to the unifying and subjugating of all residents of the Polish-Lithuanian state.148 In contrast, this kind of content is almost absent in the works of authors from secular backgrounds. It seems that the secular state elites understood that religious tolerance is indispensable for

146 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa, p. 605; Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego, 1, pp. 392, 558–59; Fałkowski, ‘Monarcha w poszukiwaniu nowego status quo’; also Koczerska, ‘Twórcy unii horodelskiej’. 147 Wapowski, Dzieje Korony Polskiej, 2, p. 168. 148 Chodynicki, Kościół prawosławny, pp. 41–45, 76–79.

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, roughly consisting of half of Orthodox, as well as numerous Jews, Mohammedans, Armenians, and others — and before the mid-sixteenth century also a significant number of Protestants — to be able to oppose external threats, especially Moscow. This situation changed owing to the Union of Brest, enforced under the influence of the Jesuits in 1596 — the compulsory joining of Orthodoxy to the Roman Church, which initiated the internal wars and religious disagreements. Many of the provisions of the union were later revoked, but even so the consequences of this act began the process of the dissolution of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, thus facilitating the growth of the power of the Tsarist state.

Works Cited Primary Sources Albrici monachi Trium Fontium chronica, a monacho Novi Monasterii Hoiensis interpolata, ed. by Paul Scheffer-Boichorst, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Series Scriptores in Folio, 23 (Hannover: Impensis Bibliopolii Aulici Hahniani, 1874), pp. 674–950 Bielski, Kronika Marcina Bielskiego, vol. 1–3 (Sanok: Pollak, 1856) Brunonis Querfurtensis Epistola ad Heinricum regem, ed. by Jadwiga Karwasińska, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 4, fasc. 3 (Warszawa: PWN, 1973), pp. 97–106 Chronica Poloniae maioris, ed. by Brygida Kürbis, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 8 (Warszawa: PWN, 1970) Die Chronik der Polen des Magisters Vincentius, ed. by Eduard Mühle (Darmstadt: WBG, Wiss. Buchgesellschaft, 2014) Dlugossi, Ioannis Dlugossi Annales seu cronicae incliti Regni Poloniae, ed. by Sofia Budkowa and others, vol. 1–11 (Warszawa: PWN, 1964–2005) Galli Anonimi chronicae et gestae ducum sive principum Polonorum, ed. by Karol Maleczyński, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 1 (Kraków: Polska Akademia Uumiejętności, 1952) Historia de praedicatione episcopi Brunonis, ed. by Georg H. Pertz, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Series Scriptores, 4 (Hannover: Impensis Bibliopolii Aulici Hahniani, 1841), pp. 579–80 Joannis de Czarnkow chronicon Polonorum, ed. by Jan Szlachtowski, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, 2 (Lwów: Polska Akademia Umiejętności, 1872), pp. 619–756 Kronika polska Marcina Kromera biskupa warmińskiego ksiąg XXX (Sanok: Pollak, 1857) Maciej z Miechowa, Opis Sarmacji Azjatyckiej i Europejskiej, ed. by Henryk Barycz, Tadeusz Bieńkowski, and Waldemar Voisé, Źródła do dziejów Nauki i Techniki, 14 (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1972) Magistri Vincentii Chronica Polonorum, ed. by Marian Plezia, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 11 (Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności, 1994) Petrus de Dusburgk, Chronica terrae prussiae, ed. by Jarosław Wenta and Sławomir Wyszomirski, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 13 (Kraków: Polska Akademia Umiejętności, 2007)

281

282

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

The Deeds of the Princes of the Poles, ed. by Paul W. Knoll and Frank Schaer, Central European Medieval Texts, 3 (Budapest: CEU Press, 2003) Wapowski, Bernard, Dzieje Korony Polskiej i Wielkiego Księstwa Litewskiego od roku 1380 do 1535, vols 1–3 (Wilno [Vilnius]: Glücksberg, 1847–1848) Secondary Studies Aleksandrowicz, Stanisław, ‘Ziemie Wielkiego Ksiestwa Litewskiego w “Chrografii” Jana Długosza’, in Studia z dziejów kartografii, ed. by Józef Babicz (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1975), pp. 295–317 Assing, Helmut, ‘Die Landesherrschaft der Askanier, Wittelsbacher und Luxemburger (Mitte des 12. bis Anfang des 15. Jahrhunderts)’, in Brandenburgische Geschichte, ed. by Ingo Materna and Wolfgang Ribbe (Berlin: Akad., 1995), pp. 85–145 Banaszkiewicz, Jacek, ‘Bolesław i Peredsława — Uwagi o uroczystości stanowienia władcy w związku z wejściem Chrobrego do Kijowa’, in Jacek Banaszkiewicz, Takie sobie średniowieczne bajeczki (Kraków: Avalon, 2012), pp. 229–89 Baronas, Darius, ‘The Year 1009: St Bruno of Querfurt between Poland and Rus’, Journal of Medieval History, 34 (2008), 1–22 Bartnicki, Mariusz, Polityka zagraniczna księcia Daniela Halickiego w latach 1217–1264 (Lublin: Wyd. UMCS, 2005) Barycz, Henryk, ed., Maciej z Miechowa 1457–1523. Historyk, geograf, lekarz, organizator nauki (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1960) Bell, Dean Ph., ‘Host Desecration’, in Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, ed. by Richard S. Levy (Santa Barbara: ABC Clio, 2005), p. 325 Berger, Paul L., and Thomas Luckmann, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge (Harmondsworth: JAI Press, 1991) Biale, David, Blood and Belief: The Circulation of a Symbol between Jews and Christians (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008) Birnbaum, Henrik, Lord Novgorod the Great: Essays in the History and Culture of a Medieval City-State (Columbus: Bloomington, 1981) Bisson, Thomas N., ‘Iconography, Politics and the Symbolism of Power in Medieval Europe: On Not Eating Polish Bread in Vain: Resonance and Conjuncture in the “Deeds of the Princes of Poland” (1109–1113)’, Viator, 29 (1998), 275–90 Buczek, Karol, The History of Polish Cartography: From the 15th to the 18th Century (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1966) Chodynicki, Kazimierz, Kościół prawosławny a Rzeczpospolita Polska. Zarys historyczny 1370–1632 (Warszawa: Inst. Popierania Nauki, 1934) Christiansen, Eric, The Northern Crusades: The Baltic and the Catholic Frontier 1100–1525, (London: University of Minnesota Press, 1980) Curta, Florin, Southern Europe in the Middle Ages 500–1250 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006) Cynarski, Stanisław, ‘Uwagi nad problemem recepcji ‘Historii’ Jana Długosza w Polsce XVI i XVII wieku’, in Dlugossiana. Studia historyczne w pięćsetlecie śmierci Jana Długosza, ed. by Stanisław Gawęda (Warszawa: PWN, 1980), pp. 281–92 Dąbrowski, Jan, Dawne dziejopisarstwo polskie (do roku 1480) (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1964)

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

Długosz, Magdalena, and Piotr O. Scholz, eds, Sarmatismus versus Orientalismus in Mitteleuropa (Berlin: Akad., 2013) Dundes, Alan, The Blood Libel Legend: A Casebook in Anti-Semitic Folklore (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1991) Dymmel, Piotr, Tradycja rękopiśmienna Roczników Jana Długosza (Warszawa: PWN, 1992) Eder, Christine E., ‘Die Schule des Klosters Tegernsee im frühen Mittelalter im Spiegel der Tegernseer Handschriften’, Studien und Mitteilungen zur Geschichte des Benediktinerordens, 83 (1972), 128–29 Eichhorn-Mulligan, Amy C., ‘The Anatomy of Power and the Miracle of Kingship: The Female Body of Sovereignty in a Medieval Irish Kingship Tale’, Speculum, 81.4 (2006), 1014–54 Eidintas, Alfonsas, Alfredas Bumblauskas, Antanas Kalakauskas, and Mindaugas Tomašaitis, The History of Lithuania (Vilnius: Eugrimas, 2013) Fałkowski, Wojciech, ‘Monarcha w poszukiwaniu nowego status quo. Sytuacja polityczna w Koronie przed unia horodelską, 1399–1413’, Zeszyty Naukowe Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, Prace historyczne, 141.2 (2014), 195–220 Fennell, John L. I., Ivan the Great of Moscow (London: Macmillan, 1961) Frost, Robert, The Oxford History of Poland-Lithuania: Vol. I, The Making of the PolishLithuanian Union, 1385–1569 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015) Gieysztor, Aleksander, ‘Obraz Rusi w Polsce średniowiecznej’, in Związki kulturalne między Polską a Rosją XI–XX (Moskva: URSS, 1998), pp. 9–16 Golovko, Aleksandr, ‘Problema politicheskogo i voennogo soyuza v otnoshenstvakh Rusi i Pol‘shi (30e gody XI–c. 1130)’, Sovetskoe Slovyanovedenie, 4 (1986), 52–59 ———, Drevnaya Rus’ i Pol’sha v politicheskich vzaimotnosheniyach X – pervoj treti XIII v. (Kiev: Alternativi, 1988) Grabski, Andrzej F., Dzieje historiografii (Warszawa: PWN, 2006) Grala, Hieronim, ‘Tradycja dziejopisarska o pobycie władcy Bizancjum w Haliczu ( Jan Długosz i kronikarz hustyński)’, Kwartalnik Historyczny, 93 (1986), 639–61 ———, ‘Kołpak Witołdowy czy czapka Monomacha. Dylematy wyznawców prawosławia w monarchii ostatnich Jagiellonów’, in Katolicyzm w Rosji i prawosławie w Polsce (XI XX w.), ed. by Jerzy Bardach and Teresa Chynczewska-Hennel (Warszawa: UN-O, 1997), pp. 51–67 Grekov, Boris D., and Aleksandr Yu Yakubovskiy, Zol’otaya Orda i ee padenie (Moskva: Nauka, 1950) Grudziński, Tadeusz, Bolesław Szczodry, Zarys dziejów panowania (Toruń: Tow. Naukowe, 1953) Grzeszczuk, Stanisław, ed., Pisarze staropolscy. Sylwetki, vol. 1 (Warszawa: Wiedza Powsz., 1991) ———, ‘Marcin Kromer czyli kariera snoba’, in Pisarze staropolscy. Sylwetki, vol. 2, ed. by Stanisław Grzeszczuk (Warszawa: Wiedza Powsz., 1997), pp. 43–70 Güttner-Sporzyński, Darius von, ‘Mateusz of Krakow (d. 1166)’, in The Crusades: An Encyclopedia, ed. by Alan V. Murray, vol. 4 (Santa Barbara: ABC – Clio, 2006), p. 806 ———, Poland, Holy War, and the Piast Monarchy, 1100–1230 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2014) Halecki, Oskar, From Florence to Brest, 1439–1596 (Roma: Fordham University Press, 1958) Halperin, Charles J., Russia and Golden Horde: The Mongol Impact on Medieval Russian History (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1985)

283

284

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

Hanisch, Wilhelm, ‘Die Luxemburger und die Juden’, in Die Juden in den böhmischen Ländern, ed. by Ferdynand Seibt (Wien: Oldenbourg, 1983), pp. 27–35 Ianin, Valentin L., ‘Medieval Novgorod’, in Cambridge History of Russia, vol. 1: From Early Rus’ to 1689, ed. by Maureen Perrie (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 188–210 Janeczek, Andrzej, ‘New Authority, New Property, New Nobility: The Foundation of Noble Estates in Red Rus’ during the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries’, Questiones Medii Aevii Novae, 7 (2002), 77–125 ———, ‘Żydzi i Ormianie — dwie gminy religijno-prawne w krajobrazie etnicznym późnośredniowiecznej Polski’, in ‘Animarum cultura’. Studia nad kulturą religijną na ziemiach polskich w średniowieczu, ed. by Halina Manikowska and Wojciech Brojer (Warszawa: Inst. Historii PAN, 2008), pp. 271–98 ———, ‘Świadomość wspólnoty słowiańskiej w pełnym i późnym średniowieczu’, in: Słowianie — idea i rzeczywistość. Zbiór studiów, ed. by Krzysztof A. Makowski and Monika Saczyńska (Poznań: IH UAM, 2013), pp. 19–70 Jasiński, Tomasz, Kronika Polska Galla Anonima w świetle unikatowej analizy komputerowej nowej generacji (Poznań: IH UAM, 2011) Karnaukhov, Dmitriy, ‘Kontseptsiya ranney etnicheskoy istorii Rusi i Moskovii v khronike Martina Kromera’, Rossiyskaya Istoriya, 1 (2009), 180–86 Kiaupa, Zigmantas, Jūratė Kiaupienė, and Albinas Kunevičius, eds, The History of Lithuania Before 1795 (Vilnius: Eugrimas, 2000) Koczerska, Maria, ‘Twórcy unii horodelskiej’, Zeszyty Naukowe Uniwersytetu Jagiellońskiego, Prace historyczne, 141.2 (2014), 257–87 Kollinger, Karol, Polityka wschodnia Bolesława Chrobrego (992–1025) (Wrocław: Chronicon, 2014) Kołodziejczyk, Dariusz, The Crimean Khanate and Poland-Lithuania International Diplomacy on the European Periphery 15th–18th Century: A Study of Peace Treaties followed by Annotated Documents (Leiden: Brill, 2011) Korolko, Mirosław, ‘Pionier sarmackiego dziejopisarstwa — Marcin Bielski’, in Pisarze staropolscy. Sylwetki, ed. by Stanisław Grzeszczuk, vol. 1 (Warszawa: Wiedza Powszechna, 1991), pp. 439–73 Krakowski, Stefan, Polska w walce z najazdami tatarskimi w XIII wieku (Warszawa: Wyd. MON, 1956) Krzyżaniakowa, Jadwiga, and Jerzy Ochmański, Władyław II Jagiełło (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 2006) Kürbis, Brygida, ‘Dziejopisarstwo polskie do połowy XV wieku. Dążenia poznawcze i poglądy’, in Brygida Kürbis, Na progach historii. Prace wybrane (Poznań: Abos, 1994), pp. 17–36 ———, ‘Mistrz Wincenty (tzw. Kadłubek)’, in Kronika polska, ed. by Brygida Kürbis (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1996) Kuczyński, Stefan Maria, ‘Stosunki polsko-ruskie do schyłku XII w.’, in Studia z dziejów Europy Wschodniej X–XVII wieku, ed. by Stefan Maria Kuczyński (Warszawa: PWN, 1965), pp. 7–31 ———, Wielka wojna z Zakonem Krzyżackim w latach 1409–1411 (Warszawa: Wyd. MON, 1987)

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

Labuda, Gerard, Zaginiona kronika z pierwszej połowy XIII wieku w Rocznikach Królestwa Polskiego Jana Długosza (Poznań: Wyd. UAM, 1983) ———, Święty Stanisław. Biskup krakowski, patron Polski, Śladami zabójstwa-męczeństwakanonizacji (Poznań: IH UAM, 2000) Leciejewicz, Lech, ‘Legendy etnogenetyczne w świecie słowiańskim’, Slavia Antiqua, 32 (1989/1990), 129–44 Leśniak, Roland, ‘Armenier in Lemberg. Grenzer sozialer Integration in den Städten Rotreußens in Spätmittelalter und und früher Neuzeit. Eine Skizze’, in On the Frontier of Latin Europe: Integration und Segregation in Red Rus’, 1350–1600, ed. by Thomas Wünsch and others (Warszawa: IAiE PAN, 2004), pp. 229–40 Maiorov, Aleksandr, ‘Pokhod Romana Mstislavicha 1205 goda v Saksoniyu ili v Pol‘shu?’, Voprosy Istroii, 11 (2008), 36–48 Manikowska, Halina, ‘Więź narodowa i państwowa’, in Kultura Polski średniowiecznej XIV– XV w., ed. by Bronisław Geremek (Warszawa: IH PAN, 1997), pp. 886–909 Martin, Janet, Medieval Russia 980–1584 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008) Menache, Sophia, ‘Tartars, Jews, Saracens and the Jewish-Mongol “Plot” of 1241’, History: The Journal of the Historical Association, 81 (1996), 319–42 Michałowska, Teresa, ‘Ego Gertruda’. Studium historycznoliterackie (Warszawa: PWN, 2001) Mickūnaitė, Giedrė, Making a Great Ruler: Grand Duke Vytautas of Lithuania (Vilnius: Eugrimas, 2006) Miłosz, Czesław, The History of Polish Literature (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1983) Mironowicz, Antoni, ‘Kultura prawosławna w dawnej Rzeczypospolitej’, in Rzeczpospolita wielu wyznań, ed. by Adam Kaźmierczak and others (Kraków: Ks. Akademicka, 2004), pp. 409–36 Mrozowicz, Wojciech, ‘Z problematyki recepcji kroniki Wincentego w średniowiecznym dziejopisarstwie polskim’, in Onus Athlanteum‘. Studia nad Kroniką biskupa Wincentego, ed. by Andrzej Dąbrówka and Witold Wojtowicz (Warszawa: IBL PAN, 2009), pp. 326–36 Nolte, Cordula, Conversio und Christianitas. Frauen in der Christianisierung vom 5. bis 8. Jahrhundert, Monographien zur Geschichte des Mitteallters 41 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1995) Nowakowski, Stanisław, Historia rozwoju horyzontu geograficznego (Warszawa: Ossolineum, 1965) Ostrowski, Donald, ‘The Growth of Moscovy, (1462–1533)’ in The Cambridge History of Russia, ed. by M. Perrie, vol. 1 (Cambrdige: Cambridge University Press, 2006), pp. 213–39 Paszkiewicz, Henryk, Polityka ruska Kazimierza Wielkiego (Warszawa: Inst. Popierania Nauki, 1925) Pelenski, Jaroslav, ‘The Contest between Lithuania-Rus’ and the Golden Horde in the Fourteenth Century for Supremacy over Eastern Europe’, Archivum Eurasiae Medii Aevii, 2 (1982), 300–20 Perfeckij, Evgenij, Historia Polonica Jana Długosze a ruské dejopisectví (Praha: Orbis, 1932) Perzanowska, Agnieszka, ‘Wiadomości źródłowe o życiu i działalności Jana Długosza’, in Dlugossiana. Studia historyczne w pięćsetlecie śmierci Jana Długosza, ed. by Stanisław Gawęda (Warszawa: PWN, 1980), pp. 293–365

285

286

a n dr ze j p l e s zc z y ń s ki

Plewczyński, Marek, Wojny Jagiellonów z wschodnimi i południowymi sąsiadami Królestwa Polskiego w XV wieku (Siedlce: Wyd. Ak. Podlaskiej, 2002) Plezia, Marian, ‘List biskupa Mateusza do św. Bernarda’, in Prace z dziejów Polski feudalnej ofiarowane Romanowi Grodeckiemu w 70 rocznicę urodzin (Warszawa: PWN, 1960), pp. 123–40 Pomian, Krzysztof, Przeszłość jako przedmiot wiary (Warszawa: PWN, 1968) Powierski, Jan, ‘Polityczne tło małżeństwa Bolesława II mazowieckiego z córka Trojdena litewskiego Gaudemundą Zofią’, in Europa Środkowa i Wschodnia w polityce Piastów, ed. by Krystyna Zielińska-Melkowska (Toruń: Wyd. UMK, 1997), pp. 63–82 Rose, Emily, ‘Ritual Murder (Medieval)’, in Antisemitism: A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution, ed. by Richard S. Levy (Santa Barbara: ABC Clio, 2005), p. 602 Rott, Dariusz, Staropolskie chorografie. Początki — rozwój — przemiany gatunku (Katowice: Wyd. U.Śl., 1995) Rowell, Stephen C., Lithuania Ascending: A Pagan Empire Within East-Central Europe, 1295–1345 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994) ———, ‘Pious Princesses or Daughters of Belial: Pagan Lithuanian Dynastic Diplomacy, 1279–1423’, Medieval Prosopography, 15.1 (1994), 3–79 Różycka-Bryzek, Anna, Freski bizantyńsko-ruskie fundacji Jagiełły w kaplicy Zamku Lubelskiego (Lublin: Muz. Lubelskie, 2012) Sághy, Marianne, ‘Pious Women and Political Scapegoats’, in Women and Gender in Medieval Europe. An Encyclopedia, ed. by Margaret Schaus (New York: Routledge, 2006), pp. 236–37 Samsonowicz, Henryk, ‘Ziemie polskie widziane z Lubeki’, in Ludzie — Kościół — Wierzenia: Studia z dziejów kultury i społeczeństwa Europy Środkowej (średniowiecze — wczesna epoka nowożytna), ed. by Wojciech Iwańczak and Stefan K. Kuczyński (Warszawa: Wyd. DiG, 2001), pp. 501–07 Sielicki, Franciszek, Polsko ruskie stosunki kulturalne do końca XV wieku (Wrocław: Wyd. Un. Wroc., 1997) Skibiński, Edward, ‘Kronika wielkopolska’, in Vademecum historyka mediewisty, ed. by Jarosław Nikodem and Dariusz A. Sikorski (Warszawa: PWN, 2012), pp. 260–65 Skomiał, Jakub, ‘Polscy kronikarze wieków średnich o Rusi i Rusinach’, Annales Universitatis Mariae Curie-Skłodowska, sec. G 59.1 (2012), 81–93 Spuler, Bertold, Die Goldene Horde. Mongolen in Rußland 1223–1502 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1965) Srodecki, Paul, ‘Validissima semper Christianitatis propugnacula — Zur Entstehung der Bollwerksrhetoric in Polen und Ungarn’, in Sarmatismus versus Orientalismus in Mitteleuropa, ed. by Magdalena Długosz and Piotr O. Scholz (Berlin: Akademia, 2013), pp. 131–68 Stopka, Krzysztof, ‘Maciej Miechowita. Życie polskiego uczonego w czasach jagiellońskich’, in Maciej Miechowita, 1457–1523 (Miechów: U Jaksy, 2013), pp. 8–26 Strzelczyk, Jerzy, ‘Peter Wlast/Wlostowic’, in Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol. 6 (München: Artemis, 2000), p. 1939 Subtelny, Orest, Ukraine: A History (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2000)

P o rt r ay i n g E as t e r n E uro pe i n Po li sh W ri t i ngs

Trajdos, Tadeusz M., Kościól katolicki na ziemiach ruskich Korony i Litwy za panowania Władyslawa II Jagiełły, 1386–1434 (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1983) Tyszkiewicz, Jan, Tatarzy na Litwie i w Polsce. Studia z dziejów XIII–XVIII w. (Warszawa: PWN, 1989) ———, Brunon z Querfurtu w Polsce i krajach sąsiednich w tysiąclecie śmierci (Pułtusk: Ak. Hum. im. A. Gieysztora, 2009) Urbański, Robert, Tartarorum gens brutalis‘. Trzynastowieczne najazdy mongolskie w literaturze polskiego średniowiecza na porównawczym tle piśmiennictwa łacińskiego antyku i wieków średnich (Warszawa: IBL PAN, 2007) Vernadsky, George V., The Mongols and Russia, A History of Russia, 3 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1970) Warner, David A., ‘Saints, Pagans, War and Rulership in Ottonian Germany’, in Plenitude of Power: The Doctrines and Exercise of Authority in the Middle Ages, ed. by Robert C. Figuera (Aldershot: Routledge, 2006), pp. 11–35 Weitraub, Wiktor, ‘Renaissance Poland and Antemurale Christianitatis’, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 3/4 (1979–1980), part 2: Eucharisterion: Essays presented to Omeljan Pritsak on his Sixtieth Birthday by his Colleagues and Students, 920–30 Wieczorek, Szymon, ‘Die Schenkungen Bolesławs III. und Salomeas von Berg an die Bendiktinerabtei Zwiefalten in den 1130–40er Jahren’, in Monarchische und adlige Sakralstiftungen im mittelalterlichen Polen, ed. by Eduard Mühle (Berlin: Akademia, 2013), pp. 131–70 Wiszewski, Przemysław, Domus Bolezlai: Values and Social Identity in Dynastic Traditions of Medieval Poland, c. 966–1138 (Leiden: Brill, 2010) Włodarski, Bronisław. Polityka ruska Leszka Białego (Lwów: Tow. Naukowe, 1925) ———, Polska i Ruś 1194–1340 (Warszawa: PWN, 1966) Zeissberg, Heinrich, ‘Die Kriege Kaiser Heinrich’s II. mit Herzog Bolesław I. von Polen’, Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien. Philosophisch-historische Klasse, 57 (1867), 361–62 Ziomek, Jerzy, Renesans (Warszawa: IBL PAN, 2012)

287

Aleksandr Musin

Value Orientation and the Image of the Orbis Gentium in Medieval East European Societies

In the past as well as in the present, the concept of ‘friend or foe’ has been based on cultural judgements consisting of a set of collective values or values orientations which, while having certain core characteristics, have nonetheless changed in certain aspects throughout the centuries.1 The values concerning the orbis gentium and peculiarities of its settlers, real or imagined, during the Middle Ages, underlay the relations of medieval states and peoples with other countries and ethnic groups, peaceful or otherwise. This article seeks to reveal and explain these ‘medieval values’ as part of the mechanisms which ensured, or ought to have ensured, the cohesion of multi-ethnic societies and the organization of their relations with neighbouring countries. It does this by examining the role of historical memory, places of memory, and national or collective myths in the formation and evolution of value orientation from the early to late Middle Ages in Eastern European societies. In this way the chapter provides an ‘eastern’ perspective on the discussions in this volume on the Grand Duchy of Lithuania (Jurgita ŠiaučiūnaitėVerbickienė), on Polish texts about Eastern Europe (Andrzej Pleszczyński). Normally, national or ethnic values are regarded as absolute aims for social life or for a specific period of it shared by the main part of the society and justifying common actions and attitudes. The formation of the above-mentioned set of characteristics/ orientations inside a society depends on different factors of spontaneous and/or artificial character. The first group of factors arises from personal or group experience and is based on the individual or collective estimation of nations according to their cultural behaviour, everyday material culture, and stereotypical mental reactions to ‘otherness’. The second group has been formed artificially from myths and national narratives, especially ‘grand narratives’2 circulating in society, its collective memory, public opinion, official propaganda, and the education system that are very often

1 For such an approach in ethnology see Jaenen, Friend and Foe. 2 For the concept and its development, see Hobsbawm, ‘Introduction’, Carr, Time. Aleksandr Musin  •  ([email protected]) is Senior Research Fellow in the Institute for the History of Material Culture, Saint Petersburg. He studies different aspects of medieval history and archaeology of Eastern and Central Europe, the cultural values and identities of their population and cultural transfers between the east-Christian and Latin worlds. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 289–323 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120067

290

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

linked to political and ideological concepts. The balance between the two groups of factors is regarded by local society as its own set of values which determine its axiology and which create the specifics of international, regional, and social history. The present paper could be regarded as a ‘symmetric research’ along with the chapter by Prof. Andrzej Pleszczyński (‘The Image of the People and Lands of Eastern Europe in Polish Writings up to the Union of Lublin (1569)’) also published in the present volume. It provides a view from the ‘other side of the border’, that is an image of the people and lands of Central Europe (although not exclusively, as this image in East European mentality is inseparable from the estimation of other parts of the orbis gentium) in Rus’ (Kievan)/Russian (Muscovite) societies until the second half of the sixteenth century. A scholar examining a similar problem based on Eastern European materials is limited to the late Middle Ages, usually up to the fifteenth century, because of the comparatively small number of texts which also depend on a basic proto-text and use information from each other, thus very often reproducing archetypical views and describing events in a stereotypical manner. It encounters certain challenges within the area of historical sources and the specificity of local historiographical traditions. To overcome this situation a new reading of well-known texts should be undertaken through an anthropological approach. First of all, the researcher of East European societies and communities for the early period of the twelfth to the first half of the fourteenth century must use the only closed corpus of Slavonic chronicles based on the text of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle. For a long period, the chroniclers used approaches and estimations based on biblical perception which were established at the beginning of the twelfth century during the compilation of the Tale of Past Years or Nestorchronik.3 Thus, the introduction to these chronicles gives the impression of a near cessation of the axiological development of the local society and of their attitude towards their neighbours. Hagiography before the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries was mostly presented through translated works4 and local texts based on them, for example, the Patericon of the Kiev Cave Monastery which provides scant information on the topic.5 I will, however, make what use of these texts as is possible. The same is true concerning the few texts of canon law of the Orthodox Church for that period.6 Various information in the Latin Chronicles, mainly concerning multi-ethnic relationships in the Baltic Sea area reflecting the value orientation of the participants, are also useful sources,7 as well as certain Arabic sources (see below).

3 For the English translation, which should be recognized as inexact and archaic, see The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor. Nevertheless, I will follow it in the citation of the Chronicle. See also the English translation of the The Chronicle of Novgorod, trans. by Michell and Forbes. The nearly complete edition of Russian chronicles in the Slavonic language is presented in the series Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey (St Petersburg, Petrograd, Leningrad, Moscow, since 1841), vols 1–41. 4 Podskalsky, Christentum und theologische Literatur. 5 Das Paterikon, ed. by Tschizewskij. 6 Pamyatniki drevnerusskogo kanonicheskogo prava, ed. by Pavlov. 7 Adam von Bremen, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte; Die Sachsengeschichte des Widukind, ed. by Lohmann and Hirsch; Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae, ed. by Arbusow, and Bauer.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

As has been noted above, the relative scarcity and nearly complete anonymity of Eastern European medieval writings obliges researchers to use retrospective analysis and even interpolation, and anthropological readings of well-known texts, as well as seeking new types of sources that can shed light on the issue of the values orientation concerning multi-ethnicity. In this paper, I would briefly like to make use of certain archaeological materials from the Novgorod excavations, including birch bark documents of the eleventh to fifteenth centuries8 that contribute significantly to our understanding of the values orientation of the local society towards the different ethnos of orbis gentium. The situation of sources changes in the fifteenth century which is characterized by a growing interest in the history in Muscovite and Novgorod societies. However, the interest and resultant active rewriting of the history can be hazardous for the correct understanding of the past, especially of the background of Russian historiography. New challenges are provided by late medieval reinterpretation of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle and by modern historiographical tradition based on this chronicle’s approach to the existence of the Russian nation from the time of Prince (saint) Vladimir in the form of the ‘Old Russian nationality’9 which deeply influences contemporary consciousness and studies. Medieval annalistic and modern historiography both recognize the single trajectory of the development of Eastern Europe from the Early Rus’ of Kiev through the Muscovite State to the Russian Empire and the modern ‘Russian world’, in other words ‘from Vladimir to Vladimir’. However, critical analysis of different types of sources of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries — late medieval chronicles,10 polemic and publicist writing (Slovo o pogibeli Russkoy zemli [Tale of the Ruin of the Russian Land],11 Skazanie o velikikh knyaz’yakh Vladimirskikh [Tale of the Grand Princes of Vladimir],12 Skazanie o Mamaevom poboishche [Tale of the Battle of Kulikovo Field or Tale of the Rout of Mamai],13 Kniga stepennaya tsarskogo rodosloviya [Book of Degrees of the Royal Genealogy or Book of Generations of the Tsar’s family];14 Istoriya o Kazanskom tsarstve [History of the Kazan’ Kingdom],15 Kievan Synopsis16), and Muscovite diplomatic correspondence with the great dukes of Lithuania and Polish kings from the end of the fifteenth to the mid-second

8 For an edition of the recent finds see Yanin, Zaliznyak, and Gippius, eds, Novgorodkie gramoty na bereste. See also Picchio, ‘The Slavonic and Latino-Germanic Background’. 9 This concept has been proposed in Mavrodin, Drevnyaya Rus’. For critics, see Yusova, ‘Davn’orus’ka narodnist’’. 10 Including, for instance, Novgorodskaya pervaya letopis; Moskovskiy letopisniy svod; Sofiyskaya I letopis; L’vovskaya letopis; Letopis Avraamki; Novgorodskya IV letopis; Voskresenskaya letopis; Nikonovskaya letopis. 11 Begunov, Pamyatnik russkoy literatury. 12 Skazanie o knyaz’yakh Vladimirskikh, ed. by Dmitrieva. 13 Povesti o Mamaevom poboishche, ed. by Shambinago; Letopisnaya povest’ o Kulikovskoy bitve, ed. by Salmina and Dimitriev. See also Halperin, ‘The Russian Land and the Russian Tsar’. 14 Kniga stepennaya tsarskogo rodosloviya, ed. by Vasenko; Lenhoff and Kleimola, eds, The Book of Royal Degrees. See also Sirenov, ‘Stepennaya kniga’. 15 Kazanskaya istoriya, ed. by Adrianova-Perets and Moiseeva; Kazanskaya istoriya, ed. by Volkova. 16 For a non-critical edition see Mechta o russkom edinstve, ed. by Sapozhnikov and Sapozhnikova.

291

292

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

half of the sixteenth century17 — and their mutual verification gives a reliable picture of the East European multi-ethnic situation and values orientation in transition, its perception by the different political and social groups during the Middle Ages, and social and ideological instruments of organizing and consolidating the multi-ethnic society adopted by the Muscovite princes since the middle of the fifteenth century. Among the historical sources, we are especially interested in two main types of information concerning medieval values: ethnic-geographical narratives and models of the political activity within its borders, as well as the memory of the past including origo gentis as the organizing means of social and political life. However, for a correct understanding, the present study diverges from previous historiographical conclusions and ‘the tyranny of a concept’ or ‘the tyranny of a construct’ in modern historiography.18 For this I propose that a comparative and contextual analysis of two medieval narratives of different periods could be especially productive: the Primary Rus’ Chronicle (beginning of the twelfth century, Kiev) and the Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ (Russian) Land (in my opinion, the second half of the fifteenth century, Muscovy, probably, Pskov).Within our study, a values orientation approach could be helpful in providing a means to understand core cultural differences related to basic human concerns or orientations that are widely used in social anthropology and cross-cultural studies. This approach is organized around such topics as the basic nature of people of different ethnos, relationship to nature, perception of time, human activity, and social relations.19 Here I will concentrate on such concerns as human nature, social relations, and sense of time, that is the question of the necessity of social and political control of groups and individuals, learning the role of history, and continuity of past traditions into the future. The responses to these main concerns form the notion of ‘values orientation’ and reveal a historical set of values of any ethnic group, society, or culture. As far as ethnic groups exist in the form of more or less organized societies, their values orientation is inseparable from multi-level and complex communication between different types of social memory. In general, modern researchers define collective memory20 as sharing a set of information held in the memories of some members of a social group which may be transmitted to future generations and used for certain individual or group purposes. Collective memory can be transformed in the official narrative into cultural memory disseminated by government institutions and which may or may not be accepted by different social groups as an official vision of the past and/or a projection for the future. The phenomenon of communicative memory should be regarded as an intermediate between collective and cultural memory used by members of society in their everyday practice at the private level, and could exist

17 Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo gosudarstva, vol. 1: (1487–1533), ed. by Karpov (1882); Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo gosudarstva, vol. 3: (1560–1570), ed. by Karpov (1892). 18 Bowlus, ‘Ethnogenesis’. Another title for comparison is Brown, ‘The Tyranny of a Construct’. 19 The key works are Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck, eds, Variations in Value Orientations; Hills, ‘Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck’s Values Orientation Theory’. 20 For this well-elaborated concept see Halbwachs, La mémoire collective; Halbwachs, Les cadres sociaux. For English translations see Halbwachs, The Collective Memory; Halbwachs, On Collective Memory.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

in an indifferent or even difficult relation with officially adopted historical policy. In such an investigative context, a special role may be playing by so-called ‘places of memory’.21 Evidently, a place of memory can comprise not only a physical space but also mental space. I argue that origo gentis, which tells about the common origin of different social and/or ethnic groups as the background of territorial and/or geographical topics, can be used in the research as lieux de mémoire.22 It is well known that in Eastern Europe the perception of the past in mystical (mythological?) ways influenced modern geopolitics more deeply and efficaciously than contemporary political or economic interests and profits. Patrick Geary has brilliantly shown that modern national myths try to find their origins from the early Middle Ages.23 A historical myth may be regarded as a set of subjective collective representations about a special historical phenomenon, nations, or event which had been formed in a fictional and invented image, thus seriously transforming and substituting itself for historical reality. The process of the identification of myths in medieval texts and visual art and their study opens new possibilities for modern historiography. Based on the above-mentioned ideas, terminology, and principles of investigation, I will attempt to outline the ‘image of peoples and lands’ in Eastern European societies and its changes during the twelfth to sixteenth centuries that led to the creation of the eastern borders of Central Europe.24Since the time of Nikolai Karamzin, scholars have tried to discover and explain the multi-ethnicity of Kievan Rus’. Karamzin equated the Rus’ of the tenth century to Russia (Rossiya) of the nineteenth century, as well as linking the Russes (Rhôs) with the Russians (Rossiyane), and supposed that the Early Rus’ State was a result of the integration of two ethnos — the Slavs and the Russes. However, as it happens, the values orientation of Kievan Rus’ lay far from the idea of multi-ethnic cohesion. The main value, as has been reflected in written sources, was a Land surrounded by different ethnic groups, first referred to as the Rus’ Land in the Middle Dnieper area with the centre in Kiev. The early medieval Slavonic state known among scholars as Early Rus’ had in general a mono-ethnic (or ‘quasi-mono-ethnic’) character like other early national

21 On this concept see Nora, ‘Between Memory and History’. On its application to medieval studies see Fried and Rader, eds, Die Welt des Mittelalters. 22 On the role of origo gentis in medieval history and its place in modern research see, for example, Wenskus, Stammesbildung und Verfassung; Corradini, Diesenberger, and Reimitz, eds, The Construction of Communities; Plassmann, Origo gentis; Coumert, Origines des peuples; Garipzanov, Geary, and Urbanczyk, eds, Franks, Northmen, and Slavs; Gazeau, Baudouin, and Modéran, eds, Identité et ethnicité. 23 Geary, The Myth of Nations. 24 It is worth noting the appearance, during the past twenty years, of new publications on the attitude of Early Rus’ towards Latin European nations and nomadic populations. However, they are usually based on traditional approaches in Russian humanities based on ethnocentric or even imperial-chauvinistic views. Only in a few cases have the authors tried to adopt innovative cultural and anthropological visions. As a result, these new publications have not brought sufficient new knowledge into the field of research. See, for example, Demin, Devnerusskaya literatura; Laushkin, ‘Regulirovanie kontaktov khristian s nekhristianami’; Dobrovol’skiy, ‘Vospriyatie polovtsev’; Dobrovol’skiy, ‘Otnoshenie k Zapadnoy Evrope’; Andreycheva, ʻObrazy inovertsev’.

293

2 94

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

states in Central Europe.25 The well-known existence of the Scandinavian élites in tenth-century Kiev does not conflict with such views. For the tenth century, we can not describe the Rus’ as identical to the Scandinavians or Varangians. It should be taken into consideration that the Rus’ were not a special ethnos ‘Varangian Rus’, as the chronicler of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle tried to explain in his famous passage: ‘these particular Varangians were known as Rus, just as some are called Swedes, and others Normans, English, and Gotlanders, for they were thus named. […] Three brothers, with their kinsfolk, who took with them all the Rus and migrated’.26 Unfortunately, this had been taken as true in nineteenth-century historiography… The term ‘Varangians’ was supposedly introduced in the Primary Rus’ Chronicle in the late eleventh century as a means to distinguish between different groups of Scandinavians who had penetrated into Eastern Europe in the eighth–ninth centuries, known in Byzantium, the Arab countries, and Western Europe under their exonym ‘Rus’/Rhôs’, and in the second half of the tenth and eleventh centuries as the Varangians par excellence.27 As far as can be ascertained, the quite active and swift process of acculturation (not assimilation) of the Scandinavian settlers in Eastern Europe ended with the formation of a new ethnic-social group known from medieval sources as ‘Rus’/ Rhôs’.28 The Scandinavian names of the elite in the Primary Rus’ Chronicle were accompanied in material culture by new elements unknown to Scandinavia and broadly in use among Slavonic tribes in the tenth century. This does not agree with the concept that the Norman state in Russia rather resembled the great merchant enterprises of seventeenth–eighteenth-century Europe, such as the East India or Hudson’s Bay companies, founded to make money and compelled by the absence of any administration in the area of their operations to assume quasi-governmental responsibilities as proposed by R. Pipes.29 This historical process within the Scandinavian presence in Eastern Europe can be regarded as double acculturation. I propose to understand in this way the information of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle sub anno 882 that argues: ‘Oleg set himself up as prince in Kiev, and declared that it should be the mother [metropolis] of Russian [Rus’] cities. The Varangians, Slavs, and others who accompanied him were called Russes [Rus’]’.30 Firstly we can attest that the Rus’ were a result of the acculturation of the Scandinavians in the local Slavonic or Finno-Ugrian milieu, and secondly, that the Rus’ acculturated themselves mainly with the eastern Polans, a Slavonic tribe around Kiev who allowed themselves to be called by the imposed name of Rus’.31 The various

25 On this hypothesis see Korolyuk, Slavyane i vostochnye romantsy. 26 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 59 (6370 [862]). 27 Melnikova and Petrukhin, ‘Skandinavy na Rusi i v Vizantii’. 28 Melnikova and Petrukhin, ‘The Origin and Evolution of the Name Rus’. 29 Pipes, Russia under the Old Regime, p. 30. Cf. Tolochko, ‘Kievan Rus’, p. 131; Tolochko, Ocherki nachalnoy Rusi, and Musin, ‘Nekotorye mysli’. 30 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 61. 31 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 62 (6406 [898]): ‘the Polyanians, the last of whom are now called Russes’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

and difficult relations between the Rus’ and the Slavs, reported by Arabic writers (Ahmad Ibn Rustah, Al-Muqaddasi, Abu Sa’id Gardezi)32 should be regarded as one of the first episodes of such interaction and acculturation concerned with the relation of the Polans to other Slavs. Most probably the form of the exonym ‘Rus’-Rhôs’ was derived from ancient Northern German rōts-/drōts (oarsman). The term could firstly have been a self-designation of groups of Scandinavians who had penetrated to the north of Eastern Europe, and was subsequently borrowed by the local Finnish tribes under the form ruotsi; later it was transmitted to the Slavs who adopted it under the form ‘Rous’.33 Evidently, from the very beginning the word ‘Rus’’ had the meaning of the consolidation of the local community, as well as that of an exonym serving to unify and consolidate the society — as we will see, it retained this function throughout its history. In the present context, it should be noted here that this ‘tool’ had been used in the early medieval period only for internal social proposals within the relatively closed community. One of the main ideas of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle was that the Slavonic tribes which became known as ‘Rus’’ were still speaking the Slavonic language.34 It should be stressed that in the legal code of Kievan Rus’ of the eleventh-century Pravda Ruskaya (Ruthenian Justice or Rus’ Truth [Law]), the first paragraph divided the Russes (Rusin) and the Slavs (Slovianin) into two different social groups.35 It is worth noting here that the term ‘rusin/ruthen’ broadly used in Eastern Europe in the late Middle Ages was a kind of socionym with a clearly defined meaning linked to the jurisdiction and protection of princely power. The leading position of the ‘Slavonic-shaped’ Northmen in the tenth century in the Middle Dnieper region among the Polans formed their common opposition to different Slavonic tribes of Eastern Europe: the Drevlyans, Radimichs, Drehovians, Severians, and Volhynians, known from the Primary Rus’ Chronicles. The opposition of Kiev as ‘Rus’ Land’ (Rus’kaya Zemlya) and other territories led to one important consequence for Eastern Europe. It is important to stress that according to the existing sources, particularly chronicles, the population of lands of Eastern Europe other than the Kiev region — Volhynia, Novgorod, and even Vladimir-Suzdal Land, the future Muscovy — did not regard and call themselves Rus’ until the thirteenth and fourteenth

32 See the following editions: Ibn Rustah, Kitāb al-A'lāk an-Nafīsa; Al-Muqaddasi, The Best Divisions; Garkavi, Skazaniya musul’manskikh pisateley o slovyanakh i russkikh, pp. 267, 283; Bartold, Izvlechenie iz soczineniya Gardizi Zayn al-akhbar, p. 60. 33 Thomsen, The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia. 34 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 63 (6406 [898]). See the Slavonic text: ‘Словѣнескъ æзыкъ и Рускыи одинъ. от Варягъ бо прозвашасѧ Русью а пѣрвѣє бѣша Словѣне. аще и Полѧне звахусѧ. но Словѣньская рѣчь бѣ Полѧми же прозвашасѧ занеже в полѣ сѣдѧху æзыкъ Словѣньскыи бѣ имъ єдин’, Ipat’evskaya letopis, cols 28–29. 35 ‘If a man kills a man: then a brother avenges a brother, or a son avenges a father, or a cousin, or a nephew; if no one takes revenge, then 80 “grivnas” for the murdered; if he is a knyaz’s man or knyaz’s official, if he is a “rusin”, or a “grid”, or a merchant, or a boyar’s official, or a mechnik (swordsman), or an exile, or a “slovenin”, then 40 grivnas for the murdered’, The Laws of Rus’, ed. by Kaiser, pp. 20–34.

295

296

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

centuries, but rather demonstrated other identities.36 Initially, the value of the concept of owns ‘land’ was the dominant mental idea of the regional identity. However, as we will see, the concept of the ‘Rus’ Land’ gradually replaced local identities of Eastern European regions and the values orientation appropriated to them. In fact, the names ‘the Rus’’ and ‘the Russes’ (the Russines) during the medieval period were very unstable and ambiguous terms with polysemic meaning. As has been stressed, these served as a mean of acculturation, an instrument of social consolidation and construction of the past within the idea of a common origin. In this process, the term Rus’ with its original ethnic-social meaning was replaced in the fifteenth century by another one — ‘Russia/Russian’ (Rossiya/Rossiyane) with the sense of a specific nation and national state. This process had its own history. Sometimes contemporary scholars use the terms ‘Russia’ and ‘the Russians’ for describing the entire population of medieval Eastern Europe and the polity which existed here during Middle Ages, but such terminology can not be regarded as academically correct. This ‘umbrella’ term creates an incorrect historical perspective, confuses different linguistic, ethnic and cultural traditions, and intensifies modern political troubles. As historical sources show, these terms could be applied only to the political organization of the Muscovite State and its population from the end of the fifteenth century.37 At the same time, early medieval East European polities of the tenth and eleventh centuries that are difficult to classify as ‘politically organized states’ existed in the dynamic multi-ethnic surrounding and were penetrated by various forms of transcontinental interaction. Such a complicated landscape needed to be organized in the perception of the local population. At the beginning of the Russian ethnic narrative, we find the ethnic-geographical account of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle was modelled based on biblical examples at the beginning of the twelfth century. It can be characterized as a general introduction to the orbis gentium situation which was characterized by the reasonably neutral attitude of the chronicler (and society?) towards different ethnos and tribes living at the periphery of Eastern Europe. Such an account includes short descriptions of their history where the Slavonic tribes have been presented as migrants when other ethnos were supposed to be an autochthonic population. In fact, it is not a description of the border realm — this account, divided into several parts, sometimes uses repetition to create an impression of an open space penetrated by different types of contacts: political, commercial, tributary, etc.38 We can read in the Chronicle the following, and I prefer to cite these passages here completely: In the share of Japheth lies Rus’, Chud’, and all the gentiles: Merya, Muroma, Ves’, Mordva, Chud’ beyond the portages, Perm’, Pechera, Yam’, Ugra, Litva,

36 See, for example, The Chronicle of Novgorod, ed. by Michell and Forbes, pp. 18 (6653 [1145]), 20 (6657[1149]). See also Paszkiewicz, The Origin of Russia. 37 For the use of such terms see, for example, Kloss, O proiskhozhdenii nazvaniya ‘Rossiya’, with exhaustive bibliography. Critical remarks are in the review of Grishchenko, Russkiy yazyk. See also Grishchenko, ‘“Rus’-Rossiia”’. 38 On this subject see Melnikova, ‘Mental Maps of the Old Russian Chronicle-Writer’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

Zimegola, Kors’, Letgola, and Liv’. The Lyakhs, the Prussians, and Chud’ border on the Varangian Sea. The Varangians dwell on the shores of that same sea and extend to the eastward as far as the portion of Shem. They likewise live to the west beside this sea as far as the land of the English and the French. For the following nations also are a part of the race of Japheth: the Varangians, the Swedes, the Normans, the Gotlanders, the Russes, the English, the Spaniards, the Italians, the Romans, the Germans, the French, the Venetians, the Genoese, and so on. Their homes are situated in the northwest, and adjoin the Hamitic tribes… Among these same Slavs are included the White Croats, the Serbs, and the Carinthians. For when the Vlakhs attacked the Danubian Slavs, settled among them, and did them violence, the latter came and made their homes by the Vistula, and were then called Lyakhs. Of these same Lyakhs, some were called Polyanians, some Lutichians, some Mazovians, and still others Pomorians… At Beloozero are situated the Ves’, and on the lake of Rostov, the Merya, and on Lake Kleshchino the Merya also. Along the river Oka (which flows into the Volga), the Muroma, the Cheremisians, and the Mordva preserve their native languages […]. The following are other tribes which pay tribute to Rus’: Chud’, Merya, Ves’, Muroma, Cheremis’, Mordva, Perm’, Pechera, Yam’, Litva, Zimegola, Kors’, Narva, and Liv’. These tribes have their languages and belong to the race of Japheth, which inhabits the lands of the north.39 Such nearly indifferent enumeration does not immediately allow an understanding of the real attitude of the Kievan chronicler and the values orientation towards non-East Slavonic ethnos(es). At first glance this enumeration is similar to the list of East Slavonic tribes which settled in Eastern Europe and had a difficult relationship with the Rus’. As the chronicle states, this relationship in several cases was tributary involving no element of administrative control. It is interesting to compare this observation to the statement of Henry of Livonia in his thirteenth-century Cronicon Livoniae. In his description of the events of ad 1212, especially the negotiating of Prince Vladimir of Polotsk with Albert, bishop of Riga, he reproaches the Russes as they were more interested in taxes and fees from the Livonians as an expression of political subjection than the conversion of the local pagan population to Christianity.40 Of course, it is possible to regard such a statement as a common preaching topic of medieval Latin literature; for example, according to Adam of Bremen, the king of Denmark made the same reproach to the Saxons who did not care about the conversion of pagan Western Slavs.41 Similar ideas can be found in the letter of ad 769 by Alcuin of York.42

39 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, pp. 52, 53, 55 [sine anno]. 40 Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae, ed. by Arbusow and Bauer, pp. 102–04 (III.16:2 [A.D. 1212]). See also Enrico di Lettonia, Chronicon Livoniae, pp. 192–94. 41 Adam von Bremen, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte, p. 166 (III. 23 [22]). 42 Alcuini sive Albini Epistolae, ed. by Ernest Dümmler, 164, No 113; Adam von Bremen, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte, p. 161, no. 111.

297

298

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

However, in this case, we can regard as reliable such information about Henry of Livonia as showing a completely indifferent attitude towards the pagan tribes. There were no signs of the concept of amicitia in the Primary Rus’ Chronicle, a real medieval value in Latin Europe. Such a concept of cohesion and coexistence is well known, for example, from Res Gestae Saxonicarum by Widukind of Corvey (c. 925–after 973) where he argued that the Saxons, former allies and friends of the Franks, became brothers with them, as if one gens as a result of Christianity (‘fratres et quasi una gens ex Christiana fide’). This process had been accomplished by the Franks with all possible means partly by delicate persuasion and partly by military force,43 ending in amicitia.44 Scholarship suggests that such modus vivendi obliged different social and ethnic communities to mutual aid and the formation of politically integrated groups.45 But in fact, the attitude of the Rus’ community towards their neighbours did not comprise any active communication leading to changes in political status and religious culture. A comparable picture can be observed in the information from the other kind of sources that reflected not a narrative but the realities of everyday life — first of all, the birch bark document of the second half of the eleventh — first half of the fifteenth century from Novgorod:46 Name of ethnos or land

Name in Cyrillic

No. of document Chronology

Bulgarians Varangians

Булгар, булгарский Варяг, варяжский

288 851, 1065

first half of fourteenth century middle of twelfth century, first half of thirteenth century Livonians Лив, либь 776, 1035 mid-second half of twelfth century Lithuanians Литва, литвин 283, 590 second half of eleventh century, second half of fourteenth century Nemtsy (Germans Немец, немецкий 3, 25, 44, 248, 282, second half of fourteenth century, or foreigners par turn of fourteenth and fifteenth excellence) centuries Poles (Lyakh) Лях 1033 second half of twelfth century Carelians Корела, корелянин, 248, 590 turn of fourteenth and fifteenth корельский centuries Kolbiags Колбяг 222 turn of twelfth andthirteenth centuries Sami Лопь 248, 249 turn of fourteenth and fifteenth centuries Obdora (Khanty) Обдора 365 second half of fourteenth century Rus’ Русь 105 beginning of twelfth century

43 Die Sachsengeschichte des Widukind, ed. by Lohmann and Hirsch, p. 24 (I. 15). 44 Die Sachsengeschichte des Widukind, ed. by Lohmann and Hirsch, p. 22 (I. 1). 45 Pleszczyński, The Birth of a Stereotype, pp. 51, 56 ff. 46 Zaliznyak, ‘Slovoukazatel’ k berestyanym gramotam’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

As has been shown in the above table, these texts nearly neglected the multi-ethnic surrounding of the land of Novgorod despite the intensive commercial and political contacts known from the chronicles and other documents. Even the name of Rus’ as a Dnieper region had been mentioned only once, at the beginning of the twelfth century. From thirty-four ethnos known in the Primary Rus’ Chronicle, birch bark documents report only seven ethnonyms, another four could be found together in letters and the late Novgorodian Chronicle of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. In a paradoxical manner, the documents which mention different ethnos (nos 288, 248, 249 83, 282) have been yielded from the excavation of the one particular urban parcel and have been discovered in the same archaeological context of the second half of the fourteenth century and at the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Such a situation shows that the medieval society in Novgorod as a whole did not seem interested in its multi-ethnic surrounding and did not actively involve itself in the interethnic relationship. The main contacts were headed by the limited community of Novgorodian merchants. The above information is related to the interethnic relationship in everyday life. In the Primary Rus’ Chronicle such ‘peaceful coexistence’ was added to the image of the political wisdom of the Rus’ Princes. According to the text, Prince Vladimir the Saint ‘lived at peace with the neighbouring Princes, Boleslav, Stephen, and Udalrich, and there was amity and friendship among them’.47 Evidently, the chronicler meant here Bolesław the Brave (Chrobry) of Poland (992–1025), St Stephen I of Hungary (997–1038), and Udalrich of Bohemia (1001–1034), with peace as an important part of values orientation. Of course, the comparison of Vladimir with the biblical example of King Solomon is an element of medieval narrative. In this case the history of ‘peaceful coexistence’ had been described in the following biblical passages: 1 Kings 4: 24–25 (‘For he had dominion over all the region on this side of the river, […] over all the kings on this side of the river: and he had peace on all sides round about him and Judah, and Israel dwelt safely’) and 1 Chronicles 22: 9 (‘for his name shall be Solomon, and I will give peace and quietness unto Israel in his days’). It is interesting to note that the idea of the peaceful coexistence of Prince Vladimir and neighbouring countries is challenged by two contemporary pieces of evidence at the beginning of the eleventh century: Epistola Brunonis ad Henricum regem and Chronicon Thietmari Merseburgensis Episcopi. Bruno of Querfurt informs us about the peace between Rus’ and the Pechenegs, established thanks to his efforts: We made peace which, as they [the Pechenegs] said, no one could have accomplished except us: ‘This peace’, they said, ‘happened to you; if it remains firm, as you teach, we shall all freely be Christians; but if that lord of the Rus’ wavers in his faith, we must think only of war, not of Christianity’. With this arrangement, I came to the lord of the Rus’, who, giving satisfaction for God’s sake, offered his son as a hostage.48

47 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 122 (6504 [996]). 48 Epistola Brunonis, ed. by Karwasinska, p. 100.

299

3 00

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

In this story, the real peacemaker was Bruno of Querfurt, not Prince Vladimir himself. Thietmar, who could have an oral information on Kievan Rus’ from his conscolasticus Bruno, in his turn, states that the name of Vladimir had been wrongly interpreted to mean ‘power of peace’ (potestas pacis; VII: 73): Indeed that which the impious hold among themselves or the occupants of this world possess is not true peace, it constantly changes. True peace is attained only by one who lays aside the soul’s every passion and seeks the Kingdom of God with the aid of patience which conquers every obstacle.49 Even if the ‘peaceful’ model of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle follows the biblical example, such a narrative should be regarded as providing a great deal of motivation and could have influenced the attitude and values orientation of the medieval population of the Rus’ towards neighbouring countries. Additionally, I would like to draw attention to the principle differences between biblical narratives and this passage of the Chronicle. In the first case the biblical author stresses the idea of the domination of King Solomon over surrounding countries, and an idea that is strange to the Early Rus’ attitude. This observation will be important later in this study when I deal with the shift in values orientation from the Kievan period to Muscovite times for estimating the ideological sources of new values orientation. Additionally, in twelfth-century hagiography and canon law, we can find another aspect of ethnic perception in Eastern Europe, as ethnic terms began to describe confessional and religious boundaries with the Latin civilization. For example, a priest of the Latin Church in Novgorod was identified as a ‘Varangian pope’,50 and the evil spirit described in the form of a Lyakh, i.e., a Pole recognized because of his special robe.51 Thus, the social functions of ethnic terms began to change, and could absorb new meaning, including confessional meanings, showing us the beginning of the shift in the values orientation. Such movement of terms from their native area of application to another can be identified in the East European attitude towards the Poles. The Novgorodian Chronicle applied a stereotypical image for them that in earlier and other cultural situations was applied to one ethnos only. So, in the description of the events of the second half of the tenth century, the Primary Rus’ Chronicles states that the Greeks suggested a way for Prince Svyatoslav Igorevich ‘to deceive the Russes, for the Greeks are crafty even to the present day’. Two hundred years later the Novgorodian chronicler wrote about the relationship between Poland and Galich-Volhynia land: ‘The King of Krakóv with a large force seized the country of Volynia (Zemlya Volynskaya) by deceit’ (that is, because they were crafty).52 Such an artificial migration of a term can be quite significant for the change in the ethnic vocabulary of the period. However, 49 Die Chronik des Bischofs Thietmar, ed. by Holtzmann, p. 489. For the English translation, see Warner, Ottonian Germany. 50 Voprosy Savvy i Il'i, p. 60. 51 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, p. 160 [6582 (1074)]. 52 Novgorodskaya pervaya letopis, p. 316; The Chronicle of Novgorod, ed. by Michell and Forbes, p. 143 (1349 [6857]).

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

such indications are not very numerous, allowing us to pass immediately to the main medieval concept of Eastern Europe — its ‘lands’. In general for the eleventh to thirteenth century Rus’ we can attest to a special idea present in the chronicles that classifies the values orientation of the Eastern European population, especially that of Rus’ Land in the Middle Dnieper area concerning its multi-ethnic borderlands: a peaceful and parallel coexistence. In fact, the chronicler who settled in Kiev as in omphalos mundi described different ‘overlapping circles’53 of ethnic character far away from Rus’ Land. As has been noted, the Rus’ Land initially included only the core possessions of the Ryurikids princes in the Middle Dnieper region — Kiev, Chernigov, and Pereiaslav territories. I have already stressed this Rus’ Land had a different relationship to the various territories of Eastern Europe settled by the Slavs and only through them — to the other ethnos existing ad marginem. As the chronicle states, this was a tributary relationship that involved no element of administrative control. At the same time, in their international relations different principalities of Eastern Europe used the term ‘the Rus’’ and ‘the Ruses/Rus(s)ins’ as a special juridical term, accepted in Rus’ Pravda for describing their subjects in medieval international law (see above). As we know, the international treaties of Smolensk with Riga and Gotland of the first quarter of the thirteenth century protected every person from Eastern Europe under the jurisdiction of the Ryurikids as ‘the Russines’ opposed to ‘the Latins’,54 in spite of the fact that Smolensk did not belong to the Rus’ Land sensu stricto. In a similar way, a native of Western Europe who became a member of an East European urban community could be officially identified as Ruthen/ Rusin (for example, Bertram Ruthenus, a member of universitas civitatis ladimiriensis, Volhynia, in ad 1324).55 In other words, different parts of Eastern Europe under the Ryurikids’ control and their settlers presented themselves as the Ruses and had been regarded as the Ruses in international contacts. In the same period of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the population of the Galician-Volhynian Land also increasingly began to figure in different texts not as Galicians, Volodymyrians, or Peremyshlianians, but as men of Rus’, especially when they were mentioned along with actual ‘foreigners’, the Poles and Hungarians who on their part permanently began to call them ‘Rutheni/Rusiny/Rus’’.56 A similar kind of identification was also known in Hungarian and Polish tradition for the border population of Eastern Europe. Even if the Hungarian kings Bella in 1189 and Andre in 1205 called themselves respectively ‘Galaciae Rex’ or ‘Galitiae Lodomeriaeque Rex’, they undertook an ‘expeditionem in Russiam’ (1188), ‘in Ruthenia’ (1264) or ‘exercitu contra Ruthenos’ (1205–1245),57 when they picked a 53 On this conception see Winston Churchill’s Fulton (or ‘Iron Curtain’) Speech (1946) and Shepard, ‘Byzantium’s Overlapping Circles’. 54 Smolenskie gramoty 13–14 vekov, ed. by. Sumnikova, pp. 10–13. 55 Kupchinskiy, Akty, pp. 165–66, no 7. 56 Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nations, p. 61. 57 On the use of these terms see Khoroshkevich, ‘Terminy “Russia” i “Moskovia”’; Font, ‘Ponyatie Ruthenia/Ruscia’; Gardi, ‘“Rex Ruscie”’.

301

302

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

fight with the Galician-Volhynian Land. I can propose only one explanation: the territory of Galicia and Volhynia that were not Rus’ sensu stricto had been ruled by the Ryurikids dynasty which was associated in the mental map58 with Rus’ Land and Kiev. In fact, for the local population the term Rutheni/Rusiny was a typical exonym, which was accepted as a self-designation only in the fourteenth century and later. It can be compared to the historical situation when many immigrants to Europe and United States from different provinces of the Russian Empire or the Soviet Union in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries have thus been officially enumerated as ‘Russians’ or are popularly considered as Russians by the general populace despite their actual ethnic origins. Why and when did the situation in the border realm change or, as Serhey Plokhiy has asked in his book: What happened to the Rus’ Land?59 We shall begin with a short introduction to the historiography of the concept of Rus’ Land. Russian scholars examining the Primary Rus’ Chronicle have long thought that its author referred to the Rus’ Land in ‘narrow’ and ‘broad’ senses. The first included the Middle Dnieper region, while the Rus’ Land in the ‘broad’ sense extended to the farthest regions under the Ryurikids’ control — in other words, all of Eastern Europe. Historians are divided on which came first, the ‘narrow’ or the ‘broad’ concept of the Rus’ Land.60 Today it is obvious that the term was originally used concerning the southern part of Eastern Europe and was only later extended to other territories, particularly Galicia and Volhynia, Vladimir and Suzdal Land, and Muscovy, which led to the creation of the medieval concept of Rus’ Land in the ‘broad’ sense.61 In fact, we have a kind of translatio imperii as a means of the appropriation and dividing of Kievan heritage between Galich-Volhynia and Vladimir-Suzdal. Ch. Halperin stated that the Galician-Volhynian elites and their neighbours to the west began to think of this land as a part of Rus’ only after the Kievan state had succumbed to the Mongol invasion in the mid-thirteenth century, and the process of its identification with Rus’ was fully completed during the post-Kievan Rus’ period. He also argues that in this historical competition it can be attested that Galicia and Volhynia adopted this name earlier than Vladimir and Muscovy. As for the transfer of the Rus’ name to the Vladimir-Suzdal principality, it did not happen before the Galician-Volhynian princes had appropriated the Kievan ‘brand’.62 According to Halperin, the name of the Rus’ Land was adopted in the north-eastern lands of Eastern Europe sometime between 1293 and 1328, with the process fully

58 On this concept see Downs and Stea, Maps in Minds. 59 Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nations, p. 59. 60 Nasonov, ‘Russkaya zemlia’, pp. 6, 26–27. 61 For a discussion see Soloviev, ‘“Reges” et “Regnum Russiae”’; Kuchkin, ‘“Russkaya zemlia”’; Vedyushkina, ‘“Rus’” i “Russkaya zemlia”’. Modern Russian historiography continues to insist on the primordiality of the ‘broad’ sense of the Rus’ Land with strict ethnic or ethno-religious connotations, mainly for traditional and/or political reasons. This position is usually used to justify the Russian ‘privatization’ of Eastern Europe. 62 Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nations, pp. 67–68.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

complete by 1340.63 However, Plokhy thinks that the end of translatio should be shifted by a hundred years to the mid-fifteenth century. The process could not be finished before the Kulikovo battle cycle of texts had been formed around 1440–1450, and Halperin, in Plokhy’s opinion, has wrongly used the late predominantly fifteenth-century Muscovite point of view on the events of the fourteenth century in Vladimir-Suzdal Land.64 Plokhy is partially right that the political and intellectual ancestor of Muscovy was not eleventh-century Kiev, but twelfth-century Suzdal, and Suzdal Land was the immediate forerunner of the notion of the Rus’ Land.65 However, he also thinks that the author of the so-called Laurentian Codex (1371) was much slower than his Galician-Volhynian counterparts to apply the term ‘Rus’ Land’ to their realm. In fact, such observations ignore several aspects of how the Vladimir-Suzdal Land, that is the north-eastern part of Eastern Europe, became Rus’ Land. For example, elements of such translatio when Rostov Land was called the Rus’ Land in the chronicle can already be observed in the 1180s.66 In fact, it was a long and complicated process. Nonetheless, around 1340 the Muscovite princes finally adopted the role of sovereigns who ruled the new Rus’ Land. As we can judge from the existing sources, such a concept did not yet comprise any claims for the territory of Kiev submitted to the Lithuanian princes since the 1320s. Nevertheless, in the study of the process of the transformation of the Muscovy and its society in new Rus’ Land, a distinction must be made between the official government position as an expression of cultural memory, and social mentality and public opinion as collective memory. The latter, as we will see, had formed only in the middle of the second half of the fifteenth century not without the influence of cultural memory shaped by the Muscovite Ryurikids. In my opinion, the faster process of adaptation of the translatio in the Galich-Volhynia Land should be explained by the long history of the external use of the exonym ‘Rutheni’ and ‘Ruthenia’ that had been applied to this territory and population by their western neighbours. After this brief survey, in my turn, I will attempt to answer the question of how the Moscow-ruled ‘new Rus’ Land’ replaced the notion of the Kiev-based one, and how its new geographical limits and the central status of that notion within the hierarchy of Muscovite loyalties67 grew. In the discussion on the historical evidence concerning the translatio of the concept of the Rus’ Land from the Dnieper to the Moscow River, researchers have generally followed a standard selection of sources, which excludes the data provided by the Slovo o pogibeli Russkoi zemli, which seems to have been compiled, according to several scholars, out of the Vladimir-Suzdal

63 For this discussion see Halperin, ‘The Concept of the Russian Land’; Halperin, ‘The Russian Land and the Russian Tsar’; Halperin, ‘The Concept of “Russkaia zemlia”’; Pritsak, ‘Kiev and All of Rus’. While the author used the term translatio, he did not, however, speak about translatio imperii, which was a special point of medieval political mentality. 64 Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nation, p. 70. 65 Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nation, p. 75. 66 Lavrent’evskaya letopis, col. 391 [6693 (1185)]. 67 These questions have been asked in Plokhy, The Origins of the Slavic Nations, pp. 72, 73.

303

3 04

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Land. However, no one expresses any doubts on the chronology of the text, usually regarded as written in the mid-thirteenth century. In my opinion, the destiny of the concept of Rus’ Land in the Muscovy and its consequences for an axiological basis of international relationships in Eastern and Central Europe can be understood through the analysis of the Slovo o pogibeli Russkoi zemli. It serves as an introduction to the Life of Alexander Nevsky (d. 1263) and has been preserved in only two copies from the end the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and was evidently composed in the region of Pskov68 not earlier than the second half of the fifteenth century. In both separate copies of the introduction to the Life of Alexander Nevsky this text appears with its title, the Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ Land, and stylistically is very close to the text of the Vita.69 This introduction has been considered by some scholars, without sufficient grounds, as the beginning of the lost monument The Lay of the Destruction of the Russian Land of the thirteenth century70 and is regarded as ‘perhaps the highest achievement of Russian literature of the early Mongols period’.71 I must stress that this text does not exist separately from the Vita, and there is no serious study of the date of the compilation of the text.72 In fact, the Tale is a kind of ‘sacred cow’ of Russian cultural memory like the Tale of Igor’s Campaign (Slovo o polku Igoreve), and no one dares to suggest any critical remarks about it. This attitude towards the medieval text was only formed in the late 1940s when the second manuscript was published.73 Alexander Nevsky was regarded as a military symbol of Stalin’s era, and the introduction to his Vita had been transformed into a separate masterpiece and became a part of new Soviet pride alongside the myth of the Great Patriotic War. The triumphal aggressive rhetoric of the text fits well with the official vocabulary of this epoch. It provoked huge politically motivated interest in the text: the main studies concerning the Tale were published in the 1940s–1960s.74 Its initial section begins with a portrayal of the ‘Russian land’ which has been described as a happy garden state.75 It is mainly this part that has attracted the attention 68 One manuscript came from the collection of the Pskov-Caves Monastery in Pechory (Pskov Oblast, Russia), known since 1891, now in the State Archive of the Pskov region, Pskov (collection 449, act 60, fifteenth century), and the second one, known since 1933, from the manuscript collection of Old Believers Grebenstchikov House of Prayer in Riga, Latvia (now in the Institute of the Russian Literature, St Petersburg, razryad IV, collection 24, act 26, sixteenth century). For a discussion see Loparev, ‘Slovo o pogibely Ruskyya zemli’; Mansikka, Zhitie Aleksandra Nevskogo, pp. 7, 9–11; Serebryanskiy, ‘Zametki i teksty iz pskovskikh pamyatnikov. 5’; Serebryanskiy, Drevnerusskie knyazeskie zhitiya. 69 Ciževskij, History of Russian Literature, p. 138. 70 For a discussion see Gorlin, ‘Le dit de la Ruine’; Soloviev, ‘Le Dit de la ruine’; Werner, ‘Über das Verhältnis’. 71 Vernadsky, ‘The Mongol Impact on Russia’, p. 189. 72 See the most recent Russian publication (with a near exhaustive bibliography) which discusses various subjects within the Tale other than its genuine chronology: Gorskiy, ‘Problemy izucheniya’. 73 Malyshev, ‘“Zhitie Aleksandra Nevskogo”’. 74 The most important articles on this subject include: Tikhmirov, ‘Gde i kogda bylo napisano’; Gudziy, ‘O “Slove o pogibeli Russkyya zemli”’; Soloviev, ‘Zametki k “Slovu o pogibeli zemli Russkoy”’; Meshcherskiy, ‘K rekonstruktsii texta “Slova o pobybeli Ruskyya zemli”’. 75 Baehr, The Paradise Myth, pp. 68–69.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

of scholars. The second part of the Tale has very often escaped historical analysis. Most usually, scholars have noted that it comprises dry enumerations of neighbouring nations bordering on the Russian Land, moving on to memories of historical (lost) pride of the Rus’, particularly of Vladimir Monomakh’s times (1113–1125) which the author did not know sufficiently well to avoid anachronisms. After the rule of Yarosalv Vsevolodovich (1191–1246), father of Alexander Nevsky, the author sees only decadence. The text might be translated in the following way: From here [i.e. the Rus’ Land] to the Hungarians, [from there] to the Poles, and to the Czechs, from the Czechs to the Yatvingians, from the Yatvingians to the Lithuanians, and to the Germans (Nemtsy), from the Germans to the Carelians, from the Carelians to the Ustyug region, where the pagan Toymichi [?] settle, and behind the Breathing Sea [Arctic Ocean], from the Sea to the Bulgarians, from the Bulgarians to the Burtases, from Burtases to the Cheremisses, from the Cheremisses to the Mordovians — all nations and pagan lands had been subjugated by the will of God to the Christian [Russian] people, to Grand Prince Vsevolod, to his father, Yuri, Prince of Kiev [Yaroslav the Wise], to his grandfather Vladimir Monomakh, and the women of Polovtsi [Cumans] frightened their children in the cradle with him. And the Lithuanians did not dare to show themselves in the light of day from their wetlands, and the Hungarians fortified stone walls of their cities with iron gates in order that Vladimir Monomakh the Great would not conquer them, and the Germans were happy that they are far away — over the Sea. The Burtasy, the Cheremis, the Vyadas [?], the Mordvinians kept wild bees [bortnichali] for Grand Prince Vladimir. And Emperor Manuel [Commnenos] was afraid of Grand Prince Vladimir as he had not conquered Constantinople and sent rich gifts to him. And in those days — from great Yaroslav, and to Vladimir [Monomakh], up to Yaroslav of that day [nyneshnego Yaroslava] and his brother Yuri, Prince of Vladimir [happened] the grief for the Christians. As the reader can see, the text provides a new vision of the orbis gentium and is based on the new axiological principles of the organization of the multi-ethnic surrounding. The principles are linked to the idea of political domination and military aggression which must be regarded as alien to the attitude of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle and the values orientation of the Kievan period of Eastern European history. In 1965 Yuriy Begunov published the critical edition of the Tale, yet his comments have a strongly apologetic character. His text leaves the impression that he had a ‘hidden polemic’ to a supposedly existing opinion that the Tale had been compiled only in the fifteenth century by one of the medieval Russian intellectuals for the special Pskov edition of the Life of Alexander Nevsky.76 In fact, the ‘hieratical’ idea that the Tale contains many anachronistic details that reveal its late medieval origin has very seldom been expressed in Russian historiography.77

76 Begunov, Pamyatnik russkoy literatury, p. 74. 77 See the commentary accompanying the Russian translation of the book by John Fennell, The Crisis of Medieval Russia: Lifshits, Khoroshkevich, and Pliguzov, ‘Prilozheniya’.

305

3 06

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

At a first glance, the enumeration of ethnos in the Tale follows the example of the Primary Rus’ Chronicle. However, the attitude of the early medieval chronicler towards other nations is neutral enough — it differs from the late medieval text. In fact, the Tale transforms the idea of the Chronicle on the tributary relationship between the Rus’ and other tribes into their political submission based on military force. The narrative develops the topic of ‘powerful princes’ who had conquered ‘pagan countries’, and before whom all neighbouring peoples and tribes trembled because of their great political and military might. The text has an openly threatening character, and several characteristics of the nations could be regarded as humiliating. Such a transformation has been explained by scholars through the situation of the Mongol invasion of the mid-thirteenth century when the Tale was a kind of lamentation on the lost majesty of Rus’. Meanwhile, the differences between the Chronicle and the Tale and the anachronisms in its text show that the text of the introduction of the Life of Alexander Nevsky could not have been written in the thirteenth century for several reasons. One of the chronological arguments is the mention of nyneshnij Yaroslav in the text — Prince Yaroslav Vsevolodovich, father of Alexander Nevsky, who died in 1246. However, the word nyneshnij should be translated not as Yaroslav of our days but of those days, that is the days when the Mongol invasion happened. It is quite possible to regard it as a rhetorical topic known in different Slavonic medieval texts, rather than as a chronological indication. Several ethnonyms mentioned in the Tale, first of all, Toymichi and Burtases (Burtas), were not in use in the thirteenth century, as can be judged by the written sources.78 A pair of nations mentioned together, Burtases (modern Chuvash/Čăvašla?) and Cheremisses, are quite characteristic of Russian literature of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, for example, Kniga stepennaya tsarskogo rodosloviya79 where they are always mentioned together. One of the sources of those writings evidently was an excerpt from the entry in Sofiyskaya or Novgorodaskya 4th Chronicles from ad 1380 (6888 MC) which for the first time tells about the battle of Kulikovo Field and had been compiled only between ad 1431–1453.80 A similar conclusion was also made by D. Ostrowski, who argued that those works could not have been written before the 1440s.81 This fact reveals an approximate chronology of the emergence of elements that form the Tale. Additionally, the statement that ‘the Hungarians fortified stone walls of their cities by iron gates in order that Vladimir Monomakh the Great not conquer them’ is also very anachronistic. It is well known that stone-fortress building in

78 Burtas were mentioned by early Arabic writers such as Ahmad Ibn Rustah. However, it never had any impact on early Rus’ ethnic vocabulary. Their ethnic history is unclear. On sources and comments see Zakhoder, Kaspiyskiy svod svedeniy, pp. 25–28, 72, 232–52. For a discussion see Afanasiev, ‘Burtasy i lesostepnoy variant’. 79 Sirenov, ‘Stepennaya kniga’, vol. 1, pp. 4, 254; vol. 2, p. 396. 80 Letopisnaya povest’ o Kulikovskoy bitve, ed. by Salmina and Dimitriev, pp. 112–13; Mingalev, ‘Letopisnaya povest’; Orlov, ‘Literaturnye istochniki Povesti’. 81 Ostrowski, Muscovy and the Mongols, pp. 155–63.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

Hungary did not begin earlier than the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth centuries.82 Several elements also have parallels only in late texts of the second half of the fifteenth century. For example, the Tale argues that some Finno-Ugrian tribes kept wild bees (bortnichali, inf. — bortnichat’) for the Rus’ princes. The idea of a forest bee-keeper as the lowest social class was openly expressed only in the fake genealogy of the Lithuanian princes kept in the fifteenth-century manuscript from Chudov monastery, Moscow. The text relates that Vytenis, Grand Duke of Lithuania (1295–1316) and brother of Gediminas (1316–1341), was an equerry or even a servant of the prince of Smolensk Rostislav, Mstislavovich († after 1239) (although in the later edition of the sixteenth century, he was a relative of the prince83). He escaped from his owner and settled in Žemaitija in the forest house of a wild-hive bee-keeper,84 thus expressing his social humiliation. At nearly the same time, such a genealogy comprised part of the Tale of the Grand Princes of Vladimir (Skazanie o velikikh knyaz’yakh Vladimirskikh),85 at the end of the fifteenth and the beginning of the sixteenth century, where the main actor was Prince Vladimir Monomakh as in the Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ Land. It is well known that this legend was the basis of official Muscovite cultural memory. Also important is that the introduction to the Life of Alexander does not describe the borders of the Rus’ Land which existed until the thirteenth century, but rather the Rus’ Land in a ‘broad’ sense invited by the Muscovite chroniclers in the fifteenth century as imagined borders of the procession of the whole Ryurikids dynasty in the territory of Eastern Europe. In this text, the territory of the Muscovite principality had been presented as a new Rus’ Land. It is obvious that the Tale had been created where it had been found — at the north-western border of Muscovy, in Pskov, which always stressed its loyalty to the Muscovite princes and was under Muscovite influence. The text had been created as a general introduction to Russian history: in the same manuscripts, for example, we can find a chronicle compilation entitled The Tale on the Beginning of the Rus’ Land. It should also be taken into consideration that it was in Pskov that the famous theory of Moscow as the Third Rome had been created.86 Evidently, the Tale was a political programme of the new unification of Eastern Europe. Such a tendency reflected the new collective memory textualized in the 82 Rusu, ‘Eigenburgen und Sächsische Grefen’. I wish to thank the participant of the project Dr Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu for this valuable reference. 83 Florya, ‘Rodoslovie litovskikh knyazey’. This change can be explained by the new prestigious positions of the princely families of Glinskie and Bel’skie, issued from the Gedeminovichi, that they were able to gain at the Muscovite court at that time. The prince of Moscow, Ivan IV Vasilyevich (the Terrible), as a descendent from the Ryurikids and the family of Gediminas via his mother Elena Glinskaya, refused this fake genealogy. See Poslaniya Ivana Groznogo, ed. by Likhachev and Lurie, p. 260. 84 Bychkova, Russko-litovskaya znat’ 15–17 vekov. 85 Skazanie o knyaz’yakh Vladimirskikh, ed. by Dmitrieva. 86 On the medieval concept of a Third Rome in Russia see Malinin, Starets Elezarova monastyrya Filofey; Sinitsyna, Tretiy Rim; Lettenbauer, Moskau das dritte Rom; Poe, ‘Moscow, the Third Rome’.

307

3 08

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

provincial intellectual milieu of Pskov, meshing well with the predominant political idea existing in Moscow at the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, which was a part of cultural memory, and was expressed by Dmitri Volodimerov, treasurer and ambassador of Grand Prince Ivan III Vasilyevich during the meeting with Stanisław Hlebow, representative of Grand Duke Alexander Jagiellon on 5 March 1504. Here he argued that all Rus’ Land in a ‘broad’ sense including its western borders belonged at that time to the Lithuanian State from the very beginning and was his patrimony: The Rus’ Land from our ancestors is our patrimony […] not only cities and districts that are now under our power but all Rus’ Land, Kiev, Smolensk and other towns that [Grand Duke Alexander Jagiellon] has under his power in the Lithuanian Land are our patrimony from the past and our ancestors with help and will of God […].87 It starts with the political claims of Muscovy on Kiev as a place of memory within the transformation of the notion of the Rus’ Land from the common possession of the Kievan Ryurikids to the exclusive patrimony of the princes of Moscow.88 The dynastic interests based on the reinterpretation and mythologization of the past were transformed into geographical expansion to the West. They also presented the local population of the claimed territories as the Rus’ and as the subjects of the Rus’-Muscovite princes. However, such ideas served not only the foreign policy but, in my opinion, one of the goals of the translatio of the ethnonyms and their transformation, which was not an external expansion but an internal mobilization. It is interesting to note that at this point the interests of the Muscovite princes and Russian intellectuals, or the political group who wrote the Tale, coincided perfectly. The above-mentioned Tale of the Grand Princes of Vladimir includes an episode which proves this. It is well known that the text is based on a legend that the Ryurikids dynasty had originated from the Roman Emperor Augustus, who despatched his relative Prus to rule the region of Prussia Regalis. Prus was the supposed ancestor of Ryurik who, according to the Primary Rus’ Chronicle, had been invited in 862 by the Slavs and Finno-Ugrians to reign in Eastern Europe.89 Traditionally, the Tale of the Grand Princes of Vladimir is regarded as voicing the ambition of the Muscovite princes for a Roman political heritage and as a means of intervention in the PolishPrussian relationship. However, this myth was not used in the foreign policy of Muscovy until the mid-sixteenth century.90 Therefore, the invention of the myth of Prus for the internal purposes of the new political body consolidated by Muscovy must be explained. My investigation supports the argument that the myth of the Prussian origin of the Ryurikids dynasty had been created in Novgorod in the 1470s during the political struggle, and in the situation of the Muscovy oppression towards Novgorodian

87 88 89 90

Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo, vol. 1, by Karpov, p. 460. Similar ideas are found in Pelenski, ‘The Origins of the Official Muscovite Claims’. Lavrent’evskaya letopis, cols 19–20. Erusalimski, ‘Prus i ‘Prusskiy vopros’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

independence.91 A Prussian street existed in the city where an aristocratic community lived seemingly loyal towards the Muscovite princes. Of course, the origins of the family and the street’s name meant nothing to the Prussians;92 the name of the street merely indicated its direction to the West, to the direction of Prussia. However, local intellectuals could invent an origo which transformed the Varangians into Prussians and used this deantroponymic name to stress the common origin of that section of local boyars and the ruling dynasty. Later, the legend containing the Novgorodian origin, a good example of communicative memory, was accepted by the cultural memory of the Muscovite State in the form of the official dynastic history. In this story, ethnic names played the role of typical exonyms/xenonyms not only as a means of social consolidation, but also that of organizing the ethnocultural landscape of Eastern European borders on the basis of a new values orientation.93 In the same way, the term ‘Russians’ began to be applied to the new ethnic and social groups newly included in the Muscovite political body. Consequently, official cultural memory began to influence regional identity and the new Muscovite policy of the ‘rus’ification’ of the new subjects. T. S. Noonan has rightly noted the success of the Muscovite grand princes in creating a ‘national Muscovite’ identity and then imposing this new identity on the conquered peoples of other Rus’ lands. Those who came under Muscovite control were not just subjects who had obligations to their Muscovite overlords — they were gradually assimilated into an emergent imperial, Muscovite society and forced to assume a new identity. According to Noonan, residents of Novgorod, Tver’, and Riazan slowly but surely became Muscovites,94 that is Russians. In my opinion, the concept of the Rus’ was used by the Muscovite Ryurikids for ‘ethnic cleansing’ of the landscape of the borderlands, firstly in a narrative manner and then in the imperial policy of more recent times. The new values orientation presented a possible tool of ‘multi-ethnic cohesion in the making’ and was an attempt at the unification of a regional-cultural conscious of pre-modern nations. As a basis of new axiology the reinterpretation of origo gentis had been chosen. It should be noted that the active mythologization and reinterpretation of the ethnic past intended to resolve contemporary political and social problems had been inevitably followed by the massive rewriting of the Russian Chronicles in Muscovy and even their falsification, especially in the field of the history of the relationship between Novgorod and the Ryurikids. The ancient privileges of Novgorod which regard the princes as seigniors of the town and not as its sovereigns in the writings of the Muscovite intellectuals had been transformed in the fifteenth century into permanent treasons against the Ryurikids and apostasies from Orthodoxy.95 Such an ideological campaign ended in the mid-sixteenth century with the Istoriya o 91 92 93 94 95

Musin, ‘“Ród ruski”. For discussion see Ślaski, ‘Stosunki Prusów’; Antoniewicz, ‘The Problem’. On the research methodology see Downs and Stea, Maps in Minds. Noonan, ‘Forging a National Identity’, p. 496. See, for example, Moskovskiy letopisniy svod kontsa 15 veka, pp. 81–82 (6678 [1171]); L’vovskaya letopis, p. 282 (6979 [1471]). For a brief analysis see Musin, Zagadki Doma Svyatoy, pp. 181–85; see also Musin, ‘“Ród ruski”, pp. 11–23.

309

310

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Kazanskom tsarstve (History of the Kazan’ Kingdom),96 which absurdly stated that the Ryurikids were from the very beginning the princes of Novgorod, Vladimir, and Moscow, while the community of Novgorod betrayed its native princes and invited a new dynasty from the Varangians (sic!). The Muscovite tradition of rewriting history based on historical parallels and false coincidences of names concerned international policy as well, revealing a superficial and careless treatment of the new Muscovite intellectuals using texts of previous chronicles. For example, in 1564 the princely order to the Muscovite boyar Vasiliy Zakhar’in-Yur’ev during the political negotiation with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth expanded the territorial claims of Ivan IV the Terrible, which in the mid-sixteenth century included ninety-one towns of Eastern Europe such as Brest, Lvov, and Galich, as well as Podolian and Volhynian Lands up to the Polish border.97 Nearly ten years later, during the negotiations with the Polish embassy of Stanislav Kryski (1578), the Russian participants stated that Prince ‘Svyatoslav reigned in Pereyalsavets-on-Danube [967–7098], that is now Vednajben (i.e., Vienna, the name evidently came from Latin Vindobona).99 Even earlier, in 1552, in order to justify the annexation of the Astrakhan Khanate, the Muscovite princely power identified Astrakhan as being in the delta of the Volga River and Tmutarakan,100 a Byzantine medieval city on the Taman peninsula, where several representatives of the Ryurikids dynasty in the second half of the eleventh century periodically exercised the function of military leaders and controlled its suburbs. Thus, the new territorial claims of new Rus’ Land began to be followed automatically by the newly made historical myth. It is quite clear that the main ideas of the Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ Land had been formulated under the impact of the desire for historical vengeance and reflected the concept of political and national ressentiment. It is worth comparing such an observation with the statement by G. Hosking, who noted that the Russian collective consciousness took shape gradually over the centuries and was ‘steeped in “ressentiment”’,101 and emphasized the deep impact of ‘raskol’ in the mid-seventeenth century on Russian national identity, linked to the imperial idea. In general, scholars consider that the imperial features of the Russian state and Russian consciousness emerged in 1552, after the annexation of Khanates on the Volga River.102 However, as I have tried to demonstrate, a similar ideology took shape, firstly of cultural memory, and then of collective memory, and emerged a half-century earlier in the second half–end of 96 Kazanskaya istoriya, pp. 54–55, 179. On the history of the text see Kuntsevich, Istoriya o Kazanskom; Keenan, ‘Coming to Grips’. 97 Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo gosudarstva, vol. 3, by Karpov, p. 260. 98 The Russian Primary Chronicle, ed. by Cross and Sherbowitz-Wetzor, pp. 84–85. 99 See the documents in the National Library of Russia (St Petersburg), Department of manuscripts, Q.IV.33, fols 32v–33; Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts (Moscow), fond 79, inventory no. 1, fol. 381, 384; Filjushkin, Tituly russkikh gosudarey, p. 146; Filjushkin, Ivan the Terrible, pp. 1 ff., 267. 100 Kniga stepennaya tsarskogo rodosloviya, ed. by Vasenko, vol. 2, pp. 653–54; Schmidt, ‘“Skazanie o vzyatii Astrakhani”’; Pelenski, Russia and Kazan, p. 122; Amelkin, ʻProblema Tmutorokanskogo knyazhestva’. 101 See Hosking, ‘The Russian National Myth Repudiated’. 102 See, for example, Kappeler, Rußland; Kappeler, ‘Das Moskauer Reich des 17’; Hosking, Russia; Hosking, Russia and the Russians; Bogatyrev, ‘Reinventing the Russian Monarchy’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

the fifteenth century as a means for historical pseudo-reconquista in its political and intellectual forms. In this movement, the intentions of the Muscovite authority and Muscovite society were perfectly agreed and consolidated by ressentiment as a starting point of the process. It could be said that the meaning of the Muscovite expansionism had been oriented not to the future, but to the past. In this connection, I would assert that the project of construction of a single identity within a unified political and geographical space was the post-Kievan-era (Muscovite-era) project involving the building of a single Rus’ legacy that had such a profound impact. The parameters of the project had been defined in the second half of fourteenth- and fifteenth-century Moscow, developed in the north-western part of Russia, in Novgorod and Pskov, and then with grateful appreciation returned to the Muscovite owner. Within this, it is interesting to revisit the causes of Russian imperialism which have been seen by various scholars as the urge to access the sea,103 the lack of a natural geographical realm,104 or the messianism of a Byzantine-biblical character.105 In respect to the key-work of the ressentiment tendency, the Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ Land had been compiled where another specific Muscovite idea, that of Moscow as the Third Rome, had been textualized in nearly the same period,106 and it would be logical to suppose that we are really dealing with a kind of messianism. However, in spite of the concept of translatio, appropriated to both texts, I cannot see in the Tale any specific religious ideas that could prove a messianic tendency of Russian political and cultural development. Even the Old Testament tendency, visible in the concept of domination over all neighbouring regions and kings107 supposedly expressed in the Tale does not make this hypothesis more certain. As far as we can judge, the concept of the ‘Third Rome’ was not a ‘pivotal moment’ for Russian cultural development and the creation of borders in Central-Eastern Europe. Such processes were unveiled not by a Byzantine legacy, but by the political ambitions of Muscovite Ryurikids and ressentiment feeling of Muscovite society based on the re-visited past. As a result Muscovy tried to become ‘New Kiev’ and ‘new Rus’ Land’ based on the dynastic idea. The East Slavic ethnic affinity108 and the religious factors of the schism in 1448–1560/1589 between the Muscovite Church and the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople109 played a marginal role in the new consolidation. I can add here that Russian imperialism can be described as assimilative expansion or assimilating expansionism (expansion of assimilative type). Its special feature consists of growing in parallel with the national state based on dynastic ambitions

103 Kerner, The Urge to the Sea. 104 Halecki, ‘Imperialism’. 105 Huttenbach, The Origins of Russian Imperialism. See also: Parke, The Geopolitics of Domination. 106 See n. 86. 107 On the Old Testament connotations in Byzantine imperial ideology see Dagron, Empereur et prêtre. 108 See, for example, Riasanovsky, Russian Identities. 109 On this subject see Pitsakis, ‘À propos des actes du Patriarcat de Constantinople’; Lourié, Russkoe Pravoslavie; Lourié, The Idea of the Muscovite Autocephaly. See also Steindorff, Religion und Integration.

311

312

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

and the national mentality. Both of these elements formed in the second half of the fifteenth century.110 Finally, the dynastic idea of Russian nationalism was replaced by a statist or imperial one, as P. Bushkovitch has noted.111 However, he proposed this change was attested during the new rule of the Romanov dynasty and especially during the reign of Peter the Great, while historically it was a special ‘know-how’ of the Muscovite Ryurikids. For many years scholars have discussed the meaning of Russian nationalism, its lack as a crucial factor in Russian history, and its supposed contradiction with the imperialistic character of the Russian state.112 However, those among them are correct who have argued for the lack of the principle differences in the Empire, national state, and nation in Russian history. The building of the Empire should be regarded as a means of national consolidation which comprises the separate implication of ‘russification’ in an imperial and national sense, or rather, between the ‘russification’ and ‘rus’ification’.113 Today, instead of placing the beginning of the idea of Russian ‘nationalistic’ imperialism in the mid-sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, we can establish a reliable chronology of its rise based on the authentic medieval written sources. The result of this research allows us to state the principal coincidence of interests of the state and society in Russia since the middle of the second half of the fifteenth century. The present investigation reveals that the concept of Rus’ and Rus’ Land can be regarded as a key point of early medieval values orientation, a so-called lieux de mémoire, and as a means of historical acculturation and social unification. The terms ‘Rus’/Russian/Ruthenians’, which from the beginning were exonyms, became a ‘migrant terminology’ with strong memorial connotations, applied to different historical situations for territorial and political claims and border creation inside of Central-Eastern Europe within the artificially created narrative landscape. The legend about the ‘invitation of the Varangians’ as a kind of origo gentis was also a significant part of the medieval values orientation. During the Muscovite-Polish-Lithuanian rivalry, it was transformed into the legend of the ‘Prussian’ origin of the Ryurikids. This legend became a tool for the consolidation of Muscovite society and a means of the assimilation of the aristocracy of Novgorod with Muscovy political elites. The ethnic term included in the reinterpretation and mythologization of the regional history could serve for local mobilization and consolidation, as well as for incorporation of newly acquired or conquered territories with societies. At the same time, the translatio of the terms in the condition of ressentiment led to the formation of an idea of princely power that Muscovy had a direct continuity with the Rus’ Land on the Dnieper River and became its immediate successor — in other 110 See, for example, the undeservedly forgotten study of Presnyakov, Obrazovanie Velikorusskogo gosudarstva. 111 Bushkovitch, ‘The Formation of a National Consciousness’; Bushkovitch, ‘What is Russia?’. See the discussion in Rowley, ‘Imperial versus National Discourse’. 112 For this discussion see Kaiser, The Geography of Nationalism; Brubaker, Myths and Misconceptions; Rowley, ‘Imperial Versus National Discourse’. 113 For such a concept see Tolz, Russia; Miller, ‘Imperiya i natsiya’.

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

words, new Rus’ Land. The Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ Land, written in the second half of the fifteenth century, openly expressed the new values orientation concerning the multi-ethnic surrounding of the Muscovite political body. In that case, the narrative of cultural and collective memory coincided perfectly. It had been organized around the political idea of the subjection of Eastern Europe to the Muscovite Ryurikids, based on the transformed and mythologized historical memory. This idea finally crystallized in internal Central-East European borders. In the new values orientation, Kiev began as a place of memory, as well as the whole territory of Eastern Europe, ruled in the past by different branches of the Ryurikids family and identified now as Rus’ Land — Rus’kaya zemlya. The spread of the Muscovite influence by means of the specific historical memory served to efface the regional values presented in local cultures and ethnic mentalities — in other words, to the ‘rus’ification’, effectuated in parallel by the state and nation in the field of collective memory and in the sphere of political, economic, and social life. Thus, the multi-ethnic cohesion in the East European border since the fifteenth century had been established not only by powerful military domination. As a result, the imperial claims of Russia should be dated not to 1552, but to half a century earlier. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the idea of dynastic domination of the Ryurikids in Eastern Europe had been added to the concept of the close ethnic unity of the population of the continent. The imperialism of Muscovy and that of its successors inevitably had a mono-ethnic character. It transformed the newly acquired and controlled population not simply into political subjects of a new state, but into real ‘Russians’ according to the strict ethnocultural sense of the term. Consequently, it should be classified as assimilative expansion. The ‘grand narratives’ of Russian history had been established not in the second half of the seventeenth century, but two hundred years earlier, and the Kievan Synopsis, which openly formulated such ideas for the first time114 influenced modern historiography rather than late medieval values orientation. However, the basic concept sown in the ground of cultural and collective memories of the Muscovite and Russian State and society — the concept of the Rus’ Land — was characterized by a strict and potentially unresolved contradiction between the regional character of values orientation and the inter-regional and international character of political organization that inevitably led to the failure of the East European imperial idea in different historical periods. To conclude I would add that in his numerous writings, Russian scholars Alexei Miller, who has studied (according to his definition) the ‘national outskirts of the Russian Empire’, speculates on the failure of an imperial project of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to create an all-Russian or big-Russian nation on the base of the Russians, Ukrainians, and Byelorussians.115 Among the causes, he includes the First World War and the Russian Revolution. However, the main cause, according to him, was a lack in the Russian Empire of effective political machinery to accomplish such

114 For the Kievan Synopsis see Peshtich, ‘“Sinopsis” kak istoricheskoe proizvedenie’; Mechta o russkom edinstve, ed. by Sapozhnikov and Sapozhnikova; Kohut, ‘The Question of Russian-Ukrainian Unity’. 115 See, for example, Miller, The Romanov Empire; Miller, ‘Étnokofessional’nyy faktor’, pp. 120, 150.

313

31 4

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

a difficult task. He has also argued that Russian imperial policy followed the normal practices of large European countries concerning the consolidation of dominant nations. The failure of this policy had been provoked mainly by accidental causes. Both statements are inaccurate. The specifics of Russian imperial policy of multi-ethnic cohesion are based on incorrect historical values orientation and an incorrect perception of the past rising from the mythologization and even falsification of early medieval history of Eastern Europe in Russian cultural and collective memory. This fact explains the collapse and subsequent metamorphosis of the Russian Empire.

Works Cited Primary Sources Adam von Bremen, Hamburgische Kirchengeschichte (Magistri Adam Bremensis Gesta Hammaburgensis ecclesiae pontificum), ed. by B. Schmeidler, in Monumenta Germaniae historica: Scriptores rerum Germermanicarum in usu Scholarum, 2 (Hannover: Hahn, 1917) Al-Muqaddasi, The Best Divisions for Knowledge of the Regions / Ahsan al-Taqasim Fi Ma'rifat al-Aqalim, ed. by B. A. Collins (Reading: Garnet, 1994) Alcuini sive Albini Epistolae, in Epistolae Karolini aevi, vol. 2, ed. by E. Dümmler, in Monumenta Germaniae historica: Epistolae, 4 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1895), pp. 1–481 Bartold, Vasiliy, Izvlechenie iz soczineniya Gardizi Zayn al-akhbar, in Vasiliy Bartold, Sochineniya, ed. by B. Gafurov, vol. 8 (Moskva: Nauka, 1973), pp. 23–62 Begunov, Yuriy, Pamyatnik russkoy literatury 13 veka: ‘Slovo o pogibeli zemli Russkoy’: issledovaniya i teksty (Moskva: Nauka, 1965) Bychkova, Margarita, Russko-litovskaya znat’ 15–17 vekov: istochnikovedenie, genealogiya, geraldika (Moskva: Kvadriga, 2012) Das Paterikon des Kiever Höhlenklosters, ed. by D. Tschizewskij (München: Eidos, 1964) Die Chronik des Bischofs Thietmar von Merseburg und ihre Korveier Überarbeitung, ed. by R. Holtzmann, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores, 6, Scriptores rerum Germanicarum, nova series, 9 (Berlin: Weidmann, 1935) Die Sachsengeschichte des Widukind von Korvei (Widukindi monachi Corbeiensis rerum gestarum Saxonicarum libri tres), ed. by H.-E. Lohmann and P. Hirsch, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores, 7, Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum, 60 (Hannover: Hahn, 1935) Enrico di Lettonia, Chronicon Livoniae. La crociata del Nord (1184–1227), ed. by P. Bugiani, (Livorno: Books & Company, 2005) Epistola Brunonis ad Henricum regem, ed. by J. Karwasinska, in Monumenta Poloniae Historica, Nova Series, 4, part 3 (Warszawa: PWN, 1973), pp. 97–106 Garkavi, Avraam, Skazaniya musul’manskikh pisateley o slovyanakh i russkikh: s poloviny 7 veka do kontsa 10 veka (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya Akademiya nauk, 1870) Heinrici Chronicon Livoniae / Heinrichs Livländische Chronik, ed. by L. Arbusow and A. Bauer, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germermanicarum in usu Scholarum, nova series, 31 (Hannover: Hahn, 1955)

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

Ibn Rustah, Kitāb al-A'lāk an-Nafīsa, ed. by M. J. De Goeje, (Leiden: Brill, 1892) Ipat’evskaya letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 2 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1908) Kazanskaya istoriya, ed. by A. V. Adrianova-Perets and G. P. Moiseeva (Moskva: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR, 1954) Kazanskaya istoriya, ed. by T. Volkova, in Pamyatniki literatuty Drevney Rusi, vtoraya polovina 16 veka, ed. by D. Likhachev (Moskva: Nauka, 1985) pp. 300–565, 601–24 Kniga stepennaya tsarskogo rodosloviya, ed. by P. Vasenko, in Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 21/1–2 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1908, 1913) Kupchinskiy, Oleg, Akty ta dokumenty Galitsko-Volynskogo knyazivstva 13-pervoy poloviny 14 stoleti (Lviv: Naukovo tovarystvo Shevchenka, 2004) Lavrent’evskaya letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 1 (Moskva: Nauka, 1962) Letopis Avraamki, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 16 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1889) Letopisnaya povest’ o Kulikovskoy bitve — Skazanie o Mamaevom poboishche, ed. by M. Salmina, V. Budaragina, and L. Dmitriev, in Pamyatniki literatuty drevney Rusi, 14– seredina 15 veka, ed. by D. Likhachev (Moskva: Nauka, 1981), pp. 112–89 L’vovskaya letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 20/1 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1910) Mechta o russkom edinstve: Kievskiy sinopsis (1674), ed. by O. Ya. Sapozhnikov and I. Yu. Sapozhnikova (Moskva: Evropa, 2006) Moskovskiy letopisniy svod kontsa 15 veka, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 25 (Moskva: Arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1949) Nikonovskaya letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 9–14 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1863) (2nd ed.: Petrograd, 1918) Novgorodskaya pervaya letopis strashego i mladshego izvodov (Moskva: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR, 1950) Novgorodskya IV letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 4.1/3 (Leningrad: Arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1929) Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo gosudarstva s Pol’sko-Litowskim gosudarstvom v tsarstvovanie Velikogo knyaz’ya Ivana Vasil’evicha, vol. 1: (1487–1533), ed. by G. Karpov, Sbornik Russkogo istoricheskogo obshchestva, 35 (St Petersburg: Russkoe istoricheskoe obshchestvo, 1882) Pamyatniki diplomaticheskikh snosheniy Moskovskogo gosudarstva s Pol’sko-Litowskim gosudarstvom, vol. 3: (1560–1570), ed. by G. Karpov, Sbornik Russkogo istoricheskogo obshchestva, 71 (St Petersburg: Russkoe istoricheskoe obshchestvo, 1892) Pamyatniki drevnerusskogo kanonicheskogo prava, vol. 1: Pamyatniki 11–15 vekov, ed. by A. Pavlov, Russkaya istoricheskaya biblioteka, 6 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1880) Poslaniya Ivana Groznogo, ed. by D. Likhachev and Ya. Lurie (Moskva: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR, 1951) Povesti o Mamaevom poboishche, ed. by S. Shambinago (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya akademiya nauk, 1907) Skazanie o knyaz’yakh Vladimirskikh, ed. by R. Dmitrieva (Moskva: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR, 1955)

315

31 6

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Smolenskie gramoty 13–14 vekov, ed. by T. Sumnikova and V. Lopatin, (Moskva: Nauka, 1963) Sofiyskaya I letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 5 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1851) The Chronicle of Novgorod (1016–1471), ed. by R. Michell and N. Forbes, Camden third series, 25 (London: Offices of the Society, 1914) The Laws of Rus’: Tenth to Fifteenth Centuries, ed. and trans. by D. H. Kaiser (Salt Lake City: Charles Schlacks, 1992) The Russian Primary Chronicle: Laurentian Text, ed. and trans. by S. H. Cross and O. P. Sherbowitz-Wetzor, Harvard Studies and Notes in Philology and Literature, 12 (Cambridge, MA.: The Medieval Academy of America, 1930) Voprosy Kirika, Savvy i Il'i, s otvetami Nifonta, episkopa Novgorodskogo, i drugikh ierarkhicheskikh lits, 1130–1156 in Pamyatniki kanonicheskogo prava, vol. 1: Pamyatniki XI–XV v., Russkaya istoricheskaya biblioteka, izdannaya Imperatorskoy Arkheograficheskoy komissiey, vol. 6 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1880), pp. 21–62 Voskresenskaya letopis, Polnoe sobranie russkikh letopisey, 7–8 (St Petersburg: Imperatorskaya arkheograficheskaya kommissiya, 1856–1859) Warner, D., Ottonian Germany: The Chronicon of Thietmar of Merseburg (New York: Manchester University Press, 2001) Yanin, Valentin, Andrey Zaliznyak, and Alexey Gippius, Novgorodkie gramoty na bereste, vol. 12: Iz raskopok 2001–2014 godov (Moskva: Yazyki slavyanskoy kultury, 2015) Secondary Studies Afanasiev, Gennadiy, ‘Burtasy i lesostepnoy variant saltovo-mayatskoy kultury’, Sovetskaya etnografiya, 3 (1985), 165–69 Amelkin, Andrey, ‘Problema Tmutorokanskogo knyazhestva v istoricheskoy mysli dopetrovskoy Rossii’, in Vostochnaya Evropa v drevnosti i srednevekovie: mnimye realnosti antichnoy i sredenvekovoy istorografii, ed. by T. Djakson (Moskva: IVI RAN, 2002), pp. 3–7 Andreycheva, Marianna, ʻObrazy inovertsev v Povesti vremennykh let’ (unpublished PhD thesis, Moscow State University, 2017) Antoniewicz, Jerzy, ‘The Problem of the “Prussian Street in Novgorod the Great”’, Acta Baltico-Slavica, 2 (1965), 7–25 Baehr, Stephen, The Paradise Myth in Eighteenth-century Russia: Utopian Patterns in Early Secular Russian Literature and Culture (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991) Begunov, Yuriy, Pamyatnik russkoy literatury 13 veka: ‘Slovo o pogibeli zemli Russkoy’: issledovaniya i teksty (Moskva: Nauka, 1965) Berend, Nora, Przemysław Urbańczyk, and Przemysław Wiszewski, Central Europe in the High Middle Ages: Bohemia, Hungary and Poland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014) Bogatyrev, Sergei, ‘Reinventing the Russian Monarchy in the 1550s: Ivan the Terrible, the Dynasty, and the Church’, The Slavonic and East-European Review, 85 (2007), 271–93

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

Bowlus, Charles, ‘Ethnogenesis: The Tyranny of a Concept’, in On Barbarian Identity: Critical Approaches to Ethnicity in the Early Middle Ages, ed. by A. Gillett (Turnhout: Brepols, 2002), pp. 241–56 Brown, Elizabeth, ‘The Tyranny of a Construct: Feudalism and Historians of Medieval Europe’, in The American Historical Review, 79.4 (1974), 1063–88 Brubaker, Rogers, ‘Myths and Misconceptions in the Study of Nationalism’, in The State of the Nation: Ernest Gellner and the Theory of Nationalism, ed. by J. Hall (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) pp. 272–305 Bushkovitch, Paul, ‘The Formation of a National Consciousness in Early Modern Russia’, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 10.3–4 (1986), 355­–76 ———, ‘What is Russia? Russian National Identity and the State, 1500–1917’, in Culture, Nation, and Identity: The Ukrainian­-Russian Encounter (1600­–1945), ed. by A. Kappeler, Z. E. Kohut, F. E. Sysyn, and M. von Hagen (Edmonton: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies Press, 2003) pp. 144­–161 Carr, David, Time, Narrative, and History (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986) Ciževskij, Dmitrij, History of Russian Literature: From the Eleventh Century to the End of the Baroque, Slavistic Printings and Reprintings, 12 (Den Haag: Mouton, 1960) Corradini, Richard, Maximilian Diesenberger, and Helmut Reimitz, eds, The Construction of Communities in the Early Middle Ages: Texts, Resources and Artefacts, The Transformation of the Roman World, 12 (Leiden: Brill, 2003) Coumert, Magali, Origines des peuples. Les récits du Haut Moyen Age occidental (550–850) (Paris: Institut d’études augustiniennes, 2007) Dagron, Gilbert, Empereur et prêtre. Etude sur le ‘césaropapisme’ byzantin (Paris: Gallimard, 1996) Demin, A., ed., Devnerusskaya literatura: vospriyatie Zapada w 11–14 vekakh (Moskva: Nasledie, 1996) Dobrovol’skiy, Dmitriy, ‘Vospriyatie polovtsev v letopisanii 11–13 vekov’, Dialog so vremenem; al’manakh intellektual’noy istorii, 39 (2012), 286–94 ———, ‘Otnoshenie k Zapadnoy Evrope v letopisanii 11 – nachala 12 veka’, in Problemy istoricheskoy geografii i demografii Rossii, vol. 2, ed. by K. Aver’yanov (Moskva: II RAN, 2013), pp. 126–37 Downs, Roger, and David Stea, Maps in Minds: Reflections on Cognitive Mapping (New York: Harper & Row, 1977) Erusalimski, Konstantin, ‘Prus i ‘Prusskiy vopros’ v diplomaticheskikh otnosheniyakh Rossii i Rechi Pospolitoy 1560-nachala 1580 godov’, in Khoroshie dni: in memoriam Alexandr Khoroshev, ed. by A. Musin (Moskva: LeopArt, 2009) pp. 276–93 Florya, Boris, ‘Rodoslovie litovskikh knyazey v russkoy politicheskoy mysli 16 veka’, in Vostochnaya Evropa v drevnosti i srednevekov’e, ed. by L. V. Cherepnin (Moskva: Nauka, 1978), pp. 320–28 Font, Martha, ‘Ponyatie Ruthenia/Ruscia, Galicia, Lodomeria v khronike vengerskogo khronista Anonimusa’, Studia Slavica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, 42 (1997), 259–69 Gardi, Đura, ‘“Rex Ruscie” olim “Rex Galliciae”’, Istrazhivania [Novi Sad], 16 (2005), 249–62

317

31 8

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Garipzanov, Ildar H., Patrick J. Geary, and Przemyslaw Urbanczyk, eds, Franks, Northmen, and Slavs: Identities and State Formation in Early Medieval Europe (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008) Gazeau, Véronique, Pierre Baudouin, and Yves Modéran, eds, Identité et ethnicité: concepts, débats historiographiques, exemples (IIIe–XIIe siècle), CRAHM (Turnhout: Brepols, 2008) Geary, Patrick, The Myth of Nations: The Medieval Origins of Europe (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2002) Gorlin, Michel, ‘Le dit de la Ruine de la terre russe et de la mort du grand-prince Jaroslav’, Revue des études slaves, 23.1–4 (1947), 5–33 Gorskiy, Anton, ‘Problemy izucheniya “Slova o pogibeli zemli Russkoy”’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 43 (1990), 18–38 Grishchenko, Aleksandr, review of Boris Kloss, O proiskhozhdenii nazvaniya ‘Rossiya’ (Moskva, 2012), Russkiy yazyk v nauchnom osvyashchenii, 2.26 (2013), 300–12 ———, ‘“Rus’-Rossiia”, and “russkie-rossiiane”, and russkii-rossiiskii in the Catalogue of the Kievan Metropolitans by St Demetrius of Rostov’, Slověne, International Journal of Slavic Studies, 3.1 (2014), 102–19 Gudziy, Nikolay, ‘O “Slove o pogibeli Russkyya zemli”’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 12 (1956), 527–45 Filjushkin Alexander, Tituly russkikh gosudarey (Moskva: Alians-Arkheo, 2006) ———, Ivan the Terrible: A Military History (London: Frontline, 2008) Fried, Johannes, and O. B. Rader, eds, Die Welt des Mittelalters. Erinnerungsorte eines Jahrtausends (München: Beck, 2011) Halbwachs, Maurice, La mémoire collective (Paris: PUF, 1950) ———, Les cadres sociaux de la mémoire (Paris: PUF, 1952) ———, The Collective Memory (New York: Harper & Row, 1980) ———, On Collective Memory (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992) Halecki, Oskar, ‘Imperialism in Slavic and East European History’, The American Slavic and East European Review, 11 (1952), 1–26 Halperin, Charles, ‘The Concept of the Russian Land from the Ninth to the Fourteenth Centuries’, Russian History, 2 (1975), 29–38 ———, ‘The Russian Land and the Russian Tsar: The Emergence of Muscovite Ideology, 1380–1408’, Forschungen zur Osteuropäischen Geschichte, 23 (1976), 7–103 ———, ‘The Concept of “Russkaia zemlia” and Medieval National Consciousness from the Tenth to the Fifteenth Centuries’, Nationalities Papers, 8.1 (1981), 75–86 ———, ‘The Battle of Kulikovo Field (1380) in History and Historical Memory’, Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History, 14.4 (2013) (New Series), 853–64 Hills, Michael, ‘Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck’s Values Orientation Theory’, Online Readings in Psychology and Culture, 4.4 (2002): http://dx.doi.org/10.9707/2307–0919.1040 Hobsbawm, Eric, ‘Introduction: Inventing Traditions’, in The Invention of Tradition, ed. by E. Hobsbawm and T. Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), pp. 1–14 Hosking, Geoffrey, ‘The Russian National Myth Repudiated’, in Myths and Nationhood, ed. by G. Hosking, and G. Schöpflin (New York: Routledge, 1997), pp. 198–210 ———, Russia: People and Empire 1552–1917 (London: Fontana, 1997)

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

———, Russia and the Russians: A History from Rus to the Russian Federation (London: Allen Lane, 2001) Huttenbach, Henry, ‘The Origins of Russian Imperialism’, in Russian Imperialism from Ivan the Great to the Revolution, ed. by T. Hunczak (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1974), pp. 18–44 Jaenen, Cornélius, Friend and Foe: Aspects of French-Amerindian Cultural Contact in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976) Kaiser, Robert, The Geography of Nationalism in Russia and the USSR (New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1994) ———, Rußland als Vielvölkerreich. Entstehung, Geschichte, Zerfall (München: Beck, 1992) Kappeler, Andreas, ‘Das Moskauer Reich des 17. Jahrhunderts und seine nichtrussischen Untertanen’, Forschungen zur osteuropäischen Geschichte, 50 (1995), 185–98 Keenan, Edward, ‘Coming to Grips with the Kazanskaya Istoriya: Some Observations on Old Answers and New Questions’, The Annals of the Ukrainian Academy of Arts and Sciences in the United States, 9.1–2 [31–32] (1964–1968), 143–83 Kerner, Robert, The Urge to the Sea: The Course of Russian History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1942) Khoroshkevich, Alla, ‘Terminy ‘Russia’ i ‘Moskovia’ v 9–13 knigakh ‘Annalov Polshi’ Jana Dlugosza’, in Cultus et cognitio: Studia z dziejow śriedniowiecznej kultury, ed. by A. Gieysztor and S. Kuczyński (Warszawa: PWN, 1976), pp. 203–04 Kloss, Boris, O proiskhozhdenii nazvaniya ‘Rossiya’ (Moskva: Yazyki russkoy kultury, 2012) Kluckhohn, Florence, and Fred Strodtbeck, Variations in Value Orientations (Evanston: Row Peterson, 1961) Kohut, Zenon, ‘The Question of Russian-Ukrainian Unity and Ukrainian Distinctiveness in Early Modern Ukrainian Thought and Culture’, in Culture, Nation, and Identity: The Ukrainian­-Russian Encounter (1600­–1945), ed. by A. Kappeler, Z. E. Kohut, F. E. Sysyn, and M. von Hagen (Edmonton­: Canadian Institute of Ukrainian Studies Press, 2003), pp. 57–86 Korolyuk, Vladimir, Slavyane i vostochnye romantsy v epokhu rannego srednevekov’ya: politicheskaya i ethnicheskaya istoriya (Moskva: Nauka, 1985) Kuchkin, Vladimir, ‘“Russkaya zemlia” po letopisnym dannym 11 – pervoy treti 13 veka’, in Drevneyshie gosudarstva Vostochnoy Evropy, ed. by A. Novosiltsev (Moskva: IVI RAN, 1995), pp. 74–100 Kuntsevich, Georgiy, Istoriya o Kazanskom tsarstve, ili Kazanskiy letopisets: Opyt istorikoliteraturnogo issledovaniya (St Petersburg: I. Skorokhodov, 1905) Laushkin, Aleksey, ‘Regulirovanie kontaktov khristian s nekhristianami v Drevney Rusi (11–13 veka)’, Sbornik russkogo istoricheskogo obshchestva, 7.155 (2003), 38–46 Lenhoff, Gail, and Ann Kleimola, eds, The Book of Royal Degrees and the Genesis of Russian Historical Consciousness (Bloomington: Slavica, 2011) Lettenbauer, Wilhelm, Moskau das dritte Rom. Zur Geschichte einer politischen Theorie (München: A. Pustet, 1961) Lifshits, Lev, Alla Khoroshkevich, and Andrey Pliguzov, ‘Prilozheniya’, in John Fennell. Krizis srednevekovoy Rusi, 1200–1304 (Moskva: Progress, 1989), pp. 227–78 Loparev, Khristian, ‘Slovo o pogibely Ruskyya zemli’: vnov’ naydennyy pamyatnik literatury 13 veka (St Petersburg: Balashov, OLDP, 1892)

319

3 20

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Lourié, Basile, Russkoe Pravoslavie mezhdu Kievom i Moskvoy (Moskva: [n. pub.], 2010) ———, The Idea of the Muscovite Autocephaly from 1441 to 1467, in Between the Worlds: the Age of the Jagiellonians, ed. by F. Ardelean, Ch. Nicholson, and J. Preiser-Kapeller, Eastern and Central European Studies, 2 (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2013), pp. 121–28 Lübke, Christian, ‘Mitteleuropa, Ostmitteleuropa, östliches Europa: Wahrnehmung und frühe Strukturen eines Raumes’, in Die ‘Blüte’ der Staaten des östlichen Europa im 14. Jahrhundert, ed. by M. Löwener (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2004), pp. 15–43 Malinin, Vasiliy, Starets Elezarova monastyrya Filofey i ego poslaniya (Kiev: KievoPecherskaya Lavra, 1901) Malyshev, Vladimir, ‘“Zhitie Aleksandra Nevskogo” (po rukopisi serediny 16 veka Grebenshchikovskoy oshchiny v Rige)’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 5 (1947), 185–93 Mansikka, Vilijo, Zhitie Aleksandra Nevskogo: razbor redaktsiy i teksta (St Petersburg: OLDP, 1913) Mavrodin, Vladimir, Drevnyaya Rus’: proiskhozhdenie russkogo naroda i obrazovanie Kievskogo gosudarstva (Moskva: Gospolitizdat, 1946) Melnikova, Elena, ‘Mental Maps of the Old Russian Chronicle-Writer of the Early Twelfth Century’, in From Goths to Varangians: Communication and Cultural Exchange Between the Baltic and the Black Sea, ed. by L. Bjerg, J. Lind, and S. M. Sindbaek (Aarhus: Aarhus University Press, 2013), pp. 317–40 Melnikova, Elena, and Vladimir Petrukhin, ‘The Origin and Evolution of the Name Rus’: The Scandinavian in Eastern-European Ethno-Political Processes before the 11th Century’, Tor, 23 (1991), 203–34 ———, ‘Skandinavy na Rusi i v Vizantii v 9–11 vekakh: k istorii nazvaniya varyag’, Slavyanovedenie, 2 (1994), 56–68 Meshcherskiy, Nikita, ‘K rekonstruktsii texta “Slova o pobybeli Ruskyya zemli”’, Vestnik Leningradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta, 14, Istoriya, yazyki, literature, 3 (1963), 44–53 Miller, Alexey, ‘Imperiya i natsiya v voobrazenii natsionalisma’, in Rossiyskaya imperia v sravnitel’noy perspective, ed. by A. Miller and M. Batalina (Moskva: Novoe izdatelstvo, 2004), pp. 263–85 ———, The Romanov Empire and Nationalism: Essays in Methodology of Historical Research, (Budapest: CEU Press, 2008) ———, ‘Étnokofessional’nyy faktor v razvitii Rossiyskoy imperii (konets 18 – nachalo 20 veka)’, in Étnicheskiy i religioznyy faktory v formirovanii i évolutsii Rossiyskogo gosudarstva, ed. by T. Krasovoskaya and V. Tishkov (Moskva: Novyy khronograf, 2012), pp. 102–50 Mingalev, Valeriy, ‘Letopisnaya povest — istochnik “Skazaniya o Mamaevom poboishche”’, Trudy Moskovskogo istoriko-arkhivnogo instituta, 24.2 (1966), pp. 55–72 Musin, Aleksandr, ‘“Ród ruski”, “ród wareski” i narodowość staroruska’, Orientalia Christiana Cracoviensia, 4: Identity, Religion, Belonging (2012), 11–23 ———, ‘Nekotorye mysli, voznikayushchie posle prochteniya novykh knig. Ob “ocherkakh nachalnoy rusi”, sostavlennykh Alekseem Tolochko’, Knyazha doba: istoriya i kul’tura, 10 (2016), 242–57

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

———, Zagadki Doma Svyatoy Sofii: tserkov’ Velikogo Novgoroda v 10–16 vekakh (St Petersburg: Peterburgskoe Vostokovedenie, 2016) Nasonov, Arseniy, ‘Russkaya zemlia’ i obrazovanie territorii drevnerusskogo gosudarstva (Moskva: Izdatelstvo AN SSSR, 1951) Noonan, Thomas, ‘Forging a National Identity: Monetary Politics during the Reign of Vasilii I (1389–1425)’, in Culture and Identity in Muscovy, 1359–1584 / Moskovskaja Rus’ (1359–1584): kul’tura i istoricheskoe samosoznanie, ed. by A. M. Klejmola and G. D. Lenchoff, UCLA Slavic Studies, 3 (Moskva: ITZ-Garant, 1997), pp. 495–529 Nora, Pierre, ‘Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire’, Representations, 26, Special Issue: Memory and Counter-Memory (1989), 7–24 Orlov, Aleksandr, ‘Literaturnye istochniki Povesti o Mamaevom poboishche’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 2 (1935), 157–63 Ostrowski, Donald, Muscovy and the Mongols: Cross-Cultural Influences on the Steppe Frontier, 1304–1589 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998) Parker, Geoffrey, The Geopolitics of Domination (London: Routledge, 1988) Paszkiewicz, Henryk, The Origin of Russia (London: Allen & Unwin, 1954) Pelenski, Jaroslaw, Russia and Kazan: Conquest and Imperial Ideology (1438–1560s), Near and Middle East Monographs, 5 (Paris: Mouton, 1974) ———, ‘The Origins of the Official Muscovite Claims to the Kievan Inheritance’, in Jaroslaw Pelenski, The Contest for the Legacy of Kievan Rus’ (Boulder: Columbia University Press, 1998), pp. 77–101 Peshtich, Sergey, ‘“Sinopsis” kak istoricheskoe proizvedenie’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 15 (1958), 284–98 Picchio, Riccardo, ‘The Slavonic and Latino-Germanic Background of the Novgorod Texts on Birchbark’, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 3–4 (1979–1980), Eucharisterion: Essays Presented to Omelyan Pritsak, part 2, 650–61 Pipes, Richard, Russia under the Old Regime (New York: Scribner, 1974) Pitsakis, Konstantinos, ‘À propos des actes du Patriarcat de Constantinople concernant la proclamation de l’Empire en Russie (XVIe siècle): survivances et souvenirs de la terminologie et de l’idéologie impériale constantinopolitaines’, in Da Roma alla Terza Roma. IX Seminario internazionale di Studi Storici, Campidoglio, 21­–22 aprile, 1989, L’idea di Roma a Mosca, secoli XV–XVI, ed. by P. Catalano (Roma: Università degli studi “La Sapienza”, Herder, 1989), pp. 87–138 Plassmann, Alheydis, Origo gentis. Identitäts- und Legitimitätsstiftung in früh- und hochmittelalterlichen Herkunftserzählungen, Orbis mediaevalis, Vorstellungswelten des Mittelalters, 7 (Berlin: Akademie, 2006) Pleszczyński, Andrzej, The Birth of a Stereotype: Polish Rulers and their Country in German Writings c. 1000 A.D., East Central and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages, 450–1450, 15 (Leiden: Brill, 2011) Plokhy, Serhii, The Origins of the Slavic Nations: Premodern Identities in Russia, Ukraine and Belarus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006) Podskalsky, Gerhard, Christentum und theologische Literatur in der Kiever Rus (988–1237) (München: Beck, 1982) Poe, Marshall, ‘Moscow, the Third Rome: The Origins and Transformations of a “Pivotal Moment”’, Jahrbücher für Geschichte Osteuropas, 49 (2001), 412–29

321

3 22

a l e k s a n d r mu s i n

Presnyakov, Aleksandr, Obrazovanie Velikorusskogo gosudarstva: otcherki istorii 13–15 stoletiy (Petrograd: Ya. Bashmakov, 1918) Pritsak, Omeljan, ‘Kiev and All of Rus’: The Fate of a Sacral Idea’, Harvard Ukrainian Studies, 10.3–4 (1986), 279–300 Riasanovsky, Nicholas, Russian Identities: A Historical Survey (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005) Rowley, Dawid, ‘Imperial Versus National Discourse: The Case of Russia’, Nations and Nationalism, 6.1 (2000), 23–42 Rusu, Adrian, ‘Eigenburgen und Sächsische Grefen in Siebenbürgen (Rumänien) (Ende des 13. Jahrhunderts–Anfang des 14. Jarhunderts)’, Beiträge zur Mittelalterarchäologie in Österreich, 23 (2007): Motte — Turmhügelhaus — Hausberg. Tum europäischen Forschungsstand eines mittelalterlichen Burgentypus, 315–26 Schmidt, Sigurd, ‘“Skazanie o vzyatii Astrakhani” v letopisnoy traditsii 17 – nachala 18 veka’, Trudy Moskovskogo gosudarstvennogo istoriko-arkhivnogo instituta, 17 (1963), 393–98 Serebryanskiy, Nikolay, ‘Zametki i teksty iz pskovskikh pamyatnikov. 5: Slovo o pogibeli Russkoy zemli. Slovo o nachale Russkoy zemli’, Trudy Pskovskogo tserkovnoarkheologicheskogo komiteta. Pskovskaya starina, 1 (1910), 176–202 ———, Drevnerusskie knyazeskie zhitiya (obzor redaktsiy i teksty) (Moskva: OIDR, 1915) Shepard, Jonathan, ‘Byzantium’s Overlapping Circles’, in Proceedings of the 21st International Congress of Byzantine Studies, London, 21–26 August 2006, ed. by E. Jeffreys, Plenary Papers, vol. 1 (London: Routledge, 2006), pp. 15–55 Sinitsyna, Nina, Tretiy Rim: Istoki i evolyutsiya russkoy srednevekovoy kontseptsii (15–16 vek) (Moskva: Indrik, 1998) Sirenov, Alexey, ‘Stepennaya kniga’ i russkaya istoricheskaya mysl’ 16–18 vekov (St Petersburg: Alians-Arkheo, 2010) Ślaski, Kazimierz, ‘Stosunki Prusów z innymi ludami nadbałtyckimi w VII–XII wieku’, Rocznik Olsztyński, 5 (1963), 9–27 Soloviev, Alexnadre, ‘Le Dit de la ruine de la terre Russe’, Byzantion, 22 (1953), 105–28 ———, ‘Zametki k “Slovu o pogibeli zemli Russkoy”’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 15 (1958), 109–13 ———, ‘“Reges” et “Regnum Russiae” au moyen age’, Byzantion, 36 (1966), 144–73 Steindorff, Ludwig, ed., Religion und Integration im Moskauer Russland. Konzepte und Praktiken, Potentiale und Grenzen. 14.–17. Jahrhundert (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2010) Thomsen, Vilhelm, The Relations between Ancient Russia and Scandinavia and the Origin of the Russian State: Three Lectures Delivered at the Taylor Institution (Oxford: [n. pub.], 1877) Tikhmirov, Mikhail, ‘Gde i kogda bylo napisano “Slovo o pogibeli Russkoy zemli”’, Trudy Otdela drevnerusskoy literatury, 8 (1951), 235–44 Tolochko, Oleksey, ‘Kievan Rus Around the Year 1000’, in Europe Around the Year 1000, ed. by P. Urbańczyk (Warszawa: DiG, 2001), pp. 123–40 ———, Ocherki nachalnoy Rusi (Kiev: Laurus, 2015) Tolz, Vera, Russia (Inventing the Nation) (London: Arnold, 2001) Vedyushkina, Irina, ‘“Rus’” i “Russkaya zemlia” v ‘Povesti vremennykh let’ i letopisnykh stat’yakh vtoroy poloviny 12 – pervoy treti 13 veka’, in Drevneyshie gosudarstva Vostochnoy Evropy, ed. by A. Novosiltsev (Moskva: IVI RAN, 1995), pp. 101–16

Va lu e O r i e n tat i o n an d t h e I m age of t he Orbis Gent ium

Vernadsky, Georgiy, ‘The Mongol Impact on Russia’, in Readings in Russian Civilization, vol. 1: Russia before Peter the Great, 900–1700, ed. by T. Riha (Chicago: Chicago University Press, 1969), pp. 173–93 Wenskus, Reinhard, Stammesbildung und Verfassung. Das Werden der frühmittelalterlichen gentes (Köln: Böhlau, 1961) Werner, Philipp, ‘Über das Verhältnis des “Slovo o pogibeli russkoj zemli” zum “Zitie Aleksandra Nevskogo”’, Historische Veröffentlichungen. Forschungen zur osteuropäischen Geschichte, 5 (1957), 7–37 Yusova, Natalya, ‘Davn’orus’ka narodnist’’: zarodzhennya i stanivlennya kontseptsii v radyanskiy istorichniy nautsi (1930 – presha polova 1940s) (Kyiv: Konsol, 2006) Zakhoder, Boris, Kaspiyskiy svod svedeniy o Vostochnoy Evrope, vol. 1 (Moskva: Nauka, 1962) Zaliznyak, Andrey, ‘Slovoukazatel’ k berestyanym gramotam (iz raskopok 1951–2003)’, in Andrey Zaliznyak, Drevnenovgorodskiy dialect (Moskva: Yazyki slavyanskikh kultur, 2004), pp. 706–829

323

Part III

The Interethnic Exchange of Ideas and the Building of Identities

In the first part of the book the authors focused on relations between an imagined vision of the past and the building and strengthening of an ethnic identity during the process of creating a politically united society. In the second part the authors examined the role of the imagined past — one, common shape of it — as portrayed by medieval and early modern historiographers for building bridges or even a fragile balance between strong ethnic identities and the common aims of inhabitants of given polities. In the last part they try to reveal how ethnic memories, even belonging to conflicted ethnicities, could overlap each other but still fail in the attempt to create a commonly accepted vision of cohabitation within a particular polity. Luciano Gallinari seeks to outline relations between Catalans and Sardinians in the period spanning the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries, within the limited space of the island of Sardinia. He critically approaches historiographic interpretations of co-existance of two ethnic groups inside the Crown of Aragon. By tracking the long-term development of discourses about the past belonging to both ethnic groups — but especially Sardinians — he emphasizes the intersections, crossroads, and exchanges of plots and heroes. On that basis, the rulers of the Crown of Aragon tried to propagate a vision of a common past of both the Sardinians and the other inhabitants of the Crown lands. This mechanism, known to us from chapters in the second part of the book, fail in this case as long as a polity of judges of Arborea existed. They claimed to be independent rulers of the entire island and its inhabitants — as separate ethnic groups with no relation to Catalans. The disappearance of the ‘judicato’ at the end of the fifteenth century created the opportunity to build the vision of a common past for all islanders — but by emphasizing their specific identity, not always in accordance with the interest of the Crown of Aragon. Analyzing the situation of the latter, Flocel Sabaté states that the construction of late medieval collective identities was based on values and memories. Certainly, reading the social and political sources, it is easy to check, as collective identities were usually both built by and revealed in the words of the so-called representatives, who justified their position through the invocation of some fictitious common values and memories. The real meaning of this, whether these discourses supported or contributed to the creation of collective identities, may be revealed by the analysis of external perception and internal awareness. The case of Catalan identity in the context of the late medieval expansion of the Crown of Aragon over the Mediterranean becomes an excellent case study of a royal power’s failure. Despite its efforts to create a Catalan identity that would encompass all the inhabitants of the lands of the Crown of Aragon, the strong opposition of competing identities of subdued ethnic groups thwarted royal plans. This chapter offers the reader a second perspective to the problem analysed previously by Luciano Gallinari — inter-relationships between the processes of identity building of dominant and dominated ethnicities within one political body. Closing the section Tomáš Velička focuses on one problem that was touched upon only lightly by Flocel Sabaté — how did these various ethnicities communicate within one political body? If the representatives of various ethnicities blended stories of different ethnic origins in order to build traditions better suited to current political situation — as we saw in many cases in previous chapters — did they strive to create a linguistic dominance over a certain subject, to control the desirable and binding

shape of the past? The political, ethnic, and linguistic diversity of medieval Bohemia is an excellent case for studying the problem. Flocel Sabaté emphasizes that a common language — Catalan — was the most important (but not strong enough) factor in the propagation of a united and heterogeneous society of the Crown of Aragon. In contrast to that Tomáš Velička shows that the pragmatic use of various languages by royal and urban bureaucracy, responding to the ethnic identity of recipients, did not disrupt the political unity of the Bohemian lands. Communities with distinct cultural identities lived side-by-side until the Hussites; the ethnic diversity of the Kingdom and the unity of royal power was widely accepted.

Luciano Gallinari

Catalans and Sardinians Opposing Identity Discourses and Fluctuating Political Relationships from the Twelfth to the Fifteenth Centuries

In this chapter I outline relations between Catalans and Sardinians on Sardinia from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries.1 I decided to examine the nature of these relations because they shed new light on the historiographical interpretations of the coexistence of two ethno-political groups inside one polity in the late medieval period. Usually, historians focus more on the conflicts and quarrels of multi-ethnic societies than on the long periods of peaceful coexistence, especially when the latter were much longer than the periods of military conflict, as in the Catalan-Sardinian case. I would like to overcome this dichotomous picture by tracing the long-term social and political processes in the island’s past. In analysing the changing relations between Catalans and Sardinians in times of war and peace I will take a closer look at the discourses about the past developed by both ethnic groups — especially Sardinians — in the context of the island’s administrative and political situation. A fundamental element of the relationship between Catalans and Sardinians was the creation of the Regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae by Pope Boniface VIII that was enfeoffed to James II of Aragon in 1297.2 This event was a watershed in the history of the two Nationes, because from then on all the institutions and peoples present in Sardinia were subject to the authority of the Aragonese sovereigns, and from the sixteenth century onwards to the power of the monarchs of Spain. As a consequence of the creation of





1 Given the great preponderance of Catalans among the Crown of Aragon’s inhabitants, I use the term ‘Catalan’ in this work in relation to the different peoples included in the Crown of Aragon: Aragonese, Catalans, Valencians, Majorcans, while the term ‘Aragonese’ is used to denote institutional relations between the Sardinians and the Iberians, since Aragon was the legal basis of the latter’s power. 2 Arribas Palau, La conquista de Cerdeña; Salavert y Roca, ‘Un nuevo documento para la historia de Cerdeña’, doc. 21, pp. 22–30; Casula, La Sardegna aragonese; Cadeddu, Corona d'Aragona e Mediterraneo and Cadeddu, ‘L’espansione catalano-aragonese’; Sanna, ‘Papa Giovanni XXII’, Sanna, ‘ll regnum Sardinie et Corsice’, and Sanna, ‘La Sardegna’. Luciano Gallinari  •  ([email protected]) is a researcher at the Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea of the National Research Council of Italy. He has published on medieval history and Byzantine history. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 329–347 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120068

330

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

Map 15.1. A political map of Sardinia in 1326 after the Aragonese conquest of the Sardinian territories of the Republic of Pisa. Information taken from: Francesco Cesare Casula, La Storia di Sardegna (1994). Source: Wikimedia commons, image issued the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 license.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

the Regnum, the two Nationes – the Catalan and the Sardinian – no longer acted on the same political and institutional level of mutual independence. Moreover, the Natio of Sardinians reacted differently to this forced inclusion in the Regnum, because a part of it had previously been subject to Ligurian and Tuscan territorial lordships, another lived under the direct dominion of the Commune of Pisa, while a third part resided in the Giudicato of Arborea.3 The latter, which at that time already had a centuries-old existence, initiated (from the mid-fourteenth century) a political, legal, and military clash against the Aragonese, thus opening the second phase of relations between the two Nationes that lasted until 1410. During this period we can see two interesting phenomena: the attempt by the Giudicato of Arborea to become the sole political spokesperson for the whole Sardinian Natio, and the dual relation that ranged from comparison to clash between the Giudicato ethno-political identity on the one hand and the Aragonese one on the other, as a result of some political and cultural ‘discourses’ elaborated by the Iberian kings and the Arborea judges. In these decades, as in every period of individual or collective crisis, this process of identity formation between these two parties grew in a remarkable way.4 Our recent studies show more and more clearly how the dynasty of judges opposed the institutional, political, economic, and cultural assimilation by the kings of Aragon, since the island rulers were those who had the most to lose from such action and those who made extensive use of identity-making and nationalist discourses to (potentially) draw all Sardinians to their cause. Some of these discourses are available for analysis by scholars in a few late medieval Sardinian sources. The paucity of sources has resulted in some historians drawing conclusions which are not based on the historical sources.5 Thus, Sardinian history is observed in a mirror that returns an image drawn nearly in its totality from outside the island, which almost inevitably increases the unidirectionality of information and the necessity to apply very accurate interpretative filters. The most important mirrors for understanding the medieval history of Sardinia are the Catalan archives, the most relevant of which is the Archive of the Crown of Aragon in Barcelona. It contains thousands of documents which record the historical







3 Arborea was one of the four polities which emerged around the first half of the eleventh century from the fragmentation of the Archontate/Giudicato of Sardinia, which is mentioned in Byzantine and papal sources between the eighth and ninth centuries, that in turn was an institutional development from the Provincia Sardiniae that was reintegrated into the Roman Empire in 554. See Gallinari, ‘Reflections on Byzantine Sardinia’, and the references contained within. 4 This contrast is a primary factor for the recognition of self and other, without which there cannot be an ethnic identity. However, ethnic identity is not stable and defined once and for all, but it is: ‘built, developed, changed and preserved during life, through various identity negotiations […]’ (costruita, sviluppata, cambiata e preservata durante la vita, attraverso varie negoziazioni di identità […]). Fabietti, L’identità etnica, pp. 121–22, 154; Mancini, Psicologia dell’identità etnica, pp. 20–23. Liebkind, ‘Ethnic Identity’, pp. 147–85. 5 Paul Veyne highlights that we have to write history as we have always done, with commensurate acknowledgement of the inequalities in terms of the unequal preservation level of past documents. Our reconstruction of history must reflect the different numbers of sources available to us; some events and charactres will have many sources available and others many fewer: see Veyne, Comment on écrit l’histoire, p. 31. See also footnote 17.

331

332

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

events of Sardinia from the thirteenth to the seventeenth century. The vast majority of these sources obviously offer the Aragonese point of view on relations with the Sardinians; however, in the Aragonese Chancery’s registers there are several copies of documents from the islanders, which provide perspectives from inside Sardinia as well. We do not have the originals or even other copies of them, making analysis even more difficult because historians are faced with ‘meta-images’ of Arborea society that, in many cases, have been accepted as reliable tout court by the historiographers. As I have outlined above, I will focus on examining how Sardinians and Catalans tried to describe themselves and establish a common picture of the political past and present of the island during times of peace and conflict. This is not an easy task since these relationships changed profoundly over the centuries as they encompassed almost the entire late Middle Ages — beginning officially from the mid-twelfth century — and continued, with significant changes at the institutional level, from 1297 until the sixteenth century, when the Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica merged into the Crown of Spain; although the connections persisted for much longer at artistic, linguistic, and cultural levels lato sensu.6 In 1157, Judge Barisone I of Arborea married Agalbors, daughter of Ponç de Cervera, the viscount of Bas, and Princess Almodis, sister of Ramon Berenguer IV, count of Barcelona, prince of Aragon and Tortosa, and marquis of Provence.7 From that time formal relations between the Sardinians and Catalans began, as well as human and cultural migrations started from the Iberian Peninsula to the Giudicato of Arborea. These links helped the judges to limit Pisa’s attempts at subjugating the whole of Sardinia between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.8 The institutional rapprochement between Arborea and Aragon further increased until the death of Barisone I, when Agalbors — ‘Arboree regina’ — had to ensure that her nephew Ponç (with the dynastic name of Hugh I) would rule over the Giudicato ‘in condominium’ with Peter I, son of the late Judge, from 1192.9 Hugh embodied the direct link between Arborea and Aragon, also demonstrated by the title of viscounts of Bas, maintained by the judges until the Giudicato’s disappearance in 1420.10

6 On the origin of Catalonia and the later Crown of Aragon see Sabaté, The Crown of Aragon. See also footnote 56. 7 Artizzu, ‘Penetrazione Catalana in Sardegna nel secolo XII’, pp. 11–23 and footnote 2. 8 The Tuscan Commune was present in Sardinia at the beginning of the eleventh century when, in collaboration with Genoa, it drove Mujāhid Prince of Denia out of the island, after he had made a brief conquest of a part of it in 1015–1016. See, among others, Zedda, ‘Bisanzio, l’Islam e i giudicati’; Zedda and Pinna, ‘La nascita dei giudicati’ and Gallinari, ‘Reflections on Byzantine Sardinia’. 9 Agalbors was called queen of Arborea since her husband had been named king of Sardinia by Frederick I Barbarossa in 1164. See Morena, Historia Frederici I, p. 176. The title was revoked a year later by the emperor, who enfeoffed the entire island to Pisa. See Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. LXXXI, pp. 232–33. Thus the ruler of Arborea completed a political process that had been pursued for more than a century by the Sardinian judges (from the second half of the eleventh century): to be internationally accepted as reges, ruling over as many Regna. These efforts were frustrated by the Apostolic See, which at that time imposed its reform of the Church and took charge of all rights to define who was emperor or king. See Gallinari, ‘Il Giudicato di Calari’. 10 Gallinari, ‘Gli ultimi anni’.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

These close relationships with the Catalan region were cemented on 8 October 1186, when King Alfonso I of Aragon acted as guarantor with the Commune of Genoa, which assisted Agalbors — ‘Arborensium regina’ — and Hugh I ‘ad recuperandum regnum et iudicatum arborensem’ after falling into Pisa’s orbit.11 The Aragonese king placed his relationship with the judges, seen as sovereigns ruling over the Regnum of Arborea, on an equal footing, although perhaps it also can be said that Alfonso I protected and consolidated the Aragonese interests in the island. Deep changes in Western Europe’s geopolitical situation and its repercussions in Sardinia in the second half of the thirteenth century are confirmed by some interesting documents from the Aragonese Chancery, which show a visible change in the relationship between Aragon and Sardinia compared to the previous century. The island enters into the struggle for political and economic dominance of the Mediterranean basin, whose referee was the Apostolic See. Clement IV, the holder of the island’s dominium eminens, replied negatively to the demand for an endowment of a non-existent Regnum Sardiniae, presented simultaneously in 1267 by James I of Aragon and Henry, prince of Castile.12 No reference to the Giudicato of Arborea or other polities present in Sardinia, such as the Ligurian and Tuscan territorial lordships (the Doria, Donoratico, Visconti, and Malaspina families), nor the Commune of Pisa itself (holder of three-quarters of the island in this period) can be found. The following written sources confirm the change of the Aragonese monarchs’ political perspective on the island and its primary local ruler. In 1284, Peter III of Aragon asked the judge of Arborea Mariano II to ensure that the Pisans would return some Iberian ships plundered in the Gulf of Cagliari.13 The intitulatio of the document shows that the Aragonese king was no longer applying to a rex, but to the ‘viro nobili domino Mariano Iudici Arboreae’. In the text the dignitas of rex and the formula Dei gratia have disappeared, as also seen in another document issued by Alfonso III in 1286, where the inscriptio of the judge of Arborea is virtually the same.14 The final turning point of the relationship between the Aragonese and Sardinians in that century, however, was the enfeoffment of the Regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae on behalf of the Apostolic See to James II of Aragon on 4 April 1297 in exchange for his renunciation of Sicily.15 At this moment the judges of Arborea entered the final

11 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. CXVIII, pp. 257–58. The same institutional terminology is also in a document confirming the engagements with Genoa (30 November 1186). See Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. CXXI, pp. 259–60. 12 Mor, Dominio eminente, pp. 210–13; Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. CVI, p. 386. 13 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. CVIII, p. 395. 14 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. CXX, p. 399. 15 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. XXI, pp. 669–71. Casula, Dizionario storico sardo, ad vocem ‘regno o giudicato’, pp. 1283–84 thought that Arborea — like the other Giudicati — would apply the legal principle non recognoscens superiorem, and therefore the oath would have been taken by the Judge only at a personal level, that is, he would not have committed to the ‘State’. On the creation of the Regnum and its enfeoffment, see also footnote 2.

333

334

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

phase of their institutional existence as vassals of the Aragonese kings, in whose name they held the last Sardinian Giudicato. Due to the strong opposition of Pisa, the realisation of the Regnum occurred only between 1323 and 1326, when Aragon deprived the Commune of almost all its insular possessions. Nevertheless, in those decades several contacts occurred between the kings of Aragon and the judges of Arborea. In the summer of 1301, in calling for economic aid against Pisa, James II strongly emphasized the close necessitudo and identity of blood that bound him to the judge of Arborea.16 This theme would be invoked several times. We have little information about what the Sardinian people thought of the Catalans, except as reported by some individuals who tried to obtain the king’s benevolence. They informed him that Sardinians were waiting anxiously for the monarch and were ready to submit to his authority, and that they wanted to free themselves from the Pisans who had been starving them.17 Close to the military expedition, on 22 December 1322, via ambassadors sent to Hugh II of Arborea, King James II reiterated the old friendship and duty of kinship that existed between the two Houses, perhaps to facilitate the request for a loan by the Sardinian ruler.18 In this same year, one of the first consequences of the Regnum’s establishment and the insertion of Sardinia into the Aragonese political orbit was the very pragmatic request made by Hugh II to the king for a change of his own title of Judge. Thus, the ruler would have wanted for himself and his House a title with unequivocal identitarian and social characteristics that did not lend itself to possible misunderstandings within the new Iberian political and institutional framework. If so, this may indicate that the the leader of the Arborea dynasty felt the need for a higher degree of harmony with the Crown of Aragon. This request by the judge reveals a clear awareness of the difficulty in integrating the Giudicato society within the Aragonese one, possessed of a widespread feudal system.19 On 5 July 1323 in Villa di Chiesa (today ‘Iglesias’) on behalf of his father James II of Aragon, the Infante Alfonso enfeoffed the Giudicato of Arborea to Hugh II. For his part, the Judge committed to accepting the royal donation of the Giudicato on behalf of himself and his successors, who would act as good vassals of their rightful lord, above whom they would recognize no other authority.20 In Iberian documents there is no space for any other argument or ‘discourse’: all the relationships between the Aragonese kings and all Sardinians, the subjects of the Giudicato and those of the Regnum, are read only in the light of the feudal link.

16 Archivo de la Corona de Aragón (ACA), Cancillería (C), reg. 334, fol. 26. Salavert y Roca, Cerdeña, doc. 37, p. 46: [5 June 1301. LLeida]. 17 Salavert y Roca, Cerdeña, pp. 301–03. ACA, CRD de Jaime II, 118. Salavert y Roca, Cerdeña, doc. 196, pp. 246–47. 18 Diplomatario aragonés, ed. by Delgado de Molina, pp. 20–21. 19 On 30 December 1322 the Aragonese monarch rejected Hugh II’s request, but he was available to give him another title only after knowing his motivations. Diplomatario aragonés, ed. by Delgado de Molina, doc. 13, pp. 24–25. 20 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. XXI, pp. 669–71.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

A letter by Hugh II sent on 19 December 1325 to Cardinal Napoleone Orsini provides some clues for assessing the mood of the Sardinians a few years after the Aragoneses’ arrival to the island. In the text, the judge affirms that the presence of numerous feudal lords evoked supposed disappointment and concerns among the islanders ‘qui unum regem se habuisse credebant et modo habent tot reges quot sunt ville in Kallaro’.21 Prudently, the judge attributed this situation to the House of Aragon’s generosity. But in fact, the claim of the judge proposes the image of the unease of Sardinians unused to such a fragmentation of the island’s territory and accustomed to the presence of a few Giudicati, seigneurial, or municipal officials.22 Despite these first blows to the initial positive image of the Iberians, Hugh II’s rapprochement policy towards the Catalan world was continued by sending two of his children to Barcelona — Peter, heir to the Giudicato throne, and Mariano, future Judge, in 1347 — for them to be educated there. Even Alfonso IV was very interested in linking the Crown with the judges’ family. In this light we may view the appointment of Peter of Arborea as a knight at the hands of this king on 3 April 1328 at the coronation ceremony as an extremely important act in the Aragonese monarchy’s identitarian process.23 These elements indicate the consideration given to the Arboreas, and the family links formed with some of the most relevant Catalan-Aragonese Houses. Such links would have favoured a growing cultural assimilation of the Arborea rulers that, perhaps in the intentions of the Aragonese monarchs, could have facilitated the assimilation of the whole Giudicato and its inhabitants. However, in that very same year of 1328, the situation in Sardinia already seemed to be compromised for the Iberians, locked in a struggle with simultaneous uprisings of other Sardinian political parties such as the city of Sassari, and the Doria and Malaspina families.24 For all the above reasons, the maintenance of good relations with the House of Arborea was even more necessary to preserve the Regnum. This complicated process of integration and cultural assimilation of the Giudicato dynasty and its ‘State’, prompted by Hugh II, was gradually interrupted from the mid-fourteenth century by the rebellion of his son, Mariano IV. After thirty years of relative peace, this Judge’s first insurrection (1353–1355), and particularly the second one (1364–1420), led to the clash between the Arborea dynasty and the Iberian Crown. The Sardinian ruler became the standard bearer of a different political discourse, full of nationalistic and identitarian tones aimed at securing the independence of the Giudicato and the whole island from the Iberian monarchs.25

21 ACA, C, CRD de Jaime II, caja 108, c. 13389, document in Arribas Palau, La conquista de Cerdeña, doc. LII, pp. 429–43. See Cadeddu, ‘Giacomo II d’Aragona’, pp. 297 and 311–12; Crabot, ‘I problemi dell’espansione territoriale catalana’. 22 Tangheroni, ‘La Sardegna prearagonese’. 23 Crònica de Pere el Cerimoniós, ed. by Soldevila, chapter 37, p. 1016 and chapter 43, p. 1019; Muntaner, Crònica, chapter CCXCVI, p. 936. See Roigé Prim, ‘La pretendida coronación’. 24 See Soddu, ‘La Signoria dei Doria’, Soddu, ‘Corona d’Aragona’, Soddu, ‘Signorie territoriali’, and Basso, Donnos Terramagnesos. 25 Gallinari, ‘Alcuni’.

335

3 36

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

On the Sardinian side, the discourses became even more subtle and interesting for a historian who, to an even greater degree, must remark on the inability to evaluate the information contained in the Iberian records against alternative island sources. The relationship between the Sardinians and Aragonese is more interesting from the legal perspective than the military one, because at this level we can identify the arguments invoked by the competitors. This last phase pushed them to deal with themselves and to become conscious of identities founded on previous experiences, but which should be reconstructed at the time, in accordance with the present crisis situation.26 Perhaps before the start of hostilities someone tried to convince the Sardinians that the House of Arborea had the right to defend the whole island militarily from the Aragoneses.27 To this end, someone spread around the island news that gave legal prestige to Oristano’s rulers using one of the most important elements in the identity-making process, that is a myth to establish the royal status of the Giudicato’s dynasty.28 A chronicle, Memoria, attempted this delicate operation using a legend of the arrival in Arborea of an anonymous Navarre princess after the sinking of her vessel along the eastern coast of Sardinia in the mid-eleventh century.29 The inclusion of this identitarian operation in the Memoria sheds some light on the presence of intellectuals in Sardinia aware of the history of the Giudicato and the Iberian Peninsula, and who were able to link them at a very specific historical moment. The legend is important in order to grasp the Arboreas’ legal claims and the political image they projected on the island in the fourteenth century. With the arrival of the Navarre princess the chronicle remembered and then re-founded, in the anthropological sense of the word, the origin and the social and identitarian status of the Giudicato dynasty, starting a different story from the previous one through the inclusion of new royal blood from Navarre. Once again, the Catalan element is

26 Baltrušaitis, Lo specchio, p. 9; Tagliapietra, La metafora dello specchio, p. 173. 27 Paolo Maninchedda assumes that between 1329 and 1364–1370, when the war between the Regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae and the Giudicato of Arborea was in progress, the authors of the Memoria de las cosas que han aconteçido algunas partes del reino de Cerdeña legitimized Mariano IV’s reaction and shift the charges of violating the feudal terms onto the Aragonese. The Memoria is an anonymous chronicle of real and legendary events that occurred between 1005 and 1479. It was probably composed at the end of the fifteenth century in Castell de Càller, compiling previous documentary and narrative sources from Sardinia, Italy, and Catalonia of different ages and origins. Our oldest copy was written in Castilian perhaps between 1570 and 1585. It appears to be a text characterised by an interesting recovery of popular legends, behind which it shows a para-literary tradition also relevant from a historical-political point of view. See Memoria de las cosas, ed. by Maninchedda, pp. xi–xxvii. 28 Myth has a threefold function in relation to human identity: it acts as a guarantee of the real, as a humanization of randomness and, finally, as a justification of human identity in the world. Because of this wealth of meanings and ‘vital’ functions, the world of the myth pertains to the sphere of the ‘sacred’: see Lanternari, Identità e differenza, pp. 123–24. 29 Memoria de las cosas, ed. by Maninchedda, pp. 5–6. Another version of the Navarre Princess landing — less detailed than the Memoria’s — was told by Giovanni Francesco Fara (Sassari, 1543; d. Bosa, 1591), who was considered the most important Sardinian historian of the sixteenth century. The first volume of De Rebus Sardois was published in 1580, while three others were published only in the nineteenth century: see Ioannis Francisci Farae, De rebus sardois.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

critical in defining the Sardinian identity.30 In fact, perhaps to urge the Sardinians to confront the Iberians, it was useful to generate such an identity-making discourse. In 1351, Mariano IV of Arborea was accused of asking the pope for the enfeoffment of the Regnum in order to then proclaim himself king of Sardinia.31 No other source corroborates this piece of information inserted into a political trial against the Judge, to show he wanted to seize the island even before his rebellion in the summer of 1353. By contrast, Mariano IV — declaring himself a vassal and subject of the Apostolic See, since Sardinia was its ‘specialem patrimonium et pecculium’ — told the pontiff of the Aragonese infringements of the 1297 bull, so that he would intervene to resolve the conflict of jurisdiction.32 Under these conditions, Peter IV decided to put the Judge on trial for rebellion and to eradicate him militarily. The monarch focused particularly on a crime of the Judge who, although he was a vassal and subject, took an oath of allegiance by the king’s subjects, and usurped the jurisdiction and lordship of his prince and natural lord.33 In so doing, Mariano IV deprived the king of one of the main instruments of his power — the Iurisdictio — putting aside all constraint of fidelitas and naturalitas that bound him to the monarch.34 On 13 September 1353 the Councillors of Castell de Càller (the capital of the Regnum) published the charges of the indictment against the Judge of Arborea, ‘homo proprius, subditus ligius et vassallus’ of the Aragonese king. Terms such as ‘malincholia’, ‘suspectus’, ‘livorosus’, author of an ‘inhonestum’ text, with a strong, negative connotation — used by Iberian notaries to describe the attitude of the Sardinian ruler — call for handling with care. They tended to represent the Judge as a psychologically unbalanced personality, capable of harbouring reprehensible feelings not suitable for a person who, at the same time, was trying to obtain from the pope the investiture of the Regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae at the expense of the king of Aragon, who had not paid the required feudal census.35 Ultimately the pope accepted the king’s arguments, and on 21 April 1354 authorized him to proceed judicially against Mariano IV, deprived of external political support.36 30 Myth has a primary role in the process of human identity constitution because it recalls — that is, it founds again. Its performance — in our case its reading — is never random, but is always linked to certain ritual occasions and it serves as a rite itself: see Lanternari, Identità e differenza, pp. 95, 103. Zerubavel, Mappe del tempo, p. 78 points out that ‘through […] human bridges like these [with the ancestors] […], collective entities such as cities or families are regenerated, in their apparent continuity’. 31 The news was given on 5/6 July 1353 by two councillors of Castell de Càller. ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, vol. II, fols 12r and 20v. 32 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, vol. III, fol. 69v. 33 Peter IV’s emphasis on his condition as natural lord of all the kingdom’s peoples — including the judge of Arborea — served to procure a loyalty and obedience higher than that which must be given to any other political powers. See Ladero Quesada, ‘Poderes públicos’, p. 44. 34 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, vol. III, fols 107r–108r. See also Sabaté, ‘Corona de Aragón’. 35 Gallinari, ‘Alcuni’. Homo in the Southern Europe was ‘le mot le plus employé to indicate celui que nous appelons serf dans une gamme très variée de relations personnelles au seigneur’ (‘the most frequently used word to indicate someone who we define as a serf within a very varied range of personal relationships to the lord’); see Bourin and Freedman, ‘Conclusion’. 36 Carte reali diplomatiche, ed. by D’Arienzo, doc. 476, pp. 245–46.

337

338

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

Legal and military hostilities ended first with the peace treaty of Sanluri signed on 1354 between Mariano IV and Peter IV, who went to Sardinia to suppress the Judge’s rebellion. The conditions of that treaty, very onerous for the monarch, were not applied and there was another agreement the following year.37 Among the most important clauses was the cancellation of any trial in progress or already concluded against the Judge.38 When the hostilities against the Aragonese were resumed in 1364, there is the impression that Mariano IV was preparing for a long and merciless clash with the king of Aragon, and that his political and institutional project had arrived at its ultimate stage. Also in this second phase the Arborea dynasty made extensive use of nationalist and identitarian discourses. On 30 January 1366, in a document written by the Regnum’s general-governor, it appears that various reports were being spread in Sardinia according to which the Pope had granted to the Judge the conquestam Sardinie, and to the Sardinians the crusade against the Aragonese, in exchange for a large amount of money. Moreover, several Sardinian witnesses also reported that in Arborea and in some parts of the Italian mainland the Judge had begun to be called King of Sardinia, as the papal appointment was taken for granted.39 However, the dynasty’s propaganda did not convince all of the islanders. Some Aragonese sources from this period also show that many of the Giudicato’s people did not accept the war against the Iberians, and that they moved to the Regnum and especially to Castell de Càller. The number of these migrants reached such a level in 1379 that it was necessary to spend one-third of Castell de Càller’s customs revenues to keep them alive.40 The last decades of the fourteenth century were characterized by a resumption of hostilities after a fragile truce in the aftermath of Judge Hugh III of Arborea’s death (1383) and the Giudicato’s institutional crisis that led Eleanor of Arborea to the government. The appointment of solicitors to negotiate the peace with Eleanor and the Sardinians, made by Peter IV on 17 April 1385, showed the islanders’ desire to return to royal obedience, mediated by Brancaleone Doria, the iudicissa Eleanor’s husband.41 Not even a month later — on 13 May 1385 — the Aragonese king answered another request for agreement sent by an undetermined ‘populus sardus’, which, in return for royal obedience, asked for the acceptance of some petitions very indicative of the situation at the time.42 This document is very important for historians because it is one of the few island sources not produced by the Arborea dynasty, but by members of the oligarchy who offered their own vision of the political situation. And this vision presents a fragmented image of the Sardinian Natio that the judges were trying to unite at the same time against the Aragoneses. A part of this Natio, which called itself ‘Sardinian people’, was 37 Tangheroni, Aspetti del commercio, pp. 101–02. 38 Carte reali diplomatiche, ed. by D’Arienzo, pp. 119–47. 39 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, vol. VIII, fol. 4r. 40 Anatra, Dall’unificazione aragonese, p. 273. 41 ACA, C, Sardinie, reg. 1047, fols 193v–195v. 42 ACA, C, Secretorum, reg. 1294, fols 80r–81v.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

opposing its nationalistic arguments to those of the judges. The document shows the Giudicato society’s fragmentation and aversion to the political and institutional role of the judges, accused of persisting in wanting and continuing the conflict with the kings of Aragon.43 The few available Sardinian sources do not tell us, except in very few cases, of the existence of political projects different than those of the judges. However, they were always the expression of the island oligarchy. No news comes from the Sardinian urban world, as opposed to what was happening at the same time in the Crown of Aragon, where the municipal authorities competed for political power with the monarchs taking advantage of their economic weakness.44 With this internal situation a peace treaty was signed in 1388 between Arborea and Aragon, marking the beginning of the last phase of the Sardinian polity’s life. The last years of the fourteenth century are rich in food for thought about the discourse on ethnic identities. In various extant sources, some very indicative terms are found which show their respective images of themselves and of the ‘other’, proposed by the two contenders: the Sardinians and the Iberians. This was a period during which there was extensive use of the expression nació sardesca (Catalan: Sardinian nation) by both sides, a concept that was bent to the political aims of the moment.45 Since 1390, when he was released after he had spent seven years in the hands of the Aragonese, the holder of the Giudicato’s power was the husband of the iudicissa Eleanor — Brancaleone Doria — who, thanks to his family connections, would again involve Genoa in a war against Aragon, obtaining the Sardinians’ support in hostilities through an extensive use of nationalist discourses.46 On 17 June 1390 a letter by Brancaleone Doria to the Aragonese Governor-General Joan de Montbuy evoked statements made over forty years earlier by Mariano IV in defence of Sardinian customary law threatened by Aragonese interference. In the document, some elements also appear praising the role attributed by him to the Arborea judges. The House of Arborea felt invested with political representation of the entire nació sardesca, on behalf of whom it had signed the peace treaty in 1388. Therefore, the House assumed the task of defending and doing justice to the nació in the moment that it was seen as a victim of the Aragonese.47 By doing so, Brancaleone forged the character of an ethnic identity for this Sardinian nació in sharp contrast with the Iberian element, with clear political aims that allow him to act regardless of the boundaries between the Giudicato and

43 In addition, this ‘populus sardus’ proposed that the sovereign give the queen, if she desired, the County of Goceano — the judges’ personal fiefdom from 1339 — even asking for her to become ‘ipsius advocata populi’. Another request to the king proposed a division of the rebel judges’ treasure into three equal parts: two of them belonging to the monarch, and the third to the agreement’s signatories. For more details on the episode see Gallinari, Una dinastia in guerra, pp. 275–76; Gallinari, ‘Brancaleone Doria’. 44 See Sabaté, ‘État et alliances dans la Catalogne du bas Moyen-Âge’. 45 Sabaté, ‘Amar la nostra nació’. 46 Gallinari, ‘Brancaleone Doria’, and the references within. 47 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, IX, fol. 7r.

339

340

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

the Regnum. On 6 January 1392, Pietro Marongio, podesta of Sassari, in tones of strong ethnic and nationalist opposition (‘nosaltres/vos’: Us/You) described to the Aragonese Governor-General the wickedness and treachery of the King and the Catalans, who expelled with great betrayal (‘ab gran trayció’) the Sardinians from the city they founded.48 According to Marongio, the Aragonese king sent into the island only scroungers and robbers (‘menyadors e robadors’) who could not survive in Catalonia, while they got rich with their theft in Sardinia.49 Although Brancaleone Doria seized many forts, villages, and cities, on 18 and 22 May 1392 several witnesses in the trial against the Judges, coming from different parts of Sardinia, reported the dislike of many islanders towards the hostilities against the Aragonese, and also that the entire Sardinian nació placed all the blame for the war on Brancaleone.50 On 20 March 1393, in the same trial it was stated that the uncertain situation existing in Sardinia was caused by the 1388 peace between the Sardinians and Aragonese. The latter could move freely around the island before the peace, but afterwards, they could not do so without a significant risk of death.51 The treaty would prove a watershed between two sharply contrasting moments and two visions of Sardinian-Iberian relationships: 1) it would indicate that in Sardinia the effects of the first military clash between the islanders and Iberians had been overcome quite quickly, although only a few years had elapsed after Judge Hugh III’s death (1383), marking a temporary cessation of hostilities; and 2) it would highlight a deep difference in the view of the Sardinian-Aragonese relationship between the island’s people and the judges of Arborea’s dynasty — a 48 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, X, fol. 33r–v. 49 Carte reali diplomatiche di Giovanni I riguardanti l’Italia, ed. by Casula, doc. 34, pp. 61–63. 50 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, IX, fols 79r–83r; Gallinari, Una dinastia in guerra, pp. 227, 251. We should remember that the sources in question are part of a legal and political process that was addressed to the pope, who was to authorize the use of force against the judges of Arborea. We may suppose that the Aragonese authorities tried to place the entire responsibility for the long war in Sardinia on the Arborea judges, proposing the role of victim for the Sardinian people. This might have allowed the elimination of the Sardinian rulers’ dynasty. 51 ACA, C, Procesos en volumen, Procesos contra los Arborea, X, fol. 160v. This profound change was not due to the war itself, which was interrupted by Judge Hugh III’s death, when a political faction of the Giudicato chose his sister Eleanor to succeed to the throne of Oristano (although the succession was supposed to go to her elder sister, Beatrice of Arborea wife of Aymeric VI, viscount of Narbonne). The new iudicissa immediately began peace talks with King Peter IV. This new phase in SardinianIberian relations was due to the obligation for the Arborea judges to return all the Regnum’s territories conquered in about thirty years of war (1353–1383), under the threat of personal safety of Brancaleone Doria, who was held firstly as a guest of the Aragonese in Barcelona and then as a prisoner in Castell de Càller for seven years (1383–1390). The imprisonment of the count of Monteleone — which violated the personal guarantees given to him by two Aragonese sovereigns, Peter IV and John I, and the return to the territorial status quo from before 1353, strengthened the aversion of the Arboreas towards Catalans. This was especially true because the Sardinian dynasty acknowledged the wasted decades of economic sacrifices necessary to finance the war. The behaviour of the Aragonese in relation to the judges and their followers explains the frequent accusations found in Sardinian documents against supports of the king: of wickedness, betrayal of a given word, and moral unfairness.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

difference that will increase in the subsequent decades until the disappearance of the last Sardinian Giudicato.52 After many years of useless diplomatic efforts and minor episodes of armed conflict that yielded no definitive results, the Sardinians and Aragonese clashed militarily in a battle in Sanluri on 30 June 1409.53 The military defeat of Sardinians in the battle provoked two events that once again intertwined the destinies of the two peoples. 1) The death of Martin, king of Sicily, in command of the Aragonese troops and the only heir of the king of Aragon who died the following year leaving no successor to the Crown, which after two years of interregnum passed to the Castilian dynasty of Trastamara. 2) The Capitulations of San Martino (29 March 1410), with which the Giudicato of Arborea ceased to be, through a sort of coup d’état carried out by part of the oligarchy of the Giudicato and its capital, which once again confirmed the lack of unity of the Sardinian Natio, even within the same Giudicato society. Among the conditions of the Capitulations there was one concerning the Judge’s vicar Leonardo Cubello and the new dynasty that would rule the marquisate of Oristano, the new institutional body that replaced the Giudicato. Cubello asked for and received from the royal lieutenant Pere Torrelles a title that would made him equal to the other barons of the Crown.54 Cubello’s request can be interpreted as a sort of ‘social reconversion’, which aimed at his inclusion in Aragonese society with a noble title that would guarantee an appropriate social status to the former Sardinian maiorale, an exponent of the Giudicato’s aristocracy.55 This request is linked to the one carried out by Hugh II about ninety years earlier, and it symbolically closed the cultural assimilation path of the Giudicato society within the Iberian one.

52 The sources on the Treaty of 1388 show once again how Sardinians (that is, the Sardinian people who lived both in the Giudicato and in the Regnum) evaluated the relationship with the Iberians differently from how the judges of Arborea and their retinue did. The latter were those who had more to lose from the consolidation of the Catalan presence in Sardinia, and therefore they even fuelled (ideologically) the rebellion against the Aragonese monarchs. The 1388 treaty is further proof of how part of the historiography of the Gudicato of Arborea interpreted the long war between Sardinians and Iberians in the light of a nationalistic clash. This is true only with regard to the political use of identity and nationalistic discourses elaborated by the judges’ dynasty and addressed to the islanders in order to incite them to war. For an initial examination of the emotional and sentimental vocabulary used in the relations between Sardinians and Aragonese, see the recent essay: Gallinari, ‘Feelings and Political Discourses’. 53 Gallinari, ‘Guglielmo III di Narbona’; Gallinari, ‘Amerigo di Narbona’; Gallinari, ‘Gli ultimi anni’; Delgado De Molina, La Battalla; Sini, ‘Sanluri’; Sentañes, ‘L’impronta Catalana’. 54 Codice Diplomatico, ed. by Tola, doc. V, p. 38. 55 See Casula, La Sardegna aragonese, vol. 2, pp. 549–56; see Gallinari, ‘Guglielmo III di Narbona’, pp. 105–09; Sini, ‘Elia de Palmas’. On Leonardo Cubello we can also see the latest considerations by Sini, ‘Reflections’.

341

342

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

The legal conflict concluded in 1420 with the sale of the rights of William II of Narbonne (the last judge) to the Giudicato and the extension to the entire island of the Regnum. The fall of the last Giudicato and the integration of the marquisate of Oristano into the Regnum was due to the Sardinians’ awareness that their fate had gradually detached from the family of the judges.56 However, this did not mean the erasure of the Giudicato from the minds of all Sardinians, some of whom saw in it the realization of the ideals of independence and autonomy, which survived for at least half a century. During temporary rebellions or clashes between the islanders and the Aragonese, the name Arborea was used as an agglutinative of indigenous forces. So it happened again for the last time in 1478, during the military conflict between Leonardo de Alagón — the last marquis of Oristano and a distant descendant of the judges — and Nicholas Carròs of Arborea, viceroy of Sardinia. The Sardinians rose up, shouting the vanished Giudicato’s name, undergoing the last defeat which marked the final demise of Sardinian insurrectional attempts, and also the evocative power, full of suggestions, associated with that name. The centuries-old relationship between Catalans and Sardinians went through several phases in the period examined in the present work, and the Catalan layer is one of the most relevant components of the island’s current identitarian profile, although it is not widely perceived by many contemporary Sardinians themselves. What was of interest to us here was the use of political discourses evoking ethnic identities during, and thanks to, the conflicts between the judges of Arborea and the kings of Aragon in the fourteenth and fifteenth century.57 Also, it was interesting to stress the attempts by the Iberian monarchs to build a multi-ethnic society in the island, clearly under their institutional and political leadership, according to the bull of enfeoffment. But it is equally noteworthy to observe how an ethnic identity of the Sardinians was at least in part created by the judges of Arborea in order to gain armed support from the island people during the military clash with Aragonese. The rulers of Arborea also resorted to the myth of their descent from the kings of Navarre because it conferred to the Giudicato dynasty a social prestige equal to or even higher than that of their enemies, the Aragonese kings.58 In contrast to this, a vision of the Aragon royal dynasty as the supreme power for all islanders was formally proposed, built upon the value of political treaties and power, but also on the vision of the Sardinians as another Natio in addition to the

56 Economia, società, istituzioni a Sassari nel Medioevo e nell’età moderna, ed. by Mattone and Tangheroni; Gallinari, ‘Sassari’, pp. 357–63; Simbula and Soddu, ‘Gli spazi dell’identità’, pp. 135–73; Soddu, ‘Le subordinazioni’, pp. 69–110; Meloni, ‘Society and Identity’, pp. 89–100; Sini, ‘Reflections’, pp. 101–16; Gallinari, ‘The Catalans in Sardinia’. 57 Sentañes, ʻL’impronta Catalana’. 58 Ferrarotti, Il silenzio della parola, p. 79 confirms Maurice Halbwachs’s opinion, according to which the memory of events or people ‘is a reformulation subject, from time to time, to readjustments and revisions resulting from the changing of the points of view operating in the present’ of someone who remembers.

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

others already present in the Crown of Aragon. The war between the Iberians and Sardinians delayed the realisation of that vision. In fact, only from the second decade of the fifteenth century — almost a century after the first arrival of the Aragoneses in Sardinia (1323) —, as a consequence of the legal disappearance of the Giudicato of Arborea, Sardinians and Catalans could begin to find common ground to create a new insular identity that was further improved in the first centuries of the early modern period.

Works Cited Primary Sources Carte reali diplomatiche di Giovanni I riguardanti l’Italia, ed. by Francesco Cesare Casula (Padova: CEDAM, 1977) Carte reali diplomatiche di Pietro IV il Cerimonioso re d’Aragona, riguardanti l’Italia, ed. by Luisa D’Arienzo (Padova: CEDAM, 1970) Codice Diplomatico della Sardegna, ed. by Pasquale Tola (Sassari: Delfino editore, 1984) (ed. or. Codex Diplomaticus Sardiniae, Augusta Taurinorum, 1861), vol. 1/1 Codice Diplomatico della Sardegna, ed. by Pasquale Tola (Sassari: Delfino editore, 1985) (ed. or. Codex Diplomaticus Sardiniae, Augusta Taurinorum, 1861), vol. 1/2 Crònica de Pere el Cerimoniós, in Les quatre grans cròniques, ed. by Ferran Soldevila (Barcelona: Editorial Selecta, 1971), pp. 1005–1225 Diplomatario aragonés de Ugone II de Arborea, ed. by Rafael Conde y Delgado de Molina (Sassari: Fondazione Banco di Sardegna, 2005) Ioannis Francisci Farae, De rebus sardois, in Opera, vol. 2, ed. by Enzo Cadoni, Ioannis Francisci Farae (Sassari: Gallizzi, 1992) Memoria de las cosas que han aconteçido en algunas partes del reino de Cerdeña, ed. by Paolo Maninchedda (Cagliari: CUEC, 2000) Muntaner, Ramon, Crònica, in Les quatre grans cròniques, ed. by Ferran Soldevila (Barcelona: Editorial Selecta, 1971), pp. 667–1000 Ottonis Morenae et continuatorum, Historia Frederici I. Das Geschichtswerk des Otto Morena und seiner Fortsetzer über die Taten Friedrichs I. in der Lombardei, ed. by Ferdinand Güterbock, in Monumenta Germaniae Historica: Scriptores rerum Germanicarum, Nova series, 7 (Berlin: Weidmannsche, 1930) Salavert y Roca, Vicente, Cerdeña y la expansión mediterranea (Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1956), vol. 2 Secondary Studies Anatra, Bruno, ‘Dall’unificazione aragonese ai Savoia’, in La Sardegna medioevale e moderna, Storia d’Italia, vol. 10 (Torino: UTET, 1984), pp. 191–663 Arribas Palau, Antonio, La conquista de Cerdeña por Jaime II de Aragón (Barcelona: Instituto Español de Estudios Mediterráneos, 1952)

343

344

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

Artizzu, Francesco, ‘Penetrazione Catalana in Sardegna nel secolo XII’, in Francesco Artizzu, Pisani e Catalani nella Sardegna medievale (Padova: CEDAM, 1973), pp. 11–23 Baltrušaitis, Jurghis, Lo specchio. Rivelazioni, inganni e sciénce-fiction (Milano: Adelphi, 1981) Basso, Enrico, Donnos Terramagnesos. Dinamiche di insediamento signorile in Sardegna: il caso dei Doria (secoli XII–XV) (Roma: Bonanno, 2018) Bourin, Monique, and Paul Freedman, ‘Conclusion’, in La servitude dans les pays de la Méditerranée occidentale chrétienne au XIIe siècle et au-delà, déclinante ou renouvelée? (Roma 8 e 9 ottobre 1999), ‘Mélanges de l’École française de Rome’, 112.2 (2000), 1039– 55 Cadeddu, Maria Eugenia, ‘Giacomo II d’Aragona e la conquista del regno di Sardegna e Corsica’, in Corona d’Aragona e Mediterraneo. Strategie d’espansione, migrazioni e commerci, ed. by Maria Eugenia Cadeddu, Medioevo. Saggi e rassegne, 20 (1995), 251–316 ———, ‘Frontiere dell’espansione catalano-aragonese nel Mediterraneo. L’epoca di Giacomo II d’Aragona (1291–1327)’, in Frontiere del Mediterraneo. Seminario Internazionale di Studi (Cagliari, 10–12 Ottobre 2002), ed. by Maria Eugenia Cadeddu and Maria Grazia Mele (Pisa: ETS, 2003), pp. 31–39 ———, ‘L’espansione catalano-aragonese nel Mediterraneo: riflessi nella storiografia iberica contemporanea’, in Quel mar che la terra inghirlanda. Studi mediterranei in ricordo di Marco Tangheroni, ed. by Franco Cardini and Maria Luisa Ceccarelli Lemut (Roma: Pacini, 2007), pp. 149–55 Casula, Francesco Cesare, La Sardegna aragonese, 2 vols (Sassari: Chiarella, 1990) ———, Dizionario storico sardo (Sassari: Carlo Delfino, 2000) Crabot, Cécile, ‘I problemi dell’espansione territoriale catalana nel Mediterraneo: conquistare un feudo in Sardegna, un bene o un male? L’esempio dei Sentmenat, signori di Orosei’, Anuario de estudios medievales, 33.2, (2003), 815–48 D’Arienzo, Luisa, ‘La pace di Alghero stipulata tra l’Aragona e l’Arborea nel 1354’, in Medioevo. Età moderna (Cagliari: Fossataro, 1972), pp. 119–48 Delgado De Molina, Rafael Conde y, La Battalla de Sent Luri. Texto y documentos (Oristano: Istar, 1997) Economia, società, istituzioni a Sassari nel Medioevo e nell’età moderna, ed. by Antonello Mattone and Marco Tangheroni (Cagliari: Edes, 1986) Fabietti, Ugo, L’identità etnica. Storia e critica di un concetto equivoco (Roma: La Nuova Italia Scientifica, 1995) Ferrarotti, Franco, Il silenzio della parola. Tradizione e memoria in un mondo smemorato (Bari: Dedalo, 2003) Ferro, Victor, El Dret Públic Català. Les Institucions a Catalunya fins al Decret de Nova Planta (Vic: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 1987) Gallinari, Luciano, ‘Guglielmo III di Narbona, ultimo sovrano d’Arborea, e la guerra dei Cent’anni’, Medioevo. Saggi e rassegne, 18 (1993), 91–121 ———, ‘Amerigo di Narbona ultimo sovrano di Arborea?’, Anuario de estudios medievales, 29 (1999), 315–33 ———, ‘Gli ultimi anni di esistenza del regno giudicale d’Arborea: riflessioni e prospettive di ricerca’, Medioevo. Saggi e rassegne, 25 (2002), 155–90 ———, ‘Sassari: da capitale giudicale a città regia’, in El món urbà a la corona d’Aragó del 1137 als decrets de Nova Planta. XVII Congrés de História de la Corona d’Aragó, vol. III

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

(Barcelona-Lleida, 7–12 septembre 2000) (Barcelona: Universitat de Barcelona, 2003), pp. 357–63 ———, ‘Alcuni ‘discorsi’ politici e istituzionali nello scontro tra Pietro IV d’Aragona e Mariano IV d’Arborea’, in Sardegna e Mediterraneo tra Medioevo ed Età Moderna. Studi in onore di Francesco Cesare Casula, ed. by Maria Giuseppina Meloni and Olivetta Schena (Genova: Instituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, 2009), pp. 149–83 ———, ‘Il Giudicato di Calari tra XI e XIII secolo. Proposte di interpretazioni istituzionali’, RiMe. Rivista dell’Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, 5 (dicembre 2010), 147–88,

———, Una dinastia in guerra e un re descurat? I giudici d’Arborea e Giovanni I re d’Aragona (1379–1396) (Cagliari: Instituto di storia dell’Europa mediterranea del CNR, 2013) ———, ‘Bilanci e prospettive della storiografia sulla Sardegna in epoca catalana’, in Sardegna catalana, ed. by Anna Maria Oliva and Olivetta Schena, (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2014), pp. 373–94 ———, ‘Brancaleone Doria ¿fallido juez de Arborea?’, in Tra il Tirreno e Gibilterra. Un Mediterraneo Iberico?, ed. by Luciano Gallinari and Flocel Sabaté, vol. 2 (Cagliari: Instituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea del CNR, 2015), pp. 576–78 ———, ‘Reflections on Byzantine Sardinia between 7th and 11th Centuries in the Light of Recent Historiographical Proposal’, in Bilanci e prospettive storiografiche, ed. by Maria Giuseppina Meloni, Anna Maria Oliva, and Olivetta Schena (Roma: Viella, 2015), pp. 83–107 ———, ‘Feelings and Political Discourses in the Giudicati Sardinia (11th–13th centuries)’, in 7th International Medieval Meeting (Lleida, 26th–28th June 2017) (Leeds: ARCHumanities, in press) ———, ‘On the Origin and Nature of the Power of the Iudex Sardiniae / ἄρχων Σαρδενίας’, in The Making of Medieval Sardinia, ed. by Alex Metcalfe and Giovanni Serreli (Leiden: Brill, in press) ———, ‘La batalla de Sanluri: un pretexto para una nueva interpretación nacionalista e identitaria de la historia medieval sarda’, Aragón en la Edad Media, 30 (2020), in press ———, ‘The Catalans in Sardinia and the Transformation of Sardinians into a Political Minority (12th–15th centuries)’, Journal of Medieval Studies, 45 (2019), 347–59 Ladero Quesada, Miguel Ángel, ‘Poderes públicos en la Europa medieval (Principados, Reinos y Coronas)’, in Poderes públicos en la Europa medieval. Principados, reinos y coronas. XXIII Semana de Estudios Medievales de Estella (Pamplona: Gobierno de Navarra, 1997), pp. 19–68 Lanternari, Vittorio, Identità e differenza. Percorsi storico-antropologici (Napoli: Liguori, 1986) Liebkind, Karmela, ‘Ethnic Identity: Challenging the Boundaries of Social Psychology’, in Social Psychology of Identity and Self Concept, ed. by Glynis M. Breakwell (London: Surrey University Press, 1992), pp. 147–85 Mancini, Tiziana, Psicologia dell’identità etnica. Sé e appartenenze culturali (Roma: Carocci, 2006) Meloni, Maria Giuseppina, ‘Society and Identity in Fifteenth-Century Cagliari Testaments’, in Sardinia from the Middle Ages to Contemporaneity: A Case Study of a Mediterranean Island Identity Profile, ed. by Luciano Gallinari (Bern: Peter Lang, 2018), pp. 89–100 Mor, Guido Carlo, Dominio eminente in Novissimo Digesto Italiano, vol. 6 (Torino: UTET, 1960)

345

346

lu c i a n o ga ll i n ar i

Palacios Martín, Bonifacio, ‘Los actos de coronaciòn y el proceso de ‘secularizaciòn’ de la monarquia catalano-aragonesa (Siglos XIII–XIV)’, in Actes du colloque organisé par le Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique et la Casa de Velázquez, (Madrid, 30 novembre et 1er décembre 1984), ed. by Jean-Philippe Genet and Bernard Vincent (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 1986), pp. 113–28 Bertran i Roigé, Prim, ‘La pretendida coronación de Juan I y el estamento nobiliario de la Corona de Aragón’, Hidalguía, 240 (September-October 1993), 691–703 Sabaté, Flocel, ‘Corona de Aragón’, in Historia de España, vol. 8: La época medieval: administración y gobierno, ed. by Pedro Andrés Porras, Eloisa Ramírez, and Flocel Sabaté (Istmo: Tres Cantos, 2003), pp. 345–81 ———, ‘État et alliances dans la Catalogne du bas Moyen-Âge’, in Du contrat d’alliance au contrat politique. Cultures et sociétés politiques dans la péninsule Ibérique à la fin du Moyen Âge, ed. by François Foronda and Ana Isabel Carrasco Manchado (Toulouse: Université Toulouse II-Le Mirail, 2007), pp. 308–60 ———, ‘Amar la nostra nació’, in Sardegna e Catalogna ‘officinae’ di identità. Riflessioni storiografiche e prospettive di ricerca, ed. by Alesandra Cioppi (Cagliari: Instituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea del CNR, 2013), pp. 15–62 ———, The Crown of Aragon: A Singular Mediterranean Empire, ed. by Flocel Sabaté i Curull, (Leiden: Brill, 2017) Salavert y Roca, Vicente, ‘Un nuevo documento para la historia de Cerdeña’, in Studi storici in onore di Francesco Loddo Canepa, vol. 2 (Firenze: Sansoni, 1959), pp. 301–12 Sanluri 1409. La Battaglia per la Libertà della Sardegna, ed. by Franciscu Sedda (Cagliari: Arkadia, 2019) Sanna, Mauro G., ‘Papa Giovanni XXII, Giacomo II d’Aragona e la questione del Regnum Sardinie et Corsice’, in Tra diritto e storia. Studi in onore di Luigi Berlinguer promossi dalle Università di Siena e di Sassari, vol. 2 (Rubbettino: Soveria Mannelli, 2008), pp. 737–52 ———, ‘ll regnum Sardinie et Corsice nell’azione politica di Bonifacio VIII’, Bullettino dell’Istituto Storico Italiano per il Medio Evo, 112 (2010), 503–28 ———, ‘La Sardegna, il Papato e le dinamiche delle espansioni mediterranee’, in La Sardegna nel Mediterraneo tardomedievale, ed. by Pinuccia Franca Simbula and Alessandro Soddu (Trieste: CERM, 2013), pp. 103–21 Sardegna catalana, ed. by Anna Maria Oliva and Olivetta Schena (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2014) Sentañes, Esther Martí, ‘L’empremta catalana en la cultura sarda. História, institucions, art, llengua i tradicions populars’, RiMe. Rivista dell’Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, 2 ( June 2009), 13–30, ———, ‘The Battle of Sanluri in the Process of Recreating Sardinian Identity’, in Perverse Identities: Identities in Conflict, ed. by Flocel Sabaté, Identities / Identités / Identidades, 3 (Bern: Peter Lang, 2015), pp. 119–46 Simbula, Pinuccia F., and Alessandro Soddu, ‘Gli spazi dell’identità cittadina tra signori e Corona nella Sardegna medievale’, in Identità cittadine e aggregazioni sociali in Italia, secoli XI–XV. Convegno di studio (Trieste, 28–30 giugno 2010), ed. by Miriam Davide (Trieste: CERM, 2012), pp. 135–73

Catalans and Sard i ni ans

Sini, Giovanni, ‘Sanluri, una villa di confine nel periodo tardo medioevo’, in La battaglia di Sanluri come scontro fra culture: quanto simili e quanto diverse? Atti del convegno di studi (Las Plassas, 24 giugno 2007), ed. by Francesca Carrada, Giorgio Murru, and Giovanni Serreli, Quaderni di studi e ricerche (Las Plassas: Grafica del Parteolla, 2008), pp. 115−34 ———, ‘Elia de Palmas. La professione di diplomatico ecclesiastico durante un periodo di mutamento a cavallo tra XIV e XV secolo’, Rime. Rivista dell’Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea, 12 ( June 2014), 107–36 , ———, ‘Reflections on the Socio-Political and Cultural Transmissions at the End of the Giudicato of Arborea: Identity-Based Resistance and (Re)construction of Historic Memory?’, in Sardinia from the Middle Ages to Contemporaneity: A Case Study of a Mediterranean Island Identity Profile, ed. by Luciano Gallinari (Bern: Peter Lang, 2018), pp. 101–16 Soddu Alessandro, ‘La Signoria dei Doria in Sardegna e l’origine di Castelgenovese’, in Castelsardo: novecento anni di storia, ed. by Antonello Mattone and Alessandro Soddu (Roma: Carocci, 2007), pp. 235–67 ———, ‘Corona d’Aragona e Malaspina nella Sardegna del Trecento’, in Sardegna catalana, ed. by Anna Maria Oliva and Olivetta (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2014), pp. 88–103 ———, ‘Le subordinazioni delle città comunali. Un caso sardo: Sassari e la Corona d’Aragona (XIV secolo)’, in Le subordinazioni delle città comunali a poteri maggiori in Italia dagli inizi del secolo XIV all’Ancien Régime. Risultati scientifici della ricerca, ed. by Miriam Davide (Trieste: Gaspari, 2014), pp. 69–110. ———, Signorie territoriali nella Sardegna medievale. I Malaspina (secc. 13–14) (Roma: Carocci, 2017) Tagliapietra, Andrea, La metafora dello specchio. Lineamenti per una storia simbolica (Milano: Feltrinelli, 1991) Tangheroni, Marco, ‘La Sardegna prearagonese: una società senza feudalesimo?’, in Structures féodales et féodalisme dans l’Occident méditerranéen (Xe–XIIIe siècles). Bilan et perspectives de recherches. Actes du Colloque de Rome (10–13 octobre 1978), Publications de l’École Française de Rome, 44 (Roma: École Française de Rome, 1980), pp. 523–50 ———, Aspetti del commercio dei cereali nei Paesi della Corona d’Aragona. vol. 1: La Sardegna (Cagliari: Della Torre, 1981) Tognetti, Sergio, ‘La Sardegna catalana. Storiografia sarda e storiografia italiana a confronto’, Nuova rivista storica, 99.3 (2015), 1037–46 Veyne, Paul, Comment on écrit l’histoire. Texte integral (Paris: Seuil, 1996) Zedda, Corrado, ‘Bisanzio, l’Islam e i giudicati: la Sardegna e il mondo mediterraneo tra VII e XI secolo’, Archivio Storico Giuridico Sardo di Sassari, n. s., X (2006), 39–112 Zedda Corrado, and Raimondo Pinna, ‘La nascita dei giudicati: una proposta per lo scioglimento di un enigma storiografico’, Archivio Storico Giuridico Sardo di Sassari, XII (2007), 27−118 Zerubavel, Eviatar, Mappe del tempo. Memoria collettiva e costruzione sociale del passato (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2005)

347

Flocel Sabaté

Catalan Identity Discourse in the Late Medieval Mediterranean Creation and Contrast with Neighbouring Identities

Values and memories form the basis of the construction of social identities, including late medieval collective identities. When reading social and political sources it is easy to confirm this, as collective identities were usually both built by and revealed in the words of so-called representatives, who justified their position through the invocation of some supposed common values and memories. The real meaning of this, whether these discourses supported or, in reality, contributed to the creation of collective identities, must be analysed through attention to items like external perception, internal awareness, and the real function of the representatives. The case of Catalan identity in the context of the late medieval expansion of the Crown of Aragon across the Mediterranean is an excellent case study for the book’s main subject, thanks to the variety of different historiographical perspectives involved. This chapter also offers another perspective to the problem analysed in the last chapter by Luciano Gallinari in relation to Sardinia, as it also reveals the interrelationship between the processes of identity building of dominant and subject ethnicities within one political body. The recovery of Catalan cultural identity in nineteenth-century Spain1 has prompted research into a century-old idea concerning the early medieval origins of the County of Barcelona, in order to assess collective national cohesion in the closeness displayed by society in the north-east of the Iberian Peninsula.2 Recent historiographical revisions,3 well-embedded within the understanding of regional European cohesion,4 have led historians to re-examine aspects of the late Middle Ages



1 2 3 4

Sabaté, ‘Constructing and Deconstructing’. Sabaté, Une histoire médiévale’. Sabaté, ‘Identity, Perception and Cohesion’. Sabaté, ‘Historical Analysis of the Catalan Identity’. Flocel Sabaté  •  ([email protected]) is Professor of Medieval History at the University of Lleida. He has published on the social and political history of the medieval Crown of Aragon. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 349–368 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120069

3 50

f lo c e l s a bat é

such as the view of the society from outside, their own awareness from inside, and the cultural and socio-economic cohesion as well as the representation assumed by the ruling elite, including attention to their speeches and the institutional frameworks. In this context, the Catalan case is extremely interesting as it brings to the fore a specific region in the north-east of the Iberian Peninsula, part of whose ruling elite was the force driving an expansion throughout the Mediterranean. Although this move afforded them prominence, at the close of the Middle Ages it was engulfed by the greater cultural and political strength of Castile.5 Therefore, the acknowledgement of a specific national Catalan identity occurred when they came into contact with other ethnic groups throughout the Mediterranean, and this provided the Catalan demonym with a singular polysemy.

The Catalan National Identity Bernard Guenée has noted that the names ‘Catalonia’ and ‘Poland’ ‘nacieron para designar Estados ya existentes’ (were born to designate existing States).6 Certainly, one can suspect that Sardinians are thus called because they live on an island that has been called Sardinia since the dawn of record keeping. In contrast, in Catalonia there was first a demonym. In the eighth century, the Carolingian Empire created the counties in the north-east of the Iberian Peninsula on the land the Muslims had taken from the Visigoths. However, the subsequent weakening of Carolingian rule a century later forced these counties to become independent from each other, creating their respective dynasties and reconverting public property into the private possessions of each count’s residence. During the tenth and eleventh centuries these counties had become stronger and consequently began to advance along the Muslim border, furthering their social, economic, and cultural development in a specific strategic position between the Islamic border on the south and the emerging European states on the north.7 The count of Barcelona was the most prominent among them due to his extensive and thriving possessions — which included three episcopal cities — his strong impact on the border, and his increasingly important maritime activity. Feudal agreements set up in the eleventh century already acknowledge his prominence, which did not interfere with the sovereignty of the other counts.8 In fact, at the beginning of the twelfth century in 1114, the count of Barcelona led a coalition of maritime cities from Barcelona to Rome to conquer Majorca, in order to put a halt to the inconvenience caused by Muslim corsairs based on the island. Although the campaign achieved its aim in taking the island, the Almoravids responded and restored the island to the Muslims, by then integrated into the African Empire.9



5 Sabaté, Percepció i identificació. 6 Guenée, Occidente, pp. 57–58. 7 Sabaté, ‘El nacimiento de Cataluña’. 8 Kosto, Making Agreements, pp. 219–94. 9 Rubiera Mata, La taifa de Denia.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

Not long afterwards, the Liber Maiolichinus was written in Pisa to record this epic campaign. The text mentions the participation of the catalanenses and the leadership of the Barchinonicus heros, introduced as Catalanicus heros and acting as rector Catalanicus hostes.10 This, the first record of the Catalan demonym, proves that from the outside the unity of the peoples living in the north-east of the Iberian Peninsula was recognized, despite the region’s political fragmentation, and was credited with a demonym regardless of official county designations. The count of Barcelona’s influence over this region was strengthened in the twelfth century with the addition of other counties through agreements, and even attaining pre-eminence through their acquisition of a royal title when they became kings of Aragon.11 At the end of the eleventh century this small kingdom had begun to expand rapidly by conquering Muslim land, and during the twelfth century they occupied territories from the Pyrenees to the south of the Ebro Valley. The joining of the different regions under the common name ‘Aragon’ occurred in the second half of the twelfth century, while Catalonia was simultaneously consolidating on the coast under the same sovereign. The fact that both regions grew stronger at the same time and under the same lord, without merging and under their own respective names of Catalonia and Aragon, while keeping their own institutions, indicates that they united around their own societies rather than a common dynasty. In fact, twelfth-century Catalonia saw the culmination of two processes: the establishment of feudalism and, more prominently, the consolidation of powerful urban elites.12 The king of Aragon and count of Barcelona asserted his supremacy over Catalonia, which was easier to describe than name: ‘a Salsis usque ad Tortosam et Ilerdam, cum finibus suis’. However, royal power was limited by its jurisdictional and fiscal weaknesses. This background allowed the estates to assert their identification with the region before the sovereign. In 1188 Alfonso the Chaste was prevented from appointing his representatives in the region from his other domains: ‘promittimus quod non constituamos in tota supradicta terra vicarium nisi cathalanum’.13 The sovereign would repeat this commitment to link his officials with the ‘land’ and, inside it, the different magnates, as Peter II the Catholic did in 1205: ‘promitto etiam quod non instituam in ipsa terra aliquos vicarios nisi milites et de ipsa terra et cum consilio magnatum et sapientium illius terre’.14 An external perception and internal awareness of Catalan identity are thus combined. Some distinctive traits, such as language, define the group, which will behave as one under its sovereign. In the south-east of the Iberian Peninsula, the Kingdom of Murcia was conquered from the Muslims by the king of Castile helped by the Aragonese king in the mid-thirteenth century — and thus, their towns and cities were mainly repopulated by Castilians and Catalans settled separately. When 10 Pisano, Liber Maiolichinus, ed. by Scalia, pp. 202, 240, 270, 272, 296, 346, 382, 434; ed. by Calisse, pp. 17, 27, 61, 83, 116, 123. 11 Sabaté, ‘El poder soberano’. 12 Sabaté, ‘Els primers temps’. 13 Gonzalvo, Les Constitucions, pp. 76, 94, 100. 14 Cartoral, ed. by Marquès, vol. 2, p. 571.

35 1

3 52

f lo c e l s a bat é

war broke out between the two monarchs at the end of the century, the population took sides in accordance with their origins and not their residence: ‘movió el rey de Aragón con su hueste e fue al reino de Murcia e por consejos de los de la tierra, que eran catalanes, diéronsele todas las villas e los castillos salvo ende Lorca, que moraban castellanos, e otrosí Alcalá e Mula’ (the King of Aragon and his army moved into the Kingdom of Murcia where, upon the advice of the region’s people, who were Catalan, he was given all the towns and castles, excepting Lorca, where Castilians lived, as well as Alcalá and Mula).15 In thirteenth-century Europe this community awareness was uniting national groups.16 A century later Francesc Eiximenis considered the Catalan nation to be better than others because it was ‘exempli de totes les altres gents cristianes en menjar honest e en temprat beure’ (an example for all the other Christian people in honest eating and tempered drinking).17 Therefore, the traits of national identity are cultural and daily practices,18 and can be summarized in the equivalency established in 1369 by King Peter the Ceremonious between ‘la nostra nació’ and ʻles nostres maneres’ (our nation and our ways).19 In a political plea in 1471, another equivalency was outlined: ‘gents e nacions y lengues e pobles’ (gentes and nations, and languages and people),20 highlighting the balance between people, a group demonym, a nation, and a language. Therefore, national identity entails a shared sentiment. Thus, when Pope Innocent IV appointed the Majorcan Nicolau Rossell as cardinal, King Peter the Ceremonious invoked him as the first ever Catalan cardinal — including Majorca’s inhabitants within the common nation and ignoring a possible precedent of a Catalan cardinal in twelfth century21 — and requested that the entire nation share the joy, since és estada feta gran gràcia e fort assenyalada a nós, e a tota nostra nació, car jassie que y hagués cardenal d’Espanya, tota vegada era castellà, e de nostra nació jamés no n·i havia haut tro ara, e com se convenga que·l dit cardenal vaia en cort de Roma, de guisa que sia honor nostra e de la nostra nació.22 a great and strong grace has been bestowed upon us and our nation, for since the first appointment of a cardinal of Spain, the post has always been occupied by a Castilian. Never has a representative from our nation been chosen until now, and since he will travel to the court of Rome, he will honour us and our nation. Consequently, the nation’s members were intended to feel as one, in accordance with the image of a sentient body. Before the Parliament or Courts, in 1454 Bishop

15 Crónica del Rey Fernando Cuarto, ed. by Rosell, p. 103; ed. by Benítez, p. 31. 16 Génicot, Europa, p. 130. 17 Eiximenis, Lo crestià, chap. 372, p. 148. 18 Sabaté, ‘Amar la nostra nació’. 19 Parlaments, ed. by Albert and Gassiot, pp. 37–38. 20 Carreras y Candi, Pere Joan Ferrer, p. 104. 21 Valls Taberner, ‘Le juriste catalan’; Kosto, ‘Was There Just One Petrus de Cardona?’. 22 Documents per l’historia, ed. by Rubió y Lluch, p. 181.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

Margarit stated that the prolonged absence of the king — in Italy since 143223 — had left the Catalan nation almost like a grieving widow: jau la dita nació catalana quasi vídua, e plora la sua desolació […] aquesta quasi vídua nació de Catalunya que per la sua innata fidelitat meresca de vostra majestat e de tot altre senyor ésser tractada.24 the aforementioned Catalan nation lies almost widowed, mourning its grief […] this almost widowed nation of Catalonia deserves to be acknowledged by your Majesty and any other Lord because of its innate loyalty. Primarily this reflects the duality between king and nation. The monarch’s attempts to consolidate his position in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, by developing a good institutional framework25 with the aid of a discourse based on Roman law,26 could not overcome the jurisdictional and fiscal weakness of its bases. In this situation, the challenges of the fourteenth century forced him to depend on extraordinary subsidies negotiated with the estates.27 These, in turn, were conditioned by the growing leadership of powerful municipal governments,28 who did not speak on their own behalf but on that of the land (terra),29 and thus was the clear duality between country and sovereign accepted.30 The representativeness adopted by those supposedly speaking on behalf of the country reinforced the discourse of national cohesion before the king. By merging their interests with those of the country, local elites, from the helm of municipal government, interfered in the performance of duties by regional royal officials, while the estates gained access to control the exercise of royal government. After 1363 the establishment of permanent deputations of the General Courts, initially to control subsidies granted to the king, actually strengthened the institutional duality between king and country.31 Ultimately, the representativeness asserted by the ruling elite and the development of institutions were based upon those traits which also strengthened the national identity discourse of Catalonia, and were considered defining once social and cultural cohesion had been established.

23 Ryder, Alfonso el Magnánimo, p. 228. 24 Parlaments, ed. by Albert and Gassiot, pp. 210–12. 25 Sabaté, ‘Discurs i estratègies’. 26 Sabaté, ‘Corona de Aragón’. 27 Sánchez, El naixement, pp. 89–134. 28 Sabaté, ‘État et alliances’. 29 Sabaté, ‘L’idéel politique’. 30 ‘Catalunya, com a comunitat política, està representada, no sols pel monarca, sinó també pel conjunt dels tres estaments de la cort o pel conjunt de la major i més sana part de cadascun d’ells’ (As a political community, Catalonia is not only represented by the king, but by all three estates of the Parliament or by the greatest and healthiest part of each of these), Montagut, Les institucions fiscalitzadores, p. 103. 31 Sánchez de Movellán, La Diputació.

35 3

3 54

f lo c e l s a bat é

The Confrontation of National Identities In 1369, King Peter the Ceremonious voiced his annoyance before the Courts because the Judge of Arborea, Mariano IV, was heading the Sardinian revolt. Along with his brother, he had been welcomed by the monarch’s father and predecessor and placed under the guidance of two Catalan knights, who had taught them to ‘servir lo senyor rei nostre pare e nós e amar la nostra nació’ (serve His Majesty our Father and us and love our nation).32 In 1323, James II invaded Sardinia in order to take possession of the royal title king of Sardinia and Corsica which was awarded by the pope in 1297.33 The opposition assembled by the Judge of Arborea since the middle of the century did not see the hostility as a struggle between leaders, but as a confrontation between peoples and national identities, since ‘los Cathalans malvadament e hinigua’ (the Catalans wickedly and iniquitously)34 invaded the island, transferring a population to dominate it. From a royal perspective, these wartime actions were justified by the aggressive attitude ‘contra los catalans’ (towards the Catalans),35 accepting that the aim of military campaigns, as indicated in 1409, was ‘aniquilar i abatre la detestable i fàtua rebellió de la nació sarda’ (to annihilate and beat the abhorrent and vain rebellion of the Sardinian nation).36 Given the hostility and the lack of understanding between peoples, any military objective had to be accompanied by the settlement of a supportive population because, as the Catalan governor of Cagliari stated in 1405 when considering a campaign against Corsica, the island was ‘fort despoblada de hòmens de la nostra nació’ (notably lacking in peoples from our nation).37 In this sense, history can be interpreted in all its aspects as a confrontation between nations. From an economic perspective, the city of Barcelona warned King Alfonso the Magnanimous in 1422 that his foreign policies were blocking the city’s international trade, which is a serious matter because the profits were enriching other nations: ‘los navilis e mercaderia disminueixen e los guanys e profits se’n porten altres nacions’ (ships and goods are diminishing and other nations are taking the winnings and profits).38 In the same sense, the Catalan nation’s success occurred to the detriment of others which, in turn, fuelled a spirit of defiance. Between 1462 and 1472 Catalonia was subsumed in a serious civil war,39 whose internal causes lay in the clash between representativeness of the estates, and the supremacy invoked by the king resulting in an outbreak of social tensions.40 Towards the end of the struggle, in 1471, a group of deputies dodged internal accusations based on the endogenous

32 Parlaments, ed. by Albert and Gassiot, pp. 37–38. 33 Arribas, La conquista. 34 Carte reali diplomatiche, p. 62. 35 Moliné, ‘Noticiari català’, p. 217. 36 Barcelona, Arxiu dela Corona d’Aragó, Cancelleria, reg. 2220, fol. 75r. 37 Ferrer i Mallol, ‘Il partito filocatalano’, p. 83. 38 Coulon, Barcelone, p. 61. 39 Ryder, Alfonso el Magnánimo; Vicens Vives, Juan II, pp. 211–351. 40 Sabaté, ‘El poder soberano’.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

causes of the war by linking it with the retaliatory action of foreign nations which would have initially been harmed by the prosperity of the Catalan nation, resulting in a desire for revenge, unleashed in the war: Liurats a diverses nacions e Senyories som atestats fets preda, oprobi e derisió a totes gents e nacions, Castellans, Portuguesos, francesos, gascons, Tudeschs, prohensals, ytalians e a totes altres lengues e pobles qui sobre nosaltres son pascuts e apres nos han oprobiosament tractats, com moltes de elles dites nacions nos fossen infestissimes e exoses e en la nostra preclara nació han volgut exercir les venjances de les injuries e dans que de la dita nostra preclara nació per lo passat havien rebudes.41 We are released to different nations and lords and these events cause looting, shame, and derision by all people and nations: Castilians, Portuguese, French, Gascons, Germans, Provencals, Italians, and all other languages and peoples who have fed and learned from us while treating us disgracefully. Many of the aforementioned nations have treated us with hostility and loathing, and on our shining nation have wanted to exercise revenge for insults and damages they had received in the past from our diaphanous nation. That being the case, one could request that blood be shed out of loyalty to the king, but first and foremost for the nation. One of the signatories of the above text, Bishop Margarit, understood in 1454 that the Catalan nation had earned its privileges with its own blood, shed in what was, in turn, a display of loyalty towards its king: ‘ni es deu algú meravellar si aquesta dita fael nació, ultra totes altres, crida la conservació de sos privilegis, així com aquella qui els ha guanyat ab sa fidelíssima aspersió de sang e en aquesta sua inmaculada fidelitat’ (nobody should marvel if the said faithful nation, over all others, calls for the conservation of its privileges, as well as those gained with its faithful shedding of blood and in its immaculate loyalty).42 Therefore, the Catalan nation is depicted as a homogeneous body with an identity separate from the king, with whom it negotiated the relevant relationship. The prosperity and privileges enjoyed by the nation were often gained at the expense of other nations. In accordance with the official discourse proclaimed at Parliament, this justified the human sacrifice described as the shedding of the nation’s blood.

Polysemy of Catalan Identity: Culture and Power Advances into Muslim territory started out from Aragon and Catalonia: 1229 marked the beginning of the conquest of the Balearic Islands, followed immediately by the expansion into the lands on the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula. Many interests were vested in this move: those of the Catalan and Aragonese nobility

41 Tate, Joan Margarit, p. 128. 42 Parlaments, ed. by Albert and Gassiot, p. 212.

35 5

356

f lo c e l s a bat é

and the commercial pursuits of the Catalan bourgeoisie alongside the sovereign’s need to consolidate a place to compensate for his limited royal power in his original territories.43 Consequently, these were structured as new kingdoms under the same king, thus becoming the Kingdom of Majorca and the Kingdom of Valencia. With the Muslim population mostly expelled in the first new kingdom and held in the Moorish quarters in the second, the new kingdoms welcomed substantial immigration, mainly Catalan,44 with this language becoming the tongue of both kingdoms. In Majorca, the new population continued to identify as Catalan.45 Furthermore, institutional development, which was more complete in Valencia, consolidated these territories within the Crown of Aragon, in reference to the royal lineage of the sovereign46 who united Catalonia, Aragon, Valencia, and Majorca, declared inseparable in 1319.47 Catalan trade in the Mediterranean, already present in eleventh-century Barcelona, grew during the following century48 and became much more extensive, especially with the participation of Majorcans and Valencians. They, along with professionals from urban society and barons from the different regions of the Crown of Aragon, benefited from the sovereign’s expansion throughout the Mediterranean. In 1283, the king received the Crown of Sicily after an internal revolt against the rule of the French Anjou dynasty.49 In 1323, he started the occupation of Sardinia. A little over a century later, in 1442, he took control of Naples,50 from where he intervened in the fragmented Italian scene and watched over the Balkans51 by placing a viceroy in Albania in the middle of the fifteenth century; this was in addition to his influence on the despotate of Epirus,52 and his irrelevant capture of Kastellorizo island opposite the Anatolian coast in 1450.53 This expansion was combined with the creation of duchies: that of Athens (1311–1388) and Neopatras (1319–1390) by the so-called Catalan Company;54 besides the good relationship with Cyprus in the fourteenth century,55 and especially with Rhodes in the fifteenth century through influence on the Order of the Hospitallers.56 These bases helped to support extensive trade, especially with the eastern Mediterranean,57 and to keep an eye on other ports such as Ragusa (today Dubrovnik).58 The Crown of Aragon, despite possessing a much smaller fleet than large Mediterranean republics such as

43 Sabaté, ‘Poder i territori’. 44 Guinot, Els fundadors. 45 Mas i Forners, Esclaus, pp. 91–156. 46 Sabaté, ‘Maison et Couronne d’Aragon’. 47 Oliver, La nación, p. 38. 48 Feliu, ‘Activitats econòmiques’. 49 Bresc and Sciascia, ‘Mort aux Angevins!’. 50 Cuadrada, ‘Política italiana’. 51 Spremic’, ‘Alfonso il Magnanimo’. 52 Zečević, ‘Confirmation Grant of King Alfonso V’. 53 Duran Duelt, Kastellórizo. 54 Marcos, Almogàvers, pp. 316–39. 55 Balletto, ‘Presenze catalane’; Otten-Froux, ‘Chipre, un des centres du commerce catalan en Orient’. 56 Bonneaud, Le prieuré. 57 Coulon, Barcelone. 58 Fejić, Shpanija.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

Venice and Geneva,59 opposed and even confronted them.60 In fact, the chronicler Bernat Desclot claimed that in the Mediterranean in 1285 ‘no solament galera ni lleny, mas no crec que ningun peix se gos alçar sobre mar si no porta un escut amb senyal del rei d’Aragó en la coa’ (any ship nor galley nor smaller one — and I also believe that neither any fish — would dare to rise above the surface of the sea if it did not bear a coat of arms with the insignia of the king of Aragon on its tail).61 The participants in this expansion were occasionally distinguished as Catalan, Valencian, Majorcan, or Aragonese. In this sense, at the end of the fifteenth century in Sardinia the monarchy was criticized for having ensured that some of its cities ‘fossen poblats de catalans, aragonesos e valencians e no de altres nacions e asò per tenir apretada e sotmesa la dita nació sarda’ (were populated by Catalans, Aragonese, and Valencians, and not by other nations, in order to keep the Sardinian nation constrained and suppressed).62 On other occasions a distinction was made between Catalans and Aragonese, like in the peace of 1388 in Sardinia, where on the royal side there were ‘cathalanos et Aragoneses, Sardos et alios honorem regium preservantes’ (Catalans and Aragonese, Sardinians and others wishing to preserve the King’s honour).63 Within Sardinia, enemies were often globally conceptualized as catalans.64 In reality, it was not the diversity of populations that changed, but the permeability of the word ‘Catalan’, which started to acquire several exaggerated meanings. In a similar way, in accordance with a royal grant from 1268, the municipal government of Barcelona appointed the consuls of the Catalan nation in the major ports to assist all merchants from the Crown of Aragon.65 In their records, those originating from Majorca and Valencia are often listed as Catalans, evidencing the principle of common language, not shared by the Aragonese.66 In any case, political unity facilitated this association, as foreseen in 1438 in a commercial agreement in Sorrento, set up ‘per Cathalanos seu adherentes regi Aragonum quomodocumque et qualitercumque’.67 Thus, the ‘Catalaneski’ cloth documented in southern Italy could have come from any Iberian region in the Crown of Aragon.68 Similarly, the guards at the Papal palace of the Aragonese Pope Benedict XIII in Avignon were seen as catalanos.69 On an even more institutional note, in the Studium Generale of Bologna all students from the Crown of Aragon were perceived to be from the Catalan nation, understood separately from the Spanish nation, which comprised the remaining Iberian scholars.70 59 Coulon, ‘The Commercial Influence’. 60 Giunta, Aragoneses, p. 146. 61 Desclot, Llibre, chap. CLXVI, p. 422. 62 Era, Il Parlamento, p. 178. 63 Casula, La Sardenya, p. 64. 64 Gallinari, ‘Amerigo di Narbona’, p. 321. 65 Ferrer, ‘El Consolat de Mar’, pp. 67–68. 66 Fejić, Shpanija. 67 Bernato, ‘Le attività di Coluccio d’Afflitto’, p. 344. 68 Iradiel Murugarren, ‘Valencia’, p. 166. 69 Moxó y Montoliú, ‘La coyuntura económica’, p. 119. 70 Tamburri, ‘España en la Universidad de Bolonia’, pp. 296–97.

35 7

3 58

f lo c e l s a bat é

Generally, everybody from the Crown of Aragon was considered Catalan, as reiterated in Sicily, where they enjoyed an intermediate status, differentiated from foreigners but not completely assimilated with the island’s natives.71 Historiography has already indicated that this use of the Catalan demonym is due to the greater political and economic weight and prestige of Catalonia within the Crown, especially regarding the Mediterranean expansion.72 At any rate, the hyperbole would grow even further. One of the two factions dividing Sicily in the fourteenth century was the parzialità detta ‘catalana’, so called because of the Iberian origin of its prominent members, although the formation also included Sicilian barons, who can equally be qualified as Catalan.73 From the outside, in ports like Ragusa, sometimes everybody with the same political origin, including individuals from Sicily and the south of Italy,74 are referred to as Catalans. Even more conspicuously, when the despotate of Epirus became institutionally organized on the model of the Crown of Aragon, the officials from the court of Naples were called ‘Catalans’, although some of their surnames are clearly Italian.75 The culture and image associated with the power of the sovereign of the Crown of Aragon is Catalan. This prestige strengthened within the royal residence of Naples and the papal court of Rome during the second half of the fifteenth century, thanks to the influence exerted by the Borgia, including two Valencian popes — Calixtus III (1455–1458) and Alexander VI (1492–1503) — and constituting what was viewed in Florence as regnano cathalani.76 Catalan is placed among the languages of prestige and power, alongside Italian and Latin, and used by assistants and related posts, who were occasionally Italian, and perhaps practised a ‘mimetismo cortesano y halagador’ (courtier and flattering imitation),77 as well as intellectuals who frequented these courts.78 Therefore, Catalan identification transcends the Crown of Aragon, following the trail of elegance inherent to prestige and power. At the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries good tables added dishes from southern Italy seasoned ‘a la catalana’ (Catalan style).79 In fact, at the court of King Ferdinand I of Naples the cookery book Libre del coch was written in Catalan, although the region had not shared a Crown with Aragon80 since 1458. Culture led Catalan identity: ‘è cosa catalana’ stated Pietro Summonte in 1524 when referring to the Grand Hall of the Castel Nuovo in Naples because it had been built three-quarters of a century before in the same Late Gothic style used by its architect, Guillem Sagrera, in his other works in Perpignan, Majorca, Valencia, and Barcelona.81 In fact, a specific Catalan Gothic had accompanied the expansion

71 Fodale, ‘Naciones mercantiles’, p. 164. 72 Alessandro, ‘Spazio geografico’, p. 7. 73 Alessandro, ‘Dinamiche socio-politiche’, p. 75. 74 Fejić, ‘Ragusei e spagnoli’, p. 81. 75 Zečević, The Tocco of the Greek Realm, pp. 117–30. 76 Dupré-Theseider, ‘La politica italiana’, p. 234. 77 Batllori, La familia, p. 150. 78 Ferrando, ‘Percepció’, pp. 196–97. 79 Laurioux, Une histoire culinaire, pp. 358–72. 80 Mestre Robert, Libre del Coch. 81 Serra Desfilis, ‘È cosa catalana’.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

of the Crown of Aragon throughout the Mediterranean during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries,82 because the new settlers spread through the region taking with them their values, traditions, and beliefs — elements that, after all, outline identity.83 Ultimately, the adjective ‘Catalan’ was polysemic. In Catalonia the Parliaments or Courts of 1292 and 1333 stressed that royal territorial officials must be Catalan, referring to a region’s natives.84 In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries this disposition was demanded by the local elites to the different lords in the areas of baronial jurisdiction.85 Furthermore, the same adjective was also adopted by those who prefer to highlight their origin — Majorcans — and applied to those who share the same language — Catalans, Majorcans, and Valencians — or those who are seen as participating in the same sovereignty, namely the Crown of Aragon. This is truly an hyperbolic sense, which identified Catalan culture with the strength of the monarchy, or even beyond when it was upheld in the Roman or Neapolitan courts outside the political framework of the Crown of Aragon. In any case, these cultural expressions have been linked to the exercise and ostentation of power.

The Displacement of Catalan Prominence by the Binding Culture of Castile In 1412, after a two-year interregnum, the throne of the Crown of Aragon passed to a Castilian dynasty.86 A century later this would motivate Guicciardini, the Florentine ambassador, to state that in 1410 the last Catalan king of the Crown of Aragon had died: ‘l’ultimo loro re che fussi catelano’ (The last king who was Catalan).87 In 1479 a further step was taken, when the grandson of the king elected in 1412 joined the two main crowns of the Iberian Peninsula upon becoming Ferdinand V of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon. In accordance with the medieval institutional model this was a dynastic union which respected each region’s institutions. In any case, the political and institutional cohesion of the Castilian monarchy was raised during the last decades of the fifteenth century,88 thanks to court officials and intellectuals who aided the proclamation of a teleological discourse establishing its roots in the Visigothic origins of Hispania and its destiny in the defence of Christianity.89 The monarchy’s messianism,90 rooted in Aragonese tradition91 and backed by the Castilians,92 supported the mission and was

82 Cioppi, Le strategie, pp. 184–85. 83 Sardina, ‘I catalani’; Porrà, ‘I culti di origine catalana’. 84 Cortes de los antiguos reinos de Aragón y de Cataluña, I, pp. 155–56, 308. 85 Cuellas, El ‘Llibre Gros dels Privilegis’, p. 227. 86 Sabaté, ‘Per què hi va haver un Compromís’; Sabaté, ‘El compromiso de Caspe’. 87 Guicciardini, Diario del viaggio, p. 22. 88 Ladero Quesada, Los Reyes Católicos. 89 Deyermond, ‘La ideología del Estado moderno’, pp. 176–78. 90 Milhou, Pouvoir royal, pp. 35–36. 91 Aurell, ‘Eschatologie’. 92 Rucquoi, ‘Mesianismo’.

359

36 0

f lo c e l s a bat é

confirmed when, in 1492, the Jews were expelled and the last Muslim kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula was conquered.93 This followed a forecast about Africa that foresaw the prompt liberation of the Holy Sepulchre from the Muslims,94 an aim which was accompanied by the task of evangelizing in the New World.95 Castilian language and literature shared these ideals,96 and decidedly led a pan-Iberian unifying project.97 The Aragonese kings from the third quarter of the fifteenth century — Alfonso the Magnanimous and John II — had bilingual poets in their court who wrote in Catalan and Castilian.98 Similarly, in the last decade of the fifteenth century the court of Pope Alexander VI (1492–1503) encouraged the use of Catalan and Castilian.99 The lack of political cohesion within the Crown of Aragon, which strengthened its respective regions to the detriment of its overall structure,100 encouraged the Hispanic monarchy to treat each of its regions separately in the sixteenth century.101 At that time, the Crown of Aragon’s participative model lacked strength because the sovereign no longer depended on the financial aid of the estates, instead relying on other resources and this led to growing tensions.102 At the same time, each of the constituent regions of the Crown of Aragon was becoming strongly Castilian influenced.103 This became visible in administration and culture, as well as in the attitude of the elites, who saw a way to advance socially.104 Thus, politics and culture continued to be two faces of the same coin, although under the Hispanic monarchy the road towards new vectors of social cohesion was opened and finally implemented in the eighteenth century, once the medieval institutions had been removed and the overseas territories linked to the Crown of Aragon had dispersed.105

Conclusions The strong elements holding national identity discourses,106 which have been supporting European societies since the nineteenth century,107 have hampered historiography in the understanding of collective identities in the preceding centuries,108 despite

93 Sesma, Fernando de Aragón. 94 Alba, Acerca de algunas particularidades, pp. 28–35. 95 Sabaté, Fin del mundo. 96 Fernández Gallardo, ‘Lengua e identidad nacional’. 97 Cocozzella, ‘Pere Torroella’, pp. 163–65. 98 Ganges, ‘Poetes bilingües’. 99 Salvador Miguel, Intelectuales españoles, pp. 51–53. 100 Sabaté, ‘Corona de Aragón’, pp. 449–50. 101 Pérez Latre, ‘Pervivència i dissolució’. 102 Simon, Els orígens ideològics, pp. 29–114. 103 Sabaté, Percepció i identificació, pp. 98–102. 104 Cahner, ‘Llengua i societat’. 105 Juan Vidal, ‘Los reinados’, pp. 209–20. 106 Thiesse, La Création des identités, pp. 23–289. 107 Berger, The Power of National Pasts. 108 Hobsbawm, Nations, pp. 35–89.

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

the traditional weight maintained by collective behaviours, furnished by justifying narratives including common ethnic references.109 Precisely, in the origin of modern proposals for social articulation around national identities we can find Rousseau, recommending that government institutions must promote social cohesion through national identities, given that these are more natural than other references such as fidelity to the reigning dynasty:110 ‘Vive la nation’ was proclaimed in Valmy in 1792.111 Before the nineteenth century some notion of nation was perceived and invoked, which should not be interpreted as the first faltering steps of what was coming, because its real sense can only be perceived by analysing the context of medieval and modern societies. These were justly defined by the vigour of the collective identities, whether municipal, labour, feudal, or national, but in any case was provided with items that facilitated external perception and internal awareness of the common cohesion — because, after all, in this epoch, the human being could never be understood as alone, but rather as a member of a collective identity.112 In this context, it has been interesting to analyse the case of the so-called Catalan nation in the late Middle Ages. Inside the framework of the medieval notion of power — identified as a ‘mixed constitution’ to match the different holders of power113 — the Catalan nation was invoked by the estates, which acted as the elite who faced the sovereign through their so-called representativeness of the national collective and their access to common institutions. Nevertheless, the same scenario facilitated that the sovereign leading the Catalan nation became an image for fostering the royal position. The elements that united the Catalan nation were not based on a rooted ethnicity of the people, but rather on different cultural features which were shared, such as language. This leads to the malleability of the ‘Catalan’ concept, because, given the leading position of Catalonia within the Crown of Aragon, the Catalan term used to be applied in a hyperbolic sense, identifying not only the members of the strict national group, but also the different peoples integrated into the Crown of Aragon, especially those who shared the Catalan language. In this way, the tensions with other peoples through which the Crown of Aragon — with Catalonia at the head — achieved a pre-eminent position in the Mediterranean could be explained not as a confrontation between kings and lords, but between nations: the Catalan nation beating other nations or, otherwise, being the victim of the envies and aggressions of other nations, as was stated in the narratives and the Chancery and Parliament texts. At any rate, at the end of the fifteenth century a new dynastic union was joined under the same monarchical crowns of Aragon and Castile. This scenario easily highlighted Catalan-Aragonese weakness and Castilian strength. The progressive

109 Hirschi, The Origins of Nationallism, pp. 50–211. 110 Cohler, Rousseau, pp. 32–35. 111 Cabanel, La question nationale, p. 3. 112 Sabaté, ‘Identities on the Move’. 113 Blythe, Ideal Government.

361

362

f lo c e l s a bat é

displacement of the Crown of Aragon, and specifically of Catalonia, to a secondary place was perceived in the great loss of its cultural features, starting with the Catalan language, which was displaced in prestigious levels by another language — Castilian. It was a decadent course, culminating in the suppression of medieval Catalan institutions at the beginning of the eighteenth century. Thus, the historical path has shown a membranous use of the Catalan demonym because it was variable as to who could be included in the Catalan identity. No less ambiguous were an external perception and an internal awareness of the Catalan nation according to cultural features. In accordance with what the king stated before Parliament in 1369, the nation was based on ‘our ways’, that is, the sum of cultural features without requiring a common ethnic reference beyond what is, of course, given when sharing culture and language. Consequently, when the equilibrium of power among territories changed under the same sovereign, cultural elements became the first mirror of change. Surprisingly, historical narratives followed changes in ethnic awarness rather than aiding its creation and shaping.

Works Cited Primary Sources Carte reali diplomatiche di Giovanni I il Cacciatore, re d’Aragona, riguardanti l’Italia, ed. by Francesco Cesare Casula, Colección de documentos inéditos del Archivo de la corona de Aragón, 48; Pubblicazioni dell’Istituto di storia medioevale e moderna dell’università degli studi di Cagliari, 23 (Padua: Cedam, 1977) Cartoral, dit de Carlemany, del bisbe de Girona (s. IX–XIV), ed. by Josep Maria Marquès, 2 vols, (Barcelona: Fundació Noguera, 1993) Cortes de los antiguos reinos de Aragón y de Cataluña, vol. 1 (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1896) Crónica del Rey Don Fernando Cuarto, in Crónicas de los Reyes de Castilla, ed. by Cayetano Rosell, vol. 1 (Madrid: Atlas, 1953), pp. 93–170; rev. ed. Crónica de Fernando IV. Estudio y edición de un texto postalfonsíed, ed. by Carmen Benítez Guerrero (El Puerto de Santa Maria: Cátedra Alfons o X el Sabio – Editorial Universidad de Sevilla, 2017) Desclot, Bernat, Llibre del rei en Pere, ed. by Stefano M. Cingolani (Barcelona: Editorial Barcino, 2010) Documents per l’historia de la cultura catalana mig-eval, ed. by Antoni Rubió y Lluch, 2 vols, (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 1908) Eiximenis, Francesc, Lo crestià. Selecció, ed. by Albert Hauf (Barcelona: Edicions 62-La Caixa, 1983) Guicciardini, Francesco, Diario del viaggio in Spagna, in Francesco Guicciardini, Diario del viaggio in Spagna — Memorie di famiglia, introduction by Bruno Maier, ed. by Mario Spinella (Pordenone: Edizioni Studi Tesi, 1993), pp. 1–36 Mestre Robert, Libre del Coch: tractat de cuina medieval, ed. by Veronika Leimgruber (Barcelona: Curial, 1997 [21996]); ed. by Joan Santanach (Barcelona: Restaurant de les 7 Portes – Editorial Barcino, 2018)

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

Moliné, Ernest, ‘Noticiari català dels segles XIV y XV’, Butlletí de l’Ateneu Barcelonès, (1915–1917), pp. 211–20 Parlaments a les corts catalanes, ed. by Ricard Albert and Joan Gassiot, Els nostres clàssics (Barcelona: Els nostres clàssics, 1928) Pisano, Enrico, Liber Maiorichinus de gestis Pisanorum illustribus, ed. by Giuseppe Scalia (Firenze: Edizioni del Galluzzo, 2017); ed. by Carlo Calisse Liber Maiolichinus de gestis Pisanorum illustribus (Roma: Istituto Palazzo dei Lincei, 1904) Secondary Studies Alba, Ramón, Acerca de algunas particularidades de las comunidades de Castilla tal vez relacionadas con el supuesto acaecer terreno del Milenio igualitario (Madrid: Editora Nacional, 1975) (d’) Alessandro, Vincenzo, ‘Spazio geografico e morfologie sociali nella Sicilia del basso medioevo’, in Commercio, finanza, funzione pubblica. Stranieri in Sicilia e in Sardegna nei secoli XIII.XV, ed. by Marco Tangheroni, (Napoli: Gisem Liguori, 1989), pp. 1–32 ———, ‘Dinamiche socio-politiche e apparati di potere: la Sicilia’, in Le Italie del tardo medioevo: 2ª Convegno Internazionale del Centro Studi Sulla Civiltà del Tardo Medioevo (San Miniato, 3–7 ottobre 1988), ed. by Sergio Gensini (Pisa: Pacini, 1990), pp. 71–90 Arribas, Antonio, La conquista de Cerdeña por Jaime II (Barcelona: Instituto Español de Estudios Mediterráneos, 1952) Aurell, Martin, ‘Eschatologie, spiritualité et politique dans la conféderation catalanoaragonaise (1282–1412)’, in Fin du monde et signes des temps. Visionnaires et prophètes en France méridionale (fin XIIIe–début XVe siècle) (Toulouse: Éditions Privat, 1992), pp. 191–235 Balletto, Laura, ‘Presenze catalane nell’isola di Cipro al tempo di Giacomo II d’Aragona’, Medioevo. Saggi e Rassegne, 20 (1996), 39–59 Batllori, Miguel La familia de los Borja (Madrid: Real Academia de la Historia, 1999) Berger, Stefan, ‘The Power of National Pasts: Writing National History in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Europe’, in Writing the Nation: A Global Perspective, ed. by Stefan Berger (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), pp. 32–46 Bernato, Sandra, ‘Le attività di Coluccio d’Afflitto a Sorrento (1437–1439)’, Schola Salernitana. Annali, 11 (2006), 331–55 Blythe, James, Ideal Government and the Mixed Constitution in the Middle Ages (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992) Bonneaud, Pierre, Le prieuré de Catalogne, le couvent de Rhodes et la couronne d’Aragon, 1415–1447 (Millau: Conservatoire Larzac Templier et hospitalier, 2004) Bresc, Henri, and Laura Sciascia, ‘Mort aux Angevins!’, in Palerme 1070–1492. Mosaïque de peuples, nation rebelle: la naissance violente de l’identité sicilienne, ed. by Henri Bresc and Geneviève Bresc-Bautier (Paris: Éditions Autrement, 1993), pp. 120–34 Cabanel, Patrick, La question nationale au XIXe siècle (Paris: Éditions La découverte, 1997) Cahner, Max, ‘Llengua i societat en el pas del segle XV al XVI. Contribució a l’estudi de la penetració del castellà als Països Catalans’, in Actes del cinquè col·loqui Internacional de Llengua i Literatura catalanes (Andorra, 1–6 d’octubre de 1979), ed. by Jordi Bruguera and Josep Massot (Barcelona: Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 1980), pp. 200–30

363

364

f lo c e l s a bat é

Carreras y Candi, Francesc, Pere Joan Ferrer, militar y senyor del Maresme (Barcelona: Imprenta La Renaixensa, 1892) Casula, Francesco Cesare, La Sardenya catalano-aragonesa. Perfil històric (Barcelona: Rafael Dalmau editor, 1985) Cioppi, Alessandra, Le strategie dell’invincibilità. Corona d’Aragona e ‘Regnum Sardinae’ nella seconda metà del Trecento (Cagliari: Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea CNR, 2012) Cocozzella, Peter, ‘Pere Torroella i Francesc Moner: aspectes del bilingüisme literari (catalano-castellà) a la segona meitat del segle XV’, Llengua & Literatura, 2 (1987), 155–72 Cohler, Anne M., Rousseau and Nationalism (New York: Basic, 1970) Coulon, Damien, Barcelone et le grand commerce d’Orient au Moyen Âge. Un siècle de relations avec l’Egypte et la Syrie-Palestine (ca. 1330–1430) (Madrid – Barcelona: Casa de Velázquez – Institut Europeu de la Mediterrània, 2004) ———, ‘The Commercial Influence of the Crown of Aragon in Oriental Mediterranean (Thirteenth — Fifteenth Centuries)’, in The Crown of Aragon: A Singular Mediterranean Empire, ed. by Flocel Sabaté (Leiden: Brill, 2017), pp. 279–308 Cuadrada, Coral, ‘Política italiana de Alfonso V de Aragón (1420–1442)’, Acta historica et archaeologica Mediaevalia, 7–8 (1986–1987), 269–309 Cuellas, Robert, El ‘Llibre Gros dels Privilegis’ de la ciutat de Balaguer (Lleida: Edicions de la Universitat de Lleida, 2015) Deyermond, Alan, ‘La ideología del Estado moderno en la literatura española del siglo XV’, in Realidades e imágenes del poder en España a fines de la Edad Media, ed. by Adeline Rucquoi (Valladolid: Ámbito, 1988), pp. 171–93 Dupré-Theseider, Eugenio, ‘La politica italiana di Alfonso il Magnanimo’, in IV Congreso de Historia de la Corona de Aragón, vol. 3 (Palma de Majorca: Excma. Diputación Provincial de Baleares, 1955), pp. 225–52 Duran Duelt, Daniel, Kastellórizo, una isla griega bajo dominio de Alfonso el Magnánimo (1450–1458). Colección documental (Barcelona: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 2003) Era, Antonio, Il Parlamento sardo nel 1481–1485 (Milano: Giuffrè, 1995) Fejić, Nenad, Shpanija i Dubrovnik u sredniem vieku (Шпанија и Дубровник у средњем веку) (Belgrade: Prosveta, 1988) ———, ‘Ragusei e spagnoli nel Medio Evo. Luci ed ombre di un rapporto commerciale’, in Ragusa e il Mediterraneo. Ruolo e funzioni repubblica marinara tra Medioevo ed Età moderna, ed. by Antonio di Vittorio (Bari: Cacucci, 1990), pp. 79–100 Feliu, Gaspar, ‘Activitats econòmiques’, in Història de Barcelona, ed. by Jaume Sobrequès, vol. 2 (Barcelona: Ajuntament de Barcelona – Enciclopèdia Catalana, 1992), pp. 233–44 Fernández Gallardo, Luis, ‘Lengua e identidad nacional en el pensamiento político de Alfonso de Cartagena’, E-Spania, 13.2 (2012), Ferrando, Antoni, ‘Percepció i institucionalització de la norma lingüística entre els valencians: panorama històric (1238–1976)’, in La configuració social de la norma lingüística a l’Europa llatina, ed. by Antoni Ferrando and Miquel Nicolàs (Alacant: Institut Interuniversitari de Filologia Valenciana, 2006), pp. 189–251 Ferrer i Mallol, Maria Teresa, ‘El Consolat de Mar i els Consolats d’Ultramar, instrument i manifestació de l’expansió del comerç català’, in L’expansió catalana a la Mediterrània

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

a la baixa edat mitjana, ed. by Maria Teresa Ferrer and Damien Coulon (Barcelona: CSIC. Institució Milà i Fontanals, Departament d’Estudis Medievals, 1999), pp. 53–79 ———, ‘Il partito filocatalano in Corsica dopo la morte di Arrigo della Rocca’, Medioevo. Saggi e Rassegne, 24 (1999), 65–87 Fodale, Salvatore, ‘Naciones mercantiles y patriciado urbano en Palermo entre los siglos XIV y XV’, in El Mediterráneo medieval y renacentista, espacio de mercados y de culturas, ed. by Jaume Aurell (Pamplona: Ediciones Universidad de Navarra, 2002), pp. 155–68 Gallinari, Luciano, ‘Amerigo di Narbona, ultimo sovrano di Arborea?’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 29 (1999), 315–33 Ganges, Montserrat, ‘Poetes bilingües (català-castellà) del segle XV’, Boletín de la Asociación Hispánica de Literatura Medieval, 6.1 (1992), 57–232 Génicot, Léopold, Europa en el siglo XIII (Barcelona: Editorial Labor, 1976) Giunta, Francesco, Aragoneses y catalanes en el Mediterráneo (Barcelona: Ariel, 1989) Gonzalvo, Gener, Les Constitucions de Pau i Treva de Catalunya (segles XI–XIII) (Barcelona: Departament de Justícia de la Generalitat de Catalunya, 1994) Guenée, Bernard, Occidente durante los siglos XIV y XV. Los Estados (Barcelona: Editorial Labor, 1973) Guinot, Enric, Els fundadors del regne de València. Repoblament, antroponímia i llengua a la València medieval (València: Tres i Quatre, 1999) Hirschi, Caspar, The Origins of Nationalism: An Alternative History from Ancient Rome to Early Modern Germany (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012) Hobsbawm, Eric, Nations et nationalisme depuis 1780 (Paris: Édtions Gallimard, 1992) Iradiel Murugarren, Francisco Paulino, ‘Valencia y la expansión mediterránea de la Corona de Aragón’, in En las costas del Mediterráneo Occidental. Las ciudades de la Península Ibérica y del reino de Mallorca y el comercio mediterráneo en la Edad Media, ed. by David Abulafia and Blanca Garí (Barcelona: Omega, 1997), pp. 155–70 Juan Vidal, Josep, ‘Los reinados de Felipe IV y Fernando VI’, in Historia de España, vol. 12: Historia Moderna. Política interna y exterior de los Borbones (Istmo: Tres Cantos, 2001), pp. 15–244 Kosto, Adam J., Making Agreements in Medieval Catalonia: Power, Order, and the Written Word, 1000–1200 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) ———, ‘Was There Just One Petrus de Cardona?’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte. Kanonistische Abteilung, 103 (2017), 145–77 Ladero Quesada, Miguel Ángel, Los Reyes Católicos: la Corona y la Unidad de España (Madrid: Asociación Francisco López de Gomara, 1989) Laurioux, Bruno, Une histoire culinaire du Moyen Âge, (Paris: Honoré Champion, 2005) Marcos, Ernest, Almogàvers. La història (Barcelona: L’Esfera dels llibres, 2005) Mas i Forners, Antoni, Esclaus i Catalans. Esclavitud i segregació a Mallorca durant els segles XIV i XV (Palma de Majorca: Lleonard Muntaner editor, 2005) Milhou, Alain, Pouvoir royal et absolutisme dans l’Espagne du XVIe siècle (Toulouse: Presses Universitaires du Mirail, 1999) (de) Montagut, Tomàs, Les institucions fiscalitzadores de la Generalitat de Catalunya (Des dels seus orígens fins la reforma de 1413) (Barcelona: Sindicatura de Comptes de Catalunya, 1996) (de) Moxó y Montoliú, Francisco, ‘La coyuntura económica catalano-aragonesa y el repliegue de Benedicto XIII de Porto Venere a Port Vendres (1403–1408)’, in Jornades

365

36 6

f lo c e l s a bat é

sobre el Cisma d’Occident a Catalunya, les Illes i el País Valencià (Barcelona-Peníscola, 19–21 d’abril de 1979), vol. 1 (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 1986), pp. 119–34 Oliver, Bienvenido, La nación y la realeza en los estados de la Corona de Aragón (Madrid: Imprenta de M. Ginesta, 1884) Otten-Froux, Catherine, ‘Chipre, un des centres du commerce catalan en Orient’, in Els catalans a la Mediterrània oriental a l’edat mitjana, ed. by Maria Teresa Ferrer i Mallol (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2003), pp. 129–53 Pérez Latre, Miguel, ‘Pervivència i dissolució. La Corona d’Aragó en temps de Felip I (II)’, in Història de la Corona d’Aragó, ed. by Ernest Belenguer, vol. 2 (Barcelona: edicions 62, 2007), pp. 213–48 Porrà, Roberto, ‘I culti di origine catalana in Sardegna. Processi di assimilazione e persistenza’, in Tra il Tirreno e Gibilterra. Un Mediterraneo Iberico?, ed. by Luciano Gallinari and Flocel Sabaté, vol. 2 (Cagliari: Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea CNR, 2015), pp. 661–93 Rubiera Mata, María Jesús, La taifa de Denia (Alicante: Ayuntamiento de Denia – Instituto Juan Gil-Albert de la Diputación Provincial de Alicante, 1985) Rucquoi, Adeline, ‘Mesianismo y milenarismo en la España medieval’, Medievalismo, 6 (1996), 9–32 Ryder, Alan, Alfonso el Magnánimo, rey de Aragón, Nápoles y Sicilia (1396–1458) (Valencia: Edicions Alfons el Magnànim-Institució Valenciana d’Estudis i Investigació, 1992) ———, The Wreck of Catalonia: Civil War in the Fifteenth Century (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007) Sabaté, Flocel, ‘Constructing and Deconstructing the Medieval Origin of Catalonia’, in Historiography and the Shaping of Regional Identity in Europe: Regions in Clio’s Looking Glass, ed. by Dick E. H. de Boer and Luis Adâo da Fonseca (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 257–81 ———, ‘Discurs i estratègies del poder reial a Catalunya al segle XIV’, Anuario de Estudios Medievales, 25 (1995), 617–46 ———, ‘Corona de Aragón’, in Historia de España, vol. 8: La época medieval: administración y gobierno (Istmo: Tres Cantos, 2003), pp. 237–458 ———, ‘Història Medieval’, in Història de Catalunya, ed. by Albert Balcells (Barcelona: L’Esfera dels Llibres, 2004), pp. 99–304 ———, ‘El nacimiento de Cataluña. Mito y realidad’, in Fundamentos Medievales de los particularismos hispánicos. IX Congreso de Estudios Medievales (2003) (Ávila: Fundación Sánchez Albornoz, 2005), pp. 221–76 ———, ‘El poder soberano en la Cataluña bajomedieval: definición y ruptura’, in Coups d’État à la fin du Moyen Âge? Aux fondements du pouvoir politique en Europe occidentale, ed. by François Foronda, Jean-Philippe Genet, and José Manuel Nieto Soria (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 2005), pp. 483–520 ———, ‘Els primers temps: segle XII (1137–1213)’, in Història de la Corona d’Aragó, ed. by Ernest Belenguer (Barcelona: Edicions 62, 2007), vol. 1, pp. 31–81 ———, ‘État et alliances dans la Catalogne du bas Moyen-Âge’, in Du contrat d’alliance au contrat politique. Cultures et sociétés politiques dans la péninsule Ibérique à la fin du Moyen Âge, ed. by François Foronda and Ana Isabel Carrasco (Toulouse: Université Toulouse II-Le Mirail, 2007), pp. 297–360

C ata l a n I de nt i t y Dis co u r s e i n t h e L at e Me d ie val Me d it e rrane an

———, Fin del mundo y nuevo mundo. El encaje ideológico entre la Europa medieval y la América moderna en nueva España (siglo XVI) (Ciudad de México: Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia, 2011) ———, ‘Poder i territori durant el regnat de Jaume I. Catalunya i Aragó’, in Jaume I. Commemoració del VIII centenari del naixement de Jaume I, ed. by María Teresa Ferrer i Mallol (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2011), pp. 61–130 ———, ‘Amar la nostra nació’, in Sardegna e Catalogna ‘officinae’ di identità. Riflessioni storiogarfiche e prospettive di ricerca, ed. by Alessandra Cioppi (Cagliari: Istituto di Storia dell’Europa Mediterranea CNR, 2013), pp. 15–63 ———, ‘Per què hi va haver un Compromís de Casp?’, in Els valencians en el Compromis de Casp i en el Cisma d’Occident, ed. by Ricard Bellvesser (Valencia: Institució Alfons el Magnànim, 2013), pp. 45–119 ———, ‘Identities on the Move’, in Identities on the Move, ed. by Flocel Sabaté (Bern: Peter Lang, 2014), pp. 14–29 ———, ‘El compromiso de Caspe: ¿Ruptura dinástica o modelo de estado?’, in Ruptura i legitimació dinàstica a l’edat mitjana, ed. by Flocel Sabaté (Lleida: Pagès editors, 2015), pp. 279–90 ———, Historical Analysis of the Catalan Identity, ed. by Flocel Sabaté (Bern: Peter Lang, 2015) ———, ‘L’idéel politique et la nation catalane: la terre, le roi et le mythe des origines’, in La légitimité implicite, ed. by Jean-Philippe Genet, vol. 2 (Paris – Rome: Publications de la Sorbonne – École française de Rome, 2015), pp. 85–140 ———, Percepció i identificació dels catalans a l’edat mitjana (Barcelona: Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2016) ———, ‘Une histoire médiévale pour l’identité catalane’, in Intégration et désintegration en Europe centrale et orientale, ed. by Sergiu Miscoiu and Nicolae Păun (Paris: L’Harmatan, 2016), pp. 33–60 ———, ‘Maison et Couronne d’Aragon’, in Histoires, femmes et pouvoirs (péninsule Ibérique, IXe–XVe siècle). Hommage à Georges Martin, ed. by Jean-Pierre Jardin, Patricia Rochwert-Zuili, and Hélène Thieulin-Pardo (Paris: Classiques Garnier, 2018), pp. 763–77 ———, ‘Identity, Perception and Cohesion of a Medieval Region: Catalonia’, in Different Europes: The Historical Evolution of Territorial Identities and Attachments as Formative Forces in a Changing Europe, ed. by Dick de Boer, Bar Spierings, and Nils Holder Pedersesen, (Bern: Peter Lang, 2020), pp. 177–206 Salvador Miguel, Nicasio, ‘Intelectuales españoles durante el gobierno de los Reyes Católicos’, in Rumbos del hispanismo en el umbral del cincuentenario de la AIH, ed. by Patrizia Botto, vol. 1 (Roma: Bagatto Libri, 2012), pp. 47–64 Sánchez, Manuel, El naixement de la fiscalitat d’Estat a Catalunya (segles XII–XIV) (Vic – Girona: Eumo Editorial – Universitat de Girona, 1995) Sánchez de Movellán, Isabel, La Diputació del General de Catalunya (1413–1479) (Barcelona: Generalitat de Catalunya – Institut d’Estudis Catalans, 2004) Sardina, Patrizia, ‘I catalani ed il Castello a Mare di Palermo’, in XVII Congrés d’història de la Corona d’Aragó, ed. by Salvador Claramunt, vol. 2 (Barcelona: Publicacions de la Universitat de Barcelona, 2003), pp. 379–87

367

36 8

f lo c e l s a bat é

Serra Desfilis, Amadeo, ‘“È cosa catalana”. La Gran Sala de Castelnuovo en el contexto mediterráneo’, in XVI Congresso Internazionale di Storia della Corona d’Aragona. Celebrazioni Alfonsine, ed. by Guido d’Agostino and Giulia Buffardi, vol. 2 (Napoli: Comuni di Napoli-Paparo edizioni, 2000), pp. 1787–99 Sesma, José Ángel, Fernando de Aragón Hispaniarum rex (Saragossa: Departamento de Cultura y Educación del Gobierno de Aragón, 1992) Simon, Antoni, Els orígens ideològics de la revolució catalana de 1640 (Barcelona: Publicacions de l’Abadia de Montserrat, 1999) Spremic’, Momčilo, ‘Alfonso il Magnanimo e la sua politica nei Balcani’, in XVI congresso Internazionale di Storia della Corona d’Aragona. Celebrazioni Alfonsine, ed. by Guido d’Agostino and Giulia Buffardi, vol. 1 (Napoli: Comune di Napoli – Paparo, 2000), pp. 741–53 Tamburri, Pascual, ‘España en la Universidad de Bolonia: vida académica y comunidad nacional (siglos XIII–XIV)’, Espacio, tiempo y forma. Serie III. Historia Medieval, 10 (1997), 263–351 Tate, Robert B., Joan Margarit i Pau, Cardinal-Bishop of Gerona: A Biographical Study (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1955) Thiesse, Anne Marie, La Création des identités nationales. Europe XVIIIe–XIXe siècle (Paris: Éditions du Seuil, 1999) Valls Taberner, Ferran, ‘Le juriste catalan Pierre de Cardona, cardinal de l’Église romaine sous Alexandre III’, in Mélanges Paul Fournier (Paris: Recueil Sirey, 1929), pp. 743–46 Vicens Vives, Jaume, Juan II de Aragón (1398–1479): monarquía y revolución en la España del siglo XV (Barcelona: Editorial Teide, 1953; Pamplona: Urgoiti, 2003) Zečević, Nada B., ‘Confirmation Grant of King Alfonso V of Aragon to Leonardo III Tocco ( July 16 1452): An Authentic Charter with a Fake Justification?’, University of East Sarajevo. Faculty of Philosophy. Collection of Papers. Philosophy, Mathematics and Natural Sciences, 14.2 (2012), 9–17 ———, The Tocco of the Greek Realm: Nobility, Power and Migration in Latin Greece (14th– 15th centuries) (Beograd: Makart, Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Eastern Sarajevo, 2014)

Tomáš Velička

Three Languages, One Town Linguistic Aspects of Written Communication between the King and Bohemian Royal Towns in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries

In earlier chapters of this book authors have analysed various relationships between stories about the past and interethnic relations within one political body. But one problem remains unexplored: how these different ethnicities communicated. If representatives of various ethnicities blended stories of different ethnic origins to construct traditions better suited to the current political situation — as we saw in many cases in previous chapters — did they strive to create linguistic dominance over a certain group of people, to control a desirable and binding shape of the past? The political, ethnic, and linguistic diversity of medieval Bohemia is an excellent case for studying such a problem. From the thirteenth century, Bohemia and Moravia1 was no longer an area with a homogenous ethnic structure, inhabited by Czechs and with Czech as the prevalent spoken language. Around 1200, the first German colonists began arriving. Similarly to other parts of Central and Eastern Europe, they brought with them technical and legal improvements, settled in uninhabited or sparsely inhabited areas, and gradually made their new homes there.2 From the thirteenth century, Bohemia became bilingual





1 In the Middle Ages, the core of the medieval state of Bohemia consisted of Bohemia (Kingdom of Bohemia) and Moravia (Margraviate of Moravia). In the course of the fourteenth century, more lands were added (Upper Palatinate, Silesia, Upper and Lower Lusatia, Brandenburg). The collection of these lands is referred to as the Lands of the Crown of Bohemia. 2 For general information, see Kötzschke and Ebert, Geschichte, Kuhn, Vergleichende Untersuchungen, Higounet, Die deutsche Ostsiedlung, Erlen, Europäischer Landesausbau, Bartlett, The Making of Europe, Körmendy, Melioratio terrae, Die mittelalterliche Kolonisation, ed. by Brauer, Rychterová, and Wihoda. Tomáš Velička  •  ([email protected]) is a Researcher at the Department of Archival Sciences and Auxilliary Sciences of History, J. E. Purkyně University, Ústí nad Labem. His research interest focuses on the history of communication, late medieval literacy in Bohemia and the medieval history of the lands of the Crown of Bohemia. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 369–404 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120070

3 70

to m á š v e l i č ka

with people speaking a variety of German dialects who had arrived from different parts of the Empire, mostly from Meissen and Bavaria, but also from further away.3 The newcomers settled mostly in the border areas of Bohemia, at higher altitudes. At the same time, though, they brought with them the concept of town dwelling that was applied broadly across the whole territory of Bohemia. In the course of a few decades, a network of towns had sprung up all over the country. German colonists brought their knowledge of urban order as well as municipal laws, but, most importantly, they formed the core of the new towns’ populations. In many places, Czechs lived in those new settlements as well, but they usually belonged to the lower classes there, while town elites consisted almost solely of German-speaking burghers. This was the case not only for the towns along the country’s borders, but also those in the Bohemian inlands.4 In this chapter, we shall focus on only one part of the historic core of the Czech medieval state, that is Bohemia (we will not discuss Moravia). There are two aspects in delineating the border between the two languages. On one level, we can see how Czech and German was spoken in the countryside, and this line runs through the map fairly clearly. The second aspect of this division is the towns — some towns even in the very centre of Bohemia were administered by Germans. It is not easy to establish the boundaries of language and nation in the Middle Ages, as several aspects come into play and the main division comes through the language spoken — the very concept of nation was unknown in that era. Even when we turn to the issue of the language in use, conclusions may be ambiguous, as quite often, especially in border areas, bilingualism is a factor. Several decades ago, Ernst Schwarz,5 a German Germanist of Czech origin, proposed several criteria for distinguishing the Czech and German inhabitants of Bohemia: he combines the names of people in question (first and last names), toponyms, and direct and indirect evidence about which language was used in the given area. The language border in medieval Bohemia differed from the situation in the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth century, where the line of borders ran clearly, based on natural resources. In the medieval era, German settlements were not as widespread as in modern days. In the countryside, they were limited to narrow strips of border regions, and stretched inland only in western and south-eastern Bohemia, while German-speaking islands existed in Českomoravská vrchovina (Bohemian-Moravian Highlands) and to the west of Prague. The German element weakened significantly as a result of the Hussite wars (after 1419), when the Czech element was strengthened in most Bohemian towns — even then, however, Germans did not leave Bohemia completely, and their numbers grew again in the sixteenth century.6



3 Besides Czechs and Germans, Jews lived in the Kingdom from the tenth century; for obvious reasons, however, I do not deal with them in the current article. 4 This colonization during the High Middle Ages has been described by Klápště, Proměna českých zemí ve středověku; Žemlička, Počátky Čech královských; Žemlička, Království v pohybu; Graus, ‘Die Problematik der deutschen Ostsiedlung’. 5 Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte. 6 Šmahel, ‘Výsledky a výhledy výzkumu’.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Among the aspects which show the language character of a given area are direct and indirect references to language use. Firstly, we must take into account the written communication from the given location — in our case, a town — with its surroundings, or, on the other hand, the language that others used to communicate with that town. The administration and external communication of a given town forms an autonomous problem, linked not only to the languages spoken in that town. When exploring this issue, we can uncover a number of themes linked to the multi-national character of the Kingdom of Bohemia, and see which languages were the preferred means of communication with towns in the late Middle Ages. Czech literature was written almost solely in Latin up until the thirteenth century. From the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, however, it enjoyed two new directions — first, literature written in German, and later in Czech.7 The oldest Czech-language literary works appear at the beginning of the fourteenth century — mostly chronicles, epics, etc. In the subsequent decades, new genres were added, such as legends and dramas. The first Czech-Latin dictionaries appeared, sometimes including German as well, that suggest there was a need for translation.8 Key religious works are translated into Czech — naturally, the first of them is the Bible, the first complete translation of which into Czech was finished around 1360.9 A little earlier, towards the end of the first half of the thirteenth century, we witness the beginnings of the German literary tradition in Bohemia — although researchers have not yet explored it in great detail, it was no less important.10 As a result of the Hussite wars, there was less literature written in German, while Czech literature became more important. From the latter half of the fifteenth century, it began dominating the literary scene of Bohemia, even though Latin still had its own unshakeable position. These literary trends in Bohemian territory were also mirrored in the production of administrative written documents, and we shall deal with these below. This article focuses on Bohemian royal towns in the late Middle Ages, between 1310 and 1526, to be precise. This period is defined by important political events in the history of Bohemia. The royal towns in Bohemia were directly subordinate to the ruler (although alongside these, a number of Bohemian towns were subordinate to the aristocracy and various Church institutions). As well, they were members of the ruler’s chamber, and the taxes paid to the king were among the most important sources of income for the kings of Bohemia in the late Middle Ages. Royal towns had more power than other towns (that is, those belonging to aristocrats and the Church), both from the viewpoint of law and size — in the pre-Modern period they were among the largest towns in the country. The number of royal towns varied (over time, some dropped lower in the hierarchy while others were elevated), but in the period 7 Nechutová, Latinská literatura. 8 Voleková, Česká lexikografie. 9 Kyas, Staročeská Bible (1981), Kyas, Staročeská Bible (1985), Kyas Staročeská bible (1988), Kyas, Česká Bible. 10 Wolkan, Geschichte der deutschen Literatur, pp. 1–17; Deutsche Literatur, ed. by Fliegler and Bok; Deutsche Literatur, ed. by Bok and Behr; Brom, Der deutsche Dalimil; Vaňková, Medizinische Texte; Bažil, ‘Myne fuze weschs’; Bažil, ‘Zpěv a mluvené slovo’.

37 1

3 72

to m á š v e l i č ka

under discussion there were around thirty of them. Those royal towns are the ideal subjects for research on multi-ethnicity in medieval Bohemia — in the countryside, Czechs and Germans lived side by side as well, but the burgher environment offers us an incomparable wealth of sources.11 We shall focus on the language specifics of communication between the king of Bohemia and the royal towns from 1310 to 1526. Then we will engage in a detailed analysis of the environment of the royal towns in north-western Bohemia, where we shall focus on the characteristics of language used in the framework of the town, its administration, and its communication with other entities. North-western Bohemia was not a homogenous territory, but rather an area with a great concentration of royal towns, comparable only to the area north-east of Prague.12 This concentration of royal urban settlements in effect paralysed the progress of other urban localities not directly subordinate to the king, that is of the liege towns which were also established there, but had never reached the importance of royal towns, both in terms of numbers and economic importance. Royal towns of north-western Bohemia are counted among the oldest urban settlements in Bohemia, some of which were founded in the early thirteenth century (Žatec, Litoměřice, Most), and others soon followed. The largest towns in the region were Litoměřice and Žatec, each having around 4000 inhabitants — there were few larger towns in Bohemia and Moravia.13 Even smaller were the remaining four towns, with around 2000 inhabitants each. North-western Bohemia is an ideal location for our research. The line dividing the Czech- and German-speaking areas ran through here, although it shifted throughout the two centuries under study. Some local towns were predominantly German, while others were Czech, and in many the proportions of the two languages were constantly changing. We shall attempt to find out which language was the standard communication tool in the given period, how its use was transformed with each recipient, and how the king reacted to this when selecting the language of documents addressed to the town. The starting point for our research will be a statistical analysis of royal documents addressed to Bohemian royal towns in the given period (1310–1526),14 as a sound basis for a more detailed analysis of each of the individual towns. The kings of Bohemia addressed a number of documents to their royal towns from the second half of the 11 This partial investigation is a short, adapted version of my Czech article, Velička, ‘Jazyk v písemné komunikaci’. 12 There, the towns of Chrudim, Čáslav, Kolín, Kutná Hora, Kouřim, and Nymburk lie in close proximity to each other. 13 Of course, the ‘crown jewel’ of all royal towns was Prague — in the second half of the fourteenth century it had approximately 40,000 inhabitants. Kutná Hora, Brno, and Olomouc followed (each with 6000–8000 inhabitants). The third largest group of towns had around 4000–6000 inhabitants each, including the two previously mentioned settlements in the north-west. 14 We are interested only in documents addressed to the town as a whole, or those that dealt with it as a single entity. Therefore, we do not deal with documents addressed to individual burghers — yet we do take them into account when looking closely into the environment of the towns in north-western Bohemia.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

thirteenth century, mostly privileges providing them with economic and administrative power over areas in their surroundings. In addition, the first mandates began appearing, documents of an administrative character which contained directions and orders addressed to a particular recipient. While not many documents of this nature have survived since the thirteenth century, an important change in this respect came when John of Luxembourg assumed power in 1310. John has sometimes been referred to as the father of Bohemian royal towns. There are over 1200 extant documents addressed to the royal towns from the Middle Ages,15 with about a sixth of these addressed to the royal towns in the north-west of Bohemia. In the existing scholarship, language-related issues have been discussed in multiple works, but with a few exceptions these works have not focused on the environment of Bohemia, attempting to view the theme from a broad perspective, as we are attempting to do here.16 Royal towns have been purposely chosen for our analysis because their tradition is uninterrupted, and compared to Church institutions their writing did not derive solely from Latin. Compared to the aristocracy, town archives offer a wealth of materials suitable for analysis. Before proceeding to our analysis, a few facts concerning the use of the languages within official administrative communication in Bohemia should be noted. Through the end of thirteenth century, Bohemia, as mentioned above, was a ‘Latin territory’ in respect to the language of the written sources. The first documents by the king and aristocracy written in German began appearing around 1300, although they were scarce. Their number grew in the second half of John of Luxembourg’s rule. When Charles IV assumed the throne in 1346, German documents slowly replaced Latin ones, and during the reign of Wenceslas, the majority of documents issued were written in German. In addition, Czech began appearing around this time — most often, Czech documents were issued by the aristocracy of Bohemia and Moravia. The first Czech royal decree was issued by Wenceslas IV in 1394, but substantially Czech was utilized most in the office of the Margrave of Moravia.17 During the Hussite era, the status of the three languages were transformed. Over time, Czech became dominant and it was the main language of most of those who issued administrative written material. One exception were the institutions of the

15 From 1310–1419, over 700 privileges and mandates exist, while from 1420–1526 we have over 550 documents available. The lower number of preserved documents from 1420–1526 issued by the king can be explained by the long periods when Bohemia lacked a king. 16 Several articles exploring the theme have been published already: Hlaváček, ‘Dreisprachigkeit’; Schneider, ‘Formen und Motive’. Concerning German: Skála, ‘Německý jazyk’; Skála, ‘Das Frühneuhochdeutsche’; and for Tschech: Uhlířová, ‘Zur Problematik’; Beránková, ‘Česky psané listiny’; Scheirichová, ‘Styl nejstarších českých listin’; Šmahel, ‘Výsledky a výhledy výzkumu’; also Procházková, ‘Národní jazyky’; Scheirichová, ‘Jazyk listin na Moravě’. Moreover, Bohemists and Germanists have also published a number of articles: Boková, Der Schreibstand; Spáčilová, Deutsche Testamente; Bromová, Textová struktura. The most recent study is Hlaváček, ‘Jazyky v českomoravských městských kancelářích’. 17 Hlaváček, ‘Jazyky v česko-moravských městských kancelářích’, p. 268. See also Baletka, ‘Dvůr’, p. 365; generally speaking, the oldest Czech document originates in the office of Boček z Kunštátu, issued in 1370: see Bartocha, ‘Jak za starých’, pp. 1–13.

37 3

3 74

to m á š v e l i č ka

Map 17.1. Germany and central Europe, including Bohemia, at the death of Emperor Charles IV, 1378. Source: H. F. Helmolt, History of the World, Volume VII, Dodd Mead 1902. Plate between pages 170 and 171. Revised by Karl Wolf, printed by the Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig. Image in the Public Domain.

Catholic Church, preferring Latin, as well as the westernmost corner of Bohemia with Cheb as its administrative centre, where German maintained its predominant position.18 Similarly, along the north-western and northern borders of Bohemia, German prevailed in areas where German inhabitants remained. In the office of King Vladislaus II, on the other hand, Czech dominated in most of the documents issued.19 Around the end of fifteenth century, Czech became the exclusive language of the ‘Land tables’, the old Czech source of law, and in the dealings of the land court. Thus, we will be examining the languages in the remaining lands of the Crown of Bohemia (see map 17.1). While Moravia followed more or less the same trajectory as 18 It is not surprising that German documents were most frequently addressed to the town of Cheb (see further discussion below). Originally, Cheb was an imperial town with no Czech inhabitants. It passed into the hands of the king of Bohemia in 1322 as an imperial pledge. 19 Macek, ‘O listinách’, pp. 64–65. For example, when dealing with his administrators in Kutná Hora, the king communicated solely in Czech from the very beginning: see Trnka, ‘Regesty královských missivů určených úředníkům mince’.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Bohemia, the situation in Upper and Lower Lusatia and in Brandenburg was different — from the second half of fourteenth century German was the main language of official documents there. In Silesia, it was very similar, although in its eastern part, that is Upper Silesia, Czech strengthened its position in the late fifteenth century. By focusing on one recipient group20 exploring its status concerning the language of received royal documents, we can then establish whether the conclusions from the preceding paragraphs correspond with the linguistic profile of documents addressed to royal towns.21 In the era of John of Luxembourg (1310–1346), documents written in Latin are overwhelmingly dominant for the recipients in question.22 Rarely, German documents appear as well, in only six cases23 out of 180. Moreover, in sixteen documents, the original version has not survived.24 Three German-language documents were addressed to Cheb — two of these were the first documents issued by John of Luxembourg for Cheb in 1322.25 By the end of the 1320s, one German-language document was sent to Kutná Hora.26 In the mid-1330s, in a German-language document John promised

20 As noted above, this group is represented by the royal towns of Bohemia (see Hoffmann, Středověké město v Čechách a na Moravě, pp. 84–85). For the period when it was ruled by the kings of Bohemia, I count Cheb among these towns (i.e. starting in 1322). Similarly, I count Pirna among them, as it was part of Bohemian Kingdom in 1294–1405. In addition, the towns in the Kłodzko (‘Kladsko’ in Czech, ‘Glatz’ in German) area — Kłodzko, Bystrzyca Kłodzka, Lądek-Zdrój, and Radków — should not be forgotten. Less clear is the position of Zittau as a Bohemian town in the pre-Hussite era. Zittau was part of the structures of Upper Lusatia only from the Hussite and post-Hussite period, yet already in the preceding period it was part of the League of Six Towns (Hexapolis, or ‘Oberlausitzer Sechsstädtebund’ in German). Documents addressed to Zittau should therefore be viewed in the context of the evolution of this League. Zittau deserves further attention, so it is not included in the following overviews. During the Hussite wars and in the period that followed, the number of royal towns varied slightly (see Hoffmann, Středověké město v Čechách a na Moravě, pp. 108–09). From 1405, Pirna was outside the authority of the king of Bohemia. On the contrary, after the Hussite wars, new royal towns include Český Brod and Tábor; in 1482 they were joined by Velvary. In 1477, Tachov left this group, as it became the property of the lords of Gutštejn. For the post-Hussite era, the towns of the Kłodzko (‘Kladsko’ in Czech) region were excluded as well. During the rule of George of Podebrady the area was promoted to that of a shire, and its towns did not have true royal status. Moreover, several towns were pawned for some period of time, which did not interfere with their royal status. Apart from Tachov (its status was later degraded from a royal to a vassal town), this was also the case in Kadaň, Domažlice, Kolín, Loket, Karlovy Vary, Ostrov nad Ohří, Most, and Ústí nad Labem (see Macek, Jagellonský věk, pp. 21–24). 21 The following overviews are based on the Codex iuris municipalis (1886–1961), additionally Geschichtsquellen, vol. 1, ed. by Volkmer and Hohaus; Geschichtsquellen, vol. 2, ed. by Volkmer and Hohaus. Especially for the post-Hussite period, it adds details to Čelakovský’s incomplete notes, yet it mostly concerns documents with only fragments preserved, and is therefore irrelevant for our purposes. 22 John’s privileges addressed to the royal towns are analysed in detail by Hlaváček, ‘Johann von Böhmen’; Žemlička, ‘Die Städtepolitik Johanns von Luxemburg’. For the Luxembourg era in general, we must mention essays by Hlaváček, ‘Český panovník’; Hlaváček, Das Urkunden; Kejř, ‘Organisation und Verwaltung’. 23 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 123, 124, 153, 175; Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 38, 39. 24 It was not possible to determine their original language. 25 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 123, 124. 26 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 153.

37 5

3 76

to m á š v e l i č ka

Cheb that he would not remove the villages Aš and Selb from its jurisdiction.27 The remaining two documents were addressed to the Old Town of Prague at the beginning of the 1340s.28 They mostly concern fiscal matters, although one German document concerned a confirmation. The use of German increased in the office of Charles IV from 1346 to 1378.29 Out of 304 preserved documents addressed to the recipients in question, 230 were written in Latin, fifty-seven in German, and for seventeen of them it is not possible to determine the original language. Compared to the previous period, when German documents represented just 3.3% of the total, this number jumped to nearly 20% of the documents in question. The trend in favour of German intensified towards the end of Charles’s rule in the 1370s. From 1373 to 1378, thirty-four documents were issued, with only ten of them in Latin. Some of the documents from this period were also issued by Wenceslas IV, most of which are duplicates of earlier documents by Charles, and the language used mimics the original.30 To compare, we can see that in the 1360s, Latin dominates while German represents only about 10% of the total. German particularly found its way into documents addressed to Cheb, where it enjoyed a majority. Out of the total of fifty-seven German documents, twenty-four were addressed to Cheb. Over one-quarter of all documents addressed to the Old Town of Prague were also in German. A slightly lower number of German privileges and mandates was addressed to Litoměřice, while German appeared fairly frequently in documents in Kadaň, Pirna, and Kutná Hora. Elsewhere, Latin had an overwhelming majority or was the sole language of the King’s documents. In addition, the ratio of languages of documents addressed to recipients in the Empire by Charles IV was different — from the 1350s, German prevailed there.31 It is also necessary to examine the relation between the content of documents and the languages used.32 What types of documents used German? Firstly, it should be

27 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 175. 28 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 38, 39. 29 Concerning the language use in Charles’s office, see Schmitt, Die deutsche Urkundensprachen; Černá, ʻNěmecké listiny Karla IV’; we should also mention the work of Fritz, ‘Bemerkungen zu den Urkundensprachen’. 30 The dominance of German in the final years of Charles’s rule is responsible for the documents granting salt, beer, and wine tax rights (ungelt und schrotamt) in 1377 and 1378 for Litoměřice, Louny, Most, Slaný, Žatec, and Hradec Králové, when all of Charles’s privileges were doubled in the same form by Wenceslas IV — yielding a total of ten documents (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 534–43, 548, 549). 31 Lawo, ‘Sprachen der Macht’, pp. 533–39. 32 For the purposes of this study, I designed an outline of eight main topics of royal documents addressed to the recipients in question, and they shall be used for the following period as well. The first group comprises confirmation and observation documents. The second group includes documents of a fiscal character (taxes, etc.) in a broad sense, with the exception of those which form a separate group as follows. The third group consists of documents concerning trade and market issues — it is similar to the previous group and some documents are hard to place in one or the other. The fourth group covers legal matters of the town. The fifth group consists of charters dealing with town administration. The sixth group covers church matters, mostly town hospitals. The seventh group covers matters of politics, where the town was in touch with another entity, person, or institution,

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Number of documents

100 80 60 40

Lat

Jews

politics

church matters

town administation

legal issues

market, trade

fiscal issues

0

confirmations

20

Ger

Figure 17.1. Royal documents categorized by content and language in 1346–1378.33

noted that the use of German was more or less the same in privileges and mandates alike. First and most frequently, German began appearing in documents concerning tax rights, where it occurs in about one-third of cases. Similarly, while it appears in political documents, their total represents only a small fraction of the overall mass examined here. Slightly less frequently, German appears in the group of trade and market deals, while significantly less often it is used in documents concerning town administration and legal matters. It appears in Church documents surprisingly often, but here we have only five documents at hand — three written in Latin, two in German. German was less frequently used in confirmation documents, where Latin was by far the most common language.

or where broader administrative matters were discussed. The eighth group contains documents concerning the Jewish community. Naturally, some documents concerned various matters from more than one of these groups — in such cases, I decided according to the prevailing content. These groups are really divided by content only, without regard to the internal or external characteristics of the given document. The division also does not distinguish between a privilege and mandate. 33 For better clarity, this and the following charts do not take into account documents where the original language remains unclear. We know them either from later translations (where it is, however, easier to reconstruct the original language), or documents preserved only as a regesta or as an excerpt, made much later than the original document. In individual cases, we comment on this in the notes.

37 7

3 78

to m á š v e l i č ka 35

Number of documents

30 25 20 15 10 5

Lat

1413-1419

1408-1412

1403-1407

1398-1402

1393-1397

1388-1392

1383-1387

1378-1382

0

Ger

Figure 17.2. Royal documents and their language in 1378–1419.

The situation was most interesting during the rule of Wenceslas IV.34 Out of 272 documents, 143 are written in Latin, 107 in German, and ten mix Czech with Latin,35 while in twelve documents, we do not know what the original language was.36 Although the literature commonly claims that German was the dominant language in Wenceslas’s office, it is clear that this cannot be applied to all groups of recipients.37 Here we have examined one group where Latin, despite the significant spread of German, maintained its supremacy. However, the use of various languages in Wenceslas’s office varied greatly. In the first years of his rule the most common was Latin, although German appeared frequently. Towards the end of 1380s, however, German became more and more frequent, and throughout the 1390s it reigned supreme over Latin.38 The ratio then began to converge again, while Czech became one of the official languages, and from about 1405 Latin becomes more frequent

34 Concerning the relationship between Charles IV and Wenceslas IV and their communication with royal towns, see Hlaváček, ‘Dvě zastavení u vztahu Václava IV’; Hlaváček, ‘Die Kommunikation’. 35 This was a Czech insert in a Latin document by Wenceslas, with information about the findings of the Provincial Court (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, č. 121; Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 771, 773–80). 36 Concerning the language used in Wenceslas’s office, see Polívka, ʻFilologické příspěvky’; Bindewald, Die Sprache. 37 In general, this rule applies to most recipients from the Lands of the Crown and from the Empire: see Hlaváček, Das Urkunden- und Kanzleiwesen, pp. 87–93. 38 A similar trend applied for documents addressed to recipients in Moravia in 1381–1410: see Scheirichová, ‘Jazyk listin na Moravě’, p. 277.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Town

Latin

German

Town

Latin

German

České Budějovice Cheb Žatec Louny Old Town of Prague Most Kadaň Litoměřice Kolín Plzeň Písek New Town of Prague Klatovy Čáslav Kouřim

18 0 17 15 10 9 10 10 11 8 9 8 7 3 6

12 23 4 3 8 8 6 6 3 3 0 1 1 4 0

Slaný Hradec Králové Malá Strana Stříbro Ústí nad Labem Pirna Mělník Loket Domažlice Nymburk Vysoké Mýto Kutná Hora Ostrov Vodňany  

5 1 5 4 2 1 4 1 4 2 3 1 2 3  

0 4 0 1 3 3 0 3 0 2 0 2 1 0  

Figure 17.3. Royal towns divided according to the royal documents received between 1378 and 1419.39

again. Towards the end of Wenceslas’s rule, German once again came closer to the level of the more prevalent Latin.39 The situation in the 1390s was interesting as German documents were frequently addressed to towns with a majority Czech population, such as Louny and Nymburk. On the other hand, Slaný did not receive a single German-language privilege or mandate from the royal office. This trend influenced the situation in the towns of the Czech north-west, as we will see shortly. Here I will only say that the leading recipient of documents in German was, again, Cheb (no Latin document was addressed to this town in the given period). Over half of the German documents went to Ústí nad Labem, Kutná Hora, Loket, Čáslav, Hradec Králové, and Pirna. Nearly half of the documents addressed Nymburk (of only a few royal documents addressed to this town), the Old Town of Prague, and Most were in German. We see about one-quarter to one-third of documents in German in České Budějovice, Kadaň, Kolín, Plzeň, and Ostrov nad Ohří. Some German documents were addressed to Žatec, a little less than one-fifth of the total. In other towns German appeared rarely, while in some places there is not a single document in German — Slaný, as noted above, but also Písek, Kouřim, the Little Quarter of Prague, and Mělník. Similar to our analysis of the period of rule of Charles IV, the documents are divided into groups by content, and we will analyse the groups separately. In two groups, German surpassed Latin: tax-related documents and documents concerning

39 The table includes towns that received at least three royal documents each.

37 9

3 80

to m á š v e l i č ka

town administration. In market and trade documents, Latin leads by a small margin. Less frequently, German appears among confirmation documents and in diplomatic matters, while in Church-related documents German does not appear at all. In the overview of content groups, we should note the language used. The most stable of all are the Latin-language confirmation documents. In 1310–1419, over four-fifths (85%, to be precise) of analysed confirmation documents were written in Latin, while only 13% were written in German. The rest were not preserved in either a full-text version or in the original, so it is difficult to establish the original language of the document. In any case, this content group represents an area where Latin was most efficient in holding its ground against the emergence of German. A similar trend appears in the group of documents titled ‘political documents’, as well as Church matters within a given town. In other content groups, German appears more frequently. The most significant upsurge of German usage can be found in fiscal documents and in those related to town administration. Latin managed to retain its primacy in matters dedicated to trade and market deals and in legal documents. Sigismund of Luxembourg’s rule in Bohemia (1419–1436) can be divided into two periods, mirrored, among other things, in the documents addressed to royal towns.40 The first period covers the years 1419–1420 to 1434–1435, when Sigismund’s title of king of Bohemia was recognized by Catholics only. Obviously, this influenced the potential recipients of his letters — they were only Catholic royal towns remaining loyal to the King throughout the Hussite wars: Cheb, České Budějovice, Plzeň, Ostrov, and Loket. Additionally, there are the towns that were loyal to the king for a certain period of time (Stříbro, Kutná Hora, Kadaň, Most, Litoměřice). In terms of the language used, we can clearly trace patterns visible from the rule of Wenceslas IV — both German and Latin are used frequently, but the first of these two is clearly dominant owing to the demographic structure of the recipients, as they were, at least partly, towns with German-speaking inhabitants. Two exceptions to this rule are Plzeň and České Budějovice; in particular, documents addressed to Plzeň were often written in Latin. From about 1422, the circle of Sigismund’s loyal followers stabilized and German became more frequent in the documents in question — Latin is only found in some documents addressed to Plzeň, and in even fewer documents for České Budějovice.41 A change in Sigismund’s standing in Bohemia went along with acceptance of his title of king of Bohemia. The number of issued documents skyrocketed and they were addressed to Bohemian recipients, including royal towns. While up to and including 1434, only thirty-nine of his documents addressed to royal towns are extant, for the remaining three years of his rule we are dealing with a huge number of forty-eight documents. As the scope of recipients (royal towns) broadens, the language profile of the documents changes. Latin use grows steeply, the number of German documents

40 Sigismund’s written communication with royal Catholic towns in Bohemia was studied by Alexandra Kaar (Kaar, ‘Die Stadt’); however, she did not focus on the language of these documents. 41 In this first period of his rule, Sigismund issued twelve Latin and twenty-seven German documents addressed to the royal towns of Bohemia.

0

Lat

1413-1419

1408-1412

1403-1407

1398-1402

1393-1397

1388-1392

1383-1387

1378-1382

1376-1378

1371-1375

Lat

1366-1370

1361-1365

1356-1360

1351-1355

1346-1350

1341-1346

1336-1340

1331-1335

1326-1330

1321-1325

1316-1320

Jews

politics

church matters

town administation

legal issues

market, trade

fiscal issues

confirmations

0

1310-1315

Number of documents Number of documents

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

50

40

30

20

10

Ger

Figure 17.4. Royal documents divided by content and language in 1378–1419.

80

70

60

50

40

30

20

10

Ger

Figure 17.5. The language of royal documents addressed to royal towns in the pre-Hussite era.

381

382

to m á š v e l i č ka 35

Number of documents

30 25 20 15 10 5 0 1420-1424

1425-1429 Lat

1430-1434 Ger

1435-1437

Cze

Figure 17.6. Royal documents issued by King Sigismund addressed to towns divided by language.

diminishes, and finally the first documents in Czech appear.42 German remains the language of communication with Cheb only.43 One random German document, a confirmation for the Old Town of Prague, was issued in 1436.44 In addition, seven Czech-language documents appear as well — the first of them was a warrant of religious freedom addressed to the towns of Prague from 1435,45 a specific document outside of the common structure of royal town privileges. The first standard document addressed to a royal town and written in Czech was the annual market warrant for the town of Chrudim, from 1435.46 After that, a Czech-language privilege addressed to all royal towns47 appears, followed by Czech documents addressed to the town of Tábor.48 The frequent use of Latin in the final years of Sigismund’s rule was caused in part by the numerous confirmations he issued — in this type of document, Latin held its ground for longer than in other types of documents. No confirmation document

42 The relation of the languages is as follows: thirty-one documents in Latin, four in German, seven in Czech. In six documents, the original language remains unknown, but in most cases it can be assumed that it was Latin. 43 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 101, 103, 121, although even Cheb received a Latin-written mandate after a long pause — no. 104. 44 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 139. 45 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 134. 46 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 78. 47 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 136. 48 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 102, 106, 115.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

25 20 15 10

Lat

Ger

Jews

politics

church matters

town administration

legal issues

marked, trade

0

fiscal issues

5 confirmations

Number of documents

30

Cze

Figure 17.7. Royal documents issued by King Sigismund addressed to towns divided by content and language.

was written in Czech up to that time — that language appeared most frequently in documents of a fiscal character. During his short rule (1438–1439), Albert of Austria (the Magnanimous, in German Weltwunder) did not issue any documents addressed to Bohemian royal towns. The 1440s are, from our point of view, only notable for documents issued by the queen-widow Barbora, who wrote almost all of her documents in Czech (the recipients were mostly towns she received as a dowry, located in East Bohemia).49 In the four years of his rule over Bohemia, Ladislaus the Posthumous (1453–1457) issued a total of 49 documents for the recipient group under consideration. Their content determined the language in use — almost three-quarters of these documents are confirmations, so it is not surprising that Latin is the most frequently used language here. German is used only when a document was addressed to Cheb, Ostrov, Loket, or Karlovy Vary.50 However, for the first time in 100 years, Cheb received a privilege issued in Latin.51 Only three documents used Czech: the first was a confirmation for

49 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 140, 141, 144, 145; only Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 134 was written in Latin. 50 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 156, 189, 194, 199, 205, 207. 51 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 195, the last was issued in 1355 (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 347).

383

3 84

to m á š v e l i č ka 35

Number of documents

30 25 20 15 10 5 0

1458-1462

1463-1467 Lat

Ger

1468-1471 Cze

Figure 17.8. Documents issued by George of Poděbrady addressed to towns divided by language.

Tábor,52 where the preceding privileges issued by Sigismund were written in Czech as well. The second and third instances was addressed to Plzeň and České Budějovice in 1457.53 In total, Ladislaus issued thirty-seven Latin, six German, and three Czech documents for the recipient group in question.54 During the rule of George of Poděbrady (1458–1471), Czech comes to the fore for the first time.55 This trend was weaker in the first years of his rule, when Latin still dominated — again, this was due to the large number of confirmation documents issued — but already before the mid-1460s the number of Czech documents began rising steeply. In isolated cases, they appeared even before that, and some confirmations were even written in Czech,56 although most were still in Latin. For German, the same situation as in the preceding decades holds — it is only used in documents issued for the westernmost region of Bohemia (Cheb, Ostrov, Loket, Karlovy Vary). Only in rare

52 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 180. 53 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 200, 201 — interestingly, the following document that grants the town of Pilsen the right to collect the ‘Jewish tax’ was, again, written in Latin, the same as the confirmation issued — which here is not surprising (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 202, 203). 54 In three further documents, the original language cannot be determined. 55 For the relation between George and the royal towns, see the article by Rak, ‘Česká venkovská královská města’. 56 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 215 (Chrudim), 224 (Hradec Králové), 239 (Tábor), 244 (Kutná Hora), 260 (Tábor).

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

circumstances was German used elsewhere.57 As mentioned above, starting around 1463–1464, Czech documents for royal towns appear much more frequently, and until the end of George’s rule, Czech maintains a position similar to Latin. Concerning content groups, Czech surpassed Latin in the fiscal documents category and in the category of market and trade-related documents. In the category relating to internal town issues, Czech and Latin were about equal. Particularly, sealing and heraldic privileges were consistently written in Latin (see below). Since most of George’s letters to royal towns were confirmations, it makes sense that Latin dominated there. The 1460s were thus a period when communication with the recipients in question was truly trilingual. Perhaps the three languages were not used with equal frequency, but at least their use was somewhat balanced, documented also in the large number of documents preserved — we have reviewed forty-eight Latin, twenty-five Czech, and ten German documents.58 From the linguistic point of view, the rule of Vladislaus II (1471–1516) was a period of change.59 In the 1470s these changes were not yet visible, but the subsequent decades brought significant changes in terms of the use of each of the three languages. From our viewpoint, it is helpful to divide Vladislaus’s period into two: the first ten years of his rule should be evaluated separately from the rest of his time in office until 1516. In the first period, the most frequently issued documents were, again, confirmations, thus influencing the language of the documents in question. Most of them are still written in Latin, although Czech does appear from time to time, and obviously some recipients received documents written in German. Throughout the 1470s, the number of confirmation documents fell steadily, and with it diminished the Latin dominance over Czech. By the end of the decade, Latin and Czech were roughly equal, and by the beginning of the 1480s, Czech, the first official language of the country, became more frequent than Latin. In the 1470s, Latin dominates in confirmation documents, but also in ones concerning internal town administration. An important subgroup were the sealing and heraldic privileges, issued in abundance by Vladislaus — this content group in particular was written exclusively in Latin. The changes of 1480s are demonstrated, among other things, by the change of the official language of these privileges. While in 1481, Domažlice received the right to use the coat of arms and the red sealing was written in Latin,60 all the rights that preceded this document were also in Latin, and eight years later a document awarding the same privileges to the town of Kolín was written in Czech.61 The same applies to all the subsequent privileges up to the end of the period of our interest.62 In the 1470s, Latin is found in documents of a fiscal character as well as in market and trade-related documents — in

57 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 306 (Most). 58 In a fairly large number of documents (thirteen), their original language remains unclear. 59 For the relationship between the king and the towns in this period, see Macek, Jagellonský věk; on the language of documents issued by Vladislaus’s office, see Macek, ‘O listinách’, pp. 64–65. 60 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 420. 61 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 456. 62 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 510, 547, 564, 584, 587; Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 199.

385

3 86

to m á š v e l i č ka

25 20 15 10

Lat

Ger

Jews

politics

church matters

town administration

legal issues

marked, trade

0

fiscal issues

5 confirmations

Number of documents

35 30

Cze

Figure 17.9. Documents issued by George of Poděbrady addressed to towns divided by content and language.

this category, Latin remained dominant. Through 1481, Vladislaus issued forty-six documents in Latin, five of them in German, and twenty-six in Czech.63 After 1481, it is no longer relevant to divide the documents by content, owing to the frequency of use of each languages. Thereafter, the language of a given document was determined by the recipients — almost exclusively with Czech and German, where German documents were addressed to Cheb, Ostrov, Loket, and Karlovy Vary.64 All other royal towns, no matter what the topic of the document, were addressed in Czech by the king. After 1481, Latin falls decisively behind the two leading languages. From 1482–1516, only three Latin documents have been preserved. In 1491, King Vladislaus confirmed the trading privileges of the Old Town of Prague from the fourteenth century issued on orders of Charles IV by the Hungarian rulers Charles Robert and Louis.65 We may assume that the language of the confirmed documents influenced the form of the newly issued one, although in many other instances Latin documents are inserted into Czech documents. Shortly afterwards, Vladislaus granted Malá Strana the right to organize an annual market, and this document was written in Latin as well.66 Finally, a privilege from 1514 addressed to Pilsen was written in 63 To this we must add that the original language of sixteen documents remains unclear. Since Czech and Latin were most commonly used, it is impossible to determine what language was used in each particular case. 64 The only exception being a document to Kadaň from 1487: see Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 449. 65 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 183. 66 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 1, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 184.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

20 15 10

Lat

Ger

Jews

politics

church matters

town administration

legal issues

marked, trade

0

fiscal issues

5

confirmations

Number of documents

25

Cze

Figure 17.10. Documents issued by Vladislaus II (until 1481) addressed to towns, divided by content and language.

Latin, confirming the right of free testation.67 The dominance of Czech after 1481 is best documented in simple numbers. In the given period, the royal office issued 159 Czech, twenty-five German, and three Latin documents for the recipient group in question. German documents were distributed unevenly, as nearly three-quarters of the total were addressed to Cheb. During the rule of Louis II (1516–1526), Czech royal towns received forty-four documents which are still extant — three-quarters were written in Czech, while the other two languages were rarely used.68 Surprising was the use of Latin in three documents issued in succession and addressed to Most in 1516, linked with the devastating fire of the previous year that practically destroyed the entire town.69 The choice of language arose from the fact that they were issued before Louis’s Czech office was established, so they were given by his office in Hungary, which issued most documents in Latin.70

67 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 633. 68 More details about the office of Louis II can be found in an article by Heřman, ‘Kancelář Ludvíka Jagellovce’. 69 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 654–56. 70 Heřman, ‘Kancelář Ludvíka Jagellovce’, p. 106. The documents issued by the Hungarian office are different from the ones issued in Prague not only in language, but also in the form of office notes or script used, a humanist minuscule or cursive.

387

3 88

to m á š v e l i č ka 35

Number of documents

30 25 20 15 10 5

Lat

Ger

1511-1515

1506-1510

1501-1505

1496-1500

1491-1495

1486-1490

1481-1485

1476-1480

1471-1475

0

Cze

Figure 17.11. Documents issued by Vladislaus II addressed to towns, divided by language.

Only in two other instances were the documents in question written in Latin. In 1521, Louis issued an order addressed to Hungarian towns concerning the jurisdiction of Cheb’s traders. The mandate itself was produced by the Hungarian royal office.71 Latin appeared for the last time in the confirmation addressed to Pilsen, sent in March of 1523.72 The document was issued during Louis’s stay in Prague, when the royal documents were composed strictly in Latin, by the registrar Jeronym.73 For communication with selected regions, the king used German, as had his father.74 In 1516–1526, we can say that the trends set in the transformative period of the 1480s and characterizing the preceding decades continued. In this respect, the rule of the last king from the Jagiellonian dynasty did not bring significant changes; the use of Latin may have increased a little, but always in a specific kind of document. The overall trend remained the same.75 Therefore, what was the overall development in language use in royal documents addressed to Czech royal towns in the Hussite and post-Hussite eras? After 1420, Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 675. Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 689. Heřman, ‘Kancelář Ludvíka Jagellovce’, p. 109. Although the one document addressed to Cheb was written in Latin: Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 675. 75 In total, the king issued thirty-one Czech, three German, and five Latin documents. In five documents, the original language remains unclear (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 665, 666, 674, 683, 702). It is, however, almost certain that all five of them were written in Czech, as they were addressed to towns that usually received documents in this language (Nymburk, Klatovy, Žatec a Vodňany). 71 72 73 74

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

389

30 25 20 15 10

Lat

Ger

Cze

Figure 17.12. Royal documents addressed to towns in the Hussite and post-Hussite era, divided by language.

the role of Czech in written communication in Bohemia increased significantly, and with a short delay this was reflected in royal documents for the recipients in question. The above research shows that the period of 1420–1526 can be divided into three stages. The first era spanned from the 1420s to the first half of the 1430s. At that time German was the dominant language, while Czech was not used in royal documents at all. The second period, spanning from about 1435–1475/1480, with a break in 1440s, is characterized by the return of the dominant standing of Latin, but at the same time, especially from the second half of the 1460s, the role of Czech increased. Czech becomes dominant in the third period of 1475/1480–1526, when Latin was hardly used at all. During the second and third period, German was used with approximately the same frequency, reduced to a stable group of recipients where Czech and Latin did not establish a strong position. To simplify, we could say that the Hussite and post-Hussite era could be seen as a path leading from bilinguality to trilinguality and back. While in the beginning of the given period Latin and German dominated, in the end they were replaced by Czech and German. In the meantime, all three languages were used. In the second part of our study, we shall examine selected towns, their national structure, and the role played by each of the languages in question in their written communication over the period of interest. As we said above, we shall focus on six royal towns of north-western Bohemia (Louny, Žatec, Kadaň, Most, Litoměřice, and Ústí nad Labem). The best example of a nationally homogenous town in the area of interest was the town of Louny. Czech names appear very frequently among the names of the town council members starting in the second half of the fourteenth century. Already from the 1380s they are in majority, and this majority continues to increase. In the decades

1521-1526

1516-1520

1511-1515

1506-1510

1501-1505

1496-1500

1491-1495

1486-1490

1481-1485

1476-1480

1471-1475

1468-1471

1463-1467

1458-1462

1453-1457

1435-1437

1430-1434

0

1425-1429

5 1420-1424

Number of documents

40 35

390

to m á š v e l i č ka

that followed (preceding the Hussite wars), German names are seen from time to time (one to two people in the twelve-member council). In the lists of other burghers, Czechs are dominant as well.76 The national character of the town is clear — so what language was used for administration in the internal affairs of the town? Town books, documenting the meetings and dealings of the council, were written in Latin from the beginning up to the start of the Hussite wars. Czech was, in general, not used in town books in the given period — this began only in the subsequent era. Most importantly, the outgoing communication of the town was written almost exclusively in Latin, the dominant language of Louny’s officials. Respecting communications addressed to the town, the picture is more diverse. Royal documents are mostly written in Latin. German appears seldom, only in documents where Louny was one of several recipients, or in documents sent to multiple royal towns at the same time in more identical versions.77 One document sent in 1389 by Wenceslas IV was written in Czech. It was an open letter, the oldest preserved royal document from Bohemia written in Czech.78 In the case of Louny, much of the correspondence between royal officials with the town has been preserved. German appears there as well, but only between 1374 and 1381. After that, Latin returns and we can assume that the transition from German to Latin in the 1380s was due to the Czech majority in the town council. However, towards the end of the period in question, two open letters written in Czech appear as well.79 At the beginning of the fifteenth century Czech appeared in several written documents of particular entities, such as aristocrats and Church officials, with the town administration.80 In the same manner as in Louny, the neighbouring town of Žatec saw Czech and German inhabitants living side by side. For example, in the butchers’ guild both nationalities were represented equally from the mid-fourteenth century. The central portion of the town had a majority of German burghers, while the suburbs had more Czechs. In 1386, we know of both German and Czech preachers living in town. It is clear that in the second half of the fourteenth century Czechs assumed dominance — some burghers transformed their names to sound more Czech, and at the beginning of the fifteenth century a Czech and German majority in the town council appears successively.81 Although the town elite was mixed in the pre-Hussite era, the language of administration was not influenced by that fact — it strictly used Latin. Royal officers wrote letters to the town administration mostly in Latin (about one-third of these documents were composed in German, however, all of them were written in 1380).82 The same applies to documents of the kings of Bohemia, but here German appears more often than in the neighbouring town of Louny. It also appears more often in 76 77 78 79 80 81 82

Schwarz, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse’, p. 42; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 181–82. Velička, ‘Louny v komunikaci’. Velička, ‘Neznámé písemnosti českých panovníků’. Velička, ‘Nejstarší kadaňský kopiář’. Velička, ‘Neznámé písemnosti českých panovníků’. Schwarz, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse’, pp. 68–69; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 171–72. Velička, ‘Nejstarší kadaňský kopiář’.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

mandates than in privileges.83 Yet similarly to Louny, German-language documents are never dominant.84 In Most, unlike in Louny and Žatec, a larger German community lived. In the pre-Hussite era Czech names appear only seldom among the members of the town council, and even the burghers outside of the council are mostly German. In the area surrounding the town there were Czech and German villages alike.85 As in most of the other royal towns, Most retained its administration in Latin up until the mid-fourteenth century.86 From the 1370s, town documents written in German appear more often, and it seems that even the council itself gradually began to conduct its business in that language. From then until 1419 we do not have a single Latin document originating in the council. German is used in communication with the margraves of Meissen, but also with the chamberlain.87 Even the Jews of Most were, at that time, more used to dealing in German than in Latin.88 Among the documents addressed to the town administration from royal officials are two Latin and three German documents. The most interesting among them are three documents written by chamberlain Konrad of Vechta in 1411. All three of them concern the rules for the use of seals; two are written in German89 and one in Latin.90 Additionally, both documents concerning the sealing wax and written within a short period are in two different languages. Today we cannot determine what their author intended and why he chose to use two languages. We must adopt the assumption that it may have been up to the particular scribe who composed each of the documents. The oldest royal document in German had already arrived to the town in 1366; and more began appearing in the 1380s and 1390s, when their number was greater than those in Latin. One of the most important royal towns was above the river Labe, Litoměřice. It was surrounded by many Czech villages; Czechs were accepted inside the town’s fortification from the time of its founding, and from the mid-fourteenth century they sometimes appeared in the council. In the second half of the fourteenth century, Czech names among burghers were more numerous than German ones (nine to six), but until 1406 Germans retained the majority in the council.91 In the pre-Hussite era it seems the town administration used both Latin and German.92 Communication with the court in Magdeburg was probably conducted in German, as we have documented since 1324. The oldest legal document, from 1282,

83 Hlaváček, ‘Jazyky v česko-moravských městských’, p. 287. 84 See Urkundenbuch der Stadt Saaz, ed. by Schlesinger. 85 Schwarz, Die Volkstumsverhältnisse, p. 65; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 187–89. 86 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 75, 80. 87 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 113, 119. 88 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 126, 127. 89 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 844, 847. 90 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, no. 846. 91 Schwarz, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse’, pp. 60–62; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 239–42. 92 Městská kniha Litoměřic, ed. by Kocánová and others, pp. 105–07, nos 17, 18, 20, 22.

391

392

to m á š v e l i č ka

was written in Latin.93 The legal documents from Magdeburg and Leipzig written at the turn of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, found in a manuscript originating in Litoměřice, were written without exception in German.94 Already in the 1350s the town had received two German royal documents.95 During Wenceslas’s rule the first German documents appear as well, but they never managed to deprive Latin of its supremacy. In terms of content, there seems to be no rule to help determine which language would be used — confirmations are the only document to be written always in Latin. The aspect of time may have been more important. German documents prevail only in the 1390s (a period when German was temporarily the main language of administration there), as in other towns. On the other hand, during the rest of Wenceslas IV’s rule, Latin documents are by far the most frequent. Languages in pre-Hussite Kadaň were unambiguous — up until the Hussite wars, no Czechs were documented there.96 The remnants of the pre-Hussite administration are scarce, yet those which remain testify that, despite the exclusively German character of the town, administration was carried out strictly in Latin.97 The majority of documents among received royal documents are also in German. In the 1390s, the number of Latin documents surpasses the remaining languages. German documents also appear more frequently among those received from the royal office, and in the period under consideration they are more numerous than Latin ones. The last town of the region in question, Ústí nad Labem, had more mixed villages in its surroundings than Litoměřice. A Czech name appears among council members for the first time in 1382. However, up until the Hussite wars, Czechs were always a minority in the council, while the same also applies to burghers who were not members of the council.98 Although in the pre-Hussite era Ústí was predominantly German, the town administration probably used Latin in the main. Very few documents from the town hall are extant, but those that remain and concern the important period around 1400 are all in Latin. Only towards the end of the pre-Hussite era do we see the first German-language burgher document.99 Latin was obviously the most frequent language in documents associated with the parish church, although Czech appeared there as well.100 John and Charles IV addressed the town with Latin privileges and mandates only.101 The first German documents arrived during the rule of Wenceslas IV. Most

93 Státní okresní archiv Litoměřice, Archiv města Litoměřice, inv. 62, fols 62, 20v–21v, 37r (Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, p. 38). 94 For a discussion of this manuscript, see Weizsäcker, Magdeburger Schöffensprüche, p. 2. 95 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 330, 376. 96 Schwarz, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse’, pp. 67–68; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 163–65. 97 Velička, ‘Nejstarší kadaňský kopiář’. 98 Schwarz, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse’, pp. 62–63; Schwarz, Volkstumsgeschichte, pp. 228–30. 99 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Aussig, ed. by Hieke, no. 172. 100 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Aussig, ed. by Hieke, no. 151. 101 An overview (and a translation) of some royal documents with commentary can be found in Bobková, Středověké Ústí.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

aristocratic documents addressed to the town used German, although not many have been preserved. From 1378 to 1419, three German102 and two Latin royal documents are extant.103 None of the languages are used specifically for a particular type of content — both Latin documents are mandates, while the German ones are privileges. The sample is too small, however, to provide decisive data. Both chamberlain-issued documents from the beginning of the fifteenth century addressed to the town council were written in German.104 As a result of the Hussite wars, the region saw significant shifts in language borders and areas. In several locations, trends from the pre-Hussite era were accelerated and concluded, for example in Žatec and Litoměřice, where the Czech element gained the upper hand. Louny retained its Czech character, and the same applies to the German national profile of Kadaň and Most. In Ústí nad Labem, the Czech element appeared slowly and fairly late, during the fifteenth century. These changes were reflected in the linguistic profile of documents from the towns in question. We shall start with Louny again. After the Hussite wars, as before them, the administration of Louny was carried out in Latin. This is, in the first place, documented in extant town records, showing that Latin accounts prevail through the second half of the fifteenth century.105 Czech first appears in this area towards the end of the second decade of the sixteenth century.106 Accounts thus reflected, with a slight delay, how Czech was introduced into the records of the legal dealings of the town council. Some Czech records appear in the sixth legal book (in the 1420s), but they become more frequent only after 1460. Czech becomes dominant around the end of the 1470s.107 The internal affairs of Louny are conducted in Latin for quite a while.108 With the outside world gradually bohemized, we see a slow turn from Latin towards Czech already during the Hussite wars.109 For a long time, however, Latin remained the language of public and semi-public signs in the town,110 although such signage was not necessarily ordered by the town council. It is clear, however, that Latin retained its position of a language suitable for public written presentation. It was the language of the sign placed on the gate of Žatec, visible to everyone (although perhaps not comprehensible) who entered the town from c. 1500.111 It comes as no surprise that the church of St Nicolas is adorned 102 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 740, 768, 786. 103 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 2, ed. by Čelakovský, nos 758, 759. 104 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Aussig, ed. by Hieke, nos 137, 147. 105 Kniha počtů, ed. by Vaniš. 106 Státní okresní archiv Louny, Archiv města Louny, sign. I E 10, I E 11. 107 Dušek, Archiv královského, p. 22; Státní okresní archiv Louny, Archiv města Louny, sign. I C 6, I C 7, I C 8. 108 Even around the end of 1450s: see Státní okresní archiv Louny, Archiv města Louny, sign. 111, 112. 109 Dušek, Archiv královského, p. 56; Státní okresní archiv Louny, Archiv města Louny, sign. 88, 89, 89b, etc. 110 For epigraphy, see Roháček, Epigrafika. For languages of inscriptions, see Roháček and Bornschlegel, ‘Innovation — Tradition — Korrelation’. 111 Soupis památek, p. 19.

393

394

to m á š v e l i č ka

with Latin signs dating to the beginning of the sixteenth century.112 A similar sign decorates the bell cast in 1509.113 In the case of Louny, the correspondence of the king with the town’s officials remained written in Latin long into the period following the Hussite wars. The situation began to change in the 1460s when George of Podebrady ruled the land, when Latin was supplemented with Czech in some documents, and from the 1480s Czech was the primary language of these, consistent with the overall trend in Bohemia. Neighbouring Žatec was markedly Czech, yet even here Latin prevailed over Czech after 1420, as far as the town administration was concerned. We must, however, distinguish between the internal and external communication of the town. In the former category, Latin retained its supremacy for a long time, similarly to neighbouring Louny. Some isolated cases of Czech documents do appear here, however, probably depending on the recipient.114 Yet, up until the 1460s Latin remains dominant. The slow entry of Czech into internal town communication stands in contrast to the swift penetration of Czech in documents addressed to external recipients, where Czech appeared frequently as early as in the 1430s.115 The language profile of documents addressed by the ruler to Žatec is more or less the same as in the case of Louny. Latin was complemented by Czech in the course of the 1460s, and together they coexisted for another two decades. After that, Czech became overwhelmingly dominant. Most was a majority German town, which is reflected in the languages of the documents related to it. Already in the pre-Hussite era the town administration used German, which remained unchanged even after 1420. With outside subjects, however, letters were sometimes exchanged in Latin; in the course of the fifteenth century, Czech documents became increasingly frequent, especially when the town was communicating with subjects in Czech-speaking parts of Bohemia.116 The language profile of the town is reflected in accounts of the construction of the Church of the Virgin Mary, started in 1517.117 The choice of language is accentuated by the fact that accounts were usually the domain of conservative Latin for the longest time, while other types of administrative documents were permeated by vernacular languages much more quickly. Knowing this, it seems clear that the rest of the town’s agenda must have been written in German already in the fifteenth century, and perhaps even towards the end of the fourteenth century, as documented by the 112 Soupis památek, pp. 21, 26, 29. 113 Soupis památek, p. 31; for more about inscriptions on bells, see the essential work by Hejnic, ‘Nápisy na českých zvonech’; for languages, Hejnic, ‘Nápisy na českých zvonech’, pp. 20–25. Although this is the key campanologist work up to this day, its usefulness for north-western Bohemia remains limited — its core resource is the volumes of the Registry of Historic and Art Artefacts (Soupis památek historických a uměleckých) that only covers parts of Bohemia. The north and north-western areas of Bohemia are, unfortunately, among those omitted. For a more recent Czech work on bells, see Lunga, Erforschung. 114 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Saaz, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 412, 417. 115 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Saaz, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 408, 409. 116 Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 351, 433, 439. 117 Rejstřík, ed. by Martin Myšička and others.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

existence of a seal of the local bakers’ guild from the fifteenth century, containing a German text.118 In this respect, seals were an extremely conservative field, and national languages began appearing there more or less from the sixteenth century (and even then only partially).119 How do royal documents for Most appear from this viewpoint? The oldest of Sigismund’s documents (up until 1434) are written in German.120 Ladislaus’s and George’s documents, however, are written almost exclusively in Latin.121 After 1434, only one document written in German arrived in the town.122 Initially, Vladislaus II followed the same trend,123 but thereafter royal documents addressed to Most began to follow the overall trend of Bohemia, when German royal documents were (with very few exceptions) restricted to the towns of the Cheb and Loket region, while the rest were issued in Czech.124 Most is thus an excellent example documenting how little influence recipients had over the language of documents addressed to them and written in their favour. Specific circumstances determined the language of three Latin documents issued by Louis II in 1516, as cited above. After 1419, the national profile of Litoměřice evolved, and with it the official language of its administration. Latin (or German) was replaced with Czech. Gradually, not only internally but externally as well, communication transitions to Czech. Town books from the beginning of the sixteenth century contain only Czech entries.125 A specific category, both in language and other respects, was communication with Magdeburg as the highest instance of town rights in Germany — Litoměřice was its counterpart in Bohemia.126 Written communication between the two towns most likely was done in Latin,127 although an example of German legal advice addressed to Louny may indicate the opposite (unless it was an exception). It is not entirely impossible that Magdeburg officials may have written in Czech to Litoměřice.128 The language of royal documents addressed to a given town basically copied the trend outside of it, with languages distributed simply and clearly. Until the end of George of Poděbrady’s rule, all preserved full-text documents were written in Latin.129

118 Státní okresní archiv Most, Cech pekařů Most, no. 6: dar hantw[e]rg: der: [] brix. See Přibyl and Bechyně, ‘O pečetích a erbu’. 119 Concerning languages of seals, see Maráz, Sfragistika, p. 125. 120 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 11, 57, 63; Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx bis zum Jahre 1526, ed. by Schlesinger, nos 169, 189. 121 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 192, 193, 247, 248, 249, 268, 298. 122 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, no. 306. 123 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 340, 341. 124 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 369, 384, 400, 424, 435, 459, 466, 545, 554, 605, 638, 639, 640, 641, 642, 643, 644. In nos 400 and 545, we do not have the full text version, but the overall context lets us determine the language of the document with near certainty. 125 Nový, Soupis městských, p. 108. 126 Weizsäcker, Magdeburger Schöffensprüche, p. 18. 127 Čelakovský, ‘O právních rukopisech města Litoměřic’, p. 549. 128 Čelakovský, ‘O právních rukopisech města Litoměřic’, p. 550. This eventuality was opposed by Weizsäcker, Magdeburger Schöffensprüche, p. 18. 129 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 14, 15, 75, 158, 159, 213.

395

396

to m á š v e l i č ka

After 1470, all royal documents were written in Czech,130 including two confirmation documents from the 1470s. Litoměřice was thus among the minority of Czech royal towns for which Vladislaus confirmed their privileges in Czech in the first years of his rule. After the Hussite wars, the town administration of Kadaň slowly adopted German. The best document of this trend is found in the oldest preserved town book, dating back to 1465. Latin only appears in notes, and there is not a single full entry written in Latin. Czech appears only in cases where the entry was a copy of a document issued by a foreign entity communicating with the town.131 For the town, the worst were the events connected with the Czech entry from 1467, when Kadaň moved in support of Jednota Zelenohorská, a Catholic union against the excommunicated King, but the opposition soon lost momentum. After that, the chamberlain Sigismund of Valečov arrived in town to judge the offenders, resulting in the issuance of a sentence ordering those responsible for previous behaviour to leave Kadaň permanently.132 That the dealings of the jury and the entry into the town records were carried out in Czech could be seen as a way of humiliating the town and expressing the superiority of the king through the authority of his officer. It may have been a demonstration of force, when the German-speaking town was forced to see the trial conducted in Czech, and to see the language used for the records of the dealings. The language selection may also have had to do with the chamberlain and his company, who may have not been fluent enough in German.133 From 1419 to 1526 in Kadaň, royal documents in Latin, German, and Czech alike are found. Documents issued by Sigismund and Ladislaus the Posthumous are in Latin,134 while George’s documents for the town use both Czech and Latin. The coming of Czech that began earlier was completed during the rule of Vladislaus II of Hungary. In the 1470s, the town received only one royal privilege — permission to use red sealing wax and, as was the custom of the royal office at the time, it was issued in Latin. Other documents by Vladislaus are more recent, from the 1480s. Previously, we have noted that at this time his office began using Czech almost exclusively, at least in documents addressed to royal towns. Kadaň was no exception, yet in one unique instance it received a German document. In content, it outlined the power of the town council over the property of fugitive burghers, and concerned the aforementioned events of 1467. Here we see an interesting contrast — the record by the chamberlain from the same year was written in Czech, while twenty years later the accounts which were settled with the king are in German. After 1487, all subsequent royal documents addressed to Kadaň were written in Czech.135

130 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 312, 343, 352, 399, 517, 529, 530, 548, 588, 618, 679. 131 Rak, ‘Kadaňské knihy trhů a testamentů’, pp. 20–21. 132 Státní okresní archiv Chomutov resident in Kadaň, Archiv města Kadaň, inv. no. 626, fol. 45r (old fol. B1); copy in Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, behind no. 292; for more on the event, see Rak, ‘Kadaňské knihy trhů a testamentů’. 133 That is the opinion of P. Rak, ‘Kadaňské knihy trhů a testamentů’, p. 33. 134 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 12, 97, 197. 135 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 441, 459, 540, 555, 592, 617, 671, 707.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Now we proceed to the last town in our selection. After 1420, the Czech element slowly strengthened in Ústí nad Labem as well. Concerning the written communication in the town, the most important indicator is the oldest preserved town book, ranging from 1438 to 1514 (with a pause 1451–1469). In the second half of the fifteenth century, a transition from the originally dominant Latin towards German is witnessed and its subsequent replacement by Czech. All three languages meet in the book of town records, but the overall trend is roughly as follows. At the beginning of the sixteenth century, the town’s official language is almost exclusively Czech. As far as external communication goes, the language of the document depended on the recipient — because Ústí lies in a mixed area, the documents are in Czech as well as German.136 Concerning the language of royal documents, the situation is clear. Out of ten preserved documents, eight are written in Latin and two in Czech. The language of a given document is also clearly determined by the time when it was written. All documents up to 1480 are written in Latin,137 and subsequently they are in Czech.138 In the 1460s and 1470s, the language was determined mainly by document content — mostly confirmations or privileges concerning coats of arms or seals (only the document from 1480 guaranteed that Vladislaus would not pawn the town). The increased role of Czech in some towns of north-western Bohemia is indirectly proved by the need to translate pre-Hussite documents originally written in the other two languages, i.e. Latin and German. Examples of translations are found in three of our towns: Louny, Žatec, and Litoměřice where, after 1420, all of these areas were prevailingly Czech. The demand for Czech versions of ancient documents arose in the third quarter of the fifteenth century. They were either translations of complete documents, or side notes, where the documents were preserved in copies. The documents were not always in active use, so the town did not necessarily need translations. In some cases, we can even assume that the translation of certain documents was a private initiative by town scribes, not an activity carried out by order of the leaders of the town council.139 In the Middle Ages, the primary language of written communication across the whole of Europe was Latin, and Bohemia was no exception. In our space, the first language to complement Latin was German. In the case of the region in question, German started its rise in the 1370s, when it first began appearing regularly in royal documents, and also around this time it was first traced in the administration of Most. In other towns under examination it was not yet important, although it temporarily gained the upper hand in Litoměřice. The largest number of German royal documents appeared at the end of the 1380s and during the 1390s. This situation was not caused, for example, by an increased number of towns that had received German-written royal documents earlier — at the time, German appears in documents addressed to towns that did

136 See Urkundenbuch der Stadt Aussig, ed. by Hieke. 137 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 99, 184, 196, 220, 318, 370, 372, 415. 138 Codex iuris municipalis, vol. 3, ed. by Čelakovský and Friedrich, nos 479, 677. 139 For more detail, see Velička, ‘Jazyk v písemné komunikaci’, pp. 81–83, 86–87, 93–95.

397

398

to m á š v e l i č ka

not otherwise use German in their administration and did not receive other German documents. This evolution fits well into the situation in the office of Moravian margrave Jost, where German rose to importance around the same time. The period after 1420 brought new trends. Important among them was the gradual strengthening of Czech, which permeated not only royal documents but also the written products of towns themselves. This process can be traced in north-western Bohemia from roughly the 1460s (even earlier in Litoměřice), and it more or less ran its course in twenty years. Obviously it was not equally strong in all the areas we explored — in some places, the same process occurred with German. However, the language of the royal privileges and mandates in question was not influenced by that. Although Germans maintained their majority in Kadaň and Most even after the Hussite wars, the king addressed them either in Latin, or, from the 1480s, in Czech. The above-mentioned recipients thus did not control the language aspect of their communication with the king, and they did not have the exclusive standing of the towns in the Cheb and Loket regions (or, the in case of Loket, their collateral keepers) who communicated with the king in German (and he with them) — that is in the language spoken by the vast majority of burghers in these towns. These were the main specifics of the towns of north-western Bohemia. Although in parts of the area German held its ground, the king did not respect this in his documents, showing the key difference between the pre-Hussite and post-Hussite era, as previously the king had at least partially taken into account in his documents the language spoken in most of the towns. These developments outlined here confirm the increased role of Czech as the main language of the country, as all the royal offices gradually shifted to using it. The recipients of such documents, with very few exceptions, were forced to accept that situation. There were specifics of the communication exchange in terms of language. The stronger player was the one to determine the general trend. However, no one directed council members in terms of their internal administration, therefore it is in this sphere that we can witness the standards of the given town/area. The language of administration does not necessarily reveal the national structure of the town or the language actually spoken in it. In several instances, we have seen that administration used Latin while the burghers were determinedly German and/or Czech. It seems that, apart from nationality, council meetings played a part in determining the language of records, as well as the figure of the scribe or even longstanding tradition in the town. Sometimes, the language was adapted with respect to the people in question, and accordingly we can find solitary documents where one or the other language was used. At the same time, these instances document the multilingual character of at least some of the town officials. Although the area was generally bilingual, communication between towns had to be maintained, which helped overcome differences in language. While language was a divisive element in the area, it did not mean that the region consisted of two isolated worlds. The two worlds may have communicated less due to the differences in language, but the lives of the local people were similar, or even the same, whatever the language they spoke. Despite differences in language, they were still burghers dealing with similar everyday problems, be it in German or Czech. It cannot be denied, however, that the primary language of the person in question, and — after the Hussite wars — their religion, determined the social relations in which they existed.

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Despite these differences, Bohemia shows coherence and cohesion. We do not have any evidence that German-speaking regions sought to secede from the rest of the country. Consciousness about land was undoubtedly far stronger than awareness of language or religious aspects. Ultimately, the Bohemian kings did not suppress the multi-ethnicity of the country. To be sure, the kings strongly favour Czech as a language of communication, especially in the period after the Hussite wars in accordance with the opinion of the representation of the Bohemian nobility. This preference was given by political circumstances, but never exceeded a certain limit. Although the Bohemian Kingdom of the late Middle Ages was a multilingual region, multi-ethnicity did not disturb the integrity of the kingdom.

Works Cited Primary Sources Codex iuris municipalis regni Bohemiae, vol. 1: Privilegia měst pražských, ed. by Jaromír Čelakovský (Praha: Knihtiskárna dr. Edvarda Grégra, 1886) Codex iuris municipalis regni Bohemiae, vol. 2: Privilegia královských měst venkovských z let 1225–1419, ed. by Jaromír Čelakovský (Praha: Knihtiskárna dr. Edvarda Grégra, 1895) Codex iuris municipalis regni Bohemiae, vol. 3: Privilegia královských měst venkovských z let 1420–1526, ed. by Jaromír Čelakovský and Gustav Friedrich (Praha: Knihtiskárna dr. Edvarda Grégra, 1948) Geschichtsquellen der Grafschaft Glatz, ed. by Franz Volkmer and Wilhelm Hohaus, vol. 1 (Habelschwerdt: n. pub., 1883) Geschichtsquellen der Grafschaft Glatz, ed. by Franz Volkmer and Wilhelm Hohaus, vol. 2 (Habelschwerdt: n. pub., 1888) Kniha počtů královského města Loun z let 1450–1472 a 1490–1491. Liber rationum regalis civitatis Lunae ad annos 1450–1472 et 1490–1491 pertinens, ed. by Jaroslav Vaniš (Praha: Academia, 1979) Městská kniha Litoměřic (1341)–1562, ed. by Barbora Kocánová and others (Ústí nad Labem: Univerzita Jana Evangelisty Purkyně, 2006) Rejstřík stavby děkanského kostela Nanebevzetí Panny Marie v Mostě 1517–1519 (Libri civitatis II.), ed. by Martin Myšička and others (Ústí nad Labem: Univerzita Jana Evangelisty Purkyně, 2006) Soupis památek historických a uměleckých v království Českém od pravěku do počátku XIX. století, vol. 2: Politický okres Lounský (Praha: Nákladem Archaeologické kommisse při České akadamii císaře Františka Josefa pro vědy, slovesnost a umění, 1897) Urkundenbuch der Stadt Brüx bis zum Jahre 1526, ed. by Ludvig Schlesinger (Praha: Im Selbstverlage des Vereines, 1876) Urkundenbuch der Stadt Saaz, ed. by Ludwig Schlesinger (Praha: Verein für Geschichte der Deutschen in Böhmen, 1892) Urkundenbuch der Stadt Aussig bis zum Jahre 1526, ed. by Wenzel Hieke, (Praha: Im Selbstverlage des Vereines, 1896)

399

4 00

to m á š v e l i č ka

Secondary Studies Baletka, Tomáš, ‘Dvůr, rezidence a kancelář moravského markraběte Jošta (1375–1411)’, Sborník archivních prací, 46 (1996), 259–536 Bartlett, Robert, The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization, and Cultural Change, 950–1350 (London: Penguin, 1994) Bartocha, Josef, ‘Jak za starých dob čeština znenáhla stala se jazykem jednacím (úředním, diplomatickým) v zemích Koruny české’, Časopis Matice Moravské, 24 (1900), 1–13, 124–37, 220–37 Bažil, Martin, ‘Myne fuze weschs du mir nicht eweclicht… Bemerkungen zum “Prager Abendmahlspiel” (Ludus de cena Domini)’, in Deutsch-böhmische Literaturbeziehungen — Germano-Bohemica. Festschrift für Václav Bok zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. by HansJoachim Behr, Igor Lisový, and Werner Williams-Krapp (Hamburg: Kovač, 2004), pp. 1–13 ———, ‘Zpěv a mluvené slovo, latina a lidový jazyk ve středověkých velikonočních hrách ze střední Evropy’, Theatralia: revue současného myšlení o divadelní kultuře, 13.1 (2010), 4–17 Beránková, Věra, ‘Česky psané listiny z církevního prostředí před r. 1526. (Přehled dokumentů.)’, in Traditio et cultus: miscellanea historica Bohemica. Miloslao Vlk, archiepiscopo Pragensi ab eius collegis amicisque ad annum sexagesimum dedicata, ed. by Zdeňka Hledíková (Praha: Karolinum, 1993), pp. 91–108 Bindewald, Helene, Die Sprache der Reichskanzlei zur Zeit König Wenzels (Halle an der Saale: Max Niemeyer, 1928) Bobková, Lenka, and Kateřina Bobková, Středověké Ústí nad Labem ve světle královských listin (Ústí nad Labem: MIM, 1999) Boková, Hildegard, Der Schreibstand der deutschsprachigen Urkunden und Stadtbucheintragungen Südböhmens aus vorhussitischer Zeit (1310–1419) (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1998) Brom, Vlastimil, Der deutsche Dalimil: Untersuchungen zur gereimten deutschen Übersetzung der alttschechischen Dalimil-Chronik (Brno: Masarykova univerzita, 2006) Bromová, Veronika, Textová struktura nejstarších českých listin se zvláštním zřetelem k vývoji formuláře (Brno: Masarykova univerzita, 2009) Čelakovský, Jaromír, ‘O právních rukopisech města Litoměřic’, Časopis Českého Muzea, 53 (1879), 143–53; 54 (1880), 542–58 Černá, Marie, ʻNěmecké listiny Karla IV. pro česká města’ (Dissertation at the Faculty of Arts of Charles University, Praha, 1953) Dušek, V. V., Archiv královského města Loun, (Praha: Nákladem Královské České Společnosti Nauk, 1898) Deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters in Böhmen und über Böhmen, vol. 2: Tagung in České Budějovice/Budweis 2002, ed. by Václav Bok, and Hans-Joachim Behr (Hamburg: Kovač, 2004) Deutsche Literatur des Mittelalters in Böhmen und über Böhmen. Vorträge der internationalen Tagung, veranstaltet vom Institut für Germanistik der Pädagogischen Fakultät der Südböhmischen Universität České Budějovice, České Budějovice, 8. bis 11. September 1999, ed. by Dominique Fliegler and Václav Bok (Wien: Praesens, 2001)

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Die mittelalterliche Kolonisation. Vergleichende Untersuchungen, ed. by Michael Brauer, Pavlína Rychterová, and Martin Wihoda (Praha: Filosofia, 2009) Erlen, Peter, Europäischer Landesausbau und mittelalterliche deutsche Ostsiedlung (Marburg: Herder Institut, 1992) Fritz, Wolfgang Dietrich, ‘Bemerkungen zu den Urkundensprachen in der Kanzlei Kaiser Karls IV.’, Philologus, 123 (1979), 154–63 Graus, František, ‘Die Problematik der deutschen Ostsiedlung aus tschechischer Sicht’, in Die deutsche Ostsiedlung des Mittelalters als Problem der europäischen Geschichte, ed. by Walter Schlesinger, Vorträge und Forschungen, 18 (Sigmaringen: Jan Thorbecke, 1975), pp. 31–75 Hejnic, Josef, ‘Nápisy na českých zvonech ve 14. až 16. století’, Časopis Národního Muzea, 129 (1960), 1–31 Heřman, Jan, ‘Kancelář Ludvíka Jagellovce (1516–1526)’, Zápisky Katedry československých dějin a archivního studia, 7 (1963), 89–109 Higounet, Charles, Die deutsche Ostsiedlung im Mittelalter (Berlin: DTV, 1990) Hlaváček, Ivan, Das Urkunden- und Kanzleiwesen des böhmischen und römischen Königs Wenzel (IV.) 1376–1419 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1970) ———, ‘Český panovník a jižní Čechy v době předhusitské’, Jihočeský sborník historický, 41 (1972), 1–18 ———, ‘Dvě zastavení u vztahu Václava IV. a českých měst’, in Pocta Josefu Petráňovi. Sborník prací z českých dějin k 60. narozeninám prof. dr. Josefa Petráně (Praha: Historický ústav ČSAV, 1991), pp. 55–78 ———, ‘Johann von Böhmen und die böhmischen Städte’, in John of Luxembourg (1296–1346) and the Art of his Era: Proceedings of the International Conference, Prague, September 16–20. 1996, ed. by Klára Benešovská (Praha: KLP, 1998), pp. 19–27 ———, ‘Die Kommunikation der Reichsstädte und der böhmisch-königlichen Städte mit der Zentralgewalt unter Karl IV. und Wenzel IV.’, in La diplomatique urbaine en Europe au moyen âge, ed. by Walter Prevenier and Thérèse de Hemptinne (Leuven: Garant, 2000), pp. 195–216 ———, ‘Die Luxemburger und die böhmischen königlichen Städte des 14. Jahrhunderts im Lichte ihres Privilegiengutes’, in Die Stadt als Kommunikationsraum. Beiträge zur Stadtgeschichte vom Mittelalter bis ins 20. Jahrhundert. Festschrift für Karl Czok zum 75. Geburtstag, ed. by Helmut Bräuer and Elke Schlenkrich (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2001), pp. 413–30 ———, ‘Dreisprachigkeit im Bereich der Böhmischen Krone: Zum Phänomen der Sprachenbenutzung im böhmischen diplomatischen Material bis zur hussitischen Revolution’, in The Development of Literate Mentalities in East Central Europe, ed. by Anna Adamska and Marco Mostert (Turnhout: Brepols, 2004), pp. 289–310 ———, ‘Jazyky v česko-moravských městských kancelářích v době předhusitské (vybrané příklady)’, Sborník archivních prací, 63.2 (2013), 235–302 Hoffmann, František, Středověké město v Čechách a na Moravě (Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2009) Kaar, Alexandra, ‘Die Stadt […] vielprivilegirt, aber wenig ergötzt. Sigismunds Herrschaftspraxis und seine Urkunden für die ‘katholischen’ königlichen Städte Böhmens’, in Kaiser Sigismund (1368–1437). Zur Herrschaftspraxis eines europäischen Monarchen, ed. by Karel Hruza, and Alexandra Kaar, (Wien: Böhlau, 2012), pp. 267–300

401

402

to m á š v e l i č ka

Kejř, Jiří, ‘Organisation und Verwaltung des königlichen Städtewesens in Böhmen zur Zeit der Luxemburger’, in Stadt und Stadtherr im 14. Jahrhundert. Entwicklungen und Funktionen, ed. by Wilhelm Rausch (Linz: Österreichischer Arbeitskreis für Städteforschung, 1972), pp. 79–96 Klápště, Jan, Proměna českých zemí ve středověku (Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2005) ———, The Czech Lands in Medieval Transformation (Leiden: Brill, 2012) Kötzschke, Rudolf, and Wolfgang Ebert, Geschichte der ostdeutschen Kolonisation (Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut AV, 1937) Körmendy, Adrienne, Melioratio terrae. Vergleichende Untersuchungen über die Siedlungsbewegung im östlichen Mitteleuropa im 13.–14. Jahrhundert (Poznań: Poznańskie Towarzystwo pryjaciół nauk, 1995) Kuhn, Walter, Vergleichende Untersuchungen zur Mittelalterlichen Ostsiedlung (Köln: Böhlau, 1973) Kyas, Vladimír, Staročeská Bible drážďanská a olomoucká. Díl 1, Evangelia (Praha: Academia, 1981) ———, Staročeská Bible drážďanská a olomoucká s částmi Bible litoměřicko-třeboňské. 2, Epištoly. Skutky apoštolů. Apokalypsa (Praha: Academia, 1985) ———, Staročeská bible drážďanská a olomoucká. Díl 3, Genesis-Endráš (Praha: Academia, 1988) ———, Česká bible v dějinách národního písemnictví (Praha: Vyšehrad, 1997) Lawo, Mathias, ‘Sprachen der Macht — Sprache als Macht. Urkundensprachen im Reich des 13. und 14. Jahrhunderts (mit editorischem Anhang)’, in Die Goldene Bulle. Politik — Wahrnehmung — Rezeption, vol. 1, ed. by Ulrike Hohensee and others (Berlin: Akademie, 2009), pp. 517–50 Lunga, Radek, ‘Erforschung der Glocken als spezifische Inschriftenträger. Charakteristik des Glockenbestandes in tschechischen Türmen — Stand und Möglichkeiten seiner Kenntnisnahme’, in The History of Written Culture in the ‘Carpatho-Danubian’ Region. Latin Paleography Network — Central and Central East Europe, vol. 1, ed. by Hana Pátková, Pavel Spunar, and Juraj Šedivý (Praha: Chronos, 2003), pp. 99–105 Macek, Josef, ‘O listinách, listech a kanceláři Vladislava Jagellonského’, Sborník archivních prací, 2 (1952), 45–122 ———, Jagellonský věk v českých zemích, vol. 3: Města (Praha: Academia, 1998) Maráz, Karel, Sfragistika. Studijní texty pro posluchače pomocných věd historických (Brno: Masarykova univerzita, 2014) Nechutová, Jana, Latinská literatura českého středověku do roku 1400 (Praha: Vyšehrad, 2000) Nový, Rostislav, Soupis městských knih českých od roku 1310 do roku 1526 (Praha: Státní pedagogické nakladatelství, 1963) Polívka, Miloslav, ʻFilologické příspěvky k problematice německých písemností vydaných kanceláří Václava IV. pro některá města v říši a Čechách’ (Dissertation at the Faculty of Arts, Charles University, Praha, 1974) Přibyl, Alois, and Josef Bechyně, ‘O pečetích a erbu města Mostu’, Sborník Severočeského musea, Historia, 4 (1964), 121–50 Procházková, Eva, ‘Národní jazyky v kanceláři Starého Města pražského v době předhusitské’, Sborník archivních prací, 28 (1978), 18–65

T h r e e Language s, One Tow n

Rak, Petr, ‘Česká venkovská královská města v politice Jiřího z Poděbrad’, Sborník historický, 32 (1985), 5–51 ———, ‘Kadaňské knihy trhů a testamentů z let 1465–1603 a testamentární praxe v Kadani od poloviny 15. do počátku 17. století’, Sborník archivních prací, 48.2 (1998), 3–106 ———, ‘Kadaňský incident z roku 1467’, in Víra nebo vlast? Exil v českých dějinách raného novověku. Proceedings of the conference held in the Museum of Ústí nad Labem on November 5–6, 1998, ed. by Michaela Hrubá (Ústí nad Labem: Albis intrnational, 2001), pp. 20–43 Roháček, Jiří, Epigrafika v památkové péči (Praha: Národní památkový ústav, 2007) Roháček, Jiří, and Franz-Albrecht Bornschlegel, ‘Innovation — Tradition — Korrelation. Die Inschriften Böhmens und des Deutschen Reiches’, in Böhmen und das Deutsche Reich. Ideen- und Kulturtransfer im Vergleich (13.–16. Jahrhundert), ed. by Eva Schlotheuber and Hubertus Seibert (München: Oldenburg, 2009), pp. 113–42 Scheirichová, Veronika, ‘Jazyk listin na Moravě v letech 1381–1410’, Vlastivědný věstník moravský, 51 (1999), 276–84 ———, ‘Styl nejstarších českých listin’, Časopis Matice Moravské, 119 (2000), 355–66 Schmitt, Ludwig Erich, Die deutsche Urkundensprachen in der Kanzlei Kaiser Karls IV. (1346 bis 1378) (Halle an der Saale: Dr Martin Sändig oHG, 1936) Schneider, Reinhard, ‘Formen und Motive mittelalterlicher Sprachenpolitik’, Lectiones eruditorum extraneorum in facultate philosophica Universitatis Carolinae Pragensis factae, 5 (1998), 7–23 Schwarz, Ernst, ‘Die Volkstumsverhältnisse in den Städten Böhmens und Mährens vor den Hussitenkriegen’, Bohemia, 2 (1961), 27–111 ———, Volkstumsgeschichte der Sudetenländer, part 1: Böhmen, Handbuch der sudetendeutschen Kulturgeschichte, 3 (München: Oldenbourg, 1965) Skála, Emil, ‘Německý jazyk v českých zemích ve 14. Století’, in Mezinárodní vědecká konference: doba Karla IV. v dějinách národů ČSSR. Materiály ze sekce jazyka a literatury (Praha: Univerzita Karlova, 1981), pp. 73–84 ———, ‘Das Frühneuhochdeutsche in den Städten Böhmens’, in Stadtsprachenforschung unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Verhältnisse der Stadt Straßburg im Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit. Vorträge des Symposiums vom 30. März bis 3. April 1987 an der Universität Mannheim, ed. by Gerhard Bauer, Göppinger Arbeiten zur Germanistik, 488 (Göppingen: Kümmerle, 1988), pp. 239–70 Spáčilová, Libuše, Deutsche Testamente von Olmützer Bürgern — Entwicklung einer Textsorte in der Olmützer Stadtkanzlei in den Jahren 1416–1555 (Wien: Praesens, 2000) Šmahel, František, ‘Výsledky a výhledy výzkumu národnostní skladby českých měst od konce 13. do počátku 15. Století’, in Národnostný vývoj miest na Slovensku do roku 1918, ed. by Richard Marsina (Martin: Osveta, 1984), pp. 239–54 Trnka, Pavel, ‘Regesty královských missivů určených úředníkům mince, nejvyššímu mincmistru a hornímu hofmistru v letech 1472–1489’, Sborník archivních prací, 59 (2009), 39–171 Uhlířová (beránková), Věra, ‘Zur Problematik der tschechisch verfaßten Urkunden’, Archiv für Diplomatik, 11/12 (1965/1966), 468–544 ———, ‘K problematice česky psaných listin předhusitské doby’, Sborník archivních prací, 14 (1964), 174–237

403

4 04

to m á š v e l i č ka

Vaňková, Lenka, Medizinische Texte aus böhmischen und mährischen Archiven und Bibliotheken (14.–16. Jahrhundert) (Ostrava: Universität Ostrava, 2014) Velička, Tomáš, ‘Louny v komunikaci s panovníkem a jeho úředníky v době předhusitské’, in Poohří, vol. 2: Památky a společnost. Sborník z konference konané u příležitosti 50. výročí prohlášení Žatce městskou památkovou rezervací (Žatec: Historie a současnost Poohří ve spolupráci s Oblastním muzeem v Lounech a Státním okresním archivem Louny, 2012), pp. 233–44 ———, ‘Nejstarší kadaňský kopiář — příspěvek k pozdně středověké městské diplomatice’, in Poohří, vol. 3: Ohře — spojnice lidí a osudů. Sborník z konference konané v Kadani 4.–5. října 2012, ed. by Jana Šílová (Kadaň: Kulturní zařízení Kadaň in cooperation with the association Historie a současnost Poohří, 2013), pp. 96–115 ———, ‘Města v žateckém kraji a královští úředníci v době předhusitské’, Porta Bohemica, 6 (2013), 146–93 ———, ‘Jazyk v písemné komunikaci královských měst českého severozápadu ve středověku’, Porta Bohemica, 7 (2015), 57–109 ———, ‘Neznámé písemnosti českých panovníků a církevních představitelů doby předhusitské pro Louny’, Archivní časopis, 65.3 (2015), 229–51 Voleková, Kateřina, Česká lexikografie 15. století (Praha: Academia, 2015) Weizsäcker, Wilhelm, Magdeburger Schöffensprüche und Rechtsmitteilungen für den Oberhof Leitmeritz (Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1943) Wolkan, Rudolf, Geschichte der deutschen Literatur in Böhmen und in den Sudetenländern (Augsburg: Johannes Stauda, 1925) Žemlička, Josef, ‘Die Städtepolitik Johanns von Luxemburg im Königreich Böhmen’, in Johann der Blinde, Graf von Luxemburg, König von Böhmen (1296–1346), ed. by Michel Pauly (Luxembourg: CLUDEM, 1997), pp. 255–62 ———, Počátky Čech královských 1198–1253. Proměna státu a společnosti (Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2002) ———, Království v pohybu. Kolonizace, města a stříbro v závěru přemyslovské epochy (Praha: Nakladatelství Lidové noviny, 2014)

Part IV

Multi-Ethnicity in the Twentieth Century

Although this book has focused on the Middle Ages and the early modern period, an inevitable question remains as to whether the observations in the chapters can be used as a reference point for the analysis of the contemporary situation of multi-ethnic societies. Do ethnic minorities still blend their memories with dominant narratives of ethnic majorities for the strengthening of their political and cultural position within a shared political body? Is the current situation different from those observed in for example, the medieval and early modern Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, or the Crown of Aragon? The case of the Polish diaspora in the USA — numerous but of a lower social status than the dominant Anglo-Saxon population — is suitable for such a reflection, that follows below.

Joanna Wojdon

Visions of the Past and their Role in Shaping the Polish American Identity, as Seen in Ethnic Festivities

According to the 2010 US census there are over nine million Americans of Polish descent, which makes them the sixth-largest American ethnic group. Most of them are fourth- or fifth-generation descendants of economic migrants from the turn of the twentieth century. The mass immigration of Poles to the United States started in the 1880s, lasting until the outbreak of World War I. Altogether, between one and two million people arrived during this period, many of whom were illiterate peasants. Only in America did they come to realize their distinctiveness from the mainstream English-speaking society.1 The Polish language and Polish traditions — including holiday observances — distinguished them from the dominating White AngloSaxon Protestant (WASP) elite, as well as from other ethnic groups. For example, they celebrated Polish historical anniversaries, such as the Polish Constitution of 3 May 1791, and anti-Russian uprisings of the nineteenth century.2 I will use the festivities of the American Polonia3 as an indication of this group’s changing ethnic identity, following in the footsteps of analyses by Janusz Mucha (sociology)4 and Andrzej Posern-Zieliński (anthropology).5 As Marko Demantowsky has argued, anniversaries play an important (maybe even too important) role in public self-understanding, heritage re-assurance, and identity formation.6 So, on the one



1 A discussion of the numbers of Polish migrants to the United States is presented in ZnanieckaŁopata, Polish Americans. 2 Posern-Zieliński, Tradycja a etniczność, pp. 130–35. 3 ‘Polonia’ is the word used by Poles and Polish Americans (scholars included) for immigrants from Poland and their descendants. 4 Mucha, Everyday Life and Festivity. 5 Posern-Zieliński, Tradycja a etniczność. 6 Demantowski, ‘From Anniversary to Anniversaryitis’. Joanna Wojdon  •  ([email protected]) is an Associate Professor at the Institute of History, University of Wrocław, and the head of the department of Methodology of Teaching History and Civic Education. Her research interests include the history of the Polish American ethnic group and public history. Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies: Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000 to the Present, I, ed. by Przemyslaw Wiszewski, EER 15 (Turnhout: Brepols, 2020), pp. 409–420 FHG10.1484/M.EER-EB.5.120071

410

j oa n n a wo j d o n

hand they form identity, while on the other hand they are a manifestation of the identity, collective memory, and beliefs of the group that celebrates them. Mucha and Posern-Zieliński chose holidays that repeated annually and concentrated on the forms of celebrations (how did the Polish Americans celebrate?). This article will pay more attention to the content (what was celebrated?), and will focus on festivities related to historical figures and events, both those celebrated annually and those recalled only on the occasions of ‘round’ anniversaries. It will discuss why these particular anniversaries, places, and people were chosen for commemoration with the overarching goal to present the dynamic, multifaceted and heterogeneous character of the Polish American identity. Thanks to the fact that the formation of Polonia as an ethnic group started as late as the nineteenth century, it has been constantly observed, commented, and researched both in the United States and in Poland (and to a lesser extent elsewhere). Historical sources are in abundance, contrary to the earlier periods discussed in this book. With all the limitation of such an approach, some conclusions of their analyses can also be applied to other groups and their relations with mainstream societies, with the Polish American experiences and practices treated as a kind of model, analogous to those of other ethnic groups in other times and countries. Going back to the nineteenth-century Polish communities in the United States, emissaries of Polish political parties arriving in the United States spoke about the American Polonia as ‘the fourth partition’ of Poland, alongside the Russian, Austrian, and German ones that had existed since the end of the eighteenth century when Poland was dismembered by her neighbours.7 ‘The fourth partition’ had certain obligations towards the other three, especially since it had more freedom, money, and opportunities to promote the Polish cause than did Poles in Europe. Polonia’s spontaneous aid to relatives in Europe thus acquired an ideological dimension, and new areas of assistance to Poland opened up. The response of Poles in America was active and generous. It included such initiatives as a delegation to Kraków to attend ceremonies commemorating the five hundredth anniversary of the battle of Grunwald (where the Polish and Lithuanian army had defeated the Teutonic Knights) in 1910, money for the Polish military efforts of Józef Piłsudski during the Balkan wars, and over 20,000 Polish American volunteers who joined the Polish army formed in Canada in 1916 and later were transported to Europe under the command of General Józef Haller.8 Several factors helped maintain the ‘Polishness’ of that immigration cohort in the nineteenth and early twentieth century, including the constant influx of new immigrants, their geographical concentration in the ‘Polish’ enclaves of American cities, the ease of travelling back and forth between America and Europe, and the political situation of Poland struggling for independence. At the same time, signs of a new, Polish American historical consciousness could be observed, e.g. monuments to Polish heroes of the American Revolutionary War, Thaddeus Kościuszko and Casimir

7 Bukowczyk, And My Children Did Not Know Me, p. 46. 8 Pula, Polish Americans, pp. 53–62.

S h ap i n g t h e Po li sh Ame ri can i d e nt i t y

Pułaski, were unveiled in Washington, DC, in 1910 (on the occasion of celebrating the five hundredth anniversary of the Battle of Grunwald).9 World War I and its immediate aftermath radically changed the situation of Poles in America. During the war the sea was almost completely closed to ships carrying immigrants from Europe. After the war, the United States imposed anti-immigration laws that set quotas on immigrants from each country. For Poland, which regained independence in 1918, the quota was as low as 6524 people annually.10 Polonia’s help in the struggle for Poland’s independence was not particularly appreciated, and the distance between Poland and Polonia grew. The Polish American veterans of General Haller’s Army who had fought in Poland did not enjoy privileges comparable to either veterans of the American army in the United States, or to the ‘legionnaires’ of Marshal Piłsudski in Poland. Ignacy Jan Paderewski, the Polish pianist and politician who had lobbied for the Polish cause during his concerts in the United States before and during World War I and was admired by Polonia, became the prime minister of Poland in 1919, but soon resigned. He did not adapt well to the Polish political scene. The thousands of dollars that Polonia sent as charitable aid or invested in Poland were swallowed up by the hyperinflation of the early 1920s.11 Polonia itself changed. Contrary to some initial expectations, relatively few immigrants returned to the free Poland. Some of those who did soon went back to the United States, disillusioned with what they saw and experienced. On the other hand, being American had also taken on new meanings. The anti-immigration laws led to increased pressure for the Americanization of ‘hyphenated Americans’ (including the Polish-Americans) in the USA. School and Church were meant to propagate the English language and the American culture and way of life. It had a profound impact on the new generations who were born in the United States, and for whom the USA, not Poland, was their homeland. They might feel some interest or even sentiment towards Poland, but they regarded themselves as Americans of Polish descent rather than Poles in America. This change was expressed by Francis Świetlik, the leader of the American delegation to the congress of Poles from abroad in Warsaw in 1927, when the delegation refused to join a newly formed organization of ‘Poles from abroad’ (Światpol) sponsored and controlled by the Polish government. He said that Polonia was ‘neither a Polish colony nor a national minority but a component part of the great American nation, proud, however, of its Polish extraction and careful to make the young generation love everything that is Polish’.12 Looking at the Polish American calendar of festivities in the interwar period, we may observe that some American holidays (unusual for traditional Poles) had been added, such as Thanksgiving and Halloween. The anniversaries of the nineteenth-century Polish uprisings declined in popularity, but the 3 May Constitution retained its prestige. According to the interpretation offered by Andrzej Posern-Zieliński, this

9 Posern-Zieliński, Tradycja a etniczność, p. 135; Brożek, Polonia amerykańska, p. 78. 10 Pula, Polish Americans, p. 65. 11 Radzik, Polonia amerykańska, pp. 373–75; Brożek, Polonia amerykańska, p. 182. 12 Cited after Pula, Polish Americans, p. 73.

411

41 2

j oa n n a wo j d o n

was due to the fact that the Constitution was democratic in nature and displayed a number of similarities to the American Constitution adopted in the same period, and the holiday was also observed in Poland.13 Moreover, unlike the uprisings where the Poles were defeated, the Third of May commemorated a positive and optimistic event that Polish Americans could be proud of. It was visible proof of the adoption of American values and attitudes by the Polish immigrants and their descendants; it showed how their identity was shaped by two different traditions. Pułaski Day, the new Polish American holiday, was a step in the same direction. It was set on 11 October, the anniversary of the death of this Polish general in the battle of Savannah during the American Revolutionary War of 1776. In 1929, it was proclaimed General Pułaski Memorial Day by President Hoover. The first Pułaski Day Parade on 5th Avenue in New York was organized in 1936. Ever since, it has gathered thousands of participants and received media coverage in both the USA and in Poland.14 A foundation promoting cultural and scientific exchange between the United States and Poland was established in 1925 in New York City and took the name of Thaddeus Kościuszko.15 Pułaski and Kościuszko have remained among the leading heroes of Polish Americans to the present day. Polish Americans are not unique in their pride that representatives of their forefathers’ homeland played important roles in crucial events of American history. General Von Steuben is commemorated by German Americans, and a parade in his honour has been organized in New York every September since 1958. Christopher Columbus’s heritage is claimed by both Italians and Greeks, and Columbus Day is the main Italian American holiday.16 Kościuszko and Pułaski ‘nobilitated’ the Polish ethnic group, especially considering that it was regarded as inferior to immigrants from Western and Northern Europe. They demonstrated that Polish immigrants to America were not made up of blue-collar labourers only, and that they had started coming to America long before the end of the nineteenth century. Polish American researchers compared the legacies of Pułaski and Kościuszko in the United States. He argued that Pułaski is better recognized by Americans and presented several hypotheses explaining this phenomenon. One of the reasons was Pułaski’s death. It does not matter that Kościuszko spent more time in the United States, or that his achievements were more durable (such as the West Point military academy or the fortifications of Saratoga), but rather that he returned to Europe and pursued his further career there while Pułaski lost his life in, or rather gave his life to America. Death simply ‘sells’ better to the general public. Also, Pułaski’s name is preferable as Kościuszko’s is very difficult to pronounce for a non-Polish speaker, confirming that Poles have ‘impossible names’. Last but not least, the calendar and weather help Pułaski, as the anniversary of his death is celebrated in early October, 13 Posern-Zieliński, Tradycja a etniczność, p. 186. 14 ‘General Pulaski Memorial Day’, [accessed 8 January 2018]. 15 ‘The Kościuszko Foundation Mission and History’, [accessed 8 January 2018]. 16 Connel, ‘Italians in the Early Atlantic World’, pp. 35–37, discusses recent controversies related to Columbus Day.

S h ap i n g t h e Po li sh Ame ri can i d e nt i t y

while Kościuszko’s birthday falls in January at a time when it could be very cold in the states with substantial Polish populations.17 World War II reflected the identity change that took place within the interwar Polonia. Polish Americans quite willingly collected money while sending parcels of food and clothes to Poland, to Polish prisoners of war in Germany, and to Polish war refugees around the world.18 They lobbied for the Polish cause in the United States, but did not join the Polish army in Canada that tried to follow the model of World War I. Less than a thousand Polish Americans were recruited this time, while most young Polish Americans fought in the US Army.19 After the war, a new large wave of Polish immigrants arrived to America, consisting of about 100,000 people admitted under the provisions of the DP Act. They are regarded as political exiles engaged in their ‘exile mission’ of bringing full sovereignty to Poland.20 They wanted to support the Polish American organizations, but only as far as they dealt with Polish issues. Maintaining a Polish American identity was not important to them. They tried to introduce their own celebrations to the Polish American calendar, in order to influence the collective memory of the Polish ethnic group. Starting with anniversaries related to World War II, they stressed 1 September 1939 and the German attack on Poland as the beginning of the war, rather than Pearl Harbor and December 1941. Observances of the Katyń massacre were even more important as they reminded public opinion about the killing of 20,000 Polish officers by the Soviet NKVD in 1940 — a fact that the Soviets stubbornly denied until the collapse of the communist regime. Special masses and rallies were organized on or around 10 April, the day when Nazi Germany announced that mass graves of Polish officers had been found in the Katyń forest near Smolensk in 1943.21 The post-WWII émigrés also commemorated the restoration of Poland’s independence on 11 November 1918, an official pre-World War II Polish holiday neglected by communist propaganda in post-war Poland. At the same time, they made significant efforts to combat the Warsaw regime in its attempts to celebrate 22 July — the anniversary of the so-called July Manifesto by the Soviet-controlled Polish provisional government in 1944 — as a new Polish national holiday. They discouraged both leaders of Polonia and American politicians from accepting invitations to observances at the Polish embassy and consulates in the United States.22 Selecting historical events to celebrate was considered a way of shaping identity. It should be observed, however, that these activities of the ‘new’ immigrants were addressed primarily to the most active part of Polonia acquainted in some manner with Polish affairs and familiar with their nuances. They prioritized home-based political goals and divisions over ethnic identity, but at the same time served as an important factor in building the cohesion of that wave of the Polish immigrants. 17 Discussion at the annual conference of the Polish American Historical Association in Washington, DC, 1 January 2004. 18 Fels, ‘“Whatever Your Heart Dictates and Your Pocket Permits”’. 19 Pula, Polish Americans, pp. 86–88. 20 Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann, The Exile Mission. 21 On the Katyn Massacare and its aftermath see e.g. Materski, Katyn. 22 Wojdon, White and Red Umbrella, pp. 85–86, 283.

413

41 4

j oa n n a wo j d o n

At the same time, the goal of the ‘old Polonia’ was to reach wider American audiences and to link Polish American memory and identity with the all-American one. Not only did they take care to ensure Presidential proclamations were issued on Pułaski Day, but they successfully lobbied for postcards and stamps with Pułaski’s image to be issued by the US Post Office. They worked to include Pułaski in observances of the US Bicentennial in 1976 and generally to have the Polish impact on US history recognized during the Bicentennial.23 They tried to have Polish Americans nominated to the American Revolution Bicentenary Agency on the federal level, and when this effort failed they worked to get them on the National Bicentennial Ethnic Racial Council, this time with some success.24 Polish Americans lobbied for streets named after Kościuszko in American cities. They maintained the Kościuszko garden in West Point, and persuaded the National Park Service to give national historic memorial status to the house in Philadelphia where Kościuszko lived during his stay in the United States.25 More than thirty years later Alex Storożyński authored a biography of this Polish American hero that won the Pulitzer Prize, and thus reached a larger American audience extending far beyond the Polish ethnic community.26 These activities aimed at incorporating Polish American history into general narratives about America’s past. History taught at schools was one of Polonia’s targets. It turned out, however, that the Polish group lacked the financial and human resources to deal with this task in a systematic manner. Rather, we can note examples of individual attempts and interventions. One of the most successful was the Holocaust history textbook in the state of New York, initially criticized by Polish Americans for omitting Polish victims of Nazi crimes. Polish American experts were invited to work on the improved edition and corrected this omission.27 Attempts to present Polish victims alongside Jewish ones in the US Holocaust Museum did not bring such positive effects, despite the fact that Aloysius Mazewski, president of the Polish American Congress, and the Polish American priest Rev. John Pawlikowski were members of the Museum Council when the concept of the core exhibit was under discussion in the 1980s. A conference organized on ‘The other victims of Holocaust’ did not satisfy the Polish American leaders.28 In the twenty-first century, Alex Storożyński, president of the Kościuszko Foundation, initiated an electronic petition to end the use of the phrase ‘Polish concentration camps’ in reference to the Nazi camps located on the occupied territory of Poland during World War II. Over 300,000 signatures demonstrated the extent to which this historical issue mobilized both Polish and Polish American public opinion.29

23 Many materials pertaining to Pułaski’s bicentennial can be found in Różański Papers, box 59, folder 3, and copies of the proclamations in Różański Papers, box 59, folders 7 and 8. 24 Mazewski, ‘Report Presented to the Tenth Convention’; Wojdon, White and Red Umbrella, p. 232. 25 Wojdon, White and Red Umbrella, pp. 235–36. 26 Storożynski, The Peasant Prince. 27 Polish American Congress 1984, cited in Wojdon, White and Red Umbrella, p. 198. 28 ‘The Forgotten Holocaust’, in Zogda. 29 The Kościuszko Foundation 2010.

S h ap i n g t h e Po li sh Ame ri can i d e nt i t y

Thus, the Polish Americans tried to link all-American observances with their own ethnic heritage. They reacted in cases where this heritage was neglected or distorted. But they also initiated their own campaigns that referred to Polish American history, and worked at using it to build ethnic pride among Polonia. One example was the three hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the arrival of the first Poles on the territory that later became the United States of America. Artur Waldo, a Polish American historian, claimed to have found in the 1940s a document (booklet) describing the role of Polish settlers in Jamestown, Virginia — the first British colony on the American coast. The book later disappeared, but other documents were found proving a Polish presence in Jamestown in 1605. This gave impulse to the idea of a commemorative event in Jamestown in 1955, despite the fact that the organizers were not able to provide the National Park Service with confirmed names of the Polish settlers. This prevented the NPS from putting permanent plaques at the memorial site, but a book was published containing all the documents concerning the Poles in Jamestown.30 The book was reprinted in 1976, and apparently the myth of the Jamestown Pioneers from Poland remained alive. They were said to have operated the first glassworks in America, to have organized the first strike in response to abuses by an employer, and to have played a forerunner of the game of baseball in their spare time. The research papers published in the Polish American Studies do not confirm those findings, however. The only sure thing, according to the article by Richard Orli, is that between two and five members of John Smith’s expedition of 1605 were Polish.31 Surprisingly, Panna Maria in Texas, the first permanent Polish settlement in the USA that does not evoke any historical controversies, has not become a real ‘place of memory’ among Polish Americans.32 General Włodzimierz Krzyżanowski, a Polish participant in the American Civil War, whose biography was published on the occasion of the war’s centennial, is also rather marginal in the Polish American historical consciousness.33 This does not stop Polish American historians from pursuing research on the Polish (and Polish American) presence in various aspects of American and world history, nor from attempts to disseminate them among general public.34 The quincentennial of the birthday of Nicolaus Copernicus in 1973 gave Polish Americans a good occasion to manifest their ethnic pride at the nationwide level. Observances were held around the world and sponsored by both the Polish government and various American institutions, including the American Academy of Sciences. Polish American individuals and communities were actively involved, kicking off a number of activities on their own. Copernicus himself did not need Polish American promotion, but his Polish connections did. This became the main task of the Polish American community, especially that German Americans had claimed the great 30 Dziób, Burke, and Wiewióra, eds, Jamestown Pioneers; Wiewióra, Jamestown Pioneers form Poland. 31 Orli, ‘The Identity’. Cf. Pula, ‘Jamestown’s 400th Anniversary’. 32 Kaya Mirecka-Plos, who was active in the American Council of Polish Cultural Clubs, confesses in her memoirs that she was not aware of the existence of Panna Maria until her visit to Poland in 2001 — Mirecka-Plos, Jan Karski, p. 231. 33 Pula, For Liberty and Justice; Haiman, ‘General Albin F. Schoepf ’. 34 See for instance Pula, ‘Polish Participation’; Pease, ‘The Pele of Chicago’.

415

41 6

j oa n n a wo j d o n

astronomer was of German nationality. Polonia lobbied for mentions of Copernicus’s Polishness in the official proclamations issued by state governors, as well as for using the Polish, not Latin, version of his name: Mikołaj Kopernik.35 There were also campaigns initiated by Polonia itself promoting Polish heritage in the United States. In Project: Pole sponsored by the Polish American millionaire Edward Piszek, historical debates played a crucial role, even though this was not the intention of Piszek himself. As a businessman, he designed a publicity campaign promoting Polish contributions to world civilization. The media promoted such figures as Copernicus and Marie Curie-Skłodowska, mentioning their Polishness. Another part of Project: Pole was the book Poland, sponsored by Piszek and published by the Polish seminary in Orchard Lake, but apparently influenced by the communist regime in terms of the vision of the past it presented.36 The selection of facts and the narrative of the book indicated that the communist system was Poland’s main achievement and the Soviet Union its best ally, while omitting many elements of Polish pre-war and World War II history that might contradict this main thesis. The World War II émigrés fiercely opposed the book and the project itself. They protested against the imposition of a communist version of the past on the American (including Polish American) readers who would unconsciously ‘buy’ it thanks to its attractive presentation.37 Both historians and ordinary Polish Americans stress the role of religion in shaping and maintaining Polish ethnic identity.38 Polish traditions, such as Christmas Eve with supper and with presents that Polish American kids receive earlier than their American friends, the Easter basket with food blessed by a priest, and the more recent Pączki Day distinguish Polish families from their friends and neighbours. Two historical aspects related to Polish American religious life and Polish American identity should be mentioned. The first and most important was the papacy of John Paul II (Cardinal Karol Wojtyła, 1978–2005) that had a profound impact on Polish American pride.39 The other consisted of observances of the thousandth anniversary of Poland’s baptism in 1966 — an occasion to appreciate the significance of the Polish American community in the American Catholic Church. This did not, however, solve all the troubles of the Polonia Catholics who felt discriminated by the American Episcopate, predominantly of Irish descent. However, the very presence of President Johnson during the dedication of a new shrine in Doylestown, Pennsylvania in 1966, gave special significance to the ceremonies that combined the round anniversary of Poland’s Christianity, and the establishment of a new place of memory for Polonia with a burial place for distinguished Polish Americans. It made it a truly Polish American event.40

35 See for instance Ideas, Suggestions for Mikołaj Kopernik; Śmietana Papers. 36 Zieleniewicz, Poland. 37 On Piszek, see his autobiography: Piszek, Some Good in the World. For the discussion on the Project: Pole see Wojdon, White and Red Umbrella, pp. 189–90. 38 Brożek, Polonia amerykańska, pp. 43–58; Bukowczyk, And My Children Did Not Know Me, pp. 40–45; Erdmans, The Grasinski Girls. 39 Radziłowski, ‘Miracle: American Polonia’. 40 Johnson, ‘Remarks at the Dedication’. See also Reagan, ‘Remarks at a Polish Festival’.

S h ap i n g t h e Po li sh Ame ri can i d e nt i t y

Contrary to the pessimistic forecasts of such prominent researchers as Florian Znaniecki and William Thomas, Polonia did not disappear or ‘melt’ into American society.41 Over 150 years from the establishment of the first permanent Polish settlement in America and nearly the same amount of time following mass emigration, the Polish American group still exists and is quite active. We can observe this while visiting such cities as Chicago, New York, Milwaukee, and New Britain (Connecticut), as well as while browsing Polish American internet sites. I do not claim, however, that Polish ethnic identity is based solely on historical memory. History and memory cannot be neglected, and research on constructing the historical identity of American Polonia brings us to the following conclusions. Elements linking the Polish group with mainstream American society were chosen and promoted. Positive elements that might build ethnic pride, and which were easy and rewarding to identify with were most likely to be accepted. This corresponds with the American way of life: to be the best rather than suffer, to find solutions and deal with problems rather than give up. Polish Americans found it ennobling to prove their presence in America ‘from the very beginning’, not only of the USA but of the European colonization of the New World. They promoted Kościuszko and Pułaski — prominent figures who played crucial roles in the most significant events of American history. They wanted to be proud of the Polish contribution to American and world history, and to make others aware of it as well. This is why they joined in celebrations of Polish and Polish American historical figures and events and initiated their own. The Polish Americans wanted the impact of ordinary people on American history (and the American dream) to be appreciated. It would help them counteract the ‘Polack jokes’ so popular in the 1960s and 1970s and instil Polish identity in the young generations who would not be ashamed of being Polish any more. Old Polonia prioritized a combination of Polish and American identities that should not exclude each other, while the post-World War II exiles were preoccupied with counteracting communist propaganda. One could observe a struggle over Polish American memory in the post-World War II period between the American mainstream (promoting Americanization), the Warsaw regime (supporting Polishness but in a pro-communist version), and Polish American elites (who sometimes lacked a clear concept and had very limited resources). Historical interpretations served as weapons in these battles. Apparently, shared geographical/spatial origin can serve as a uniting factor, but it does not necessarily suffice in order to create a coherent group. The attractiveness of mainstream American society and its culture impacted not only individual Polish Americans (up to losing their Polish identity) but also Polonia as a group (that adapted some of the American practices to their own habits). The Polish ethnic identity was not the only one to be identified with and celebrated by the members of the Polish American community. They practised and displayed their religious beliefs (which may have cemented them as an ethno-religious group or separated them from one another — as in the case of the Polish Jews, or atheists). They could prioritize their social or professional status: e.g. it was not uncommon for Polish 41 Znaniecki and Thomas, The Polish Peasant.

417

41 8

j oa n n a wo j d o n

professionals to break ties with their ethnic community for their cultural needs, educational background, everyday habits did not belong to the working class ethnic practices. Political differences (in relation to the US or Poland’s politics), economic competition, cultural preferences or personal issues gave plenty of reasons for intergroup conflicts which Polonia often complained about but could not overcome. All these seem to be universal experiences and thus, conclusions from focusing on multiple historical sources related to this particular ethnic group may help interpret other, more fragmented, materials.

Works Cited Primary Sources Ideas, Suggestions for Mikołaj Kopernik, 1473–1973 Quincentennial Observances, to observe the 500th Anniversary of the Birth of Astronomer Mikołaj Kopernik, Polish American Congress Inc., National Kopernik Quincentennial Committee, 1973 Johnson, Lyndon, ‘Remarks at the Dedication of the Shrine of Our Lady of Czestochowa, Doylestown, Pennsylvania’ (1966), http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index. php?pid=27935 Mazewski, Aloysius A., ‘Report Presented to the Tenth Convention of the Polish American Congress, Inc., in Philadelphia, Pa.’, 36, Biblioteka Narodowa (Warsaw, Poland), Dział Dokumentów Życia Społecznego, Polonia amerykańska, 1976 D ‘Outline of Events in the Development of the New York Education Department’s Holocaust and Genocide Study Guide’, in Polish American Congress and Polish American Congress Charitable Foundation Board of Directors Washington Hotel Minutes Meeting October 11 and 12, 1984, (Washington, DC: Polish American Congress, 1984), pp. 129–30 Reagan, Ronald, ‘Remarks at a Polish Festival in Doylestown, Pennsylvania’, September 9 1984, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=40348 Różański, Edward, and Loda Papers, Immigration History Research Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota Śmietana Papers — Śmietana, Walter Papers Immigration History Research Center, Minneapolis, Minnesota ‘The Forgotten Holocaust: Polish Experience’, Zgoda, 15 March 1987, p. 1 The Kościuszko Foundation 2010 — The Kościuszko Foundation, ‘Petition on German Concentration Camps’, https://thekf.org/kf/our_impact/petition/ (retrieved on 9 January 2018) Secondary Studies Brożek, Andrzej, Polonia amerykańska 1854–1939 (Warszawa: Interpress, 1977); English version: Polish Americans: 1854–1939 (Warszawa: Interpress, 1985) Bukowczyk, John, And My Children Did Not Know Me: A History of the Polish Americans (Indianapolis: Indiana University Press, 1996)

S h ap i n g t h e Po li sh Ame ri can i d e nt i t y

Connel, William, ‘Italians in the Early Atlantic World’, in The Routledge History of Italian Americans, ed. by William J. Connel and Stanislao G. Pugliese (New York: Routledge, 2018), pp. 17–41 Demantowski, Marko, ‘From Anniversary to Anniversaryitis’, http://public-historyweekly.oldenbourg-verlag.de/2-2014-11/vom-jubilaeum-zur-jubilaeumitis/ (retrieved 8 January 2018) Dziób, Franciszek, Karol Burke, and Józef Wiewióra, eds, Jamestown Pioneers from Poland (Chicago: Polish American Congress, 1958) Erdmans, Mary, The Grasinski Girls: The Choices They Had and the Choices They Made (Athens: Ohio University Press, 2004) Fels, Bradley, ‘“Whatever Your Heart Dictates and Your Pocket Permits”: Polish-American Aid to Polish Refugees during World War II’, Journal of American Ethnic History, 22.3 (2003), 3–30 ‘General Pulaski Memorial Day’, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Pulaski_ Memorial_Day (retrieved 8 January 2018) Haiman, Miecislaus, ‘General Albin F. Schoepf ’, Polish American Studies, 2.3–4 (1945), 70– 78 Jaroszyńska-Kirchmann, Anna, The Exile Mission: The Polish Political Diaspora and Polish Americans, 1939–1956 (Athens: Athens University Press, 2004) ‘The Kościuszko Foundation Mission and History’, https://www.thekf.org/kf/about/ mission_history (retrieved 8 January 2018) Materski, Wojciech, Anna Cienciala, and Natalia Lebedeva, eds, Katyn: A Crime Without Punishment, Annals of Communism Series (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007) Mirecka-Plos, Kaja, Jan Karski — człowiek, któremu powiedziałam prawdę (Katowice: Credo, 2014) Mucha, Janusz, Everyday Life and Festivity in a Local Ethnic Community: Polish-Americans in South Bend, Indiana, East European Monographs, 441 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1996) Orli, Richard, ‘The Identity of the 1608 Jamestown Craftsmen’, Polish American Studies, 65.2 (2008), 17–26 Pease, Neal, ‘The Pele of Chicago: Janusz Kowalik and the Beginnings of Professional Soccer in the United States’, Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Polish American Historical Association (Denver: 6 January 2017) Piszek, Edward, Some Good in the World. A Life of Purpose: A Memoir by E. J. Piszek as Told to Jake Morgan (Boulder: University Press of Colorado, 2001) Posern-Zieliński, Andrzej, Tradycja a etniczność. Przemiany kultury Polonii amerykańskiej, (Wrocław: Ossolineum, 1982) Pula, James, For Liberty and Justice: The Life And Times Of Wladimir Krzyżanowski (Chicago: Polish American Congress Charitable Foundation, 1978) ———, Polish Americans: An Ethnic Community (New York: Twayne, 1995) ———, ‘Jamestown’s 400th Anniversary’, Polish American Studies, 65.2 (2008), 9–15 ———, ‘Polish Participation in the Antislavery Crusade. Paper presented at the Annual Meeting of the Polish American Historical Association’ (Atlanta: 8 January 2016) Radzik, Tadeusz, Polonia amerykańska wobec Polski 1918–1939 (Lublin: UMCS, 1990)

419

4 20

j oa n n a wo j d o n

Radziłowski, John, ‘Miracle: American Polonia, Karol Wojtyła and the Election of Pope John Paul II’, Polish American Studies, 63.1 (2006), 79–87 Storożynski, Alex, The Peasant Prince: Thaddeus Kosciuszko and the Age of Revolution (New York: Thomas Dunne, 2009) Wiewióra, Joseph, ed., Jamestown Pioneers from Poland: Revised Edition of the Commemorative Book Originally Published for Polonia’s Observance in Jamestown in 1958 (Chicago: Polish American Congress Charitable Foundation, 1976) Wojdon, Joanna, White and Red Umbrella: Polish American Congress in the Cold War Era 1944–1988 (Reno: Helena History, 2015) Zieleniewicz, Andrzej, Poland (Orchard Lake: Orchard Lake Schools, 1971) Znaniecka-Łopata, Helena, Polish Americans: Status Competition in an Ethnic Community (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice-Hall, 1976) Znaniecki, Florian, and William Thomas, The Polish Peasant in Europe and in America [originally published between 1918 and 1920], ed. by Eli Zaretsky (Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1995)

Index

Alba Iulia: 74, 76, 80, 81, 83–87 Alexander Nevsky: 304 Alfonso, Peter. See Dialogus contra Judaeos Andrew II, king of Hungary: 58, 59, 62 Annals or Chronicles of the Famous Kingdom of Poland, by Jan Długosz: 265–69 Aragon, Crown of: 331–32, 334, 349, 356, 358–60 Arborea, House of: 335, 336, 339, 354 Attila: 77–78 Avis, dynasty of: 185, 206 Avis, Military Order of: 186, 191, 204 Barcelona: 116, 119, 129, 354, 357 Count of: 350, 351 Balearic Islands: 115, 116, 120, 125, 355 Bielski, Marcin: 276–77 Bílejovský, Bohuslav. See Czech Chronicle, containing the way of Christian faith of communion under both kinds Bohemia, Kingdom of: 93, 95, 96, 98, 99, 101, 102, 107, 371, The Book of Henryków: 146–48 Brazil: 165–67 Bruno of Querfurt: 261, 299–300 Cabral, Pedro Álvares: 165, 167 Caminha, Pedro Vaz de: 165–70, 173, 175–76 Castillian dynasty: 359–360 Catalans: 120, 354, 357–59 Catalan nation: 352–55, 357, 361 Catalogus abbatum Saganensium, by Ludolf of Żagań (Sagan): 148–49

Charles IV of Luxembourg, emperor, King of Bohemia: 96, 102, 103, 376 Chronica Polonorum (also: Chronicon Polono-Silesiacum): 142–43, 145 Chronica Polonorum, by Wincenty Kadłubek: 262–63 Chronica Principum Poloniae, by Canon Peter of Byczyna: 143–44 Chronicle about the Foundation of the Czech Land, by Martin Kuthen of Šprinsberk: 104 Chronicle of Dalimil: 95, 99 Chronicle of Greater Poland: 263–64, 266 Cistercians: 142, 144, 146 Cluny, abbacy of: 126 Cordoba: 126 Caliphate of: 188 Crónica da Tomada de Ceuta, by Gomes Eanes de Zurara: 204–06 Crónica de D. João I, by Fernão Lopes: 203–04 Cronicon Livoniae, by Henry of Livonia: 297 Crown of Bohemia: 22, 93, 96, 101, 109 Lands of: 31, 93, 94, 97, 99, 107, 108, 374 Cumans: 58, 65–66, 67, 76, 77, 250, 267, 305 Czech, mythical forefather of Czechs: 101, 105, 277–78 Czech Chronicle, by Václav Hájek of Libočany: 104–05 Czech Chronicle, containing the way of Christian faith of communion under both kinds, by Bohuslav Bílejovský: 102–03

4 22

i n de x

Czech History, by Aeneas Silvio Piccolomini: 107–08 Czechs: 99, 101, 103 Deeds of the Princes of the Poles, by Gallus Anonymous: 262 Dialogus contra Judaeos, by Peter Alfonso (Mosé Sefardí): 126 Dominicans: 128–29, 134 Emery, son of the king Stephen (Saint): 63 Ethnicity: 36–37, 101, 139–41, 187 Franks: 43–44, 47 Germans: 95, 98, 100, 103, 105, 106, 107, 141–44, 147, 149, 213, 369–70 Germany: 64, 108, 141, 144, 213, 395, 413 Gesta Hungarorum, by Anonymous the notary: 76 Gesta Hungarorum, by Simon of Kéza: 77–78 Giudicato of Arborea: 331–33 Głogów Annals, by Caspar Borgeni: 155–57 Guinea: 162, 164–65 Hedwig Codex. See Schlackenwerth Codex Hedwig of Andechs, saint: 142, 149, 150, 151–53 Henry I the Bearded, Duke of Silesia: 142, 144, 150 Henry II the Pious, Duke of Silesia: 142, 143–44, 150, 275 Henryków, abbey of: 146–47, 157 Historical calendar. See Kalendář historický by Daniel Adam of Veleslavín History, Andrew of Bergamo: 42–43 Hugh II, Judge of Arborea: 334, 335, 341 Hugh III, Judge of Arborea: 338, 340 Hungarians: 20, 56, 58, 62, 65–67, 73, 76, 78, 81, 82, 89, 156, 157, 271, 278, 301, 305, 306 Hussites: 22, 94, 97, 100, 102, 103–05, 107, 108, 370, 373–74, 389, 393, 399 Wars: 370–71, 375, 380, 390, 392, 393, 394, 396, 398, 399

identity, ethnic: 33–35, 37–38, 41, 44–45, 49, 95 implicit understanding: 169–70, 174, 176 Islam: 127–28 James II, King of Aragon: 333–34 Jews: 56–57, 102, 126, 128, 129–31, 202, 268–69 Catalan: 118–19, 121 Lithuanian: 215–16, 218–23, 225–26, 229, 231, 244, 254–55 Portuguese: 186–87, 190–202, 206 João I, king of Portugal: 186, 190–94, 196–97, 201–02 Kalendář historický by Daniel Adam of Veleslavín: 100–01 Karaites: 213, 216, 219, 222–23, 226, 238–39 Arrival to Grand Duchy of Lithuania: 240–49 Crimean: 244–45, 247–51 Khazars: 249, 250, 251, 255 Kiev: 301, 302, 308, 311 Koran: 126–27 Kromer, Marcin: 274–76 Ladislas IV Cuman, king of Hungary: 58, 65 language Arabic: 118, 124, 125 Czech: 94, 95–96, 97–98, 100, 101, 103, 107, 370–71, 373–75, 378, 382–83, 385–87, 389, 393, 395, 397–98 German: 56, 94, 96, 97, 107, 108, 141–42, 156, 158, 369–71, 373–80, 382, 385, 389, 395, 396–98 Hebrew: 126, 130 Hungarian: 56, 88 Latin: 56, 88, 94, 96, 130, 371, 373, 376, 378–80, 382–83, 385–87, 389, 393, 395, 397–98 Polish: 94, 141, 156, 158 law: 147–48

i nd e x

Lech, mythical forefather of Poles: 101, 277–78 Legnica, battle of: 150, 155, 275 Libellus de institutione morum (Admonitions): 63–64 Lithuanians: 264–65, 267, 270–75, 278 Llul, Ramon: 124–25, 132–33 Lombards: 42–43, 44, 48 Lubiąż (Lubens), Cistercian abbey: 142, 144, 146 Lutherans: 227–28 Majorca: 116, 117, 120, 125, 350, 356, 359 Mariano IV, Judge of Arborea: 335, 337–38 Martí, Ramon: 128–29, 130, 131–32 Martin Kuthen of Šprinsberk. See Chronicle about the Foundation of the Czech Land memory: 75–76 Miechowita, Maciej: 277–78 Mongols: 264, 302 Moscow State: 268, 275, 276, 279–82, 291 multiculturalism: 213–14 multiethnicity: 73, 139–41, 149 Muslim: 120–21, 133, 186–90, 195–201, 203, 205–07, 216, 280, 350–52, 356 Nahmanides (Rabbi Bonastruc ça Porta): 130 Nestorchronik. See Tale of Past Years Novgorod: 291, 299, 300, 308 Novgorodian Chronicle: 299, 300 Old Annals of Bohemia. See Staré letopisy České Pechenegs: 73, 76, 77, 261, 267, 299 Penyafort, Ramon of: 121, 123, 124, 129, 130 Peter IV, King of Aragon: 338–39 Peter the Venerable: 126–27 Pisa: 120, 331–34, 351 Poles: 107, 141–44, 147, 149, 270, 300, 301, 410–11

Preachers, Order of: 121–22, 134 Primary Rus’ Chronicle: 290, 291, 292, 294–96, 298, 299–300, 302, 305–06 Pułaski Day: 412–13 Roma, people: 218, 223–24 Romanians: 73–74, 76–78 Rothkirch. See Studnica, battle of Rus’: 260–63, 266–67, 273, 275, 276, 278, 290, 293–96, 312 Rus’ Land: 302–04, 312–13 Ryurikids: dynasty: 301, 302, 303, 307–08, 309–13 Sarmatians: 270, 280 Saxons in Transylvania: 74–75, 79, 81–83, 85, 86, 88–89 Schlackenwerth Codex: 149–50, 155 Sefardí, Mosé. See Dialogus contra Judaeos Seville: 123, 126 Sibiu 83, 85 Silesia: 107–08 Slovaks: 105 Slovo o pogibeli Russkoi zemli: 292, 304–08, 310–11, 313 Solomon, king: 299–300 Staré letopisy České: 100 Stephen, saint, king of Hungary 61, 63, 64 Stránský, Pavel: 106–07 Studnica (Rothkirch), battle of: 142, 143–44 Szeklers: 73, 74, 77–78, 86 Tale of Past Years: 290 Tale of the Ruin of the Rus’ (Russian) Land. See Slovo o pogibeli Russkoi zemli Talmud: 129, 130 Tatars: 213, 216, 218, 222, 224–25, 231, 241–42, 251, 253, 255, 264, 272–73, 275–76, 278, 279, 280 Teutonic Order: 241, 252, 265, 268, 272, Usodimare, Antoniotto: 162–63

423

424

i n de x

Valencia, Kingdom of: 116–17, 123 Varangians: 294, 297, 300, 312 Vasco da Gama: 163, 165, 167 Veleslavín, Daniel Adam of. See Kalendář historický Verona, city: 39–41 Versus de Verona (Rhythmus Pipinianus): 39–40 Versus Lubenses: 144–46

Vladimir the Saint, duke of Kiev: 299–300 Vytautas the Great (Alexander), Grand Duke of Lithuania: 211, 213–14, 220, 223, 239, 243–44, 247, 251–55, 274 Wapowski, Bernard: 270–72 Władysław Jagiełło, King of Poland, Grand Duke of Lithuania: 267–68

Early European Research

All volumes in this series are evaluated by an Editorial Board, strictly on academic grounds, based on reports prepared by referees who have been commissioned by virtue of their specialism in the appropriate field. The Board ensures that the screening is done independently and without conflicts of interest. The definitive texts supplied by authors are also subject to review by the Board before being approved for publication. Further, the volumes are copyedited to conform to the publisher’s stylebook and to the best international academic standards in the field.

Titles in Series Sociability and its Discontents: Civil Society, Social Capital, and their Alternatives in Late Medieval and Early Modern Europe, ed. by Nicholas Eckstein and Nicholas Terpstra (2009) Diseases of the Imagination and Imaginary Disease in the Early Modern Period, ed. by Yasmin Haskell (2011) Giovanni Tarantino, Republicanism, Sinophilia, and Historical Writing: Thomas Gordon (c. 1691–1750) and his ‘History of England’ (2012) Writing Royal Entries in Early Modern Europe, ed. by Marie-Claude Canova-Green, Jean Andrews, and Marie-France Wagner (2013) Friendship and Social Networks in Scandinavia c.1000–1800, ed. by Jón Viðar Sigurðsson and Thomas Småberg (2013) Identities in Early Modern English Writing: Religion, Gender, Nation, ed. by Lorna Fitzsimmons (2014) Fama and her Sisters: Gossip and Rumour in Early Modern Europe, ed. by Heather Kerr and Claire Walker (2015) Understanding Emotions in Early Europe, ed. by Michael Champion and Andrew Lynch (2015) Raphaële Garrod, Cosmographical Novelties in French Renaissance Prose (1550–1630): Dialectic and Discovery (2016) Languages of Power in Italy (1300–1600), ed. by Daniel Bornstein, Laura Gaffuri, and Brian Jeffrey Maxson (2017) Performing Emotions in Early Europe, ed by Philippa Maddern, Joanne McEwan, and Anne M. Scott (2018) Women and Credit in Pre-Industrial Europe, ed. by Elise M. Dermineur (2018) Emotion and Medieval Textual Media, ed. by Mary C. Flannery (2019) Luxury and the Ethics of Greed in Early Modern Italy, ed. by Catherine Kovesi (2019) Historiography and the Shaping of Regional Identity in Europe: Regions in Clio’s Looking Glass, ed. by Dick E. H. de Boer and Luis Adão da Fonseca (2020)