The Image of the Barbarian in Medieval Europe

Abstract

On various occasions civilized man has found himself marching side by side with men at lower (or different) levels of social and cultural development. The great civilizations were accustomed to compare themselves quite favorably with these barbarian neighbors, whom they viewed with varying degrees of condescension, suspicion, scorn, and dread. Civilized man, with his urban institutions, his agrarian way of life, his technological and economic sophistication, and his conspicuous literary and plastic artistry, conceived of himself as superior to these other folk with whom he sometimes competed for domination of the richer parts of the world. Long before the ancient Greeks invented the word ‘barbarian’ to describe the Scythians and other peoples who differed from them in not subscribing to the ideals of Greek culture, other civilized men had expressed similar sentiments toward alien peoples with whom they came into contact. This was the point that the old Akkadian author was trying to make when he spoke of neighboring tribes as people ‘who knew not grain’ and who ‘had never known a city’.* Subsequently, both in Asia and Europe the spokesmen of a civilized style of life expressed their dislike or distrust of the barbarian by means of a stereotyped image of him which was couched in terms favorable to civilization. A Chinese chronicler, for example, remarked of the fierce Hsiung-Nu, who troubled the peace of the Middle Kingdom, that ‘their only concern is self-advantage, and they know nothing of propriety and righteousness’.

Imagen, representación y vías de acceso al pasado

“…En la práctica, pareciera que el resultado de ese desarrollo fue la asimilación del término "bárbaro" con el ateísmo, la herejía o el paganismo, de modo tal que la distinción entre "bárbaro" y "romano" fue reemplazada por la separación entre "bárbaro" y "cristiano". Una división religiosa pasaba a predominar sobre las demás características culturales, aunque se seguían adscribiendo a los bárbaros comportamientos asociados a la ferocidad, la traición o la brutalidad (Jones, 1971y Southern, 1953.…”

Canibais do Brasil: os açougues de Fries, Holbein e Münster (século XVI)

“…As constantes invasões mantinham viva a lenda e autores antigos e medievais como Comodiano, Ambrósio, Orósio e Isidoro, entre outros, que associariam Gog e Magog com os nômades das estepes; Citas, Hunos, Alanos, Avaros e Tártaros. 51 (...) the legend of Alexander and the inclosed nations served not only to identify the various historical challengers of civilization but also gave hope for the eventual triumph of Christian civilization over the forces of Antichrist. The eschatological content of the story of God and Magog both satisfied European curiosity about an astonishing and frightening people, the Tartars, and reassured medieval man that they occupied a place in the Christian plan of salvation (...).…”

England's Northern Frontier

“…22 Of course, reading such material requires sensitivity to the universal topos of northern barbarity and incivility cultivated since classical antiquity, and which is more often to the fore in studies of periods preceding and following the later middle ages. 23 Indeed, historians of Scotland have also become alert to the 'portfolio of developed motifs' upon which late medieval authors drew as they wrote about the peoples of their own realm. 24 Walter Bower himself turned to passages from Vegetius on the sepentrionales populi in order to explain the headstrong pugnacity of his co-lieges, the Scoti transmontani, those dwelling beyond the Mounth.…”