# Is there a historical term a "barbarian" might use for "civilized" people/"city folk"? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 14, 2014, 1:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689 "2014-03-14T13:14:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ranchoth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranchoth/32/1066_2.png) [@Ranchoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranchoth)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 8:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/21 "2014-03-15T08:34:13Z")
> [@naita](#): > > In what way does the Norse term Skræling come anywhere near the term you describe. I don’t mean to claim the Norse were better than the hunter-gatherer indigenous people they encountered in any objective way, but although Vikings may be your stereotypical barbarians, if you want a barbarian-“city folk” contrast, hunter-gatherers seem an exceptionally poor choice for “city folk”. Er, exactly my point, actually—the only example I could even find of a derogatory exonym used _by_ “barbarians” was just the equivalent _of_ “barbarian.” Not, as **Amateur Barbarian** put it, the Viking version of “pot-pooping poof.” (_Pottinn-skítapúffingr_?) Hence the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Chickenwrangler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chickenwrangler/32/91_2.png) [@Chickenwrangler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chickenwrangler)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 9:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/22 "2014-03-15T09:22:36Z")
While “civilized” societies would call the rampaging hoards “barbarians” I doubt that the “barbarians” thought of themselves as such. :mad: They would have considered themselves the superior/better society and probably referred to anyone else as “barbarians” So at a guess I would say terms like “barbarian” and the like worked both ways 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Kobal2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kobal2/32/20_2.png) [@Kobal2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kobal2)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 10:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/23 "2014-03-15T10:23:05Z")
> [@Amateur\_Barbarian](#): > > Don’t nearly \*all \*self/them names in linguistic history boil down to “Us, the [Chosen|Worthy|Noble|Civilized] People” and “Those [Savages|Barbarians|Cretins] Over There”? Not necessarily. The Biblical tribes that the Hebrews often antagonize are generally called (by the Hebrews) “the Somethingites” or “the Somethingim”, where Something can be the place they come from, or the name of their head honcho, or possibly a remarkable feature/specialty of that particular tribe. For example, there’s debate on whether the Kenites were a) the people of Cain b) The Blacksmiths or c) The Spearmen, but none of those exonyms are particularly derogative. ---
**Author:** ![Aspidistra](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspidistra/32/3894_2.png) [@Aspidistra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspidistra)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 10:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/24 "2014-03-15T10:56:56Z")
Not a noun, but I imagine words like “decadent”, “effete” and “soft” would be the sorts of words the “barbarians” used to impugn any civilised nations they didn’t like. The Gaelic word “Sassenach”, meaning basically “someone who’s not a gael” comes pretty close, considering most of the people who weren’t gaels eventually became more “civilised” - in tems of technical advancement at any rate ---
**Author:** ![naita](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/naita/32/5862_2.png) [@naita](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/naita)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/25 "2014-03-15T12:04:22Z")
> [@Ranchoth](#): > > Er, exactly my point, actually—the only example I could even find of a derogatory exonym used _by_ “barbarians” was just the equivalent _of_ “barbarian.” Not, as **Amateur Barbarian** put it, the Viking version of “pot-pooping poof.” (_Pottinn-skítapúffingr_?) Hence the problem. From what I read it wasn’t so much derogatory as descriptive, although I suppose that’s derogatory in the sense that it shows a lack of care for what the people so described called themselves. The wikipedia article links the etymology to the inuit wearing animal skins rather than wool clothing. ---
**Author:** ![Amateur\_Barbarian](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/59ef9b/32.png) [@Amateur\_Barbarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Amateur_Barbarian)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/26 "2014-03-15T15:09:24Z")
> [@ChickenLegs](#): > > City slicker? Dude? BackEaster? F’ing Greenies (Colorado urbanites)? Massholes? ---
**Author:** ![Steken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e274bd/32.png) [@Steken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Steken)\ **Post date:** [March 15, 2014, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689/27 "2014-03-15T19:36:52Z")
“Hujaa” is a racist, derogatory Mongolian word for the Chinese. Whether the word was used already back in Ghingis’ day, I do not know. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-there-a-historical-term-a-barbarian-might-use-for-civilized-people-city-folk/683689.md?page=1)