NCERT Explained: Class X History, Chapter 1 - The Rise of Nationalism in Europe

Introduction to the Topic

Welcome, students! Today, we embark on a fascinating journey back to 19th-century Europe, a time of dramatic change, revolutionary ideas, and the birth of the modern world as we know it. We'll be exploring Chapter 1 of your Class X History textbook, 'The Rise of Nationalism in Europe'. This chapter isn't just a collection of dates and events; it's the story of how the very idea of a 'nation' came into being. Before this period, people's loyalties were primarily to a king, a city, or a local lord, not to a country defined by a common culture, language, and history. The world was dominated by vast, multi-national dynastic empires like the Habsburg Empire, which ruled over diverse groups of people who spoke different languages and had distinct traditions.

This chapter traces the powerful force of nationalism – the belief that people who share a common identity have the right to form their own independent state. We will see how this idea, sparked by events like the French Revolution, swept across the continent, toppling monarchies, redrawing maps, and creating the nations we recognize today, like Germany and Italy. Understanding this chapter is crucial because the rise of nationalism in Europe had a profound impact on the entire world, shaping modern politics, conflicts, and the very concept of national identity. Let's dive in and unravel this epic story of transformation!

Key Concepts Explained

The French Revolution and the Idea of the Nation (1789)

The first clear expression of nationalism came with the French Revolution in 1789. Before the revolution, France was ruled by an absolute monarch. The revolution transferred sovereignty from the king to the French citizens. It proclaimed that it was the people who would henceforth constitute the nation and shape its destiny. So, how did the revolutionaries create this new sense of collective identity?

• The Ideas of 'La Patrie' and 'Le Citoyen': They introduced the concepts of la patrie (the fatherland) and le citoyen (the citizen). This emphasized the notion of a community enjoying equal rights under a constitution.
• New Symbols: A new French flag, the tricolour, was chosen to replace the former royal standard.
• Centralised Administration: A centralised administrative system was put in place, formulating uniform laws for all citizens within its territory. Internal customs duties and dues were abolished, and a uniform system of weights and measures was adopted.
• Common Language: Regional dialects were discouraged, and French, as it was spoken and written in Paris, became the common language of the nation.

The revolutionaries declared that it was the mission and the destiny of the French nation to liberate the peoples of Europe from despotism. This mission was carried forward by Napoleon Bonaparte. Although he destroyed democracy in France by establishing a monarchy, he incorporated revolutionary principles in the administrative field to make the whole system more rational and efficient. The Napoleonic Code of 1804 did away with all privileges based on birth, established equality before the law, and secured the right to property. He simplified administrative divisions, abolished the feudal system, and freed peasants from serfdom. This standardisation and modernisation, exported to regions under French control, made people in Holland, Switzerland, Italy, and Germany realise the benefits of a unified national system, planting the seeds of nationalism across Europe.

The Making of Nationalism in Europe

If you look at the map of mid-18th-century Europe, you will not find the 'nation-states' that we know today. Germany, Italy, and Switzerland were divided into kingdoms, duchies, and cantons whose rulers had their autonomous territories. Eastern and Central Europe were under autocratic monarchies within which lived diverse peoples. The Habsburg Empire, for example, included the Alpine regions, Austria, and Hungary, as well as Bohemia, Lombardy, and Venetia. The only tie binding these diverse groups together was a common allegiance to the emperor. So, how did nationalism and the idea of the nation-state emerge?

The Aristocracy and the New Middle Class

Socially and politically, a landed aristocracy was the dominant class on the continent. They owned estates in the countryside and also town-houses. They spoke French in high society and were connected by ties of marriage. This powerful aristocracy was, however, numerically a small group. The majority of the population was made up of the peasantry.

In Western Europe, the growth of towns and the emergence of commercial classes, whose existence was based on production for the market, led to industrialisation. This industrialisation led to the emergence of a new social group: a working-class population and a middle class made up of industrialists, businessmen, and professionals. It was among this educated, liberal middle class that ideas of national unity following the abolition of aristocratic privileges gained popularity. They were the ones who spearheaded the nationalist movements.

What did Liberal Nationalism Stand For?

The term 'liberalism' derives from the Latin root liber, meaning free. For the new middle classes, liberalism stood for freedom for the individual and equality of all before the law.

• Politically, it emphasised the concept of government by consent. It stood for the end of autocracy and clerical privileges, a constitution, and a representative government through parliament. However, it did not necessarily stand for universal suffrage (the right of all adults to vote). In revolutionary France, for instance, only property-owning men had the right to vote.
• Economically, liberalism stood for the freedom of markets and the abolition of state-imposed restrictions on the movement of goods and capital. For example, a merchant travelling in 1833 from Hamburg to Nuremberg to sell his goods would have had to pass through 11 customs barriers and pay a customs duty of about 5 per cent at each one of them. The new commercial classes argued for the creation of a unified economic territory, leading to the formation of the zollverein or customs union in 1834 by Prussia, which abolished tariff barriers and created a network of railways, further stimulating economic nationalism.

After the defeat of Napoleon in 1815, European governments were driven by a spirit of Conservatism. Conservatives wanted to re-establish traditional institutions like the monarchy, the Church, and social hierarchies. The Treaty of Vienna (1815), hosted by the Austrian Chancellor Duke Metternich, aimed to undo most of the changes that had come about in Europe during the Napoleonic wars. The Bourbon dynasty was restored to power in France, and a series of states were set up on the boundaries of France to prevent future expansion. However, the liberal-nationalist revolutionaries, driven underground, continued to spread their ideas in secret societies.

The Age of Revolutions: 1830-1848

As conservative regimes tried to consolidate their power, liberal nationalists continued to fuel revolutions across Europe. As Metternich once famously remarked, 'When France sneezes, the rest of Europe catches a cold'. The July Revolution of 1830 in France sparked uprisings elsewhere.

• France (1830): The Bourbon kings were overthrown by liberal revolutionaries who installed a constitutional monarchy with Louis Philippe at its head.
• Belgium: Inspired by France, an uprising in Brussels led to Belgium breaking away from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
• Greek War of Independence (1821-1832): This was a landmark event that mobilised nationalist feelings among the educated elite across Europe. Greece had been part of the Ottoman Empire since the 15th century. Poets and artists lauded Greece as the cradle of European civilisation and supported its struggle. Finally, the Treaty of Constantinople of 1832 recognised Greece as an independent nation.

The Romantic Imagination and National Feeling

It wasn't just wars and territorial expansion that forged nationalism. Culture played an important role in creating the idea of the nation. Romanticism, a cultural movement, focused on emotions, intuition, and mystical feelings. Romantic artists and poets criticised the glorification of reason and science and instead tried to create a sense of a shared collective heritage, a common cultural past, as the basis of a nation.

German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder claimed that true German culture was to be discovered among the common people – das volk. It was through folk songs, folk poetry, and folk dances that the true spirit of the nation (volksgeist) was popularised. The emphasis on vernacular language and the collection of local folklore was not just to recover an ancient national spirit, but also to carry the modern nationalist message to large audiences who were mostly illiterate. In Poland, which had been partitioned by the Great Powers, national feelings were kept alive through music and language. Karol Kurpiński, for example, celebrated the national struggle through his operas and music, turning folk dances like the polonaise and mazurka into nationalist symbols.

Hunger, Hardship and Popular Revolt (1848)

The 1830s were years of great economic hardship in Europe. The first half of the nineteenth century saw an enormous increase in population all over Europe. In most countries, there were more seekers of jobs than employment. The rise of food prices or a year of bad harvest led to widespread pauperism in town and country. In 1848, food shortages and widespread unemployment brought the population of Paris out on the roads. Louis Philippe was forced to flee, and a National Assembly proclaimed a Republic, granted suffrage to all adult males above 21, and guaranteed the right to work.

In another part of Europe, in 1845, weavers in Silesia had led a revolt against contractors who supplied them raw material and gave them orders for finished textiles but drastically reduced their payments. This revolt showed the desperation of the working class.

The year 1848 was also the year of the Revolution of the Liberals. Parallel to the revolts of the poor, a revolution led by the educated middle classes was underway. In Germany, Italy, Poland, and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, men and women of the liberal middle classes combined their demands for constitutionalism with national unification. In the German regions, a large number of political associations came together in the city of Frankfurt and decided to vote for an all-German National Assembly. On 18 May 1848, 831 elected representatives marched in a festive procession to take their places in the Frankfurt Parliament. They drafted a constitution for a German nation to be headed by a monarchy subject to a parliament. However, when the crown was offered to Friedrich Wilhelm IV, King of Prussia, he rejected it. The parliament, dominated by the middle classes, lost its support and was eventually disbanded. Despite this failure, the old order could not be restored. Monarchs began to realise that the cycles of revolution could only be ended by granting concessions to the liberal-nationalist revolutionaries.

The Unification of Germany and Italy

After 1848, nationalism in Europe moved away from its association with democracy and revolution. Nationalist sentiments were now often mobilised by conservatives for promoting state power and achieving political domination over Europe. This process is most clearly seen in the unification of Germany and Italy.

The Unification of Germany (1866-1871)

Nationalist feelings were widespread among middle-class Germans, who in 1848 tried to unite the different regions of the German confederation into a nation-state. This liberal initiative was, however, repressed by the combined forces of the monarchy and the military, supported by the large landowners (called Junkers) of Prussia. From then on, Prussia took on the leadership of the movement for national unification.

Its chief minister, Otto von Bismarck, was the architect of this process. He was not a democrat but a master of Realpolitik (politics based on practical objectives rather than on ideals). He carried out the unification with the help of the Prussian army and bureaucracy, famously declaring that the great questions of the day would not be decided by speeches and majority resolutions but by 'iron and blood'.

The process involved three wars over seven years:

1. War with Denmark (1864): Prussia and Austria jointly defeated Denmark to annex Schleswig-Holstein.
2. Austro-Prussian War (1866): Bismarck skillfully isolated Austria and then defeated it, removing it from the German Confederation.
3. Franco-Prussian War (1870-1871): A provoked France declared war on Prussia. The Prussian victory completed the process of unification.

In January 1871, the Prussian king, Kaiser Wilhelm I, was proclaimed German Emperor in a ceremony held at the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles. The new German Empire was a symbol of the victory of Prussian state power. The new state placed a strong emphasis on modernising the currency, banking, legal, and judicial systems in Germany.

The Unification of Italy

Like Germany, Italy too had a long history of political fragmentation. Italians were scattered over several dynastic states as well as the multi-national Habsburg Empire. During the middle of the nineteenth century, Italy was divided into seven states. Only one, Sardinia-Piedmont, was ruled by an Italian princely house.

The unification of Italy was the work of four key figures:

• Giuseppe Mazzini: Known as the 'soul' of Italian unification. He was a revolutionary who founded two secret societies, 'Young Italy' in Marseilles and 'Young Europe' in Berne. He believed that God had intended nations to be the natural units of mankind. Though his revolutionary uprisings failed, he laid the ideological groundwork for unification.
• King Victor Emmanuel II: He was the king of Sardinia-Piedmont and became the face of the unified Italy. He saw the unification of Italy as an opportunity for economic development and political dominance.
• Count Cavour: The 'brain' of the unification. As the chief minister of Sardinia-Piedmont, he was neither a revolutionary nor a democrat. He led the movement to unify the regions of Italy. Through a tactful diplomatic alliance with France, Sardinia-Piedmont succeeded in defeating the Austrian forces in 1859, acquiring Lombardy.
• Giuseppe Garibaldi: The 'sword' of the unification. In 1860, he led his famous expedition of the 'Thousand' (Red Shirts) to South Italy. They succeeded in winning the support of the local peasants and drove out the Spanish rulers from the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies.

In 1861, Victor Emmanuel II was proclaimed king of a united Italy. However, much of the Italian population, among whom rates of illiteracy were very high, remained blissfully unaware of liberal-nationalist ideology. The peasant masses who had supported Garibaldi in southern Italy had never even heard of 'Italia' and believed that 'La Talia' was Victor Emmanuel’s wife!

Visualising the Nation

How do you give a face to an abstract idea like a 'nation'? In the 18th and 19th centuries, artists found a way by personifying the nation. They represented a country as if it were a person. Nations were then portrayed as female figures. This female form was not meant to represent any particular woman in real life; rather, it sought to give the abstract idea of the nation a concrete form. This female figure became an allegory of the nation.

• Marianne in France: This was the name given to the female allegory of France. Her characteristics were drawn from those of Liberty and the Republic – the red cap, the tricolour, the cockade. Statues of Marianne were erected in public squares to remind the public of the national symbol of unity.
• Germania in Germany: Germania became the allegory of the German nation. In visual representations, Germania wears a crown of oak leaves, as the German oak stands for heroism. Her image was often displayed with a sword, an olive branch (symbolising a willingness to make peace), and the tricolour flag of liberal-nationalists.

Nationalism and Imperialism

By the last quarter of the nineteenth century, the character of nationalism had changed. It was no longer the idealistic, liberal-democratic sentiment of the first half of the century. Nationalism became a narrow creed with limited ends. Nationalist groups became increasingly intolerant of each other and ever ready to go to war. The major European powers, in turn, manipulated the nationalist aspirations of the subject peoples in Europe to further their own imperialist aims.

The most serious source of nationalist tension in Europe after 1871 was the area called the Balkans. The Balkans was a region of geographical and ethnic variation comprising modern-day Romania, Bulgaria, Albania, Greece, Macedonia, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, Serbia and Montenegro whose inhabitants were broadly known as the Slavs. A large part of the Balkans was under the control of the Ottoman Empire. The spread of the ideas of romantic nationalism in the Balkans, together with the disintegration of the Ottoman Empire, made this region very explosive.

The Balkan peoples based their claims for independence on nationality and used history to prove that they had once been independent but had subsequently been subjugated by foreign powers. As the different Slavic nationalities struggled to define their identity and independence, the Balkan area became an area of intense conflict. The Balkan states were fiercely jealous of each other, and each hoped to gain more territory at the expense of the others.

Matters were further complicated because the Balkans also became the scene of big power rivalry. Russia, Germany, England, and Austro-Hungary were keen on countering the hold of other powers over the Balkans, and this extended their own control over the area. This led to a series of wars in the region and finally, the First World War in 1914. Nationalism, aligned with imperialism, led Europe to disaster. However, many countries in the world which had been colonised by the European powers began to oppose imperial domination. The anti-imperial movements that developed everywhere were nationalist, in the sense that they all struggled to form independent nation-states. The European idea of nationalism was replicated, but people everywhere developed their own specific variety of nationalism.

Summary & Key Takeaways

• Nationalism: A belief system that instills a sense of common identity among the members of a particular nation. It emerged as a major force in 19th-century Europe.
• French Revolution (1789): The first clear expression of nationalism, which transferred sovereignty from the monarch to the citizens.
• Liberalism: An ideology that stood for individual freedom, equality before the law, government by consent, and free markets. It was a key driver of nationalist movements.
• Romanticism: A cultural movement that emphasised emotion, folklore, and vernacular language to create a sense of a shared collective heritage.
• Age of Revolutions (1830-1848): A period of widespread liberal and nationalist uprisings across Europe, challenging the conservative order established by the Treaty of Vienna (1815).
• Unification of Germany: Achieved under the leadership of Prussia's Otto von Bismarck through a policy of 'iron and blood', culminating in 1871.
• Unification of Italy: A complex process led by figures like Mazzini, Cavour, and Garibaldi, resulting in a unified kingdom under Victor Emmanuel II in 1861.
• Allegory: Nations were often personified as female figures, such as Marianne for France and Germania for Germany, to give the abstract idea a concrete form.
• Nationalism and Imperialism: By the late 19th century, aggressive nationalism, especially in the Balkan region, became a tool for imperial competition among major European powers, eventually leading to the First World War.