Hellenicity
Between Ethnicity and Culture
336 pages
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5 maps, 6 line drawings
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6 x 9
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© 2002
In today's cosmopolitan world, ethnic and national identity has assumed an ever-increasing importance. But how is this identity formed, and how does it change over time?
With Hellenicity, Jonathan M. Hall explores these questions in the context of ancient Greece, drawing on an exceptionally wide range of evidence to determine when, how, why, and to what extent the Greeks conceived themselves as a single people. Hall argues that a subjective sense of Hellenic identity emerged in Greece much later than is normally assumed. For instance, he shows that the four main ethnic subcategories of the ancient Greeks—Akhaians, Ionians, Aiolians, and Dorians—were not primordial survivals from a premigratory period, but emerged in precise historical circumstances during the eighth and seventh centuries B.C. Furthermore, Hall demonstrates that the terms of defining Hellenic identity shifted from ethnic to broader cultural criteria during the course of the fifth century B.C., chiefly due to the influence of Athens, whose citizens formulated a new Athenoconcentric conception of "Greekness."
With Hellenicity, Jonathan M. Hall explores these questions in the context of ancient Greece, drawing on an exceptionally wide range of evidence to determine when, how, why, and to what extent the Greeks conceived themselves as a single people. Hall argues that a subjective sense of Hellenic identity emerged in Greece much later than is normally assumed. For instance, he shows that the four main ethnic subcategories of the ancient Greeks—Akhaians, Ionians, Aiolians, and Dorians—were not primordial survivals from a premigratory period, but emerged in precise historical circumstances during the eighth and seventh centuries B.C. Furthermore, Hall demonstrates that the terms of defining Hellenic identity shifted from ethnic to broader cultural criteria during the course of the fifth century B.C., chiefly due to the influence of Athens, whose citizens formulated a new Athenoconcentric conception of "Greekness."
"An important, dense, rich, and challenging book of very wide scope."—Carla Antonaccio, Mediterranean Historical Review
"The portrait is powerful and vivid. Details can be disputed, hypotheses doubted, and conclusions challenged. But this book offers an illuminating vision of the evolution, diffusion, and transformation of the Greeks' take on their own identity, a vision rooted in the historical contingencies of antiquity but one whose perspective reaches to the present."—Erich S. Gruen, International Journal of the Classical Tradition
“This is a rich and well-documented book that uses a lively prose style to raise pressing questions about ethnicity and identity in the ancient world. . . . In general, the book will contribute to the dialogue of scholars in Greek literature, history, and archaeology, and it will also be of use to scholars concerned with ethnic and cultural identity outside ancient Greece. . . . Hall has not only made us think more carefully and precisely about ancient ethnicity, he has elevated the discussion of the subject to a new level.”
Contents
List of Maps and Figures
List of Abbreviations Used in Notes and Bibliography
Preface
Note on Nomenclature and Orthography
1. Theory and Method in Studying Ethnicity
Introduction
Defining Ethnicity
Discourse and Praxis: Saying and Doing
2. The Question of Origins
Greek Views of Greek Beginnings
The Invention of the Indo-Europeans
The Coming of the Greeks
The Becoming of the Greeks
Ethnic Unity in the Bronze Age?
3. Hellen's Sons: Blood and Belonging in Early Greece
The Akhaians of South Italy and the Peloponnese
The Ionians and Aiolians of Asia Minor
The Dorian Invasion: Fact or Fiction?
The Origins of Dorian Self-Consciousness
4. Identity and Alterity? The View from the Margins
'Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea': Encounters in the Mediterranean
Aggression and Accommodation
'When Two Worlds Collide': The Question of Acculturation
Barbarophonoi: The Linguistic Factor
Perceptions of Others: The Literary Testimony
Identity at the Margins?
5. Land and Peoplehood: The Ethnogenesis of the Hellenes
What's in a Name? 'Hellas' and 'Hellenes'
Commune Graeciae consilium: Delphi and Hellas
Patrai and genos: Olympia and the Hellenes
The Birth of a Nation
6. From Ethnicity to Culture
The Barbarian Enters the Stage
The Ascendancy of Culture
Panhellenism and the 'School of Hellas'
Looking Ahead: The Hellenistic Period
Epilogue
Appendix A: Dating Early Greek Poets
Appendix B: The Historicity of Early Olympic Victors
Bibliography
Index of Ancient Sources
Index
List of Abbreviations Used in Notes and Bibliography
Preface
Note on Nomenclature and Orthography
1. Theory and Method in Studying Ethnicity
Introduction
Defining Ethnicity
Discourse and Praxis: Saying and Doing
2. The Question of Origins
Greek Views of Greek Beginnings
The Invention of the Indo-Europeans
The Coming of the Greeks
The Becoming of the Greeks
Ethnic Unity in the Bronze Age?
3. Hellen's Sons: Blood and Belonging in Early Greece
The Akhaians of South Italy and the Peloponnese
The Ionians and Aiolians of Asia Minor
The Dorian Invasion: Fact or Fiction?
The Origins of Dorian Self-Consciousness
4. Identity and Alterity? The View from the Margins
'Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea': Encounters in the Mediterranean
Aggression and Accommodation
'When Two Worlds Collide': The Question of Acculturation
Barbarophonoi: The Linguistic Factor
Perceptions of Others: The Literary Testimony
Identity at the Margins?
5. Land and Peoplehood: The Ethnogenesis of the Hellenes
What's in a Name? 'Hellas' and 'Hellenes'
Commune Graeciae consilium: Delphi and Hellas
Patrai and genos: Olympia and the Hellenes
The Birth of a Nation
6. From Ethnicity to Culture
The Barbarian Enters the Stage
The Ascendancy of Culture
Panhellenism and the 'School of Hellas'
Looking Ahead: The Hellenistic Period
Epilogue
Appendix A: Dating Early Greek Poets
Appendix B: The Historicity of Early Olympic Victors
Bibliography
Index of Ancient Sources
Index
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