What Is History A Collection of Definitions

History is the study of the human past as it is described in the written documents left by human beings. The past, with all its decisions completed, its participants dead and its history told, is what the general public perceives as the immutable bedrock on which we historians and archaeologists  stand. But as purveyors of the past, we recognize that the bedrock is really quicksand, that bits of the story are yet untold, and that what has been told comes tainted by the conditions of what we are today. Thats my opinion, of course—here are a collection of others.   Pithy History Definitions No one could argue that the best definition isnt a short one, but it helps if you can be witty as well. John Jacob Anderson History is a narration of the events which have happened among mankind, including an account of the rise and fall of nations, as well as of other great changes which have affected the political and social condition of the human race. (A Manual of General History) W.C. Sellar and R.J. Yeatman History is not what you thought. It is what you remember. All other history defeats itself. (1066 and All That) James Joyce History, Stephen said, is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake. (Ulysses) Arnold J. Toynbee History not used is nothing, for all intellectual life is action, like practical life, and if you dont use the stuff well, it might as well be dead. The Psycho-Historian Between 1942 and 1944, the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov wrote the first short stories which were to become the basis for the Foundation trilogy. The main conceit of the Foundation Trilogy is that if you are a good enough mathematician, you can accurately predict the future, based on the record of the past. Asimov read very widely indeed, so it should come as no surprise that his ideas were based on the writings of other historians. Charles Austin Beard If a science of history were achieved, it would, like the science of celestial mechanics, make possible the calculable prediction of the future in history. It would bring the totality of historical occurrences within a single field and reveal the unfolding future to its last end, including all the apparent choices made and to be made. It would be omniscience. The creator of it would possess the attributes ascribed by the theologians to God. The future once revealed, humanity would have nothing to do except to await its doom. Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges History is and should be a science... History is not the accumulation of events of every kind which happened in the past. It is the science of human societies. Voltaire The first foundations of all history are the recitals of the fathers to the children, transmitted afterward from one generation to another; at their origin, they are at the very most probable, when they do not shock common sense, and they lose one degree of probability in each generation. (The Philosophical Dictionary) Edward Hallett Carr History is ... a dialogue between the present and the past. (originally: Geschichte ist ... ein Dialog zwischen Gegenwart und Vergangenheit.) (What Is History?) Martin Luther King, Jr. The major lessons of history? There are four: First, whom the gods destroy they first make mad with power. Second, the mills of God grind slowly, but they grind exceeding small. Third, the bee fertilizes the flower it robs. Fourth, when it is dark enough you can see the stars. (Attributed to historian Charles Austin Beard, but this version is the one  Martin Luther King  used in The death of evil upon the seashore) A Pack of Tricks Not everyone likes the study of history or finds it useful. Henry Ford was a prime example of that and so was Henry David Thoreau, what may be one of the very few things those two gentlemen had in common. Voltaire History is nothing but a pack of tricks we play on the dead. (French original) Jay vu un temps oà ¹ vous naimiez guà ¨res lhistoire. Ce nest aprà ¨s tout quun ramas de tracasseries quon fait aux morts... Henry David Thoreau As for the Pyramids, there is nothing to wonder at in them so much as the fact that so many men could be found degraded enough to spend their lives constructing a tomb for some ambitious booby, whom it would have been wiser and manlier to have drowned in the Nile, and then given his body to the dogs. (Walden) Jane Austen History, real solemn history, I cannot be interested in. I read it a little as a duty, but it tells me nothing that does not either vex or weary me. The quarrels of popes and kings, with wars or pestilences, in every page; the men all so good for nothing, and hardly any women at all—it is very tiresome. (Northanger Abbey) Ambrose Bierce HISTORY, n. An account mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers mostly fools: Of Roman history, great  Niebuhrs shown Tis nine-tenths lying. Faith, I wish twere known, Ere we accept great Niebuhr as a guide, Wherein he blundered and how much he lied. (Devils Dictionary) Malcolm X A race of people is like an individual man; until it uses its own talent, takes pride in its own history, expresses its own culture, affirms its own selfhood, it can never fulfill itself. The Passage of Time Whether you like history or not, theres no denying the impact it leaves on us. Henry David Thoreau Most events recorded in history are more remarkable than important, like eclipses of the sun and moon, by which all are attracted, but whose effects no one takes the trouble to calculate. (A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers.) Gusti Bienstock Kollman You know, its so strange, Ive lived through four forms of government in my life: monarchy, republic, Hitlers Reich, American democracy. The [Weimar] republic was only ... 1918 to 1933, thats fifteen years! Imagine that, only fifteen years. But, then, Hitler was going to last a thousand years and he lasted only ... 1933 to 1945... twelve, twelve years only! Hah! Plutarch So very difficult a matter it is to trace and find out the truth of anything by history. (Plutarchs Lives) Douglas Adams The History of every major Galactic Civilization tends to pass through three distinct and recognizable phases, those of Survival, Inquiry, and Sophistication, otherwise known as the How, Why and Where phases. For instance, the first phase is characterized by the question How can we eat? the second by the question Why do we eat? and the third by the question Where shall we have lunch? (Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe) According to Prufrock T.S. Eliot After such knowledge, what forgiveness? Think nowHistory has many cunning passages, contrived corridorsAnd  issues,  deceives with whispering ambitions,Guides us by vanities. Think nowShe gives when our attention is distractedAnd what she gives, gives with such supple confusionsThat the giving famishes the craving. Gives too lateWhats not believed in, or if still believed,In memory only, reconsidered passion. Gives too soonInto weak hands, whats thought can be dispensed withTill the refusal propagates a fear. ThinkNeither fear nor courage saves us. Unnatural vicesAre fathered by our heroism. VirtuesAre forced upon us by our impudent crimes.These tears are shaken from the wrath-bearing tree.(The Waste Land, Prufrock and Other Poems.)