UNIVERSITY OF DAR ES SALAAM
DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY AND ARCHAEOLOGY
Salvatory Stephen Nyanto
B.A (Hist & Arch) (Hons), M.A (History), Dar
Lecture Notes
HI 260: PHILOSOPHIES AND METHODOLOGIES OF HISTORY
Introduction
This is an elementary course on the theory of history. It introduces students to the changing theoretical underpinnings of historical scholarship over the entire period in the history of the discipline. The course provides an overview of the main trends in the approaches and the writing of history. At the end of the course, students will have grasped and mastered some of the outstanding tendencies and the trends in the theory of history and their practical expressions in the works of history. Additionally, students will also have mastered the trends and patterns in the changing perspectives and approaches to the study and the writing of history stretching from the ancient Chinese, Arab and European until the modern African historiography.
Module 1: Basic Concepts
1. History
History is not simply the recording and writing about what happened in the past. The meaning of ‘history’ goes beyond writing and recording past experiences. Scholars have therefore underscored the meaning of history depending on their points of view/philosophical background of the historian and the methodology employed in reconstructing history. It is under this context therefore, the meanings of history have not assumed one direction or/and position. Edward Hallet Carr’s What is History? views history as a process of interaction, a dialogue between the historian in the present and the facts of the past (Carr, 1962: 39). Collingwood on the other hand, views history as a special form of inquiry or research or a special form of thought (Collingwood, 1957: 7). In his attempt to underscore the meaning of history, Arthur Marwick, views the term as an interpretation of the past in which serious efforts have been made to filter out myth and fable (Marwick, 1992: 3). In order to widen an understanding of the term, Marwick goes further to identify basic elements that define the term. These include: a).What actually happened in the past ie the human past; b). The activity of inquiring into the past based on rigorous study to challenge myth and legend; c). Interpretations based on inquiry into the past; d). The accumulated body of knowledge about then past based on the interpretation of historian using fragmented and imperfect sources and e). Those aspects of the past understood to be important, interesting and which have been made accessible by historical inquiry and the accumulated body of knowledge (Ibid, p.6).
Over centuries, the term ‘history’ has acquired at least two basic meanings. First, to mean past events [res gestae]. Secondly, to mean knowledge/narrative about past events [historia rerum gestarum]. The past means all the processes and events that have already taken place. In this sense, the term ‘history’ refers to the entire processes of the past. The term when used in the sense of narrative/knowledge about the past events [ historia rerum gestarum] has at least two meanings. First, it may denote the research procedure that constructs past events [science interpreted as the craft of the historian] and secondly, the result of such reconstruction that is always in the form of historian’s statements about past events [science interpreted as results of research]. The concept, historia rerum gestarum, when that which pertains to research procedures is excluded from it, corresponds to the interpretation of history as a set of statements about past events ie history as a result of historian’s work (Topolski, 1976:55). The subject matter of history differs from that of natural sciences. This is due to the fact that, it is different form of experience and the way historians approach it is quite different from the natural scientists. In general, the subject matter of history is concerned with the processes of the past and the knowledge/ narrative about those processes.
2. Philosophy of History
Philosophy of History is also known as ‘Theory of History’ or ‘Methodology of History’ (Nyirenda, 2004: 13). Literally, the term ‘philosophy of history’ signifies the loving pursuit of wisdom or simply love of wisdom (Murray, 1970: 3). The term was originally used by the Greek philosophers who spent their time to wonder about the nature of the Universe, the purpose of life etc using reason and evidence from their own experiences to create new assumptions. Generally, philosophy of history means thinking and reflection upon history (Friedrich, 2004). It is an area in philosophy that is concerned with concepts, methods and theories used in history. It entails a complete philosophy perceived from the historical point of view relying both on epistemological theory of knowledge and the nature [metaphysics] of history (Strauss, 1983: 53). According to Collingwood, the philosophy of history is concerned neither with the past by itself nor with the historian’s thought itself but the inquiry conducted by the historian and series of events that the historian inquires ( See Carr,1962: 16).
All in all, philosophy of history is naturally interdisciplinary. It assumes a willingness to use the epistemological and metaphysical assumptions of philosophy in an attempt to understand and give meaning to the empirical data of history (Mazlish, 1966: vii). It is generally concerned with two principal questions: how do we know what has happened?, and what is the meaning and mechanism of that happening?. The attempt to answer the first question ‘how do we know what has happened’ is generally placed under the label called Speculative philosophy of history and this leads to the first category of the philosophy of history. The attempt to deal with the meaning and the mechanism of history is always placed under the label Critical/Analytical philosophy of history (Ibid, p.1, Nyirenda, 2004) and this leads to the second category. Nevertheless, the great philosophers of the last few centuries made no distinction. They only tried to deal with the problem of history as a whole (Ibid, p.2). Although Gardiner, Danto, Nadel, Dray and White attempted to distinguish the two kinds of philosophy of history ie Speculative and Analytical philosophy of history, they agreed that the only meaningful sense in which there can be philosophy of history is the second category [Analytical/Critical philosophy of history] whose main task is to clarify and analyse the idea of history (Murray, 1970: 26).
Philosophy of history should not be confused with historiography which is the study of history as an academic discipline that deals with methods and the development of the discipline of history over time. Historiography is generally the science of writing history. It has been changing over time due to the prevailing social conditions in the society. Hence we have colonial, nationalist, Marxist and Post modernist traditions. Likewise, the philosophy of history should not be confused with the history of philosophy which is the study of philosophical ideas over time.
The term ‘Philosophy of history’ was inverted by Voltaire in the 18th century. He is credited to be the first to use the term for the first time in its modern period as distinct from the theological interpretation of history (Lowith, 1948: 1). The leading principle was no longer the will of God and the divine providence but the will of man and reason. With the gradual termination of the 18th century belief in reason and progress, philosophy of history became more or less homeless. The term is still used even more widely than before, but its content has been so diluted to the extent that any thought on history may call itself a philosophy. The label ‘philosophy of history’ is cheaply used nowadays ie philosophy of life, of business of Nyerere etc. It does not indicate a specific philosophy but merely public and private opinions ( Mazlish,1966: 1).
3. The Subject matter of Philosophy of History
The subject matter of the philosophy of history is primarily concerned with three important aspects. These include 1. Philosophy of history as a reflection of the past events. 2. Philosophy of history as a reflection of the procedures of history and 3, Philosophy of history as reflection of the historian’s statements.
i) Philosophy of History as a reflection of the Past events
Philosophy of history as a reflection of the past events res gestae can be divided into two parts according to the development of the theory of history [philosophy of history]. These include: Idealist philosophy of history and Materialist philosophy of history. The aim of the idealist philosophy of history was to understand past events as a whole in order to discover the meaning of history in its totality. This kind of reflection is also biblical. The assumption behind this kind of reflection is that history or the past events can happen without any conceived plot or plan contradictory as the events may be (Nyirenda, 2004: 14). The second kind of reflection [Materialist philosophy of history] was attempted by Karl Max and his followers. The aim was to show that history is motivated by material forces. This is done either by the contradiction or conflict between the development of the productive forces and the relation of production or between the bourgeois and the proletariat ie by class struggle (ibid, p. 15).
ii) Philosophy of History as a reflection of the procedures of history [ historia rerum gestarum]
This is a reflection of the cognitive processes for the production of historical knowledge. In order to differentiate it from the above reflection, this is often referred to as Analytical or Critical Philosophy of History. According to Atkinson, Critical philosophy of history reflects on the following questions:
● What kinds of knowledge does history provide?
● Is history science similar to other sciences?
● Is historical knowledge objective? To what extent is historical knowledge objective?
● To what extent are the documents authentic? Some philosophers want to know whether the objective of history is the same as that of other sciences.
The other concern of the Analytical/Critical philosophy of History is to analyse the task of the historian. What does he/she do? Does he record or explain? If the historian explains, what is the nature of historical explanation?
The last concern in the philosophy of this kind is about values and subjectivism. How are they treated? How is subjectivism controlled? Since documents must be interpreted and the interpreter is influenced by the values he has, how is then truth obtained? All these questions are dealt in this type of the philosophy of history.
Module 2: Production of Historical Knowledge [The Historian’s Craft]
1. The Nature of Historical Knowledge
Historical knowledge is about what happened in the past; the question appears as to whether it is a science or belief. It exists in the form of statements and some are written [written history] and some are oral statements [unwritten]. Historical knowledge is distinct from other forms of knowledge because it is basically about the past, it is about the causes of those events and it is about the consequences or results of those events [happenings, processes etc].
R.G.Collingwood in his The Idea of History, identifies three issues that are essential in the production of historical knowledge. These include: knowledge of the mind on the past, interpretation of the past and life experiences as he argued “Historical knowledge is the knowledge of what the mind has done in the past and at the same time it is the redoing of this, the interpretation of past acts in the present. Its object is therefore not a mere object, something outside the mind which knows it,  it is an activity of thought which can be known only in so far as the mind re enacts it and knows itself as so doing. To the historian, the activities whose history he is studying are not spectacles to be watched but experiences to be lived through in his own mind” (Collingwood, 1957:218).
Historical knowledge is produced by individuals and communities of people. Production of historical knowledge is basically a reconstruction of the past. In this, a historian strives in as much as possible to bring the past into shape ie in its original form (the historian’s craft). However, production of historical knowledge does not involve a total reproduction of the past. In reconstructing the past, the historian finds various forms of evidence of the past and brings them together to make them make sense out of the available pieces of evidence. Reconstruction is nevertheless different from the total reproduction of the entire past. There are always limitations since a historian cannot reproduce the entire past [this will be dealt in due course]. Historical knowledge exists in two forms: oral and written history.
2. Characteristics of Historical Knowledge
i) Historical knowledge is never perfect
There is always a room for improvement. Every piece of historical writing differs from one another due to the level of elaboration and analysis as well. People usually differ in the levels of elaboration [clarity of issues] and analysis so does historical knowledge.
ii) Truth character
Historical knowledge differs in terms of truth character. Some are closer to the truth while others are very far from the historical truth.
iii) Accuracy
Some historical knowledge is accurate while the other is inaccurate and hence can mislead the people. Nevertheless, there is no history that is totally perfect [100%]
iv) Scope
Historical knowledge differs in terms of scope [in terms of region, coverage and analysis]. Some are far better as they are more capable of relating various historical processes while others are not.


3. Marks of Historicity and their Importance
A mark refers to something that distinguishes history from other disciplines which are not history. History is always found in the form of statements which are either written or unwritten-oral history. In general, the marks of historicity are signs or objects that are found in historical writing but they are not part of the main story. Historical knowledge is thus distinguished by marks of historicity. They include: References, Footnote, Graphs, Maps and Oath taking [Statements of assurance]. Marks of historicity are indications of where information used comes from in an attempt to produce historical knowledge. They are not fixed; they always change over time depending on the development of the society. In communal society, the marks of historicity  were only two; one was an oath taking and the second statements of assurance [telling who told you]. In due course, marks of historicity have changed and currently we have references, footnote, graphs and maps. They are the only indicators that differentiate history from fiction [novels, plays and short stories]. How are they important in the production of historical knowledge? Marks of historicity bring into historical scholarship an element of scientific knowledge. In this context, history can also be claimed to be a scientific discipline because of the use of the marks of historicity that provide evidence. They are thus accepted methods of showing both correspondence and evidence.
4. Forces that Influence the Nature of Historical Knowledge
i) Social Context
In the course of producing historical knowledge, one needs to look at a specific social context within which a particular narrative is written. One should consider the dominant ideology [socialist, capitalist etc] and the contemporary political debate [revolution, liberation etc].
ii) The inclination of the Individual Historian
Although it is true that historian is influenced by the social context but every historian has bias. For instance, if a period is dominated by revolution, some historians will reconstruct history attempting to maintain the status quo, others will criticise the system and others will maintain their neutral position. Every historian reconstructs history depending on a particular social context. For example, within a colonial situation, some supported the colonial masters, others supported the nationalists and others remained neutral.
iii) Sources and their availability
Such sources include written, unwritten and archaeology. If the historian reads the colonial sources, he/she will be influenced by the sources and consequently his/her history will be painted by those colours. Likewise, when a historian is exposed to the Nationalist, Marxist and Post modernist traditions, his/her history will be influenced by the sources and will determine the arguments and conclusion about the subject matter.
iv) Research Process
Every historical writing has to be preceded by research. Therefore, research process/procedures will also influence the kind of historical knowledge. A historian who goes to the field to collect data, his/her history will be deep compared to a person who sits and just writes history. His/her history will be shallow. Funding also influences the research process. If the sponsors provide money for research, they will order the researcher to undertake a kind of research that is pleasing to them.
v) Analysis
After the research is completed what follows is the analysis of the data collected. Every researcher has to analyse the research findings. The researcher is influenced by the people surrounding him/her and the publisher. In the process of analysis the knowledge may change. The researcher has to think a convenient place to publish his/her findings. If the publisher has enough money will influence the production of historical knowledge. He/she may be convinced to change when the researcher is funded by an organisation. In this way, the researcher will be influenced to change the historical knowledge.
5. Epistemological Approaches in the Production of Historical Knowledge
Production of historical knowledge is generally understood to be the knowledge about the past. It is always produced by individuals and communities of people. Production of historical knowledge does not involve a total reproduction of the past. In reconstructing the past, historians find various forms of evidence of the past in order to make them sense. Reconstruction is different from the total reproduction of the past. R.G.Collingwood, identifies three issues that are essential in the production of historical knowledge. These include, “knowledge of the mind of the past” interpretation of the knowledge of the past” and “life experiences” as he argued, “Historical knowledge is the knowledge of what the mind has done in the past, and at the same time it is the redoing of this , the interpretation of past acts in the present. Its object is therefore not a mere object, something outside the mind which knows it, it is an activity of thought, which can be known only in so far as the mind re enacts it and knows itself as so doing. To the historian, the activities whose history he is studying are not spectacles to be watched but experiences to be lived through in his own mind. They are objective or known only because they are also subjective or activities of his own” (Collingwood, 1957:218).
There are three epistemological approaches to the production of historical knowledge.
i) Objective Approach
This assumes that “facts speak themselves” and hence “the past speaks for itself”. Therefore, scholars who believe in the objective reality hold the view that, the task of a historian is to capture the past objectively without adding any value on it. Hence, according to this approach, it is the objective facts that determine the production of historical knowledge. The main duty of the historian therefore, is to capture the facts and reconstruct history. Under this approach, there is no relative subjectivism. Nothing interferes the production of historical knowledge; it is value free and hence what is needed is to gather pieces of evidence and put together. It is therefore through gathering of the pieces of evidence that will dictate the conclusion of the historian. Proponent of this view includes Leopld von Ranke. His frequently quoted statement is that the “task of history is to say what exactly happened” (White, 1965:3). This view is also supported by the Positivists notably David Hume, Agust Comte and Stuart Mill. The Positivists argue that, the historian’s first duty is accumulate factual knowledge about the past-facts which are verified by applying critical method to the primary sources. Those facts will eventually determine how the past should be explained or interpreted. In this process therefore, the beliefs and value and values of historians are irrelevant (Tosh, 1984: 109).

ii) Relativist/Subjective Approach
In this process, historical knowledge depends on who produces. It can never be free from personal prejudices and judgments. The historian makes his own questions; interviews informants of his/her own choice and selects information. The whole information depends on the status of the historian himself/herself. Philosophically, knowledge is determined by the subject. Thus, historical knowledge is relative to time, person and the context in which it is produced. Proponent of this view includes Theodolre Zeldin who holds the view that any historian can offer his/her readers his/her personal vision which corresponds to their own aspirations and sympathies: “everyone has the right to find his own perspective” (Tosh, 1984: 108).
This position is also supported by the Idealists notably Dilthey, Croce and Collingwood. The idealists reject fundamental assumption of positivism. According to them, the reality of past events must instead be apprehended by an imaginative identification with the people of the past which depends on intuition and empathy qualities that have no place in the classical view of scientific method. Therefore, historical knowledge is inherently subjective and truths which it uncovers are more a kin to truth in the artist’s sense than the scientist’s (Tosh 1984: 110). According to Richard Cobb, “the writing of history is one of the fullest and most rewarding expressions of an individual personality”(Tosh, 1984:118). Therefore, the essence of historical inquiry is selection of “relevant” sources of “historical facts” and of “significant” interpretation. At every stage, both the direction and the destination of the inquiry re determined as much as the inquirer of the data. Clearly, the rigid segregation of facts and value demanded by the posivists is unknowable in history. In this sense, historical knowledge is not and cannot be “objective” (that is empirically derived in its entirety from the objective of the inquiry) (Tosh, 1984: 117).
Gordon Connell-Smith and Howell Lloyd in The Relevance of History, view “history as the thought about the past that is always the result of selection and thus facts are chosen and set into order by the historian (Schaff, 1976: 93). To put this clear, they argued, history is not ‘the past’ nor yet the surviving past. It is a reconstruction of certain parts of the past (from surviving evidence) which in some way have had relevance for the present circumstances of the historian who reconstructed them (Connell-Smith and Lloyd, 1972:41, Schaff, 1976:93).
Edward H. Carr supports this position. His basic tenets include the following: First, facts are present [available] to the historian in documents, the historian collects them, takes them at home and cooks and serves them in whatever styles appeals to him (Carr,1962:3). Secondly, it is incorrect to say that facts speak for themselves. The facts speak only when the historian calls them. It is he who decides to which facts to give floor and in what order or context (Ibid, p.5). Therefore, the belief that historical facts existing independently of the interpretation of the historian is totally fallacious. Thirdly, the facts of history never come to us in pure form since they do not and cannot exist in pure form. They are always refracted through the mind of the recorder (distortion of the facts).
iii)Dialectical Approach
This position holds the view that, the production of historical knowledge is a result of the interaction between the subject and an object [historian and facts]. In this approach, fundamental recognition is given to the objective reality, something that must happen for history to be written. It is true that, the objective reality has to be seen through the eyes of a historian. However, careful she/he might be, the facts will be put with colours by the historian. The historian therefore, has a role to play on the facts, to create an argument that can be supported by pieces of evidence. Everything that occurs in history books is a combination of both objective reality and historian’s interpretation in revealing/ reconstructing the past.
The object and subject are always in interaction; they mutually influence each other. When a researcher goes for research, he/she will meet with written sources, interviews key informants and in some instances he may be influenced to change the attitude. In this way, the object [fact] will influence the subject [historian] to change. A similar case is put forward by E.H.Carr. In his view, the relation of human being to the environment is similar to the relation of a historian to his theme. Therefore, the relationship between the historian and his facts is one of equality of give and take. Initially, the historian starts with a provisional selection of facts and a provisional interpretation. He further contends that, the historian and facts are necessary to one another. The historian without facts is toothless and futile, the facts without historians are dead and meaningless (Carr, 1962: 24). History in E.H.Carr’s view is therefore conceptualised to involve a continuous process of interaction between the historian and his facts, an ending dialogue between the present and the past (Ibid, p.29).
Module 3 Philosophy of History in the Ancient European and Arab Historiography [Pre- capitalist Historiography]
i)Philosophy of History in the Pre-Capitalist/Ancient Europe
Ancient Europe covers the period from antiquity to 5th century BC whose writings and philosophy were set up both the Greeks and later the Romans.  Up until the 5th century BC, the Greeks dominated Europe especially the Mediterranean Europe. The Greeks were mostly egalitarian [classless society] that put emphasis on equality. It is because of the absence of classes that there were no professional philosophers. Everyone worked and cooperated with one another and there was no specialisation. Philosophy was generally sporadic rather than systematised [it was not well organised]. It needed one not to know how to read and write; everyone became a philosopher.
In both the Greek and the Mediterranean world, history existed in the form of narratives based on sporadic thinking and egalitarian system of living. Such historical narratives were exploited by everyone who could remember. Most of them were in the form of mythical tales [nobody who exactly remembered]. Stories were narrated without questioning their origin; a lot of them were narrated and passed from one generation to another. Prominent among them included stories about certain heroic deeds in nature that were referred to as legends.
Historical knowledge also took the form of poem ie the poem of Hesiod [historical knowledge was also expressed in the form of poems]. From the beginning of the 5th BC, there was a slow transition from slave society to feudal society. Philosophy also changed where the people started thinking about nature and the order of things [nature of existence] The dominant philosophy at this time was naturalism and among the question raised by philophers was about the change in the society- what is change?. Philosophers started questioning about the change and one of the questions was the kind of force behind the change [what is a force behind the change?]. Some argued as being a result of water, others unlimited void, air etc. At this time, a Greek philosopher called Helaclitus argued that everything is in the form of change all the time. History however, remained in the form of mythical tales, legends and poems. Slowly, it began to be state oriented (narratives on the people in power, wars etc.
From the 5th century to 4th BC, the European society ie modern Greek and Italy began to enter into advanced stage of feudalism. Feudalism became hierarchical with no democratic election where the ruling class owned land while the majority tenants remained landless. During this period, philosophy was chiefly concerned with epistemology rather than metaphysics [nature of the existence]. It was within this period when the sophists [theoreticians] emerged as the politicians of the days; these were people who made arguments for the sake of knowledge. In their view, knowledge comes from human senses and senses are always subjective and hence knowledge depends on who produces. Socrates on the other hand held the view that a true knowledge is conceptual [reflection] and not sensuous ie knowledge comes out through reflection. According to Plato, concepts are not the sources of knowledge; they are realities themselves.
Prominent among the historians of those days included Herodotus and Thucydides. They differed not only in the wars they dealt with but also in their approaches. Herodotus dealt with the history of the Great Persian war. His cultural history therefore ended with a celebration of the Greek city states especially Athens. Thucydides on the other hand, described the Pelopnesian war only up to 411 BC well before it ended when he died and whether or not he really understood that the series of campaigns he described constituted just one Peloponesian war (Breisach, 1983: 13).
 Both Herodotus and Thucydides wrote about war not in order to justify it but because they perceived it as an essential force in the shaping of the Greek destiny. Herodotus viewed the Great Persian wars as the great battle between the forces of despotism and freedom, between orient and accident and between a despotic monarchy and city states governed by their citizens ie a struggle between good and evil (Breisach, 1983: 13). Thucydides on the other hand, found wars to be only partially controlled by human will. When Sparta and Athens collided, it seemed to be solely the result of conscious decisions made freely by two parties but actually strong impulses toward war, originated in the very structure of the political situation (ibid, p. 14).




General Characteristics of Historical Knowledge in Ancient [Antiquity] Europe
The European antiquity period is characterised into two periods: A period of Pre-class society and a period of class society.
Pre-Class Society
It was communal society which was dominated by collective ownership of means of production and sporadic philosophy [it was not specialised]
It was communal society with egalitarian values [the values of equality of sharing]. Every individual felt as a part of the society. The nature of historical knowledge was unique as it was hardly organised and hardly recognized. It was in the form of mythical tales, legends, poems and songs because it related very well in other artistic presentation ie songs, legends and poems.
It was hardly elaborate; there was hardly any debate, there was no specialist or specialization in history.
Histories in European classless society was to remember certain important events such as natural hazards, epidemics, its agonies would be remembered and would be passed through generation; when their significance died they were immediately forgotten. In those historical narrations all seemed to emphasize a close relationship between human beings and nature since humans were closely related to nature. Nature was generally seen as relative in the families or society and hence history tended to emphasize egalitarianism and kept the society together.
Historical knowledge was considered instrumental; it was used for entertainments, teaching etc
In Class Society
The nature of historical knowledge slowly changed to reflect hierarchy and social relationship in the society.
Histories focused more on political events ie wars, biographies of kings, heroes, military generals etc. This reflected class relations at a political level. When classes consolidated historical narratives consolidated their class character and their focus on hierarchy, wars etc. At the peak of the classical moment, wars were great issues and history was driven by powerful people in the society and the major emphasis was on political issues. Historical knowledge was considered as powerful [instrumental]. It had to be learnt for purpose; people had to learn and memorise the history of the empire. Historical knowledge was then studied for the purpose of collecting past mistakes.
History was to be remembered in order to solve some conflicts such as disputes over land; people turned to history to resolve conflicts. The underlying concept/assumption was that history repeats itself, it has a pattern and the pattern is the past.
ii) Philosophy of History in the Pre-Capitalist/Ancient Arab World
The History of the Arab World can be divided into two phases: Pre-Islamic phase and Islamic phase.
i) Pre-Islamic Phase/Period
Starts from the remote past to the 6th -7th centuries AD when Prophet Muhamad ibn Abd Allah Abd Al-Muttalib ibn Hashim (Kishlasnky et.al, 2001:220) was born. It was a long period that was generally characterised by:
The Arab classless society
The majority of it people were egalitarian
Dominated by sporadic philosophy of history
Historical knowledge existed in the form of legends, poems etc
The art of writing and history is stretched as far back as during the 3rd century BC. The early Arab historian writer was Berossus. He wrote a piece of history in 250 BC titled History of Babylonia. In his history, he covered historical changes and process over thirty thousand years about Babylon and its people.
Characteristics of historical writings in the Pre-Islamic Historiography
Historical writings focused on local scene ie had a localised coverage; talked about local communities and local state. There was no idea of universal history instead history was very local because its people were not travelling very far from their usual areas of domicile.
Histories were very descriptive in nature; they simply explained about the processes and no major efforts could be put on changes ie there was no guiding theory in historical writing; everything was based on description.
ii) The Islamic Period/Period
 Islam came into existence after the birth of prophet Abu al- Qasim Muhammad ibn Abd Allah ibn al-Muttalib ibn Hashim or simply called Prophet Muhammad in the 7th century and later on spread in the Arab world and beyond under the influence of his followers [especially when he died in summer 632 after short illness leaving no successors and direction concerning the leadership of the Umma] (Kishlasnky et al, 2001: 224). Eventually, Islam brought new life to many fields of learning. Muhammad the prophet taught that ‘the ink of the scholar is holier than the blood of a martyr’. Therefore, encouraged by this idea, scholars flocked to the centres of learning that grew up in the cities of the Islamic Empire (Beers, 1993:235)
The Koran was the focus of much Muslim scholarship. Legal experts wrote many texts in which they interpreted the Koran. Their writings became part of the Islamic law code. Islamic law along with common religious beliefs and the use of Arabic, helped to unite Muslims on three continents. Yet Muslim scholars did not limit their studies to the holy Koran. They translated ancient Greek works on Philosophy and science. This was evident at the centres of learning such as in Baghdad where scholars studied Roman, Jewish, Persian and Indian texts and in this way, the Arabs were able to preserve much of the ancient leaning (ibid).
It was therefore at this time when peoples thinking in the Islamic world was influenced by Islamic theology and values. Islamic outlook was thus used as a historical framework. Historical events were generally seen to have a pattern [the past had a pattern] and the pattern was defined as Unfolding of the Divine Purpose. In this sense, history was seen to be driven by God and God had a purpose. Hence when a good state was formed, it was explained as God’s plan. Historical events were seen as God’s divine purpose. The task of a historian was simply to record things clearly and systematically so that they would share the divine purpose.
Historical writing was based on a combination of two methodologies ie Induction [that involved collection of information to make sense] and Deduction [that involved reasoning based on some existing principles to deduce conclusions]. Historical knowledge was therefore a combination of the two approaches as it was driven by religious ideology.
Development of Historiography in the Islamic Period
Historiography in the Islamic period was not static, it was changing over time. The major differences can be seen in reference to the three main phases of the development of Islam.
The First Phase [100 years of Islam]
The main theme was on the concentration of historical writings on biographies of certain individuals. Historians first started with the biographies of the Prophet. Prominent among the Historians who ventured into this field included Ibn Ishaq who wrote The Biography of the Prophet, al waqid in his History of the Wars of the Prophet and Ogba in his The Life of the Prophet.
The Second Phase [2nd Islamic century]
In the second phase, history focused on the development and expansion of Islam. A lot of history was written about how Islam expanded and developed in the world. Arab historians started writing about other parts of the world. Islam expanded rapidly; its people started composing historical writings covering parts of North Africa, West Africa, Europe and Far East. The main sources were dynastic annals [narratives]. Arab historians had a tendency of depending on dynastic annals. They also relied on the chronicles [stories about a particular are, eventf etc]. These were particularly composed by state historians.
The Third Phase [from 16th onwards]
Interference by European scholars in places of Arab Historiography became dominant. It was a time when Europeans began to influence and dominate the entire world ie through merchantilism. This in consequence, led to the beginning of mixture of historiography [European, Arab and Christianity]. By the 18th century, European historiography began to dominate other parts of the world. However, Arab Historiography remained a challenge to the European tradition.

General Characteristic of the Pre-European Arab Historiography
Historiography was clearly dominated by religious idealism ie it was led by the underlying religious thinking.
There was a tendency for historians to keep themselves closer to the sources; people made efforts to provide evidence.
There was an emphasis on the sources that claimed eye witness. These were given more priority.
There was less criticism of the sources because of heavily relying on the sources.
Ibn Khaldun, the 14th Century Historian
Personal Biography
Ibn Khaldun was born in Tunis in 1332 and therefore became a cosmopolitan [a person born in the city]. He was a scholar and statesman with political and educational experience serving as an advisor to the kind and a jurist [a member of the judicial panel]. He left his native North West Africa in 1382 and never returned ( Khaldun, 1983:xxix). He got first Quaranic education where he learnt a number of things including Hadiths, he also learnt jurist prudent, studied philosophy, Arab poems and met with other Arab scholars from other parts of the world.
He is remembered to be one of the most systematic Theorist of History ( a philosopher of history). Sometimes he is regarded as the founder of history. He wrote a number of books and prominent among them included Universal History. A book that dealt with history of the Mediterranean Europe and Africa. The volume consists of three books: 1. The influence of civilisation on men, ii. History of Arabs and other people from Antiquity to the emergence of writing and iii, History of Berber people and their tribes.


The Influence of Civilisation
Together with a preface has been published separately a book called Muqaddimah which means an Introduction. Ibn Khaldun’s great work [the Muqaddimah] is another important source for his own biography. The book sharply outlines his personal philosophy and provides insights into the working of his mind (Khaldun, 1983: xxx). It covers his biographies about the author, theories of history, environmental and political issues. He also discusses the errors of the ancient historians, aspects of civilisations, sections of various sciences etc.
Ibn Khaldun’s General Methodological Tendencies in History
-He combined elements of materialism and idealism at the same time, he was deeply religious. Having travelled over the world he developed a tendency of materialist explanation. He could explain why variations in colours between people occurred, the differences between the Europeans in the North, South and Arabs as being a result of climate.
-He disagreed the idea of history as unfolding of divine purpose. He thought to be transformations that were internally motivated (driven). He considered change as a process and hence historical knowledge was a record of change in the society.
- He believed that changes were cyclical in patterns ie they followed the cyclical path. He did not agree with a linear pattern of changes in the past. He used the analogy of living organism whose life begins, develops and matures and collapses and finally dies; when they die they come out in another form. He used this analogy to explain the changes in the society as it begins, develops and collapses. As it collapses, it influences the emergence of another society.
-Ibn Khaldun conceptualised the society into two: Rural society/ population living at some distance from the great population centres. The second category was the Urban population/society that did not have the same meaning as it has today. Cities in his days permitted and required a good deal of agricultural activity. In Ibn Khaldun’s thinking, the sociological distinction amounts to no more than a qualitative distinction as to the size and destiny of human settlements (Khaldun, 1983: lxxvii). Rural society according to him lacked a sense of togetherness ie Asabiah. However, he held the view that rural communities were more courageous and resistant to changes. Urban society in his view was advanced in the artistic presentation, more polite, more civilised and more sophisticated. Its people had a sense of togetherness with power being concentrated in the hands of the kings, generals etc. However, deep inside the city there was a seed of self destruction ie in the city, some people afforded to live a luxurious life and become addicted to those luxuries. In order to get luxuries they had to exploit the other and hence solidarity goes down and slowly the urban society declines [collapses]. As soon as it collapses, a new basis begins to create a just society.

















MODULE 4: MEDIEVAL EUROPEAN PHILOSOPHY OF HISTORY
The Medieval period also refers to Dark ages or Middle Ages stretching from the 14th century to the 16th century. The period was dominated by the church as the only organ that could speculate about the nature of the existence. It was also dominated by feudalism that divided the society into the land lords and the serfs who worked to the landlords to make their ends meet In general, it can be argued that the social and political conditions in the medieval Europe was dominated by feudalism and the church.
The society had very strong hierarchical order as it was divided into the rich and the poor. The hierarchy of the society was defined in terms of the earthly hierarchy. The Pope was at the top of the hierarchy and below him were bishops and arch bishops followed by kings, powerful political individuals, royal families and at the bottom were peasants and serfs. The people conceived the cosmic [heavenly] hierarchy and related it to the earthly hierarchy. They conceived God to be at the top followed by powerful forces and the lowest angels. The two hierarchies reflected upon each other [ie they reflected the actual relationship of the people]. Earthly hierarchy: Pope- arch-bishops and bishops- kings-powerful political individuals- royal families and peasants. Heavenly hierarchy: God-arch angels-Junior angels. Because of the dominance of the church in thinking, there developed a Christian Philosophy that was by and large based on Christian ideology that dominated the medieval Europe.
Christian Philosophy
The Christian philosophy ie Christian epistemology, logic and ethics in most instances, came from Christian religious teachings [theology] basically the Old Testament.  The Christian theology of the medieval Europe was referred to as Jewish Christian ideas about the Old Testament. Thus, thinking about the past was also influenced by the Old Testament.
 Jewish Christian Conception of Time
 The Jewish Christian tradition viewed time as linear, progressive and providential. Linear: meant time and events move in a linear pattern. It has the beginning and an end. Progressive: meant that history and time move from poor and unorganized state (in terms of human relationship and peoples relationship with God). Providential: meant that the movement of time and events were all designed by God, they were engineered by God; they were fulfillment of God’s plan, they did not happen haphazardly. Whatever happened was determined by God. According to the Christian philosophy, history begins with the creation of the universe and it ends when the Messiah comes [the second coming]. History is therefore a movement [ objective reality] towards betterment of human affairs. In Christian Philosophy, there is a definite end of the world and the end of history.
Writings in the Christian Philosophy of History
The Christian Philosophy of History was influenced by the Old Testament since it was written long before Christianity began. The Old Testament was considered to be the preparation of the New Testament. Therefore, the two merged together and fulfilled the Christian Historiography. The New Testament was written between 75 A.D and 100A.D It brought profound new ideas coming from new experiences including the life of Jesus. A number of Historical texts were written in the medieval Europe; they were however influenced by religious information especially the Bible.
Sixtus Julius Africanus
He wrote the book titled, Christian Historiography. Sixtus concerned mostly with early Christianity stretching as far back as during the third [3rd] century A.D. He was concerned with chronology and he relied mostly on the bible especially the Old Testament to establish chronology. He struggled to know the years that had passed from Adam to Jesus. He was generally concerned with what was happening in the bible and tried to reconstruct history using the bible as the source of information.
St. Augustine of Hippo
He was a bishop of Hippo [in today’s Tunisia]. St. Augustine was concerned with what was happening in the Mediterranean world. As a leader, he was disturbed by complaints from the people who thought that Christianity brought troubles, famine, wars, and tortures in the Mediterranean world; the people believed that all these problems were brought by Christianity. Therefore, St.Augustine was truly concerned as the people brought false relationship between political issues and religion. He saw paganism coming very strong. Hence there was a need for him to reverse such a widespread prophecy.
St. Augustine’s The City of God.
The book was written from 413-426 AD. It was dominated by the following social context. The book was written when the Roman Empire started to collapse. The social structure was hierarchical. It was a period when people started travelling all over the Mediterranean World. As a clergy, he faced difficulties as the sense of paganism started becoming dominant and claimed that the Roman Empire collapsed due to Christianity. He decided to defend the church distinguishing between the Roman Empire and the church which was universal.
In the book he argued that history consists of two forces ie forces of evils and forces of God. The forces of God were referred to as the city of God while the forces against God were referred to as the city of evil. He further argued that, these two forces are all intermixed. It was difficult to distinguish them; he made an appeal to historians urging them to make efforts to distinguish the two forces. The forces of God were events and processes that were for God. Therefore in writing, historians were called upon to write about processes that were geared towards perfection. To him, events that were not for God did not constitute history. According to St. Augustine, history had a pattern [ ie a movement towards perfection]. He therefore, warned historians not to concentrate on events that could not lead people towards a better perfection.
Similarly, St. Augustine conceptualised time and history to be linear, progressive and providential. Linear: meant that time had a beginning and an end. Providential: meant that the path of history is God’s plan and Progressive: meant that history and time moved from disorganized to organised stages. He emphasized on history as the movement of people and civilisation to a situation closer to God in terms of their deeds. According to him, history was a story that was gradually accepted to God. Therefore, events that led the people closer to God were considered ‘History’ and events that could lead the people astray from God were not considered ‘history’. Events that belonged to the city of evil were not understandable and hence did not constitute history.

MODULE 6: THE NATIONALIST HISTORIOGRAPHY
Meaning and the Social Context
The term “nationalist historiography” which A.J.Temu and B.Swai call “Africanist historiography” does not refer to history written by politicians. It was history inspired by the success of nationalism in giving birth to new African nations and was full of enthusiasm about possibilities for development in these new nations.  This historiography emerged in the 1960s when African countries were struggling for independence.  Bethwel Ogot stressed that after independence, the post colonial state embarked on political, social and economic development programmes with different countries opting for necessary ideological approaches to the problem of development. Therefore with this in mind, by the end of the 1960s, one could even read a history of Tanzania that traced the existence of the Tanzanian nation from the archaeological findings of the Olduvai Gorge to the Arusha Declaration (Kimambo & Temu, 1969: Introduction). The nationalist ideological triumph over colonialism in the late 1950s and 1960s were important to the development of nationalist historiography. Historical knowledge produced in the decade of the 1960s was conceived basically as liberating social force and as a means of strengthening self government.
Major Arguments of the Nationalist Historiography
First of all, the nationalist historiography held not only that the Tanzanian peoples had their own history but also they were in control of their own development. In this way, the nationalist historiography reconstructed again the history of Africa which was largely distorted by colonial historians. For example, the East African coast was perceived by the colonial historians to depend entirely on the Indian Ocean trade for its prosperity and that its civilisation was a result of the initiatives made by the Arabs and Persians. This notion was however criticised by African nationalists like Masao and Muturo who archaeologically proved that the East African Coast were settled and founded by the Swahili people who originated from the Bantu speaking population and also who had their own social, economic and political achievements and civilisations. Archaeologiocal evidence throughout the East African coast leaves no doubt that in all cases there were local inhabitants with their own civilisations before the coming of the Arabs.
Secondly, the nationalists also appreciated African initiatives in the struggle against colonialism. They glorified the wars of African resistance against the imposition of colonial rule and later on nationalist struggles as important African’s initiatives to be free from foreign domination. The emergence of new African independent states was therefore demonstrated as a manifestation of the efforts made by African people to determine their own political destiny in the world community. Colonialism was hence regarded as an event that held back [dismantled] the process of political development in Africa. Thus, the theme pursued by the nationalist historians of “discovering people’s initiatives” was aimed at changing the European image of the African past from the one which “never changed” to one which was dynamic and full of changes initiated by the people themselves.
Thirdly, the nationalist historians concentrated on political changes especially those which involved states and state-related institutions. With this in mind, nationalist historiography concentrated on large centralised states and over looked stateless/ decentralized societies. An important addition in the study of centralised states was made. They argued that African societies were egalitarian, classless and democratic characterised by absence of exploitative relations. They condemned slave trade and colonialism for bringing exploitation and oppression in Africa. They further contended that the era before slavery and colonialism in Africa was a golden age,a period when African societies were living in harmony characterised by equality and mutual assistance.
Critiques of Nationalist Historiography
No sooner had the paradigm become famous among historians than it came under fire. This section therefore presents the weaknesses of the nationalist historiography in Africa in general and Tanzania in particular.
First of all, Nationalist historians became the first to recognize the weaknesses of the paradigm in terms of interpretation and research strategy.  For example, Donald Denoon and Adam Kuper were worried about the political implication of an interpretation that showed too much commitment to the “Political philosophy of current African nationalism.” In 1968, I.N.Kimambo expressed worries about the concentration on political issues that subordinated economic issues since studies were increasingly becoming anachronistic [old fashioned] being pre-occupied with politics.
Secondly, the paradigm was criticised for its commitment on political philosophy that introduced neither new research methodology nor different philosophical outlook. Therefore, the nationalist’s lack of attention to local systems of environmental knowledge hindered their efforts to show that Tanzania had full of changes initiated by the people themselves. Although Tanzania made a political commitment to Ujamaa or traditional socialist path of development in 1967, such a political change encouraged deeper discussions of nationalist historiography.
Thirdly, Bourgeois nationalist historiography was criticised for its methodological poverty, idealism and rejection of theory. In this case, it remained precisely at the same level as “bourgeois colonialist” tradition it was struggling to replace. It was argued that the nationalist position was nothing but a “negative mirror image” of the bourgeois colonial history.
Finally, by the end of 1960s the enthusiasm was fading away because of the anticipated fast development of the new nation had not taken place. The political history of Tanzania had radically changed because of this realisation particularly with the Arusha Declaration of 1967 specifically because of the failure of the plans inherited from the colonial period. The Arusha declaration expressed the intention of building a socialist base on Ujamaa ie the traditional principles of working together and sharing. For the Dar es Salaam historians, this was a new challenge because the emphasis on political initiatives had not produced an understanding of economic struggles that allowed societies to survive over centuries. Thus, the discussion and debates initiated in the department of History in Dar es Salaam [due to the influence of the Arusha declaration] resulted into the emergence of the underdevelopment theory by W.Rodney that replaced the Nationalist historiography. In this way, the focus moved from political structures to economic base.




ESTABLISHMENT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY AT THE UNIVERSITY OF DAR ES SALAAM
The University of Dar es Salaam was established later than other east African countries and the department of History came into being officially in 1965. It started at a time when conservative colonial perspective was being challenged in the colonies. This gave rise to the liberal school that did not criticise colonialism and did not praise too much Africans. Members of this school included Andrew Roberts, Basil Davidson, Prof.T.O.Ranger etc.
One of these Prof. T.O.Ranger became the first head of the department. He was a British; he had been teaching in Southern Rhodesia (Zimbabwe). He was kicked out by Ian Smith’s regime because of his nationalist character. Ranger argued that Africans throughout history had their own initiatives in his inaugural lecture titled “The Recovery of African Initiatives in Tanzanian History.”
In 1965, T.O.Ranger established the Liberal Theory that was against European conservative history that claimed Africa to have no history, no development and no civilisation. The Liberal school argued that Africa had history of its own, developments and civilisations. Ranger’s theoretical project was to show how Africa had their own initiatives throughout history. He argued that in the antiquity, the Africans had their own initiatives, slave trade followed the route that had been established. When things changed in the world, Africans took advantage of what came ( legitimate trade). During colonialism, Africans resisted due to their local initiatives where they thought it was advantageous, they produced cash crops, sent their children to school etc. However, the Liberal tradition did not exist long after the departure of Prof.Ranger. This gave rise to nationalist tradition.
The Nationalist Tradition
Based on emphasis of national building and nationalist movements. The nationalist tradition criticised colonialism that was exploitative and hence put emphasis on national building. African Professors come into being with I.N.Kimambo, A.J.Temu etc. The first book, A History of Tanzania was published as an implementation of the Arusha declaration. Other books written under the nationalist tradition included Tanzania under Colonial Rule edited by M.H.Y.Kaniki.
However, the tradition did not exist long before it was criticised. According to John Saul in his Beyond Socialism, the nationalist tradition had lost its track, it glorified the Africans, had no criticism of African leaders. It did not use class analysis and neither did concentrate on what was in the class. This gave rise to the Radical tradition (centre and periphery model).
Radical Tradition (Centre and Periphery, Underdevelopment school)
In their writings, they borrowed ideas from the Centre-Periphery theory headed by Andre Gunder Frank in Latin America. The centre-periphery model held the view that the whole world is under capitalism which has created two tendencies, one part becoming richer and richer while the other part becoming poorer and poorer. The rich were at the centre and the poor were in the periphery. To them, Africans was considered to be in the periphery. Africa was considered poor (backward) due to slave trade, free trade (legitimate trade of 18th and 19th centuries), colonialism and neo-colonialism. All these were aspects of capitalism and African backwardness had to be explained along the line of capitalist system. Teaching at the University of Dar es Salaam was based on the theory of Centre-Periphery model. Prominent among the initiator of this tradition in the department of history was Prof. W. Rodney whose How Europe Underdeveloped Africa was a manifestation of the centre and periphery model.
Materialist/ Marxist Tradition
The new theory emphasised the question of class. Issa G.Shivji published Silent Class Struggles, later on Class Struggles in Tanzania explained that there was a class of Bureaucratic bourgeoisie who were more advantaged ( managers, leaders and international bourgeoisie) and the down trodden ie the peasants. History had to show who exploited who. By the mid 1970s class analysis based on history was common. Prominent among the scholars under this tradition included:  Henry Slater, Jacques Depelchin, Wamba dia Wamba etc. They propagated the idea of writing history from the point of view of the class of the exploited. The tradition was called Materialist Tradition because scholars followed the ideas of Karl Marx. Materialist historians: 1) Were materialist; they explained development in materialist terms. 2. They followed (used) class as an instrument for analysis and 3). They wrote history from the point of view of the exploited (down trodden). To them the right to write history was to write on the basis of the exploited. To be able to write history one has to participate in the class struggle. Materialist tradition was dominant in the department of history up to the 1980s.
Current Situation in the Department of History
There is a notable decline in political commitment. The way history is taught, research is different. In the 1960s history teaching reflected the nationalist struggle and national building. History was taught on the point of view of the down trodden.
There has a been a decline of the philosophy of Marxism and Leninism, it is not explicitly shown. In the past Marxist Leninism paradigm was much emphasized. The kind of history written is nowadays neutral that does not follow the Marxist Leninism paradigm.
More diversification of Historical themes (study areas).
Social history: - History of world religions, History of disease and healing, Demographic history, Environmental history.
The reason for increased diversification was to see how the development would survive under which historians and research must undertake.
       

     

Characteristics of Christian historiography in medieval period

Tuesday, January 20, 2015

Characteristics of Christian historiography in medieval period

In medieval Europe, the writing of history began with church histories. After the fifth century for nearly eight hundred years, the Christian writers dominated the field of historiography. Christian or medieval European historiography has been variedly called patristic, providential or salvation historiography.  

The main characteristics of Christian historiography in medieval period are:

1.       Universal history: The Bible History written on Christian principles is bound to be a universal history or a history of the world, going back to the origin of man, the Book of Genesis. Historiographical thinking was combined with the theological needs of history. The Bible gave a coherent history in a historiographical frame of reference.  The acceptance of Catholicism strengthened this historical homogenization, for one of its core elements was its character of being a universal religion.  The earliest Christian historical works were chronologies designed to link events from scripture with political events, and to create a universal history of humanity.

2.       Chronology- History periodized: Having divided the past into two, Christian historiography subdivided it again. Thus history was divided into epochs or periods; each with a particular characteristics of its own, and each marked off from the one before by an epoch-making event.

These histories had a concept of time which was changeless because it was the divine time. Gradually, however, there was a change in the concept of time. Influenced by the pre-Christian tradition of history-writing, the historians began to think of time in more temporal terms, as a measurable sequence. This change in thinking made possible the use of chronology to write history. Contacts with other regions such as the Byzantine and the Arab world brought different influences from which also the medieval European historiography benefited.

This fluid sense of chronological boundaries is also visible in the chronicles

of the high Middle Ages. Here two chronological systems dominated: the incarnation era

and the registering of reigns and pontificates, and numerous chroniclers strove to establish

a factual as well as a narrative unity of these elements. This resulted in a belief in the

natural changeability and the ephemeral nature of history as such, because all earthly

things were ruled by time. For the medieval chroniclers, historical change was primarily a

cycle of growth and decay of regents and kingdoms.

The medieval concept of the past thus was determined by an extremely peculiar, ambiguous,

even paradoxical, mixture of belief in historical progression on the one hand and its immutability on the other, of an epochal change and at the same time a continuity of times and historical situations. In the final analysis, it lacked a sense of the truly historical characterisation of the past. However, owing to its emphasis on verifiability of the chronological arrangement, this understanding cannot be classified as being truly timeless, but in various ways it nevertheless lacked a sense of assigning a specific peculiarity to each passing epoch. The past was perceived as a (temporal) development corresponding to the saeculum, the earthly time, with an unchanging character and essence. This engendered a widespread tendency to order historical events according to their respective time which was in no way seen as contradictory to the opposing tendency to detach the subject matter of the same events from their chronological order.

Historiographical thinking was combined with the theological needs of history

The Bible in the middle ages was seen not simply as a literal description of the unfolding of a Christian religion, but also as a chronicle of a succession of spiritual parts. The diverse texts of the Christian tradition were unified in the Bible, thus giving it a coherent history in a historiographical frame of reference which was blended with a unified system of symbolisms, so uniting history with tradition and representation. The acceptance of Catholicism strengthened this historical homogenisation, for one of its core elements was its character of being a universal religion which had little space for the particularist rules, norms and values of specific groups. The earliest Christian historical works were chronologies designed to link events from scripture with political events, and to create a universal history of humanity.

Another feature of medieval historical writing in Europe was that it seemed perennially poised at the crossroads between eschatological aspirations of a universal Christendom and the objective conditions of the real world.

In this fashion, world history came to be established as a computable, finite, yet unstable entity under the control of change in the historiographical traditions of medieval Europe. But, this view of world history soon came under stress. Two factors caused the stress: first, there was the manifestly continuous existence of the world despite the eschatological belief that the predicted end of the world was close; and second, there was the reception in the Occident, during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, of the Aristotelian concept of time as an endless process. The first factor was enhanced by the use of the AD chronology itself, which helped to deal historiographically with the institutional discontinuities of the Roman Empire. Hence it was ultimately in conflict with the eschatological belief in the finiteness of the existence of the world as an earthly city. The Aristotelian definition of time, came to be reintroduced in the Occident through the Arab translations of Aristotle’s original works from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. According to the Aristotelian concept, time was regarded as the mover of all things, elevated above all other divine creations. In consequence of the spread of this concept of time, it became difficult to conceive existence without time, even beyond Judgement Day. In other words, if time was prior to everything else, existence became inconceivable outside of or beyond time and thinking about a world without change became subject to fairy tales and mere speculation.

One major problem with medieval European historical writing was its perception of history

as primarily as a chronological progression.. Historical changes were seen in political rise

and decline or in change of rulership, possibly complemented by spatial displacement of

the centres of power, and historical events were installed in their precise temporal frame.

But these changes were not estimated, interpreted, or explained according to their

respective historical situations, as structural changes, changes in contemporary attitudes,

or, even in the historical conditions. Owing to a linear concept of time, the authors

recognized an irretrievability of history, but they did not acknowledge a thorough alteration

through the coming of new epochs. Therefore, they completely lacked any sense of

‘alternative pasts’ or of the historical peculiarity of each epoch. The twelfth century, as a

modern historian has remarked, the twelfth century was not simply concerned with ‘the

pastness of the past’ but with ‘its timeless edification’. The past and the present were

thus fused in one continuous narrative.

The tendency to link the present time with the period of the Roman Empire and to emphasise a continuity indicates a characteristic feature of the concept (or consciousness) of history in the high Middle Ages that seems to contradict the tendency to determine and record precise historic dates. On the one hand, the authors acknowledged and noted change and development, and they distinguished between epochs or phases in history; on the other hand, their perceptions of the events were imbued with an astounding sense of ‘timelessness’ that ignored a real difference in the epochal character insofar as this went beyond the political succession of power, reign, and kingdoms. On the contrary, it allowed events that were long past to be applied directly to the present.

Characteristics of Christian/western historiography in medieval period:

Ecclesiastical history suffers from a series of defects from the beginning itself. First, it had adopted the entire ancient pre-Christain and Jewish history without checking its authenticity. Hence, it become very difficult to accept the persons and events mentioned in the Gospel as historical personalities and events. Secondly, Church history is closely related to revelation, but in history, it is difficult to substantiate revelations. It is an accepted fact that knowledge can be gained through observation, intuition and revelation, but knowledge gained thorugh the last two methods cannot be called historical knowledge, which should be such as to be reflected and revived in the historian’s mind. Since this is not possible in the case of revelation it goes out of the purview of history, however, powerful an instrument it might be for philosophy and religion. Thirdly, church history made a very vicious distinction between ‘sacred’ and ‘profane’ history. Religious history was sacred to it and secular history was profane. It developed such an antipathy and resentment for the ordinary and worldly deed of men that it did not care to regard them as worthy of our attention. Consequently, a good part of human activity, essentially the substance of it, ws excluded fromt e domain of history. What remained was speculative and hypothetical ideas that oculd hardly constitute history. Fourthly, Church history built around itself a ring of false guardianship of piety and authority, which defied all scrutiny and logic. It has ever been a wealness of church history that it never subjected itself to a dispassionate analysis either of its sources or of its interpretations. It is the solitary branch of history that claims exception from critical investigation of treatment.

Providential history: Christian historiography ascribed events not to their human agents but to the workings of providence, preordaining their course.

Apocalyptic history: Christian historiography attached a central importance to the historical life of Christ. It treated earlier events as leading up to it or preparing for it, and subsequent events as developing its consequences. It therefore divided history into two parts: the first part leading up to the birth of Christ has a forward-looking character consisting in blind preparation for an event not yet revealed; the second part has a backward-looking haracter depending on the fact that the revelation has been made.

These histories had a concept of time which was changeless because it was the divine time. Gradually, however, there was a change in the concept of time. Influenced by the pre-Christian tradition of history-writing, the historians began to think of time in more temporal terms, as a measurable sequence. This change in thinking made possible the use of chronology to write history. Contacts with other regions such as the Byzantine and the Arab world brought different influences from which also the medieval European historiography benefited.

Sheikh Ali’s : Characteristics of church historiography:

2 chief characteristics:

1)      First, it developed a special technique to treat inspired and sacred writings. It was concerned mostly with explaining the ways of God to man, and hence it was not interested in secular matters.

2)      Secondly, its approach was not objective but subjective. It was not based on reason but on faith and belief. It obeyed not any law that could be explained by logic, but a divine law which has a fixed course of action, and whose destiny is best known only to God. Therefore, whenever an extraordinary or unusual situation arose its explanation is sought in the Divine Will, and not on the basis of cause and effect. Consequently, the church historiographers developed a method of the own which interpreted situations in terms suitable for religious literature. They adopted an indirect method of conveying their ideas and wrote in allegory which bypassed critics,.

3)      Thirdly, it is highly defective in chronology. According to Sextus Julius Africanus, creation took place 5499 years before Christ. It divided the historical period into five parts – 1) from Abraham to the Trojan War 2) from the Trojan war to the first Olympiad 3) from the first Olympiad to the reign of Darius 4) from the reign of Darius to the death of Christ and 5) from the death of Christ to the reign of Constantine. Christian historiography achieved a certain unity which was theological and gave a religious meaning to history.

4)      Fourthly, the Christian Fathers developed a kind of history which was to vindicate the charge that Christianity was responsible for the fall of Rome. This they had to write in  order to answer the charge of the pagans who accused the Church of engineering the fall of the empire. The vindicatin came in a forceful way from Paulus Orasius (AD 380-420), a Spaniard who later became a disciple of St. Augustine. He wrote seven books of history against the pagans, and argued that the ultimate destiny of all mankind, whether pagan, Jew or Christain would depend on god.

5)      Fifthly, Church historiography falls into two heads, religious and secular. Religious history was based on the assumption that human history was guided by God, and this history comprised mostly of miracles and saints. The other name for such a religious history is patristic history. Secular history was known as pagan history, which received greater attention in later years, although religious history still maintained its ground. Until the Renaissance period, histories of both these types were written side by side with no improvement. The defects of patristic history persisted until the age of Enlightenment. But all history was the monopoly of the monk, who wrote both secular and religious history.

6)      Sixthly, in the period that followed the reign of Charlemagne a new type of historical literature, namely Annalsand Chronicles, came into existence. The word Annals means annual information, particularly astronomical records determining the exact date of the Easter festival. This was no more than a kind of almanac table. This practice first began in England and later spread to other parts of Europe.  This Chronicle which followed was concerned with the events of a place. Its object was not to presents a piece of literary composition but to supply some information or prove a particular point. Chronicles give full information on contemporary happenings, but not on past events, and they are not very authentic or accurate accounts if events but merely narrativs of the events that took place when the author was alive. Of all the chronicles produced during the medieval period, the Anglo-Saxon chronicle is the most famous.

7)      Finally, with the fall of the Roman Empire, the historians gained a wider scope to comment on the events. They raised their voice, while the empire was in the process of decay, against administrative inefficiently, corruption, increasing taxation, social derangement, economic strain, breakdown of law and order and the barbarian invasions.

8)      Thus, the historiography of the period was characterized by dogmatic interpretation, a primitive and crude style and a highly colored and subjective approach. The Churchmen and the monks alone were the custodians of history, and they presented their own point of view. History was an instrument in their hand to advance the interests of the Church, and to propagate the Christian faith by indicating how nations had suffered by not observing the Divine Law. Since a body of authentic record was not available, and since they did not bother to collect material by personal exertion, they wrote wither on the basis of old traditions and gospel stories or on contemporary events or on significant episodes such as the Crusades. Reason which had played such a vital role during the Greco-Roman period was pushed to the background and faith took its place. This did not in any way help in the promotion of thought.

9)      Gibbon went to the extent of saying the most powerful factor for the downfall of the Roman empire was Christianity which restrained the free thought and checked human liberty, as it was obligatory to obey not man-made laws but only  the Divine Law, the custodian of which was the church. Since the priests were the instruments to administer this law which was supposed to be infallible, there was no scope for flexibility of the law, and for the growth of the human mind. The historians became the key agents to foster such thoughts as they had the power too substantiate the thesis with reference to the events of the past. Consequently, the period has rightly earned the title of the Dark Ages. Christians considered the affairs of history as the expression of the Divine Will.

10)  In short, the Christian conception of history matured in the writings of St. Augustine. The City of God became manifest in the Church which warned against sin, injustice, immorality and impropriety. For the Christians the fall of Rome had no meaning because their real city was far away from it. St. Augustine considered history as a linear movement consisting of eight stages, five of the past, one that is present and two in the future when Christ will incarnate himself to save humanity. The motive force of this movement id the will and grace of God. The entire drama of history, moving from creation to dissolution and the advent of Jesus is the manifestation of Divine Will. All things good or bad form links of that long chain of Divine planning. Thus, the Christian outlook on historical change is ‘charismatic, linear, universal and impersonal.’

11)  Since its main purpose was to build faith in transcendental forces, it was far from rational or critical history, and a number of weaknesses have been noted by scholars.

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