ABSTRACT
Human society has probably always had a historical consciousness of some form, that is, people have been narrating their pasts and telling stories about the ‘before now’ for thousands of years. There can be found in all civilisations and communities a genre of narrative, be it oral or written, that we might today describe as something like history. These earlier authors of histories have contributed much, not only to our knowledge of the times about which they wrote, but also to our comprehension of what history has been understood to be by their societies. Many of the historiographical issues that they raised are still being discussed and debated today. Is the purpose of history to faithfully record the past, or to educate, to entertain or to provide moral guidance for the benefi t of individuals and society? What causes change over time in societies: the progress and development of civilisation, God, material conditions, economics, geographical or climatic factors, or class confl ict? Is there a pattern to history? Is it linear or cyclical? What should the role of the historian be? Should she simply chronicle events that happened, or attempt to analyse and explain why they happened? Should the personal beliefs and perspectives of the historian be allowed to infl uence their narrative or should the historian ‘tell things as they were done’?1 What is the appropriate subject matter of histories: wars, diplomacy, the activities of the political elite, explanations as to why empires rise and fall, the development of society, or the lives of the common people? Who were the intended audiences of histories? Lastly, what type of writing is history: is it like poetry, or more like a science? Inherent in this last distinction are wider issues concerning the
epistemological status of history – in other words what type of knowledge is history? Is it factual knowledge, like science, or is it more fi ctive and imaginative, like poetry or literature? In this chapter we will explore how these questions have been addressed in different societies and cultures over the past two thousand years, through an analysis of various histories and historians. We will consider what the various approaches have in common and how they differed. Obviously, there is not the space for a detailed discussion of all the main historians and trends in historical writing from around the world (see the recommended reading for books that deal with this subject in more depth), so we will look at just some of the more important people and ideas that you may come across in your reading or studies: those historians whose ideas had a profound infl uence on different audiences and on later historians. Moreover, because we wish to challenge the preconception that historical consciousness was generally a modern European phenomenon, we will pay particular attention to the historical traditions and scholars of the Chinese, Islamic and Afro-Asian worlds.
