Race, as a concept, is generally understood as a product of modernity. But many aspects of our ideas of race and ethnicity (from the Greek ethnos, ‘people’) have a long—indeed, an ancient—history. The forms of prejudice which have done such damage in ‘western’ modernity, and now motivate the resurgence of far-right and neo-Nazi groups, can be traced back to classical Greek and Roman notions of who was (or was not) civilised. Paradoxically, contemporary ethnonationalists often claim descent from the (so-called) ‘barbarian’ groups who helped bring about the end of the Western Roman Empire, and formed new kingdoms which—if you squint hard enough— look a bit like modern European nation states.
This module explores how late ancient people thought about ethnic groups, and traces the impact these concepts and identities had on the lives of those who inhabited late and post-Roman societies. It follows these ideas in action in the Western Mediterranean over the late fourth to the sixth century CE: that is, the period of the ‘Fall of Rome’. Students will examine a series of case studies which illuminate how late Roman people understood ethnic belonging, the ways in which these were reshaped by the creation of new, post-imperial polities, and the manner in which they intersected with other forms of identity and community (e.g. gender, religion and social status). Together we will place ancient and modern notions of identity, ethnicity, and race in dialogue. In so doing, we will seek to attain a better understanding of both, and debate whether we should revisit the idea that ancient and medieval people did not think in racial terms.