European nobilities invented a myth of the masses akin to the barbarian construct

Evidence

The masses did not exist as such. As earlier, Greek and Roman thinkers had created the totalizing construct of the barbarians, the feudal nobilities of western Europe had inspired and authored a similar myth. — Cedric J. Robinson, Black Marxism_ The Making of the Black…, 186

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to the later discussion of how racial ideology similarly totalized non-European peoples, and to Said’s Orientalism framing.
• DEFINE: Establishes that ‘the masses’ is an ideologically constructed category, not a preexisting social fact.