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Classical Discourse and British Imperial Identity: The Civilizing Mission

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Britain’s Imperial Muse

Part of the book series: Britain and the World ((BAW))

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Abstract

To find the earliest connections between the civilizing mission of empire as described in classical discourse and that claimed by the British in connection with their empire, we would again need to look far beyond the chronological parameters of this study. Nicholas Canny has shown how individuals such as T. Smith, E. Spenser, and J. Davies deployed the image of Rome’s civilizing mission to Britain, as a justification for their actions in colonizing Ireland in the Elizabethan period.323 But as we have seen, the notion of empire as a vehicle of civilization was much older than this: it sprang full grown and girded from the hoary brow of antiquity via the works of Virgil, Plutarch, Tacitus, and Claudian for example. Thus Thomas Smith attributed his belief in the ability of colonization and imperial expansion to spread law and order, the essential prerequisites of civilization, to the success of Rome in Britain.324 In short, classical discourse had suggested a way of conceiving of conquest, colonization, and empire that included the spread of civilization.

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Notes to Text

  1. N. Canny (1973) ‘The Ideology of English Colonization: From Ireland to America’ William and Mary Quarterly, third series, vol. 30, pp. 588, 590.

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  2. Ibid. pp. 588–9.

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  7. Wakefield’s key pamphlets were published in 1829–30. E.G. Wakefield (1829) A Letter from Sydney (London). (1829) Sketch of a Proposal for Colonizing Australasia (London). (1837) The British Colonization of New Zealand: Being an Account of the Principles, Objects, and Plans of the New Zealand Association: Together with Particulars Concerning the Position, Extent, Soil and Climate, Natural Productions, and Native Inhabitants of New Zealand: With Charts and Illustrations: Published for the New Zealand Association (London). (1849) A View of the Art of Colonization: With Present Reference to the British Empire: In Letters between a Statesman and a Colonist (London).

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  21. Ibid., p. 71.

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  60. Lord Cromer (1910) Ancient and Modern Imperialism (London) p. 127. Here he paraphrased De Re. Nat. 2.79. Translated by his contemporary C.S. Calverley as: ‘Burgeons one generation, and one fades. Let but a few years/Pass, and a race has arisen which was not: as in a racecourse,/One hands on to another the burning torch of Existence.’ The Complete Works (London, 1902) p. 278. Cromer’s use of Rome in this connection runs contrary to Rogers and Hingley’s claim that the link between India and Rome was severed late in the 19th century. See, (2011) ‘Edward Gibbon and Francis Haverfield: The Traditions of Imperial Decline’, in M. Bradley (ed.) Classics and Imperialism in the British Empire (Oxford) p. 200.

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  1. Albion College, Michigan, USA

    C. A. Hagerman (Assistant Professor of History)

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Hagerman, C.A. (2013). Classical Discourse and British Imperial Identity: The Civilizing Mission. In: Britain’s Imperial Muse. Britain and the World. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137316424_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137316424_5

  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London

  • Print ISBN: 978-1-349-32643-3

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-137-31642-4

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