From Antiquity to Enlightenment: Changes in the Objectivity of Written History, and the Continuanceof Two Major School’s in Written History.
...cize him in the future for his use of unaccredited sources, a rule later laid out by Plutarch who wrote, “[m]y fourth sign of ill will in history-writing is a preference for the less creditable version….” This is not to suggest that Herodotus was wrong but, however, it does show that he did not take care to adhere to the straight facts. The second school of thought started in ancient times was by another historian, Thucydides. Thucydides criticized Herodotus heavily for his story-telling approach. He firmly believed that history was about fact, and nothing more. For Thucydides, written history was not to tell a story, but to inform through primary sources. Thucydides asserted that the most credible source is the account from the actual event itself. He explains that the only way to truly write about history, is to actually have lived the even itself. Since his works were primarily on the Peloponnesian Wars, which he participated in himself, it was easy to entrench himself in this doctrine. “Compared to Herodotus, Thucydides shows a much sharper focus, narrower horizons, and a more critical attitude toward truth.” While Antiquity was a marvel in the advent of written history, it was far from perfect. It would not be until the Medieval period that Herodotus’ and Thucydides’ purposes of writing history would take a turn to a more religious bias. During this period one historian sticks out more than any of the others. Josephus Flavius, followed by Augustus and Bede, would make a transformation from writing history as a story or informative essay on Grecian self-history to history as a written record to the greatness of God. To these writers, history is a tool to be used in justifying and bringing glory to Christianity. In a sense, their writing could be seen as a record of worship towards God. Flavius writes, “the main lesson to be learned from history…is that men who conform to the will of God, and do not venture to transgress laws…prosper in al things beyond belief….” Augustine and Bede say similar things in their histories with the exception of their primary subjects: Christian doctrine being Augustine’s, and great men being Bede’s. This movement away from the classical antiquity writers is significant in that the form of writing history for over a thousand years has finally made a deliberate move away from the revered fathers of history. Still, however, one can see that the two schools of written history begun by Herodotus and Thucydides continue to prevail. While Flavius and Bede stick to the Fact school of thought, Augustine obviously writes in a novelistic form that is common to the Story school of thought. As we move out of the medieval period and into the renowned Renaissance, we begin to see another major movement in the objective of written history. Here it can be seen that writers of history separate themselves from religious influence and begin a new territory of history writing: the Political History. In these first political writings we see major artists appear, such as Niccolo Machiavelli and Thomas Hobbes. These two authors move away from writing for the church and direct their writing towards more secular aims. Machiavelli himself writes specifically in the area of how to rule successfully. He writes that other historians are inept because they only pay specific attention to the details of battle as he states, “I found that in the description of the wars waged by the Florentines against foreign princes and people they had been most exact, but upon the subject of civil discord and internal strifes and their consequences they had been entirely silent….” Hobbes himself continues in the political history genre by writing for the purpose of looking into governments critically, and warning against wrong forms of government. Coinciding with this platform of writing history is Hobbes notion that the purpose of writing history is “to instruct and enable men, by the knowledge of actions past, to bear themselves prudently in the present and providently towards the future.” In other words: the study of history will make you a better person. Finally we come to the Enlightenment period wherein resides two very important writers. One a true historian, and the other a true pioneer in the perspective of written history: Von Ranke and Karl Marx respectively. It is commonly said that the fathers of history come from its Greek roots, namely Herodotus and Thucydides. Now the father of Modern history, Von Ranke, enters the sc...