Temp quoting Lawrence Stone wrote:

... one should always try to write plain English, avoiding jargon and obfuscation, and making one's meaning as clear as possible to the reader ...

An admirable sentiment though I can see one drawback, having once been accused on the BBC forum of obfuscation for having used a large word. The word? "Obfuscation".

Without dragging the discussion further into one of literary style I would simply say that there is exactitude and clarity when writing. They are not synonymous and in fact rarely overlap when attempting to convey an honest representation of one's views on a topic which requires both to be imparted. If I am reading, for example, an analysis of the data gleaned from an archaeological dig then I expect exactitude. If I am reading speculative theory regarding what the data might imply I appreciate clarity, since I have noticed that a commitment to such clarity lends itself to honest theory and exposes dishonest theory all the more easily in other cases. Obfuscation in either exercise is unwelcome and raises more suspicions than interest on my part, though the solution to avoiding it is not quite the same for both.

Objectivity, a concept touched upon in Paul's linked articles, is itself not objectively ascertained in the case of historical theory, whereas in the case of scientific analysis of historical data it stands a much better chance of so being. With this in the back of one's mind one becomes after a while quite adept at noticing the point of departure from one to the other, sometimes even within one sentence, when reading historical treatise.

It is a question of expectation. I expect that that the author has conflated the two for reasons of literary style and readability, and I expect that my own intelligence as the reader is not being understimated when it comes to recognising and acknowledging this. However when I suspect for even a moment that the author himself is not aware of the conflation, or is doing it in the hope that I am too obtuse to notice, then both he and his theory decline rapidly in my estimation. Much "biblical" archaeology and the books etc which are produced in that field are cases in point. But there are many other examples (depressingly many these days).

Just edited my post above. Realised that bits of it didn't make sense as originally written.

Didn't mean to "drag" the discussion into one of literary style - sorry!

PS I think obfuscation is a delightful word, and one that should be used more often.

nordmann,

in a discussion on Historum, you, as I know you, can perhaps help me, as I learned from you in this discussion.

The discussion on Historum about the "evergreen": What is history?

https://historum.com/threads/what-is-history.135442/page-10

As the latest replies on that thread between Tulius and me are most referring to the Romance world as a Paul Veine and a Jacques Le Goff, we can however perhaps discuss nevertheless the matter in parallel overhere.
 
I am preparing this evening a reply to the Portuguese ex-teacher Tulius, on which I would appreciate to have afterwards your comments.

Kind regards, Paul.

nordmann as mentioned my message from yesterday to Tulius:

"Tulius, thank you again for another addendum to our "questio" about the two sides of history writing (historiography (ie), Geschichtsschreibung).

First the scientific research about the historical events and then second the narration (story) to construct honestly without bias a coherent and logical (in the scientific sense) unity of that researched data.

And lucky that you mention Jacques Le Goff as that one together with Marc Bloch were my first light houses into my query for historiography.

To take now Jacques Le Goff

Jacques Le Goff - Wikipedia

 en.wikipedia.org

His work about the 12th century is perhaps a perfect example of what we here discuss: and the scientific research first and then second the honest narration about it (the second the most difficult)

Amazon.com: Intellectuals in the Middle Ages (9780631185192): Le Goff, Jacques: Books

Amazon.com: Intellectuals in the Middle Ages (9780631185192): Le Goff, Jacques: Books
www.amazon.com
I read it in the time in French and discussed it on the ex-BBC history messageboard and on a forum of a French Napoleon site: Tribune Histoire and later on a small English language forum Res Historica together with the French forum Passion Histoire.

And yes my search as a would be historian in my humble way and essentially based on that book from Le Goff is in an unqualified way perhaps an illustration of this duality of history writing:
In the time I had not yet a google translator and all translations from French to English are made by myself:

My search: Are the Middle Ages not more a bridge, a transition from Antiquity to Renaissance than a rupture?
Tribune Histoire • Consulter le sujet - Renaissance : rupture ou continuité ?
Forum Histoire - Passion Histoire • Consulter le sujet - Savants du moyen-age

Dark ages bridge to the renaissance

I think I did already research on the old BBC messageboard, but it is difficult to search for my posts overthere now. So I will first add my references on the F
 reshistorica.forumotion.com

The Europe of the 12th Century

Reading two novels each about the 12th century Europe: "The Captive Queen" from Alison Weir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alison_Weir http://www.goodreads.com/b
 reshistorica.forumotion.com

And perhaps a very small critique to Le Goff about the Carolingian Rennaissance:

Charlemagne's Palace School

Sparked by LiR's mentioning of Charlemagne and the later division in 843 I did some quick search as it was for me one of the first history lessons in chidhood a
 reshistorica.forumotion.com

Kind regards, Paul.

Sorry, Paul, but the above is completely unintelligible, and I'm sure not only to me.

Can you perhaps summarise your point, and maybe the point to which this is apparently a response, and do so while resisting the temptation to pepper your post with electronic links left, right and centre?

When I can understand you and your interlocutor's points then I can certainly add my own view, as you request. But in this case (even after trying to read the discussion on the other forum) I am completely unaware of whatever opinion or point you are trying to present, presuming there is one to be gleaned at all.

Yes nordmann you are right. I rectified my message with a comment (seemingly you can't edit your message overthere, only the day itself and as it was from yesterday no edit possibility anymore...)

Thus as you can see, my only question for your comments remains:

"Tulius, thank you again for another addendum to our "questio" about the two sides of history writing (historiography (ie), Geschichtsschreibung).

First the scientific research about the historical events and then second the narration (story) to construct honestly without bias a coherent and logical (in the scientific sense) unity of that researched data."
 
Kind regards, Paul.

There seems to be a lot of subjective opinion being offered in the thread over there, none of which is necessarily wrong or even contradictory, so I'm not sure what you are asking me to comment upon.

An objective definition of "history" can only be determined within very particular contexts - are we using the term in the sense of an academic discipline, or a broad literary theme, or a colloquial catch-all term for all that has previously occurred, or indeed any one of a number of other quite valid contexts, not all of which are mutually complementary? Your own suggestion cited above certainly conforms with some accuracy to the first context I listed. But I see others have also presumed other contexts before they too offered equally valid definitions that cannot therefore conform with your own.

So I have only two observations that I think are germane to you and your friends' discussion:

Geschichtsschreibung (historiography) is concerned primarily with a study of how history is regarded, approached and ultimately converted within academia to become in itself an academic discipline. In the context of a discussion called "what is history?" it is therefore of very limited pertinence when the theme is broadened to colloquial usage of the term.

The only honest answer to the question "what is history?" that contains any semantic exactitude is "it is a word". Like many other words it in fact fails the very first test of semantic exactitude - "can it mean two equally valid things to two different people?".

Science by definition is a systematic methodology that aims to build knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions.

History concerns itself with the narrative of events through time, and while the narrative can be interpreted in endless different ways  - ie the study of history - the single timeline of events is fixed and only occurred once. One cannot re-run history and thus any interpretation or prediction about history as a whole is essentially untestable. History is not a science.

History is often NOT a complete accurate and comprehensive account of facts, but only what the dominant or orthodox view of the time has recorded for posterity.

Dirk

nordmann wrote:

Geschichtsschreibung (historiography) is concerned primarily with a study of how history is regarded, approached and ultimately converted within academia to become in itself an academic discipline. In the context of a discussion called "what is history?" it is therefore of very limited pertinence when the theme is broadened to colloquial usage of the term.

The only honest answer to the question "what is history?" that contains any semantic exactitude is "it is a word". Like many other words it in fact fails the very first test of semantic exactitude - "can it mean two equally valid things to two different people?".

 
nordmann, you are right of course that it is difficult to define the concept of a word, especially such one as "history" and as many words of this category, it isn't easy to have the same definition by two different people.

But I thought that Tulius' aim in his thread was to come to a broadly accepted definition of the concept of the word "history".
And as such it was my aim to come at least with him and I hope also with you to an acceptable definition endorsed at least by us three and I hope at least by a broader (honest!  ) public.

And yes we have the colloquial term of the word "history" which means whatever you want as the latest today approach in the Historum thread, but to come for instance to a broader accepted academic approach of the concept I want to define it as I understand it.

And for me: 
"historiography" is indeed the study by academici of the "history" and that study has in my opinion a duality:

First the scientific research of the events and
Secondly the construction of a narrative of these events in a coherent, logical and unbiassed way.

And the object of this study is the "history". 
And I would "history" describe as the story of all the events on earth (for the moment (we have already had a man on the moon)) that occured due to human deeds since their emergence.

I forgot yesterday to add this last paragraph in my message to Tulius on Historum.
But if I remember it well he too made allusion upstream in his thread of these three aspects of that academic concept of the word "history"

Kind regards, Paul.

Paul wrote:

But I thought that Tulius' aim in his thread was to come to a broadly accepted definition of the concept of the word "history".

Then he is doomed to failure. Some words are semantically inexact for good reason, as both MM and Dirk have just proved again, if proof was even needed at this point.

Your own flailing around trying even to identify the common contexts in which the word is used and which lend it some meaning, however disparate, is also proof of the futility of the exercise.

As I said, the only correct answer to the other thread's title question "What is History?" is "It is a word." Trying to adduce one correct definition applicable to all its uses is a waste of time. And always has been - as history itself proves.

Thanks nordmann for your immediate reply.

And I learned today for the first time in my life the word "flailing".
nordmann but at least I did a honest trial  ...
And you seem to agree about the honesty of my trial, if I understand you well?
"trying even to identify the common contexts in which the word is used and which lend it some meaning"


Kind regards, Paul.

Honest pursuit does not always necessarily end up with productive or righteous outcome - ask Einstein. But yes, I believe you are honestly attempting something (however futile), as are both MM and Dirk above who each give totally correct comments based on honestly held views regarding the definition of history but from two rather different perspectives and therefore not entirely complementary.

nordmann wrote:

we now think of history as an accumulation of knowledge about the past ... this has by no means always been the case and both the history of the subject called history as well as the etymology of the word itself betrays its actual roots.

Yes - the difference between ‘history’ and ‘the past’ (as academic concepts) is only about 100 years old. This view sees the past (or even 'The Past') as absolute. It happened. And it happened in its entirety and in all its complexity. History, on the other hand, is seen as our interpretation of the past. We make that interpretation based on the available evidence. At best, therefore, history can only be a snapshot of the past. More often than not, however, it’s barely a hole-in-the-corner glimpse.

For example, outside the Natural History Museum in London stands a petrified tree trunk (or a fossil tree to use the preferred paleontological term). The tree lived about 300 million years ago and was dug up in a quarry in Scotland in the 1820s. Study of its remains has resulted in some palaeontologists suggesting that it was a conifer while others suggest that it was a fern. These interpretations are what we call ‘history’ (or ‘natural history’ in this case). The actual tree itself during its lifetime, however, remains in the past. What insects, birds or animals lived on it, what it looked like in the landscape, how many other similar trees or trees of other genera were in its vicinity and what sound it made when it fell are all things which we cannot really know. That last example (of the noise a tree makes when it falls) is a nod to the Irish philosopher George Berkeley who over 300 years ago purportedly posed the question whether an unwitnessed tree falling actually makes a sound. This in turn developed into the concept of perception being reality. In other words, if cognisant humans are not imagining history (or interpreting the past) then that brings into question the very existence of the past. It also suggests that the field of philosophy was already 200 years ahead of history in this thinking.      
 
And it doesn't just apply to natural history. The same applies to the recordable and verifiable human past. Take the 1530s for instance. We can make an attempt at re-creating a street scene from that decade for the purposes of, say, an historical drama. All the various experts on architectural history, the history of clothing and textiles, the history of hairstyles and coiffure, technological history, historical social mores, the history of transportation, historic breeds and animal husbandry etc could be brought in as advisors but an actual street scene from the 1530s nevertheless remains in the past. In cannot be recreated in its entirety.

And yet that re-created scene will indeed be 'the past' in the minds of many of those viewing the film even for those attempting an objective critique. There are often very few or no other points of reference. In short – although historians can draw on scientific disciplines such as paleontology, geology and technology etc in their attempts at interpreting the past, the subject matter is simply too vast and the exercise too subjective and fraught with philosophical conundra to be classified as being scientific in and of itself.

Vizzer wrote:

nordmann wrote:

we now think of history as an accumulation of knowledge about the past ... this has by no means always been the case and both the history of the subject called history as well as the etymology of the word itself betrays its actual roots.

Yes - the difference between ‘history’ and ‘the past’ (as academic concepts) is only about 100 years old. This view sees the past (or even 'The Past') as absolute. It happened. And it happened in its entirety and in all its complexity. History, on the other hand, is seen as our interpretation of the past. We make that interpretation based on the available evidence. At best, therefore, history can only be a snapshot of the past. More often than not, however, it’s barely a hole-in-the-corner glimpse.

For example, outside the Natural History Museum in London stands a petrified tree trunk (or a fossil tree to use the preferred paleontological term). The tree lived about 300 million years ago and was dug up in a quarry in Scotland in the 1820s. Study of its remains has resulted in some palaeontologists suggesting that it was a conifer while others suggest that it was a fern. These interpretations are what we call ‘history’ (or ‘natural history’ in this case). The actual tree itself during its lifetime, however, remains in the past. What insects, birds or animals lived on it, what it looked like in the landscape, how many other similar trees or trees of other genera were in its vicinity and what sound it made when it fell are all things which we cannot really know. That last example (of the noise a tree makes when it falls) is a nod to the Irish philosopher George Berkeley who over 300 years ago purportedly posed the question whether an unwitnessed tree falling actually makes a sound. This in turn developed into the concept of perception being reality. In other words, if cognisant humans are not imagining history (or interpreting the past) then that brings into question the very existence of the past. It also suggests that the field of philosophy was already 200 years ahead of history in this thinking.      
 
And it doesn't just apply to natural history. The same applies to the recordable and verifiable human past. Take the 1530s for instance. We can make an attempt at re-creating a street scene from that decade for the purposes of, say, an historical drama. All the various experts on architectural history, the history of clothing and textiles, the history of hairstyles and coiffure, technological history, historical social mores, the history of transportation, historic breeds and animal husbandry etc could be brought in as advisors but an actual street scene from the 1530s nevertheless remains in the past. In cannot be recreated in its entirety.

And yet that re-created scene will indeed be 'the past' in the minds of many of those viewing the film even for those attempting an objective critique. There are often very few or no other points of reference. In short – although historians can draw on scientific disciplines such as paleontology, geology and technology etc in their attempts at interpreting the past, the subject matter is simply too vast and the exercise too subjective and fraught with philosophical conundra to be classified as being scientific in and of itself.

Thank you very much Vizzer for another interesting attempt to define the concept of the word "history".

In my own flaying around the core trial of a definition, I came as you saw to a duality of "historiography": first the scientific research of the events and then second the construction into a coherent narration by a professional historian (history writer?).
Then thirdly the object of that study is the "past" that I describe as the sum of all events in the past.

As I read your message I see there on the first sight my three definitions?


The third one?:
"You wrote":
"Yes - the difference between ‘history’ and ‘the past’ (as academic concepts) is only about 100 years old. This view sees the past (or even 'The Past') as absolute. It happened. And it happened in its entirety and in all its complexity"


The first and the second one?:
"You wrote":
The same applies to the recordable and verifiable human past. Take the 1530s for instance. We can make an attempt at re-creating a street scene from that decade for the purposes of, say, an historical drama. All the various experts on architectural history, the history of clothing and textiles, the history of hairstyles and coiffure, technological history, historical social mores, the history of transportation, historic breeds and animal husbandry etc could be brought in as advisors but an actual street scene from the 1530s nevertheless remains in the past. In cannot be recreated in its entirety.
And yet that re-created scene will indeed be 'the past' in the minds of many of those viewing the film even for those attempting an objective critique. There are often very few or no other points of reference. In short – although historians can draw on scientific disciplines such as paleontology, geology and technology etc in their attempts at interpreting the past, the subject matter is simply too vast and the exercise too subjective and fraught with philosophical conundra to be classified as being scientific in and of itself."

My comments:
And yes after doing the research with all kind of scientific disciplines, you have to construct with that available knowledge of the "past" a "picture" of what happened there specifically on that moment. And it is there that the craftmanship of the true historian starts in my humble opinion.
And there I differ a bit with what you wrote. Basically you are right that that construction can never be a scientific one, as, as a historian, you can never verify scientifically all composing items of your construction and as such it will always remain a trial to do it as honest and unbiased as possible and within the "scientific method". But in my opinion this srutinous attempt to construct an event in the past can at least give some insight into that event?


Vizzer, I differ in opinion with nordmann, that all us flailing around trials to try to find a definition is worthless.
I remember from 2002 on the ex-BBC history messageboard a "Mad Mike", who said: after all the honest discussions about a subject, there emerges a broader and more accurate "picture" about it.

Kind regards, Paul.

I have been haunted by that tree - or rather by what Vizzer told us about it. I now want to go and see it! I wonder how different people react to it when they do gaze on it? Just words here had me immediately "imagining" a landscape - a wild, empty, frozen wasteland - I could hear the wind and felt the utter desolation of an empty planet. What a load of unscientific nonsense, no doubt! But for a moment I was lost there...

Vizzer wrote:

 In other words, if cognisant humans are not imagining history (or interpreting the past) then that brings into question the very existence of the past.  

It is, because I think it? Or should that have the emphasis on I? it is, because I think it? I trust I make myself obscure? Bottle of wine needed later to continue this discussion! But that word "imagine" is so important, I think. Does it have any place in the study of "history" - surely it must? I find these meanings of the Latin root, imago, fascinating, especially the references to "ghosts":

(art) depiction. (rhetoric) comparison. Ancestral image. Conception, thought. Echo. Ghost, apparition. Image, imitation, likeness, statue, representation. Reminder. Semblance, appearance, shadow.

History as ghosts? I've been reading too much Hilary Mantel!

Back in ancient Greece historians not only had no problem with being accused of using their imagination but reckoned in fact that it was obligatory. How else, they would have argued, could you ensure that your works were regarded as intended? Of course their intentions contained ambitions no modern historian would ever admit to - including whether they wanted to be seen as "tragic" historians (such as Duris), "heroic" historians (such as Hecatæus) or even chroniclers of the absurd (as Herodotus described his own content when he wrote a history based on Hecatæus as a primary source). None of them would even have understood had they been described as "factual" historians - except perhaps the peripatetic Theophrastus who was careful when writing history to throw in as much botanical and mathematical information as possible to convince his reader that he was grounded in impartial fact (he failed - and ended up being described by everyone as the most "tragic" historian of all).

But Theo aside, at least everyone else was openly admitting that what they were presenting to their readers as "history" was to be consumed in exactly the same way as any other literary triumph of imagination. Hollywood continues their glorious legacy, if in rather debased form.

By Roman times there was indeed a switch to at least pretending history was fact, and the Greeks' sterling efforts from the past were already being dismissed as unreliable, though in truth what Roman historians were producing wasn't much better in that respect, just written more tersely. Cicero, a great collector of these works, wrote an essay comparing them all (announcing Herodotus as his favourite which is probably why this bloke's name is the one that still springs to mind before any of the rest of the bunch these days). I particularly like his summary of Duris - "certainly an industrious writer". It was the ancient equivalent of the Duke of Gloucester's similar remark to that great chronicler of Cicero's own time - "Another damn'd thick, square book! Always, scribble, scribble, scribble! Eh! Mr. Gibbon?"

Gibbon in fact ended up being criticised by his own editor for not using his imagination, showing that at least among the devoutly religious in his time (the editor, the right reverend H.H. Milman, bemoaned the fact that Gibbon hadn't made Christianity the central point of his work) fantasy should still trump fact, even for an historian. The foreword to the 4th edition of his "Rise and Fall" therefore carries this cautionary editorial note of censure from Milman to readers about to eagerly embark on a sojourn through this monumental work:

"The glories of Christianity, in short, touch on no chord in the heart of the writer; his imagination remains unkindled; his words, though they maintain their stately and measured march, have become cool, argumentative, and inanimate."

With editors like that who needs critics? Historians, no matter when or where they may have lived, simply cannot win ....

nordmann, quoting from H.H. Milman, wrote:

...his words, though they maintain their stately and measured march, have become cool, argumentative, and inanimate.

I bet H.H. would say the same about your posts, nordmann! Only joking - above post very interesting, as ever, not at all "inanimate".
I wonder if Gibbon was ever tempted to respond?

As Milman well knew (after all he had edited the book), Gibbon had already "answered" him many times within the text. Whereas Milman might rather unfairly accuse Gibbon of lacking imagination - if you read Gibbon's own often humorous and always entertaining footnotes you can see just how undeserved Milman's rather dismissive criticism was - Gibbon himself regarded religion, and in particular Christianity, as a corruptor of imagination, not its friend at all. He blamed, rather than credited, an imagination in thrall to authoritarian doctrine for all that went wrong with the early church, from its abject toadyism to its knack of producing heresies at a prodigious rate.

One passage that must have really got up Milman's pious Protestant nose was the following, in a chapter devoted to how Christianity debased itself even as it pursued and extinguished deviant theologies:

The disciples of philosophy asserted the rights of intellectual freedom, and their respect for the sentiments of their teachers was a liberal and voluntary tribute, which they offered to superior reason. But the Christians formed a numerous and disciplined society; and the jurisdiction of their laws and magistrates was strictly exercised over the minds of the faithful. The loose wanderings of the imagination were gradually confined by creeds and confessions; the freedom of private judgment submitted to the public wisdom of synods; the authority of a theologian was determined by his ecclesiastical rank; and the episcopal successors of the apostles inflicted the censures of the church on those who deviated from the orthodox belief.

Gibbon, the good historian that he was, knew he was obliged to tackle Christianity in an historical sense according to one set of critical principles, and then stick to it. He chose (wisely in my view) to be somewhat ahead of his time and to regard the religion on its merits as an undeniable school of thought that had gained popularity. His job was to point out the evidences for this, and if the same evidence also illustrated how it behaved with regard to other schools of thought, and if this carried much more than implied criticism of its methods, then he was obliged to report this too.

This is about as objective as an historian can get - and Milman's reaction in its extreme religion-prompted subjectivity helped enhance, by contrast, Gibbon's painstakingly "enlightened" objectivity. But of course we can now look at Gibbon's same words and see that he was merely being subjective in the cause of another ambition of his own - adherence to Hume et al's injunction to beware the metaphysical if the physical alone explains the phenomenon.

As I said - as an historian, no matter how painstaking, you simply can't win.

PS: I suspected as much but thought I'd better confirm it with a bit of googling. Milman was of course the editor of the 4th edition which was published well after Gibbon's death. He could therefore be reasonably certain that the poor author had little chance to reply to his sanctimonious little digs.

nordmann, quoting Gibbon, wrote:

The disciples of philosophy asserted the rights of intellectual freedom, and their respect for the sentiments of their teachers was a liberal and voluntary tribute, which they offered to superior reason. But the Christians formed a numerous and disciplined society; and the jurisdiction of their laws and magistrates was strictly exercised over the minds of the faithful. The loose wanderings of the imagination were gradually confined by creeds and confessions; the freedom of private judgment submitted to the public wisdom of synods; the authority of a theologian was determined by his ecclesiastical rank; and the episcopal successors of the apostles inflicted the censures of the church on those who deviated from the orthodox belief.

Oh, I do like that. Gosh, how it still rings true today.

I have never read Gibbon - perhaps I could tackle some of his great work during the coming Covid hibernation Mark II. Funnily enough, I remember my father saying - on one of the rare occasions when he acknowledged that I perhaps had a brain - that he envied me for still having Decline and Fall to read. I never got round to it somehow - I wonder why?

It's a little sad reading Gibbon these days. He was a great mind and a very good author, but we now have so much material data about the period thanks to archaeology etc that he never had, some of which even fundamentally contradicts many of his presumptions of fact, that one can only wonder how even more monumental a work he might have produced if he'd only waited a century or two.

In the context of the thread's title therefore I suppose Gibbon ideally represents the fate of all historians, or at least the good ones. For all their effort to employ as much scientific discipline as possible in the pursuit of their craft (and Gibbon is regarded as a true pioneer in elevating history to a discipline worthy of description as scientific), true longevity of the finished product will always and inevitably end up being predicated mostly on the sheer artistry they brought to their work.

But it's "artistry" that makes life worth living - well, I think so. There's an artistry all around us in life and death. Why on earth otherwise would I want to go to London and look at a bit of dried-out rotton wood, not to mention gawp at some oily, coloured daubing on bits of canvas?

We need our illusions - they are what keep us going? Daft attitude maybe, but there it is.

PS That said, facts can be useful.

PPS Going off topic - sorry.

nordmann wrote:

It's a little sad reading Gibbon these days. He was a great mind and a very good author, but we now have so much material data about the period thanks to archaeology etc that he never had, some of which even fundamentally contradicts many of his presumptions of fact, that one can only wonder how even more monumental a work he might have produced if he'd only waited a century or two.

Doesn't that confirm a bit nordmann, what I said about history writing as a construction of the narrative done after all the scientific research, that it will always be open to critic from other academic historians, who found new historical sources to alter that narrative and so to come to a broader and more accurate picture of a given statement or opinion? A bit as academic research in science progresses too?

PS. Just today I remembered that my first title of my first thread, somewhere in March 2002 on the BBC history messageboard, was, you guess it, "What is history?"
One can think the circle is round, but I hope for another 23 years before the circle is closed... and yes what importance one attributes to a decimal number...but I disgress, as Temperance and you know well, is one!!! of my bad "habitudes" (yes Temperance, "habitude" seems to be also English...)

Kind regards to both, Paul.

Well, yes. But much of scientific publication is also narrative after scientific research, and equally open to criticism when the research advances. So in what crucial respect therefore is history,  if tackled honestly,  any different from science? 

Gibbon, especially by the standard of his day, was arguably being as scientific - if not more so  - than many of his scientific contemporaries.  And the same is true today. 

The real crux of the matter,  and it has nothing to do with history per se, is to what extent we follow and concoct narratives? Temp isn't completely wrong when she promotes the value of illusion, you know.

nordmann wrote:

 The real crux of the matter,  and it has nothing to do with history, is to what extent we follow and concoct narratives? Temp isn't completely wrong when she promotes the value of illusion, you know.

Nordmann, how on earth can someone so supremely intelligent as you say such a thing? It has everything to do with history - and a fair few other things too...

But you are right: I  - and one or two others - am not completely wrong.

Fixed.

Just seen your edit to your post. OK - that alters things somewhat. Art and science - there's room enough for both approaches: I think we all here agree on that - don't we?

An Arundel Tomb by Philip Larkin

Side by side, their faces blurred,
The earl and countess lie in stone,
Their proper habits vaguely shown
As jointed armour, stiffened pleat,
And that faint hint of the absurd–
The little dogs under their feet.
Such plainness of the pre-baroque
Hardly involves the eye, until
It meets his left hand gauntlet, still
Clasped empty in the other; and
One sees, with sharp tender shock,
His hand withdrawn, holding her hand.
They would not think to lie so long.
Such faithfulness in effigy
Was just a detail friends could see:
A sculptor’s sweet commissioned grace
Thrown off in helping to prolong
The Latin names around the base.
They would not guess how early in
Their supine stationary voyage
Their air would change to soundless damage,
Turn the old tenantry away;
How soon succeeding eyes begin
To look, not read. Rigidly they
Persisted, linked, through lengths and breadths
Of time. Snow fell, undated. Light
Each summer thronged the grass. A bright
Litter of birdcalls strewed the same
Bone-riddled ground. And up the paths
The endless altered people came,
Washing at their identity.
Now, helpless in the hollow of
An unarmorial age, a trough
Of smoke in slow suspended skeins
Above their scrap of history,
Only an attitude remains:
Time has transfigured them into
Untruth. The stone finality
They hardly meant has come to be
Their final blazon, and to prove
Our almost-instinct almost true:
What will survive of us is love.




EDIT: In the cold light of day, I was about to delete Larkin's superb poem as being of no relevance here. But no - let him and his earl and countess stay.