It was suggested to me that I submit the following here. I thought it was a good idea, so here I am.
I'm a bit fed up with people looking at history through 19th century glasses. That's when, as I understand it, the masses started to identify with the political entity known as the state and people were starting to be considered citizens and not subjects (I know, I know, this citizen-thing was known in ancient Greece and Rome, but only for free males of course). Before people were loyal to a regent, only later did they become more and more loyal to a political entity they were thought to be part of based mostly on ethnic markers (language, culture). That's when the modern nation states were actually born.
Nevertheless people today tend to implement these thoughts on the times before the 19th century without a second thought, as if the nation state and it's loyalties have always existed. "The French invaded", "the Russians subjugated", "the Irish starved" and so on. It's of course easier to handle history in this way, but it feels kinda like an anachronism. It is my understanding that the masses, who were largely uneducated peasants before the 19th century and industrialisation, did not see themselves as French, German, Swedes and so on. They had not yet been given the nationalist tools to think like that. They were much more local in their way of thought and as I understand it religion was much more a factor of identity back then. The thing with "being Russian" or "Swedish" was something for the upper classes, the cosmopolite nobles who were educated and indoctrinated in the interests of the realm. They were the ones that were responsible for the defence of the area that their king ruled, an area that the masses probably had no real clue about. I mean, who used rare maps back then besides nobles and kings who had vast areas to look after?
It makes more sense that nobles and maybe rich merchants might have used identities that correspond more with the nation state idea of today. Nobles were of course the class with power in society and history usually remembers them by name, but they were nevertheless a small minority of the total population.
So, three things.
Any thoughts on this?
Does anyone have good literature on the subject of identity of the masses before national romanticism?
I'm kinda restricted to Europe in this, but I'm curious to know if the development of the identity of the masses has been similar in the rest of the world.
Generally, as far as I can see through long reading people identified in many different ways - and what identification was most important could wary a lot depending on the subject and what you wanted to tell apart.
Religion was common, as was location, language and crown. The crown would be a kind of proto-nation (the crown of Sweden for example) meaning a set of laws, traditions, rulers and ways of doing things. Class, social status and lawful rights could also be used.
For example, Swedish medieval peasants would probably identify themselves as christians (as opposed to muslim moors), catholics (as opposed to orthodox Novgorodians), Norse-speaking (as opposed to Lower German as the Hansa merchants) and Swedish (as opposed to German or Danish, meaning that they identified with a set of laws, a local rulership and their old rights to representation in the estates parliament and to own their own land and not be serfs). Further they might identify with their region (as opposed to peasants of other regions who could support other claimants to the throne or other courses of action for the country) down to the smallest unit, a farm.
Generally, people seem to have been reluctant to accept foreign rulers (foreign in this case meanign a different language, used to a different set of laws and different traditions) and there seems to have been a lot of wrangling and attempts to secure the old rights of nobility and masses alike when foreign rulers took the throne.
Eliminating a crown meant that you abolished its administration, laws, traditions and local elite and that you intended to centralise Power to yourself, which would cause masses and noblemen alike to identify with said crown and resist you.
The whole question is very complex and how people identified and where they placed their loyalty varied a lot with whatever outside pressure might turn up. Swedish peasants were for example more afraid of going the way of continental (and to some extent Danish) peasants and lose their free-held land and become serfs without rights and representation than they were of death itself and frequently took to arms during the 15th and 16th centuries against the Danish Kings and his rule of Sweden.
Yet in the early 17th century, during the Kalmar War 1611-1613 Swedish and Danish peasants on either side of the border assisted each other, warned each other if armies (from whichever side) was aproaching and helped each other hide in the forests if that was the case - clearly they identified more as peasants and potential victims of rape, looting and pillage than their identity as Danish or Swedish.
Piggy-backing off of the great responses of u/vonadler: Medieval Catalans were an interesting case study for what you're asking. Over the course of the 13th century they spread throughout the Mediterranean, settling in the kingdoms of Mallorca and Sicily, for example. While the kingdom of Mallorca was independent from the Crown of Aragon in the late 13th and early 14th centuries, there was perceived sense of difference based on their homeland and sovereign (king), but this difference competed with the people's linguistic and cultural similarities. The result was ambiguity of identity and diplomatic confusion.
For example, in Tunis and Palermo, there were "Catalan Consulates" established by the Crown of Aragon. That's what they were called, and they were to be used by "Catalans" from Catalunya, Valencia, AND the independent Kingdom of Mallorca. This may have included Muslims from Catalunya and Valencia, as well. So "Catalan" identity was based on somethings like religion, language, and the king you lived under, but it wasn't necessarily just any one of these things. Later, the Kingdom of Mallorca established its own Consulate in Tunis, a "Mallorcan Consulate" separate from the "Catalan Consulate", and this pissed the king of Aragon off, who claimed (through a 50-year-old feudal oath) right of protection for all "Catalans" when they were abroad. It didn't help, either, that the King of Mallorca was also negotiating a better trade deal with the King of Tunis, giving "Mallorcans" privileges over "Catalans". These two groups would have been almost undistinguishable if you bumped into them in the port.
Then there's Italy. The whole peninsula spoke various dialects of what we'd call "Italian" today, but in the later Middle Ages they were considered different languages. You spoke "Genoese" or "Venetian" or "Florentine". They were, of course, mutually intelligible and there were many cultural similarities between the various groups. But it appears that one's identity came mostly from your city of origin. You'd read about Venetians talking about how Florentines are lewd, goofy practical jokers that you shouldn't take seriously, and Florentines talking about how Venetians would sell their mothers if it made a profit, etc.
The Italian project is interesting, because the creation of "Italy", the Nation-State, had to overcome all these differences and create a National Identity. If you've ever visited Italy or heard Northern Italians' disdain for the south, you know that the project isn't finished.