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Abstract
Wrote Miklós Zrínyi (Nikola Zrinski) in the mid seventeenth century about those who died fighting against the Ottomans. The poet, who himself was engaged in both politics and war, defined Hungarian identity as Christian and premised on warfare unto death against Muslims.
This article draws on a range of examples from the high and late medieval period to demonstrate the mechanisms of excluding groups from society. It especially considers evidence where the same group is included according to some sources, but excluded according to others. This entails analysing three interconnected issues. First, how the terminology that was used to designate those seen as not members of the same society or even humanity; second, the purposes for which excluding mechanisms were put in place and third, agency, and conflict over when and whom to exclude.
This interdisciplinary collection addresses the position of minorities in democratic societies, with a particular focus on minority rights and recognition. For the first time, it brings together leading international authorities on ethnicity, nationalism and minority rights from both social and political theory, with the specific aim of fostering further debate between the disciplines. In their introduction, the editors explore the ways in which politics and sociology can complement each other in unravelling the many contradictory aspects of complex phenomena. Topics addressed include the constructed nature of ethnicity, its relation to class and to 'new racism', different forms of nationalism, self determination and indigenous politics, the politics of recognition versus the politics of redistribution, and the re-emergence of cosmopolitanism. This book is essential reading for all those involved in the study of ethnicity, nationalism and minority rights.
BEFORE CHRISTIANITY: RELIGION AND POWER A Hungarian-speaking population, probably together with Turkic speakers, gradually conquered and settled the Carpathian Basin from the end of the ninth century onwards, after being attacked by Pechenegs. Scholars have speculated about the route and chronology of their migrations, about the ethnogenesis of the Hungarians and their social and political structure, with widely varied results. No firm evidence exists before the ninth century. Even the sources for the period between the ninth and eleventh centuries are extremely fragmentary and controversial, therefore most interpretations remain open to debate. Pre-Christian religious beliefs have been reconstructed as animistic-shamanistic by scholars, based on analogies, linguistic evidence (the dating of which is problematic), the analysis of modern folklore and archaeological data. The worship of forces of nature characterized beliefs. Muslim sources describe the Hungarians as star-worshippers and sometimes as fire-worshippers. Several sources mention oaths taken on dogs, where the dog was cut in half, to symbolize the fate of the oath-breaker. Based on the prohibitions in Christian regulation, cult at holy groves and springs, where sacrifices were made, seems to have been an important part of traditional beliefs, but no archaeological evidence of cult sites is known. Folklorists point to the existence of helping spirits. Whereas traditionally scholars claimed that shamanism was a key element of pre-Christian beliefs, recently the existence of shamanism among the Hungarians has been disputed.
This 2007 text is a comparative, analysis of one of the most fundamental stages in the formation of Europe. Leading scholars explore the role of the spread of Christianity and the formation of new principalities in the birth of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Bohemia, Hungary, Poland and Rus' around the year 1000. Drawing on history, archaeology and art history, and emphasizing problems related to the sources and historiographical debates, they demonstrate the complex interdependence between the processes of religious and political change, covering conditions prior to the introduction of Christianity, the adoption of Christianity, and the development of the rulers' power. Regional patterns emerge, highlighting both the similarities in ruler-sponsored cases of Christianization, and differences in the consolidation of power and in institutions introduced by Christianity. The essays reveal how local societies adopted Christianity; medieval ideas of what constituted the dividing line between Christians and non-Christians; and the connections between Christianity and power.
Georgius de Hungaria (b. 1422/23) went through extraordinary experiences while being a slave in Ottoman Turkey for the two decades after he had been captured in 1438. In his subsequent account, Tractatus de Moribus (first written down in 1481/82), he not only reflects upon his woeful experiences as a slave, but also provides detailed information about Ottoman culture. For some time Georgius seems to have been on the brink of converting to Islam and experienced forms of mystic visions that confirmed this new belief. But he eventually returned to Christianity and later, while writing his account, made every attempt to assert his firm adherence to Christian teachings. As a critical analysis of his treatise demonstrates, however, his open admiration of Ottoman culture is undeniable, and his sharp criticism of Islam ultimately proves to be the writer's self-defense against a deep-seated fear of having transgressed traditional European norms.
The article seeks to establish a basic distinction between Islam, as a religious faith, and Islamism, as a political ideology, without denying Islamists to be based in Islam, however, in an invention of tradition. All Islamists share the goal of Islamist governance and are in disagreement, however, over the strategy/tactic: violent Jihadism or institutional participation. Despite their approval of the ballot-box, institutional Islamists reject the political values and culture of a democracy. Therefore, the compatibility of Islamism and democracy is questioned.
At the Gate of Christendom, 212. 43 References to ethnic hatred certainly do not explain such events, see, e.g
Jan 1979
3-6
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, 1979), 3–6, 30; Berend, At the Gate of Christendom, 212. 43 References to ethnic hatred certainly do not explain such events, see, e.g., Rogers Brubaker, Ethnicity without Groups (Cambridge, MA, 2004);
28. They propose a range of other terms (such as " identification " ), to replace " identity " as a scholarly term. Recent work with additional bibliography on the author and his great-grandfather: Ágnes R. Várkonyi, Európa Zrínyije: Válogatott Tanulmányok [Europe's Zrínyi: Selected Articles
Jan 2010
Brubaker
Cooper
45 Brubaker and Cooper, " Beyond 'Identity,' " 28. They propose a range of other terms (such as " identification " ), to replace " identity " as a scholarly term. Recent work with additional bibliography on the author and his great-grandfather: Ágnes R. Várkonyi, Európa Zrínyije: Válogatott Tanulmányok [Europe's Zrínyi: Selected Articles] (Budapest, 2010);
References to ethnic hatred certainly do not explain such events, see, e.g., Rogers Brubaker The Myth of Ethnic War: Serbia and Croatia in the
Jan 1990
Nora Berend
V P Gagnon Jr
NORA BEREND
43 References to ethnic hatred certainly do not explain such events, see, e.g., Rogers Brubaker, Ethnicity without
Groups (Cambridge, MA, 2004); V. P. Gagnon Jr., The Myth of Ethnic War: Serbia and Croatia in the 1990s
(Ithaca, 2004).
Identity and Violence, 61; quotation at 67
Sen
Sen, Identity and Violence, 61; quotation at 67.
Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget
25-26
Bk Zrínyi
Szigeti Veszedelem
Bk. 13, vv. 25–26, Zrínyi, Szigeti Veszedelem, 174, Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 205–06; Bk. 15, v. 77, Zrínyi, Szigeti
Veszedelem, 203, Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 247.
49
Rezeption 52–60; Chronica unnd Beschreibung der Türckey
Jan 1983
Klockow
Georgius De Hungaria
44 Klockow, Georgius de Hungaria, chap. IV, " Rezeption, " 52–60; Chronica unnd Beschreibung der Türckey. Mit
eyner Vorrhed D. Martini Lutheri, introduction by Carl Göllner (Cologne/Vienna, 1983), Schriften zur
Landeskunde Siebenbürgens, vol. 6 (reprint of 1530 Nuremberg ed.).
CXCV; analysis (including the charge of voluntary conversion to Islam
Jan 1859
1216-1352
Augustinus Theiner
Vetera Monumenta Historica Hungariam Sacram
Illustrantia
Augustinus Theiner, Vetera Monumenta Historica Hungariam Sacram Illustrantia, vol. 1, 1216–1352 (Rome,
1859), 30, 60–61, 94, 114–15, nos. LVIII, LIX, CXXVII, CLXVIII, CXCV; analysis (including the charge of
voluntary conversion to Islam) in Berend, At the Gate of Christendom, 152–60.
Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 7; Bk. 2
50
E G Zrínyi
Szigeti Veszedelem
E.g., Bk. 1, v. 6, Zrínyi, Szigeti Veszedelem, 28, Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 7; Bk. 2, v. 72, Zrínyi, Szigeti Veszedelem, 48,
Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 34; Bk. 6, v. 86, Zrínyi, Szigeti Veszedelem, 96, Zrínyi, Siege of Sziget, 100.
50