READING IN PHILIPPINE HISTORY

LESSON 1

THE MEANING OF HISTORY

History is derived from the Greek word historia which means learning by inquiry. The Greek

philosopher, Aristotle, looked upon history as the systematic accounting of al set of natural

phenomena, that is, taking into consideration the chronological arrangement of the account. This

explained that knowledge is derived through conducting a process of scientific investigation of

past events.

The word History is referred usually for accounts of phenomena, especially human affairs in

chronological order. These are theories constructed by historians in investigating history: the

factual history and the speculative history. Factual history presents readers the plain and basic

information vis-à-vis the events that took place (what), the time and date with which the events

happened (when), the place with which the events took place and the people that were involved

(who). Speculative history on the other hand, goes beyond facts because it is concerned about the

reasons for which events happened (why), and the way they happened (how). "It tries to

speculate on the cause and effect of an event." (Cantal, Cardinal, Espino & Galindo, 2014)

History deals with the study of past events. Individuals who write about history are called

historians. They seek to understand the present by examining what went before. They undertake
arduous historical research to come up with a meaningful and organized rebuilding of the past.

But whose past are we talking about? This is the basic questions that the historian needs to

answer because this sets the purpose and framework of a historical account. Hence, a salient

feature of historical writing is the facility to give meaning and impact value to the group of

people about their past. The practice of historical writing is called historiography, the traditional

method in doing historical research that focus on gathering of documents from different libraries

and archives to form a pool of evidence needed in making a descriptive or analytical narrative.

The modern historical writing does not only include examination of documents but also the use

of research methods from related areas of study such as archeology and geography.

THE LIMITATION OF HISTORICAL KNOWLEDGE

The incompleteness of record has limited man's knowledge of history. Most human affairs

happen without leaving any evidence or records of any kind, no artifacts, or if there are, no

further evidence of the human setting in which to place surviving artifacts. Although it may have

happened, but the past has perished forever with only occasional traces. The whole history of the

past (called history-as-actuality) can be known to a historian only through the surviving records

(history-as-record), and most of history-as-record is only a tiny part the whole phenomenon.

Even the archeological and anthropological discoveries are only small parts discovered from the

total past.

Historians study the records or evidences that survived the time. They tell history from what they

understood a credible part of the record. However, their claims many remains variable as there

can be historical records that could be discovered, which may affirm on refute those that they
have already presented. This explains the "incompleteness of the "object" that the historians

study.

HISTORICAL AS THE SUBJECTIVE PROCESS OF RE-CREATION

From the incomplete evidence, historians strive to restore the total part of mankind. They do it

from the point of view that human beings live in different times and that their experiences maybe

somehow comparable, or that their experiences may have significantly differed contingent on the

place and time. For the historians, history becomes only that part of the human past which can be

meaningfully reconstructed from the available records and from inference regarding their setting.

In short, historian's aim is verisimilitude (the truth, authenticity, plausibility) about a past. Unlike

the study of the natural science that has objectively measurable phenomena, the study of history

is subjective process as documents and relics are scattered and do not together comprise the total

object that the historian is studying. Some of the natural scientists, such as geologists and paleo-

zoologists who study fossils from the traces of a perished past, greatly resemble historians in this

regard, but they differ at certain points since historians deal with human testimonies as well as

physical traces.

HISTORICAL METHOD AND HISTORIOGRAPHY

The process of critically examining and analyzing the records and survivals of the past is called
historical method. The imaginative reconstruction of the past form the data derived

historiography. By means of historical and historiography (both of which are frequently grouped

together simply as historical method), he historian endeavors to reconstruct as much of the past

of mankind as he/she can. Even in this limited effort, however, the historian handicapped. He/she

rarely can tell the story even of a part of the past as it occurred. For the past conceived of as

something "actually occurred" places obvious limits upon the kinds of record and of imagination

that the historians may. use. These limits distinguish history from fiction, poetry, drama and

fantasy.

Historical analysis is also an important element of historical method. In historical analysis,

historians: (1) select the subject to investigate; (2) collect the probable sources of information on

the subject; (3) examine the sources of genuineness, in part of in whole; and (4) extract credible

"particulars" from the sources (or parts of sources). The synthesis of the "particulars" thus

derived is historiography. Synthesis and analysis cannot be entirely separated since they have a

common ground, which is the ability to understand the past through some meaningful, evocative

and convincing historical or cross-disciplinary connections between a given historical issue and

other historical contexts, periods, or themes.

LESSON 2

SOURCES OF HISTORICAL DATA

HISTORICAL DATA are sourced from artifacts have been left by the fast. These artifacts can

either be relics or remains, or the testimonies of witnesses to the past. Thus, historical sources are

those materials from which the historians construct meaning. To rearticulate, a source is an

object from the past or testimony concerning the past on which historians depends to create their

own depiction of the past. A historical work or interpretation is thus the result of such depiction.

The source provides evidence about the existence of the event, and a historical interpretation in

an argument of the event.

Relics or "remains", whose existence offers researchers a clue about the past, for example, the

relics or remains of a prehistoric settlement. Artifacts can be found where relics of human

happenings can be found, for example, a potsherd, a coin, a ruin, a manuscript, a book, a portrait,

a stamp, a piece of wreckage, a strand of hair, or other archeological or anthropological remains.

These object, however never happening or the events; if writing documents, they may be the

results or the records of events. Whether artifacts or documents, they are materials out of which
history may be written. (Howell & Preveneir, 2001.)

Testimonies or witnesses, whether oral or written, may have been created to serve a record or

they might have been created for some purposes. All these describe an event, such as the records

of a property exchange, speeches and commentaries.

The historian deals with the dynamic or genetic (the becoming) as well as the static (the being)

and aims at being interpretative (explaining why and how things happen and interrelated) as well

as descriptive (telling what happened, when and where, and who took part). Besides, the

descriptive data as can be describe direct and immediately from surviving artifacts are only small

part of the periods to which then belongs. A historical context can be given to them if only they

can be placed in human setting. The lives of human being can be assumed from the retrieved

artifacts, but without further evidence the human contexts of these artifacts can be never

recaptured of any degree of certainty.

WRITTEN SOURCES OF HISTORY

Written sources are usually categorized in three ways: (1) narrative or literary (2) diplomatic or

juridical and (3) social documents.

1. Narrative or literatures are chronicles or tracts presented in narrative form, written to impart a

message whose motives for their composition vary widely. For example, a scientific tract is

typically composed in order to inform contemporaries or succeeding generation; a newspaper

article might be intended to shape opinion; the so-called ego document or personal narrative such
as a diary or memoir might be composed in order to persuade readers of the justice of the

author's actions; a novel or film might be made to entertain ,to deliver a moral teaching, or to

further a religious cause; a biography might be written in praise of the subject's worth and

achievements (a panegyric, a public speech or published text in praise of someone or something

or hagiography, the writing of the lives of saints). narrative source is therefore broader than what

is usually considered fiction. (Howell & Prevenier, 2001).

2. Diplomatic sources are understood to be those which document/record an existing legal

situation or create a new one, and it is these kinds of sources that professional historians once

treated as the purest, the "best" source. The classic diplomatic source is the charter, which a legal

instrument. A legal document is usually sealed or authenticated to provide evidence that a legal

transaction has been completed and can be used as evidence in a judicial proceeding in case of

dispute. Scholars differentiate those legal instruments issued by public authorities (such as kings

or popes, the Supreme Court of the Philippines and Philippine Congress) from those involving

only private parties (such as a will or a mortgage agreement). Diplomatic sources possess

specific formal properties, such as hand and print style, the ink, the seal, for external properties

and rhetorical devices and images for internal properties, which are determined by the norms of

laws and by tradition. Such characters also vary in time (each generation has its own norms) and

according to origin (each bureaucracy has its own traditions).

3. Social documents are information pertaining to economic, social, political, or judicial

significance. They are records kept by bureaucracies. A few examples are government reports,

such as municipal accounts, research findings, and documents like these, parliamentary
procedures, civil registry records, property. registers, and records of census.

NON-WRITTEN SOURCES OF HISTORY

Unwritten sources are as essential as written sources. They are two types: the material evidence

and oral evidence.

1. Material evidence, also known as archaeological evidence is one of the most important

unwritten evidences. This includes artistic creation such as pottery, jewelry, dwellings, grave,

churches, roads, and others that tell a story about the past. These artifacts can tell a great deal

about the ways of life of people in the past, and their culture. These artifacts can also reveal a

great deal about the socio-cultural interconnections of the different groups of people especially

when an object is unearthed in more one place. Commercial exchange may also be revealed by

the presence of artifacts in different places. Even places that are thought to be significant, such as

garbage pits, can provide valuable information to historians as these can be traces of a former

settlement.

Sometimes, archeological sites that are of interest to historians are unearthed during excavations

for road, sewer line, and big building structures. Known historical sites are purposely excavated

with the hope of reconstructing and understanding their meaningful past. Moreover,
archeological finds such as coins or monies can provide historians with significant information

relating to government transactions during which the currencies were in circulation. Similarly,

historians can get substantial information from drawings, etching. paintings, films, and

photographs. These are the visual representations of the past.

2. Oral evidence is also an important source of information for historians. Much are told by the

tales or sagas of ancient peoples and the folk songs or popular rituals from the premodern period

of Philippine history. During the present age. interviews are another major form oral evidence.

PRIMARY VERSUS SECONDARY SOURCES

There are two general kinds of historical sources: direct or primary and indirect or secondary.

1. Primary sources are original, first-hand account of an event or period that are usually written

or made during or close to the event or period. These sources are original and factual, not

interpretive. Their key function is to provide facts. Examples of primary sources are diaries,

journal, letters, newspaper and magazine articles (factual accounts). government records (census,

marriage, military), photographs, maps, postcard, posters, recorded or transcribed speeches,

interviews with participants or witnesses, interviews with people who lived during a certain time,

songs, play, novels, stories, paintings, drawings, and sculptures.

2. Secondary sources, on the other hand, are materials made by people long after the events

being described had taken place to provide valuable interpretations of historical events. A

secondary source analyzes and interprets primary sources. It is an interpretation of second-hand

account of a historical event. Examples of secondary sources are biographies, histories, literacy
criticism, books written by a third party about a historical event, art and theater reviews,

newspaper or journal articles that interpret.

LESSON 3 HISTORICAL CRITICISMS

Historical criticism examines the origins of earliest text to appreciate the underlying

circumstances upon which the text came to be (Soulen and Soulen, 2001).It has two important

goals: First ,to discover the original meaning of the text in its primitive or historical context and

it's literal sense or sensus literalis historicus. Second, is to establish a reconstruction of the

historical situation of the author and recipient of the text. Historical criticism has two types,

external criticism and internal criticism.

Historical criticism has its roots in the 17th century during the Protestant Reformation and gained

popular recognition in the 19th and 20th century (Ebeling, 1963). The absence of historical

investigation paved the way for historical criticism to rest on philosophical and theological

interpretation. The passing of time has advance historical criticism into various methodologies

used today such as source criticism (which analyze and studies the sources used by biblical

author), form criticism (which seek to determine a unit original from and historical context of the
literary tradition), redaction criticism (which regards the author of the text as editor of the source

material), tradition criticism (which attempt to trace the developmental stage of the oral tradition

from its historical emergence to its literary presentation), canonical criticism (which focuses its

interpretation of the Bible on the text of biblical cannon), and related methodologies

(Soulen,2001).

There are two parts of a historical criticism. The first part is to determine the authenticity of the

material, also called provenance of the source .The critics should determine the origin of the

material, its author, and the source of information used. External criticism is used in determining

these facts .The second part is to weigh the testimony to the truth .The critic must examine the

trustworthiness of the testimony as well as determine the probability of the statement to be true.

This process is called internal criticism or higher criticism since it deals with more important

matter than the external form.

1. External Criticism determines the authenticity of the source. The authenticity of materi I may

be teste two ways, by paleographical (the deciphering and dating of historical manuscript) and

diplomatic criticism (critical analysis of historical documents to understand how the document

came to be, the information transmitted, and the relationship between the facts purported in the

document and the reality). The material must be investigated based on the time and place it is

written. The critic must determine whether the material under investigation is raw, meaning

unaltered, and it exists exactly as the author left it.

The content must be viewed in every possible angle, as forgery was not unknown during the

Middle Ages. The authority of the material can be examined from other genuine sources having

the same subject or written during the same period. The similarities or agreements and

differences or disagreement of some common details, such as the culture and traditions, and
events during the period by which the document was made can be a basis for judging the

authenticity of the text.

2. Internal criticism determines the historicity of the facts contained in the documents. It is not

necessary to prove the authenticity of the material or document. However, the facts contained in

the document must first be tested before any conclusion pertaining to it can be admitted. In

determining the value of the facts, the character of the sources, the knowledge of the author, and

the influences prevalent at the time of writing must be careful investigated. It must be ascertained

first that the critic knows exactly what the author said and that he/she understands the documents

from the standpoint of the author. Moreover, the facts given by the author or writer must be

firmly established as having taken place exactly as reported.

TEST OF AUTHENTICITY

To distinguish a hoax a misrepresentation from a genuine document, the historian must use tests

common in police and legal detection. Making the best guess if the date of the documents, he/she

examines the materials to see whether they are not anachronistic: paper was rare in Europe

before the fifteenth century, and printing was unknown; pencils did not exist before the 16th

century; typewriting was not invented until the 19th century; and Indian paper came only at the

end of that century. The historian also examines the inks for signs of age or of anachronistic

chemical composition.

Making the best guess of the possible author of the document, he/she sees of he/she can identify

the handwriting, signature, seal, letterhead, or watermarked. Even when the handwriting is

unfamiliar, it can be compared with authenticated specimens. One of the unfulfilled needs of the

historian is more of what the French call "isographies" or the dictionaries of biography giving

examples of handwriting. For some period of history, experts using techniques known as
paleography and diplomatics have long known that in certain regions at certain times

handwriting and the style and form of official documents were conventionalized. The disciplines

of paleography and diplomatics were founded in 17th century by Dom Jean Mabillon, a French

Benedictine monk and scholar of the Congregation of Saint Maur. Seals have been the subject of

special study by sigillographers, and experts can detect fake ones. Anachronistic style (idiom,

orthography, or punctuation) can be detected by specialists who are familiar withcotemporary

writing. Often spelling particularly of proper names and signatures, reveal forgery as would also

unhistoric grammar. Anachronistic references or events (too early or too late or too remote) or

the shafting of a document at a time when the alleged writer could not possibly have been at all

place designated (the alibi) uncovers Fraud sometimes skillful forger has all the a copy in certain

passages: by skillful paraphrase and invention he/she given away by the absence trivia .