INTRODUCTION

In chapter one of this book I outlined the essentials of ethnicity, defining ethnic identity as the temporary resultant of a process of developing collective self-images, attitudes and conduct that takes place in a context of interaction between those directly involved and outsiders. Ethnic identities are by definition subjective, dynamic and situational constructs, which makes their relationship to material culture problematic. Unlike many other kinds of cultural identity, unless combined with textual data, they are in principle archaeologically intangible. The purpose of this chapter is to elaborate on and apply these general principles in the specific case of the Batavians.

In chapter 5 I outlined a model of an emerging Batavian polity in the Lower Rhine frontier zone of the Roman empire and of the earliest beginnings of the Roman-Batavian relationship. It is against that historical background that I intend to analyse in this chapter the creation of a Batavian self-image, one which seems to have been shaped to a significant degree by interaction with the Roman world. It is clear that the Batavian community as a political entity came first, and that it was then followed by the shaping of an ethnic identity – a Batavian self-image.

By definition, a tension exists between ethnic identity as image or representation and as reality. As a rule, ethnic identities are constructed around a body of clichés, stereotypes and invented histories. A process is involved, whereby the collective formulates and applies rules of inclusion, role fulfilment and exclusion in interaction with their self-image and the image that others construct of them. But ethnic identity covers actions as well as images. It would be correct to say that ethnic identities are moulded, channelled and modified through constant interaction between the group image and the praxis of individual and collective action. In terms of the topic of my research, this means that Batavian identity was shaped in the forcefield between internal and external perception – between self-image and the image formed by outsiders – and was then named and appropriated as their own.

One obvious methodological problem is the almost total absence of primary sources about the selfimage of the Batavians.