The ethnic origin in historical analysis
INTRODUCTION
Sometimes at the time of the analysis of a historical process, it is commondetermined within the community framework that is being studied, and consequently, we tend to seek and see that same schematization in the sources.
With these collections in mind, the objective of this presentation is to try to see how, from the analysis of a series of papyraceous sources, this can be completed much more, making the concept of “ethnicity” something much more plastic and moldable that allows usSee the nuances and differential degrees within certain cultural integration processes, in our case, in the first centuries of Macedonia domination in Egypt.
Without delving too much in the previous debates around the concept, ethnicity can be understood as a type of social organization based on the ascription to certain groups with common interests and origin. If we follow the position of the Norwegian anthropologist Fredrik Barth, we can talk about an "ascription" to an ethnic category when a person is classified in terms of their most basic identity, presumably determined by its origin and context of origin. Thus, to the extent that social actors begin to use ethnic identities to categorize each other for interactional purposes, ethnic groups are formed.
From this definition, we can infer three arguments:
- Ethnicity, understood as a form of organization of cultural differences, implies that certain specific elements of it (in a broad sense) are specially indicated as "ethnically significant" and others are more "neutral" (moldable). Based on this differentiation, society is divided between a "we" and a "they", which serves in practice to mark the limits both inside and outside the ethnic groups.
- Ethnicity is an independent dimension of social life. While a certain ethnic group can borrow elements of another culture, such as those linked to religion, ways of life, forms of occupation of land or work, as well as something as important as language, always retains a nucleusunique differentiation that works as an identity limit brand .
- In early Ptolema Egypt, ethnicity is part of the set of socio-cultural integration strategies, since if we consider identity as a subjective construction of the individuals that compose it, then the survival of an ethnic identity is not the result ofPassive assimilation through mere biological reproduction, but the result of a continuous interest by these individuals to maintain those ethnic ethnic limits (Boundaries). Each generation, then, is the one that decides for itself which ethnic elements maintains and which not to define itself as such, which means that as soon as the maintenance of such ethnic identity becomes for some irrelevant reason, the group disappears since itsethnic limits are blurred within others;Something similar happened in the Hellenistic and early-Roman Egypt with minority immigrant identities, as in the case of Alexandrian Jews and the traces that were integrated into the chora through the clerleum system in areas such as El-Fayyum.
Now, from Barth’s premises we must add the contributions referred specifically to the world of classical antiquity. In the first place, we cannot fail to cite two invaluable works by Jonathan Hall: Ethnic Identity in Greek Antiquity and Hellenicity, who feel a remarkable theoretical precedent by sustaining the importance of understanding ethnicity, or "Hellenicity" as the author particularly calls the author the author the author, such as: "(…) a specific type of cultural identity, together with other subvariants such as linguistic, religious, occupational, and others", where distinction lies in the idea that ethnic identity is defined from mutual recognitionof ancestors (real or fictitious) and common relationship relations, as well as a common historical past and identification with a certain place of origin.
Second, it is necessary to point out that Koen Goudriaan, in an already classic work on the problem of ethnicity in Hellenistic Egypt, has also argued on the basis of Barth’s approaches that the best way to study an ethnic group is athrough the historical future of the different "ethnic strategies" adopted by their individuals, or by the group in general, in their daily relationships with the "others" integranting. Following this logic, we can define as “ethnic strategy” to a deliberate action carried out by the group in question in relation to its ethnic identity categories, in other words, in the adaptability of its cultural components, since in this case the authorhandles a much wider concept of ethnicity than in the case of hall.
These two visions can be complemented with some recent contributions that emphasize to see ethnic identity as a multifaceted phenomenon. Dorothy Thompson, for example, argues that ethnic markers adopt a performative dimension in Egypt, since “(…) a person’s ethnic identity can vary in different contexts. So a self-definition does not need to be the same as a designation or category applied from an outside ”. To exemplify it, although the author takes the population that migrated to the United States at the end of the 19th century in search of new life opportunities, we can think, saving historical distances, in the case of immigrant identities in theContext of the so -called "immigration alluvion" between the end of the 19th and early twentieth centuries in the Río de la Plata. There, in the port migration offices, the Basques, Catalans and Galicians were cataloged for administrative purposes as a single identity collective: "Spaniards", and the same happened with the Sicilians, Lombardos and Neapolitans to label them with the generic denomination of "Italian" .
Crossing the limits of "Greek" and "Egyptian"
Following the proposed line of work, what we want to underline is that the context is what determines the meaning of ethnic markers. And the Ptolemaic Egypt is no exception, since we will see from the sources the power that encloses the ethnicity to create and cross "limits" (Boundaries), as a-marco in which all the contradictions that are generatedIn praxis . If we follow Hall’s conceptual framework, individuals can emphasize ethnic identity to consciously mark a differentiation (limit) between a "we" and some "others", to which we add that such strategy could also be operated from the State, inThis Ptolemaic case, to divide the population into manageable groups especially for fiscal purposes. But perhaps, if when studying the sources of the period we open our eyes and frightened the subtle called Morpheus, we can see that many times inside the performance inherent in ethnicity processes we can find a different and more interesting use to analyze: as toolsTo cross and transform those same ethnic and cultural borders.
However, our goal in the following section will be to weigh the methodological validity of some of these characteristics in a certain corpus of sources, with special emphasis on early Ptolemaic papyros (S S. IV-III) of the El-Fayyum region, in Nomo Arsinoíta.
In the first place, it is necessary to emphasize that many of the sources we have of the period are of a judicial nature, and here we find a small problem that has been long studying since the middle of the last century by authors such as Mikhail Rostovtzeff, Claire Preaux, which whichThey maintain the idea that we are not aware of the existence of a legal definition of ‘Egyptians’ in use during the Ptolemaic era, and for that reason these sources would prevent us from developing cultural analysis since letting be guided only by onomastic issues would be to fix ourAttention in a mere discursive fiction.
Faced with this problem posed, we maintain that the absence of a legal definition did not prevent the inhabitants of Hellenistic Egypt from organizing and self-defining each other as members of the same ethnic community. However, as we saw before, those ethnicities were social constructions, so through everyday praxis, what happened is that a social definition of ‘Egyptian’ was built, but also the same happened for the Greek case, sinceThe word ἕλλην (Hellene) existed and operated in the same way as a marker of social belonging. In this way, ethnicity processes, understood as social phenomena and not as much as legal, can help pay the idea that both "Greeks" and "Egyptians" were not formed as fixed "social classes", which does not mean denyingthat in practice the Hellenos could have become better political and/or economic positions than the Egyptians in certain specific cases. Anyway, the latter could also be discussed long and lying in another job, since if we leave the area of bass Egypt and we go into the chora, especially in nomos such as the Heracleopolitan or the Menfita, we can see Egyptians in positions in positionsof some importance, especially in the clergy or local administration of the Earth (Toparcas, regions), as well as in certain military sectors..
Finally, but not for them less important, we will try to show how the early Ptolemaic state, through its local officials, operated as a “leveling” of social differences, contributing largely to the strengthening of social integration strategies, especiallyIn regions of the Egyptian Chora with strong Greek migration influx such as the Nomo Arsinoíta.
The ethnicity in action: the case of the Diofanes file
The first case that we will analyze under this optics is that of some of the most important papyri of the so -called "Diofanes Archive". It is interesting to note that this corpus is composed of around 125 papyri written in the Greek language, among which are both private and judicial epistolary records. Four of them are in possession of the British Library, and the rest scattered between the collections of the Cairo Museum and the Universities of Lille and Paris. All the pieces were recovered from cardboard from different mummies, and cataloged within the same corpus from the constant reference to an individual in particular: the strategos diofanes, which according to these same sources, held said position in the Nomo Arsinoíta, at least, between 222-218 to.C., Although it is likely to have been for longer. If we make a general estimate based on the current sources found on this region dated in the III-II centuries to.C., around 200-250 Strategoi are known, and of all of them diofanes is by far the best witnessed.
"Therefore, I ask you and I beg you, oh king, that you do not allow justice to take"
Negative face of coexistence between Greeks (many clerucos) and Egyptians in the chora (Diofanes and
Now as an example and to do it quickly I will present two papyri that come from the Strategos Diofanes file that can portray these issues:
This papiros corpus is composed of around 125 papyri written in Greek (epistolary and judicial records), 4 of them are in the British Library, and the rest in Cairo and SorbonneMummies. The papiros tell us that Diófanes held the position of Strategos (civic-military position that directed the names in Egitpto after the conquest of Alejandro) of the Nomo Arsinoita (El-Fayyum) between the years 222-218 to.C.., But the funny thing is that they do not tell us about their military role, but rather of their administrative functions in charge of one of the richest territorial divisions of the kingdom.
The texts that I have selected are complaints and legal demands (papyro ent ent entéx – real requests) presented by different individuals (both Greek and Egyptians) through the corresponding administrative channels, which can give us a photograph at least in this particular context ofThe Ptolemaic Chora:
After seeing the tensions inherent to the inter-ethnic interaction in this small historical cut, ethnicity then would not seem to coincide exclusively with status issues, since the Greeks (and the Egyptians also) did not enjoy privileges exclusively on the basis of theirEthnic identity, although this did not prevent the Egyptians in certain circumstances also to have greater difficulties in accessing the authorities, at least those of medium level.
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