Ideas of European Unity Before 1945

Ideas Of European Unity Before 1945

The idea of European unity is a historically recent idea.

The word 'Europe' originally referred to the south-eastern part of Europe, in the same way that 'Asia' originally referred to western Anatolia, and 'Africa' referred to northern Africa, and it was the Greek civilization who used the words to mean the continents as they do today.

After the Fall of Constantinople to the Turks in 1453, the first proposal for peaceful methods of unifying Europe against a common enemy emerged. George of Podebrady, a Hussite king of Bohemia proposed the creation of a union of Christian nations against the Turks in 1464. However, there is no evidence that he viewed Europe as being anything other than a geographical place where those Christian nations resided.

The Frankish Empire of Charlemagne and the Holy Roman Empire united large areas of Germany, Italy and France under a loose administration for hundreds of years without articulating an 'idea of European unity'. However, the idea of Europe, of those parts of Europe occupied by Germanic peoples, representing 'Europe' had become common by the 19th century. That the 19th century idea of Europe was essentially a Germanic one can be witnessed from the counterblast by the Russia philosopher Danilevsky in his Russia and Europe. The idea of Germany and Europe being coterminous was taken to its fateful conclusion under Hitler.

Read more about Ideas Of European Unity Before 1945:  Holy Roman Empire, Pre-Napoleon, 19th Century, After The First World War, Impact of The Second World War

Famous quotes containing the words ideas of, ideas, european and/or unity:

    We are told to maintain constitutions because they are constitutions, and what is laid down in those constitutions?... Certain great fundamental ideas of right are common to the world, and ... all laws of man’s making which trample on these ideas, are null and void—wrong to obey, right to disobey. The Constitution of the United States recognizes human slavery; and makes the souls of men articles of purchase and of sale.
    Anna Elizabeth Dickinson (1842–1932)

    Most advice on child-rearing is sought in the hope that it will confirm our prior convictions. If the parent had wished to proceed in a certain way but was made insecure by opposing opinions of neighbors, friends, or relatives, then it gives him great comfort to find his ideas seconded by an expert.
    Bruno Bettelheim (20th century)

    In verity ... we are the poor. This humanity we would claim for ourselves is the legacy, not only of the Enlightenment, but of the thousands and thousands of European peasants and poor townspeople who came here bringing their humanity and their sufferings with them. It is the absence of a stable upper class that is responsible for much of the vulgarity of the American scene. Should we blush before the visitor for this deficiency?
    Mary McCarthy (1912–1989)

    If usually the “present age” is no very long time, still, at our pleasure, or in the service of some such unity of meaning as the history of civilization, or the study of geology, may suggest, we may conceive the present as extending over many centuries, or over a hundred thousand years.
    Josiah Royce (1855–1916)