page_title: Nationalization of history
section_title: Nation mythologies, histories and states
hierarchical_section_title: Nationalization of history / Legacy of nationalization of history / Nation mythologies, histories and states
caption_attribution_description: Scans of the 1888 translation of Kalevala into English. Ancient Finnish Hero. Illustration from inside front of Volume 1 of Kalevala. Translated by John Martin Crawford, published 1888.
context_page_description: Nationalization of history is the term used in historiography to describe the process of separation of "one's own" history from the common universal history, by way of perceiving, understanding and treating the past that results with construction of history as history of a nation. If national labeling of the past is not treated with great care, it can result in the retrospective nationalization of history and even assigning nonexistent or exaggerating existing national attributes of historical events and persons. Nationalization of history, which began after a period of globalization of history, was not only one of causes, but also element and result of the process of establishment of modern nations.
context_section_description: One of the most important consequences of printed texts of nationalized  history was that it provided a basis for national revivals in the process of creating modern nations. Projects of national awakenings captured nationalized history and turned it into a weapon of popularization of national myths in the period of establishing history as a social scientific discipline. A shortcut to production of national mythologies that proves ancient origins of modern nations, providing them with a respectable past, was forgery of historical documents, literature and historical works that were lost for some time, and then suddenly rediscovered to the approval of an astonished grateful public. Authors of such rediscovered treasures that were in a quest for success and glory did not suspect that they were in fact builders of as yet nonexistent modern nations. Even when it was obvious that certain texts were basically invented national myths, many social groups, and even intellectuals, wanted to believe that they were authentic national epics, like the Kalevala in Finland.
  The nationalization of history, which had its origins more in the epics and tendentious oratory than in philosophy, sometimes grew the idea of an esprit des peuples or national spirit, and, later still, the idea that each nation had a 'mission'. Such ideas did not evolve into groups of associated individuals, but into universal spirits that is said to be able to destroy individuals and nations.
  Nationalization of history was an important element of national revival and creating new nation states in the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century. New nation states and their institutions had the most important role in social process of the professionalization and institutionalization of history that was additionally supporting the process of nationalization of history. The final consequence was that national history regarded the nation-state as the primary unit of historical analysis.
caption: An ancient Finnish Hero – Illustration from Kalevala
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