American national identity was mythically tied to Anglo-Saxon medieval ancestry from its founding.

Evidence

Alongside Protestant Christianity, whiteness, which was often framed in ancient and medieval mythologies, was the other qualifier of early American identity. Numerous examples of Anglo-Saxon mythology are found in the historical record. Thomas Jefferson hoped to place replicas of Hengist and Horsa on the seal of the new country, claiming that these figures are “from whom we claim the honor of being descended, and whose political principles and form of government we have assumed.” — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 572

Alongside Protestant Christianity, whiteness, which was often framed in ancient and medieval mythologies, was the other qualifier of early American identity. Numerous examples of Anglo-Saxon mythology are found in the historical record. Thomas Jefferson hoped to place replicas of Hengist and Horsa on the seal of the new country, claiming that these figures are “from whom we claim the honor of being descended, and whose political principles and form of government we have assumed.” Jefferson also viewed the Old Testament pillar of fire, which like the myth of Hengist and Horsa is found in Bede’s tome on Britain, not as an emblem of protection but as a symbol of conquest. As the American medieval historian Charles Homer Haskins remarked, “English is in a sense early American history.” — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 572

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Arjana’s core thesis that the medieval West manufactured images to justify exclusion — here Anglo-Saxonism as the positive mirror of the Muslim monster.
• DEFINE: Names racial Anglo-Saxonism as a qualifier of early American identity built on medieval mythology, not modern racial science.
• SEED: Angle: today’s English-only and anti-Muslim legislation as a direct unbroken inheritance from Jefferson’s Saxonist founding mythology — the medieval ‘us’ is doing exclusionary work continuously.
• corroborated: 2 independent passages support this claim — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 572