History of Gothic Culture and the Goth Scene

Updated for
 Halloween 2007

It's been said that if Goth didn't exist, somebody would have to invent it. The truth is, Goth has pretty much always existed, in most cultures; it was just never identified or named as a separate movement before the mid-19th century. It is not a strictly western-European phenomenon (Russian culture, for example, has always been remarkably Goth), but the identifying factors and naming conventions have all pretty much come from western Europe.

"Goth" originally referred to Germanic tribes who conquered and controlled much of Europe in the Middle Ages. "Gothic" referred to a style of art and architecture, and was originally a demeaning term used by people during the Renaissance, to indicate their contempt for the "crude" and "unenlightened" culture of the Goths as compared to their own.

The Middle Ages were, in fact, quite gothic. There was a fascination, bordering on obsession, with the contrast between good and evil, with death, and with the struggle between purity and decadence. There was also a great deal of remarkable and striking art and literature on these themes produced during this time (roughly 300-1300 C.E.), and all of this no doubt was a factor in the appreciation the Romantics developed for this period in history.

In the early 19th century, an artistic movement called Romanticism arose. It was focused around fantastical themes, the ongoing struggle between good and evil, sensuality, and frequently death. From this movement arose a smaller movement, personified by writers like Byron and Shelley, that was increasingly morbid and decadent. This more morbid style came to be known as gothic, in part because of the appreciation of its leaders for the "Gothic" style of the Middle Ages.

Victorianism repressed the sensuality of Romanticism and gothic, but kept the good-evil dichotomy and the obsession with death, overlaid with a strict morality that nevertheless kept the darker impulses bubbling and more likely to burst out in bizarre ways....more...