Batı Kanonunda Etnik Aidiyetin Merhaleleri: Orta Çağ’da Gens ve Natio Kavramlarının Etimolojik Açıdan Karşılaştırılması

Yıl 2024, , 161 - 183, 26.06.2024

Fahri Danış

https://doi.org/10.48120/oad.1360011

Öz

Günümüzde 'ulus' olarak anılan siyasi aidiyet biçiminin geçmişini incelediğimizde, birbiriyle yakından bağlantılı görülen birkaç kavramın tercih edildiği görülür. Antik Yunan’da aynı site içerisinde yaşayan toplulukları ya da daha genel bir perspektifle aynı toprak parçasını paylaşan grupları ifade etmek için kullanılan ‘ethnos’ tabiri ve Yunanca konuşmayan, mutlak öteki anlamındaki ‘barbaros’ terimi bu kavramlardan en sık başvurulanıdır. Özellikle Orta Çağ'da bu konudaki literatürde, 'gens' ve 'natio' konseptleri fazlasıyla öne çıkar. Bu Latince terimler, kan veya doğum yoluyla birbirine bağlı insan gruplarını ifade etmek için çeşitli tarihçilerin başvurduğu öncelikli kavramlar görünümündedir. Öte yandan Orta Çağ kroniklerinde artık ‘ulus’ olarak tercüme edebileceğimiz bu iki kavram arasında rasyonel veya hiyerarşik bir ilişki kurmak oldukça zordur. Bugünkü meşru siyasal aidiyet kategorisi olarak ‘ulus’u önceleyen bu iki kavramın Orta Çağ metinlerindeki çalışma prensiplerini ya da hangi kapsamda kullanıldıklarını ortaya koymak, her şeyden önce çağdaş kimlik tartışmalarında ve milliyetçilik literatüründe önemli çıkarımlarda bulunmayı kolaylaştıracaktır. Bu çalışma, tam da bu konuyu sorunsallaştırarak etimolojik olarak ‘ulus’ kavramını önceleyen gens ve natio konseptlerinin tarihsel bağlamda kullanımlarını karşılaştırmayı, aralarında anlamlı bir ilişki kurmanın imkanını soruşturmayı ve etnik aidiyetin Orta Çağ’daki temsil biçimlerini detaylandırmayı hedeflemektedir. Bu doğrultuda çalışmada; her kimliğin bir öteki üzerinden anlam kazandığı prensibi üzerinden hareketle ‘ötekilik merkezleri’nin varlığı soruşturulacak ve Orta Çağ literatüründe oldukça önemli üç ismin (Prümlü Regino, Sevilyalı İsidore ve Bede) yapıtlarında bu merkezlerin hangi kapsamda ele alındığı, gens ve natio konseptlerinin belirli ötekilikleri ne şekilde ifade ettiği tartışması ele alınacaktır.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Gens, Populus, Barbar, Ulus, Etnik Kimlik, Natio

Stages of Ethnic Belonging in the Western Canon: Etymological Rules of the Medieval Gens and Natio Concepts

Öz

Several closely connected notions come to the fore when we examine the past of the form of political belonging that is now referred to as the ‘nation.’ The two most commonly used of these notions are ‘ethnos’, which was employed in ancient Greece to indicate communities residing in the same polis or, more generally, groups sharing the same piece of land, and ‘barbaros’, which refers to the unquestionable other who does not speak Greek. ‘Gens’ and ‘natio’ were the most significant of these divisions by the Middle Ages. These Latin terms, in particular, refer to groups of people who are linked by blood or birth. However, it is difficult to find a rational or hierarchical relationship between these two notions—which we can now translate as nation, in the medieval chronicles. Above all, it will be simpler to draw significant conclusions in modern identity discussions and nationalism literature by revealing the underlying assumptions of these two concepts, which prioritize "nation" as the legitimate category of political belonging in today's society. In order to investigate the possibility of creating a meaningful connection between the concepts of "gens" and "natio," which etymologically precede the concept of "nation," and to describe the various ways in which ethnic belonging was represented in the Middle Ages, this study will problematize this very issue. In this direction, the study will examine the existence of "centers of otherness," the extent to which these centers are discussed in the works of three very significant figures in medieval literature (Regino of Prum, Isidore of Seville, and Bede), and how the concepts of "gens" and "natio" have a certain otherness.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Gens, Populus, Barbarian, Nation, Ethnic Belonging

Kaynakça

• Adams, Jeremy duQuesnay. The Populus of Augustine and Jerome: A Study in the Patristic Sense of Community, New York: Yale University Press, 1971.
• Appianus. Appian’s Roman History, vol. I. tr. H. White, London: LOEB Classical Library, 1972.
• Aristotle. Politics. tr. H. Rackham, London: LOEB Classical Library, 1959.
• Armstrong, John A.. Nations before Nationalism. Chapel Hill1: University of North Carolina Press, 1982.
• Balsdon, J.P.V.D. Romans and Aliens. Chapel Hill1: University of North Carolina Press, 1979.
• Bartlett, Robert. The Making of Europe: Conquest, Colonization and Cultural Change, 950-1350. London: Penguin Books, 1994.
• Bartlett, Robert. “Medieval and Modern Concepts of Race and Ethnicity”, Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies 31, no: 1 (2001): 39-56.
• Barth, Fredrik. “Introduction”, in Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Culture Difference. ed. Fredrik Barth, 9-39. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1969.
• Bede. Historia Ecclesiastica Gentis Anglorum. tr. J.E. King. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1962.
• Bouchard, Michel and Bogdan, Gheorghe. “From Barbarian Other to Chosen People: The Etymology, Ideology and Evolution of ‘Nation’ at the Shifting Edge of Medieval Western Christendom”, National Identities 17, no: 1 (2015): 1-23.
• Braude, Benjamin. “The Sons of Noah and the Construction of Ethnic and Geographical Identities in the Medieval and Early Modern Periods”, The William and Mary Quarterly 54, no: 1 (1997): 103-142.
• Breuilly, John. “Changes in the Political Uses of the Nation: Continuity or Discontinuity?”, in Power and Nation in European History. ed. Len Scales and Oliver Zimmer, 67-101. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
• Brown Michelle P.. “Bede’s Life in Context”, in The Cambridge Companion to Bede. ed. S. DeGregorio, 3-25. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
• Brown, Peter. The Rise of Western Christendom: Triumph and Diversity, A.D. 200-1000. West Sussex: Wiley Blackwell, 2013.
• Geertz, Clifford. The Interpretation of Cultures. New York: Basic Books, 1973.
• Weeda, Claire. “Ethnic Identification and Stereotypes in Western Europe, circa 1100–1300”, History Compass 12, no: 7 (2014): 586-606.
• Cicero. De Natura Deorum. tr. H. Rackham. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1967.
• Cicero. De Republica, De Legibus. tr. J.G.F. Powell. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Connor, Walker. “The Dawning of Nation”, in When is the Nation?. ed. Atsuko Ichijo and Gordana Uzelac, 40-47. New York: Routledge, 2005.
• Davies, Rees. “Presidential Address: The Peoples of Britain and Ireland 1100-1400. I. Identities”, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 4, no: 1 (1994): 1-20.
• Davies, Rees. “Nations and National Identities in the Medieval World: An Apologia”, RBHC 34, no: 4 (2004): 567-579.
• Diodorus of Sicily. Books XII-XIII. tr. C.H. Oldfather. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1950.
• Drews, Wolfram. The Unknown Neighbour: The Jew in the Thought of Isidore of Seville. Leiden: Brill, 2006.
• Eco, Umberto. The Search fort he Perfect Language, London: Wiley-Blackwell, 1997.
• Sextus Pompeius Festus. De Verborvm Significatv Qyaesvpersvnt Cvm Pavli Epitome. ed. W.M. Lindsay. Stuttgart: B.G. Teubner, 1997.
• Figueira, Thomas. “Language as a Marker of Ethnicity in Herodotus and Contemporaries”, in Ethnicity and Identity in Herodotus. ed. Thomas Figueira and Carmen Soares, 43-72. New York: Routledge, 2020.
• Geary, Patrick. “Ethnic Identity as a Situational Construct in the Early Middle Ages”, MAGW 113, no: 1 (1983): 15-26.
• Geary, Patrick. “Barbarians and Ethnicity”, in Late Antiquity: A Guide to the Postclassical World. ed. G.W. Bowersock, Peter Brown and Oleg Grabar, 107-129. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1999.
• Geary, Patrick. Myth of Nations. New York: Princeton University Press, 2002.
• Gellner, Ernest. Nations and Nationalism. Oxford: Basil Blacwell, 1983.
• Glare, P.W.. Oxford Latin Dictionary. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.
• Greenfeld, Liah. Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity. Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1993.
• Gruen, Erich. “Did Ancient Identity Depend on Ethnicity? A Preliminary Probe”, Phoenix 67, no: 1/2 (2013): 1-22.
• Gruen, Erich. Ethnicity in the Ancient World – Did it Matter?, Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, 2020.
• Guenee, Bernard. States and Rulers in Later Medieval Europe. tr. J. Vale. Oxford: Blackwell, 1985.
• Hall, Jonathan M.. Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2001.
• Hall, Stuart. “The Work of Representation”, in Representation: Cultural Representations and Signifying Practices. ed. S. Hall, 13-75. London: SAGE, 2003.
• Hansen, Mogens Herman. Polis: An Introduction to the Ancient Greek City-State. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006.
• Harrison, Thomas Harrison. “Herodotus’ Conception of Foreign Languages”, Histos 2, no: 1 (1998): 1-45.
• Hastings, Adrian. The Construction of Nationhood: Ethnicity, Religion and Nationalism. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1996.
• Heng, Geraldine. “The Invention of Race in the European Middle Ages I: Race Studies, Modernity, and the Middle Ages”, Literature Compass 8, no: 5 (2018): 315-331.
• Herodotus. Books I-II. tr. A.D. Godley. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1975.
• Hirschi, Caspar. The Origins of Nationalism: An Alternative History from Ancient Rome to Early Modern Germany. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012.
• Hobsbawm, Eric. Nations and Nationalism since 1780: Programme, Myth, Reality. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1992.
• Hobsbawm, Eric. “Introduction”, in The Invention of Tradition. ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
• Hoppenbrouwers, Peter. “Ethnogenesis and the Construction of Nationhood in Medieval Europe”, The Medieval History Journal 9, no: 1 (2006): 195-242.
• Huizinga, Johan. Men and Ideas: History, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance. New York: Princeton University Press, 1959.
• Isaac, Benjamin. The Invention of Racism in Classical Antiquity. New York: Princeton University Press, 2004.
• Isidore of Seville. Etymologiae. tr. S.A. Barney, W.J. Lewis, J.A. Beach and O. Berghof. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
• Jones, C.P.. “θνος and γνος in Herodotus”, The Classical Quarterly 46, no: 2 (1996): 315-320.
• Kant, Immanuel. Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View. tr. R. B. Lauden. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
• Kibre, Pearl. The Nations in the Medieval Universities. Massachusetts: Harvard Universty Press, 1948.
• Kisch, Guido. “Nationalism and Race in Medieval Law”, Seminar 1, no: 1 (1943): 48-74.
• Knoll, Paul W.. “Nationes and Other Bonding Groups at Late Medieval Central European Universities”, in Mobs: An Interdisciplinary Inquiry. ed. N.V. Deusen and L.M. Koff, 95-117. Leiden: Brill, 2012.
• Kumar, Krishan. The Making of English National Identity. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2006.
• Lorenz, Chris. “Representations of Identity: Ethnicity, Race, Class, Gender and Religion. An Introduction to Conceptual History”, in The Contested Nation. Ethnicity, Religion, Class and Gender in National Histories. ed. Chris Lorenz and Stefan Berger, 24-50. Houndsmill: Springer, 2008.
• MacLean Simon. History and Politics in Late Carolingian and Ottonian Europe The Chronicle of Regino of Prüm and Adalbert of Magdeburg. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2009.
• Marchal, Guy P.. “Introduction”, in The Uses of the Middle Ages in Modern European States: History, Nationhood and the Search for Origins. ed. R.J.W. Evans and G.P. Marchal, 1-5. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011.
• Mathisen, R.W.. “Natio, Gens, Provincialis and Civis: Geographical Terminology and Personal Identity in Late Antiquity”, in Shifting Genres in Late Antiquity. ed. J. Greatrex and H. Elton, 277-286. London: Routledge, 2015.
• Opsahl, Erik. “Norwegian Identity in the Late Middle Ages, Regnal or National?”, Frühmittelalterliche Studien 51, no: 1 (2017): 449-460.
• Ozkirimli, Umut. Theories of Nationalism: A Critical Introduction. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010.
• Pernau, Margrit. “Whither Conceptual History? From National to Entangled Histories”, Contributions to the History of Concepts 7, no: 1 (2012): 1-11.
• Platon. Republic. vol. I-V. tr. P. Shorey. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1937.
• Pohl, Walter. “Introduction: The Strategies of Distinctions”, in Strategies of Distinction: The Construction of Ethnic Communities. ed. W. Pohl and H. Reimitz, 1-17. Leiden: Brill, 1998.
• Pohl, Walter. “Ethnonyms and Early Medieval Ethnicity”, The Hungarian Historical Review 7, no: 1 (2018): 5-17.
• Polybius. The Histories. vol 5-8. tr. G.W. Paton. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1979.
• Pliny. Natural History. vol. VI. tr. W.H.S. Jones. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1961.
• Regino of Prüm. Chronicon. ed. F. Kurze. Hannover: Impensis Bibliopoli Hahniani, 1890.
• Reynolds, Susan. Kingdoms and Communities in Western Europe, 900-1300. Oxford: Clerandon Press, 1997.
• Reynolds, Susan. “The Idea of the Nation as a Political Community”, in Power and Nation in European History. ed. Len Scales and Oliver Zimmer, 54-66. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
• Salinero, Raul Gonzalez. “Confronting the Other: Isidore of Seville on Pagans, Romans, Barbarians, Heretics, and Jews”, in A Companion to Isidore of Seville. ed. A. Fear and J. Wood, 359-397. Leiden: Brill, 2020.
• Scales, Len and Zimmer, Oliver. “Introduction”, in Power and the Nation in European History. ed. L. Scales and O. Zimmer, 1-29. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005.
• Seton-Watson, Hugh. Nations and States: An Enquiry into the Origins of Nations and the Politics. London: Methuen, 1977.
• Shils, Edward. “Primordial, Personal, Sacred and Civil Ties: Some Particular Observations on the Relationships of Sociological Research and Theory”, The British Journal of Sociology 8, no: 2 (1957): 130-145.
• Skinner, Quentin. Vision of Politics. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002.
• Smith, Anthony D.. National Identity. London: Penguin Books, 1991.
• Smith, Anthony D.. “National Identities: Modern and Medieval”, in Concepts of National Identity in the Middle Ages. (ed. S. Forde, L. Johnson and A.V. Murray, 21-46. Leeds: University of Leeds Press, 1995.
• Sollors, Werner. “Ethnic Groups/Ethnicity: Historical Aspects”, in International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences. vol. 10. ed. N.J. Smelser and P. B. Baltes, 4813-4817. 2001.
• Teschke, Benno. The Myth of 1648: Class, Geopolotics and Making of Modern International Relations. London: Verso, 2003.
• Thucydides. History of the Peloponnesian War, vol. VI. tr. C.F. Smith. London: LOEB Classical Library, 1959.
• Walbank, Frank William. “The Problem of Greek Nationality”, Phoenix 5, no: 2 (1951): 41-60.
• Woolf, Daniel. “Of Nations, Nationalism and National Identity”, in The Many Faces of Clio: Cross-cultural Approaches to Historiography Essays in Honor of Georg G. Iggers. ed. Q.E. Wang and F. Fillafer, 71-103. Oxford: Berghan Books, 2006.
• Zientara, Benedykt. “Populus – Gens – Natio. Einige Probleme aus dem Bereich der ethnischen Terminologie des frühen Mittelalters”, in Nationalismus in vorindustrieller Zeit. ed. O. Dann, 11-20. München: De Gruyter, 1986.