Towards «new light» or «canceling» medieval Slavs? Notes to Eduard Mühle’ book

Abstract

The review of the monograph by renowned German scholar Professor Eduard Mühle, currently — President of Viadrina University at Frankfurt (Oder), published in 2020-2023 in German, Polish, English and Czech, is based upon its edition as No 89 of Brill’s collection «Central-Eastern and Eastern Europe in the Middle Ages». As the author states, «The books is aimed, to show, on the one hand, how the "Slavs" — ever since they first appeared in 6th-century Byzantine sources — were treated as a cultural construct and as such politically instrumentalized in various contexts». Up to Prof. Mühle, the book «describes the real historical structures hidden behind the phenomenon of the "Slavs" in the Middle Ages». Beginning with a sketch of modern and contemporary ideological practices, where the concept of Slavdom was widely used for political ends, he follows with mentions of the «Slavs» in medieval Byzantine, Latin and Oriental texts against the background of the medieval Slavic «realities», challenging the relevancy of the very term «Slavs» and naming them «Slav-speaking» through the whole book. The reviewer critically analyzes the author’s approach and his monograph’s structure, which from his viewpoint in fact are turning «the new light» in which the medieval Slav history is represented, into «canceling» the Slavs as part of the European history.