Minorities and the Empire, Part 1: The Language of Discourse, the Doctrine of Civilization-ism, and the Dynamics of Roman Europe
In an age that likes to claim to embrace diversity and multiculturalism, many Romans like to proclaim mid-modern Rhomania as a harbinger of that, a beacon of respect for minorities in a hostile world.
They are wrong. The Roman ‘minority system’ was not a precocious prequel to modern ideals of multiculturalism, but an effort to manage and control and utilize minorities in the Empire for the benefit of the Empire.
Rhomania, both then and now, has been remarkably resistant to the modern ‘ideal’ of racism. Characteristically, it is viewed as a stupid Latin ideology that condemns people simply for cosmetic reasons, which is neither rational nor just. However, ‘such a belief is to be expected from a vain and shallow people such as Latins’.
As that quote amply illustrates, Romans are no strangers to prejudice; they just view race as an invalid criterion. Roman prejudice against Latins is quite well known, but ‘Latin’ in Roman minds is a cultural-religious-political construct, not an ethnicity. Many prominent Romans are of Latin descent, as shown even by their family names such as Gylielmos which is derived from Guillaume. It is not hidden. However since such individuals and families are culturally and religiously and political Roman, the only thing Latin about them their genome, there are no barriers or prejudice against them in Roman society. That is true both now and in the mid-modern period. Helvetians were honored as heroes of the Empire just after the Great Latin War and nobody saw anything untoward in that.
The Roman use of the term ‘Arab’ in common discourse is similar. It is a religious and cultural term, not an ethnic one. An Arab=Sunni in the Roman mind. An individual who is of Arab ethnicity but who follows Orthodoxy, such as an Anizzah, is not called an Arab but a Melkite.
While in this system, all Arabs are Sunnis, not all Sunnis are Arabs. Arabs, in Roman eyes, have a connotation of being religious fanatics and country bumpkins. Considering the many achievements of Arabs throughout history, this is not a fair reputation and many Romans will distinguish between the ‘sophisticated Arabs of the Abbasids’ (which many consider to have been beneficially influenced by Roman and Sassanid civilization) and their ‘fallen descendants’. That isn’t much of an improvement, but Roman prejudice is under no obligation to be more rational or reasonable than the prejudices of other peoples.
The Persians are a different matter. The history between Rhomania and Persia is a long and bloody one, but going back to the days of the Parthians the rivalry, however fierce, was viewed as that of equals. No one would ever think to call the Persians barbarians. So while the Persians of the 1600s are unquestionably Sunni, in Roman eyes they are sophisticated and intellectual. Iskandar the Great was a terrible foe, but no Roman would call him a brute. When Kaisar Andreas was summoned to the Shah on the field of Nineveh, the dialogue between the Kaisar and Prince Osman was consciously, on both sides, that of Alexander and Porus.
A side effect of that is while all good Romans perceive Islam as a false faith, when Persians speak of Islam Romans give their faith more respect. Extremely cynical when it comes to holy warriors, many Romans suspect Arab Sunni Islam as a pious cloak for simple greed, invoking God as an excuse to rape and enslave their neighbors and loot their possessions. When Latin Catholics speak, save for the exception of Franciscan friars, Romans feel the same way.
While Arab and Persian are used mainly as stereotypes, the Roman use of the word ‘Turk’ is much more nuanced. At this point there is much Turkish blood in the Roman body; Demetrios Megas, the founder of the Second Komnenid dynasty, was half-Turkish, and he is far from the only example. Yet Turkish raiders have also inflicted incalculable damage to the Empire over centuries, typically while espousing the ghazi ethos while doing so. It cannot be said that there is no prejudice when the term is used, but context is usually taken in consideration when used.
The Roman contrast between what they perceive as Arab and Persian, and differing reactions to said labels, is an offshoot of civilization-ism. This is an ideology that values cultures and/or peoples by their perceived level of sophistication and development, with city-based societies with advanced political and social structures at the highest level, and hunter-gatherers on the bottom, with innumerable gradients.
Civilization-ism does not care about skin color or any biological characteristics of the individual people, only about the society created by said people, although it will then make judgments about the peoples of said societies once they are graded. In this mindset, the dark skin of Ethiopians and Khoikhoi is irrelevant. But while the Ethiopians would be recognized as operating on the highest level of humanity, the Khoikhoi would be at the lowest.
One could say this is a product of the differential taxation system of Demetrios III, which placed every person (who paid taxes) in various categories, some of which were ‘higher’ or ‘lower’ than each other. However in inchoate form this ideology has existed for generations prior to the Sideroi. David the Great, the conqueror of Mexico, strongly believed in this, clearly distinguishing in his writings between the city-dwellers of Mexico that he respected and the natives of the Caribbean who he despised as primitives.
That said, civilization-ism is refined and developed as people discuss the idea in kaffos oikoi and universities throughout the Empire, especially as more information about the world is made available during the climax of the Historic-Romantic. Peoples around the world are studied and graded, with debates about classifications and qualifications, a continuation of the Roman desire to systematize knowledge of the world.
Despite its growing widespread nature, there are some disputes, such as how much allowance should be made for geographical context and availability of resources. An isolated poor people would have a much harder chance of developing ‘high culture’. There is also debate about how people can ‘change their grade’, whether it’s something an individual can do or a process that really takes generations. More Romans fall towards the former view, although agreeing that individuals from certain societies may have more to travel than others.
Historians debate over the origins of civilization-ism. Some say that it is a development of the tension between the farmer and the nomad, which caused so much trouble for Rhomania during the medieval era. Others say it is a product of Roman expansion into ‘Island Asia’, where they saw affluent port cities with developed economies and sophisticated polities and also headhunter cannibals, who to the Romans all physically looked the same. Perhaps it is a development of a culture that uses ‘two-book man’ (a man who only owns/reads two books) as an insult.
One chilling purpose of civilization-ism is that it helps to dehumanize the Arabs of Syria and Palestine. Because of their reputation for provincial backwardness, the Arabs are considered ‘lower’ on the scale and therefore of ‘less value’, in contrast to Persians for example. Or even their non-Sunni neighbors, whose material culture isn’t much different, but they’re viewed as ‘higher’ and ‘more valuable’, far from the first time an ideology is exploited for political purposes.
A longer-term effect of civilization-ism is rather subversive. Just as civilization-ism does not care about skin color, it is also not supposed to care about religion, although monotheist religion is often considered a mark of a sophisticated society. (But then the Chinese, which no Roman would consider below the highest level of civilization, don’t have a monotheistic religion, as some Romans argue.) That said, in 1635 religion is a pivotal marker of identity.
The Aegean themes, the maritime lands, and the Chaldean theme are overwhelmingly Greek and Orthodox and thus match the ‘default’ state of Roman-ness. Belief in the Orthodox Christian faith and speaking the Greek language are the two main markers of Roman identity. Given their dominance of the Aegean themes, wherein dwell close to 3/4ths of the Imperial heartland’s population, it is unsurprising that Greeks make up the bulk of the Imperial heartland’s people, roughly 13 million out of 16.7 million in 1635.
(In the context of discussing various peoples inside the Roman Empire, the term Greek is used. Sometimes Greek is used in a cultural/ethnic sense while Roman is a political identity, but a Greek speaker would identify themselves as a Roman if asked. So would an integrated Armenian or Melkite for that manner.)
Rhomania has a great many minorities, but after the devastation of Syria and conversion of Egypt and Sicily into Despotates, their numbers can’t compare to the Greek majority.
The Bulgarians, unsurprisingly, reside mainly in Bulgaria; those deported from Bulgaria to Anatolia have been absorbed into the Greek milieu. These are almost entirely poor peasantry living out in the countryside, with the towns of Bulgaria populated largely by Greek-speakers. There are a few exceptions such as Ruse, but Bulgarian town dwellers are also heavily absorbed into Greek culture. Greek is the language of politics, culture, and commerce.
Most Bulgarians stay where they live, in common with most paroikoi across the Empire. As with those other paroikoi, their best chance for advancement is to join the army, which functions as a vehicle for Romanization. The language of the army is also Greek.
There are some flickers though of Bulgarian culture. The priests of the countryside speak Bulgarian to their parishioners, with plain village churches adorned with simple but breathtaking icons painted by talented locals. There is also the Zograf Monastery on the Holy Mountain, which contains a fine library with many medieval Bulgarian texts.
The Albanians are semi-Hellenized. While they speak their own language, their script uses Greek lettering. While Albanian peasantry only speak Albanian, those of the middle and especially upper classes also speak Greek for the same reasons Bulgarian town dwellers do so.
There are also the Arvanites, those of Albanian descent who’ve settled in Greece over the last couple of centuries. Across the social spectrum they are bilingual in their own dialect of Albanian and in Greek. In certain areas of Hellas they make up the bulk of the population and are often well known for their skill in animal husbandry.
Another common ethnic minority in Roman Europe is the Serbs. Many of these live around Novo Brdo, the region of Serbia conquered by Roman arms when the rest was overrun by the Hungarians. The silver mines are mostly dry now, but for reasons of prestige the White Palace is uninclined to relinquish it. Most other Serbs are scattered throughout Macedonia, having emigrated for work opportunities. Some Serb notables are absentee landlords of estates, which suits the Roman government. The estates still pay tax to Constantinople but provide a useful level for keeping the Serbian version of dynatoi in line.
There are also Vlach and Russian immigrants who’ve moved to the region for the same reason Serbs did. Vlachs have a stereotype of being shepherds, working their herds across well-worn grazing pathways. The main reason for Vlachia’s relatively low population in 1635 is that the Hungarian-Polish invasion that ravaged Vlachia during the Time of Trouble drove many Vlachs south of the Danube, a flow encouraged by Helena I with great benefit to Rhomania.
There are also some Latin elements, primarily in Attica and the Morea. Some are the remnants from the Crusader states, descendants of Latins who entered Roman service during or after the Laskarid re-conquest. Others are descended from Italian traders, principally the Genoese of Modon (Methoni) and Coron (Koroni), which were only absorbed back into Rhomania by Andreas I on the eve of the Tenth Crusade.
A key item to note about all the western minorities is that they follow the Orthodox faith. Only the Latins were not already Orthodox, and those living in Rhomania have long since converted to Orthodoxy. As such, in the eyes of the White Palace they do not really count as minorities. Those who speak Greek fluently without a foreign-sounding accent face no bar to advancement.
It is a far more complicated affair as one crosses into Asia.