Historiography

Michael Bentley looks at the father of British historiography who was an eloquent and controversial opponent of teleology.

Christopher B. Krebs considers Irene Coltman Brown’s article on the ambivalent and ironic Roman historian Tacitus, first published in History Today in 1981.

George Macaulay Trevelyan, one of the last Whig historians, died on 21st July 1962. On the anniversary of his death, we have published an article from a 1962 edition of History Today, in which he is remembered, not just for his work as a historian, but also for the man he was.

Writing her first historical novel has raised some unexpected challenges for the historian Stella Tillyard.

Since its discovery in Yemen in 1972 a collection of brittle documents, believed to be among the earliest Koranic texts, has been the subject of fierce and divisive debate among scholars of Islamic history, as Scott MacMillan reports.

Roger Moorhouse revisits a perceptive article by John Erickson on the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union, first published in History Today in 2001, its insights born of a brief period of Russian openness.

Chris Wickham revisits an article by J.B.Morrall, first published in History Today in 1959, on the strange, shortlived emperor who in the tenth century sought to rule the lands we now call Germany and Italy.

Some historians romanticise the powerless to the point where they can do no wrong. This offers a moral threat to both the profession and the wider society, which must be challenged, says Tim Stanley.

In writing a young person’s history of Britain Patrick Dillon found himself wondering where myth ends and history begins.

As the TV series Ancient Worlds reaches its conclusion, its writer and presenter Richard Miles looks at the challenges of making a historical documentary.

The historian’s desire for certainty is hard to square with the fragility of sources and their constant reworking by the profession. Casting a cold eye on the remaining evidence relating to the deaths of Edward II and Richard II, Ian Mortimer plots a way forward for his discipline.

J.H. Plumb comments on how the famous historian of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon, sought a detached and truthful past, free from preconception or the idea of inherent purpose.

Nick Poyntz looks at the ways in which the ubiquitous search engine is changing the nature of historical research.