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Europe and survived to this very day, which would mean, as ascertained by Peter Štih, who
had argumentatively rejected the Veneti theory in scientific and lay articles, as well as in
newspaper polemics (see Štih: Miti in stereotipi v podobi starejše slovenske nacionalne
zgodovine, and his other articles), that three millennia ago the Slovenes had controlled two
thirds of Europe and wrote in their language, while today they are left with only 20,000
kilometers of modern Slovenia. A few years later Ivan Tomažič »corrected« this unpleasant
discovery in his book Slovenci. Kdo smo? Od kdaj in od kod izviramo? [Slovenes. Who are
We? When and Where do We Come from?] with a thesis that in the Veneti »lies the origin of
other nations in Central Europe as well: Pomeranians, Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, the majority
of Germans and Austrians, the Italian Venetians, Friulians«, and to all of their
consciousnesses the Veneti theory is to bring »insurmountable problems«. The Veneti theory
is rejected by the most prominent Slovene medievalists (beginning with the late academician
Bogo Grafenauer), as by archaeologists (Mitja Guštin) and by most linguists. A journal was
published on the unscientific nature of this theory (Arheo, No. 10, 1990), the polemics filled
the letters of readers at the end of the eighties and the beginning of the nineties, and the
»venetologists« replied to Arheo the same year with the book Z Veneti v novi čas [With the
Veneti into a New Era]. The polemics, various round tables and lectures on this topic are still
topical today; lately the efforts of the »venetologists« are headed in the direction of the
genetic »proving« of autochthonism.
The theories of autochthony connected with the Illyrian-Slavic tradition, and also with the
Veneti, are much older. They are already apparent with the Protestants, Marko Pohlin,
Valentin Vodnik (Ilirija oživljena - [Illyria Resurrected]) and a number of writers in the
second half of the 19th and in the beginning of the 20th century, all the way to the socialist
Henrik Tuma. The modern Veneti theory fell into a time when the Slovenes had begun to tear
away from Yugoslavism, when it had to be proved that they have »no historical and ethnic
tie« to the southern Slavs (Ivan Tomažič) and on the basis of this ascertainment find a new
identity. It is therefore understandable that this theory had reached a peak right before the
attaining of independence, although it is – a little due to inertia, and a little probably due to
never-ending Slovene complexes – preserved also after the attaining of independence, when it
has already exhausted its »national awakening« function.
In the time of the separation from the southern Slavs in the 1980s, in addition to the rise of
venetology, also belongs the renewed quest for a common Central European identity (mostly
connected with the area of the former Austria-Hungary), which above all came to life at a
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level of cultural connecting and perhaps a political illusion here and there (in certain Austrian
political circles the illusion of how they could regain »the imperial/royal« role if the
circumstances were to change), however, it did not reach mythical proportions. It had
triggered quite a few polemics; in Slovenia primarily due to the statement by the Austrian
writer Peter Handke that Central Europe is nothing other than a »meteorological notion«
(Repe: 1999) and the cynical rejection by certain politicians (a few years ago, while visiting
Slovenia, the cynical Czech President Vaclav Klaus labeled the modern quest for a Central
European identity and the act of connecting on that basis as »rhetoric«).
The myth of the farmhand nature of the Slovene nation is connected with the myth of the lost
state – Carantania and the constant longing for it (a part of the quest for this connection lies
also in symbols – e.g. suggestions to include the Carantanian panther in the Slovene coat-of-
arms, which is, according to Joško Šavli, »the symbol of every Slovene«). The essential part of
the story is that the Slavs (or in the mythic version Slovenes) settled on today's territory as
Avar serfs at the end of the 6th century, managed to become independent and create their own
state, and were later enslaved by the Germans, remaining under German slavery until World
War I (Carinthia, »the cradle of Slovenism« remaining there for ever). Such mythology is
otherwise characteristic of all Central European (as well as other) nations that had had (are
said to had had) some form of statehood in the early Middle Ages (although nationality had
not played a part at that time), and afterwards lost it. The farmhand perception, which was
largely also an integral part of the early Slovene scientific historiography, has created several
stereotypes, which comprise the whole of the myth, and also function by themselves. One part
refers to Germans as the greatest Slovene enemies; it had dragged on until the end of the
1980s and was only lost after that place in Slovene consciousness was taken on by the Serbs;
Austria, and especially Germany, became Slovene allies during the attaining of independence.
Naturally, the modern fear of Germans was realistically founded in the international (also
physical) confrontations in the second half of the 19th century, when the Germans had
dominated many regions in Carniola and other provinces, while the »German fortress
triangle« (Janez Cvirn) particularly controlled the Lower Styria (this also caused a rift in
Slovene ranks and a great hatred towards the so-called »Germanophiles«, who did not
envisage modernization for the Slovenes without Germanism); in the chauvinistic acts of the
Austrian Germans during World War I and upon its ending; and especially in the Nazi
ethnocide over the Slovenes during World War II.
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