British Identities Before Nationalism

This book examines the status and uses of ethnicity in political debate during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the era that immediately preceded the onset of modern racialist and nationalist thinking. Ranging widely across the political cultures of England, Scotland, Ireland and revolutionary America, it also considers European influences and comparisons as well as engaging historically with current debates over nationalism and identity.

Acknowledgements; 1. Introduction; Part I. Theological Contexts: 2. Prologue: the mosaic foundations of early modern British identity; 3. Ethnic theology and British identities; Part II. The Three Kingdoms: 4. Whose ancient constitution? Ethnicity and the English past, 1600-c. 1790; 5. Britons, Saxons and the Anglican quest for legitimacy; 6. The Gaelic dilemma in early modern Scottish political culture; 7. The weave of Irish identities, 1600-c. 1790; Part III. Points of Contact: 8. Constructing the pre-romantic Celt; 9. Mapping a Gothic Europe; 10. The varieties of Gothicism in the British Atlantic world, 1689-c. 1790; 11. Conclusion; Index.