Walter Pohl

Dieses Buch stellt die Völkerwanderung, Ethnogenese sowie die Umwandlung der Römischen Welt dar: Modelle für den Wandel Europas am Beginn des Mittelalters. Sie erfahren einiges über die schwierige Integration der Goten, über Aufstieg und Fall des Hunnenreiches, die Entstehung des fränkischen Europa, sowie über Nachrömische und nichtrömische Gesellschaften.

Eroberung und Integration

Die Völkerwanderung

Gábor Klaniczay

Pavlína Rychterová

Paweł Kras

The volume unites conversations with four masters of Medieval Studies from east-central Europe: János Bak from Hungary, Jerzy Kłoczowski from Poland, František Šmahel from the Czech Republic, and Herwig Wolfram from Austria. The interviews, made by younger colleagues, reveal engaging life stories, with numerous observations, anecdotes and experiences. The four scholars grew up before and during the war, under Nazi occupation, emerged as young scholars in the difficult post-war period, and, for most of their careers worked in the shadow of the Iron Curtain, two of them spending most of their lifetimes under communist regimes. The conversations focus on ways in which open-minded young intellectuals became medieval historians under difficult circumstances, how they experienced the long shadows of totalitarian regimes with their acute sensitivity for historical change, and how their perceptions of the world around them reflected back on their approach to medieval history. The histories of their nations were broken, most of them ceased to exist and then were re-established during their lifetimes, came under foreign domination, were split up, or had their territories shifted. These changes affected these scholars' identities and patriotic feelings, and their present was reflected in the distant mirror of the medieval past.

Four Medievalists in Twentieth-Century Central Europe. Conversations with Jerzy Kłoczowski, János M. Bak, František Šmahel, and Herwig Wolfram

Times of Upheaval

Cinzia Grifoni

Marianne Pollheimer-Mohaupt

Clemens Gantner

Roman identity is one of the most interesting cases of social identity because in the course of time, it could mean so many different things: for instance, Greek-speaking subjects of the Byzantine empire, inhabitants of the city of Rome, autonomous civic or regional groups, Latin speakers under ‘barbarian’ rule in the West or, increasingly, representatives of the Church of Rome. Eventually, the Christian dimension of Roman identity gained ground. The shifting concepts of Romanness represent a methodological challenge for studies of ethnicity because, depending on its uses, Roman identity may be regarded as ‘ethnic’ in a broad sense, but under most criteria, it is not. Romanness is indeed a test case how an established and prestigious social identity can acquire many different shades of meaning, which we would class as civic, political, imperial, ethnic, cultural, legal, religious, regional or as status groups. This book offers comprehensive overviews of the meaning of Romanness in most (former) Roman provinces, complemented by a number of comparative and thematic studies. A similarly wide-ranging overview has not been available so far.

Early Medieval Regions and Identities

Transformations of Romanness

The Avars arrived in Europe from the Central Asian steppes in the mid-sixth century CE and dominated much of Central and Eastern Europe for almost 250 years. Fierce warriors and canny power brokers, the Avars were more influential and durable than Attila's Huns, yet have remained hidden in history. Walter Pohl's epic narrative, translated into English for the first time, restores them to their rightful place in the story of early medieval Europe. The Avars offers a comprehensive overview of their history, tracing the Avars from the construction of their steppe empire in the center of Europe; their wars and alliances with the Byzantines, Slavs, Lombards, and others; their apex as the first so-called barbarian power to besiege Constantinople (in 626); to their fall under the Frankish armies of Charlemagne and subsequent disappearance as a distinct cultural group. Pohl uncovers the secrets of their society, synthesizing the rich archaeological record recovered from more than 60,000 graves of the period, as well as accounts of the Avars by Byzantine and other chroniclers. In recovering the story of the fascinating encounter between Eurasian nomads who established an empire in the heart of Europe and the post-Roman Christian cultures of Europe, this book provides a new perspective on the origins of medieval Europe itself.

A Steppe Empire in Central Europe, 567–822

The Avars

Richard Payne

This volume looks at 'visions of community' in a comparative perspective, from Late Antiquity to the dawning of the age of crusades. It addresses the question of why and how distinctive new political cultures developed after the disintegration of the Roman World, and to what degree their differences had already emerged in the first post-Roman centuries. The Latin West, Orthodox Byzantium and its Slavic periphery, and the Islamic world each retained different parts of the Graeco-Roman heritage, while introducing new elements. For instance, ethnicity became a legitimizing element of rulership in the West, remained a structural element of the imperial periphery in Byzantium, and contributed to the inner dynamic of Islamic states without becoming a resource of political integration. Similarly, the political role of religion also differed between the emerging post-Roman worlds. It is surprising that little systematic research has been done in these fields so far. The 32 contributions to the volume explore this new line of research and look at different aspects of the process, with leading western Medievalists, Byzantinists and Islamicists covering a wide range of pertinent topics. At a closer look, some of the apparent differences between the West and the Islamic world seem less distinctive, and the inner variety of all post-Roman societies becomes more marked. At the same time, new variations in the discourse of community and the practice of power emerge. Anybody interested in the development of the post-Roman Mediterranean, but also in the relationship between the Islamic World and the West, will gain new insights from these studies on the political role of ethnicity and religion in the post-Roman Mediterranean.

The West, Byzantium and the Islamic World, 300–1100

Visions of Community in the Post-Roman World

Helmut Reimitz

The Construction of the Ethnic Communities, 300-800

Strategies of Distinction

Maximilian Diesenberger

der Autor, der Text und der Heilige

Eugippius und Severin

Max Diesenberger

Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften

Der Band untersucht die Integration von Barbaren in der spatromischen Welt im Zusammenhang mit den spatantiken und fruhmittelalterlichen Formen gesellschaftlicher Integration insgesamt. Im Zentrum stehen dabei der Aufbau neuer Herrschaften auf dem Boden des Imperium Romanum und daruber hinaus und die ethnische Integration, der die romisch-barbarischen Regna ihren Zusammenhalt verdanken. Gerade der weite Horizont der versammelten Arbeiten macht die Bedeutung des Bandes aus. Fruhmittelalterforscher aus neun Landern decken einen Bereich ab, der uber das westromisch-frankische Europa zum byzantinischen und slawischen Osten und ins islamische Spanien reicht. Ebenso vielfaltig sind die Forschungsansatze, wobei die Wiener Forschungstradition der "Wiener Schule" der Fruhmittelalterforschung entscheidende Impulse geben konnte. Mehrere Beitrage weisen nach, dass die antiken Formen sozialer und politischer Integration im 5. - 6. Jahrhundert im Westen sowie im Osten auf sehr ahnliche Weise im Wandel waren. Identitatsbildung zwischen Fremdwahrnehmung und Selbstdarstellung wird vor allem anhand der Franken aus mehreren Blickwinkeln neu gedeutet. Untersucht und differenziert wird die Rolle der Kirche bei der Integration der neuen Gentes und Regna. Das Verhaltnis von Siedlungsvorgangen und ethnischen Prozessen wird aus archaologischer wie historischer Sicht problematisiert. Rolle und Selbstdarstellung des Konigtums bei Goten, Alemannen und Franken werden eingehend untersucht, wobei auch die Rolle der Historiographie kritisch hinterfragt wird. Neue Einsichten gibt es insgesamt zu den kulturellen Grundlagen der ethnischen und sozialen Integration, wobei immer wieder die Aneignung und Deutung der Vergangenheit eine Rolle spielt. Mehrere Beitrage widmen sich schliesslich der oft vernachlassigten Rolle der Slawen bei der "Umwandlung der romischen Welt". Die meisten Beitrage gehen auf Vortrage bei einem internationalen Symposion der Forschungsstelle fur Geschichte des Mittelalters der Osterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften zuruck.

ethnische Identitäten und soziale Organisation im Frühmittelalter

Integration und Herrschaft

Christina Lutter

Eirik Hovden

"This volume explores some of the many different meanings of community across medieval Eurasia. How did the three "'universal' religions, Christianity, Islam and Buddhism, frame the emergence of various types of community under their sway? The studies assembled here in thematic clusters address the terminology of community; genealogies; urban communities; and monasteries or 'enclaves of learning' in particular in early medieval Europe, medieval South Arabia and Tibet, and late medieval Central Europe and Dalmatia. It includes work by medieval historians, social anthropologists, and Asian Studies scholars. The volume present the results of in-depth comparative research from the Visions of Community project in Vienna, and of a dialogue with guests, offering new and exciting perspectives on the emerging field of comparative medieval history."--Back cover.

Comparative Approaches

Meanings of Community Across Medieval Eurasia

ein Steppenvolk im Mitteleuropa, 567-822 n. Chr

Die Awaren

Hans-Werner Goetz

Jörg Jarnut

This book is the first comprehensive and comparative study of the difficult relationship between ethnic identities and political organisation in the post-Roman and early medieval kingdoms. 16 authors (historians, archaeologists and linguists) deal with ten important kingdoms of this period and with its political and legal context.

The Relationship Between Late Antique and Early Medieval Peoples and Kingdoms in the Transformation of the Roman World

Regna and Gentes

Walter Pohl

About

Books

Join the club