Early in my doctoral studies, I told a senior scholar whom I greatly admired that my work was on medieval questions of identity. The scholar sagely replied, “and what do you do with the answers to the questions?” At the time, I had been so tied up in who medieval people were that I had not seriously considered what to do with the knowledge! If a scholar manages to unravel some of the complexity of premodern identity, what value does it have other than complicating historical identity narratives? In my opinion, Wiszewski’s Inter-Ethnic Relations and the Functioning of Multi-Ethnic Societies offers a useful answer to the question of what one does with identity studies. The authors of this volume provide an array of case studies ranging across the Middle Ages, early modernity, and the early twentieth century from predominantly the Iberian and Central European context. As the second volume of the ongoing Brepols series “Cohesion in Multi-Ethnic Societies in Europe from c. 1000- to the Present,” this volume does the challenging comparative work that illuminates ways that multi-ethnic societies functioned in political, social, and cultural contexts. The first book of the series, Memories in Multi-Ethnic Societies (2020), was valuable for exploring how identities developed, but was not overly concerned with the “so what” question. Volume II, with mostly new authors, seems to delve much deeper into what identity meant to people in context by exploring how ethnicities relate to prominent “others” both as minorities and majorities. These case studies show us conditions that bring questions of identity into the historical record in often pragmatic ways rather than dramatic and exceptional events. Though not all ethnic or religious interactions are necessarily peaceful, these chapters highlight the sometimes-delicate negotiation required to make multi-ethnic societies function. The ensuing Volume III will almost certainly address more dramatic events as it intends to examine political actors and how they influence inter-ethnic relations, often in ways fomenting violence. Before that though, Wiszewski states, “in order to understand how politicians influence inter-ethnic relations, it is crucial to recognize the ties and dependencies that arise between different ethnic groups” (12). I fully agree and thank him for this volume that highlights the ordinary relationships that governed life in muti-ethnic cities. This work provides an admirable array of case studies to show just how interdependent ethnic groups could be in the premodern and modern era. It shows clearly what different identities did and how identity shaped experiences across generations in Europe and beyond.
Those interested in questions of European identity will not be surprised by the geographic focus of the work as it highlights diversity on the Iberian Peninsula and across Central and Eastern Europe. Both regions have been fertile ground for questions concerning the development and implication of identity formation. Scholars have frequently investigated them as historic frontier spaces where ethnicity, religion, and political systems collided. Within those general geographic regions, the diversity of peoples and locations allows for representational and relatively unique situations that merit study. This work constructs a relatively broad picture of inter-ethnic societies through accumulating many narrowly focused studies.
Though the chapters deserve thorough summaries, the volume’s variety and this medium lends itself to brief synopses. Following Wiszewski’s introduction, Maria Bonet Donato examines in the first full chapter how Catalonians utilized external “others,” such as the neighboring Muslims, to tie together a poly-ethnic Christian community in the twelfth century. Jesús Brufal-Sucarrat flips that narrative in Chapter 2, by examining how distinct Muslim communities negotiated differences in the face of Christian expansion. The next two chapters focus on the specific milieu in the Kingdom of Portugal as Maria Filomena Lopes de Barros examines legislation ensuring ethnic distinctions between Christians, Jews, and Muslims, and Paula Pinto Costa and Joana Lencart examine how Papal charters defined the relations between military orders, Muslims, and Jews in the Kingdom. Finaly, in the western Mediterranean, Luciano Gallinari examines the complex relations of the Kingdom of Aragon and the inhabitants of Sardinia as they negotiated a shared identity, commonly overlooked in later historiography (116-17). A significant geographic shift begins with Wiszewski’s analysis of Silesian identity as Polish speakers and German speakers developed a “pragmatic” relationship driven by the needs of the ruling dukes. Grzegorz Myśliwski examines urban environments in the Kingdom of Poland, as groups from both East and West found themselves in shared economic spaces, sometimes with peaceful cohabitations and sometimes without. Andrzej Pleszczyński examines the borderlands between Latin and Orthodox Europe in the early modern period as diverse urban centers found stability through cooperation. In the ninth chapter, Cosmin Popa-Gorjanu examines why in late medieval Transylvania various groups maintained a rigid separation and resisted ethnic mingling. Daniel Bagi in the following chapter focuses on the ability of social elites to advance in the neighboring Kingdom of Hungary as successive foreign rulers of the kingdom introduced new families into the Hungarian nobility. Monika Ramonaitė, shifts the work’s focus to the Baltics, and Lithuania specifically, to examine the role of Jewish and Karaite minorities in medical fields and the role that played in identification. Dovilė Troskovaitė also examines Karaite culture and its relation to physical region in Lithuania, highlighting its competition with, and identity separate from, other Jewish communities. In particular, she examines the community’s distinct Lithuanian identity as separate from other Rabbinic Jews in the broader region and the influence of state actors who supported this distinct Lithuanian-Jewish identity. Jurgita Šiaučiūnaitė-Verbickinė examines a fascinating topic of gift giving among ethnic groups, in particular, strategic gift giving by Jewish communities in Lithuania, which allowed them to maintain beneficial connections and stability. Endre Sashalmi examines how the dominant Russian and Orthodox culture of the late nineteenth-century empire of Alexander III explicitly promoted a message of one ethnicity that would unite the massive multi-ethnic state. Finally, Joanna Wojdon examines the role that Polish parishes played in promoting and organizing immigration to the United States beginning in the nineteenth century.
Wiszewski and his team have taken on a truly impressive challenge with such a broad scope. Each chapter introduces a range of source material to examine inter-ethnic negotiations spanning legal documents, laws, charters, taxation records, letters, linguistic analyses, and other material. One of the strengths of this work is its ability to inspire similar questions in different geographic regions. Each isolated case study necessarily begs the question of whether the same methodologies, questions, and answers are available in different contexts. Though the breadth of the topic deserves praise, would we not also consider Paris, London, Rome, or Jerusalem multi-ethnic societies at different points in their history? The answer is an obvious yes. The authors highlight Iberia and Central Europe for their rich multi-ethnic histories, but the potential exists for a more wholistic approach. Admittedly, increasing the breadth to such a degree is probably beyond a single volume and maybe enough studies of those urban centers already exist, but the impact of broadening the scope would also help more fully integrate the study of multi-ethnic societies from the cultural frontier into the larger story of Europe and European identity. Hopefully scholars will take inspiration from this work to investigate a broader swath of inter-ethnic relations across Europe.
In conclusion, this volume serves as a rich source for those scholars and teachers interested in diversifying the story of European history. These case studies are an excellent resource for moving beyond dramatic interactions between religious and ethnic groups and provide valuable insight into how people navigated identity in daily life. I look forward to drawing parallels in my own research and drawing examples from this volume into my lectures going forward.