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In this chapter I want to focus on the genesis and development of a conceptual demarcation running through western society from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages whereby a particular discourse of power is privileged over against others. The nexus of this discourse is the West-East dualism and the corresponding counter-factualism of an "us"/"them" polarity. I wish to show that one of the most enduring forms of western identity was the postulation of a centre, anchored in a historical myth of origins, and that this served to reinforce the formation of adversarial world-views. The origins of Eurocentrism, then, lay not in the idea of Europe itself as a cultural model, but in the structures of a discourse which served to reinforce the power of the centre. Thus, when the idea of Europe emerged as a cultural idea it became associated with structures of power and their identity projects. The cultural space for the formation of an autonomous discourse of Europe had not yet formed. Prior to the early modern period the idea of Europe was always articulated through other discourses, of which the most significant was Christendom. In other words, then, "European" identity, as an ethno-cultural and political project, preceded the formation of the idea of Europe as such. But of course we cannot call this a "European identity" since it was never focused on the idea of Europe itself. The idea of Europe when it did emerge was embedded in Christendom having become virtually coterminous with the notion of the Occident, which preceded the idea of Europe. It was this latter notion of the Occident or West that provided continuity between Hellenism, Christendom and the idea of Europe.

DOI: 10.1057/9780230379657_2

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