Brittany: A Concise History (review)

This book is part of a new series that aims to provide introductions to the histories of regions of Europe that do not have ‘their own present-day independent nation state or have only recently gained such a state’ (p. vii), and thus this volume on Brittany joins earlier ones on Catalonia, Cornwall and Galicia. Gwenno Piette’s concise but remarkably detailed and careful account of the westernmost province of France traces how Brittany first became an entity under Nominoé in the ninth century, and then how, over the centuries, its fate became so intertwined with that of France as to be almost totally assimilated. At the same time, she charts the attempts by Bretons to swim against the tide of homogenization, which have ensured the survival of Brittany’s cultural and linguistic difference into the twenty-first century. Opening with Carnac’s standing stones, the work includes discussion of Romanization, British colonizers, Nominoé, the French Revolution and ‘chouannerie’, Brittany’s nineteenth-century cultural revival, or ‘le bretonisme’, the gradual politicization of the Breton movement in the course of the twentieth century, and the effects of two world wars. The portrait of Brittany that emerges is broad, and includes attention to the economics, agriculture, fishing, manufacturing and demographics of the region, as well as to cultural and political landmarks. Particularly welcome is the unbiased account of collaboration by a minority of Breton activists during the Second World War; just as in her discussion of ‘chouannerie’, Piette states the facts, briefly juxtaposes the situation in Brittany with that in other regions of France, and moves on. Similarly, she admits that the Breton movement only ever involved ‘a small minority of the population’ (p. 1), but argues that the activities of this group warrant study because they have ‘played a part in preventing the country from simply evolving into a completely assimilated French province’ (p. 1). The series is aimed at the general reader (indeed it contains no notes, and but the briefest of bibliographies), but this volume will nevertheless be an extremely useful starting point for anyone interested in the development of regional and national identities in Europe, and is especially suited to students of France or of other Celtic cultures. It also provides groundwork that would allow for a fresh approach to European culture that moves beyond disagreements over the stretching of the word ‘post-colonial’, to embrace new case-studies of cultural complexity such as that of modern-day Brittany.