Protochronism

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Protochronism (Romanian: Protocronism, originating in the Ancient Greek terms for before time [itself]) is a modern tendency in cultural nationalism. The term was coined in Romania to describe the marked tendency of the Nicolae Ceauşescu regime to ascribe, largely relying on questionable data and subjective interpretations, an idealised past to the country as a whole. A pejorative term that was given to the Romanian phenomenon is Dacomania (sometimes Thracomania), while its advocates prefer Dacology.

1 Overview
2 History
3 Modern-day equivalents
4 Notes
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Overview

In this context, the term makes reference to the trend (noticed in several versions of Romanian nationalism) to ascribe a unique quality to the Dacians and their civilization. Usually glossing over the fact that Dacian society lacked such basic instruments as a writing system, protochronists attempt to prove either that Dacians had a major part to play in Ancient history, or even that they had the ascendancy over all cultures (with a particular accent on Ancient Rome, which, in a complete reversal of the founding myth, would have been created by Dacian migrants). Also noted are the exploitation of the Tărtăria tablets as certain proof that writing originated on proto-Dacian territory, and the belief that the enigmatic Dacian language survived all the way to the Middle Ages. An additional - but not universal - feature is the attempted connection between the supposed monotheism of the mysterious Zalmoxis cult and Christianity, in the belief that Dacians easily adopted and subsequently influenced the religion which would have been preached to them by Saint Andrew (considered, doubtfuly, as the clear origin of modern-day Romanian Orthodoxy).

[edit] History

The ideas have been explained as part of an inferiority complex present in Romanian nationalism^[1], one which also manifested itself in works not connected with Protochronism, mainly as a rejection of the ideas that Romanian territories only served as a colony of Rome, voided of initiative, and subject to an influx of Latins which would have completely wiped out a Dacian presence.

Protochronism most likely came about with the views professed in the 1870s by Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu^[2], one of the main points of the dispute between him and the conservative Junimea. For example, Hasdeu's Etymologicum magnum Romaniae not only claimed that Dacians gave Rome many of her Emperors, but also that the ruling dynasties of early medieval Wallachia and Moldavia were descendants of a caste of Dacians descending from "King" (chieftain) Burebista.

After World War I and throughout Greater Romania's existence, the ideology increased its appeal. The Iron Guard flirted with the concept, making considerable parallels between its projects and interpretations of what would have been Zalmoxis' message. What also contributed was the fact that, in a neutral context, the Romanian archaeology school led by Vasile Pârvan investigated scores of previously ignored Dacian sites.

The beliefs came to be expanded by Nicolae Densuşianu, who wrote a complete parallel to Romanian official history, which included among the Dacians such diverse figures as those of the Asen dynasty, and Horea. The main volume is the Dacia Preistorică ("Prehistoric Dacia").

In 1974 Edgar Papu published in the mainstream cultural monthly Secolul XX an essay titled "The Romanian Prothocronism", arguing for Romanian chronological priority for some European achievements.^[3] The idea was promptly adopted by the nationalist Ceauşescu regime, which subsequently encouraged and amplified a cultural and historical discourse claiming the prevalence of autochtony over any foreign influence. Ceauşescu's ideologues developed a singular concept after the 1974 11th Congress of the Communist Party of Romania, when they attached Protochronism to official Marxism, arguing that the Dacians had produced a permanent and unorganized State [sic]. The Dacians had been favored by several communist generations as autochthonous insurgents against an "Imperialist" Rome (with the Stalinist leadership of the 1950s proclaiming them to be closely linked with the Slavic peoples); however, Ceauşescu's was an interpretation with a distinct motivation, making a connection with the opinions of previous protochronists. The regime started a partnership with Italian resident, former Iron Guardist and millionaire Iosif Constantin Drăgan, who is still a champion of the Dacian cause).^[4] Critics regard these excesses as the expression of an isolationist course amalgamating provincial ressentiments and nationalistic exasperation. Thus, economical autarchy and cultural isolation of the late Ceauşescu’s regime came along with an increasingly strident prothocronism.

Today, the interpretation is gaining popularity.^[5] The main representative is still Drăgan, but he is seconded by the New York City-based physician Napoleon Săvescu. Together, they issue the eloquently-titled magazine Noi, Dacii ("Us Dacians").

[edit] Modern-day equivalents

Albanian communist dictator Enver Hoxha supported the theory of Zacharie Mayani that Albanians and Albanian language are related to ancient Etruscan civilization, as well as that of the Pelasgians.
Bulgarian communist dictator Todor Zhivkov supported the theory that there are clear links between the Bulgarians and the ancient Thracians. His daughter Lyudmila Zhivkova created the Institute of Thracology as part of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences.
Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein has frequently appealed to imagery and rhetoric that assumed a direct link between the modern-day country and Sumer or Babylon.
Iranian Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi tried to forge a secular national identity by appealing to various stages of the Persian Empire (and especially to the Achaemenid dynasty).

[edit] Notes

^ Verdery, pp. 177
^ Verdery, pp. 326
^ Martin
^ Verdary, pp. 343
^ Observatorul Cultural, "Renaşterea Daciei?", August 2001

[edit] References

Lucian Boia, Istorie şi mit în conştiinţa românească, Bucharest, Humanitas, 1997
B. P. Hasdeu, Ethymologicum Magnum Romaniae. Dicţionarul limbei istorice şi poporane a românilor (Pagini alese), Bucharest, Minerva, 1970
(Romanian) Mircea Martin, "Cultura română între comunism şi naţionalism" (II), in Revista 22, 44 (660)/XIII, October-November 2002
Katherine Verdery, National Ideology under Socialism. Identity and Cultural Politics in Ceauşescu's Romania, University of California Press, 1991. ISBN 0-520-20358-5