Nationalism

Nationalism is a kind of ethnocentrism expressed in radical ethnic feelings that sometimes slip towards xenophobia and reject other peoples who are held to be of lower rank, edging toward racism. This phenomenon at origin is not old; it was created and developed since the nineteenth century ce with the Romantic Movement. It is more complex than ethnicity. The aim of nationalists is to gather into one nation-state all the parts of homogeneous ethnic groups or to separate their own group from one or some other groups in order to have full independence. At the origin of this secession, there is often a clash of interests.

This nationalism is based above all on common language and religion, so that some areas become unified under the leadership of one of them. So Germany unified under the king of Prussia, and Italy under the king of Piedmont. Besides this centripetal movement, there was, and there still is a possible centrifugal movement; the dismemberment of the Habsburg Empire provides a good example of this.

Nationalism is not a natural sentiment; it is nourished with myths, the so-called foundation myths, legendary stories and rewriting of historical events, making reference to glorious ancestors, for example in France Saint Louis exercising justice under an oak, Joan of Arc, or the anti-Roman Vercingetorix. The nation is now a legal notion, which is completely foreign to the concepts of ancient peoples.

It does not seem that the Mesopotamian people knew this kind of nationalist feeling and above all did not feel racial contempt for the Aramaeans, Hebrews, or others. However, in Babylonia and in Assyria, the ruling class and perhaps the people tried to create a coherent political entity and wanted self-government. The Babylonians had a feeling of superiority over the Assyrians in intellectual activities and made every effort to keep up their own customs and cultural traditions against the Assyrians. Assyrians, on the other hand, glorified their military power and were very proud of exercising their influence on the bordering countries, even in remote regions. It is beyond all doubt that the opposition between these two ‘‘nations’’ certainly resulted from the geopolitical contrast between the northern and the southern parts of Mesopotamia, that is, between Babylonia, an area of irrigated fields with palm groves and flourishing sea-trade through the Persian Gulf, and Assyria, a hilly land with rainfall farming interacting with nearby mountain peoples and Anatolia, modern Turkey.