A national personification is an
anthropomorphic
Anthropomorphism is the attribution of human traits, emotions, or intentions to non-human entities. It is considered to be an innate tendency of human psychology.
Personification is the related attribution of human form and characteristics t ...
personification of a state or the people(s) it inhabits. It may appear in
political cartoons and
propaganda.
Some early personifications in the Western world tended to be national manifestations of the majestic wisdom and war goddess
Minerva
Minerva (; ett, Menrva) is the Roman goddess of wisdom, justice, law, victory, and the sponsor of arts, trade, and strategy. Minerva is not a patron of violence such as Mars, but of strategic war. From the second century BC onward, the Ro ...
/
Athena
Athena or Athene, often given the epithet Pallas, is an ancient Greek goddess associated with wisdom, warfare, and handicraft who was later syncretized with the Roman goddess Minerva. Athena was regarded as the patron and protectress of ...
, and often took the
Latin name of the ancient
Roman province. Examples of this type include
Britannia
Britannia () is the national personification of Britain as a helmeted female warrior holding a trident and shield. An image first used in classical antiquity, the Latin ''Britannia'' was the name variously applied to the British Isles, Great ...
,
Germania,
Hibernia,
Hispania,
Helvetia
Helvetia () is the female national personification of Switzerland, officially ''Confoederatio Helvetica,'' the Swiss Confederation.
The allegory is typically pictured in a flowing gown, with a spear and a shield emblazoned with the Swiss fla ...
and
Polonia. Examples of personifications of the
Goddess of Liberty include
Marianne
Marianne () has been the national personification of the French Republic since the French Revolution, as a personification of liberty, equality, fraternity and reason, as well as a portrayal of the Goddess of Liberty.
Marianne is displayed in ...
, the
Statue of Liberty (''Liberty Enlightening the World''), and many examples of United States coinage. Another ancient model was
Roma, a female
deity who personified the city of
Rome and more broadly, the Roman state, and who was revived in the 20th Century as the personification of
Mussolini's "
New Roman Empire
The Italian colonial empire ( it, Impero coloniale italiano), known as the Italian Empire (''Impero Italiano'') between 1936 and 1943, began in Africa in the 19th century and comprised the colonies, protectorates, concessions and dependencie ...
". Examples of representations of the
everyman
The everyman is a stock character of fiction. An ordinary and humble character, the everyman is generally a protagonist whose benign conduct fosters the audience's identification with them.
Origin
The term ''everyman'' was used as early a ...
or citizenry in addition to the nation itself are
Deutscher Michel,
John Bull and
Uncle Sam.
[Eric Hobsbawm, "Mass-Producing Traditions: Europe, 1870-1914," in Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger, eds., ''The Invention of Tradition'' (Cambridge, 1983), 263-307.]
Gallery
File:Vespasian. Judaea Capta commemorative (CNG 303440).jpg, ''Iudaea Capta'', "Conquered Judaea
Judea or Judaea ( or ; from he, יהודה, Standard ''Yəhūda'', Tiberian ''Yehūḏā''; el, Ἰουδαία, ; la, Iūdaea) is an ancient, historic, Biblical Hebrew, contemporaneous Latin, and the modern-day name of the mountainous sou ...
", commemorative coin issued by the Roman emperor Vespasian (left) after the Jewish War
File:4 Gift Bringers of Otto III.jpg, An early example of national personification in a gospel book dated 990: Sclavinia, Germania, Gallia
Gaul ( la, Gallia) was a region of Western Europe first described by the Romans. It was inhabited by Celtic and Aquitani tribes, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, most of Switzerland, parts of Northern Italy (only during R ...
, and Roma, bringing offerings to Emperor Otto III.
Image:Allegorie Pacificatie van Gent.jpg, In this Allegory depicting the 1576 Pacification of Ghent
The Pacification of Ghent, signed on 8 November 1576, was an alliance between the provinces of the Habsburg Netherlands. The main objectives were to remove Spanish mercenaries who had made themselves hated by all sides due to their plundering, an ...
by Adriaen Pietersz van de Venne, the seated women represent a short-lived unity among the embattled provinces of what would become the present-day Belgium and Netherlands
File:Friedrich Overbeck 008.jpg, '' Italia und Germania'' (1828) by Johann Friedrich Overbeck
Johann Friedrich Overbeck (3 July 1789 – 12 November 1869) was a German painter. As a member of the Nazarene movement, he also made four etchings.
Early life and education
Born in Lübeck, his ancestors for three generations had been Prote ...
.
File:Naval-race-1909.jpg, 1909 cartoon in '' Puck'' shows (clockwise) US, Germany, Britain, France and Japan engaged in naval race in a "no limit" game.
Personifications by country or territory
See also
*
Afghanis-tan
or ''Afghanistan'' is a Japanese yonkoma manga, originally published as a webcomic, by Timaking (ちまきing). It is also the name of the heroine of the manga. The manga is nicknamed
Background
''Afghanis-tan'' illustrates the modern h ...
, a manga originally published as a
webcomic
Webcomics (also known as online comics or Internet comics) are comics published on a website or mobile app. While many are published exclusively on the web, others are also published in magazines, newspapers, or comic books.
Webcomics can be co ...
about Central Asia with personified countries.
*
Polandball
Countryballs, also known as Polandball, is an art style and internet meme used in online comic strips in which countries are typically personified as imperfect spherical characters (there are some exceptions, such as Israel, Nepal, Kazakhstan ...
, a contemporary form of national personification in which countries are drawn
by Internet users as stereotypic balls and
shared as
comics
a medium used to express ideas with images, often combined with text or other visual information. It typically the form of a sequence of panels of images. Textual devices such as speech balloons, captions, and onomatopoeia can indicate ...
on
online communities.
* ''
Hetalia: Axis Powers'', an
anime
is hand-drawn and computer-generated animation originating from Japan. Outside of Japan and in English, ''anime'' refers specifically to animation produced in Japan. However, in Japan and in Japanese, (a term derived from a shortening o ...
about personified countries interacting, mostly taking place within the World Wars.
*
Mural crown
*
National animal
This is a list of countries that have officially designated one or more animals as their national animals.
National animal
{, class="wikitable sortable"
! Country
! Name of animal
! Scientific name (Latin name)
! class="unsortable", Picture
...
, often personifies a nation in cartoons.
*
National emblem
A national emblem is an emblem or seal that is reserved for use by a nation state or multi-national state as a symbol of that nation. Many nations have a seal or emblem in addition to a national flag and a national coat of arms. Other national ...
, for other metaphors for nations.
*
National god
A national god is a guardian divinity whose special concern is the safety and well-being of an ethnic group (''nation''), and of that group's leaders. This is contrasted with other guardian figures such as family gods responsible for the well-be ...
, a deity that embodies a nation.
*
National patron saint, a Saint that is regarded as the heavenly advocate of a nation.
References
Further reading
*
Lionel Gossman
Lionel Gossman (1929 – 11 January 2021) was a Scottish-American scholar of French literature. He taught Romance Languages at Johns Hopkins University and Princeton University, and wrote extensively on the history, theory and practice of histori ...
. "Making of a Romantic Icon: The Religious Context of Friedrich Overbeck's 'Italia und Germania.'" American Philosophical Society, 2007.
External links
A scholarly case study of the evolution of Deutscher MichelKirsten Stirling: "The Image of the Nation as a Woman in Twentieth Century Scottish Literature"
{{DEFAULTSORT:National Personification
National personifications,
Visual arts genres
Liberty symbols