Anthropology was by definition impossible, as long as these distinctions between ourselves and the primitive, ourselves and the barbarian, ourselves and the pagan, held sway over people's minds.
The Romans and Greeks labelled those outside their borders as barbarians uncivilised brutes who needed to be conquered for fears of them contaminating the empire.
Those of the dyed barbarians who had chosen the cultivable tracts were, in comparison with those who had left their marks here, as writers on paper beside writers on parchment.
It was just that Yankee stepmother who squalled and said I was a wild barbarian and decent people weren't safe around uncivilized Southerners" . " Well, you can't blame her.
Sharing continuity with the classical Roman Empire gave the Byzantine empire a technological and artistic advantage over its neighbors, whom Byzantines considered barbarians.