Nationhood and Nationalism in French History Writing: Franks, Gallo-Romans and the Shaping of the “Roman National”

The aim of this chapter is to offer an overview of the ways in which French national narratives were construed between the early eighteenth and the late twentieth century. It will shed light on the eighteenth-century origins of the culturally and intellectually dominant nineteenth-century narrative of nos ancêtres les Gaulois. It does so by looking at how scholars, antiquarians, and historians conceived of their “national” past, providing insight into the formation of French historical thought and touching on the most important names, schools, and methodological aspects of French historiography, addressing the issues of the political uses of the past.