History-What Really Happened? Excellent Lecture on Historiography youtube.com

This is the first lecture of a series titled History and Civilization.

History is not just what-really-happened-in-the-past, but a complex intersection of truths, bias and hopes.

A glance at two very different historians, the Roman Tacitus and the Byzantine Procopius, shows the range and difficulty inherent in the study of the past.

History encompasses at least three different ways of accessing the past: it can be remembered or recovered or even invented. All are imperfect in some way. For instance, no historian or historical source reveals the full and unvarnished truth, so memory is a fallible guide.

Also, no evidence brought to light through archaeology or historical investigation is complete without context, and sometimes the significance of recovered data is hard to determine.

Furthermore, many purported "histories" can be shown to have been invented; at the same time, however, these fabrications still tell us much about a society's beliefs and dreams. All in all, the best histories are the best stories.

This lecture series is brought to you by Mark L. Damen