ABSTRACT
The categories of “foreigner” and “stranger,” are by no means coterminous. The concept of foreigner is predicated upon a collective self-awareness which depends on ethnic or political identification, signifying those who do not participate in the political group of the subject, the national group in modern societies. Religion in the Middle Ages served as a powerful means of self-identification, and as an important distinguishing trait between one large group and the others, the foreigners. The development culminates with Nicetas Choniates. This historian is as inconsistent as anyone in his use of the term “Roman”, and quite subtle in his attitude toward foreigners; an intelligent man, he did not assume the pose of presenting all foreigners, collectively and individually, in a negative way. Given the historical circumstances, it is not surprising that Choniates’ most clear-cut definition of “foreigner” is undertaken in connection with Western Europe.
