concepts of nationality in the ancient world?

How did the normal individual, let's say a trader or farmer, identify with the larger political organizations around them? Did the ancient world lean towards a more westphalian concept of nation state, or was it geared more towards a feudalistic loyalty to local nobility? A mixture of both?

For instance a farmer in the Pelopeneses, let's say from Athens, would consider himself as Athenian? or would he have more loyalty to his specific tribe? Certainly they wouldn't consider themselves "Koinon" or "Delian" when the leagues were around? We don't consider ourselves "Naftaean" or "North American", but Europeans do consider themselves "European" despite specific national identities. I understand regional 'allegiances' of sort, Bavarians, Prussians, Bostonians, etc. but the larger political context supercedes them.


How about in more tightly organized entities, like the SPQR? Was the concept of SPQR as a nation state a reality? Or was the landed aristocracy and nobles, or later Consuls, just seen as representatives of SPQR political influence, and those below them still clinging to local allegiances and political identities?

Knowing that most kingdoms were simply a family, I doubt there was a political awareness beyond their loyal satraps as being "Seleukid" or "Sakae" as i'd imagine the presence of the ruling family were only ever noticed on the coins printed and the clothes of the man who took them when collecting taxes.

Europeans think of themselves as Europeans mainly when comparing themselves to non-Europeans. When comparing themselves to each other, they think of themselves as French or German, etc.

So your Athenian farmer might think of himself as Greek when compared to Persians, Athenian when compared to Macedonians, Corinthians or Spartans, and of his local tribe when compared to other people under Athenian dominion. It's dependent on context.

Just a short note: the concept of national states was introduced in western Europe in the last few centuries. It would not be wise to judge different societies with contemporary tools.

Another short note: national identity is often propagated by the ruling classes in order to keep their subordinates in line and use them against rival elites. Therefore these identities change according to the needs of each ruling class for internal stability and its struggles against external enemies. A fitting example would be the different views in ancient literature on whether the Macedonians where Greek or not.

I don't think any meaningful territorial-based sense of nationality existed then. There were linguistic, cultural and ethnic ideals of identity (being "Greek" or "Macedonian") or those more specifically related to tribe or clan, but nothing so abstract as "European".

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Originally Posted by Noble Wrath

Just a short note: the concept of national states was introduced in western Europe in the last few centuries. It would not be wise to judge different societies with contemporary tools.

Another short note: national identity is often propagated by the ruling classes in order to keep their subordinates in line and use them against rival elites. Therefore these identities change according to the needs of each ruling class for internal stability and its struggles against external enemies. A fitting example would be the different views in ancient literature on whether the Macedonians where Greek or not.

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Yes, hence my reference to the concept as created in the Treaty of Westphalia.

I understand using modern views on nationality can't apply to the ancient world, or even to pre westphalian Europe, but we can still try to see what there was. For all I know, the SPQR was more akin to a modern nation state?


This question is mostly laid in response to hundreds of hours at looking at borders on my EB map, but also real borders at various times. I understand that to be part of a Kingdom mostly just meant you paid taxes to a different person, using their coinage, and that's it. It's why Cyrus was so praised because he didn't impose any Persian culture on them, allowing his subjects to retain their cultural, religious and in some respects their political identities.

but what about in the real world equivalent of a type I government? where the political structure is directly connected to the primary decision making body, not it's satraps, or client kings.


was it totally and completely cultural and linguistic? non Persian subject people wouldn't see themselves in the larger political entity of the Persian Empire? was the Shahanshah a distant figure who meant nothing to you, or was he as (hypothetically) given utmost respect?

Obviously the British colonies weren't as culturally or linguistically disparate as Medeans, Persians, Arabs and Egyptians, but they eventually overcame their individual identities to become the larger political, not linguistic, not cultural, entity of the United States. Did these groups overcome their cultural precluvities to associate themselves with the "Persian" political entity?

there has to be a book on the subject as this really does fascinate me

you´re part of something because you refuse to be something else :\ thats the basis of "nationality" since nations where those with whom you shared a common culture (germans and austrians for instance) and thus empires where those who had within their borders people from diferent cultural groups

in many ways you can view it today in most sub saharan countries they aren´t trully countries per se as much as they are empires since withint each countries borders you have alot of cultural (i don´t like using the term ethnic since thats always very biased i mean you have 2 parents 4 grandparents 8 great great parents and so forth wich can come from a miriad of diferent origins or parts of the globe) south africa had around 11 diferent languages angola as at least 11 major sub groups congo nigeria are like wtf are all those dudes doing together if we redrew the map of africa according to the natives interests instead of the worlds superpowers we would probably end up with around 245 diferent countries in africa

notable exceptions are liberia (it´s still a plastic non natural country but for diferent reasons) somalia (arab conections and muslim free cities) and ethiopia(coptic christians) since they where always part of a given "empire" before we the "whities" stepped in and even then you have many sub groups like the afar and those 2 great expections are mainly "nations" for religious reasons since the abyssinians and the somali represented themselfs and got attached to it as ways to say they wheren´t part of that other group

in the end it always comes down to the old political weapon of using the fear of the "others"

I remember as citizenship of poleis was something that foreigners could be awarded...
Even among Athenai people differentiated themselves between demos, for example with trophies related to military campaigns in other countries...
SPQR had so many social/legal divisions, I don't think the whole "empire" considered themselves as Romani, even Lucan during the principality said he was a Celtiberos...

In ancient times, family had a much more important role than today, I can easily see commoners referring to themselves with patronymics or tribe names...
Only distinctions I think were social classes and whether or not someone was a member of a royal family...

Nations depend on imagined communities and borders. Look for these things (among others mentioned) when looking for proto-nations in antiquity. It is far too easy to choose not to study the ancients in their own context and to instead impose our modern notions upon them.

The last I checked, Westphalia was regarded as the more-or-less the first official recognition of the concept of the modern sovereign territorial state; which is AFAIK rather different from the rather newer concept of nation-state...
Or at least, an awful lot of the "Westphalian" sovereign states were quite emphatically anything but nation-states well into the 1800s.

Jus' sayin'.

yes thank you for that, but you understand what I mean. the concept of a sovereign state in the ancient world, regardless of the many ethnicities (nations) within it.

nation states were probably more common in the ancient world, don't you think? a conglomerate of ethnically related peoples under one banner.

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Originally Posted by fomalhaut

yes thank you for that, but you understand what I mean. the concept of a sovereign state in the ancient world, regardless of the many ethnicities (nations) within it.

nation states were probably more common in the ancient world, don't you think? a conglomerate of ethnically related peoples under one banner.

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not really i mean normally people would gather around their own family and village and unleass there was a strong threat from the outside they would bicker at each other

even today we can see that to some extent with inter villages rivarly

a good example is for instance the inter clan wars of scotland there´s roughly around 200 diferent clans inside a small country all competiting and allying with each other

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Originally Posted by fomalhaut

yes thank you for that, but you understand what I mean. the concept of a sovereign state in the ancient world, regardless of the many ethnicities (nations) within it.

nation states were probably more common in the ancient world, don't you think? a conglomerate of ethnically related peoples under one banner.

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a conglomerate of ethnically related people doesn't necessarily mean that: the Lakhmids for example, were a series of Arab tribes under the tutelage of a more powerful tribe (banu Lakhm*), but there was no nationalism involved. it was simply a series of tribes "bribed", or coerced, into subordination-a loose one, since The Arabs in general had zero concept of national identity. if the Lakhmids messed up in war, or failed to send money to the tribal leaders, then the tribes simply abandoned them.

*themselves vassals of the Sassanids

(most Arabs didn't refer to themselves as "Arab"; they went by "lakhmiy" or "qurayshiy" or "taghlibiy"; there is evidence that the term "Arab" was even unknown to some tribes)

To be honest, I'd have to say the term "nationality" is meaningless. Citizenship and ethnicity are well-defined terms, whereas nationality is a relatively vague concept that can be used to designate citizenship or ethnicity or both at once. I don't think the Enlightenment concepts of nationality had any fundamental effect on how European peoples defined themselve; certainly you can find examples of "nationalism" throughout the Middle Ages, Dark Ages and Ancient times. The two great national unification movements of the 19th century owed more, IMO, to the scope of people broadening (leading them to define themselves as German or Italian opposed to the French or the Austrians, rather than Saxon or Florentine opposed to their neighbours), than to the considerations of Enlightenment thinkers. Education and rising standards of living also lead the masses to be more vocal and involved in politics.

Generally I'd say people's identities are best visualised as a set of concentric circles; a Londer is not a Mancunian but both are English as opposed to Welsh, the English and the Welsh are British as opposed to the French, the British and French are Europeans as opposed to the Americans, and all are Westerners as opposed to Chinese; if we met extraterrestrials, defining ourselves as human would be much more important. Of course some elements of identity would be better represented as ellipses; for instance, gender can be more important than ethnicity or less so, depending on context.

Intersectionality is an even better, more accurate model of identity than that of concentric circles, but even it has its cons. Scholarship on theory of identity is on-going.

thanks for the good replies guys

any recommended readings on the subject, vartan?

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Originally Posted by vartan

Intersectionality is an even better, more accurate model of identity than that of concentric circles, but even it has its cons. Scholarship on theory of identity is on-going.

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I know this term only from inequality research about intersectional (and not only additional) effects of discriminations due to race, gender, sex, body, etc. Does it mean something similar here or is it a totally different concept?

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Originally Posted by Kival

I know this term only from inequality research about intersectional (and not only additional) effects of discriminations due to race, gender, sex, body, etc. Does it mean something similar here or is it a totally different concept?

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I'm not sure how it comes up elsewhere, but you'll probably come across it in classes that study the things you mentioned, so things like AfAm studies, Wom studies, and so on. Fomal I'll see my old syllabi and get back to you.

There is no such thing as nationality in the ancient world.

"Nation" comes from lt. "natus" (sp) and means "born in". You are part of the nation that you are born into, obviously. The thing you have in common with the other individuals in your nation is your birth. That means, your are meant to be equal regarding the place of birth within the borders of your state. That's what makes borders so exceptionally important in our era. Nationalism - which is considered right wing today, but ist ultimately the concept, the tool with which nations were designed - is an invention of the time of the French revolution in France and from then spreading, afaik.

Before the French revolution people identified themselves to the region, sometimes very small, they lived in. The model CirdanDharix gave is very good imo. So people had a regional identity. That was one side. The other side were the capitals of the states, the centres of power. The seat of a dynasty, their palace. Around them lived their aristocracy and appointed officials which comprised the ruling class. In this region, the "power region", the people naturally identified much more with their state, as they saw it everyday and was often identical with their regional identification.

Nationalism could spread as the technical means evolved to control the "outlying" regions. That means, first railroads, and then telegraphs. I cannot imagine, say, Wyoming being part of the US without railroad and telegraph. That means that nationalism is a 19th century concept. At that time, intellectuals made up the nations with the help of ancient sources. They took the history and turned it to something that "inevitably" led to the great nation they today are. The ancient and medieval states as a precursor to modern nations. Obviously, that's 100% bull, since the outcome of history is never sure.

Today the means of communication and control evolved to such a degree that a world identity becomes possible. Not yet, as there are many factors making that impossible, but the means are ready. A European identity is already there, especially in younger people. I think despite all the ado nobody really wants to give up the European Union. Regarding themself as European will never mean giving up seeing yourself as German or whatever, the language alone makes for that.

Regarding the Arche Seleukeia, I see the prime example of a state NOT being a nation, since it was comprised of a myriad of different regions, people, languages, cultures. They had a ruling class, the greeks, that imposed several centers of power (the colonies). The greeks were the backbone of the state as they ensured the king's power. A good indicator that the AS was anything but a nation is seen in the name: there was none. That state did not have a name, imagine that today. The concept of nations and nationalism is so deeply in our mindset that a country without a name is really hard to imagine. In official documents, the state was at best called "matter of the king".

"Republic" comes from "res publica" that means "public matter". So in ancient Rome, we see a more modern concept of state. It's a perfect example of regional identity at a center of power like I described above. But if we go a bit to the south, we see people that have absolutely nothing to do with the Romans. They saw them as conquerors. Sulla slaughtered the Samnites at around 80 BC. That means that there is a difference at that time between them and inhabitants of the city. Only these had Roman citizenship. Later it was expanded to Italia, and very late to the rest of the empire. But citizenship doesn't not mean that you view yourself as being part of a nation. The existence of provinces in the Roman Empire tells us that there is no such thing as nationality in the Roman empire. If they viewed themselves as a nation, why would they divide their realm into provinces, governed by a Roman of nation / citizenship?

Nation means that the place of birth within your state plays (almost) no role for your natinhood. A nation is a state where "ethnicity" and territory are supposed to be identical with a state authority within certain boudaries. I can think of no ancient state to which this applies. If we give regions like Latium the status of a proper nation, than every region of the world is a nation.

Here you go Fom. We were taught the concept of intersectionality in lecture, but you can put the puzzle together with these corresponding pieces. Note that they will naturally have other concepts in them, including but not limited to gender (+ the critique of so-called 'roles'), sex, and heteronormativity.

Fausto-Sterling, Anne. 1993. “The Five Sexes: Why Male and Female Are Not Enough.” The Sciences. March/April. Pp. 20-25
Lorde, Audre. 1984. “Age, Race, Class and Sex: Women Redefining Difference.” In Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde. Trumansburg, NY: The Crossing Press; 114-123.
Reddy, Maureen. 1994. “Why do white people have vaginas?” In Crossing the Color Line. Rutgers University Press. Pp. 41-64.

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Originally Posted by Centurio Nixalsverdrus

Before the French revolution people identified themselves to the region, sometimes very small, they lived in. The model CirdanDharix gave is very good imo. So people had a regional identity. That was one side. The other side were the capitals of the states, the centres of power. The seat of a dynasty, their palace. Around them lived their aristocracy and appointed officials which comprised the ruling class. In this region, the "power region", the people naturally identified much more with their state, as they saw it everyday and was often identical with their regional identification.

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Never forget that these very same affiliations were imagined communities just as much as modern day nations are. Anderson's pretty important and has been for a while when it comes to nations.

Anderson, Benedict R. O., Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism, Rev. ed. London: Verso, 2006.

You might want to give the book 'The Myth of Nations' by Patrick Geary a look. It's a bit more modern in orientation, but it does a fairly good idea of explaining the actual evolution of nationalism - hint, the French Revolution was far from it's first manifestation.