Barbarism and Religion

by J. G. A. Pocock

• ISBN13: 9780521856256
• ISBN10: 0521856256
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2005-11-28
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

'Barbarism and Religion' - Edward Gibbon's own phrase - is the title of a sequence of works by John Pocock designed to situate Gibbon, and his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, in a series of contexts in the history of eighteenth-century Europe. In the fourth volume in the sequence, Pocock argues that barbarism was central to the history of western historiography, to the history of the Enlightenment, and to Edward Gibbon himself. As a concept it was deeply problematic to Enlightened historians seeking to understand their own civilised societies in the light of exposure to newly discovered civilisations which were, until then, beyond the reach of history itself.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	ix
List of abbreviations	x
Introduction	1	(10)
PART I THE HISTORY AND THEORY OF BARBARISM
Introducing the barbarian: problems of barbarism and religion	11	(6)
Anquetil-Duperron: despotism and prophecy in Sassanid Persia	17	(20)
Antoine-Yves Goguet: the Confusion of Tongues and the origins of civility	37	(28)
Thomas Carte: Japhetic settlers in the western islands	65	(14)
The forest Germans: lethargy and passion in a transhumant culture	79	(20)
PART II JOSEPH DE GUIGNES AND THE DISCOVERY OF EURASIA
Gentile history in the further Asia	99	(11)
The many faces of Fo: the problem of religion in Eurasian history	110	(23)
Hans, Huns and Romans: the rhythms of barbarism and empire	133	(24)
PART III THE NEW WORLD AND THE PROBLEM OF HISTORY
The invention and discovery of savagery	157	(24)
Robertson's America: the Scottish theoretical encounter with the New World	181	(11)
The universe of savagery and the search for history	192	(13)
Ancient history for modern colonists: the reception of Robertson	205	(24)
PART IV THE CRISIS OF THE SEABORNE EMPIRES
European history and the global ocean	229	(17)
The antiquity of Asia: priests, legislators and the tragedy of history	246	(23)
American savages and European barbarians: the invasion of the natural world	269	(25)
Slaves and settlers: the sugar islands in the new geopolitics	294	(19)
Utopia and revolution: the northern continent in history	313	(18)
CONCLUSION
Gibbon and the empires	331	(9)
Envoi	340	(3)
Bibliography of works cited	343	(8)
Index	351