Methodology of History

METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
SYNTHESE LIBRARY
MONOGRAPHS ON EPISTEMOLOGY,
LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE,
SOCIOLOGY OF SCIENCE AND OF KNOWLEDGE,
AND ON THE MATHEMATICAL METHODS OF
SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES
Managing Editor:
J AAKKO HINTIKKA, Academy of Finland and Stanford University
Editors:
ROBERT S. COHEN, Boston University
DONALD DAVIDSON, Rockefeller University and Princeton University
GABRIEL NUCHELMANS, University of Leyden
WESLEY C. SALMON, University of Arizona
VOLUME 88
JERZY TOPOLSKI
METHODOLOGY
OF HISTORY
Translated from the Polish by
OLGIERD WOJTASIEWICZ
D. REIDEL PUBLISHIN G COMPANY

DORDRECHT - HOLLAND / BOSTON - U.S.A.
PWN - POLISH SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHERS

WARSAW-POLAND
Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Topolski, Jerzy.
Methodology of history.
(Synthese library; v. 88)

Translation of Metodologia historii.
Bibliography: p.
1. History - Methodology. I. Title.
D16. T6613 900'.1'8 76-25080
lSBN-13: 978-94-010-1125-9 e-lSBN-13: 978-94-010-1123-5
DOl: 10.1007/978-94-010-1123-5
This translation has been made from

METODOLOGIA HISTORII
Published in 1973 by Panstwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, Warszawa
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CONTENTS
IN'rRODUCfION •
PART ONE
METHODOLOGY AND HISTORY
I. THE SUBJECT MA'ITER OF 1lffi MErnODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 11

1. The main branches and aspects of the methodology of sciences 11
2. The methodology uf sciences and semiotics. . . . 12
3. The methodology of sciences and the history of science . 18
4. The methodology of sciences and the theory of games and of
decision-making . 19
5. The methodology of sciences and information theory . 20
6. The methodology of sciences and epistemology. . . . . 22
7. The methodology of sciences and ontological and psychological
investigations . .. .. . 22
8. Conclusions for use in specialized methodologies . 26
ll. THE SUBJECT MA'ITER OF 1lffi MErnODOLOGY OF HISTORY . 30

1. Branches of the methodology of history 30
2. The pragmatic methodology of history . 33
3. The apragmatic methodology of history. 35
4. The objective methodology of history. . . . .. 36
5. The general methodology of history versus the methodologies
of the various historical disciplines. . . . . . . 38
6. The general methodology of history in relation to heuristics
and source criticism. The place of the auxiliary historical dis-
ciplines . 41
IT!. THE SCOPE OF 1lffi SUBJECT MA'ITER (DoMAIN) OF HISTORICAL

RESEARCH 46
1. Preliminary remarks . . . . . .. 46
2. The etymology and the semantic evolution of the term history 46
3. General definitions of the subject matter of history (as a sci-
ence). ... . . SO
4. History as res gestae and history as historia rerum gestarum 53
vi CONTENTS
PART Two
PATI'ERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
GROUNDS FOR CLASSIFICATION • 59
IV. PRAGMATIC REFLECTION 67

1. Antiquity . . 67
2. The Middle Ages 71
V. CRITICAL REFLECTION • 78
1. The development of the critical pattern of research and early

eruditionism. . 78
2. The philosophical variant of the critical pattern of historical
research. Further development of instruments of historical ,crit-
icism in the 18th century . 84
VI. ERUDITE AND GENETIC REFLECTION 96

1. The grounds for singling out this pattern of reflection. The
third phase of historical narration. . . . 96
2. Methodological reflection under Romanticism. . 99
3. The peculiarities of positivist reflections on history 109
VII. STRUCTURAL REFLECTION • 124

1. The rise of a structural pattern of historical research . 124
2. Philosophical inspirations of anti-positivist history . 125
3. The anti-positivist philosophy of history . 127
4. The characteristics of structural reflection in historical research 139
5. H. Berr and the Annates school. Other trends in France. 143
6. Methodological reflection in Britain and in America . 148
7. Methodological trends in German historiography. . . 151
8. Structural historiography in other countries. Concluding re-
marks 154
VIII. LooICAL REFLECTION 169

1. The rise of the logical reflection on science. . . . 169
2. The problem of the logical-positivist demarcation of science
and metaphysics . . .. . 172
3. Methodological issues in analytic philosophy. . . . 174
4. Misunderstandings over the struggle of analytic philosophy
against metaphysics in history. K. Popper and I. Berlin 176
5. Trends in the logical analysis of history 181
IX. DIALECTICAL REFLECTION • 193

I. A review of the earlier types of reflection on history . 193
2. The rise of dialectical reflection on history . 197
3. The novel ontological and e¢stemological elements in ma-
terialistic dialectic 203
4. The rise of historical materialism . 208
CONTENTS vii
PART THREE
TIlE OBJECflVE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
X. HISTORICAL FACTS • 219

1. Preliminary remarks .. . ... 219
2. The controversy over the concept of historical fact . . . 220
3. The main characteristics of the dialectical interpretation of
historical fact. A fact as a system . ... 225
4. Spatio·temporal determinants of historical facts . 230
XI. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 239

1. The principle of causality as the basis of the statement on the
regularity of historical facts. . . . 239
2. Determinism and indeterminism in history . 245
3. Regularity and chance in history " 249
4. The problem of an individual's free will . 252
5. The role of prominent individuals in history. . . . 255
6. Fatalism and teleologism. The problem of determinism in the
explanation of past events . 262
XII. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (HISTORICAL REGULARITIES) 275

1. The concept of historical regularities and their tentative clas-
sification . . . . . . . . . 275
2. Historical regularities and principal causes . 276
3. Synchronic regularities . 278
4. Diachronic regularities. . . . . . ... 284
5. The regularities of historical development (synchronic-dia-
chronic regularities). . . . . . . . . 287
6. Stages in the process of history (social formations) . 295
PART FOUR
THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY. THEORY OF

SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE
XIII. THE NATIJRE OF HISTORICAL COGNITION • 305

1. General description of the process of cognition . 305
2. Characteristics of scientific cognition. . . . . 307
3. The controversy over the nature of historical cognition . 310
4. Arguments against scepticism. The characteristic traits of his-
torical cognition .......... 314
5. Epistemological relativism and the problem of objectivity in
historical cognition . 326
6. Truth in history . . . .. .. 339
7. The concept of probability in historical research 345
viii CONTENTS
XIV. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF

HISTORICAL RESEARCH • 360
1. The problem of decisions . •..... 360

2. Basic concepts in the theory of historical questions and answers 361
3. The concept of hypothesis in historical research. .. 366
4. The structure of historical theories and methodological models 370
5. Schemata of hypothetical procedure in historical research. 376
XV. THEORY OF SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE. 386

1. The general concept of historical source 386
2. Earlier classifications of historical sources. . . . 389
3. A tentative solution of the problem of the classification of
sources. . . . . . . . . . . 392
4. The reading of source information (decoding). . . 395
5. The concept of source-based knowledge and source-based data 398
XVI. THEORY OF NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE • 401

1. A tentative explanation of the concept of non-souree-based
knowledge . . . . . . . . . . 401
2. The structure of non-source-based knowledge. Non-source-
based data. . . . . . . . . 404
3. The origin of non-source-based knowledge. 405
4. Current knowledge and common sense . 407
5. Non-source-based scientific knowledge. . . 411
6. Theoretical issues of the integration of science. 413
XVII. THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED

KNOWLEDGE 418
1. An analysis of the historian's procedure from the point of view
of the role of source-based and non-source-based knowledge 418
2. The functions of non-source-based knOWledgel' The problem of
the nominal model of questions. . . . . .. 421
3. The functions of non-source-based knowledge2' The problem
of methodological model (selection) . 423
4. The functions of non-source-based data . 426
PART FIVE
THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY: THE
METHODS OF RECONSTRUCTION OF THE PROCESS OF
mSTORY
XVllI. THE AunrnNTICI'IY OF SOURCES AND TIJE RELIABILI'IY OF

INFORMANTS 431
1. The general concept of source criticism . 431
2. The authenticity of sources. . . . . . . . 433
3. The rules of the examination of authenticity (external criticism) 434
4. The concept of reliability . . 442
5. The study of reliability (internal criticism) . 444
6. Problems of authorship of sources . 449
CONTENTS ix
XIX. METIIODS OF ESTABLISHING HISlORICAL FACTS. 454

1. A general reconstruction of the procedure of establishing facts 454
2. Induction and deduction in research. . . 456
3. Induction and deduction in historical research. . . 460
4. The direct and the indirect method of establishing facts 461
5. The philological (lexical) method . 467
6. The geographical method . 468
7. The genealogical method. . . . . . . 469
8. The comparative method (in its territorial version). . . 471
9. The retrogressive method (the chronological version of the
comparative method). . . . . . . . . . 474
10. Inference from the lack of data (argumentum ex silentio) . 475
xx. QUANTITATIVE METIIODS IN HISlORICAL RESEARCH • 483

1. An outline of the development of quantitative analyses in
historical research. . . . . . . . .. 483
2. The concept and the objectives of historical statistics . 488
3. Statistical grouping of data. . . . . . .. 492
4. Calculations by estimation and calculations based directly on
sources . . . .. 495
5. Exhaustive calculations versus representative samples. The
chi-square test. . . . . . . 501
6. The numerical analysis of structures . 506
7. A numerical analysis of changes. 515
8. Correlation analysis . . . . . . 520
9. Computer applications in historical research 523
10. Quantitative analyses of texts . . . .. 526
11. Prospects for applications of mathematics in historical research 528
XXI. THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH • 536

1. The various interpretations of historical explanation . 536
2. Understanding and explanation . . . . . . 539
3. Types of causal explanation in historical research . 544
4. Explanation of goal-oriented human actions (humanistic in-
terpretation) . . . . . . . . 545
5. Explanation by reference to dispositions. . . . . . 552
6. The general procedure of causal explanation. Hempel's model 558
7. Explanation by indication of conditions which are both
sufficient and necessary . . . . . . . 568
8. Explanation by indication of sufficient conditions . 570
9. Explanation by pointing to necessary conditions . 572
10. Explanation by reference to conditions necessary in a given
situation . . . . . . . . . . . . 574
11. Explanation by reference to favourable conditions . 576
12. Search for disturbing factors . .... 577
13. Explanation by reference to more direct and less direct causes 578
14. Genetic explanation and genetic description 580
XXII. CoNSTRUCTION AND SYN1HESIS • 587

1. Basic and derivative research questions . 587
2. Simple and synthetic constructions . 588
x CONTENTS
3. The problem of synthesis in historical research . 590

4. Periodization in history . . ..... 593
5. Territorial and factual scope and classification of research types 596
PART SIX
THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY
XXIll. THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATION. 605

1. The problem of narration in the methodology of sciences . 605
2. Historical narratives versus narratives in general. . . . 606
3. Types of scientific historical narratives. Chronicle writing versus
historiography . 608
4. Historical imagination . 614
5. The language of narratives. 615
6. Classifying and ordering concePts . 617
7. The role of counterfactual inference 620
XXIV. COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: HISTORICAL STATEMENTS AND

LAWS. 625
1. Categories of historical statements . 625
2. Spatio-temporal determinants . . 627
3. The controversy over historical generalizations . 628
4. Types of historical generalizations . . 631
5. The controversy over the laws of science . 634
6. Laws in historical narratives . 637
7. The concept of regularities in some historical studies 640
xxv. ELEMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS . 643

1. Valuation versus evaluations. The logical value of evaluations 643
2. The various forms of the valuating attitude of historians . 646
3. The kinds of evaluations in historical narratives. . . 649
4. The criterion of progress as the main element of proper evalu-
ations in historiography. . 651
5. Historians in face of evaluations . 655
XXVI. THE ME1HODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH. 661

1. Criteria of classification of sciences.. 661
2. The anti-naturalist and the naturalist view of the social
sciences. . . . . . . . . . 664
3. Subject-oriented and pragmatic idiographism . .. 668
4. History versus sociology. The need for the development of
social history 671
5. The tasks of history 674
INDEX OF NAMES . 678

INTRODUCTION
No discipline has been more praised or more criticized than the writing
of history. Cioero claimed that history teaches men how to live. Aris-
totle denied it the very name of science and regwded poetry as the
higher wisdom. At various times history has been assigned a command-
ing or a demeaning statIUs in the hierarchy of sciences. Today one can
admire the increasing precision and sophistication of the methods used
by historia:ns. On the other hand, Thucydides' History of the PeZo-
ponesian War still serves as the ideal model of how to reconstruct the
historical past. Even those who deny the possibility of an objective
reconstruction of the past would themselves likie to be recorded by
historians, "objectively" or not. Dislike of history and fear of its verdict
are not incompatible with reverence and awe for its practitioners, the
historians. So man's attitude to history is ambiguous.
The controversy about history continues. Widely differing issues are
at stake. Historians themselves, however, are the least engaged in the
struggle. Rarely does a historian decide to open the door of his study
and join in the melee about the meaning of history. More often he
slams it shut and returns to his studies, oblivious of the fact that with
the passage of thne the gap between his scientific work and its audience
might widen. The historian does not shun the battle, he merely chooses
his own battleground. What he tries to stand for is, of course, historical
truth and honesty in the presentation of the past, believing that this is
the best way he can serve society. Preoccupied with this problem he
leaves to others the controversy about history as a discipline. The
is&uesare decided behind his back, even though in his daily work he
provides arguments for all sides. Even when he does decide to join in
the conflict he too often fails to realize that his participation is limited
because he speaks a special language. Should the historian change his
attitude towards this conttmrersy about history? He cannot engage in
a two-front battle: ars Zonga, vita brevis.
What should be the role of the practising, professional historian in
2 INTRODucnON
the controversy about history as a discipline? He can neither ignore it

nor devote all his time to it. He can. however, define his own position
in the debate and then exemplify it through his daily work. In this way
he can defend his position while at the same time doing his job and
building up the substantive body of knowledge on which history
depends.
The time is opporrune for the practising historian to help to shape
the outcome of the debate over historiography. Age-old beliefs in the
hierarchical structure ofscienoe are now collapsing. It is no longer
assumed that t'here is one model for all scientific work to which other
disciplines are necessarily subordinated. This belief has disintegrated
only slowly. Its decay began in the early 19th centJury with the de-
monstr:ation that even in mathematics itself there are broad areas which
lack precision and in which intuitive thinking prevails. This demon-
stration led to a comprehensive study of mathematical methods (d.
D. Hilbert). A series of steps followed, including the Godel theorem
and other demonstrations of the illusion of the belief that a perfectly
rigorous lan~age can exist. The radical program of physicalism also
collapsed. This once-attractJive idea of building a unified.science based
on the reducibility of the terms used in all disciplines to those used in
physios, was proved impracticable.
The growing conviction that no ideal science exists and the emphasis
on the distinctiveness of each discipline, at least at the present level
development, has stimulated empirical researah on specific disciplines
and relationships among them. It has turned out that we can preach the
unity of science, require the language of science to be precise, demand
that scholars handle it carefully as any delicate instl1U1llent must be
handled, and at the same time abandon dogmatic claims as to any
definite hierarchy of sciences.
The interest in research on scientific method affects history deeply.
That discipline has always been controversial. In recent decades, in
a world of rapid change (cf. Geoffrey Barraclough), historians have
busied themselves with their substantive researches (moving further and
further away from the vision of Anatole France) and have improved
their methods. Their outp\llt has accumulated rapidly. Armed with the
increased output of this more methodologically sophisticated sort of
historical writing, the historian today is able to enter the controversy
INTRODUCTION 3
over the natlUre and status of history as a science with new confidence.
If he ignores the latest historical methods and its achievements he will
be met with condescending smiles on the part of more experienced and
methodologically advanced social scientists. All historians must be
aware of the newest methods even if they themselves do not actually
use them. Without this general awareness history cannot advance in
status.
Earlier statements by historians on their own research techniques
reveal the nature and degree of their methodological awareness. A few
decades ago when Marc Bloch was writing his The Historians' Craft,
and the science of scientific method was not so far advanced as npw,
historians took little interest in explicit problems of methods. Since
then, much has been said about the science of history without the
participation of historians. Today the practitioners of historiography
have to be more aware of methodological considerations.
Misunderstandings about historical methodology persist, and make
it a difficult task to write history in the full consciousness of the re-
search method being used. A fairly common view of historical metho-
dology is that it comprises an ordered set of formulae which make it
easier to solve complicated cases. The question of methods only arises
in specific questions; particular methods are applied to particular cases
and are considered important only in so far as they are directly "useful"
to a specific research problem. Thus, direct interest in researoh methods
on the part of historians (as reflected in various books) was for long
confined to a sphere of problems, fixed in the 19th century and dom-
inated by technical issues such as the criticism of sources.
The present book has emerged from accumulated reflections on the
state of the science of history and on the real dangers which threaten
that science. History faced dangers in the 19th century when it began
to abandon the theoretical constructions of Enlightenment historio-
graphy in favor of 19th century eruditionism, and came up against
a new science, sociology. The sociologists were developing on the
groU!Il:ds neglected by historians, though cultivated by them in earlier
years (e.g., by Ibn Khaldun, Macchiavelli, Voltaire, Ferguson, and
others). History, old and arrogant in its achievements, saw its role
undermined by sociology in the area of theoretical statements, mainly
structural in natlUre. This meant that history was deprived of one of
4 INTRODUCTION
two principal elements indispensable in explaining the enigma of

historical development. For in order to explain the development of
a system (Chapters IX and X) we must know not only the various
stages through which this system passes in consecutive time-moments
(since this illustrates its changes only), but also the structure of the
system. In every science, it seems. it is indispensable to engage in both
empirical and theoretical research. The proportion between these two
forms of research is not the same for each branch of science. Yet there
are olose links between observation and theory in all sciences. and
observation (experience) can never be fully separated from theory.
The analysis of L. Geymonat stresses the "openness" of scientific
theories. Geymonat is correct in saying that the essence of science can
never be grasped without considerations which are historical and
pragmatic in nature. 1 To avoid the dangers to which history is ex-
posed the historian must be more methodology-conscious. This will
help him to watch what is going on in science and to see how high the
stakes are. The point is not that one science will dominate the rest. but
which of the social sciences is to provide an integrated approach to
the study of society. Is it to be history? Or sociology? Or social
psychology? The call for the unity of science. conceived as a hierarchy
of disciplines, is more determinedly being replaced by the call for the
integration of sciences, assuming the equal status of all disciplines and
calling for possible links among them. History must find its proper
place among the many sciences.
The present book can be used to teach the methodology of history
but was not primarily intended for that purpose. Its intent is to review
the major problems of methodological research on historiography and
to assess the major results obtained. The book makes a proposal based
on a definite conception of the science of history and its tasks. Its two
primary statements, given in everyday language. are:
(l) The task of historical research is to explain - i.e., to describe the
means and causes of - the development of systems.
(2) It is impossible to separate observation from theory in the task
of carrying out effective historical research on system-development. The
more a historian is nomothetically-conscious the more effective his
research will be. To be nomothetically-conscious is a function of the
INTRODUCTION 5
type of theoretical knowledge which is at his disposal. Much will de-

pend, of course, on the scope and the quality of that knowledge.
These two assumptions are the main conclusions drawn from as
thorough an analysis as possible of the various stages in the evolution
of historiography. The first refers to history as the subject matter of
historical research and the second to research procedures used by
practitioners and their results, formulated in specific statements.
Part One of the book is concerned with the scope of the methodology
of history and the various meanings of that term. It has been assumed
here that historical methodology may be interpreted in a narrow and
in a broad way. Narrowly conceived, it covers only the "scienee" of
the "science of history", interpreted as a set of methods and a set of
statements. Broadly conceived, it covers additional general consider-
ations on the subject matter of historical research. This book prefers
the second, broader conception.
Part Two brings out the main outline of the evolution of reflections
on history and historical writing. Various types of reflections are con-
sidered: pragmatic, critical, erudite-genetic, structural, logical and dia-
lectical. Each type concentrates on partioular aspects of historical re-
search. The logical and the dialectical types are close to the subject
matter of the book. The dialectical type, it is assumed here, refers to
the comprehension of the process of history, while the logical type
provides formal tools for a metascientific analysis by describing the
research work of historians and the methodological structure of his-
toriography. The claim that observation and theory cannot be dis-
tinguished, results in the concept of knowledge that is not purely
source-based - a novel idea for traditional historians, with their close
regard for sources. Non-source-based knowledge is discussed in Part
Three, which mainly carries comments on the subject matter of histor-
ical research. Conclusions in that field, sometimes called the philosophy
of history, are believed here to be the most important element of
non-souree-based knowledge required in historical research. Henee the
study in this section of the book of the problem of what is the his-
torical "fact".
Parts Four and Five deal with the procedure of reconstructing the
process of history, a procedure in which the historian resorts both to
source-based and non-souree-based knowledge. Here are analysed the
6 INTRODUCTION
theory of historical sources, the study of their reliability and authen-

ticity, the methods of establishing historical facts, and the problems of
explanation and synthesis. Part Six, the last, concerns an analysis of
the methodological structure of the science of history. An attempt is
made to give a tentative answer to the age-old question about the
idiographic nature of the science of history.
In writing this book I have been constantly aware of the difficulty
of the task. I was in an incomparably better situation when I worked
with the late A. Malewski on Studies in the Methodology of History
(in Polish, 1960). If that book aroused some interest, as seen in re-
views by C. Znamierowski, J. Giedymin, S. Nowak, L. Nowak and
other scholars, then this was mainly due to the contribution of A. Ma-
lewski, who demonstrated exceptional skill in methodological analysis
of historical data. In my belief the present book is defective in part
because it is not possible for a single author to combine satisfactorily
the competence of a methodologist and that of a practising historian,
the competence of two disciplines which are now developing so
turbulently. I am also conscious of the fact that my competence must
increasingly lag behind the latest advances in science.
When, despite such difficulties, I decided to take on the task of
writing an outline of the methodology of history, I knew that I could
rely on the goodwill of many people who have helped me throughout
the work. This applies especially to aid in a more rigorous formulation
of ideas. The help of J. Giedymin, beginning with the first outline of
the book, was of special importance. I refer not only to his novel studies
in the methodology of the social sciences (in particular the methodology
of questions and answers and of historical analyses, on which I have
drawn many times), but also to his generous personal advice and the
review of this book which he wrote for the publisher. My acknow-
ledgements are due to T. Zawadzki for discussions covering all chapters
of the book. He was especially helpful in reconstructing the methodo-
logical assumptions of ancient historians. Also T. Kozanecki and other
colleagues provided books and comments. I am indebted to the Po-
znan Branch of the Polish Philosophical Society where some of the
issues considered here were discussed. Special thanks are due to
Professors G. Labuda and the late M. H. Serejski, who were kind
INTRODUcnON 7
enough to read the manuscript and gave unsparing time to make com-
ments.
Though I mention all these scholars of goodwill I do not mean to
imply that they share the responsibility for the opinions stated in this
book. All critiCisms and objections should be addressed by the reader
to the author himself. A final explanation is due to the reader: is the
author to be considered a historian or a methodologist? I wish to be
considered as a historian who wants to put into effect a program for
the integration of science. If I am excessively bold in penetrating into
domains of renowned experts let my desire to consider the possible in-
tegration of science serve as my excuse. Throughout my work I have
been stimulated by a statement found in a well-known older work by
Ch. Langlois and Ch. Seignobos: "En realite, l'histoire est sans doute
la discipline ou il est Ie plus necessaire que les travailleurs aient une
conscience claire de la methode dont Us se servent".2
The full consciousness of this fact will bring the study of history
nearer to the public at large, and will bring about an effective par-
ticipation of history, one of the oldest and yet always young disciplines.
in interpreting and changing the world.
PomafJ., September 1966.
REFERENCES
1 L. Geymonat, Filosofia e filosofia della scienza, Milano 1960.
2 Ch. Langlois, Ch. Seignobos, Introduction aux etudes historiques, Paris
1905, p. xii.
PART ONE
METHODOLOGY AND HISTORY

I. THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY
OF SCIENCES
1. The main branches and aspects of the methodology of sciences
The subject matter of the general methodology of sciences, which

discipline is often also called the logic, philosophy, or the theory, of
science, has no strict demarcation lines. It would also be useless, as it
seems, to look for such a definition of the subject matter of the meth-
odology of sciences upon which all persons involved would agree.
It is presumably more to the point to indicate the range of problems
with which the general methodology of sciences is concerned, and also
those with which, in the opinion of the scientists, it should be con-
cerned. In this way we can arrive at an undisputed set of the problems
which are specific to methodological research. Only in the light of this
analysis will it be possible to suggest such an interpretation of the
methodology of sciences which could be used in the study of method-
ological problems of history.
There is, on the whole, no controversy oveJ;. the fact that the general
methodology of sciences covers two types of interest:
(1) interest in the cognitive operations used in scientific research,
(2) interest in the products of such cognitive operations.
The first of these two branches of methodology refers to science
understood as a cognitive process that in the last analysis consists in
formulation and substantiation of theorems, while the second refers to
science understood as the product of that cognitive process (Le., in the
last analysis, a set of theorems or, in other words, a set of statements).
In the terminology suggested by K. Ajdukiewicz, that branch of meth-
odology whose subject matter is science as the craft of the scholars,
i.e., science as activity, hence type (1) above, is called pragmatic
methodology, whereas the study of science conceived not as the craft
of the scholars, but rather as the product of theIr cognitive operations
is called apragmatic methodology.l
Note also that both cognitive operations and products of such oper-
ations can be studied in two ways, which can serve as a basis for sing-
12 METHODOLOGY AND IDSTORY
ling out not two branches of methodology, but two ways of method-
ological research within those branches. From this point of view we
may speak about:
(1) descriptive methodology,
(2) normative methodology.
Descriptive methodology is confined to a description of cognitive
operations and their products, while normative methodology strives to
list the rules of rational scientific procedures and to indicate the degree
of development of a given discipline. 2
Current definitions of the methodology of sciences usually stress in
various ways its pragmatic or apragmatic, and descriptive or normative,
interpretations. In research practice these viewpoints are very often
merged.
We have to mention another internal division of methodology, which
also is essential for our considerations, namely the distinction between
the general methodology of sciences and the specialized methodologies
of the various disciplines. The latter ones may be interpreted in a nar-
rower or a broader way. For instance, we may take as an example of
a specialized methodology - the methodology of all non-formalized dis-
ciplines (i.e., the natural and the social sciences), or the methodology
of the social sciences alone, or the methodology of the historical sci-
ences, or, finally, the methodologies of the various historical disciplines. 3
General methodology may be treated both as an analysis of cognitive
operations and as that of products of such operations.'
2. The methodology of sciences and semiotics
When we reflect on the subject matter of the methodology of sciences,

and hence also the methodology of history, we encounter at every step
the concept of semiotics (or semantics in the broader sense of the term),
which is sometimes identified with the field of interest of the method-
ology of sciences. Hence the question about the relationship between
the methodology of sciences and semiotics, in particular the role of the
latter in research in the field of the methodology of sciences (both
general and specialized).
The subject matter of semiotics (whose patron is J. Locke5 and
founder is Ch. Morris 6) consists of all signs or, to put it more precisely,
THE SUBJEcr MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 13
all those processes in which something functions as a sign. Semiotics

is often interpreted as the general science of signs, the general science
of signs and languages; or the general ,theory of signs.7 The concept of
sign is restricted to specified knowledge. "Any object (or a state of
things) is a sign relative to a specified body of knowledge if it is used,
or produced, in a regular way, and if that regular use, or production,
of it can be reconstructed rationally from the point of view of com-
munication purposes within that specified body of knowledge".8
Within semiotics as pertaining to all signs we have logical semiotics,
concerned with a certain type of signs only, namely with language,
which may further be restricted to the study of the language of science.
In semiotics, the study of the language of science is, at least theo-
retically, fairly broad, since semiotics is divided into three branches:
(a) syntactics, which is the theory of the formal properties of linguis-
tic expressions and is concerned with relationships between linguistic
expressions,
(b) semantics (in the narrower sense of the term), which is concerned
with the relationships between linguistic expressions and the domain
(Le., objects and/or states of things) which these expressions describe,
(c) pragmatics, which is concerned with the relationships between
language and language users (Le., between men and the language they
use).
Thus semiotics has double contacts with reality: on the one hand, by
having contacts with the object studied, and, on the other, with the
researcher. This can be charted as foHows:
Semantics Pragmatics
Object of .ILanguage ofl Language user

study
(
)/ .
SCIence I( )
(interpreter of
(denotatum, I facts, researcher)
designatum, +
domain) 1Syntactics I
As can be seen, it is only syntactics-once the domain of the illusory
hopes cherished by logical positivists9-wbich confines its interests to
a logical analysis of the language of science. Were the methodology of
sciences confined to this, this would eliminate its proper subject matter
which must take into account the basic goal of science: description and
explanation of fact!! (when it comes to science as a result of activity)
and its humanistic aspect (when it comes to science as the craft of the
scientists). This conclusion had been reached even by the logical pos-
itivists, who were increasingly engaging in extralinguistic research,lO
which, as is known, has resulted in the break up of that once closely
knit group.
For all the importance of studies in the field of syntactics, methodo-
logical analyses draw much more from semantic researches, which are
concerned with the relationship between the object of study and the
language of science. ll This means a relationship between two domains:
objective and linguistic. When analysing it we cannot fail to take the
characteristics of these two domains into account. This is why the
various trends in ontological research, which deal with the properties
of reality, have close links with semantics. But it remains an open
issue whether they are part of semiotics or whether they serve as
a basis of semantic research. There is no such doubt as to syntactic
research, which indisputably forms part of semiotics.
Within strictly semantic analyses, i.e., those concerned with relation-
ships between the world of objects and states of things, on the one
hand, and names and statements, on the other, the basic concepts are
those of denoting, representing, designating, metalanguage, and truth,
and also the related concepts of domain, isomorphism, and model.
These now compose the fundamental categories of the methodology of
sciences, without which methodological research can hardly be imagin-
ed. This applies to both general methodology and specialized ones.
Since these concepts will be useful in the discussion of the methodol-
ogical issues of historical research, it is worth while to analyse them
briefly now, in order to make later considerations easier.
Denoting means referring names, predicates, and other syntactic
categories to objects and states of things. Thus, for instance, the term
(name) "the court of Louis XIV" denotes a definite set of objects (in
this case a collective one - see below); the term "Polish gentry" denotes
another set (in this case a distributive one - see below), and the name
"Stefan Batory", a given king of Poland, i.e., an individual object.
These terms (names) thus have their denotations. Predicates, i.e., ex-
pressions of the type "is long", "came", etc., which next to names.
THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 15
interpreted as singular terms, form the major part of logical syntax,

also have their denotations, namely sets (in the case of predicates of
one argument each) and relations of two or more members (in the case
of predicates of two or more arguments each).12
Representing applies to variables, i.e., certain symbols (such as x),
which stand for every element of the set over which a given variable
ranges, without indicating for which element it stands. For instance, in
the sentence "If x was a nobleman, then x had specified privileges" the
variable x does not refer to any object in the sense of denoting it, but
represents given objects. Variables to not occur frequently in narration.
Designating applies only to names interpreted as singular terms. In
the case of individual names, the denotation 'of a name is a set of one
element, that only element being the designatum of the name in ques-
tion (for instance, "Isaac Newton"). This is otherwise in the case of
general names (i.e., terms which have more than one designatum each,
such as "ambassador") and empty names (i.e., those which have no
designata at all and whose denotations are empty sets: "Cyclops",
"Pegasus", etc.).13
Other fundamental semantic concepts are connected with the distinc-
tion, very important from the methodological point of view and dating
back to G. Frege and D. Hilbert, between object language and meta-
language. Object language is the language in which the objects and
states of things investigated in a given case are described,!' whereas
metalanguage is simply a language which serves to discuss the object
language. If we say that "the lack of a strong government was one of
the causes of the partition of Poland", we use an object language, and
when we say that "BobrzyJiski's (Polish historian, 1849-1935-Tr.)
statement that the lack of a strong government was one of the causes
of the partition of Poland is correct", then we use a metalanguage.
Metalanguage (a language of the second order) thus consists of state-
ments about other statements; meta-metalanguage (a language of the
third order) thus consists of statements about other statements which
in turn refer to still other statements.
It can easily be noted that the concepts of truth and falsehood refer
to metalanguage, since they state something about expressions for-
mulated in object language. To explain them we have to resort to the
concepts of domain and semantic model.
16 METHODOLOGY AND mSTORY
The concept of domain makes it possible to define - in metalan-

guage - the subject matter of research. A domain may be symbolically
represented by (the ordered pair) (V. C), where V (termed the uni-
verse of discourse) stands for a nonempty set of individuals, and C
stands for the characteristic of that universe. i.e.. the subsets of V, the
relations holdiiIlg between the elements of V. and the idividuals specifi-
cally singled out in V.15 This symbolism is general enough to cover
any domain. including. for instance, the domain of historical research
(which in object language may be defined as the totality of past events).
It is obvious that in a glVen language we may speak about a given do-
~ain if. and only if. the relation of isomorphism (correspondence)
holds between that language and that domain. i.e., if that domain can
be described in that language. This statement is of immense significance
in methodological analyses.
The semantic definition of truth is a more rigorous formulation of
what is termed the classical definition of truth; the latter says that
a statement is true if it agrees with reality.16 The semantic definition of
truth is additionally restricted to a given language and a given domain.
One and the same inscription (sequence of written symbols) may be
a statement (well-formed expression) in one language. but not in anothet;
one. Likewise. one and the same statement in a given language may be
true in one domain (i.e., for a specified interpretation of those extra-
logical constants which occur in that statement). and false in another one
(i.e.• for another interpretation of the extralogical constants which occur
in that statement). Statements only can be true or false. which means
that statements only can have one of the two logical values: truth and
falsehood. It is another issue that our ignorance often prevents us
from deciding whaJt is the value of a given statement. Every statement
in a given object language has a metalinguistic counterpart which
states that what is said in the object-language statement holds in a giv-
en domain. It may be said that a statement in a given object language
is true in a given domain if and only if its metalinguistic counterpart
is true (i.e.. if and only if there is a correspondence between the two
statements). It is also worth mentioning that what is termed tautologies
are statements which are true in any domain, and what is termed con-
tradictory statements are statements which are false in any domain.
The concept of model is linked with that of the truth of a statement
THE SUBIEcr MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 17
or a set of statements. Any domain in which a given statement is true is

a semantic model of that statement. Hence a tautology has a model in
every domain, and a contradictory statement has no model at all.
A domain in which the axioms of a given theory are true is a model of
that theory. It can easily be noted that in science we are concerned
with those domains which are models of the various disciplines (a dis-
cipline being treated as a set of statements on specified objects),11 since
science consists of true statements, and not of contradictory ones.
As can be seen, semantic considerations refer to issues which are of
vital interest for the methodology of sciences, regardless of whether
that methodology investigates cognitive operations or results of such
operations.
Pragmatics, which is the third branch of semiotics, studies relation-
ships between human beings and their languages, and thus in a way
encroaches upon psychology. For the time being, that branch of se-
miotics still does not have its own theory. It can nevertheless be said
that pragmatics is interested in judgements as the mental counterparts
of statements made. 1s A statement, once made, in addition to denoting
an utterance carries a mental charge that refers to the speaker's attitude
toward his statement, a charge that deserves to be analysed. That
charge is of great interest for the methodology of sciences. in particular
the methodologies of those disciplines which, as history, in their in-
vestigations make use of statements made by others. It is worth know-
ing what the speaker's attitude is toward the statement he has made.
This is so because we include in science those statements which we
accept as true, and the grounds on which we accept them as such may
be of various kinds: it may be our unconditional belief in the truth of
a given statement, or the acceptance of a certain statement on the
strength of our acceptance of other statements. It is only in the process
of their verification that they change from presumably true statements
into those accepted as true. The analysis of what are termed psycho-
logical codes is very important in the study of research procedures and
their results.
To sum up, it may be said that semiotics (which makes use of
various disciplines, above all logic) is closely connected with the meth-
odology of sciences both in the pragmatic and the apragmatic aspect
of the latter. If the methodology of sciences be interpreted very broadly
it may be assumed that semiotics is a component part Df methodology.

Such, for instance, is the opiniDn of G. Klaus, as formulated in his
Semiotik und Erkenntnistheorie (1962). But it may also be said that in
methodDlogy we make use of the achievements of semiotics. It is
another issue that semioticians (such as MDrris) used to hope that the
prDblems of the language of science could be solved completely by
a separate discipline, which they claimed tD have isolated and which
was to remain as it were Dutside scientific research. But, as L. Gey-
mDnat was right in pointing out, an analysis Df the languages used in
science, since that is the focus of interest for semiDtics, should be con-
nected with the study of the history of sciences. "We should insist", he
wrDte, "on the necessity of closely linking the analysis of the languages
of science with the study of their history, (...) (since) only such links
can prevent linguistic analysis from becoming abstract and dDgmatic".19
This will make it possible precisely to formulate the links of the lan-
guage used in a given discipline with everyday language, and thus to
solve a problem which is of prime importance for methodological con-
siderations also in the case Df history, which, too, on the whole uses
everyday language.
3. The methodology of sciences and the history of science
The importance for methodological analyses of the study of the history

of science can hardly be doubted, even though opinions of scholars
are not uniform. Such analyses acquire in this way a non-formal point
Df view that takes into consideration the specific development of each
discipline. As is known, the history of science may pertain to various
issues and may be pursued in different ways. We may have to do both
with the history of conflicts between scholarly opinions Dn a given issue
(e.g., the history of the controversy over the causes of the fall of the
Roman Empire) and with the history of the ways in which a given do-
main has been investigated.
General methodology is interested above all in the latter aspect of the
study of the history of science. The history of science in the sense of
the former aspect (let it be termed objective) is pursued rather as a com-
ponent part of a given discipline. For instance, the history of historio-
graphy (if not interpreted as the history of research methods) is treated
as a branch of historical research connected with history in the strict

sense of the tenn; likewise, the history of chemistry is treated as
a branch of chemistry, etc. For general methodology such research (on
the factual advances in a given discipline) is of secondary importance.
But it can be a moot point whether the rapidly developing history of
science in the latter aspect (be it termed methodological), and hence
interpreted as a study of changes in the methods and/or ways 20 of in-
vestigating the domains of the various disciplines is, or is not, within
the sphere of the methodology of sciences. Should we interpret the
methodology of sciences broadly, then we would certainly have to in-
clude such considerations in its sphere; should we decide to interpret
it in a narrower sense, we would have to say that the methodology of
sciences is, or can be, pursued by relying, among other things, on the
history of science. It seems that the more specialized the methodology
in question the greater the importance of research on the history of the
science in question for various methodological analyses. It would, for
instance, be difficult to imagine the pursuit of the methodology of his-
tory without research on the history of that discipline. In such cases
there is also more need for links with the first of the two aspects of the
history of science as singled out above.
4. The Methodology of sciences and the theory of games and of

decision-making
Semiotics and mathematical logic, on the one hand, and the history of
science in its methodological aspect, on the other, are - according to
one's standpoint - either components of the general methodology of
sciences or disciplines on which methodological research is based. Now
the same applies to the theory of decision-making and the theory of
games. 21 Scientific research may be treated as a kind of rational behav-
iour (which is an ideal type of specified goal-oriented behaviour) and
research procedures may accordingly be examined from that point of
view. The methodology of sciences can rest satisfied (and this is what
happens when it comes to its descriptive version) with simple descrip-
tions of research operations as carried out by scientists, without ex-
amining the effectiveness of the decisions they make, or, to use the
language of the theory of games, the effectiveness of the strategies they
20 METHODOLOGY AND msroRY
choose. But we can go further (and this is what happens when it

comes to its nonnative version) and try to find out the latent rules by
which scientists are guided when they strive to attain their cognitive
goals. and hence possibly to define the optimum strategy for each re-
search operation. When the problems of decision-making are included
in methodological considerations. the latter are shifted from the level of
description to that of explanation and assessment. At the same time
methodological analysis is brought closer to the issue of valuation,
which in turn results in bringing out its links with such disciplines as
axiology. the theory of morals. and the sociology of science. All these
also are closely connected with the methodology of sciences. Each of
them has further ramifications, which also is quite natural in the field
of science. Certain concepts drawn from the theory of decision-making
and the theory of games will be introduced later in connection with
more specialized analyses concerned directly with the methodology of
history. Here it is worth pointing to their considerable usefulness pre-
cisely in that branch of methodology. since the historian is concerned
with the actions of human beings in the past, and while doing so he
wants not only to describe them. but to explain them as well. The
theory of games can be used so to say on two levels; it can serve as
an instrument in research on the procedures used by historians them-
selves. but also in research on the behaviour of those people with whom
historians are concerned. As a methodological instrument it can thus
work in two ways.
5. The methodology of sciences and information theory

When it comes to links with the methodology of sciences, the case of
information theory resembles that of semiotics. Since, as J. Giedymin
writes. "we solve cognitive problems by acquiring and analysing items
of information. hence the concept of information and that of inform-
ant. especially observer and his reliability. must be included in funda-
mental methodological concepts, next to those which are traditionally
being used"." There is no need to emphasize that these issues are of
primary significance for history - a science in which. as we have said
earlier. use is made of results of observations carried out by others. If
we decide to interpret methodology broadly. information theory may be
included in it as its component part; we may also assume that in the
methodology of sciences research is conducted also on the basis of

categories that are specific to information theory.
Information theory has contributed to the methodology of sciences
numerous concepts without which methodological investigations could
now hardly be imagined.2a Next to the concepts of information and
informant, as mentioned above, we have to list in the first place those
of message, code, channel, and entropy. A distinction is made between
selective and semantic information. Selective information can be trans-
mitted by non-semantic symbols, whereas semantic information can be
transmitted only by statements, either true or false. J. Giedymin sug-
gests the following definition of information: "By information in gen-
eral we mean a reduction of variety, that is, a restriction of a set
(universe) of possibilities in accordance with certain. criteria, and by
semantic information we mean a reduction of the variety which is the
set of valuations (binary interpretations) of statements in a specified
set" .24 The concept of information does not coincide with that of sign,
the latter being very much restricted by various conditions. Information
theory has thus opened up, in many analyses, new vistas closed to
semiotics.
An item of information prepared so as to reach (via the channel) the
receiver is termed a message. This preparation means encoding. If
a message (item of information) is to be received, it must be decoded,
i.e., the receiver must know the code. In most general terms, a code is
a function which assigns a definite content to a given message. 25
In the case of semantic information the basic code is the linguistic
code, that is, a language comprehended both by the sender and the
receiver. In science we use a code which might be termed a factual
linguistic code, but we are also interested in what might be termed
a psychological linguistic code and a metaphorical code, and we even
are right in stressing the creative role of the latter. The written code
is connected with the linguistic code.
The information channel is that through which a message passes on
its way from the sender to the receiver (e.g., paper in the case of ordi-
nary writing, the air in the case of speech). Entropy is the measure of
disorder, indefiniteness, chaos. Hence information reduces entropy. The
amount of information received equals the difference between the en-
tropy of a given system before and after that information is received.
6. The methodology of sciences and epistemology

It is often claimed that the methodology of sciences (but, the stress
here is not on specialized methodologies) forms part of the theory of
cognition (griosiology, epistemology). This opinion has a good sub-
stantiation: scientific cognition is just a variation of human cognition
in general, and the fundamental problems of scientific cognition can be
solved only on the basis of the results of general gnosiological con-
siderations. It is true that semiotics and information theory are con-
cerned with the relationship between facts and statements about them,
but they do not analyse the process which takes place between facts
and the man who acquires the knowledge of them, i.e., the way man
comes to know the world around' him. These disciplines are interested
in the degree of agreement between a statement and facts, and possibly
also the degree of agreement between a statement and the convic-
tion of the speaker, and the degree of agreement between message sent
and message received. 26 If these cognitive operations which ocour in
research work are to be analysed thoroughly, we have to turn to episte-
mology. Likewise, when we analyse scientific knowledge as the effect
of scientific cognition it is worthwhile to resort to general gnosiological
considerations on human knOWledge.
The opinion that the methodology of sciences has very strong links
with epistemology, or that it bases its research on the achievements
of the latter discipline, is well substantiated. It might also be said that
the methodology of sciences in its broader interpretation includes part
of gnosiological analyses.
7. The methodology of sciences and ontological and psychological in-

vestigations
All the disciplines discussed so far could be treated either as parts of
general methodological investigations or as disciplines on which method-
ological investigations are based. This was so because they were con-
cerned mostly with the undisputable fields of interest of the methodo-
logy of sciences: cognitive operations and their results (see Sec. 1 above).
Hence, when the scope of the methodology of sciences was extended
so as to cover those disciplines (semiotics, the theory of decision-mak-
ing and the theory of games, information theory, the history of science
in its methodological aspect. epistemology). it did not go beyond these

two fields. But if we look at the modified schema, which could now be
represented as follows:
Statements
Object about object +-------+1 Researcher I
of research of research
then we note that the methodology of sciences has thus come to include
the relationships - investigated by the various disciplines. and not by
semiotics alone - between the object of research and statements about
it. between statements about the object of research and the researcher,
and the statements as such (the logical analysis of language), but the
investigations of the object of research as such and the researcher as
such have been disregarded. The former ones are the subject matter of
various trends in ontological analyses, and the latter ones, of psycholog-
ical considerations.
The question arises, whether and how far the inclusion of those anal-
yses and considerations in the methodology of sciences could be postu-
lated. An answer in the affirmative would yield the distinction between:
(1) methodology in the narrower sense of the term,
(2) methodology in the broader sense of the term.
But, regardless of any opinions on this issue, it is self-evident that-
as has been emphasized in connection with the basic principles of
semantics (Sec. 2 above) - if appropriate results are to be obtained,
methodological research is, and ought to be, conducted with reference
to the subject matter of research, Le., the domain of a given science.
The way in which research is conducted largely depends on our opinion
on its subject matter.
The most fundamental questions refer, first, to what types of objects
and relations between them (in other words: ontological categories.
types of facts) are denoted by the names and other expressions that
occur in a given language (when the latter is interpreted semantically,
Le., when appropriate objects are assigned to its terms). Secondly, to
what is the nature of such objects. Endeavours to answer these questions
have been made since the very beginning of philosophical considera-
tions (for instance, Aristotle's ontological categories), but considerable
advances in this respect have been made recently. When it comes to the
first question, the pride of place goes to the advances in set theory, and
such nascent disciplines as mere010gy and cybernetics. Set theory, origi-
nated by Cantor,27 has had an immense impact on many disciplines in
modem times. Its basic concepts are those of set and set membership.
Set theory is concerned with what is termed distributive sets. The con-
cept of distributive set refers to the totality of objects (which are ele-
ments of that set) that have a certain common property. For instance,
the set "mankind" stands for the set of the human beings who are
living in the world, the kings of Poland form the set of those kings who
have ever reigned in Poland, the Polish gentry forms a set of a similar
kind. The abstract nature of distributive sets must be emphasized. Each
such set is a general object other than the objects which form the ele-
ments of a given set.28
In set theory, various operations on sets are carried out, while the
concept of set is also often used in methodology. Such operations and
analyses have resulted in singling out subsets (parts of sets), ordered
systems (I.e., sets in which a certain order of elements is preserved), and
the concepts of binary relations (sets of ordered pairs of individuals),
ternary relations, etc. The ontological categories of set theory are: an
individual, a (distributive) set, and an infinite number of relations,
functions, etc., which are sets of special kinds.
Mereology is ooncerned with sets of the second kind, i.e., collective
setS.29 These, as distinct from the distributive ones, are individuals in
the sense of set theory and not an abstract sum of properties of given
objects. Examples of collective sets are: a forest, the court of Queen
Victoria, a pile of stones (which is to be distinguished from a distribu-
tive set of stones when it comes to stones "in general", and not to
a specified pile of 'them), etc.
Cybernetics views the world in a somewhat different way than set
theory and mereology. This young discipline uses the concepts of
system and coupling as its basic concepts of ontological interpretation.ao
As in information theory the content of information is irrelevant, so
in cybernetics the concept of system may refer to various domains. The
concept of system is connected with those of elements of a structure,
notion, and the development of the system - concepts which are of ex-
treme significance in historical research. Their meanings are not re-
THE SUBJEGr MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 25
called here, as they will be discussed later, in the course of detailed

analyses.
Set theory, mereology, cybernetics, by using terms such as individual,
set, relation, system, coupling, etc., characterize the object of scientific
research in a general way. Answers to questions about the most general
characteristics of those objects which are domains of research of the
various disciplines are also provided by ontological analyses connected
with the philosophy of natural science (interpreted broadly, so that man
and society are also treated as part of nature). These analyses cover
such issues as the material unity of the world, the ontic process (dialec-
tics), the concept of time and that of space. These well-known issues
will not be described here, even in a general manner, because they will
be discussed in special sections of the book. These issues are of extreme
significance in methodological reflections on history.81
While it may be doubted whether we are to accept even some ontolo-
gical considerations (formulated in metalanguage or in object language)
as parts of the general methodology of sciences, the case is different
when it comes to specialized methodologies. In the latter, when we have
to do with certain groups of sciences or with individual disciplines, we
have to admit that the general opinion on the structure of a given
domain, being part of the researcher's general body of knowledge in
the light of which he conducts his research, essentially affects the course
of that research by enabling him to distinguish essential facts from less
important ones. This is why an analysis of his opinion on the structure
of the domain in question should to some extent be included in method-
ological considerations. According to whether these considerations are,
or are not, included in a given specialized methodology we shall refer
to a (specialized) methodology in a broader or in a narrower sense.
These conclusions abviously apply to the methodology of history. With-
out that ontological knowledge it would not be possible to go beyond
an ordinary description of the past.
It remains to discuss the problem of including psychological con-
siderations in the scope of the methodology of sciences. If we exclude.
for the time being, the sphere of interest of semiotic pragmatics, then
this leaves obviously merely the psychology of scientific activity - a field
of great interest. This, however, is an indisputable branch of psycho-
logy, but its results should be of interest for the methodologist who
26 METHODOLOGY AND HISTORY
investigates cognitive (research) operations, and the methodologist who

investigates the results of such operations.
8. Conclusions for use in specialized methodologies
Following our reflections on the subject matter of the methodology of

sciences we have concluded that. in order to carry out its principal
tasks, i.e., to study cognitive operations and their results, general
methodology avails itself of achievements of various disciplines. Some of
these have developed but recently and are making rapid advances.
which - be it alone on this account - enables us to predict further con-
siderable progress in methodology. According to our objectives we may
treat these disciplines. or some of them, or hold some branches of them,
as parts of the methodology of sciences, or that methodological research
on science is being carried out on the basis of these disciplines. The
latter view corresponds better to present-day research practice.
The foregoing analysis yields certain conclusions to be used in spe-
cialized methodologies: the domain of their investigations (which resem-
bles in general the domain of interests of general methodology) emerges
in outline, and differences in instruments of research become manifest
to some extent. These divergences are due, above all, to differences in
the nature of the domain of the various disciplines. When it comes to
general methodology, that domain coincides with reality as a whole
(in other words, all possible domains or all possible worlds). But the
closer we approach the methodologies of the various disciplines (or
even their groups), the more clearly we notice differences between the
domains studied by them. For instance, the subject matter of research
in physics differs much from the subject matter of research in history,
even though they can be investigated in a uniform manner by using
the instruments provided by general methodology. This gives rise to the
problem, which has not been solved thus far, to what extent these in-
struments, be they termed general, can be used in specialized methodol-
ogies, and to what extent and how they must be adjusted to the needs
of the latter. To what extent, finally, are we to use instruments that are
specific to a given discipline, or group of disciplines only? Or are we,
perhaps, to make them from case to case? Are these instruments merely
varieties of the general instruments discussed above? It may be said, at
any rate, that when it comes to specialized methodologies we ought to

define their respective scopes of methodological interests and the types
of research instruments used in them with reference to general method-
ology and to analyses of the various specialized domains of research.
REFERENCES
1 K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, Dordrecht-Warszawa 1972, pp. 185-190.
I A strict distinction between these aspects is made by J. Giedymin, who
speaks about descriptive methodology (the study of the language of science and
the operations performed in research) and about normative methodology (the
set of rules and theorems that guide research procedures) and two meanings-
from that point of view - of the term methodology. (See his "Hipotezy, meto-
dologia opisowa, wyjaSnianie" (Hypotheses, Descriptive Methodology, Explana-
tion) in Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 4/1962, p. 919; and Problemy. ZaloZenia.
Rozstrzygni~cia (problems, Assumptions, DeCisions), Poznan 1964, pp. 17 and
177.
3 Cf. K. Ajdukiewicz, op. cit., p. 186.
4 Ibidem.
S J. Locke, An Essay on Human Understanding, vol. II, chap. XI, book IV.
6 Ch. Morris, "Foundations of the Theory of Signs", in: International Ency-
clopaedia of Unified Science, vol. I, No. 2/1938; Signs, Language and Behavior.
New York 1946.
7 Note in this connection selected writings of K. Ajdukiewicz, one of the
founders of the methodology of sciences, J~zyk i poznanie (Language and Cogni-
tion), vol. I, Warszawa 1960, vol. II, Warszawa 1965. For non-specialists there
is a popular exposition of the principles of semiotics by H. Stonert, J~zyk i ntJ-
uka (Language and Science), Warszawa 1964.
8 J. Giedymin and J. Kmita, Wyklady z logiki formalnej, teorii komunikacji
i metodologii nauk (Lectures on Formal Logic, Communica-tion Theory and the
Methodology of Sciences), Poznan 1965, p. 15. In his modified definition of the
sign Kmita omits the regularity condition in the communication by a given
cultural action or cultural product of a specified state of things. Cf. his Wyklady
z logiki i metodologii nauk (Lectures on Formal Logic and the Methodology of
Sciences), Warszawa 1973, pp. 32-3.
D See R. Camap, "Die Ueberwindung der MetaphYSik durch die logische
Analyse der Sprache", Erkenntf'lis, vol. 12, 1932, and Philosophy and Logical
Syntax, London 1935.
10 See R. Camap, "The Methodological Character of Theoretical Concepts"
in: Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. I, Minneapolis 1956.
11 Its development is connected with the name of the Polish logician A. Tar-
ski. See his paper ''The Establishment of Scientific Semantics" in: Logic, Se-
mantics, Metamathematics (A. Tarski's papers, 1923 to 1938), Oxford 1956.
12 A statement with a predicate of one argument: "Napoleon died in 1821";
28 METHODOLOGY AND msroRY
a statement with a predicate of two arguments: "Wellington defeated Napole-

on". Syntactical categories are discussed in a popular way by H. Stonert (see
footnote 7 above). We shall not take up the issue of the semantic functions
(denoting) of function symbols, variables, sentential connectives, quantifiers, etc.,
since that does not affect the problem now under consideration. Function sym-
bols, of course, have their denotations, too.
18 See H. Stonert, op. cit., p. 192.
14 Reference is made here, obviously, to an interpreted language (Le., a lan-
guage which has semantic rules that assign specified objects to the terms that
occur in that inguage), and not to a language which is pure calculus (such as
with which matemathicallogic is concerned). In this connection see J. Giedymin
and J. Kmita, op. cit. (see footnote 8 above), pp. 37 ff.
15 See J. Giedymin, Problemy (..•), ed. cit., p. 177.
16 On the concept of truth see R. Suszko, "Logika formalna a niekt6re za-
gadnienia teorii poznania" (Formal Logic and Certain Issues in Gnosiology),
Mysl Filozo/iczna, No. 2-3/1957. The semantic definition of truth is associated
with the name of A. Tarski (The Concept of Truth in Formalized Languages,
in Logic, Semon tics, Metamathematics, Oxford 1956).
17 Cf. H. Stonert, op. cit., pp. 234-5.
18 Ibid., p.245. The founders of pragmatics, next to Morris, include K. Twar-
dowski, T. Kotarbmski, R. Camap, R. M. Martin.
19 L. Geymonat, op. cit., p. 192.
20 In this connection note the definition of the method given by T. Kotar-

bmski: "a method is a mode of action used with the consciousness of a repeti-
tion of its application in similar cases" (in Gnosiology, Oxford 1966, p. 446).
21 The book mainly consulted on this issue was: R. D. Luce, H. Raiffa,
Games and Decisions, New York 1957. The principles of rational actions are
studied by the discipline termed praxiology. Cf. T. Kotarbmski, Praxiology,
Oxford 1965.
22 Cf. J. Giedymin, Problemy (...), ed. cit., p. 7.
23 The books consulted on the basic concepts and the history of information
theory included: P. H. Woodward, Probability and Information Theory, Lon-
don 1955; A. M. Yaglom and Y. M. Yaglom, Probability and information (the
original in Russian, Moscow 1960); J. Giedymin, J. Kmita, Wyklady (...), ed.
cit. See also M. Po~bski, "Sztuka a informacja" (Art and Information) Rocznik
Historii Sztuki, vol. III, 1962, pp. 44-106; J. Ziomek, Staff i Kochanowski. Pro-
ba zastosowania teor;; informacji w badaniach nad przekladem (Staff and Ko-
chanowski. A Tentative Application of Information Theory in the Study of
Translations), Poznan 1965; J. Giedymin, Problemy (...), ed. cit., pp. 20--22
(where he quotes the literature of the subject: works by C. E. Shannon, A. I.
Khinchin, J. G. Kemeny, D. Harrah, and others).
24 J. Giedymin, op. cit., pp. 20--1. What follows is his explanation of the
concept of semantic information. To be able to speak about such information
we need the following data:
(a) a set Y of (true or false) statements;

(b) a set V of the possible combinations of logical values: truth (denoted
by 'I') and falsehood (denoted by '0'), assigned to the various statements (this is
the set of valuations, i.e., the universe of uncertainty);
(c) a subset C(V) of V, which reduces the variety of cases and is designated
under specified criteria.
The following example is analysed: consider two statements, A and B, so
that
Y = (A, B),
V = {1,1;1,0; 0,1; O,O}.
Now C(V) may be any pair which is an element of V, e.g., C(V) = (1,0). If, in
reply to the question about the values of A and B, we give the valuation (1,0),
which indicates that A is true and B is false, we provide semantic information,
because the choice of C(V) out of the set V is a constraint on V. The choice
of C(V) is, in science, based on the various criteria, but in the last analysis we
are concerned with an answer that would comply with facts. (Cf. J. Giedymin,
op. cit., p. 21.)
25 Cf. J. Giedymin, J. Kmita, Wyklady ( ...), ed. cit., Chap. ill, "Metalinguis-
tic Behaviour in Communication".

26 The terms for the various parts of the chain of communication follow the
suggestions made by S. Nowak in his Studia z metodologii nauk spolecznych
(Studies in the Methodology of the Social Sciences), Warszawa 1965, Chap. VI.
27 The book mainly consulted on set theory was J. Slupecki, L. Borkowski,
Elements of Mathematical Logic and Set Theory, Oxford 1967 (i.e., in practice,
its Polish-language version of 1963).
28 See J. Slupecki, L. Borkowski, op. cit., pp. 297 ff. See also K. Pasenkie-
wicz, Logika og61na (General Logic), vo1. I, Warszawa-Krak6w 1963, pp. 112 ff.
29 Mereology originates from S. Lesniewski, Cf. J. Slupecki, "Towards a Gen-
eralized Mereology of Lesniewski", Studia Logica, vol. VIII, Poznan 1958. On
Lesniewski's logic in general see E. C. Luschei, The Logical Systems of Lesniewski,
Amsterdam 1%2. In LeSniewski's mereology, the only specifically mereological
primitive term is the relation x ~ y, which is interpreted thus: an object x is
(proper or non-proper) part of an object y.
80 The gnosiological (methodological) level is represented by information
theory as a branch of cybernetics. Cybernetics was originated by N. Wiener,
Cybernetics, New York 1948. See also W. R. Ashby, An Introduction to Cyber-
netics, London 1958, and O. Lange, Wholes and Parts, Oxford-Warszawa 1%5.
31 This applies in particular to the problems of time.
II. THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY
OF HISTORY
1. Branches of the methodology of history
In view Qf what has been said above concerning the domain of the
general methodQIQgy of sciences and the conclusiQns resulting there-
from fQr specialized methodQlogies we can list the fQllQwing three fields
Qf interest Qf the methodQIQgy of history:
(1) reflectiQns on cognitive DperatiQns in histQrical research. i.e., on
the science of history interpreted as the craft Qf the histQrians;
(2) reflectiQns Qn the results Qf research, i.e.• Qn the science of histQry
interpreted as a set of statements on the domain under investigation;
(3) reflectiQns Qn the subject matter of historical research. i.e.• on
history in the sense of the past events.
ReflectiQns Qn past events could, of course, be considered tQ be SOl
specialized a domain of research that it would not be justified to treat
them as part of the methodDIDgy Df histDry. This. hQwever. seems tD be
a secondary issue. NQ classification of the research interests invDlved
may result in denying the importance for methodQIQgical work Df re-
flections Qn the subject matter of research. If it is assumed that the goal
Df the science of history (interpreted from the inner point Df view Df
that science itself) is tD arrive at true statements, then we have tD knDW
nDt Qnly the method Qf arriving at such statements, i.e., the methQd of
formulating them. This part of the task is carried out by the first branch
of the methodology of history. But in order tQ be able tQ substantiate
these statements we must be in a PQsition tQ confront them with what
is known about the domain of research. Our knowledge of the facts.
as has been said earlier, does not gQ beyQnd what has been stated
scientifically about them; in other words, the way we see an object of
study is shaped by Qur knowledge of that object. When we substantiate
a statement (in a given domain) we first of all confront it with the
knowledge we have (about that domain), and we usually reject it if it
THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY 31
seems to us to be at variance or contradictory with that knowledge and

if we at the same time have no reasons to modify our knowledge on
that point. It is only later that confrontation with actual behaviour
takes place. Hence, from the point of view of the methodology of
history, the knowledge of that with which the historian confronts his
statements cannot be indifferent.
When it comes to methodology interpreted normatively we say that
we have to strive for making our knowledge of the object in question-
i.e., that system of reference to which we compare our statements about
the object of study -as good as possible. It might be said metaphori-
cally that the knowledge of the object of study serves as a mirror which
we use to reflect our statements; hence the point is that this mirror
reveals all possible distortions in the image of the past as we recon-
struct it. Since in research practice formulation of statements and their
substantiation are interconnected, and the relatively final formulation
of a statement takes place only after its tentative substantiation at
various stages, it may be said that our knowledge of the object of study
plays an immense role also in the process of formulation of statements.
As will be demonstrated later, this holds for all stages of the historian's
research procedure.
In the literature of the subject there is no uniformity in the defini-
tions of the various branches of study which have here been termed
methodological, and also of the totality of such study. The first of these
branches, concerned with the study of cognitive operations, is (see, for
instance, E. Bernheim) sometimes excluded from the methodology of
history, whereas the second, concerned with science interpreted as a set
of statements, is more frequently termed methodology. Reflections on
the procedure of historical research, even including problems of re-
search techniques (see, for instance, M. Handelsman), and investigations
which are an outcome of analyses carried out in the first two branches
of the methodology of history, as listed above, and concerned with
establishing the methodological nature of the science of history and the
place of that discipline in the system of science, are most often what
is thought to be methodology. The rather frequently encountered term
theory of history varies in meaning from author to author. In its
broadest sense it stands for reflections on the language of the science of
history together with analyses (but not interpreted normatively) of
research operations, and with the exclusion of all that which could be
classed as research techniques. It was in this sense that the term was
used by P. Gardiner, when he gave the title of Theories of History
(published 1959) to his well-known selection from authors who had
engaged in reflections on the science of history.
Reflections on the subject matter of historical research are often
labelled the philosophy of history. It was used by Voltaire,1 Hegel,
and others in the sense of reflections on past events. Its meaning is
still evolving: it stands as before for reflections an the past, but has
also acquired a derogatory tinge which indicates that we have to do
with speculations, not subject to scientific control, mainly on the future
course of events. To cut himself off from these implications A. C. Dan-
to entitled his interesting work An Analytical Philosophy of History
(published 1965), which also points to connections with the trend (or
various trends) of what is termed analytical philosophy. Other repre-
sentatives of that philosophy, and also many authors who are outside
that trend, use the term philosophy of history not in the sense of reflec-
tions on the course of events, but on the science of history, interpreted
as both cognitive operations and their results. 2 Those authors who con-
fine the methodology of history to a certain type of reflections only, but,
on the other hand, whose reflections deal with the problems of research
techniques, feel the need to find a general, integrating term for the total-
ity of their investigations. In this connection we encounter the terms
histories (used in its Polish form by the Polish historians J. Lelewel and
M. Handelsman), encyclopaedia and methodology of history, introduc-
tion to historical research (studies) (Ch. Langlois, Ch. Scignobos, L. Hal-
phen),a etc.
To avoid this terminological confusion it is suggested here to treat the
totality of reflections on cognitive operations and results of such opera-
tions and the subject matter of historical research as issues in the
methodology of history, with the following working terms attached to
the various spheres of such reflections:
(1) pragmatic methodology of history,
(2) apragmatic methodology of history,
(3) objective methodology of history.
2. The pragmatic methodology of history

To indicate what are the tasks of the methodology of history conceived
as an analysis of the cognitive operations performed by historians we
refer to a definition of the tasks of pragmatic methodology. drawn from
a book by K. Ajdukiewicz. When mentioning the descriptive and the
normative viewpoint he says that "The three main tasks of that branch
of methodology which is concerned with science as the profession of
scientists. i.e.• science as activity. are: (1) singling out the types of
activities carried out in research work. and analysis of such types
of activities. resulting in definitions which explain in what such activities
consist; (2) description of research procedures (in general outlines) as
used in the various disciplines; (3) finding out the goals for which re-
searchers in the various fields strive. whether consciously or not. and
the resulting codification of standards of correct research procedures".4
Thus the main part of this type of methodological considerations
refers to reconstruction and possibly evaluation of modes (schemata.
principles) of inference and all other kinds of reasoning used to solve
problems (answer questions) posed in science.& The three main tasks
indicated above fully apply to history. In the case of the first two we
have to do with an analysis and description of the following operations
(which need not all arise in every case under consideration):
(1) choice of the domain of research,
(2) posing of a question within that domain,
(3) establishing the sources on which the study is to be based (if the
question posed is to be answered),
(4) (external and internal) criticism of the sources.
(5) description - always selective - of what occurred. and to what the
question refers,
(6) explanation (why was it so?),
(7) arriving at theoretical statements,
(8) synthetic formulation of results (i.e., answering the question with-
in the domain under consideration),
(9) evaluation of persons and events in the past.
When it comes to the third of the tasks of pragmatic methodology,
as listed by Ajdukiewicz, interests in the science of history focus on
defining the goals by which historians are guided in their research; in
34 METHODOLOGY AND ffiSTORY
this connection it must be realized that these goals may change in the
course of history. It suffices to recall that it was not always the desire
to draw the true picture of the past that was guiding the historians. As
we know. at first the dominant goal was that of providing paragons of
conduct. When the striving for the truth has become self-evident. it
has remained an open question. whether the historian is merely to
describe the past "faithfully". or whether he is to strive for bringing
out the regularities that govern social life. The resulting question has
been: What is he doing in face of this alternative. and does the striving
for the truth preclude the didactic function of history? Is the historian
to evaluate persons and events?
The attainment of each of these goals requires complex modes and
standards of procedure. The primary goal- arriving at true statements -
requires the ability formally to substantiate and to verify statements.
This is linked with a system of concepts of specified cognitive opera-
tions. which first of all includes the concept of hypothesis verification.
It is obvi'OUs that the goal of research directly affects the nature of
the scientific procedure involved, for if a person, for instance. does not
set himself the task of accounting for the regularities that govern the
process of history. then he will not be concerned with arriving at cer-
tain theoretical statements.
Part Two below will be wholly devoted to a historical analysis of
these goals and an analysis of changes in the research procedures used
by historians. changes resulting from modifications of research goals.
Parts Four and Five will be concerned with a reconstruction (analysis
and evaluation) of procedures actually used in historical research.
The fundamental concepts in the pragmatic methodology of history.
as adopted in this book, include: (1) observation. (2) source-based
knowledge. (3) non-source-based knowledge. (4) historical source. (5)
source-based and non-source-based infonnation. (6) authenticity of
sources. (7) reliability of infonnants. (8) methodological model (selection
of facts). (9) establishment of facts. (10) explanation. (11) substantia-
tion and verification. (12) hypothesis. (13) acceptance. (14) probability.
(15) valuation, (16) construction and synthesis.
THE SUBJECT MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF lllSTORY 35
3. The apragmatic methodology of history
That methodology of history which has here been termed apragmatic

is closely linked with the pragmatic one. Apragmatic methodology in
our case is concerned with the results of historians' work. and hence
with an analysis of the statements they formulate. It is obvious that.
when investigating scientific procedures, we cannot fail to discuss state-
ments made by historians. Since all in all we are concerned with entire
structures. sets, or sequences of statements of various kinds (observa-
tion statements, theoretical statements) which are logically interconnect-
ed, hence we face the task of reconstructing a system that the science
of history forms; this is why the considerations in question may be
termed systematic-methodological. At present it is the theory of deduc-
tive systems (metamathematics) which is developed most in this sphere
of science. but nothing prevents us from trying to systematize other
disciplines as well.
While pragmatic methodology cannot be pursued without concomitant
regard for the issues which belong to apragmatic methodology, we could
imagine research in the latter field without reference to results obtained
in the former.
The importance of analyses in the field of apragmatic methodology is
particularly marked when we try to point out the characteristic features
of the science of history (in other words. its methodological structure) in
order to define its place in the system of sciences. In this way we can
establish features common to various disciplines and thus advance re-
search on the classification of sciences.
As far as history is concerned. apragmatic methodology covers above
all reflections on historical statements. historical generalizations. strictly
general statements and laws. and the concept of narration. But, as has
been said above. the role of the various types of statements is the con-
cern of pragmatic methodology as well. Reflections in the sphere of
apragmatic methodology will be dealt with in Part Six of the book.
In order to apply apragmatic methodology of history it is thus in-
dispensable. as it seems, to adopt the concepts of: (1) historical state-
ment, (2) historical generalization. (3) law in the semantic sense of the
term. (4) scientific law. (5) value judgement. (6) historical narration.
(7) object language and metalanguage. (8) truth, (9) isomorphism.
36 METHODOLOGY AND lllSTORY
4. The objective methodology of history
The term: objective methodology of history is perhaps not the most

fortunate one (subject-matter-oriented methodology of history would
perhaps be more precise, but extremely clumsy - Tr.), but has been
adopted here in order to stress that we do not mean an "ordinary"
transfer into the methodology of history of those disciplines which are
called the philosophy of history or the theory of social development
or cybernetics, or finally those disciplines which are concerned with the
subject matter of historical studies, but a special reflection on that
subject matter, reflection which makes use of the above-mentioned (and
possibly other) disciplines for the purposes of historical research. For
the time being this is a postulate, but it will be well if in the future
such reflections penetrate the methodology of history on a greater scale
and are appropriately transformed there. This would make it possible
to adapt, for the needs of historical research and for the study of that
research, the theoretical and metatheoretical achievements of philoso-
phical ontology, cybernetics, and even set theory, mereology, and other
disciplines, whether existing or those still to emerge.
The importance of the knowledge of the domain studied in the course
of historical investigations conducted by historians for the selection of
facts has been pointed out above. It might be added here that, when
making use of the semantic definition of truth, as given above, it is
not possible to qualify statements as true or false without having some
knowledge of the domain in question. As is known, a statement s (for-
mulated in an object language) is true in a domain D if and only if
things are so as its metalanguage counterpart S states.8 The question
arises, what knowledge about D one must have in order to be able
tentatively to assign to statements the logical values of truth or false-
hood. As is known, domains are models for statements, sets of state-
ments, or entire disciplines. But those domains only serve as such mod-
els in which those statements, sets of statements, or entire disciplines
are true, i.e., have their metalanguage counterparts in them. The his-
torian is interested in how to characterize the domain which is a model
of his statements; an answer to this question is to be provided by the
objective ontological methodology of history. A question about the
truth of certain statements is thus a question about whether they have
THE SUBJEC'f MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF IllsrORY 37
a model, i.e.. whether there is a domain in which they are true, and
whether it is a domain which is an object of research (a sphere of in-
terest) of historical science. Hence the knowledge of that domain must
be systematized so that it can serve historians. That knowledge, as
acquired by the various historians, ought to reveal as many as possible
convergent ways of denoting. Besides making it possible to use the
knowledge of the subject matter (domain) in assigning to statements
specified logical values (which a historian does as it were automati-
cally), reflections on the subject matter provide numerous heuristic
directives as to what is to be studied (the problem of selection), on
what to focus attention in explanations, and possibly what criteria to
use in evaluating past events. They also provide historians with the
basic theoretical concepts (terms) needed to formulate statements about
the object of study.
Thus the task of the objective methodology of history is to charac-
terize, in a general way, the domain which is the model of historical
science as to:
(l) make it possible to distinguish the true statements about that
domain from the false;
(2) provide heuristic directives for the study of that domain;
(3) provide theoretical terms needed in a scientific description of that
domain.
All knowledge of the subject matter of study is part of a historian's
knowledge, a part which also is essential in historical research. We can
go further and recall that all cognition, and hence scientific cognition as
well, takes place only in the light of specified knowledge. In the case of
historical research that knowledge, as distinct from that which is ac-
quired in the course of the study of historical sources, might be termed
non-source-based. Part Four of this book is dedicated, in connection
with an analysis of the subject matter of research, to a closer study of
that non-source-based knowledge,
The basic concepts in the objective methodology of history are those
of: (1) historical fact, (2) elements of a system and structure of a sys-
tem, (3) difIer~nce between: systems, elements of systems, structures
of system, (4) changes in the state of a system and elements of a sys-
tem, (5) development of a system, (6) cause, (7) regularity.
38 MEfHODOLOGY AND IDSTORY
5. The general methodology of history versus the methodologies of

the various historical disciplines
In additiO'n to the branches O'f the methodology O'f history as indicated

above it is alsO' wO'rthwhile nO'ting the divisiO'n. based O'n different crite-
ria, into the general methodO'logy of history and the methodologies of
the various historical disciplines. 7 It can easily be seen that our con-
siderations so far have been concerned with the general methodology
of history, within which we have singled out methodology in a broader
and in a narrower sense of the term. The relation between the general
methodO'logy O'f history and the methodO'logies O'f the various histO'rical
disciplines might be interpreted similarly to the relation between the
general methodology of sciences and the methodologies of the special-
ized disciplines. Thus the general methO'dO'logy of histO'ry in the study
of the variO'US issues is less dependent O'n given data which are analysed
by the various historical disciplines. It is not interested in the pecul-
iarities of the subject matter of those disciplines, i.e., in analysing
history from a certain point O'f view (e.g., military, ecO'nomic, ideolog-
ical, etc.), but analyses the history of mankind as a whole in its basic
categories (e.g., time, space) and relationships (e.g., the relatiO'n between
the ecO'nomic and the ideologioal sphere). Likewise, it does not in-
vestigate the peculiarities O'f the methO'ds O'f reconstructing the particular
segments of the past as investigated by the variO'us historical disciplines,
but is concerned with the fundamental methods of reconstructing the
whO'le of history. Special methods, specific to the variO'us disciplines.
cO'ncern it only as certain aspects of fundamental principles, which are
being ,discovered by the general methodO'logy of history. Also when it
comes to' the study of the methodological structure O'f history the pe-
culiarities of the various histO'rical disciplines are studied by the general
methodO'logy O'f history only fO'r the purpO'se O'f making comparisons
intended to elucidate the general methO'dO'IO'gical characteristics of the
historioal sciences. The general methodolO'gy O'f history is thus a highly
abstract discipline; its task is to' fO'rmulate statements that would cover
all historical sciences, and hence it cannot go into the issues that are
peculiar to the specialized disciplines, which should work out their own
methodologies.
At present. both the general methodolO'gy of history and, a fortiori.
the specialized methodologies, for all the long tradition of general re-
flections on history, are only taking their first firm steps. Among the
various historical disciplines, economic history, the history of science
together with the history of historiography, the history of education, and
to some extent the history of the military art are the only ones that can
boast of more or less developed methodological reflections. It is worth
stressing at this point that general methodologioal reflections in history
have thus far been inspired above all by the traditional issues of polit-
ical history, so that the general methodology of history has in practice
been largely the specialized methodology of political history. It has not
yet been penetrated in particular by reflections characteristic of eco-
nomic history, which investigates a different type of processes than
political history does, but which has become an independent discipline
only recently.
Economic history has to its credit a fairly large number of studies
devoted to general reflections. Those which are more synthetic in nature
approach the problem in two ways. In some of them the main body of
considerations is concerned with the subject matter of study, that is,
with economic history interpreted in various ways, and less attention
is paid to the specific methods of the scientific reconstruction of that
history. This is the approach characteristic of the works by Ch. Morazes
and Ch. Verlinden,9 which give a synthetic view of the process of
economic development. Works of the second type concentrate on his-
torio'graphic analysis and report on research attainments in economic
history.lo The book by W. Kula, Problems and Methods in Economic
History (in Polish, 1963), which marks a new approach, is also to be
included in the latter group. Its author does not confine himself to
historiographic analyses, but by the very structure of his book points
to what he believes to be the principal research problems in economic
history, and reviews critically the solutions offered so far. The book
opens with a chapter on the history of economic history. Next come
chapters on the subject matter of economic history, sources for the
economic history of modern Poland (including the recent period), and
the division of economic history into periods. Finally in Chap. 5,
W. Kula outlines what he thinks to be the main trends in the study of
the issues in economic history, linking that problem with the issue of
the methods of synthesis in economic history. The other chapters are
thDse Dn historical statistics, historical demography, historical research

on social structures, on price and market studies, historical metrology,
man's dependence on nature, the cO'mparative method and generaliza-
tions in economic history, and predictions based on economic history.
This brief review of the contents of W. Kula's book is intended to shO'w
hDw the range of methodO'logical issues is being shaped in economic
histO'ry.
In regard to theO'retical reflections in recent years on the history of
science, mentiO'n is due to' The Structure of ScienJific Rellolution (1962)
by T. S. Kuhn, whO' is concerned with the subject matter Df the histO'ry
of science, in particular the characteristic features O'f the develO'pment of
science. Kuhn strives to' substantiate the statement that science develO'Ps
mainly through revO'lutiDns which, by rejecting DId methods, make new
paradigms Df scientific procedures. Science, as Kuhn is claiming, does
nDt develop through a simple cumulatiDn Df small discoveries as con-
tributions to' the whDle system, as was believed. for instance, by the
fDllowers of R. Carnap.ll
Reflections O'n the history of historiDgraphy, with which we are par-
ticularly interested here, are fairly advanced and have been 'growing
recently at a lively pace. Hundreds of synthetic studies, in variDus
languages and of VariDUS scope, cDuld be mentiDned. 12 A separate
group consists Df books dedicated to' a single historian: W. Kaegi's
study of J. Burckhard can be mentioned as an example. 13 Issues in the
history Df historiography are discussed by M. H. Serejski, whO' wrItes
thus: "The basic task of a historian of historiography C...) is to dis-
cover the intertwining relationships between the development O'f histor-
ical ideas and life, i.e., the system O'f social relations, the culture Df
a given epoch, political events, etc." and immediately fDllDws with the
question: "DO'es this require the use O'f any specific methO'ds and cO'gni-
tive prO'cedures?"14 It seems that this is the fundamental question in the
field of specialized methDdO'IO'gy, a discipline which in the case under
consideratiDn is a member of the family of the historical sciences.
When answering this question thDse authDrs whO' are concerned with
historiDgraphy, if they gO' beyO'nd their purely histDrical tasks and
reflect on the wO'rk they are dDing, in the first place analyse the subject
matter of their discipline.
In the nascent methDdDlogy of military histO'ry mention is due to'
THE SUBJEcr MATTER OF THE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY 41
comments by S. Herbst and B. Miskiewicz. lI; The proceedings of a sym-

posium recently held in L6di illustrate discussions concerning the meth-
odology of the history of education. 16
It may be expected that the further development of the historical
disciplines largely depends on progress in specialized methodologies.
The spheres of interest of the latter still lack precise formulation. These
methodologies are mainly concerned with the peculiarities of the sub-
ject matters of their respective disciplines, although, as the case of eco-
nomic history has shown, they engage in increasingly penetrating re-
flections ori the solving of problems that are specific to a given historical
discipline and on the methodological structure of these specialized dis-
ciplines.
6. The general methodology of history in relation to heuristics and

source criticism. The place of the auxiliary historical disciplines
The division into the general methodology of history, on the one side,
and the methodologies of the specialized historical disciplines, on the
other, is connected with the problem, whether, or how far, the method-
ology of history should be concerned with heuristics and (external and
internal) criticism of sources, i.e., with issues which are in the field of
interest of the so-called auxiliary historical disciplinesP
The goal of the auxiliary historical sciences was defined already by
J. Lelewel (1822) who stated that their task was to help comprehend
the sources. 1S Another similar formulation has remained valid to this
day.19 Yet not all problems of the comprehension of historical sources
can be linked with the auxiliary historical sciences. W. Sernkowicz says
that these disciplines "serve the historian by being indispensable in
identifying, comprehending, establishing the time and place of events
and in the critical assessment of historical source" .20 It can easily be
noted that in his statement the critical assessment of sources is rather
clearly separated. from the preliminary operations a historian must per-
form. These preliminary operations are usually called external or erudi-
tional criticism of a source; these were mentioned by Semkowicz in
the first part of his statement, whereas in the second he was concerned.
with internal criticism, termed. hermeneutics, whose main task is to
establish the degree of reliability of the information provided by given
sources. The traditional auxiliary historical disciplines are indispensable,

but not sufficient, for that task.
The general methodology of history must totally exclude from its con-
siderations the discipline termed heuristics, which M. Handelsman de-
fines as the knowledge of historical materials, their distribution, and the
way of finding them out and gathering them (the science of sources,
and the science of archives, libraries, and bibliographies).21 All such
information serves as the point of departure for historical research; in-
formation of this type is to indicate where the required data about the
past are to be looked for, and where non-source-based knowledge is
to be drawn from, and also to indicate the technique of gathering and
ordering the data which are to serve to reconstruct given events. The
external criticism of sources is based on rules of procedure established
by the auxiliary disciplines (palaeography, diplomatic, chronology, gene-
alogy, etc.), but it may not be totally irrelevant from the point of
view of the general methodology of history. Methodology must be in-
terested in the cognitive value of such rules and in their logical struc-
ture. This statement applies to rules of a general nature and not to
specific information and technical advice to be found in text-books on
auxiliary historical disciplines. While external criticism is of interest
for the general methodology of history only in its basic formulation.
internal criticism, which does not draw its rules from the auxiliary
historical disciplines, but merely makes use of the achievements of ex-
ternal criticism, is in all respects a subject for methodological considera-
tions. It is self-evident that specialized methodologies may include
heuristics and a larger set of more detailed rules of external criticism.
It is also worthwhile pointing to the relative nature of the concept
"auxiliary historical disciplines". In a broad int'erpretation every disci-
pline whose results or methods are used by the historian in his research
might be termed auxiliary. The necessity of integration of science, of
which we are more and more conscious, accounts for the fact that
science becomes a complex of intertwined disciplines assisting one an-
other, so that every discipline is auxiliary in relation to some other
discipline. In this way history (we do not mean here the methodology
of history) has its auxiliary disciplines in economics, sociology, psycho-
logy, logic, etc., and even increasingly in mathematics and cybernetics
(including information theory). W. Semkowicz made a distinction, for
classification purposes, between disciplines which assist history and the

auxiliary historical disciplines; in the case of the latter he meant the
traditional auxiliary historical disciplines connected with heuristics and
the external criticism of sources. In general terms it may be said that
the auxiliary historical disciplines are connected with heuristics22 and
the external criticism of sources, i.e., with the preliminary stages of
historians' work, whereas the ldisciplines which assist history, by pro-
viding non-source-based information artd by pointing to new possibili-
ties of research methods, are connected with later stages of historians'
work, i.e., hermeneutics (internal criticism) and what is termed syn-
thesis (mainly causal explanations and evaluations). There is no need
to emphasize that with the development of science both the concept
of the auxiliary historical disciplines and what Semkowicz called the
disciplines which assist history is undergoing an evolution.
REFERENCES
1 He is credited with the coining of that term in 1756 (by J. Bury and other
authors).
2 Characteristically enough, the periodical History and Theory has the expla-
natory subtitle: Studies in the Philosophy of History.
8 Those authors whose "introductions to historical 'research" are adapted to
the requirements of the teaching of history, are guided by somewhat different
considerations. They select issues concerned with the branches indicated above
and also take into account the technical aspects of historical research (cf.
W. Moszczenska, Wst{!P do badan historycznych (Introduction to Historical
Rese~rch), Warszawa 1%0, and B. Miskiewicz's book bearing the same title,
Poznan 1964). The scope of such approaches is under discussion.
4 K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., p. 188.
~ In this connection note the definition of inference, to be used hereafter:
"Inference is a mental process by which, on the strength of a more or less cate-
gorical acceptance of premisses, we arrive at the acceptance of the conclusion
which we previously either did not accept at all or accepted less categorically,
the degree of certainty of acceptance of the conclusion being not higher than
the degree of certainty of acceptance of the premisses". (K. Ajdukiewicz, op. cit.,
p. 107). It is assumed that the term reasoning is broader than inference, even
though these two (together with the term method) are being used alternately.
(Cf. J. Giedymin, Z problem6w [ogicznych analizy hislorycznej (Selected Logical
Issues of Historical Analyses), Poznan 1961, p. 28).
6 H. Stonert, op. cit., p. 230.
7 This classification corresponds to the earlie'!" division into the general
methodology of sciences and the (various) specialized methodologies, and has its
justification in the latter. On the concept of the methodology of history see

V. Husa, "Metoda - metodika-metodologie", Ceskoslovensky Casopis Historicky,
VI, pp. 311-5.
8 Ch. Moraze, Introduction a l'histoire economique, Paris 1948 (first pub-
lished in 1943).
9 Ch. Verlindoo, Introduction a l'histoire economique, Coimbra 1948.
10 Cf. A. Fanfani, Introduzione allo studio della stOifia economica, Milano
1960 (3rd ed.); C. Beutin, Einfiihrung in die Wirtschaftsgeschichte, Koln-Graz
1958; W. Kula, Problemy i metod, historii gospodarczej (Issues and Methods
in Economic History), Warszawa 1963, p. 7.
11 See also Derek J. de Solla Price, Science Since Babylon, New Haven-
London 1961.
12 More general works are for example: G. P. Gooch, History and Histo-
rians in the Nineteenth Century, London 1913; K. Ritter, Die Entwicklung der
Geschichtswissenschaft, Mtinchoo-Berlin 1916; J. T. Shotwell, An Introduction
to the History of History, New York 1923; E. Fueter, Geschichte der neueren
Histo/iographie, Miinchen-Berlin 1936; J. W. Thompson, A History of the
Writing of History, vols. I and II, New York 1942; H. Srbik, Geist und Ge-
schichte yom deutschen Humanismus bis zur Gegenwart, vols. I and II, Mtin-
chen-Sa1zburg 1950-1; H. Butterfield, Man on His Past, Cambridge 1955.
13 W. Kaegi, Jacob Burckhardt. Eine Biographie, vols. I-III, Basel 1945-56.
14 M. H. Serejski, Przeszlo§(: a terainiejszosc. Szkice i studia historiograficzne
(The Past and the Present. Essays and Studies in Historiography), Wrodaw-
Warszawa-Krak6w 1965, pp. 12-3. See especially the essays on "The Issues in
the History of Historiography" and "The History of Historiography and the
Science of History".
15 S. Herbst, "Historia wojskowa, trese, dzieje, metoda, metodologia" (Milita-
ry History, Its Meaning, History, Method, and Methodology), in: Zeszyty Nau-
kowe WAP, Historia, vol. VII, No.5, Warszawa 1961, pp. 30-9; B. Miskiewicz
in his work 0 metodyce badan historyczno-wojskowych (Methods in the Study
of Military History), Poznan 1961, is concerned with the following issues: the
war as understood in military history; the relationships between war, army and
military art, on the one hand, and history, on the other; the interconnections
between war, army, and military art; trends in the study of military history;
the necessary competences of the military historian; attainments and tasks of
military history. This list shows that the author is mainly concerned with the
subject matter of military history.
16 Z zagadnien metodologicznych historii wychowania (Methodological Issues
in the History of Education), L6dz 1965.
17 The auxiliary historical sciences traditionally include: the science of the
solirces, the science of archives and libraries, palaeography and neography, dip-
lomatics, sphragistics, chronology, genealogy, heraldry, numismatics, metrology,
and historical statistics (Le., those disciplines which refer to the sources and are
concerned with their external and internal criticism). Cf. A. von Brandt, Werk-
zeug des Histvrikers. Eine Einfuhrung in die historischen Hilfwissenschaften,

Stuttgart 1958 (3rd ed. 1963).
18 The title of Lelewel's book is Nauki dajqce poznae ir6dla historyczne
(The Sciences Which Make it Possible to Acquire the Knowledge of Historical
Sources). The term historische Hilfswissenschaften was introduced by Theodor
Sickel, an Austrian historian and palaeographer (fl. 2nd half of the 19th cent.).
19 Cf. e.g. Chronologia polska (The Chronology of Poland), B. Wlodarski
(ed.), Warszawa 1957, with a preface by T. Manteuffel (who wrote on p. 5:
"Before proceeding to the interpretation of a given source we have first to
understand it").
20 W. Semkowicz, Paleografia lacinska (Latin Palaeography), Krakow 1951,
p.5.
21 M. Handelsman, Historyka (The Methodology of Historical Research),
Warszawa 1928, pp. 41 ff.
22 Heuristics is occasionally als'o described as an auxiliary historical science.
III. THE SCOPE OF THE SUBJECT MATTER (DOMAIN)
OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
1. Preliminary remarks
Further reflections on the methodology of history require a preliminary

orientation as to the scope of interests ascribed to the science of his-
tory. This refers to a general framework concerning which a general
consensus could always be obtained. This will outline the field for
detailed reflections on the subject matter of history.
As was the case of other disciplines, opinions on the domain of
historical research varied throughout centuries, so that even today they
may not be taken as final. Part Two of this book is concerned, i.a.
with an analysis of those changes. At present our task is narrower; to
outline the general boundaries of the subject matter of historical re-
search, so as to pvovide a point of reference for further reflections on
the subject matter of history, both in its historical (Part Two) and the-
oretical (Part Three) aspect. Two paths are to take us to our destina-
tion. First, we shall study the etymology and the semantic evolutions
of the term history, secondly, we shall analyse some of the definitions
of that term, as used by historians, philosophers of history, and method-
ologists. This will provide data for a precise definition of a modern
meaning of that term, as used in this book.
2. The etymology and the semantic evolution of the term history
In answering the question about the meaning of the term history, it is

very helpful to take into account the results of the etymological anal-
ysis. The term goes back to the Greek word historia, which means
inquiry, interview, interrogation of an eye-witness, and also reports on
the results of such actions. In Herodotus it occurs five times precisely
in this meaning.! Analogous examples are provided by Ephorus, the
author of Historia koinon praxeon. The analysis of other Greek texts,
beginning with those by Homer, made by F. Mtiller, leads to a similar
THE SCOPE OF THE SUBJECT MATTER OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 47
statement. MUller shows that in Old Greek texts the term historia has
three meanings: research and reporting on research; a poetic story; and
an exact description of facts.2 In addition to the term historia we also
find in Greek the word histor, which means a witness, a judge, a person
who knows, and also the word historea, interpreted as: to search, to
inquire, to examine. All these words are believed to be related to the
Indo-European stem vid, from which is derived video in Latin, voir
and savoir in French, wissen in German, widziee and wiedza in Polish,
videti in Czech, and a number of other words in many languages. s
From Greek, the term histaria passed to other languages, mainly
through the intermediary of Latin, gradually acquiring a more precise
meaning in the process. History, Histode, histoire, stoda, istoria, histo-
ria - these are some of the present-day forms of the word in question.
In classic Latin, historia still stands for the same thing as in Greek, so
that the stress is laid on direct observation, research, and the resulting
reports. This can oIearly be seen in the case of Tacitus, who not for-
tuitously used the term Historiae for reports on the times he observed
personally (69 to 96 A.D.), whereas his reports on the earlier period
(14 to 68 A.D.) are entitled annals (Annales). The translation of Taci-
tus' Historiae by dzieje (past events), which is common in Poland, is
of course inexact, since in antiquity, and even in the Middle Ages, the
term historia was not yet used to denote past events. Moreover, at that
time this term implied something static and not too extensive in time,
and was not confined to human actions (cf. Pliny's Historia naturalis).
This fact refl·ected the conviction that the knowledge of older times
could not have the same degree of precision as reslearch based on the
testimony of witnesses who spoke about known facts. Such inquiries
were believed impossible with reference to earlier periods, and even if
they were made, this was accompanied by the consciousness of a differ-
ence of situations, which was reflected in a differentiation of terms.
The term annals, and later chronicle, coined in antiquity, remained
in the Middle Ages the principal terms used to denote both a current
recording of remarkable facts and a narrative history writing. The med-
iaeval annals, and indirectly chronicles as well, were linked with the
Church practice of making paschal cycles and calendars (included in
breviaries and missals). The records made in the annals were inserted
in calendars and cycles. Terms such as annals and chronicles include
an element of time, which was missing in the Greek historia and was
scanty in Tacitus' relations and narratives (historiae). Under the impact
of a new approach to the past and the future the concept of history
could acquire a new meaning, but this required amalgamation of strictly
chronological chronicle writing and free historical narratives, which in
the Middle Ages were known as biographies, vitae (e.g., Vita Caroli
Magni by Einhard, 9th cent.) or events and deeds, gesta (e.g., Res ge-
stae Saxonicae by Widukind).
But until the end of the Middle Ages the term historia was used in
the specific meaning indicated above. If we bear in mind that in med-
iaeval Latin historiare was the same as narrare or dicere, then we find
it obvious that the term was used where a strict observance of a chrono-
logical structure, typical of annals and chronicles, was not intended.
We may not take into consideration such titles as Historia Gothorum
(Jordanes, 6th cent.), Historia Francorum (Gregory of Tours, 6th
cent.), or Historia Polonica (Poland's Dlugosz, 1455-80), since these
were usually added by later copyists and editors. But sometimes the
term historia (usually in the form historiae, as in Tacitus), was used
in fact. But in such cases the works in question are to be classed as
gesta, i.e., narratives, rather than chronicles in the strict sense of the
word. Gregory of Tours, the father of French historiography, probably
did not give any title at all to his work. In the first printed version,
dated 1512, that is some 800 years later than the date of origin, the
title is as follows: Gregorii Turonensis episcopi historiarum praecipue
Gallicarum lib. X. Historia Francorum appears only in the 1561 edi-
tion. Its author himself uses the term historiae (in the plural) when he
states in the conluding section that he wrote, among other things, ten
books of histories of Tacitus' type, but it is evident that he means
historical narratives of the gesta type.4 The same may be said about
Orosius (5th cent.), the author of Historiarum adversus paganos libri,
the most eminent historian in late antiquity (or the early Middle Ages)
next to Bede and Isidorus of Sevilla.
Dlugosz did not take the liberty to use the term historia, at that time
still not yet precise enough and devoid of a proper historical sense, and
entitled his work traditionally as Annales seu cronicae incUti Regni
Poloniae. It was only in S. Herburt's first edition, dated 1614 and not
based on the autograph version, that the term Historia Polonica was
THE SCOPE OF THE SUBJECT MATTER OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 49
used and came to be included in current language, but with a mark of

anachronism (the same appUes to the Polish translation Dzieje Polski).
The term historia, or rather historiae, apart from being used sporad-
ically to denote res gestae in general, was widely used in the Middle
Ages with reference to the "sacred" events described in the Old and
the New Testament.s The same holds for Polish literature written in
Latin. 6 There is no need to emphasize that the biblical history came
closer to vitae or gesta than to annals or chronicles. In the late Middle
Ages the Germanic languages developed a term of their own, which
corresponds to the Latin gesta or res gestae. The term in question has
its German form Geschichte (geschiedenes), which is derived from
geschehen, "to happen, to occur". In the Germanic languages this term
has 'evolved to become the principal and most comprehensive term for
history in the various senses of the latter word. In many other lan-
guages this role is played by historia, or its graphic and phonetic
variations.
In Polish, the term dzieje (past ,events) came more and more into use
to denote events outside the sphere of biblical history. This evolution
was completed in the late Middle Ages. A characteristic moment in
this evolution can be seen in the fusion of the mediaeval term roczniki
(annals) and later dzieje in such terms as dzieje roczne (events recorded
annually) (e.g., M. Kromer), and also koscielne dzieje roczne (Church
events recorded annually) (P. Skarga), although the term dzieje is
common as early as the 16th century (e.g., L. G6rnicki). Yet as late
at the 18th century, alongside historia, increasingly used from the 16th
century on, we find such terms as dziejopismo, dziejopisarstwo (history
writing) (e.g., A. Naruszewicz). The last-named term is in current
usage in Polish to this day.
In the 16th century the old annals and chronicles gradually faded
out, and historiae, i.e., historical narratives of the gesta and vitae type,
faced increasing critical requirements. Thus foundations arose for amal-
gamating all these trends and developing a fairly uniform type of
history writing, which evolved toward scientific history writing, and
giving it a necessarily common term of the Geschichte or the history
type. This term soon freed itself from mediaeval restrictions and cov-
ered within its scope both history itself and the process of its re-
construction by an appropriate narrative.
50 METHODOLOGY AND mSTORY
It is clear that in those languages which (like French) did not have
an equivalent of the term dzieje. the term of the history type (also in
Latin texts) had to become common earlier. Yet it is worth noting. by
way of example. that such authors as Bodin and Bruni (Historiarum
Florentini populi !ibri XII) and others used it still in the plural. The
change into the singular coincided with the emergence of the science of
history. Following that evolution some languages developed the opposi-
tion between dZl\!je and the like. on the one hand. and history. on the
other, whereas the other languages (which caused the French much
complaint) had to cover both meanings with one term.
The evolution of the term history is shown by the diagram below.
It can clearly be seen how in the Renaissance period the concepts of
history and Geschichte comes to link the two basic trends in 'the human
interest in past events. One of ,them was marked by the element of nar-
ration, which developed on the basis of the ancient mythography and
Zeitgeschichte. the mediaeval gesta, vitae. and "sacred" history and the
like; the other. based above all on mediaeval annals and Church chron-
icles and chorography, provided the time element, so important for
the development of history writing proper. Further evolution led to
a "clear distinction between history as past events and history as narra-
tion about past events. But the term history came to acquire its method-
ological aspect only when history writing became scientific.
The schema given below makes no strict chronological distinction
between antiquity and the Middle Ages. AU kinds of writings are treat-
ed jointly. even though it is common knowledge that, for instance. the
Greek Zeitgeschichte from Herodotus on, marked an immense step for-
ward as compared with Hekataios' genealogy (mythography) and local
chronicles like that of Charon of Lampsakos.
It must also be pointed out (which has not been indicated in the dia-
gram) that the various types of ancient works, which later one way or
another contributed to the more precise concept of history writing, also
gave rise to other disciplines (such as ethnography, geography, etc.).
3. General definitions of the subject matter of history (as a science)
What has been said in Sec. 2 shows that the apparently self-evident
opinion that interest in past events falls under 'the scope of history writ-
History in modern interpretation
Development of I
History as a set scientific method I

History as History as research procedure
past events for reconstruction of past events of statements in general
about past events ~
tIl
T ~
~
History as interpreted in the tIl
Age of Enlightenment Development of ~

historical ~
Historia rerum criticism tIl
Res gestae
gestarum
I
i ~~
History as interpreted in the a::
Renaissance period
(more precise narration about past events)
........ Spatio-temporal ........
~
o't1
elements
~
Mediaeval Geographical and
§
Historia Gesta Paschal tables,
Vitae annales and ethnographical ~
sacra (historiae) calendariography
chronicles descriptions ::>:1
tIl
U'l
tIl
I ~
Ij
Ancient Ancient Chorographical
:r:
Ancient Ancient Ancient
"Zeitgeschichte" annal writing and ethnographical
mythography biography chronography
(historia, (East, Israel, descriptions CJ1
writing
historiae) Greece, Rome) ......
ing, emerged gradually throughout the centuries. At first the term

historia was more strongly linked with present events as related by an
eye-witness, i.e., with the narration of history, than with the task of
reconstructing past events. It was only the consolidation of the belief
that history means recDnstruction of past events that laid foundations
fDr reflection on how these past events which are to be the object of
historians' interest ought to be comprehended.
It was agreed that research should cover all aspects of past events:
political, social, scientific, artistic, etc. On the whole, agreement was
also reached on the point that such past events are those of man, or,
in other words, human societies (as distinct from the world of nature).
These convergent dements can clearly be noticed in the definitions of
history contained in the numerous works quoted in this book. But
differences are noticeable, too. They pertain, however, not so much to
the scope of the subject matter of historical research as to the goals of
the science of history. But these issues will be discussed later.
E. Bernheim says that "history is a science of the development of
mankind",7 R. G. Collingwood states that historical research is con-
cerned with human actions in the past.s J. Huizinga formulates the same
idea so that he treats history as "the intellectual form in which a civili-
zation renders account to itself of its past". 9 According to R. Aron
history is the study of the human past,1o M. Bloch points to human
activities in the past,u L. Febvre emphasizes that history is concerned
not with man, but with human societies, with organized groupS.12 In
E. Callot's book we find a definition which also evaluates the science
of history: "History is a descriptive science which is concerned with
a given society as a whole in its temporal aspect".13 Some scholars refer
only tD "the past" (Y. H. Galbraith, K. Jaspers, and others).
K. Marx and F. Engels wrote (with reference to histDry understood
as past events) that "history is only the activity of a goal-oriented
man",14 which supports those definitions according to which history is
something more than just the scienoe of the past. In more expanded
definitions, with which we are not concerned now, attention - as has
been said earlier - is also drawn to the gDalS of the science of history.
The main divergences amDng them are due to differences of opinion as
to whether history is to inform about the regularities of the historical
process, or rest satisfied with a simple reporting of events. The answer
in the affirmative to the first questiDn obviously presupposes the assump-

tion that facts form a regular process.
To show that this type of definitions of history. namely definitions
which emphasize that history is concerned with social actions in the
past. belongs to' an advanced stage of that discipline's developments,
Dne can recall Voltaire's definition of history, which refers to other
issues of this science. issues which at that time were still coming to the
fore: "history is a narrative of facts adopted as true, as distinct from
a fable, which is a narrative of facts whch are untrue Dr fictitions" .15
In Voltaire's times the pDint was to' stress the necessity of separating
history from fables, which was then not self-evident to the average man
(even including SDme histDrians).
4. History as res gestae and history as historia rerum gestarum
Over the centuries the term history acquired at least two basic mean-
ings: (1) past events (res gestae), and (2) narrative about past events
(historia rerum gestarum). History as past events is in turn interpreted
in various ways. If the term is used without a modifier that wDuld
indicate its chronological or factual scope, then we may have to do
either with past events in general, interpreted as the totality of the
facts that took place in the past. or with an anthropomorphization of
that concept, manifested in statements which refer to "the verdicts of
history", "the punishing arm" of history, and the like. Since we imagine
past events always on the basis of what we know about them, the con-
tent which various persons (or groups of persons) associate with the
term history (as used to denote past events) may vary greatly, from
ideas inspired by science and those permeated with legends and myths.
The analysis of this issue is the subject matter of research on historical
consciDusness manifested by individuals and groups, hence on the role
of history as the sum of ideas about past events, and the conclusions
resulting therefrom.
The use of the term history with a modifier that indicates its scope,
e.g., the history of Poland, mediaeval history, the history of London.
the history of the labour movement, etc., shows clearly that the term
is used in the sense of past events.
The term history, when used in the sense of a narrative about past
events (historia rerum gestarum), has at least two meanings, which fact
is not always borne in mind. First, it may denote the research procedure
that reconstructs past events (science interpreted as the craft of the
scholars), and, secondly, the result of such a reconstruction in the foml
of a set of historians' statements about past events (science interpreted
as results of research). But in contemporary languages there is usually
a distinction between history as past events and history as science (or
knowledge), since alongside the term history the term historiogra-
phy (historigraphie, historiografia. storiografia, etc.) is also 'Used. In
German the analogous pair of terms is Geschichte versus Geschichts-
schreibung. This does not, however, undermine the general character
of the term history, since historiography has an auxiliary meaning only.
The latter is dominant only in the phrase the history of historiography,
and this as it seems, is largely due to euphonic reasons, namely the
avoidance of the phrase the history of history, as used by Popeliniere.
In French we can often encounter the contrasting Histoire with histoire,
where the term written with the capital H is reserved as a denotation
of past events. The one-sided meaning of the term historiography can
also be clearly felt in this connection, as it suggests only the effect of
historians' research, i.e., the outcome of their writing. This holds also
for the historiographia as used in Greek. 16 It does not point to any
research procedure. Perhaps this is why the term historiography has
not fund universal application, were it even in its narrower sense. The
tendency to use the 'Uniform term history, be it even at the cost of
a certain lack of clarity, is obvious.
The suggested distinction seems self-evident: when using the term
history we may mean the research process alone. In Hegel's well-known
division into res gestae and historia rerum gestarum,12 which later
spread in science, not all was olear, and the issue became intricate only
at a later date. In those interpretations historia rerum gestarum stands
for historical narration. It is not well known how far we might include
in it the content associated with research procedure itself, i.e., science
interpreted as activity. This problem emerges only with the develop-
ment of the scientific method of historical research (19th cent.), when
the passing from past events to a narrative about those events became
more intricate as it had to satisfy increasingly rigorous conditions of
source criticism and the precision of narration. This was mainly an
achievement of positivism, which wanted to raise history to the level

of a true science. The concept of 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,
i.e., history as the result of a historian's wmk. When the term history
is used in this meaning, it is usually accompanied by a modifier which
describes its scope; we say, for instance, a history of the French Revo-
lution, a history of Florence, a history of capitalism. The interpretation
of the term history as a research procedure does not here come into
question, but such terms as economic history, military history, history
of material culture, etc., to some extent suggest the procedure used to
reconstruct past events in the sphere of economics, military art and
operations, material culture, etc. Thus, economic history stands for both
past events in the sphere of economics and the discipline concerned
with those past events, interpreted as a research procedure and a set of
statements about those past events.
We have thus singled out three basic meanings of the term history:
history as past events, history as research operations carried out by
a historian, and history as a result of such researoh operations, i.e.,
a set of statements about past events. In the last two senses we refer to
history as a scientific discipline. This interpretation of history has, as
mentioned above, evolved gradually following the development of
reflection on past events and the development of the discipline whioh
is to reconstruct those events.
The classification of fields of interest of the methodology of history,
as adopted above, is a counterpart of these three interpretations of
history. Each branch of methodology is concerned with one of these
interpretations.
REFERENCES
1 J. Wikarjak, Historia powszechna Herodota (Herodotus' Universal History),
Poznan 1961, p. 5. See also J. Dobias, Dejepisectvi v staroveke (Ancient Histo-

riography), Praha 1948, pp. 86-7.
2 F. Muller, De "historiae" vocabulo atque notione, Mnemosyne vol. 43,
1926, pp. 234-57, in particular, p. 246. See also K. Keuck, Historia. Geschichte
des Wortes und seiner Bedeutung in der Antike und in den romanischen Spra-
chen, Munster 1934.
8 Cf. H. J. Marrou, Qu'est-ce-que l'histoire. L'histoire et ses methodes, Paris
1961, pp. 3 if; R. Jolivet, Definition et se-ns de l'histoire. L'Homme et ['histoire,

Paris 1952; 1. Dobias, Dejepisectvi v staroveke, pp. 86-7.
4 Cf. Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Scripta res rerum Merovingicarum,
vol. I, part 1, Hannover 1884.
5 Du Cange, Glossarium mediae et infimae latinitatis, vol. III, Niort 1884,
pp.209-10.
6 Cf. Siownik staropolski (The Dictionary of Old Polish), vol. II, Wroclaw-
Krak6w-Warszawa 1959, No. 7(13), p. 54. The only source quoted is Rozmysla-
nia przemyskie (przemysl Meditations); the term has apparently not been found
in other sources covered by the study.
7 E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der historischen Methode und der Geschichtsphilo-
sophie, Leipzig 1908 (5th and 6th ed.), p. 10. "Die Geschichte ist eine Wissen-
schaft von der Entwicklung der Menschen."
8 R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, London 1961, p. 9.
9 J. Huizinga, A Definition of the Concept of History. Philosophy of History,
Oxford 1936, p. 9. Quoted after A. Stem, Philosophy of History and the Prob-
lem of Values, Oxford 1956, p. 17.
10 R. Aron, Introduction a la philosophie de l'histoire, Paris 1938, p. 17.
11 M. Bloch, Apologie pour l'histoire ou metier d'historien, Paris 1949, p. 4.
12 Cf. E. Callot, Ambiguites et antinomies de l'histoire, Paris 1962, p. 107,

"( ...) pas l'homme, jamais l'homme ( ...) les societes humaines, les groupes
organisees."
is Ibid., p. 106. "L'histoire, disons-nous, est la science descriptive de la
societe tout entiere sous l'angle au temps."
14 K. Marx, F. Engels, Die heilige Familie, Berlin 1953, p. 210. "Die Ge-
schichte - Zwecke durchzuarbeiten, sondern sie ist nichts als die Tatigkeit des
seine Zwecke verfolgenden Menschen."
15 Cf. A. Stem, Philosophy of History and the Problem of Values, The
Hague 1962, p. 18. "L'histoire est Ie recit des faits donnees pour vrais, au con-
traire de la fable qui est Ie cecit des faits donnes pour faux ou fictifs."
18 Cf. F. Jacoby, Ueber die Entwicklung der griechischen Historiographie
und den Plan einer neuen Sammlung der griechischen Historikerfragmente, Klio,
vol. IX, Leipzig 1909, p. 96, footnote 1.
17 It would be to the point to recall J. Lelewel's reflections from 1818. He
wrote that "the word historia is taken in its various meanings. It denotes both
events and narratives, that is, the noting down of such events. The Polish word
dzieje seems to correspond to events to be spoken about, and it may also replace
the meaning of the word historia ( ...) events (dzieje) expounded in this (Le.,
scholarly - J. T.) way usually bear the august name of history in its most exalted
and noblest sense. Except for the German language, which in this sense uses the
word Geschichte, all other European languages adopt the Greek word historia,
without any further interpretation. The Polish language can also accept it
readily." (J. Lelewel, Dziela (Collected Works), vol. II, part 2, Warszawa 1964,
p. 871.)
PART TWO
PATTERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH

GROUNDS FOR CLASSIFICATION
As has been rightly said by L. Geymonat,l already quoted above,

methodological research on science cannot be conducted if it does not
include "the historical dimension". Any methodological analysis, let us
emphasize once more, which does not take this viewpoint into account
cannot yield sufficiently comprehensive conclusions as to the language
of a given discipline and the problems of that discipline, nor can it
suggest any means of solving such problems. It is only when we grasp
a given discipline as a historical whole, i.e., when we treat it as a system
that is undergoing incessant changes, that we can realize the dialectics
of its development and the problems which are specific to it. This will
also bring out the development trends of that discipline. It we come
to know them as they find their manifestation in the goal aimed at
(more or less consciously) by scholars, then we can consider what that
goal, as reconstructed by us, has made or makes possible to attain, and
what hampers its attainment.
When it comes to history, the problem outlined above can be in-
vestigated in two aspects:
(1) research practice of the historians (in the sense of research pro-
cedures and results obtained);
(2) reflections on that research practice.
Thus we may deal both with how the historians have investigated the
subject matter of their discipline and what results (that are of method~
logical interest) they obtained, and with the study of what they have
thought of that discipline as such.
In the latter case, methodologists are, of course, interested not only
in opinions of historians, but equally in ,the opinions of philosophers,
sociologists, methodologists, and possibly representatives of other
disciplines as well. This is so because the historians' reflections on their
research were usually confined to heuristics and source criticism, with
a special stress on, research techniques.
If we combine this conclusion with the classification of the branches
60 PAITERNS OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH
of the methodology of history, we may say that as far as the history

of the science of history is concerned methodologists are interested in:
(a) what the opinions on the subject matter (domain) of historical
research (its scope and characteristic features) were;
(b) how that subject-matter was studied and what was thought about
that issue;
(c) what was thought about the research results obtained.
Instead of discussing these points one by one it seems more appro-
priate to bring out certain patterns of historical research that were
dominant in various epochs, and the related methodological reflections.
We adopt the goal ascribed to historical research2 to be the criterion of
distinction as between the various types of reflection (the term reflec-
tion covering both the pattern of research and opinions about it). The
instruments of research were subordinated to this goal, and, on the
other hand, both those instruments and the very formulation of the
goal depended on what was believed to be the subject matter of re-
search. Thus the adoption of the goal as the criterion of distinction
between the various patterns of historical research makes it possible
to describe those patterns in a synthetic manner.
We can evaluate the various patterns of historical research by taking
into consideration either the goaJs which guide that research within
a given pattern or the goals which were formulated by the science of
history only as that discipline was developing. Hence certain actions,
quite rational in the light of a given pattern, may prove quite irrational
when confronted with a goal formulated at a later stage. These two
viewpoints are not always distinguished clearly enough; on the other
hand, both should be considered jointly.
, Even though, to put it in a most general way, the various patterns of
histOrical research changed throughout the centuries, and one of them
always became dominant on a broader scale, none of them would ever
vanish completely, as they all would find supporters and conditions for
revival. There would not be much exaggeration in the statement that
the number of those patterns kept increasing along with the develop-
ment of the science of history. At a given moment, the scientifically
most ambitious one would become the standard of evaluation for obso-
lescent or reviving patterns. Each pattern would contribute definite
values to historical research. The next one, even if it often developed
GROUNDS FOR CLASSIFICATION 61
as the denial of its predecessor, would avail itself at least of the techni-
cal achievements of the latter. Sometimes, when a given pattern was
still dominant, eminent forerunners of new solutions would appear and
formulate new goals. These forerunner include, for instance, Ibn Khal-
dun, whose ideas we find remarkable even today, and Karl Marx, the
author of the most advanced pattern of historical research. New pat-
terns or expansions of existing ones were formulated, among others, by
L. Valla, Voltaire, L. Ranke, and H. Berr.
It appears that the goals set to historical research can be reconstruct-
ed as follows. s Antiquity and a large part of the Middle Ages were
dominated by the practical (pragmatic) goal of historical writing. The
ancients did not set history the formulation of true statements about
the past as its main task, and thus saw it not as a science, but as
a form of practical, life· oriented activity. As J. M. Finley has aptly
demonstrated, in Greece up to the close of the 6th century B.C. the
dominant form in which the historical consciousness of the Greeks was
manifested was the myth, but the myth was expressed by poetry, and
not by history writing. Homer's heroes did not act in any temporal
dimension whatever,4 and the epic did not have anything in common
with a historical description. It was only the political development of
the Greek polis that stimulated the transition from myths and oral
tradition to historical literature.5 To win its place under the sun an-
cient history writing, not in Greece alone, had to vie with poetry. The
point was that poetry had to be deprived of its heretofore exclusive
function of formulating general statements and of its mission of stating
vital truths that sum up the experience of mankind. Adages concerned
with practical wisdom were at that time in fact to be found in poetry
rather than in nascent historiography. Hence Aristotle8 was right when,
from the standpoint of the theory of science, he ranked poetry, and
especially tragedy, higher than history. At that time descriptions of past
events were dominated by narratives of single and separate facts, and
no attempts were made to probe into the causes of events and to eval-
uate the latter. Herodotus' famous statement which opens his Histories
apodexis points to the undertaking by emergent history writing of the
task of describing past events so that they be not forgotten, of finding
out the causes of a given turn of events and of evaluating the past. 7
This was more than poetry could provide, since this included accuracy
62 PA1TERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
in the reporting of facts and a causal analysis. 8 Poetry was to continue

satisfying aesthetic needs, even through vying with poetry made histo-
rians strive for proper formulations of their statements. Some of them
would go so far as to obliterate the difference between a poetic and
a historical description. This led to discussions about the limits of
dramatization permitted in historical descriptions. 9 A distinction was
made between "tragical" and "rhethorical" history. Some historians,
such as Thucydides, opposed "poetic" history that had mainly aesthetic
tasks in view. 10 On the whole, Greek historiogmphy strove tQ put into
effect those principles which Aristotle had codified for the tragedy, by
trying to bring out - through descriptions and explanations of human
actions - conclusions to be drawn from the past. l l Hence it is not a co-
incidence that all great historical workS in antiquity, those by Thucy-
dides (probably the greatest of all), Timaios, Polybius, Salustius, and
Tacitus, were in fact political essays, introductions to politics (as Thu-
cydides' work has been termed by F. Chatelet), concerned with events
contemporary with their authors, and abounding with appropriate
precepts.12 Introducing various concepts from political life they were
also models of historical narration.
Thus, historical science was born out of a conflict with poetry. Late
into the Middle Ages, when works that could vie with those of Thucy-
dides and Tacitus were no longer available, epic poetry replaced or
assisted feeble historiography. The tasks of historical narration were, as
has been mentioned above, formulated at the very beginning of that
conflict. To assume the role of magistra vitae was at that time the only
possibility of development of historical writings. It was still too early
to demand that historical narration state the truth and to see in this its
task. Hence the pragmatic model of history writing was the only way
out, and this is why Herodotus is not in vain called the father of
historiography, at least in the European culture area.
The scanty tradition of writing annals and chronicles needed cen-
turies, as has been mentioned previously, to contribute to historical nar-
ration the consciousness of new tasks. But the origins of historical
science are to be looked for elsewhere.
The new model of history writing was shaped laboriously and over
many centuries. Gradually, however, the search for the truth about the
past comes to be formulated as the main task of historiography, thus
replacing the task of providing moral precepts. Information about the

past was being studied critically, hence this new model of history writ-
ing is termed critical. Formulation of true statements, so emphatically
stressed by 17th century savants,13 becomes the task avowed - as the
principal one - by all historians, who henceforth consider the reproach
of untruth as the greatest insult.
This new task of history writing did not, of course, put an end to
old pragmatism. We could even reflect whether not to shift the caesura
between the epoch of the pragmatic model and that of the critical mod-
el, say, from Valla (where we still place it) to Gibbon. Niebuhr. and
Ranke, because the pragmatic tendencies not only stayed on, but often
dominated, over a long period. But once the truth transformed itself
from its pupa-like existence in antiquity into the imago, seen by all, the
birth of the new model of history writing must be taken for granted.
From that moment on the still non-extinct pragmatic principles were
being propagated under different conditions; the admission of the fact
that the primary goal of history writing was the search for the truth had
by then become universal. Hence the assessment of that new pragma-
tism, and also of all later forms of pragmatism, must be different; it
must depend on whether a given pragmatic attitude makes the discovery
of the truth more difficult, or not, or perhaps even makes it easier. But
let this rule not induce us to assess wrongly the work of ancient histo-
rians. The fact that the main goal of their narratives was practical does
not imply that they spread false statements. If a person strives to make
history writing serve practical purposes this is not tantamount to his
disguising the truth. Although it is sometimes forgotten, Cicero linked
his famous adage stating that historia magistra vitae with the recom-
mendation that the historian should strive for lumen veritatis and be-
ware of falsehoods.
When the model of historical research emerged, controversies began
over the meaning of the discovery of the truth. Since too little was
known about the subject matter of historical research, that new model
of historical study was based on weak foundations, and there were only
too many ideas of the truth that was to be discovered. In the first
period of the prevalence of that new model in Europe at least four
such ideas could be singled out: two of them Church-oriented (Roman
Catholic and Protestant), one court-oriented, and one "learned". i.e.
64 PATTERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
originating from the historians dominated by the ideas of the respublica

docta.
The image of the past events. obtained in this way. could not be
easily confronted with anything. This was noticed by such thinkers as
Voltaire. Turgot. Coooorcet. Montesquieu, and Herder. who called for
an expansion of historical research and introduced into history a num-
ber of general concepts drawn from the evolution of human societies.
We can see the starting point of these strivings in the renowned La
Siecle de Louis XIV (1756) by Voltaire, who was also the author of
the entry History in the Encyclopedie. The critical model of historical
research gave rise to two trends: the eruditional (which stressed the
need of accumulation of data about the past) and the philosophical (as
termed by Hegel), which stressed the intention of finding out regularities
in past events; this was to be achieved by making use. in historical re-
search. of the general knowledge about society. and was. of course.
being done with a view to discovering the truth.
The eruditional trend at first had the upper hand. It emphasized the
need of broadening the historian's research techniques so that he would
be able to accumulate the most comprehensive knowledge of the sub-
ject matter of his study. This was to be, first of all. a knowledge of facts.
though bold synthesizing ideas were not lacking. either. The concept
of nation, which drew attention to the necessity of studying the past
of a given people, served as an important motive power of that re-
search. Historians. whether factographers or synthesis-writers. were
united by one and the same dominant striving for accumulating infor-
mation about past events (mainly of their respective nations), and this
is why they may be classed as representatives of the same eruditionaI
trend. Old savants were also amassing facts. but that was the period
when they had to bear in mind. above all. that they must have the
truth in view. When two centuries later the same was being said by
Ranke. the striving for the truth had by then been an old maxim (al-
though it had to be repeated even then, and in later epochs, too). and
the new goal was seen in finding preferably many facts.
The eruditional pattern had its highest achievement in genetic reflec-
tion. i.e., paying attention to the need of linking established facts into
chronological sequences. On the whole. the eruditional pattern in its
as it were Romantic. its positivist (genetically-oriented) and its "art
collector's" variations attached vast importance to facts. (The qualifica-

tion as it were Romantic is advisable because of the inexact nature of
the term.) But the facts were always too few. Each study opened up
new, unexplored areas. The novel element which was the stress laid by
some historians (e.g., H. T. Buckle) on the need of looking for regu-
larities in past events was, as we shall see, little related to analysis of
facts because of its specific interpretation of regularities.
The growing tendency toward an integrated approach to the subject
matter of study, i.e., toward revealing the whole structure of that sub-
ject matter of historical research, was a reaction to the eruditional-ge-
netic pattern of research. This helped intensify the various tendencies
toward integration of historical study and resulted in a new type of
reflection on historical research and in a new pattern of such research,
which might be termed structural.
The dialectical pattern of historical research set itself even more
ambitious tasks. It comprised all achievements of earlier and contem-
porary trends in historiography, which it integrated by making the
study of the development of society the primary task of historical re-
search. It was only in this pattern that the category of development was
introduced into the science of history to replace the Cartesian concept
of progress. The study of development means the integration of the
genetic and the structural approaoh. This makes it possible to eliminate
those factors which stand outside the process of history (the deity, the
spirit of the nation, progress interpreted in terms of the concept of the
law of nature, geographic and racial factors interpreted in a determin-
istic way, etc.). The dialectical pattern of historical research presup-
poses, however, extensive knowledge which would make it possible to
study simultaneously both the structure and the changes in time.
Each of these patterns gave as a result its own type of historical
narration. The structure of that narration was changing as historical
research was developing, i.e., as historiography was being set new tasks.
The foundations of historical narration were shaped, on the whole, at
the time when the first two patterns prevailed.
REFERENCES
1 L. Geymonat, Filosofia e filosofia della scienza, p. 196 (Polish translation).
2 Interpretation of that goal, as has been stated acco'rding to K. Ajdukiewicz
(Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., p. 188) is iIi the sphere of pragmatic methodology,
that is, a bran<:h of methodology which is very often discussed together with
apragmatic methodology.
3 This classification is not made from the point of view of the history of
historiography, and hence does not coincide with it on some points.
4 J. M. Finley, "Myth, Memory and History", History and Theory, IV 1965,
pp. 281-302.
5 This fact is pointed to by J. M. Finley in his paper quoted above.
6 Aristotle's opinion has been analysed by many authors. See in this connec-
tion R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, New York 1956, p. 24; F. J. Teg-
gart, Theory and Processes of History, Berkeley 1941, p. 7; E. Nagel, "Some
Issues in the Logic of Historical Analysis", Theories of History, Glencoe, I, 11,
1959, p. 373; M. J. Finley, "Myth, Memory and History", pp. 281-2.
7 This meant the formulation of the basic types of research procedures as
used by historians. The fact is emphasized by A. Stern, "L'irreversibilite de
l'histoire", Diogene, No. 20/1960, pp. 3-19. On Herodotus see F. Chatelet, La
naissance de I' histoire, Paris 1962, pp. 55-95.
8 Diogene, No. 29/1960, p. 18; see also J. Dobias, op. cit., p. 120, footnote 1.
9 Cf. E. Bernheim, op. cit., p. 26.
10 Ibid., p. 27.
11 The fact was pointed to by K. Fritz, "Die Bedeutung des Aristoteles fUr
die Geschichtsschreibung", Histoire et historiens dans ['antiquite, Vandoeuvres-

Geneve 1956, pp. 85 if, in particular p. 156.
12 There is a tendency to link the turning point in historical research (that
is, the shaping of a new pattern of research) with the activity of 17th century
representatives of the erudite approach. Their activity is in this connection
treated as part of the so-called scientific revolution in the 17th century (cf.
H. Butterfield and F. Smith-Fussner). This interpretation is based on many
simplifications. The difficulty of pinpointing "the moment when a turning point
begins" has been stressed by M. H. Serejski, Przeszlosc a terazniejszosc (The
Past and the Present), ed. cit., pp. 31-2.
13 My attention to this other aspect of Cicero's principle has been drawn by
M. H. Serejski (personal communication).

IV. PRAGMATIC REFLECfION
1. Antiquity
The habitual linking of the origin of pragmatism, i.e., the idea of

ascribing practical tasks to history writing, with the names of Polybius
and even Thucydides is not correct, because, as J. Dobias has shown,
writing history with the intention of providing recommendations for,
and evaluations of, public and private activities can be traced back,
in its nuclear form, to Hittite (14th cent. B.C.) and Hebrew historio-
graphy (the latter connected with the editing of the Old Testament).!
The term pragmatikos is due in fact to Polybius (2nd cent. B.c.), but
all the writings of Thucydides (5th cent. B.C.), the founder of political
historiography, writings intended to instruct statesmen, were already
marked by advanced pragmatism.! The fact that the Muse of history
was called Clio testifies to the early domination of Greek historiography
by pragmatism, which has been stressed on other occasions.3 The name
Clio presumably comes from kleio, "to glorify, to worship". This
opinion regarding the goals of history writing came to mark historio-
graphy for a long time, thus determining the tasks of any historian
conscious of his role, even though such historian, as Polybius, believed
that history could be written otherwise for the "sages", i.e., without
faith and the fear of gods (deisdaimonia).
Although pragmatically-oriented historians were setting themselves
the task of looking for the causes of events, and, in practice, of human
actions, which is often believed to be the characteristic feature of
pragmatic historiography, yet their actual achievements in that respect
were rather small. Looking for causes has, nevertheless, since become
an element of historical narration. Divine intervention and providence
was pointed to in antiquity (cf. Herodotus) as it later was in the Middle
Ages, but the role of man (individual) as a factor in history, an in-
dividual whose actions were all the time being evaluated (cf. Thucy-
dides), was stressed much more strongly than it was in the Middle
68 PATIERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
Ages; in antiquity this meant abandoning myths in favour of thinking

in historical tenns. Polybius, one of the greatest ancient historians,
superior to many others in his methodological sense, though otherwise
very controversial, eliminated supernatural factors from his analysis as
he thought that by referring to such factors we merely try to conceal
our ignorance. In line with its humanistic approach Greek and Roman
historiography gave priority among natural factors to individual actions,
but also noted to some degree the effect on man of the environment,
mainly climate.'
In the final analysis, so far as the problem of explanation is concern-
ed, antiquity advanced several factors that would explain past events.
The first place was given to activities of an individual influenced by
his natural environment, i.e., the psychological motives of such activi-
ties (interpreted statically); the divine factor was also emphasized in
varying degrees. On the other hand, reflections on the concept of cause
are not to be found in ancient historiography. As the concept of
development in history was not yet comprehended, no explanations of
that mechanism were undertaken. Only the concept of change came to
be included in the basic repertory of the categories of historical con-
structions. Although narration includes description, explanation, and
evaluation, the structural framework of such narration, namely reference
to time and space, was only in its nascent stage.
Ancient Greek and Roman historians were not as good at coping
with time as were later their mediaeval colleagues. They may even be
said to have moved backward, because the Egyptians and the Babylo-
nians, noted for their achievements in astronomy, knew how to meas-
ure time better than did the Greeks and the Romans, whose chrono~
logical problems ended only with the introduction of the Julian calendar
in 46 B.c. 5 The Egyptians also had a better sense of the lapse of
time.
In Herodotus, time and space as elements arranging descriptions and
helping to produce complete historical statements did not play any
major role. He tried to introduce temporal sequence of events and dat-
ing, but his dating was based on different systems (such as the reigns of
Persian kings, etc.), and thus resulted in an asynchronic approach. It
was only He11ianicos ·of Mytilene (c. 479 to c. 395 B.c.), the founder
of Greek chronography, who tried to unify the basis of historical dating
PRAGMATIC REFLECTION 69
by referring to the list of Hera's priestesses at Argos. Further attempts

(by referring to the chronology of the Olympic Games) are due to
Timaios of Taormina (c. 355-340 to c. 245-200 B.C.), and especially
to Eratosthenes of Cyrene (c. 275 to 195 B.C.). But there was, on the
whole. no clear approach to chronology till the very end of the an-
cient period.
It is emphasized that the Romans had, on the whole, a more de-
veloped sense of the passage of time than the Greeks had; the latter
were marked by an earlier and more comprehensive reflection on space. 6
But, as was also in the case of time, that reflection was not philoso-
phical in nature: it was rather technical, intended to arrange narration
and to make it more precise. In this connection let us note above all
Hekataios of Miletus (the turn of the 6th cent. B.C.), the maker of the
Map of the World (Ges periodes) and the author of geographical de-
scriptions, who in his Periegesis for the first time drew a demarcation
line between Europe and Asia, and thus initiated this trend in histor-
ical writing. From that moment on we see that the sense of space be-
comes rooted in Greek and Roman historiography. The works of
Eratosthenes, which helped demarcate and comprehend space, were
a major attainment. In the final analysis, the weakness of chronological
reflection, perpetuated by the idea of "eternal returns" which was
strongly developed in Greek philosophy, was linked with a weak sense
of change in history and, on the other hand, its continuity. This com-
ment is not to be exaggerated, because even in Homer we can notice
a sense of unity between the past and the presenU
In ancient philosophy, the very concept of change and motion is
manifested visibly, for instance in Aristotle, but it hardly ever pene-
trates historiography. It is also worth adding that, for all the advance
made by mediaeval historiographers in sensing the passage of time,
ancient historiographers indicated changes in the past more strongly
than did mediaeval ones, since the latter were mainly concerned with
patterns, and hence with invariable elements. In ancient historiography
such patterns were more flexible and more closely connected with
human actions, even though human beings had their destinies deter-
mined by fate, which was in the hands of gods.
The foregoing comments pertained to the reflection of the ancients
on the method of describing the past. As we have seen, they reflected
on the desirable aesthetic values of such a description, its social role.

the necessity of the most comprehensive possible causal interpretations,
and the ordering of descriptions from the point of view of time and
space. They also dealt with the necessity of being objective and of
striving for the truth (Polybius).
For all the omnipotence of methodological individualism, which
dominated ancient historiography, we also find traces of synthetic ap-
proaches, which, however, paid too little attention to the causes of the
differences in the situations of the various peoples, even if the first steps
in that direction were made. This applies above all to Roman historio-
graphy, developed against the background of the political expansion
of Rome, which took into account universal history, without which the
history of Rome could not be understood. In Greek historiography, the
first place from this point of view goes to Hellianicos of Mytilene, the
author of a universal history and several monographs, according to
H. I. MarrouS underrated as a historian. At a later period the tendency
toward comprehensive approaches can be seen in many historians,
among them above all Poseidonius (135 to 50 B.c.).
There was, however, much less reflection on historical cognition it-
self, i.e., on the source-based foundations of narration, although the
ancients (for instance Thucydides) had in practice largely mastered
heuristics and many methods of reconstructing the past. This neces-
sarily resulted - for all the lack of theoretical studies - in the develop-
ment of practical heuristics. The progress in that field can be seen from
the fact that Herodotus, in contrast to logographers, to some extent
did reveal his sources. This, however, was not the rule; precise as he
was, even Tacitus did not quote his sources.9 On the whole there was
no climate conducive to collecting and investigating sources. Historians
did not care about collecting sources and safeguarding them; they
would make use of those testimonies which they encountered, and even
that they would do in a manner which was literary rather than schol-
arly. This general assessment is not refuted by certain exceptions, in
particular Aristotle's inductive approach and his recommendation to
collect data about facts. All this was due to the circumstance that the
scholarly approach to past events could still hardly be found, and the
same applies to the Middle Ages. The critical sense toward the sources
can be seen already in the elements of a rational interpretation of old
myths when treated as sources, elements which we find in the Genea-

logia of Hekataios of Miletus (see above). But later, even though con-
scientiousness in the study of the sources increased historians failed to
come forth with their external and internal criticism.
2. The Middle Ages
In the final analysis the Middle Ages inherited from antiquity, as far as
the historical method was concerned, certain elements of the theory of
historical description, and above all immense practical experience in
history writing marked by high aesthetic values. But that practical ex-
perience was not used properly and it was only in the late mediaeval
period, under the impact of humanism, that European historiography
achieved the old level of narration, careful about its form, but more
precise as to the arranging of the subject matter in time and space.
Reflection on time also represented the main strength of mediaeval
thought both concerning the philosophy of history and the techniques
of history writing. For the Christians time is clearly oriented: from
the creation of the world to the last judgement. In antiquity, especially
for the Greeks, time had no direction and was running cyclically. The
change in the opinion on time in the Middle Ages had to reflect on the
ways of interpreting past events. The most important for history writing
was the introduction by Aurelius Augustinus (St. Augustine, A.D. 354-
430) of the interpretation of the past as a sequence of certain epochs
each of which was a realization of a specified divine aim. The linear
interpretation of events was reinforced by christological conceptions (the
epochs of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost), and later the di-
vision, introduced by Joachim de Fiore (12th cent.), into epochs (status)
and periods (aetates), marked by successive generations and sometimes
also by the activities of prominent personalities, such as John the
Baptist, Constantine the Great, etc. Reference to this will later be made
by Bossuet (1627-1704), and still later by philosophers in the Age of
Enlightenment, who permeated these conceptions with secular ele-
ments.
In mediaeval historical practice advances in time measurement were,
for the time being, much more important. Alongside the earlier achieve-
ments of the chronographers Sextus Julius Africanus (3rd cent.) and
72 PATTERNS OF msTORICAL RESEARCH
Eusebius of Caesarea (4th cent.)10 the foundations were laid by the

eminent Church historian, the Venerable Bede (c. 673 to 735), author
of De Temporum Ratione, by his work on the paschal tables that
served to compute the dates of Easter. Bede noticed the growing dis-
crepancy between the astronomical year and the year of the Julian
calendar and thus initiated the study of a calendar reform, which ulti-
mately took place only in the 16th century with the introduction of the
Gregorian calendar and which, anyway, the Church initially obstructed.
Of the greatest practical importance, however, was his paschal table in
which time was counted from the birth of Christ. This method of com-
putation was created by the Roman monk called Dionysius the Short
(6th cent.), but Bede was the first to introduce Dionysius' method into
historiography. Bede's work and those by later Christian computists
contributed to the unification of the chronological system used in
mediaeval historical writing in Europe. This holds, however, only for
the annals and chronicles (in the strict sense of these terms), since the
authors of those works which were more narrative or epic in character
(we have in mind the period up to the 12th century). such as the gesta.
did not attach so much importance to chronological precision, as they
focused their attention on the most colourful and instructive possible
descriptions of events. It may be said generally, though not too pre-
cisely. that the former trend was more connected with Church centres
(cloisters and chapters), whereas the latter represented rather court-
oriented historical writing.
Reflection on the element of space. which directed historians' at-
tention toward differences between territories and peoples, and hence
called for explanations of such differences. became more pronounced
in the Middle Ages. On the other hand, great attainments in the field
of geography were due to Arabs, such as Al Mussudi (10th cent.) and
Ibn Khaldun (14th cent.), probably the greatest mediaeval travellers.
helped in this respect by the relative unity of the Moslem worldY Their
works did not, however. affect Christian authors.
It is not to be wondered, therefore. that for all its improvement of
the precision of descriptions Christian historiography did not show any
progress in reflections on the causes of differences and changes. The
strong ancient humanistic trend in presenting past events combined,
however personalistically. the sources of changes with human actions.
In the Christian Middle Ages that trend was weakened greatly. In-
dividualism gave place to universalism; man became an instrument in
the hands of God who assigns history its goal and ensures the world
his divine protection. while man himself is not in a position to make
any essential changes in the world. This interpretation of events must
have resulted in a definite methodological attitude toward the descrip-
tion of those events. The observance in descriptions of the temporal
sequence of events made historians search for a causal ne:x:us. but omni-
present pragmatism, on the other hand, made them look in past events
for patterns that ultimately come from God, and thus blocked the way
of explanatory procedures, both in respect to the factors accounting for
changes and reflections on the very concept of causation in history.
Some progress in historical explanations went to the credit of Arab
historiographers. but they, too. lacked the category of historical de-
velopment.
Mediaeval historiography was pragmatic both in its Church version
(implementation of Christian ideas) and in its lay version (service to
monarchs and states). which. however. following a stronger domination
of intellectual life by religious elements had more far-reaching effects
than it had in antiquity concerning the selection of facts, and hence
manysidedness and relative objectivity of approach. On the other hand.
however. Christian universalism contributed to the development of uni·
versalist trends in historiography that strove to grasp the whole of the
past in the broadest possible geographical context. even though the
adoption of the all-explaining divine factor did not direct attention to
other factors that could account for differences and changes. Examples
can be found in the works of Orosius (mentioned previously), Otto of
Friesingen (12th cent.). and Martin of Opava (Troppau). called Martin
the Pole. author of The Chronicle of Popes and Emperors (13rd cent.).
Hence. for all the tendencies to integral approaches, the lack of re-
flections on the concepts of difference. change. and development pre-
vented a transformation of the basically compilatory mediaeval chron-
icle-writing. It is obvious that even most precise use of time and space
as elements of description does not suffice for that description to be-
come a coherent picture. That requires advanced reflection on explain-
ingdifferences in situations, changes in time. and development; such
explanations can result only from an exploratory approach to past
74 PAITERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
events, and that approach was non-existant in the Middle Ages, as it

also had been in antiquity.
But descriptions could be improved by being based. on the most
reliable possible foundations. The Middle Ages, especially in Byzantine
and Arab historiography, did mark some progress in the analysis of
sources. But, if we concentrate on Christian literature, that criticism
was extremely shy. It was due to certain advances in heuristics, at-
tention paid to the gathering of sources, and a more careful and more
complete documentation of descriptions. That progress was parallel to
a marked broadening of the intellectual horizon of the upper strata of
society, connected with the development of urban culture and univer-
sity life, and with a certain evolution of views on the tasks of history.
Demand was growing for works that would be laic in nature and en-
gaged politically no less than they would be religiously. The point was
to have works that would correspond to the manifestation of growing
national patriotism; traditional annals and hagiography, based on weak
heuristic foundations and at that time already declining, could not rise
to the occasion. The trend began in the 11th and 12th centuries both
in Western Europe and in Russia (in the latter case under the impact
of Byzantine historiography), but it gained momentum later to find its
culminating point in the 15th century.
In Poland the striving to write a great national chronicle was mani-
fested in the 14th cent. in the form of Cronica Magna seu Longa Po-
lonorum, which seems to have been a result of preparatory (heuristic,
work done probably by Janko of Czarnk6w12 that had the writing of
a national history in view.18 The idea was put into effect by Jan Dlu·
gosz. His Annales testify to a considerable progress in heuristic tech-
niques, even if we bear in mind that Dlugosz was one of the most emi-
nent historians of his times. J. D~browski claims that in the epoch in
which Dlugosz was active "no historian in Europe could equal him,
not to say surpass him".14 He also claims that even the first humanist
writers, including the famous Enneas Silvius Piccolomini, did not pro-
duce any work that could vie with Dlugosz's, although his was still
written in the spirit of Church pragmatism. In making use of sources
Dlugosz showed a tendency to base his conclusions on the most varied
possible foundations and, which is worth emphasizing, to obtain primary
sources, i.e., not only later compilations, but also those documents
"which are scattered in churches, archives. and other places". He wrote

that he did not want "to rest satisfied with repeating what had been
written by earlier and foreign historians, but strove to, make a step for-
ward".l~ It is to be noted, since the fact usually remains unobserved,
that by the very juxtaposition of various sources (Polish chronicles.
and Bohemian. Russian. Hungarian, and Teutonic Knights' data. letters,
oral tradition. his own observations, and reports by his contemporaries)
Dlugosz revealed elements of their external and internal criticism. Fol-
lowing the usage of his time, Dlugosz did not quote his sources, but
a critical analysis of his work shows that wIlen describing a given fact
he preferred to base himself on those testimonies which were as original
as possible and ohronologically closest to the fact in question. The
reliability of Dlugosz's work. due to advances in heuristics which he
represented, has been demonstrated recently. nevertheless in his nar-
ratives he confused reports on facts with figments of his own imagin-
ation with which he wanted to fill the gaps in the sources and to offer
causal explanations. His criticism of the sources could not yet be mod-
em in nature because well-developed auxiliary sciences were still non-
existent: they were called into being only later by reflection on the
foundations of historical cognition.
But the birth of auxiliary historical sciences could be noted at the
time when Dlugosz was active. As could be expected. these disciplines
accompanied criticism toward documents. which were so important in
the Middle Ages and which were often forged. L. Valla (1407-57).
a papal secretary and an exceptionally interesting mind, was one of the
first scholars to demonstrate suspicions of this kind. When analysing
what was termed Constantine's donation, which he concluded to be
a myth. he tried to use both external and internal criticism. A historian.
he thought, ought to be objective and to see to it that his image of the
past be not distorted by studium. odium or vanitas. 16
In the late Middle Ages exceptional values were contributed to the
interpretation of history writing by Ibn Khaldun (Abd al"-Ra.hmiin ibn
Khaldun, 1332-1406). the most eminent historian in the Moslem world.
author of a work on the history of the Arabs, the Persians. and the
Berbers, and of his epoch-making Prolegomena to History. In his
works he clearly anticipated the attainments of later sociological re-
flection on history by pointing to the necessity of taking into account
76 PATTERNS OF IUSTORICAL RESEARCH
changes in social structure in the process of history. By analysing, above

all, the differences between nomadic and sedentary peoples he pointed
to factors that account for social changes (mainly the geographical
factor). He interpreted the subject matter of history very broadly as
a study of "the culture of the world", thus anticipating the Age of En-
lightenment. We can find in his works glimpses of a distinction between
scientific and descriptive history (the former consisting in the study of
changes in social structure). He also combined an extensive knowledge
of sources with much criticismP
REFERENCES
1 J. Dobias, op. cit., pp. 36, 49-50. The most penetrating comments on nar-
ration in ancient historians are to be found in L. Canfora, Totalita e selezione

nella storiografia c/assica, Bari 1972.
2 Ibid., p. 102; E. Bernheim, op. cit .. p. 27; R. Aron, "Thucydide et Ie recit
des evenements", History and Theory, vol. I, 1961, pp. 104 et passim; see also
F. Chatelet, La naissance de I'histoire, ed. cit., pp. 81 ff.
a For instance A. Stem, Philosophy of History and the Problem of Values,
The Hague 1962, p. 49.
4 Cf. J. Dobias, op. cit., pp. 182-4; F. 1. Teggart, Theory and Processes of
History, ed. cit., pp. 174-5; L. Febvre, A Geographical Introduction to History,

London 1932, pp. 1-4. The effect of the climate on man was emphasized by
Hippocrates, Plato, and Aristotle (in the well-known passage in Chap. VII of
his Politics).
5 Chronologia polska (The Chronology of Poland), Warszawa 1957, p. 36.
6 Cf. K. Hanell. "Zur Problematik der iilteren romischen Geschichtsschrei-
bung", Histoire et historiens dans ['antiquite, ed. cit., pp. 180 ff (a statement by
J. de Romilly in the discussion). Even in Thucydides the geographical element
plays a very small part. See in this connection F. Sieveking, Die Funktion geo-
graphischer Mitteilungen im Geschichtswerk 'des Thukidydes, Klio, vol. 42, 1964,
pp. 73-179, in particular p. 73.
7 Cf. K. Latte, "Die Anfiinge der griechischen Geschichtsschreibung", His-
to ire et historiens dans I'antiquite, ed cit., pp. 3-4.

8 H. J. Marrou, Qu'est-ce-que l'histoire. L'Histoire et ses methodes, ed. cit.,
pp.5 ff.
D Cf. S. Hamer "Tacyt i jego dzielo" (Tacitus and His Work), which is an
introduction to Tacitus, Dziela (Collected Works), vol. I, Warszawa 1959, p. 50.
10 Cf. W. Nigg, Die Kirchengeschichtschreibung. Grundziige ihrer his tori-
schen Entwicklung, Miinchen 1934.
11 This fact is fully manifested in the well-known travelogues of Ibn Bat-
tuta (l4th century). The Polish-language version of his records is Peculiarities
of Towns and Wonders of Travels, 1325-54. Warszawa 1962.
12 This follows the suggestions of J. Th}.browski in his Dawne dziejopisarstwo

polskie (Old Polish Historiography), Warszawa 1%4, pp. 129 ff.
18 Cf. B. Kiirbis, Dziejopisarstwo wielkopolskie XIII i XIV w. (Historio-
graphy in Greater Poland in the 13th and 14th Centuries), Warszawa 1959,
pp. 35 et passim.
14 J. D~browski, op. cit., p. 239.
1.1 Ibid., p. 223.
16 Cf. B. Suchodolski, Narodziny no,woiytnej fi/ozofii czlowieka (The Birth
of the Modem Philosophy of Man), Warszawa 1%3, pp. 35-7. L. Valla is men-
tioned, sometimes in considerable detail, in many works.
17 Research on Ibn Khaldun is summed up by H. Becker and H. E. Barnes
in Social Thought from Lore to Science, vol. I, 3rd ed., New York 1%3.
Among works on Ibn Khaldun note the work by N. Schmidt, Ibn Khaldun,
1930, in particular the chapter on Ibn Khaldun as a historian, and Muhsin Mahdi,
Ibn Khaldun's Philosophy of History, 1957. Polish contributions include J. Bie-
lawski, "Tw6rca socjologii w swiecie Islamu Ibn Chaldun" (Ibn Khaldun, the
Founder of Sociology in the Moslem World), Kultura i Spoleczenstwo, vol. III,
No.2. Ibn Khaldun's work has been published in an English-language transla-
tion, The Muquddimah: An Introduction to History, 3 vols., New York 1958.
v. CRITICAL REFLECTION
1. The development of the critical pattern of research and early eru-

ditionism
It was noticeable in the late Middle Ages and clearly marked in mod-
ern times that the centre of gravity of a historian's interest was mov-
ing from the narration itself toward the foundations of that narration.
The result was a magnificent development of a historian's critical tech-
niques. The increasing subtlety of those techniques are the signum spe-
cificum of a historian's good work, and are treated, by some historians
interested in methodology (e.g., L. E. Halkin), as the criterion of the
scientific nature of historical research even today, when the standards
of historical research have risen to a higher level and good research
techniques are taken for granted. This criterion, which minimized the
issue of past events, was - in the light of the critical pattern of re-
search - made richer by the requirement that historical narratives be
not only true, but also given to theory (philosophy). This requirement
was being advanced mainly by philosophers and theorists of science,
although prominent historians also would not shun general consider-
ations.
The critical pattern of research was dominated by reflection - inspired
by various motives - on the methods of establishing the sources on
which research is based and by criticism toward such sources. That
criticism covered. of, course. also various works previously written by
historians. Such was the spirit which inspired the first comprehensive
modern history of historiography. written by La Popeliniere.1 The many
interesting proposals to be found in that work - which propounded the
idea of "accomplished history" (histoire accomplie) - include the con-
demnation of such narratives which ascribe to their heroes monologues
and dialogues invented by historians. La Popeliniere opposes the ex~
cessive passing of verdicts on the past, and he compares those historians
who do so to students who. on leaving the lecture hall, try "to change"
CRITICAL REFLECTION 79
the laws of Lycurgus or Solon. He stresses that history should not be

written for anyone's use. The narrative must be true and intended to
discredit legends and myths. Its scientific nature must be established by
the striving to discover the "natural causes" (causes naturelles) of
historical events. It seems that La Popeliniere's work may be treated as
a manifestation of a newly formed pattern of historical research. Many
more works that propagated that pattern of research could be quoted.
They had their philosophical analogue in the works of Francis Bacon
(1561-1626), who advocated caution in the formulation of opinions and
wanted to reform science by pointing to the dominant role of induction.
In the case of history this meant the recommendation to follow strictly
the sources. But he did not postulate a total renunciation of hypotheses
that would not be based on sources. His idea of systematizing those
factors which siege human minds and hence also hinder the historian
in his critical reconstruction of the past, became famous. They are what
he calls idola theatri (blind acceptance of doctrine), idola fori (taking
words for things), idola specus (individual beliefs), and Mola tribus
(group myths). But Bacon's inductionism was to find its full continu-
ation only in 19th century positivism.
It is self-evident that, as compared with modern criticism of sources,
that criticism, advocated and practised with reference to the testimonies
of the past, was still limited in scope, and moreover it had its origin,
especially during the Renaissance, not in the researcher's independent
striving for the truth, but in practical aims. Reference to historical ex-
amples as arguments in conflicts was becoming increasingly popular.
This was stimulated on an unprecedented scale by the religious con-
flicts in the Reformation period. The advocates of the Reformation
were looking for support in the past and strove to demonstrate (in
a given field) the falsehood of the picture of the past as drawn by older
Church historiography and their contemporary papal history writing.
These endeavours began in the 15th century and intensified in the 16th.
In this connection, the analysis of sources would often go beyond exter-
nal criticism, thus forming the nucleus of hermeneutics. But the results
of the analytic interest in sources were to manifest themselves in a more
accomplished form only in the 17,th century. The Renaissance called
for a critical examination of the sources, but - if we consider the issue
from the point of view of the development of reflection on history- it
80 PA'JTERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
resulted mainly in the development of social and political philosophy

(the former might also be termed historical sociology), which was of
immense importance for the then nascent evolution of opinions on the
subject matter of historical research. In N. Machiavelli (1469-1527),
F. Guicciardini (1483-1540), J. Bodin (1530-96) and others that phi-
losophy, which so far had been deductive and theological, became inter-
twined with history. The point of departure, however, was not so much
a scholarly quest for the truth that would be purely cognitive in nature.
but rather the needs of social and political knowledge. support for
which was being sought in the past. even though the authors in ques-
tion were far from moralizing.
The exceptional importance of Machiavelli's works for the develop-
ment of reflection on history must be emphasized. Machiavelli, whom
his contemporaries. by the way, considered to be above all a historian,
contributed to politics - after an interval that lasted from Aristotle on-
a secular and scientific approach. In his historical works Macchiave1ii,
following a partly beaten path, if we take the Villanis and their FLo-
rentine Chronicles to be his direct predecessors, stressed social issues
together with conflicts within society. showed interest in the origin of
the state (the birth of the concept of social contract!). in the social role
of religion and law, and in economic life. The broadening of the sub-
ject matter of historical research was connected with reference to phi-
losophical (theoretical), non-theological. ideas which helped organize
historical description of events, and which were non-existent in prag-
matic and chronic1e-oriented historiography. This broadening of the
subject matter also assumed the appropriate selection of data about
facts. It is not by coincidence, then, that reflection on this issue dates
back to the Renaissance. For all the differences between the two his-
torians. F. Guicciardini represented similar general methodological
trends in history writing as did his great predecessor.!
In the development of the methodology of history writing the tum-
ing point is to be seen in J. Bodin's Methodus ad fociLem historiarum
cognitionem (1566), born out of the above-mentioned controversies
over the Reformation and dedicated exclusively to reflections on history.
even though it referred rather to past events than to the methods of
their reconstruction. 8 J. Bodin emphasized that further development of
history writing required a.better analysis in depth and a more penetrat-
ing criticism of the sources. In his reflection on history he was the first
to stress so forcibly the necessity of historians having non-source-based
knowledge, mainly that of geographical and chronological problems. In
his analysis of "human history", which he singled out himself, i.e., the
origin of society and the state, and hence those factors also which ex-
plain differences in the situations of the various peoples, Bodin drew
attention to geographical and climatic features of the environment and
to anthropological features of human beings (static factors), but he also
noticed the role of social factors, mainly the conflicts which emerge in
societies, and hence factors connected with human actions (dynamic
factors). Many of his conclusions resemble those previously drawn by
his brilliant predecessor Ibn Khaldun, whose writings Bodin might have
read. Bodin also proved to have a much better sense of historical time
and process of history than earlier historians had had.
The appearance of the concept of "progress",4 at that time not yet
very clearly understood, also testifies to a general evolution of opinions
under the Renaissance. Progress has sbce become a permanent category
in historical thinking, and may be regarded as the principal attainment
of Renaissance writers in that field. The initial stage of that evolution
was marked by the works of F. Bacon and J. Bodin, of whom the
latter also tried to assess earlier historiography to some extent. His en-
deavour then had a prominent continuator in the person of La Pope-
liniere.
Intensified sense of criticism, as manifested in Renaissance history
writing, resulted in the birth of auxiliary historical sciences, first of all
of diplomatics (in the broad sense of the term). This was accompanied
by marked advances in chronology, following the controversies caused
by the reform of Pope Gregory XIII (J. Scalinger, 1540-1609,
Thesaurus Temporum; D. Petavius, 1583-1652, De Doctrina Tempo-
rum, 1627). Scalinger proposed the division of time, as referred to in
history writing, on the mathematical and astronomical principles, while
Petavius was the first to succeed in dating events as those which took
place either before or after the birth of Christ. This system of dating
became common during the 17th century. Like the study of chronology,
diplomatios, too, developed in the monastic milieu of the Abbeys of
St. Germain-des-Pres and St. Denis, but was born only in 1681, i.e.,
with the appearance of Book I of J. Mabillon's De Re Diplomatica
82 PA'ITERNS OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH
Libri VI. The same period also saw the publication of Du Cange's
dictionary of mediaeval Latin, which has remained valuable to this
day.
The 17th century. which was marked above all by progress in the
technique of establishing facts. saw the publication of the first collec-
tions of sources. sometimes very comprehensive. in which the prin-
ciples of criticism were being graduaUy applied. In 1623, G. J. Voss
published in Leyden his Ars Historica. which was the nucleus of future
treatises on history writing. We do not find in it any rigorous methodo-
logical analyses, but merely a listing of the rules of the technique of
history writing, ooncerning which Voss calls for the ability to distin-
guish falsehood from truth. The ability to write history is termed there
"historical art". a critical art. S The opinion. stressed by F. Bacon, that
it is necessary to free oneself from pragmatism and to write objective
narratives of past events was gaining ground among scholars. Discus-
sions on the issue were intensifying. which gave strength to the critical
tendencies on the part of the scholars who had at their disposal gradual-
ly improving techniques.
The eveI~.ts which took place in the 17th. and partly also in the 16th.
century in the sphere of history writing deserve special attention.8 It
was at that time that a professional milieu of historians. and scholars in
general. Conscious of their identity and concentrated on an objective
reconstruction of past events, was formed for the first time. mainly in
France. They wanted to treat history as a science, and accordingly op-
posed the pragmatic tendencies, especially those inspired by the Church
and by ruling circles. In this connection they on the whole rejected the
previously common speculations on past events and focused attention
on improving research methods. i.e.• mainly the criticism of -sources.
These tendencies come from various quarters. and were manifested
clearly in the more enlightened Church circles, both Catholic and
Protestant. In discussions, attention came to be paid to a good sub-
stantiation of claims. An interesting manifestation of this is offered
above all by the Acta Sanctorum. a work of the group of scholars
called the Bollandists after Jean Bolland. the initiator of the publi-
cation. In their work some rigour of scientific thinking was applied to
the domain so little marked by criticism as is hagiography. The clearest
manifestation of the new tendencies in history writing could be seen in
the above-mentioned works of Mabillon and Du Cange. It was Mabil-

Ion who established the fundamental set of rules of investigating the
authenticity and reliability of sources that was to be held as valid for
a long time. 7
To sum up, we may speak of the birth of the first phase of erudi-
tionism in historiography. Its pioneer role consisted in trying to make
historical research scientific. The promoters of eruditionism opposed
both Church-oriented and nobility-oriented historiography. Eruditional
historiography did not, of course, vanish in the 17th century, but con-
tinued to exist while being regularly enriched with new values that later
came to be the characteristic feature of historical works.
For all these endeavours to be critical, history writing nevertheless
remained an art that did not abound in criticism, but intended to play,
togeth~ with philosophy, and sometimes even on its own, the role of
magistra vitae. Hence it can readily be understood that it failed to win
the approval of sceptical and rigorous Descartes (1596-1650), as it had
earlier failed to win the approval of Aristotle. Descartes, who postulated
a deductive pattern of knowledge, reproached history with too little
criticism, too much imagination, and inability to select facts. In doing
so he was quite right, and the prevailing situation, combined with the
fact that natural science, previously neglected, was becoming more and
more scientific, could widen the gap between the vast and rigorous
studies of nature, on the one hand, and those of society, on the other.
Descartes' impact on methodology in historical research was of two
kinds. First, he promoted a philosophical atmosphere that favoured
the striving for rigour, clarity, and criticism. Secondly, by advancing the
idea of constant progress, fixed once and for all until human knowledge,
based on the axiom of the natural order of the Universe, reaches the
state of perfection, he was the real author of the idea, developed later
in the Age of Enlightenment, of laws of Nature treated as the axioms
from which all knowledge of man can be deduced (by a process of
deduction analogous to that in geometry). This implied a definite idea
of progress: from Descartes on progress came to be understood ahistor-
ically, as a "natural process", which is the realization of unchanging
laws of Nature that make human beings happy and can themselves be
grasped by reason. The unchanging character of these laws was, ob-
viously, linked with the assumption that human nature is unchanging,
too. In this interpretation, progress assumed the possibility of finding

out the laws by which it is governed as certain a priori priciples which
are independent of the actual course of events. It was only during the
Age of Enlightenment that such laws came to be looked for on a large
scale.s
2. The philosophical variant of the critical pattern of historical re-

search. Further development of instruments of historical criticism in
the 18th century
The danger of too large disproportions between the development of

historical research and that of natural science was averted by the further
development of anti-feudal social and political ideas, born during the
Renaissance and linked with the decay of feudalism and the growth
of the ideology that corresponded with the needs of the bourgeoisie
which was gaining strength. This was so because these facts gave history
the chance of becoming, in due time, the science which investigates the
origin and the development of human society and explains the for-
mation of social institutions, above all the 'institution of the state. This
was shown primarily by the reflections of Grotius, Harrington, Hobbes,
Locke (ooncerning, among other things, the issue of the social contract),
and later by the vast panorama of philosophical, social, and political
thought in the 18th century. This, however, required immense parallel
work on the methodology of historical research. But the latter failed
to keep pace with achievements in explaining the process of history,
achievements linked with further progress in making historical research
"philosophical", i.e., with the great eruption of social ideas.
Interest in causal explanation, i.e., in explaining above all the differ-
ences in the actual situations of the various peoples, induced the scho-
lars to develop the comparative method and genetic approaches. While
heuristics and source criticism, and hence the establishment of past
events, were developing on an increasing scale, the Age of Enlighten-
ment exerted stronger influence on the definition of the subject matter
of historical research, on the analysis of the factors which helped ex-
plain past events, and on the laws of progress in history. In the re-
flection on the nature of historical narration history began to emerge,
uncertainly at first, as a scientific discipline which with some criticism
describes past events (from the Renaissance interpreted on an increas-

ingly broad scale), explains facts, and - by reference to generalizations -
tries to predict the possible intertwining of events. As a result of all
this, the serious age-old gaps in the methodological reflection on history
writing were being filled, sometimes rather superficially, which did not
mean that disproportions in methodological reflection had vanished.
The immense job of making history a full-fledged discipline saw the
co-operation of philosophers (in the then interpretation of the term)
and writers of history. The characteristic feature was the lively interest
shown in practical historical research by philosophers, including the
greatest minds of those times (such as Huine, Voltaire, and others),
a fact whose importance for the development of both the science of
history and reflection on it could hardly be exaggerated.
When it comes to heuristics and source criticism, a certain cognitive
scepticism is worth stressing. In 1722, Levesque de Poully wrote Sur
l'incertitude de Z' histoire des quatres premiers siecies de Rome; a similar
study was published in 1738 by Louis de Beaufort.9 More confidence
in the possibility of finding out the truth on the strength of sources was
shown by Nicolas Lenglet de Fresnoy, author of La Methode pour
etudier l'histoire (1713, supplemented version in 1740), which was the
next text-book of the technique of historical research after Voss' Ars
historica. A comparison of the text-books of Voss and Fresnoy reveals
progress in criticism.10 Fresnoy tried to list the criteria of the reliability
of sources (observations made by the author of a given source himself,
impartiality, clarity and precision of statements) and the causes of de-
fects in sources dating from various periods. He pointed, in accordance
with the then nascent opinion, to the differences between originals,
more valuable for researchers, and copies of sources. He stressed the
importance of non-source-based knowledge in establishing facts (know-
ledge of various religions and customs). Numerous and ambitious edi-
tions of sources provided practice and at the same time a stimulus to
develop heuristics and source criticism, and hence, the auxiliary histor-
ical sciences. The following titles may be mentioned by way of example.
French: Palaeographia graeca by Bernard de Montfaucon (1708), Re-
rum Gallicarum et Francicarum scriptores by M. Bouquet (from 1738
on, in 31 volumes), Sacrorum Conciliorum nova et amplissima collectio
by J. Mansi (from 1759 on); English: Foedera conventiones literae et
86 PATI'ERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
cuiusque generis acta publica by T. Rymer (from 1704 on); Italian:

Rerum Italicarum scriptores ab anno Chr. 500-1500 in 25 volumes and
other publications by L. A. Muratori; German: Codex Juris gentium
diplomaticus (1693). Scriptores rerum Brunsvicensium (from 1707 on)
and other items by G. W. Leibniz, Teutsches Reichsarchiv by
J. Ch. Ltinig (from 1710 on). Scriptores rerum Germanicarum praecipue
Saxonicarum by J. B. Menckes (from 1778 on), the first comprehensive
publication of the regesta type compiled by P. Georgisch (from 1740
on); Polish: Volumina Legum (from 1732 on). Codex Diplomaticus
(from 1758 on).
In view of this lively interest in heuristics and source criticism the
demand for a new Mabillon-like publication seemed natural; it was
satisfied by Toustain and Tassin who published Le Nouveau traite de
diplomatique (6 volumes. 1750-65). The development of diplomatics
was accompanied by that of palaeography, which gradually became
a separate auxiliary historical discipline. The same holds for chrono-
logy: its origin as an auxiliary historical discipline goes back to the
studies made by French Benedictines, who in 1750 started publishing
L'art de verifier les dates et les faits historiques. The coming decades
saw the publication of large numbers of text-books of the various
auxiliary historical disciplines. The gradual development of linguistics
contributed also more and more precise instruments for the comprehen-
sion and criticism of sources.
Former theoretical reflections on the establishing of facts also failed
to comply with advances in the practice of research. Further progress
in that field, as compared with Fresnoy's work, was shown above all
by the studies of J. M. Chladenius (Allgemeine Geschichtswissenschaft,
1752) and G. B. de Mably (De la maniere d' ecrire l' histoire, 1782), and
next by the many text-books of J. C. Gatterer and A. L. Sch16zer. Chla-
denius' work was dominated by the issue of the reliability of sources.
The degree of the reliability of a source-based item of information, i.e.,
its agreement with facts, is indicated by the "quality" of the inform-
ant, the degree of the universality of the event in question, confirma-
tion by other sources. conclusions to be drawn from the analysis of the
actual state of things. The other works, next to the problems of source
criticism, paid more attention to the new approaches to social and po-
litical facts, so characteristic of the Age of Enlightenment; the tendency
to write universal history; reflections on classification, the striving for

an integrated interpretation of past events and of the links between
history and other disciplines. In Poland, these ideas were briefly ex-
pounded in Memorial wzgl~dem pisania historii narodowej (Memoran-
dum on How to Write National History) (1775) by A. Naruszewicz
(1733-96). This eminent historian stressed the importance of a good
technique for arriving at the truth. He wrote, 'iCriticism tells us how to
discern the good from the evil, and appearances from the truth, to
weigh human affairs on the scale of reason, to track their causes, to
analyse methods, and to assess effects",l1 although, preoccupied with
the ideas of the Age of Enlightenment, he represented even more the
nascent eruditionism than "philosophizing" history. In their striving for
"philosophizing" history, that eruditionism, marked by the stress on
a systematic academic exposition of the subject, was propounded by
representatives of the Gottingen school founded by the above-mention-
ed J. C. Gatterer (1727-99) and A. L. Schlozer (1735-1809), noted
authors of outlines of general history.12 That school became the direct
predecessor or forerunner of the eruditional pattern of historical re-
search, which developed in the 19th century, but it is not to be identified
with that later trend. The striving for eruditionism and criticism were
at first too limited (for instance, Gatterer and Schlozer still did not
know how to separate biblical from secular history), and, on the other
hand, the connections with the Volta irian turning point were too strong.
Changes in the views on the subject matter of historical research were
closely connected with progress in causal explanation. Next to the de-
velopment of the critical approach to historical sources, this was the
greatest achievement of modern methodological reflection on history.
The imbuing of the study of history with social issues, and hence the
essential extension of the subject matter of historical research - or
rather the birth of the science of society within the study of history-
dates only, as we have said, from the Renaissance. It is significant that
it is historians - Ibn Khaldun and Ferguson, the author of Essay on the
History of Civil Society (1767) - who are usually mentioned as the
fathers of sociology. In their historical works they analysed dynamically
the various sociological categories connected with the life of social
groups and with social changes. Next to the pioneer works of these two
scholars and the above-mentioned studies dating from the Renaissance,
88 PATTERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
the evolution of opinions on the subject matter of history was stimu-

lated by the following works from the Age of Enlightenment: above all
those of Voltaire,13 and further those of Montesquieu,14 A. H. L. Hee-
ren,lS J. MUller,16 E. Gibbon,17 and many others. Voltaire stated that
making history scientific depended on the development of the tech-
niques of criticism and on the broadness of historians' view of the past.
The increasing knowledge of the past as a whole, in all their manifesta-
tions, supported by philosophizing, was - which historians of the Age
of Enlightenment saw clearly - to help in gaining a true picture of the
past. E. Gibbon's work on the fall of the Roman Empire can serve as
an excellent example of this type of history writing. On the whole, in
the works of this kind, linked with the intellectual expansion of modem
secular social, political, legal, and economic thOUght, works which also
drew from the improving geographical knowledge (e.g., the discoveries
of new lands), the subject matter of historical narration - history em-
braced increasingly vast areas of human activities, to emerge in the
most extreme formulations - quite clearly as the study of all human
culture in the variegated and evolving forms. On the other hand, how-
ever, we know that the most consistent formulation of the issue would
still remain for some fifty years merely a requirement; so strong was
the inertia of the old traditions in history writing. At any rate, an ever-
more integrated approach to the tasks of historiography, which resulted
in increased interest in universal history, was steadily gaining ground.
That type of integrationism was based on quite different foundations
than was Christian Church universalism, integrated by the idea of God.
Today it is difficult to say whether that introduction of more and
more differentiated factors into the inquiry of the causes of differences
in the situations of various countries and peoples resulted in the broad-
ening of the subject matter of historical research, or whether the
relation was the opposite. There is, however, no doubt that these two
trends were strictly concomitant, even though they were hindered by
the idea of unchanging human nature, an idea that was fairly strong in
the Age of Enlightenment. Among the factors advanced to explain the
differences and changes, the explicative role of the supernatural world
was shrinking (obviously, only in the minds of those who were follow-
ing the spirit of the time, and even that not without exceptions), where-
as such factors as the geographical environment and the climate, the
intellectual level of the various peoples and the cultural characteristics

of social groups, and even economic factors (mostly -trade) were being
analysed with increasing precision. which may be treated as the dawn
of many s~ialized disciplines, such as anthropogeography. ethnology,
economic history. and even sociology. This gave more importance to
dynamic factors, connected with human activities, but differences and
changes in static factors, independent of human actions, such as the
climate. the geographical environment. and racial differences. were still
dominant in historical reflection.
It would be difficult to list all the more important historians who
took into account in their considerations the factors mentioned above.
They can be seen in general in all those works which strove to treat
the subject matter of historical description more broadly and which
broke away from the still strong theological interpretation of history
whose model was given in the 17th century by Bossuet. But some of
the works were of special significance for the development of reflections
on the nature of interrelationships in history. They belonged to two
trends: one paying more attention to physical and biological factors,
and the other which sought the explanation of the national character
and the situations of social groups in socio-psychological factors. Mon-
tesquieu in this connection analysed above all the climatic factors.
which he considered to be of the greatest importance, and next the
development of trade and contacts between peoples, the density of pop-
ulation. and intellectual level. 18 Gibbon saw the causes of the fall of
the Roman Empire in the development of Christianity. D. Hume,
a philosopher. but also the author of History of Great Britain in 19
volumes (from 1754 on), called a cultural determinist by H. Backer and
H. E. Barnes, went much further in his analysis of differences and
changes. He thought that before we take into account the possible
effects of climatic and biological factors we have first to investigate the
effects of culture-conditioned factors. These may include the various
processes of congregation, imitation. and education, contacts between
various groups and exchange of ideas, and revolutionary breaking off
of stabilized relationships in the sphere of ideas, political rule. and so-
ciety.lv Turgot followed the same path.20 But. as in the case of Montes-
quieu and Hume. the assumption that human nature does not change
(man treated ahistorically) deprived his tentative explanations of differ-
90 PA'ITERNS OF msroRlcAL RESEARCH
ences in the situations of the various communities of historical depth

by turning them into anonymous schemata applicable to any period of
history. He believed that man is always the same, at all times and in all
places.!! In his opinion, social change is born mainly as a result of
migrations and culture contacts, especially through the intermediary
of trade.!!
Social factors, and to a large extent economic factors as well, were
being taken into account by J. G. Herder, who, while paying attentiOn
to the role of the geographical environment, and the climate above all,
as a permanent factor, did not succumb to geographical determinism,
thus intentionally avoiding the mistakes committed by Montesquieu. If
all historiography in the Age of Enlightenment is taken into considera-
tion, Herder probably showed the best understanding of the interaction
of the various factors in history, but the exceptional significance of that
eminent mind consisted in his breaking off with the idea of unchanging
human nature, despite the different attitude adopted by Kant. If we
consider the similar attitude of Ferguson, and that of Condorcet, who
when speaking about constant progress in the history of mankind
thought that it was due to improvements in human mind and in educa-
tion,23 we may say that the thinkers of the Age of Enlightenment de-
veloped a marked trend which treated history writing as a reflection of
a dialectical (this especially in the case of Herder) effect of constantly
changing factors of progress in man, that is, a trend in historical re-
search which tried to link the study of progress with the study of the
real process of historical events. This trend also includes A. L. Heeren,
who stressed such phenomena as trade, transport, migrations, and
conflicts.24 All those authors, as they did not understand the concept of
progress, but wanted to find out elements of differences in human
situations, had to refer to data from other fields, which gave rise to the
comparative method in historical research.
Increased interest in the past and deeper historical analyses helped
reflection on the methodological nature of the science of history. This
did not refer to history writing as it was in a given period, but rather
concentrated on the place history should hold in the domain of sci-
ences. To some extent that reflection was a specific variation of the anti-
Cartesian reaction. R. G. Collingwood wrote that Hume in his Treatise
on Human Nature (1734-40) "placed history on a footin,2".2S In fact.
Hume's contributions (like those of Locke and partly Berkeley) to

reflections on history as a science are great, but "placing history on
a footing", i.e., treating it not only as narration, but also as a science Of
a specified type, was the collective work of a galaxy of brilliant minds.
The earliest of them was G. B. Vico (1668-1744), the author of the
pioneering Scienza Nuova, first published in 1725, and then thoroughly
revised and published in a new version in 1738. He reproached Des-
cartes with the incorrect tendency to model all research after geometry,
whereas the various sciences require different treatment according to
their subject matter. History, which is concerned with the study of
what man has done, differs in its method from natural science. Since
the comprehension of human actions by man has a greater chance of
success than his comprehension of nature, the character of history, in
view of its humanistic content, is defined quite clearly.2s History was
conceived by Vico as the study of the past of society. As far as the
scope of cognition was concerned, Kant's approach was similar, as he
claimed that man's knowledge reaches the limits of his own actions.
but Kant was preoccupied with natural science which he was imbuing
with the idea of change and variability (which was to affect historical
thought only at a later date), and hence took no closer interest in history.
While Vico's ideas formulated the point of departure in the methodolo-
gical analysis of historical research in the Age of Enlightenment, the
ideas of A. N. Condorcet (1743-94) marked its culmination. But the
works of these two authors, who still belonged to one and the same
trend of rebirth, characteristic of the Age of Enlightenment, were ac-
companied by the nascent divergence of views on the possibility of
applying patterns used in natural science to historical research, and to
researoh in the social sciences in general. Vico, obviously, did not see
the problem as an alternative of two methodological patterns: he was
just seeking for history a place on the map of science, from where it
had been removed by Descartes. On the contrary, Condorcet, who con-
tinued Cartesian ideas, had his own view of the problem: he wanted to
formulate a universal science of man, modelled on mathematics, which
in turn determined his opinion on the methodological issues of history.
As in the case of nature, the history of mankind is governed by laws
which can be discovered in the process of research. Once these laws
are known, the trend of historical development can be predicted in
a scientific manner.27 But these are still deductive laws based on the
acceptance of the order predetennined by nature. Once these laws are
discovered. practical activity should create conditions - through an
appropriate shaping of minds - suitable for ensuring a "natural" course
of events and for removing all obstacles that could block it.
To sum up. the period which we have called one of critical reflec-
tion on history. and which - as far as the 18th century is concerned-
might equally well be called the period of philosophical reflection or
the period of deductionism, was marked by signal changes in historio-
graphy. In addition to the greatest progress made - in the field of meth-
odological thought - in heuristics and criticism. which originated theo-
retical approaches to these branches of historians' procedure, historical
narration came to be permeated with elements of social theory, which
was due to a growing social demand for historical writing. The struc-
ture of historical approaches began to emerge from such elements. New
parts of that structure in the form of sociological, anthropo-geograph-
ical, and even to some extent economic, categories were added to
the old parts of it. in the meantime reinforced by attempts at periodiza-
tion of the elements of time and space which help organize historical
descriptions. This gave birth to the conviction that definite theoretical
knowledge which would guide historical research was necessary. These
changes in opinions on historical research were combined with an evo-
lution in looking at the past. In the process of history people began
to see the working of certain universal laws. and not just only "the
hand of God". even though these laws were interpreted in the Carte-
sian way. This made it possible, with reference to the knowledge of
"the laws of nature". to point to the possibility of history being an
instrument of prediction (mainly Condorcet). All this, of course, applies
to the leading achievements, which quantitatively were lost in a sea of
traditional history writing, uncritical and anecdote-oriented. which was
a continuation of traditional pragmatic historiography.
REFERENCES
1 H. L. V. de 1a Popeliniere, Histoire des Histoires avec l'idee de l'histoire
accomplie, 1599.
2 Cf. W. Voise, Poczqtki nowozytnych nauk spolecznych (The Origins of the
Modern Social Sciences), Warszawa 1962, pp. 206-22.

3 Consider also J. Bodin's basic work La Republique, first published 1576.
CRITICAL REFLECnON 93
4 Cf. K. Grzybowski, "Z dziej6w poj~ia post~pu" (Issues in the History of

the Concept of Progress), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 3/1957, pp. 3 ff. On
changes in historical thinking during the Renaissance see W. K. Ferguson, Tire
Renaissance in Historical Thought, Boston 1948; A. Klempt, Die Sakularisierung
der universalhistorischen AutJassung. Zum Wandel der Geschichtswissenschaft
im 16 und 17 lahrhundert, Gottingen 1960; H. Butterfield, The Origins of Mod-
ern Science 1300-1800, London 1958. Concerning Poland see K. Dobrowolski,
"Studia nad kultUfll. naukow~ w Polsce do schylku XVI stulecia" (Studies in
Scientific Culture in Poland up to the End of the 16th Century), Nauka Polska,
vol. XVII, Warszawa 1933, and S. Herbst, "PocZl!tki historycznego widzenia rze-
czywistoSci w nauce i sztuce polski ego Odrodzenia" (The Beginnings of the
Historical Approach in Science and Art under the Renaissance in Poland), OJ-
rodzenie w Polsce, (The Renaissance in Poland), vol. II, part. 1, Warszawa
1956. See also G. Monod, "Du progres des etudes historiques en France depuis
Ie XVI siecle". Revue Historique, vol. I, Paris 1876, pp. 5-33.
Ii E. Bernheim, op. cit., pp. 31, 173, 222, 227.
6 Cf. F. Smith-Fussner, The Historical Revolution. Historical Writing and

Thought, 1580-1660, London 1962. The present writer is indebted to M. H.
Serejski for drawing his attention to this book.
7 Jean Mabillon (1639-1707) was a monk in the Benedictine abbey of St.
Germain-des-Pres in Paris. He established the rules of examining the authenticity
of sources (mediaeval diplomas) when studying documents from the Marovingian
period. Jean Bolland 1596-1665, a Belgian Jesuit, arrived at the same results
when publishing documents pertaining to biographies of saints (the Acta Sanc-
torum mentioned above) and when preparing his Martyrologium Romanum.
8 R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, ed. cit., p_ 59; F. J. Teggart,
Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., pp. 87-91.
9 E. Bernheim, op. 'cit., p. 223.
10 Ibid., p. 226. A pertinent appraisal of Fresnoy's works was given in 1826

by J. Lelewel, "0 historii, jej rozgal~zieniach i naukach zwi~k z ni~ maj~
cych" (On History, Its Ramifications and Related Disciplines), Dziela (Collected
Works), vol. II, part 1, Warszawa 1964, pp. 233, 395-7, 402-3, 405. See also
J. Topolski, "Na drodze do nowoczesnej nauki historycznej. Nicolas Lenglet
DuFresnoy (1674-1755) i jego metoda badania historycznego" (Toward the
Modem Science of History. Nicolas Lenglet DuFresnoy (1674-1755) and His
Method of Historical Research), in: Wiek XVIII. Polska i swiat (The Eighteenth
Century. Poland and the world), Warszawa 1974, pp. 51-61.
11 A. Naruszewicz, "Memorial wzgl~dem pisania historii narodowej" (A
Memorandum on the Writing of the Nation's History), in: Historycy 0 historii
(Historians on History), M. H. Serejski (ed.), Warszawa 1963, p. 36.
12 On the Gottingen school see H. Wesendonck, Die Begrundf.lng der neueren
deutschen Geschichtsschreibung durch Gatterer und SchlOzer, Leipzig 1875. For
a newer approach see H. Butterfield, Man on His Past, Cambridge 1955; M. H.
94 PATTERNS OF IDsrORICAL RESEARCH
Serejski, Koncepcja historii powszechnej Joachima Lelewela (Joachim Lelewel's

Idea of Universal History), Warszawa 1958, pp. 33-41.
18 This applies in particular to his work Le Siecle de Louis XIV, Berlin 1751,
in which Voltaire discussed many economic problems. These interests of his are
also revealed by his other works, especially Essai sur les Moeurs et Esprit des
Nations (1753-8). Later authors differ widely in their opinions on Voltaire's
role in the history of historical research. He is extolled by Fuoro Diaz (Voltaire
storico, Torino 1958), whereas J. H. Brunfitt (Voltaire Historian, London 1958)
is much more critical by pointing out that on some issues Montesquieu's inter-
pretations are better and that Voltaire still ascribed exaggerated importance to
outstanding individuals. For the model edition of Voltaire's historical works see
Voltaire, oeuvres historiques, Bibliotheque de la Pl(:iade, Paris, with an intro-
duction by Rene Pomeau. See also Ideas in History. Essays Presented to Louis
Gottschalk, Durham, N. c., 1965 (with papers on Voltaire and Condorcet by
K. Weintraub and R. Rockwood, and with a discussion of German historicism
by G. G. Iggers).
14 Ch. L. Montesquieu, L'esprit des lois (first published in 1748) and other
works.
15 A. H. L. Heeren, Ideen iiber die Politik, den Verkehr und den Handel der
vornehmsten Volker der alten Welt, vols. I-III, Gottingen 1793-1812. Many
pertinent comments on that historian are to be found in S. I. Krandievsky,
Ocerki po istoriografii ekonomiceskoy istorii (Notes on the Historiography of
Economic History), Kharkov 1964, pp. 123-4.
16 J. von MUller, Geschichte der schweizerischen Eidgenossenschaft, Leipzig
1786-1808.
17 E. Gibbon, The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
1776-88. F. J. Teggart (Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., pp. 36-8) is
right in highly appreciating Gibbon's role in the development of historical
thinking. '
18 See the comments by H. Becker and H. E. Barnes, Social Thought From
Lore to Science, pp. 527-529 (polish translation). Montesquieu in his emphasis
on the immense importance of the climate as a historical factor was inspired by
J. Arbuthnoth, the author of Essay Concerning the Effects of Air on Human
Bodies (1733). L'esprit des lois appeared in 1748.
19 This applies in particular to Hurne's works Of Rise and Progress of the
Arts and Sciences (1742) and Of National Character (1748). Cf. F. J. Teggart,
Theory and Processes of History, 3rd ed., 1962, Chap. 15, "The Method of
Hurne and Turgot", pp. 181 ff; and H. Becker and H. E. Barnes, op. cit.,
pp. 526-527.
20 F. J. Teggart, op. cit., pp. 183 ff.
21 A. R. J. Turgot, Oeuvres, ed. G. ScheIle, vol. 1, Paris 1913. The present
writer is much indebted to I. Berlin, The Age of Enlightenment. The 18th
Century Philosophy Selected with Introduction and Interpretative Commentary,
New York 1956. See also G. Pflug, "Die Entstehung der historischen Methode
PATTERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 95
im 18. Jahrhundert", Deutsche Vierteljahrschrift fur Literaturwissenschaft und

Geistesgeschichte, vol. XXVIII, 1954, pp. 447-71; K. Weyand, Kants Geschichts-
philosophie, Koln 1963.
22 For a comprehensive analysis of this issue see H. Becker and H. E. Bar-
nes, op. cit., pp. 529-535.
23 A. N. Condorcet, Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progres de ['esprit
humain (first published 1794); see also B. Suchodolski's introduction to the
Polish-language edition, Warszawa 1957.
24 Cf. H. Becker and H. E. Barnes, op. cit., pp. 538-541. See also J. Nieder-
mann, Kultur. Werden und Wandlungen des Begriffs und seiner Ersatzbe-
griffe von Cicero bis Herder, Biblioteca dell' Archivum Romanicum, Series I,
vol. 28, Firenze 1941; A. L. Kroeber, C. Kluckhohn, Culture. A Critical Review
of Concepts and Definitions, Cambridge 1952; M. H. Serejski, "PocZ4tki i dzieje
slow 'kultura' i 'cywilizacja' w Polsce" (The Origins and History of the Terms
'Culture' and 'Civilization' in Poland), in: Przeszlosc a terainiejszosc (The Past
and the Present), pp. 237 fI.
llS R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, p. 65; see also G. A. Sabine,
"Hume's Contribution to the Historical Method", Philosophical Review, vol. 15,
1909.
26 See G. B. Vico, The New Science, in: Theories of History, P. Gardiner
(ed.), Glencoe 1959, pp. 12-21, in particular pp. 20-1; B. Croce, "Giovanni Bat-
tista Vico", Encyclopaedia of the Social Sciences, vol. 15, pp. 249-50.
27 Cf. A. N. Condorcet, The Progress of the Human Mind, in: Theories of
History, p. 57.
VI. ERUDITE AND GENETIC REFLECfION
1. The grounds for singling out this pattern of reflection. The third
phase of historical narration
For all practical purposes we might doubt whether 19th century historio-
graphy, so much abounding in various trends (more descriptive versus
more philosophizing ones, less engaged versus iife-oriented ones), com-
plied with the requirements of any single pattern. The issue is even
more controversial as, since the striving for the truth had been made
the principal task of historical research, historiography was developing
continuously as far as research techniques were concerned. From that
point of view 19th century historiography was a continuation of earlier
eruditional and philosophizing trends, especially if we consider the Got-
tingen school and the further development of German historiography.
Yet all that earlier history writing was only arriving laboriously at the
separation of facts from myths, legends, and fables. Even SchlOzer
quite seriously began' the first period of universal history with Adam,
and ended it with Noah. Historiography consisted in collecting facts,
was erudite in character, but above all it had to solidify the critical
sense which makes it possible to sift the truth from untruth. In prag-
matic historiography that sense could be found in a nuclear form, but
it could not have developed in view of the other tasks that were being
set before historical research.
By the turn of the 18th century that basic work - as far as laying the
foundations for historical statements was concerned - had been com-
pleted. There was no more need systematically to emphasize that in the
writing of history one should base one's statements on what is testified
by sources; now that historians had that habit ingrained in them they
could proceed to formulate as many such statements as possible. The
primary task, which of course absorbed the previous ones, was to in-
crease the knowledge of the past, i.e., to strive for erudition. It must,
however, be borne in mind that this trend could have various motiva-
ERUDITE AND GENETIC REFLECTION 97
tions, in particular the national ideas, at the time when national con-
sciousness had been awoke and was consolidating. Erudition, inter-
preted either in the sense of antiquarians and art collectors, or in the
sense of synthesis-writing, or in the sense of aestheticism, became the
obligatory. standard and at the same time the object of historians' pride.
This standard united different trends, some of them even incompatible
with one another as to political attitudes and opinions on the tasks of
history. Another feature of 19th century historiography was the final
shaping of historical narration. Next to the exclusion (in theory, of
course) from the narratives of non-confirmed statements, its principal
achievement was to strive for a genetic description, i.e., to expound the
subject matter so as to reconstruct chronological sequences of events,
that is, the successive stages of the processes under investigation. Earlier
erudites had been satisfied with more simplified forms of description.
The genetic viewpoint was inspired first by the various teleological con-
ceptions, and later by the positivist idea of progress and evolution.
Philosophically quite different, both trends were consolidating diachro-
nic, i.e., time-oriented, reflection.
The scientific achievements of the erudite pattern of history writing
must be assessed in two ways.
The domination of erudite historiography did not mean the extinc-
tion of the philosophical trend in history writing. The 19th century was
too complex for the historians to be able to describe all the phenomena
in terms of unambiguous formulas. That century gave to historiography
its strong and weak points that can be seen to this day. As social con-
ditions were changing as a result of industrialization divergences in the
interpretation of the historical method and in conceiving history as
a branch of human cognition. which had existed before in a nuclear
form, were increasing over and over again. What previously could be
counted as one trend, namely that striving to combine with history
writing the duty of explaining the past, and not only of describing it.
now became an evermore varying mosaic of conflicting opinions.
Eighteenth-century moderation in the treatment of gradually discovered
factors that explained differences in social situations in. the case of many
authors turned into a tendency to radical formulations that exaggerate
the applicative role of a given factor (geographical environment, bio-
logical factor, role of individuals, etc.). That conglomerate of opinions
which were being usually watched with interest by the educated com-
munity, a conglomerate whose oomplexity was constantly increasing,
when combined with an unprecedented increase in the output of his-
torical works, taking the form of hundreds and thousands of mostly
many-volume publications (which make us admire the efforts of in-
dividuals), provided philosophers connected with various political and
class-based groups with a wealth of material for reflection on both the
past and the process of reconstructing it. In the 18th century the demar-
cation line between historians and philosophers was practically non-ex--
istent. but later. with the development of formal education and the birth
of the teaching of history in university seminars (at first in Germany,
and later in other countries as well), and even of a school of source
criticism (Ecole de Chartes, 1823), professional historians, relying on
a set of rules of criticism. based mostly on philological knowledge and
auxiliary historical disciplines. became common. They would now leave
non-source-based reflection to philosophers who, in accori:lance with
increasing specialization, would not engage, in contrast with the past,
in historical research themselves. This had to affect both history writing
and reflection on it. The study of past events could not replace a study
of social structures. This gap in the science of society. which was made
by erudite historiography. came gradually to be filled by sociology,
which formerly had been developing within history, and now was given
a strong impulse by A. Comte.!
On the whole, 19th century historiograph~ did not lose any of the
main features of methodological analysis that had marked it in the
previous periods. It continued to be critical, and was developing that
feature of its own in a signal manner. It did not disregard theoretical
reflection even if the latter was not its strong point. It preached objec-
tivism. but was still pragmatic. the difference being that its pragmatism
was often skilfully concealed (cryptopragmatism). The erudite approach,
which we ascribe to its dominant part, meant only a somewhat stronger
stress on collecting and examining critically source-based information.
The theoretical weakness of erudite history writing kept it at the level
of genetic explanations. i.e.• descriptions of sequences of events. which
did not point to any deeper causes of such events and to the laws of
historical development; and even genetic explanations were made easier
by Hegelian. and later positivist. evolutionism. This is why it has been
tenned genetic historiography; it often called itself that.

In the development of methodological reflection on history writing of
the 19th century - which H. Berr, very correctly and in accordance
with the then prevailing conviction, called "the age of history" after
A. Thierry - we see a clear demarcation line in the years 1850-70,
when the reaction against the aesthetizing erudite narration and the
nationalist implications of Romanticism, and also against democratic
ideas, started taking on various fonns which imparted to the last dec-
ades of the century the characteristic mark of methodological ap-
proaches that were strongly linked to specified social and political at-
titudes. At that time history consolidated its position as a science and
came to hold a foremost place among the humanistic disciplines. His-
torians became principal figures at the universities of that time.
2. Methodological reflection under Romanticism
In the first half of the 19th century the methodological observations and
prescription to be found in historical works could be derived from two,
to some extent conflicting, principles: the consolidating, idealistic and
evolutionist, teleology and the belief in the possibility of fully recon-
structing the past by a chronological listing of facts established through
a critical analysis of sources. The first of these principles helped his-
torical research gradually to assimilate the category of change and pro-
gress, a category that was coming to be understood more and more
fully, while the second - which, as we have said, was a direct continua-
tion of earlier critical trends - was developing modern research tech-
niques of historians, but because of its extreme empiricism (induc-
tionism) prevented them from assimilating theoretical social categories
that would guide source-based observations. Few historians only, in-
cluding the Pole, Lelewel, succeeded in basing tqeir research on the
latest achievements of the philosophical thought of the period, achieve-
ments which advanced the methodology of sciences forward (e.g., those
of Kant), and at the same time in using research techniques which to
this day strike us with their precision and which also took into account
consciously adopted theoretical categories and directives.
The· said principles were manifesting themselves in the works of the
various historians in different degrees. Some historians were striving
100 PATI'ERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
more to demonstrate the development of certain sooial ideas or political

principles (e.g., J. Michelet and T. Macaulay), while others, program-
matically more objectively-minded (e.g., L. Ranke), were mainly con-
cerned with making the full use of all data and with establishing the
greatest possible number of facts. The fonner group produced synthetic
formulations guided largely by the topical needs of political aspirations
and conflicts and intended to demonstrate that the world, in accordance
with a certain logic of history, had long been moving in a given direc-
tion (e.g., toward the implementation of the ideas of freedom and de-
mocracy), whereas the latter group produced erudite syntheses that
listed numerous facts into chronological sequences. Both groups were
still far away from scientific syntheses, even though the former repre-
sented those historians who, while not disassociating themselves from
the requirements of practical life and ideological and political struggles,
had a better sense of the needs of science. Both groups were very much
concerned with the beauty of the literary form of historical narration,
which fact, together with their joint developing of modern techniques
of source criticism, was the strongest link between the two groups.
Their works abound in intuitive psychology and skill of lively recon-
structions of the past. The historians of that time resorted in their works
to the techniques of the belles lettres, and that method made up for
the gap caused by a lack of theoretical categories that would turn
descriptions of past events into historical syntheses. For many decades
they did not need to have their books rendered accessible: their own
literary skills made them reach the public and shape definite attitudes
in their readers in a way which has probably never been surpassed
since.3 H. Berr calls A. Thierry and J. Michelet poets "au sens profond
du mot".' And the same Thierry, when pointing to the methodological
foundations of the historiography of his time, said: "A mon avis, louIe
composition historique est un travail d'art autant que d' erudition".&
These historians had great merits in the field of erudite criticism,
which was associated with a rapid development of auxiliary historical
disciplines, whose concepts have been expanding since that time. The
foundations were laid not only by the inner requirements of historical
research, but also, in a comparable degree, by advances in other disci-
plines, such as philology (comparative linguistics above all), geography,
political economy, etc. It is true that there was a considerable diver-
gence of opinions as to the scope of the auxiliary historical disciplines,

but their classification into auxiliary disciplines in the strict sense of
the term (which help to acquire knowledge of historical sources) and
those which are connected with history, accepted to this today (see
Chap. II), began to emerge. Increasingly numerous textbooks of meth-
ods of historical research, in which we find that divergence of opi-
nions, a hectic search for clear classifications, and the terminological
confusion resulting therefrom, were characteristic features of the de-
velopment of erudite historiography.
Textbooks were dominated by reflections on the concept and types
of historical sources and by information derived from auxilary disci-
plines, which later would become the subject matter of separate com-
pendia. The general issues were mainly those of the concept of history
and the inner division of that discipline.
The most illustrative in that respect are German textbooks (which
also were valued most), both the earlier ones: by C. J. Gatterer (H and-
buch der Umversalhistorie, 1765), by K. T. G. Schonemann (Grundriss
einer Encyklopiidie der historischen Wissenschaften, 1788-99), and the
later ones: by J. E. Fabri (Encyklopiidie der historischen Hauptwissen-
s,ehaften und deren Hilfsdoktrinen, 1808), by C. F. RUhs (Entwurf einer
Propiideutik der historischen Studien, 1811), by E. W. G. Wachsmuth
(Entwurf einer Theorie der Geschichte, 1820), etc.
The methodological works of the Pole, J. Lelewel, above all Historyka
(The Study of History, 1815) and 0 historii, jej rozgal~zieniach i na-
ukach zwiQzek z mQ majQcych (On History and Its Ramifications and
the Related Disciplines. 1826). which reflected the philosophical ap-
proach to history writing, differed markedly from. the manuals mention-
ed above. The textbooks discussed the principles of a "describing" and
"narrating" historiography treated as an art, whereas Lelewel was
equally concerned with causal explanation. He saw the following stages
in a historian's work: heuristics (in the present-day sense of the term),
criticism, causal explanation ("pointing the paths that lead to the com-
prehension of the causes and effects of human affairs"), and the meth-
ods of exposition, description and narration, which he called historio-
graphy. He was right in claiming - which was not realized at that time-
that e~planation requires a social theory, which he included in his meth-
odological analyses. He deliberately replaced the term ars historica by
the Polish term historyka (which he coined himself and which can be
rendered as "the study of history" - Tr.) in order to free methodologi-
cal considerations from associations with art. Other authors of manuals
referred only (by various terms coined by them&elves) to heuristics,
criticism. and historiography (description, exposition). Wachsmuth by
the theory of history meant heuristics (the whole of research) and ex-
position. Within heuristics he was concerned with the sources (among
which he valued written sources most) ,and with the analysis of place
and time as the forms of historical events. His interpretation of heuris-
tics was thus very broad. The concept of historical source and the
classification of sources progressed at that time considerably. For Le-
lewel. antything that could contribute to the reconstruction of the past
was a historical source. He classified historical sources into oral tradi-
tion, unwritten (silent) sources, and written sources. He also realized
that, from the point of view of a given research problem, there may be
direct and indirect sources (i.e.• items of information).
The achievements of historiography in the first half of the 19th cen-
tury as far as criticism was concerned made it possible for the method
of an indirect establishment of facts ,to develop. The stimulus came from
the strong interest taken in ancient and mediaeval history, which re-
quired an indirect establishing of facts. Data for indirect inference came
to be sought in auxiliary historical disciplines and in general know-
ledge provided by the development of science at that time.
On the whole, the theory of historical description advanced much.
Erudition-minded historians treated the subject matter of such descrip-
tion as broadly as their predecessors did in the Age of Enlightenment,
but they failed to move further toward an integrated interpretation of
social facts. In the earlier periods, polyhistors could afford to combine
the various viewpoints: political, economic, anthropological, etc. Later.
as a result of advanced specialization. the task became increasingly
difficult, finally to prove unattainable. In spite of strivings for integrated
approaches historical studies8 were still dominated by political history,
both in the case of "objective-minded" scholars and those who were
politically engaged. The study of political history also most clearly re-
flected the characteristic methodological principles of historiography in
the Romantic period. The former group was most interested in acient
history which thev were reinterpreting from time to time, and in medi-
aeval history, the 16th and 17th centuries included. The latter group
was also willing to study issues of more topical interest.
Among the historians who were the most representative of the Ro-
mantic period in the first half of the 19th century, J. Ch. L. Simonde de
Sismondi (1774-1842), a progressive economist and historian whom
V. Lenin later called a representative of economic Romanticism,7 was
the first to publish his works (1807). He represented the interests of the
lower middle class and in his works on political history he was con-
cerned with the development of the ideas of political freedom, democ-
racy, and the parliamentary system. In the same period (1808) the
works appeared of K. F. Eichhorn (1787-1854), together with those
of K. F. Savigny (1779-1861), the founder of the historical school in
the study of law. Savigny was a representative of the school which inter-
preted history as the science which portrays the constant progress of
mankind. B That period also saw the publication (1811-12) of the first
two volumes of the renowned Romische Geschichte by B; G. Niebuhr
(1776-1831), who together with L. Ranke (1795-1886), is considered
to be the founder of truly "scientific" historiography.
Without belittling the contribution of these historians to the formation
of the erudite and genetic pattern of history writing we have to empha-
size that such opinions are highly exaggerated, which also follows clearly
from what has been said above. The activity of Ranke and other his-
torians who were upholding similar ideas did not denote any turning
point in the general development of research methods in history.
Ranke's famous statement in the foreword to the first edition of Ge-
schichte der romanischen und germanischen Volker (1824) that he did
not want to moralize, but only to show "wie es eigentlich gewesen"
("how it really was"), meant not only his stressing of the antipragmat-
ic attitude (which was nothing new), but also, in contradiction with
this principle of objectivity, condemned the philosophical historiography
of the Age of Enlightenment, engaged in the struggle for social and po-
litical progress, even though Ranke on other occasions did draw from
the Age of Enlightenment (for instance, when he valued highly the
possibilities of history as a research method). Discussions of Ranke's
work come more and more to undermine the opinion formulated,
among others, by Dilthey that in Ranke's philosophy of history there
was nothing but the conviction that a dispassionate study of individual
104 PA'ITERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
facts (i.e., describing "how it really was") as the aim of historical

research. Ranke emphasized the importance of the intuitive under-
standing of the will of outstanding individuals. of the spirit or the
epoch, and of such institutions as the state - which in the last analysis
is a product of God's mind. All changes in history are manifestations
of God's will. and "every epoch". as Ranke emphasized in another
famous statement of his, "is immediate to God".9 Ranke rejected philo-
sophical speculations. nor did he declare himself in favour of the na-
tionalist German policy as fiercely as his disciples later did (he was
more of a conformist), but he did have his idea of history, the meaning
of which turns out to be conservatism and belief in Providence. After
all he had studied theology, which was not without effect on his writ-
ings, and especially his attitude to explanation in history. .
Ranke's contemporaries included such famous historians as the
Frenchmen A. Thierry (1795-1856) and J. Michelet (1798-1874). the
Englishmen Th. Carlyle (1798-1881) and Th. Macaulay (1800-59), the
Dutchman G. v. Prinsterer (1801-76), and the Czech F. Palacky (1798-
1876). Those somewhat older included J. Lelewel (1786-1861). F. Gui-
zot (1787-1874), and above all N. M. Karamzin (1765-1826). whose
Istoriya gosudarstva Rossiyskogo (A History of the Russian State) be-
gan to appear in 1818. All of them left on the historiography of their
times a perhaps stronger imprint than Ranke did. Many of them (which
applies even to Carlyle in the early period of his activity) were preach-
ing the ideas of democracy or liberalism. In spite of their strivings for
a universal approach they were all marked by ethnocentrism of various
kinds. It was at that time that the vocabulary of historical terms came
to include such concepts as those of nation, people, social class, and
class struggle. Michelet, who - which is worth recalling here - was to
some degree under the influence of A. Mickiewicz's lectures in the
College de France, extolled the French Revolution,lO but he above all
extolled France. His prenationalism (let the term nationalism be kept
for the later period) made him state that the French were "the first
nation of Europe".ll Other historians of that period held similar opin-
ions about their respective nations: Macaulay called the English the
"greatest and most highly civilized people",l! and Ranke thought the
same about the Germans. Such opinions were the most dangerous when
circulated by historians who represented countries which were oppres-
sing other nations, especially if they were combined (as was Ranke's
case) with a consistent affirmation of the given state and its power.
Karamzin revived interest in old Russian history. Palacky stood for
the Czech nation's right to political independence.13 In such strivings
he was, however, surpassed by Lelewel,14 who moreover knew what
should be the real path to political freedom. Guizot and Thierry justi-
fied the historical role of the third estate as the principal force of the
nation.
Lelewel combined immense historical work with vast interests in the
methodology of history, which has been described above. For all his
great erudition he was not a historian of the erudite type. He opposed
the then dominant narrative history writing and strove for a philo-
sophical approach to history, which was to be based on the most ad-
vanced achievements of epistemology and on a system of sociological
categories (conceived by Lelewel himself), a system which offered
a structural view of the subject matter of research. This had nothing to
do with any teleological conceptions of a spirit of the nation, which he
viewed sceptically, and even explicity dissociated himself from them,
regardles~ of whether they came from Condorcet, Kant, Ficlite, or
Polish Romanticists. Like Michelet, Guizot, and Thierry, Lelewel saw
the main motive power of historical changes in the activity of the
masses, a purely secular and highly democratic idea. Considering the
opinions prevalent in his times, Lelewel went very far. He saw past
events integrally and stressed their "unity and integrality", but ob-
viously still could not analyse the factors contributing to development
in any greater detail, so as to be able to point to the causes of changes
in that integrality. He was very particular about accuracy and preci-
sion in research, being very exacting in that respect. In his methodo-
logical approach he was on ma~y points superior to later, positivist,
historiographers who prolonged the life of idiographism in history
writing by breaking completely with the concept of a "philosophical"
historiography, guided by specified general assumptions.l~
The first decades of the 19th century saw thorough studies in the
field of economic history, largely influenced by advances in political
economy. This occurred in all countries, but above all in Britain, where
capitalism was advanced most and where the first series of studies in
economic history even came to precede the rise of the historical school
in economics.18 Out of dozens of names and hundreds of publications

let us mention the Frenchmen L. Reynier (ancient economic history)
~nd A. A. Montell (a socio-economic history of France in 10 volumes.
from 1828 on), the Englishmen D. Macpherson (a history of English
trade. manufactures. and shipping in four volumes. 1805). T. Took
and W. Newmarch (prices and currency in Britain. 1793-1850, pub-
lished in 1838-57), and G. R. Porter (an economic history of the Brit-
ish Empire in three volumes, 1836-43), the Germans G. Hansen
(agrarian history) and G. L. Maurer, historian of the old German mark
(village community), who was much valued by Marx and EngelsY
That period also saw the beginnings of studies of the economic status
of the poor people (F. Eden, The State of the Poor, 1797) and of the
growing working class (P. Gaskell, D. Tuchett, E. Buret, P. Vin<;ard,
and others), which coincided with the beginnings of the sociological
studies of the situation of the working class, conducted by L. R. Vil-
lerme, Le Play, and others.
The history of culture also had students of its own. Thus the subject
matter of narratives was vast.
These works. like those in political history, were often inspired by
the tendency to justify the needs of reforming the situation of the peas-
ants and the workers. These studies, too, reflected the ideas of change
and progress. Next to political criteria of progress (such as freedom),
reflection on economic criteria of progress began to emerge timidly
under the influence of the industrial revolution which was then taking
place.
Progress was at that time interpreted by historians as a continuous
process whose motive power was not the laws of nature, but equally
obscure inner spiritual forces. more variable. however, than human
nature is. The concept of static progress which can be comprehended
by deduction and which has a terminal point. invariable and attainable
in every epoch,18 was replaced by the concept of progress whose nature
must be discovered by investigations since it is not given a priori. This
meant an extension of the inductive tasks of a historical description
and also certain advances in the analysis of the concept of change.
That concept, however, was still ahead of the cognitive possibilities of
genetic narration. This type of historiography adopted neither the dia-
lectic suggestions made by Herder nor Hegel's (1770-1831) expanded
dialectics and holism, i.e., an integrated approach to the past which

offered some chances of interpreting progress as a developmental pro-
cess and of explaining it causally. As the bourgeoisie first consolidated
itself, and then came to feel the growing danger of new social forces,
this type of historiography, associated with the bourgeoisie, gradually
lost its objective possibilities of formulating bold interpretations of the
past, since such interpretations were at variance with its class interests.
Hence, reference to the motives of action of individuals continued
to prevail in the sphere of causal explanations as far as minor facts
were concerned. And the general course of events needed no expla-
nation at all, because, in accordance with the opinions of J. B. Fichte
(1762-1814) and F. W. J. Schelling (1775-1854), Hegel's concepts of
the absolute idea, and the opinions of other thinkers (among them
F. Schiller), which were assimilated by historians, the process of history
was interpreted as a sui generis self-development of an idea, and
history as a whole was, in the last analysis, the history of that idea
which had to be comprehended. 19 The origin of that idea could not be
fathomed if the existence of the guiding power of God were not as-
sumed. This was done by some. Ranke accepted God's absolving
omnipotence in history (and this was why he was blamed for relativism
that justified historical acts of lawlessness).2o Others believed in the idea
of progress that materialized in the course of history and looked for it
in their researches. For both groups, the idea manifested itself in the
actions of those human beings who were its bearers. On this point we
find great divergences of opinions: from the caricatural identification
of history solely with the actions of outstanding individuals by Th. Car-
lyle21 to more balanced but also hero-oriented conceptions of Ranke
and othersl!2 and the ascribing by Sismondi of the differences in the
past of the various nations to the system of government to the advanced
conceptions of Guizot, Thierry, Tocqueville and L. von Stein,23 who
saw the motive power of progress in the action of the third estate as
a class. This was not yet a theoretical approach that would introduce
the categories of class and class struggle into historiography, but a con-
crete ascribing of specified characteristics to a single class which op-
posed feudalism. This marked strengthening of the structure of nar-
ration was not taken over later by the methodological ideas of the
historians linked with the interests of the bourgeoisie.
These approaches. for all the profound differences between them. did
not assume any need of establishing historical laws. because. in the
interpretation of the historians active in the first half of the 19th
century. reality (the subject matter of research) by its very nature did
not allow to establish any laws about it. Those historians thus repre-
sented objective idiographism,24 that made them remain at the stage of
describing single facts which, in their opinion. were unique in nature.
As compared with the methodological attainments of the Age of En-
lightenment, which stated the existence of historical laws (even though
these were established by reference to the changelessness of the category
of reason) we notice a step backwards. which nevertheless includes
a nucleus of methodological progress. The laws of progress came to be
replaced by ideas or trends which governed the various periods in the
past, and these were the subjects to be discovered by investigations.
The most frequent references were those to the spirit of the nation. very
popular with the historians in the Romantic period. While they strove
to overcome the limitations of the concepts of laws of progress as
formulated in the Age of Enlightenment they did not yet know how to
replace these by laws of development; they accordingly decided to do
without the laws formulated by the Enlightenment historians and to
go on with an analysis of the concept of change, although they did
that at the price of immersion in metaphysics.
The separation of natural science from social science contributed
even more to the inquiries into the place of history within the system
of sciences. G. B. Vico's anti-Cartesian reaction about one century
earlier was a manifestation of the historian's increased self-compre-
hension and demonstrated that his work was eqUally. though in a differ-
ent manner, scientific as was the work of natural scientists. In the first
half of the 19th century, the interpretation of the science of history
moved further along that path. thus abandoning the integrated ap-
proach which marked D'Alembert and Condorcet. Schelling. and in
particular Hegel, made a very strict distinction between natural and
historical phenomena. The concept of development did not apply to
the former. since changes in nature are cyclical. Hence research in
natural science and historical research belong to two different worlds.
each of them governed by principles of its own. It. is worthwhile noting
that neither Hegel's integrated approach to history. and hence his
ERUDITE AND GENEnC REFLECTION 109
methodological holism. nor dialectics which paved the way for the
comprehension of the mechanism of development, were adopted by
historians active in the first half of the 19th century. But, as compared
with the later periods, the divergence in the approaches to the subject
matter of historical research, as described above, was not very ad-
vanced. The unifying role was to some extent played by the idealistic
concept of teleology.
3. The peculiarities of positivist reflections on history
The second half of the 19th century saw a number of changes in the
methodological reflection on history. Here again we have to look for
them in the practical activities of the historians, although their method-
ological knowledge increased markedly, too. At the same time history
as a discipline became, as never before, an almost inexhaustible source
of reflections for both philosophers and sociologists. Their discussions
were in fact based on the rapid growth of the various disciplines, each
of which tried to define its place in the world of science and, quite
understandably, to make that place as conspicuous as ,possible.
In the second half of the 19th century historiography was influenced
mainly by positivism,25 the trend which, by rejecting metaphysics and
calling for a sober examination of facts, succeeded in dominating phil-
osophical and scientific thought and penetrated deep into everyday
manner of thinking. But by its demand that historians should stick to
facts and not go beyond source-based data positivism consolidated the
erudite trend in the science of history and gave it more modern found-
ations. The "philosophical" approach to history as understood in the
Age of Enlightenment or, for instance, by Lelewel, came to be elimi-
nated from science, although considerable residues of the speculative
and teleological approaches of the "spirit of the nation" type continued
to develop, especially in the nationalist, so-called Prussian school of
history. It must also be borne in mind that the printing presses con-
tinued to be flooded with writings on history whose standard made
them lag far behind the best achievements of the period, achievements
with which we are naturally mainly concerned here.
When speaking about the effect of the positivist ideas on the meth-
odological reflections on history which came to be marked in Europe,
and also outside Europe, about 1850, as the characteristic factor in the
development of those reflections and the measure of their attainments,
we have to note that the extinction of old ideas and the birth of new
ones were taking place in a way which makes it difficult to pinpoint
the process chronologically. Representatives of the old school were
still alive and active, thus influencing their disciples who did not take
over the new ideas automatically. Among the representatives of the
new generation of historians, most of them born in the second quarter
of the 19th century or about 1850, some were more inclined toward the
objective trend (represented by Ranke), and others, toward the teleo-
logical trend (represented by French historians). Contrary to appear-
ances, the latter was to a greater degree the forerunner of positivism
in history than the former. Moreover, historians were drawing various
inspirations from positivism, which was an eclectic doctrine itself. We
may also speak about several types of positivism,26 which influenced
historical research in different ways.
The positivist trend in philosophy and science was initiated by
A. Comte (1798-1857) in his Cours de philosophie positive (1830-42),
which became the point of departure for the several variations of the
French school of positivism (H. Taine, 1838-97; E. Renan, 1823-92;
and others). The same period saw the rise of English empirical posi-
tivism, based on its own sources and most fully formulated in the works
of J. S. Mill (1806-73); it owed its extraordinarily strong impact on the
mestality of its contemporaries to H. T. Buckle's (1820-62) renowned
History of Civilization in England (1857--61), translated into many
languages (such also was the opinion of J. S. Mill himself). Buckle's
work also was a source of inspiration for the positivist methodology
of history. When constructing his epistemological empiricism and
theory of induction Mill rejected all a priori premisses (including the
reality of general concepts) and assumed the existence of individual
things and facts only. He claimed that inductive reasoning must pre-
cede deductive reasoning and that both are based on the principles
worked out by him in the study of natural science.27 Comte also con-
sidered that only empirical things and facts could be a subject matter
of science.
This opinion contributed to advances in the techniques of narration
by the final, at least in theory, dissociation of history from literature,
of which history had been reputed to be a branch. Some scholars who

engage in the old discussion on the issue when history became a scien-
tific discipline, take this fact to be the most important symptom and
are accordingly inclined to treat history as a science beginning with
c. 1850. Yet, as a matter of fact, all this was of secondary importance;
a work on history whose language rises to a level of literary art may
prove much more scientific than an exposition which is dry but shal-
low.
Positivism eliminated from historical narratives the still great ac-
cumulations of fantasy (e.g., in the search for the "origin" of the na-
tion, the state, various institutions, etc.) and weakened signally the
strong elements of religious metaphysics. It emphasized the renunciation
of all pragmatism even more than it had been done earlier. It sharpened
the tools of historical criticism in a masterly way and continued to
improve the intricate technique of indirect demonstration. Historical
books and periodicals and congresses of historians, which were in-
creasing in numbers, became the arena of sharp controversies over the
correct interpretation of sources. Crypto-pragmatism remained, how-
ever, a universal phenomenon. In Poland, this gave rise to the contro-
versy between what were termed the Warsaw and the Cracow school
of history. Judged by the standards of their times, both were more or
less positivist, the difference between them being mainly in the degree
of support to the Catholic camp and in the attitude toward topical
social and political issues. Their discussions did not contribute any
new methodological ideas. 2s
Advances in heuristics and criticism, which consisted in calling for
a sober appraisal of facts and precision in handling the sources, were
clearly evident in the series of new textbooks of the historical method
(methodologies, introductions, principles of historical criticism, etc.).
They did away with the earlier incessant search for terminologies and
classifications: by that time, owing to the advances of logical reflection,
those issues had been discussed and codified. There was, of course, in
that respect a difference between the approaches dating from the middle
and those from the last decades of the 19th century. The earliest pub-
lications are those by P. J. B. Buchez of 1833 (Introduction a fa science
de ['histoire), with some positivist overtones, twenty volumes of studies
by P. C. F. Daunou (Cours d'etudes historiques, 1842-9), and-with
112 PA'ITERNS OF IllsrORICAL RESEARCH
major reservations - works by German historians, such as J. G. Droy-

sen's Enzyklopiidie und Methodologie der Geschichte (1858) and Grund-
riss der Historik (1868).29 Somewhat later various countries saw the
appearance of many similar works in the positivist style, namely those
by Ch. de Smedtal (1881), N. T. Kareyev (1883-1913), E. A. Freeman
(1896), P. Lacombe (1904),00 G. B. Andrews (1897), and Ch. Langlois
and Ch. Seignobos (1897), the last-named one being the most popular
of all. Listed here together as they are they differed from one another,
sometimes considerably, in the philosophical approach of their respec-
tive authors. Common to them, however, was the striving to be precise
on issues of the historical method. We can see new ideas concerning
the classification of sources. The various stages in the historian's work
came to be fixed as heuristics, criticism, systematization (construction)
and description.
The watchwords reflecting the new methods were the basis for the
opening of historical journals. The Revue Historique, now just
a century old, was founded in 1876, with G. Monod as its editor-in-
chief, to consolidate historical positivism in France. Both the studies
strictly concerned with reflection on the science of history and the
numerous large monographs and small contributions were inspired by
the famous statement: "L'Histoire se fait avec des documents", made
by Langlois and Seignobos. Documents (in the sense of sources) con-
taining information about facts were to be the basis of observations
similar to those made in natural science. The more numerous the ob-
servations (i.e., the more numerous the established facts) the more
reliable the research. It was believed that this was the only possible way
of obtaining knowledge of the past, a process with which the historian's
personality should interfere as little as possible. The focal point was
the fact, as was the case in the study of nature.
Positivism, which - as E. Durkheim, the French sociologist, put it-
grew in the shadow of natural science, at that time transferred to the
sphere of history the concept of fact, which was later to be strengthened
by the influence of post-positivist (especially Durkheim's) sociology as
one of the fundamental categories of historical reflection. a1
In the present-day methodology of history there are no longer any
references to the origin of that concept, which, in the present writer's
opinion, accounts for many obscurities in its proper interpretation. Yet
it is imperative to emphasize the markedly static sense of the term due

to the positivist interpretation of historical fact. Its sense cannot be
grasped if the whole conception of positivist methodology is ignored,
a methodology which, by referring clearly to the ideas current in the
Age of Enlightenment, took over both its major values and weak-
nesses.a:! Concerning reflection on history, too, positivism (mainly
through A. Cornte) transmitted ideas characteristic of the Age of En-
lightenment - and, to some extent, of Cartesian philosophy - to the 19th
century.33 At the cost of abandoning the teleological approach, which
implied metaphysics but introduced man, and even social classes, as
active elements in history, historians obtained more clarity in establish-
ipg facts, but they moved backward on the path toward a better com-
prehension of the categories of change and development, categories
which are essential to all reflection on the pursuit of history.
As a result, that viewpoint rendered difficult a full development of
both history and "social physics", i.e., sociology, postulated by Comte.
Comte classified the sciences into the abstract ones, that is those which
discover laws about facts, and concrete, i.e., descriptive - those which
formulate statements about facts.34 Except for sociology, all other social
sciences, including history, were placed by him in the latter class of
secondary, descriptive disciplines. As conceived by Comte, every ab-
stract science, including sociology, has its static and its dynamic part.
In the sphere of social physics that dynamic part resembles a historical
sociology, to be concerned with establishing an ideal sequence of man-
ifestations of progress in the history of mankind. This requires above
all a comparative method, based on the observation of contemporary
societies that represent various stages of development; the historical
method comes only second in importance, because Comte's ideal se.
quences do not need any temporal and spatial co-ordinates. Progress,
to be seen in mankind's passing from one stage to another, is something
natural and takes place regardless of given historical events. It
materializes continuously, through slow changes determined in advance
by its own laws. Historical facts or events are not its carriers, and
hence they may be treated statically as passive elements of history, as
building blocks placed by someone in a prearranged way. In that re-
spect they resemble equally static facts of nature: despite the emergence,
from the mid-18th century on, of an evolutionary approach to nature
114 PA'ITERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
(Kant, Laplace, Lamarck, Hutton), Comte's standpoint continued to

be that of treating natural facts as entirely static. The evolutionary ap·
proach, which emphasized the continuity of small changes, was adopted
by Comte only with reference to dynamic disciplines in abstract scien·
ces, concerned with abstract progress. The static concept of historical
fact was later supported by post..Q)mtean sociology. which abandoned
Comte's unconvincing evolutionary idea of progress and concentrated
on the static approach, that is. on the study of the structure of con·
temporary society. Such studies. at first full of speculative constructions,
gradually evolved toward an empirical approach.as
The two principal sources of evolutionist inspiration in the 19th
century. i.e.• evolutionism in anthropology and evolutionism in natural
science, could not stimulate historical reflection, either. because these
two. largely under Comte's influence, treated changes as independent
of facts.
Anthropologists in their striving for theoretical constructions were
doing without a study of historical facts and confined themselves to
rejecting Comte's belief in a uniform development of mankind.18 They
were mainly interested in the study of similarities. and this led some to
ahistorical discussions of "beginnings" of various phenomena. and
others to diffusionism. i.e .• excessive attention paid to search for cross-
cultural influences. The important point was, however. that they covered
with their research those periods which had previously been treated as
"legendary" and that they went beyond the conventional sphere of
European culture.
The revolution in natural science, due to the formulation by Ch. Dar-
win (1809-82) of his theory of evolution (1859). provided nature with
a history. but that was an evolutionist history that complied with the
principle, formulated in the 18th century and later adopted by Comte
and adjusted to nature, stating that natura non facit sa/tum.17 That was
why H. Spencer's (1820-1903) conception of evolutionist positivism.
even though it marked some progress in the development of evolution·
ism as it covered with that principle the whole of social and natural
phenomena, did not open new vistas to historiography (except for
offering better associations derived, from the organic ~pproach). From
the historians' point of view H. Taine's (1838-93) analyses were more
interesting. Taine's approach to the social sciences was. like Spencer's
and Cornte's. consistently naturalistic; he thought that the methodo-

logical principles observed in the natural sciences were valid for the
social sciences, too,38 and claimed that both natural and historical facts
were recurrent in character. He rejected evolutionism with respect to
both and accordingly faced the task of explaining otherwise the differ-
ence in stages of civilization, which made him interpret history much
more profoundly than Comte had done. because he did not refer to an
abstract concept of progress that is independent of the interplay of
facts.
Cornte's idea. which did not take into account that actual state of
historical studies and restricted facts to simple descriptions, was never
fully accepted by historians. Those who used to reflect on issues of the
methodology of historical research did not want to see the tasks of
history writing confined to descriptions; they wanted historians to
formulate generalizations and to discover laws which govern f"vents, as
this is done in "abstract sciences". H. T. Buckle's work mentioned
above39 was the most consistent manifesto of those ideas. It provoked
many discussions. mainly because of its anticlericalism. but could not
affect historiography in any considerable degree. first, because the
traditions of the erudite approach were to strong. and secondly. be-
cause the positivist concept of historical laws was too much burdened
with ahistorical ideas going back to the 17th century and to the En-
lightenment, ideas which led to the concept of laws of nature and
unchanging intellectual characteristics of man. We can find similar
ideas even in J. S. Mill, who criticized his father (James Mill) and
J. Bentham for a too narrow interpretation of the idea of unchanging
laws of nature that govern the conduct of man and who understood
history better than Comte did. Despite the requirement that the various
stages in the evolution of society be studied empirically and that em-
pirical laws be formulated in that respect such laws could not be ex-
plained without reference to the fundamental principles of the individ-
ual's psychology (laws of human nature).40 In this interpretation, these
laws were not laws of historical development. but laws of progress.
Evolution pointed to the passive nature of its own object; development
implied changes in the object without predetermining the nature of
such changes. continuous or dialectical. This is why the common opin-
ions stating that evolutionism turned history into a science are quite
116 PATrERNS OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH
groundless. To become a separate discipline history needed the com-

bination of the study of facts with the study of changes in the form
of an integrated study of the process of development. and not of pro-
gress, whether conceived metaphysically or positivistically (i.e., as an
evolution of the human mind or human knowledge).
When the concept of progress was dissociated from the intervention
of the divine factor and associated with the concept of laws treated
independently of the process of historical changes, i.e.• fatalistically and
teleologically. the only way out was to link those laws with the nature
(psychology) of man. This was so because linking them with man's
actions would mean a denial of the conception described above: human
actions do not take place in isolation, and hence the laws under con-
sideration would have to be deduced from the relations between man
and the surrounding world, and not from his psychology. This would
have far-reaching consequences, namely the replacement of laws of
progress by laws of development.
Mill pointed to the fact that from the logical point of view a law is
a strictly general statement. He distinguished causal laws and laws of
co-occurrence. Comte did not link the category of cause directly with
laws. since for him cause had its raison d'etre in the study of the se-
quence of facts, and not in the study of changes. 41 Mill thought the
causal nature of human actions to be a result of the interplay of the
said laws. but admitted some role of man's free will.4.2 The acceptance
of the existence of laws freed historiography from the charge of ob-
jective idiographism. even though. as we have seen, the interpretation
of laws was in fact ahistorical. In practice, however. idiographic history
writing was being pursued; that idiographism was due not to any im-
possibility of investigating the laws under consideration. but to the
practical difficulties of searching for them. because the concept of pos-
itivist laws was artificial and did not follow from the actual needs of
the science of history. which must above all be interested in the mech-
anism of development. Buckle's example showed that even the re-
search techniques of such an outstanding historian yielded trivial results
in the search of such laws. This meant the way of overcoming of the
increasingly alarming consequences of evolutionist (genetic) erudition-
ism had to be sought elsewhere.
In the analysis of the factors contributing to differences in the level
of the various societies all more noteworthy observations usually arose

as a result of deviating from the principles of consistent positivism. The
set of factors affecting history taken into consideration remained the
same. Excessive importance was attached to the geographical factor
(the influence of Buckle and the geographical school, F. J. Turner), the
demographic factor, the development of human knowledge, the role of
the state (S. M. Solovyev and others), while - although not in all cases -
religion and the Church were denied any important historical role.
The development of economic history as a separate historical dis-
cipline contributed to a better understanding of the economic factor.
The complex circumstances which accounted for its rise included the
historical school of political economy, which developed from an op-
position to the classical conceptions of Smith and Ricardo. The main
attainments were not theoretical statements, but innumerable volumes
of studies in economic history. The birth of the historical school was
linked with genetic conceptions (i.e., with sui generis historicism) that
were characteristic of the Romantic period (compare the ideas of
Savigny, Ranke, and others) and of Comte's positivist philosophy. The
highest theoretical achievement of that school was the various concep-
tions of stages in the economic development of mankind. Born of
positivist evolutionism, often in connection with interpretation which
tended to treat society as an organism, these conceptions suffered from
an ahistorical approach: when pointing to the various stages of econ-
omic development they did not discover the mechanism of transition
from one stage to another. Hence in the interpretation of the historical
school the various stages appear as something complete and fully form-
ed., without any transition periods. W. Roscher (1817-94), like B. Hilde-
brand (1812-86), distinguished the natural, the money, and the credit
economy, but he did so not on the s·trength of a study of historical
changes, but by studying analogies in the history of the various coun-
tries. That was perhaps why K. Knies (1821-98), who was most ad-
vanced in methodological reflection, emphasized the national character
of human activities and abstained from referring to such universally
conceived stages of development. He stressed that the main task of
economics was to discover concrete, historically conditioned causes of
man's economic activity; such causes could vary in nature, the most
important being natural conditions and man's mentality. Analogies,
which according to Knies are the content of historical (economic) laws.

take place if there is a parallelism not only in the properties of the
phenomena in question (which was assumed in the conception of stages
in economic development), but also in the causes that account for such
phenomena.
In its further development the historical school took two different
courses. One of them continued the idea of stages in economic develop-
ment (e.g.• K. BUcher), replacing thereby the search for regularities in
economic development; the other (e.g.• G. SchmoIler) went further
(even though appearances might suggest the contrary). but while it
made a step further to,ward the search for laws it did not transgress
the limits of causality and genetic description. However, as has been
mentioned earlier. even the theoretically most advanced interpretations
of positivism (by Comte and J. S. Mill) failed to link causality with the
idea of universal regularities. Laws were conceived of as if they were
a force outside the activities of man: in the best case (J. S. Mill) human
actions were interpreted as a resultant of such laws and "human
nature".411
The positivist approach.' which gradually turned out to work as
a brake on explanations. was in historical research connected with an
increasing disintegration of historical studies. Political history (though
interpreted in different ways) was still dominant, even if it saw its
monopoly threatened by economic history. but the development of the
various historical disciplines resulted in advancing specialization. In-
dividual historians narrowed their respective fields of vision more and
more. which led them either to abandoning endeavours to formulate
explanations or to overemphasize those issues on which their research
was concentrated. Discussions were dominated by arguments drawn
from heuristics. external criticism and politics, and not from social or
economic theory. The animation that resulted from the birth of positiv-
ist methodology was followed in the case of most historians by an
alarming ebbing of interest in methodology. Only a few of the historians
saw that historical research, concerned with its own "flood of facts",
was accompanied by the rise of many disciplines interested in man and
society. which marked a new situation for the social sciences as a whole.
Still less numerous were those who managed to appreciate the oppor-
tunities offered by the dialectical method. the theory of historical mate-
rialism, and Marxian political economy, which by that time had already
been well-fonnulated. That was why the Marxists played a rather small
part in the reaction to positivist methodology; yet the attitude toward
the new theory and method was the subject matter of an increasing
number of discussions, since scholars could hardly remain indifferent
to the new ideas that announced solutions of many vital problems of
the humanities.
REFERENCES
1 This statement should not be pushed to the extreme; it applies to the
general characteristics of the period's historiography and not to individual
historians.
2 On 19th century historiography much information can still be obtained
from G. P. Gooch, History and Historians in the Nineteenth Century, despite

the fact that the book was published more than 50 years ago, and from
E. FUter, Geschichte der neueren Historiographie, ed. cit. See also L. Halphen,
L' histoire en France depuis cent ans, Paris 1914; H. E. Barnes, A History of
Historical Writing, sec. revised edition, New York 1963; B. G. Reizov, Francus-
kaya romanticeskaja istoriografia (French Historiography in the Romantic
Period), Leningrad 1956; J. W. Thompson, A History of Historical Writing, New
York 1942. On German historiography consult F. Wegele, Geschichte der
deutschen Historiographie, Miinchen 1935; F. Meinecke, Die Entstehung des
Historismus (vols. I-II), Berlin 1936; G. Below, Die deutsche Geschichtsschrei-
bung, Berlin 1915.
a Discussions of the issue how far the state-oriented and nationalist German
historiography had paved the way for Nazism often point to Ranke, whose
works had had an immense effect; in this connection note that Ranke died only
in 1886, at the age of 91, being a prolific writer to the end of his days. The
problem is analysed by P. Geyl, "Ranke in the Light of Catastrophe", in: De-
bates with Historians, Groningen, Djakarta, The Hague 1955, p. 118. On Ranke
and the historiography of his times see also C. Hinrichs, Ranke und die Ge-
schichtstheologie der Goethezeit, Gottingen 1954.
4 H. Berr, La synthese en histoire, son rapport avec la synthese generale
(revised ed.), Paris 1953, pp. 232-3.
5 "A mon avis, toute composition historiques est un travail d'art autant que
d'erudition." Quoted after H. Berr, op. cit., p. 233. See also the broad analysis
of the French Romantic school in B. G. Reizov's book referred to in footnote
2 above; On the poetic character of that school see p. 150.
8 Cf. J. Topolski, "Zagadnienia gospooarcze u Joachima Lelewela" (Joachim

Lelewel on Economic Problems), in: Z badmi nad pracami historycznymi J. Le-
lewela (Studies in J. Lelewel's Historical Writings), Poznan 1962, pp. 33-50.
7 V. Lenin, K charakteristike ekonomiceskogo romantisma (Contribution to
120 PATIERNS OF mSfORICAL RESEARCH
economic romanticism) Out of Sismondi's historical writings mention is due to

L'Hhistoire des republiques italiennes du moyen age, ZUrich-Paris 1807-18
(16 vols.) and to the most important item, namely Histoire des Frant;ais sous les
deux premieres dynasties, Paris 1821. On Sismondi see also Y. Plekhanov, The
Development of the Monist View of History, Moscow 1956, pp. 26-27.
8 Cf. K. Grzybowski, "0 miejscu niemieckiej szkoly historycznej w rozwoju
nauki prawa" (The Place of the German School of History in the Development
of Jurisprudence), Czasopismo Prawno-Historyczne, vol. VIII, No. 2/1956. Sa-
vigny was also interested in the history of Roman law; in this connection see
his Geschichte des Romischen Rechts im Mittelalter, Heidelberg 1816-8.
9 This is emphasized by P. Geyl. The issue is also discussed by G. G. Ig-
gers, "The Image of Ranke in American and German Thought", History and
Theory, vol. II, No. 1/1962, pp. 17-40, and by G. Schilfert, Studien iiber die
deutsche Geschichtwissenschaft, Berlin 1963, pp. 241 fI. See also Acton's opinion
of Ranke in H. Butterfield, Man on His Past, pp. 86 fI. The idiographic char-
acter of Ranke's writings was stressed by K. Marx.
lU On this point see M. H. Serejski, "Jules Micheleta Polska" (poland as
Seen by Jules Michelet), in: Przeszlosc a terainiejszosc (The Past and the Pres-
ent), pp. 108 fI.
11 Cf. P. Geyl, "Michelet and His History of the French Revolution", in:
Debates with Historians, p. 82.

12 "Macaulay in His Essays", Debates with Historians, p. 26.
18 In his fundamental work Geschichte von Bohmen, vols. I-V, Praha

1836-67 (the Czech-language version was first published during the Spring of
Nations and continued 1848-76). His main motif was the Czech nation's strug-
gle for freedom.
14 This can be seen clearly from the result of research on his works. A broad
discussion of Lelewel's methodological approach is to be found in the intro-
duction to his Pisma Metodologiczne (Methodological Writings), in Dziela
(Collected Works), vol. II, parts 1 and 2, pp. 7-93, in particular pp. 46-77.
These findings are largely used in the present book.
15 As mentioned above, Lelewel's methodological writings are to be found
in vol. II of this collected works (Warszawa 1964). Much light is shed on his
methodological approach by his Dzieje historii i jej badan i sztuki (A History
of History, Its Research and Art) in Dziela (Collected Works), vol. II, part 2,
pp. 709-856. L. Janowski in his Wst(!P og6lny do historii powszechnej (A Gen-
eral Introduction to Universal History), 1846, drew close to Lelewel's stand-
point. Other followers of Lelewel's approach could be mentioned, too, but in
general Lelewel was not understood by his contemporaries since he was too far
ahead of his times.
18 For the history of economic history see W. Kula, Problemy i metody hi-
storii gospodarczej (Issues and Methods in Economic History), Warszawa 1963.
17 The study of old rural land communities was quite popular in 19th cen-
tury historiography. Cf. the works by E. Nasse and P. Violette. Lelewel's rele--
vant ideas were associated with that trend of research.

18 T. J. Teggart's comments in his Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit.,
pp. 96-8, are very instructive in this respect.
19 See in particular Hegel's introduction to his Philosophy of History (in:
Theories of History, ed. cit., pp. 60 ff). Lelewel's characteristic comment on

Fichte's idea of history is worth quoting: History "is an infinitely progressive
idea, the embodiment (...) of an ideal (...), but the moment when it will reach
the ideal which it is approaching, can be indicated neither by experience nor by
theory, it is only a point of faith, a belief on the part of an acting man." (Dzie-
fa (Collected Works), vol. II, Part 1, pp. 819-20). See also R. G. Collingwood,
The Idea of History, ed. cit., pp. 89-114.
20 P. Geyl, Debates with Historians, ed. cit., p. 13.
21 Especially in On Heroes, Hero-Worship and the Heroic in History. See
also P. Geyl, "Carlyle, His Significance and Reputation" in: Debates with His-
torians, ed. cit., pp. 35-55.
22 This fact was pointed to by W. Dilthey.
23 Author of Geschichte der sozialen Beweg,ung in Frankreich von 1789 bis

an unsere Tage, 1850.
24 See A. Malewski and J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii historii (Studies in
the Methodology of History), Warszawa 1960, pp. 11-40.
25 It must be borne in mind that positivism was represented by its various
versions.
26 Cf. J. Legowicz, Zarys historii filozofii (An Outline of the History of
Philosophy), Warszawa 1964, pp. 302 ff.
27 The effect of philosophical positivism on historiography is discussed by
I. S. Kon in Die Geschichtsphilosophie des 20. Jahrhunderts, ed. cit., pp. 46 ff,
and by A. Galleati in Natura e finalita della storia nel moderno pensiero euro-
peo. Dalla storia filosofica allo storismo idealistico, Milano 1953, pp. 173 fI.
28 In methodological reflection, which was not too far advanced, references
were made to the requirement of objectivism (especially the Warsaw school
with T. Korzon, and T. Wojciechowski), to empiricism and inductionism (A. Pa-
wiflski, M. Bobrzynski, T. Korzon, and others), to "regularities" in social de·
velopment CW. Smolenski, M. Bobrzynski, and others), to the unity of the
methods of natural science and history (M. Bobrzyflski, T. Wojciechowski).
J. Szujski, who represented anti-positivist views, mainly opposed the anticlerical
and lay approach characteristic of that trend. S. Smolka also was to a large
degree opposed to positivism. Statements made by Polish historians of that
period are to be found in M. H. Serejski, Historycy 0 historii (Historians on
History), ed. cit., pp. 139-400 (with the editor's comments on pp. 130-8). The
viewpoint of K. Potkanski remains to be examined.
29 The manuscript of the second of these two works was dated 1858 (2nd
ed. in 1875, 3rd ed. in 1882). Later both works were published together as
Johann Gustav Droysen Historik (1936-43). The latest edition (1958) bears the
title Historik. Vorlesungen liber Enzyklopadie und Methodologie der Geschichte.
On J. G. Droysen (1808-84) see F. Meinecke, "Johann Gustav Droysen. Sein

Briefwechsel und seine Geschichtsschreibung", Historische Zeitschrift, No. 141/
/1938, pp. 249-83. Droysen, who was mainly concerned with ancient history, also
wrote a particularly tendentious Geschichte der preussischen PoUtik in 15 vols.,
brought up to the Seven Years' War (published 1868-86). J. G. Droysen did
not accept laws in the positivist sense of the term; he was an intuitionist and
one of the promoters of the idea of Staatsgefiihl in Germany, the idea which
essentially affected the methodological views of German historians and hindered
the development of positivist ideas. J. G. Droysen's influence upon W. Dilthey
has recently been emphasized (see F. F. Suter, Philosophie de I'histoire chez
Wilhelm Dilthey, Basle 1960, p. 204). In addition to J. G. Droysen, his sons
Gustav Droysen (history of the 17th century) and Hans Droysen (Inilitary his-
tory) were also active historians.
80 B. Lacombe, De I' histoire coosideree comme une science, Paris 1894 (2nd
ed. in 1930).
81 The term used more frequently earlier was event, but the issue is inessen-
tial, since both a fact and an event may be interpreted statically and dYnaIni-
cally.
82 Comte's schema of historiography reflects the influence of the Saint-Simon
school.
83 This definition was adopted - through the intermediary of M. Defoumy
(La sociologie positiviste - Auguste Comte, Louvain 1902, pp. 353-4) - by F. J.
Teggart in his Theory and Processes of History; he also offered a penetrating
interpretation of Comte's methodological ideas. See also L. Levy-BrUhl, Die
Philosophie Auguste Comte's, Leipzig 1912.
34 Cf. A. Comte, Cours de la philosophie positive, 1830-42.
35 a. H. Maus, "Zur Vorgeschichte der empirischen Sozialforschung",
Handbuch der Empirischen Sozialforschung, vol. I, Stuttgart 1967, pp. 18-37.
88 This remark refers to such cultural anthropologists as E. B. Tylor,
G. Weitz, J. F. McLennan, L. H. Morgan, J. G. Frazer, and also to L. Gum-
plowicz. (Note in this connection J. Lutyitski's introduction to the Polish-lan-
guage version of J. G. Frazer's The Golden Bough, which appeared in Poland
in 1962.) See also J. H. Steward's analysis of the concept of evolution in cul-
tural anthropology (in Anthropology Today, A. L. Kroeber (ed.), Chicago
1953, pp. 313-25, with bibliography).
37 Compare F. J. Teggart's approach in Theory and Processes of History,
ed. cit., pp. 137-8.
88 On the situation in present-day science in this respect see J. GiedyInin,
"Sp6r Ini~dzy naturalizmem i antynaturalizmem w pojmowaniu nauk spolecz-
nych" (The Controversy between Naturalists and Anti-naturalists over the In-
terpretation of the Social Sciences), Rocznik Ekonomiczny PTE, Poznan, vol.
XIII, 1961-2, pp. 173-91.
89 See in particular Chaps. I to IV.
40 Cf. Theories of History, ed. cit., pp. 83-4. J. S. Mill's theses are expound-
ERUDITE AND GENETIC REFLECfION 123
ed in his A System of Logic (Book VI, Chaps. X and XI) (reprinted in Theories
at History, pp. 84-105).
41 "As we have seen, the first characteristic of the Positive Philosophy is
that it regards all phenomena as subjected to invariable natural laws. Our busi-
ness is - seeing how vain is any research into what are called Causes, whether
first or final- to pursue an accurate discovery of these Laws, with a view to
reducing them to the smallest possible number". A. Comte, Cours de la philo-
sophie possitive, vol. I, ed. cit., Chap 1 (quoted after A. Comte, ''The Character
of the Positive Philosophy", in: Theories at History, P. Gardiner (ed.) Glencoe
1959, p. 76).
42 "I have discussed this question, as far as seemed suitable to the occasion,
in a former Chapter; and I only think it necessary to repeat that the doctrine
of the Causation of human actions, improperly called the doctrine of Necessity,
affirms mysterious nexus, or overruling fatality: it asserts only that men's ac-
tions are the joint result of the general laws and circumstances of human nature,
and of their particular characters". J. S. Mill, A System of Logic, Book VI,
Chap. X, quoted after Theories of History, ed. cit., p. 96. J. F. Stephen (cf. The
Study of History, 1961), to whom attention was recently drawn in History and
Theory, vol. I, No. 2/1961, pp. 186-201, tries to interpret the concept of laws
in history in a similar manner.
43 There is an immense number of works on the concept of stages in econo-
mic development (and mankind's development in general). The recent items
include B. F. Hoselitz, "Theories of Stages of Economic Growth", in: Theories
of Economic Growth, 1960, and W. Kula, Problemy i metody historii gospodar-
czej (Issues and Methods in Economic History), ed. cit., pp. 24-33. Earlier works
include above all K. BUcher, Die Entstehung der Volkswirtschaft, 1893, and
K. Breysig, Der Stufenbau und die Gesetze der Weltgeschichte, 1904. Breysig's
work will be mentioned later
vn. STRUCTURAL REFLECTION
1. The rise of a structural pattern of historical research
The anti-positivist methodological reflection in historical studies was

marked above all by denial and scepticism. That scepticism had three
aspects. Anti-positivist ideas were born out of doubts concerning the
cognitive values of inductive cumulation of facts, i.e., analytical cogni-
tion. It was doubted, with much justification, whether human knowledge
of the past events increases in proportion to the number of established
facts. In the birth of that new reflection no less important role was
played by scepticism about the positivist idea of an incessant evolution
of man's intellectual and moral values, an evolution which was sup-
posed to follow natural laws of progress that work regardless of facts;
thus, this form of scepticism pertained to the very existence of such
laws. Finally, scepticism about the optimistic treatment of historio-
graphy as a discipline which closely resembles the natural sciences and
about the correctness of the principle of "objective" historiography
dissociated from practical requirements also had a strong impact on
anti-positivist reflection.
This three-fold scepticism directly or indirectly affecting all spheres
of the methodological reflection on history, led to various and often
mutually incompatible proposals. The first resulted both in cognitive
pessimism in historical research and in enriching historical cogni-
tion with strivings for integrated approaches. The second led, on the
one hand, to a new denial of any historical laws and to a return to
objective idiographism and to indeterminism, and, on the other, to
a further progress in reflections on historical laws and explanations in
history. The third gave both a total denial of the scientific nature of
history and new arguments in favour of the claim that historical re-
search is an exact discipline. To sum up, some of the new trends can
now be interpreted as a critical continuation and expansion of the
basic ideas of positivism (in its more or less evolutionist version), and
STRUCTURAL REFLECTION 125
others as a denial of these ideas and a reversal to earlier conceptions.

The dominant, and valuable, characteristic of the methodolO'gical re-
flection born of the sceptical criticism of 19th century positivism was
the noticing - although from different philosophical standpoints - of
the importance for histO'rical research of the integrated approach, O'f
which erudite historiography was a manifold denial. This resulted in
attempts, made in variO'us ways, (1) to integrate internally the historical
analysis of the process O'f fact-finding and to link it with synthetic in-
terpretations, (2) to combine separate political, economic, and other
viewpoints O'f the subject matter of research, (3) to' make use of other
disciplines when cO'nducting historical research.
All this contributed to the adoption of a new, structural, standpoint
which somehow established links between separate positivistically inter-
preted facts; such a standpO'int was needed very much by historical re-
search, which cO'ncerns the whole of social development, a process in
which all elements are more or less interconnected. What was still mis-
sing was a clearer trend to' integrate a study of facts with a study of
changes, i.e., to' make the apprO'ach more dynamic, and it must be borne
in mind that only a combination of these two gave an opportunity for
a full description and explanation of the process of development in
history. EvO'lutionism was criticized by being totally rejected, but no
better solution was indicated. For all those shortcomings the methodo-
logical reflection born of the criticism of the erudite approach may be
termed structural, since it was dominated by a striving fO'r structural
interpretations of entirety. Yet, as we shall see, such interpretations
were often purely speculative. Thus here again a step forward in one
sphere of methodological reflectiO'n meant a step backward O'r stagnatiO'n
in another sphere.
2. Philosophical inspirations of anti-positivist history
It was mainly from philosophy, which at the turn of the 19th century
had its revival, especially in gnosiology and methodology, that historical
research drew inspirations for its oppositiO'n to the domination of the
methodological pattern of natural science, the positivist disintegration
of the subject matter of research, its static interpretation and the passive
attitude of the historian who was supposed merely to take cognizance
of separate facts as recorded in the sources. Philosophers, many of

whom treated ontology as metaphysics, not only laid new foundations
for a general theory of knowledge, but also, for the first time on such
a scale, covered historical cognition and the methodological structure of
history with their analyses. Methodological reflection, carried on by
historians in this new philosophical atmosphere, consisted, like in the
19th century, in more or less precise applications of those analyses to
the practical requirements of historical research. Since at that time
history as a science came to face certain problems that were common
to all humanistic and social disciplines, it was not left unaffected by
the trends prevalent in those disciplines, mainly in sociology, anthropo-
logy, economics, and psychology. But then, obviously, history with its
own problems became one of the general sources of the search for new
solutions in philosphy and the humanities and social sciences in general.
In gnosiology, intuitive cognition was suggested as a replacement for
inductive empiricism, the main and active role in such cognition being
ascribed to the mind of the researcher as the organizing factor. The
importance of his role was to manifest itself above all in the sciences of
culture, and hence in history, too, because in order to grasp all aspects
of culture as a complex product of man it was necessary - as the
opinion prevailed - to understand it directly, and not just only to ex-
plain it by indicating the cause (which is a sufficient procedure in
natural science). Interpreted as many variations of purely intuitive
cognition which is a cognitive experience that does not lend itself to
any closer analysis, this requirement was being formulated by neo-Kant-
ians of the Baden and Marburg schools, by neo-Hegelians, by the
"philosophy of life" school,! and by phenomenologists.
H. Bergson (1859-1942), whose influence upon philosophical ideas
in history at that time was probably stronger than anyone else's, wanted
to interpret the world as a totality in motion (in opposition to positiv-
ists) and wrote in this connection that "Evolution requires the present
to be in fact a continuation of the past, it requires duration as a con-
necting link'',! and, when criticizing Spencer, wrote that in his evol-
utionism "no reference was made either to becoming or to evolution",
because "the usual trick of Spencer's method was to reconstruct evol-
ution from fragments of what had already evolved".3
The phenomenology of E. Husser! (1859-1939), a representative of
anti-empiricist logical reflection on science, also referred to intuition, i.e.,

neither to induction nor to deduction, but to "direct" cognition that is
independent of psychology and theory, although it did that in a different
sense. According to Husserl, not only individual objects (facts), but also
the general essences of things (abstractions) are accessible to that in-
tuition which he termed. eidetic. When it comes to such intuition, one
has to renounce all conceptual constructions, even latent ones. "This
universal suspension of all attitude toward the objective world, termed
the phenomenological epoche, becomes those methodological means by
which I interpret myself as the I and as that life of consciousness in
which and through which the whole objective world exists for me just
such as it is for me".4 Thus the object of cognition is not something
which can passively be grasped, but something which is constituted by
the "creative" role of an act of cognition. It can easily be noted that
it is at this point that the idealistic final stage of integral phenomeno-
logical cognition manifests itself clearly.
E. Cassirer (1874-1945), of the Marburg school, who was equally
influential, examined culture not as an accumulation of individual facts
and phenomena, but as a whole which has a specified logical structure.
He claimed - otherwise than Husserl - that cognition requires a priori
elements (symbols), which, however, are interpreted not in any defini-
tive manner, but with the consideration of their variability in the course
of history. Such symbols enable us to combine facts into entireties, but
any such entirety is not anything real, a being in the ontological sense
of the word, but a construction of the mind. It is only this combining
of facts into entireties which makes it possible to understand a given
element of culture. In opposing Ranke's formulation Cassirer wrote that
"what memory preserves out of facts and processes becomes a histori-
cal recollection only when we know how to transform it and to include
in our 'inside' ".5
3. The anti-positivist philosophy of history
General philosophical investigations had their direct extension in the

philosophy of history which was being developed briskly mainly by
those philosophers who were also engaged in historical research.s As
a result it yielded a wealth of opinions that clashed on many issues, but
jointly opposed the erudite approach, which was optimistic on the issue
of cognition and deterministic (or rather fatalistic) otherwise. That
philosophy is now interpreted from various viewpoints, and stress is
being laid on its various characteristics. I. S. Kon analysed it in terms
of a "crisis of historical thinking".6 a He saw that crisis in non-Marxist
philosophy from the rise of Marxism on. His opinion would be difficult
to defend. Marx's ideas, which were much ahead of his times, had no
chances to be spread widely when they arose, and that not only for the
class-conditioned reasons, mentioned previously. At that time reflection
on historiography was at the stage of the erudite genetic approach; its
"natural" step forward was to draw attention to problems of structure.
Hence historiography as a whole was not yet ready to adopt dialectical
patterns (which united the genetic and the structural approach) without
first going through the structural stage. Hence reflection at that stage
may not be treated as a general manifestation of historical thinking: on
many issues it marked a signal progress (in the analysis of research
procedures) as compared with the solutions suggested by the genetic
erudite approach, even though it did not rise to the leyel of the dialec-
tical pattern of research.
Many trends in the post-positivist philosophy of history have been
termed "a critical philosophy of history" by R. Aron, who sees their
characteristic trait in the rejection of Hegel's system,1 i.e., in a con-
ception which is rather "directional" than one-sidedly structural, and
also in their gnosiological relativism. M. Mandelbaum classifies the
various conceptions from the point of view of their attitude toward the
possibility of an objective (true) historical cognition, and points to the
relativists on the one hand, and the anti-relativists on the other. A dif-
ferent standpoint, which applies mainly to German philosophers, is to
classify them into the advocates of historicism and anti-historicism
(P. Engel-Janosi, P. Rossi, K. Popper, and others),8 not to speak of
the numerous "national" variations of the philosophical reflection which
is now under consideration.
In the criticism of the positivist historical cognition ("historical rea-
son") the principal (but rather varied) conceptions were those of
W. Dilthey (1833-1911), B. Croce (1866-1952), G. Simmel (1858-1918),
H. Rickert (1863-1936), and M. Weber (1864-1920). All of them point-
ed to the fact that the positivists had ignored the differences between
SI'RUGrURAL REFLECTION 129
the knowledge of nature and the knowledge of social life (the world of
values, spirit, and human activity), the radical formulation being that
of Dilthey, who said that "we explain nature, and we understand spiri-
tual life". In Dilthey the doctrine of historical understanding (Verste-
hen) was most developed, and also extremely complicated.9 When criti-
cizing the incompleteness of induction Dilthey claimed that when we
have to "grasp" certain totalities. and hence also in the case of histori-
aa.l cognition, we do not arrive at that integrated approach (which.
according to him, is the principal manifestation of the objective nature
of historical cognition) without an appropriate cognitive experience.
Thus. in Dilthey's theory, historical cognition is relative and dependent
on the nature of the said experience; a historian forms for himself
a SUbjective image of the past by looking at it through a system of
present-day values. That historical cognition is based on historical data,
which are a form of the manifestation of the activity of the spirit; his-
torical research is thus oriented toward the cognition of various "objec-
tive manifestations of the spirit". Two methods of acquiring the know-
ledge of facts are involved and used jointly: experience (which applies
to one's own person) and understanding (which applies to others). Un-
derstanding (Verstehen) is an operation in which. on the basis of our
own spiritual experiences, we live through someone's experiences. Ex-
perience alone. not combined with understanding. would only yield our
own biography. But it can easily be noted that the limits of understand-
ing are marked by the boundaries of our own spiritual biography, since
we cannot "understand" those experiences of others which we have not
experienced ourselves. Dilthey thought biographies to be the principal
form of the historian's work, and autobiographies were held by him to
be the most valuable of all sources. Human beings whose actions are
goal-oriented, but spontaneous (expression of life) are the principal to-
talities to be studied by historians.
B. Croce in his intuitionism was close to Dilthey. He claimed that it
was only with reference to nature that we reconstruct the chains of
causes and effects, based on the concept of cause, which is alien to
history. In natural science we use theoretical terms, but history is char-
acterized by narration. In his narratives a historian obviously uses
theoretical constructions, but this is only a necessary form of thinking,
whose substance is intuition as the source of all historical cognition.
Intuition (based on one's mental experience) was for Croce a form of

expression of the spirit, which produces images (i.e., ideas) rather than
concepts. Intuition is prior to the production of concepts and to practi-
cal activity, because (as M. Mandelbaum explains when analysing
Croce's theory) it is independent of them, whereas converse situations
do not occur. Even in his first essay on the philosophy of history, La
storia ridotta sotto it concetto generale de/l'arte (1893), Croce referred
to "an intuitive vision" through which we come to know individual
facts (and such are being studied in historical research) and which
resembles artistic intuition. He developed this idea especially in T eoria
e storia della storiografia (1917). In order to know facts one needs
"empathy" and "a mental identification with facts". The idea of his-
toriography as a subjective product of the living mind which animates
historical facts that "vibrate" in him and thus imprints on all past
events the mark of contemporaneity is to be found also in La storia
come Pensiero e come Azione (1938). There is not a trace of anything
that would be "external" to "the spirit". Past and present facts can be
understood only as spiritual facts, so that, at the spiritual level, the past
as it were merges with the present. Real facts recorded in the sources
become real only when they become elements of the varying present as
a result of their spiritual animation.
The conclusions which follow from this conception for historical
cognition to some extent resemble those drawn by Dilthey. It is im-
possible to acquire the knowledge of what really took place in the past
if all past events are to be "contemporary", i.e., animated by tJ;te men-
tality of the historian who is actually living. If intuition makes facts,
then it makes present facts, and not past ones. Thus it follows from
Croce's doctrine that it is impossible to acquire any objective know-
ledge of the past. To avoid the objection of total relativism Croce in-
troduced, as the ultimate criterion of truth, the incomprehensible con-
cept of "the Absolute". M. Mandelbaum, when drawing conclusions
from Croce's theory, wrote in 1938 that, in the light of his own theory,
"Croce has no right to criticize the current practice of historical writing
in Germany (i.e., that which prevailed in 1938 - J.T.) as long as this
writing answers to a true need (...) a point has been raised which only
the Absolute, and not Mr. Croce, can answer".10
G. Sirnmel based his theory of history on the experiences of the
STRUCIURAL REFLECTION 131
history of culture. Although he, too, claimed that historical writing is

a product of the historian's intuition, he nevertheless opposed relativism.
Yet for all his reservations the consequences of his approach are rela-
tivistic in nature. I. S. Kon called Simmel's conception a synthesis of
Dilthey's Verstehen (understanding) and the Kantian a priori approach,
applied to history. A similar interpretation is given by Mandelbaum. l l
History as we know it, Simmel claimed, is a product of our mind which
in that creative action of its own refers to the historian's inner mental
experience; yet we do not have to do with purely SUbjective interpreta-
tion of history, even though historical knowledge is not a mirror of the
past. Its objective nature is guaranteed by "universal and necessary"
categories of the mind, which organize inner experience. The historian
describes only mental facts: thoughts, emotions, acts of will, but this,
Simmel claims, does not mean encroaching upon psychology, because
historical narration is concerned with individual facts and with their
description, whereas psychology - which, according to Simmel, is a
natural discipline - makes use of the procedure which generalizes and
explains. The historian can penetrate those individual psychological
data and present them as an integrated whole by availing himself of
the suprasubjective (ubersubiektive) ability to grasp mental states of
others, whether individual or collective. That ability consists, on the
one hand, in understanding through projection of one's own mental
experiences upon others and, on the other, in "the direct sensing of the
supra subjective". This sensing of the supra subjective supposedly guar-
antees that in this projection the historian utilizes only those experien-
ces which can be said to be experiences of other people as well; thus
guaranteeing the objective nature of cognition. That any "typical" in-
ner experience is possible follows from the existence of the above-men-
tioned common categories of human thinking. For all these reservations,
the final conclusion is that in historical knowledge the inner experience
of every historian plays a creative role, which makes it impossible to
acquire an objective knowledge of the past.
Rickert's theory of history is much more subtle and precise; it avoids
such open metaphysics as that which marks the analyses of Croce, Dil-
they, and Simmel. It was, in fact, largely directed against Dilthey and
his school. Rickert was interested not in the nature of the subject matter
of historical research (the process of history),12 but in the methodology
132 PATTERNS OF IllSTORICAL RESEARCH
of that research, which is supposedly fact-oriented (those facts being in

turn exclusively individual and non-recurrent). Rickert, too, spoke about
understanding (Verstehen) in history. but he analysed that concept in
greater detail. He showed that we understand individual facts by com-
bining them into sequences of causes and effects (which makes the
Verstehen operation to include an explanation procedure) or by in-
tegrating them into certain totalities (i.e., structures). the linking ele-
ment being a referenoe to values. This reference to values turns a given
object (fact. process) into a historical "individuality". For instance,
Napoleon and Goethe are historical individualities, but a man in the
street is not. This is so because Napoleon and Goethe embodied certain
values, although a person connected with Napoleon also became such
an individuality. Yet an act of valuation as performed by a histarian
does not alone suffice to impart a historical status to the objects he is
concerned with; this takes place only when they are referred to uni-
versal social (human) values, as Rickert called them. i.e., values accept-
ed by all. A historian may value highly a friend of his, but this fact
alane need not suffice to "refer" him to those universal axiolagical
categories. These axiological categories are culture values (Kulturwer-
te), which in turn gives history the rank of an individualizing science
of culture.
For Rickert the peculiarity af the humanities as compared with the
natural sciences consists in that all human actians (and their products)
cannot be separated from valuation. That reference to values is for him
the basis far establishing causal relatianships, which, however. are
restricted to' causes that accaunt for human actians. In arder to' ex-
plain human actians the researcher must link a given action (ar its
praducts) with the agent's system of values, which mativates that
action.
When it comes to the methodology of the social sciences (including
history), structural reflection reached its highest level in the works of
M. Weber.13 His analyses of the tools of scientific (including historical)
cognition and of the role of valuation in science have served as sources
of important methodological inspirations. He opposed the intuitionists,
and he shared with Rickert only the opinion that the sciences of culture
are concerned with phenomena of cultural importance and that such
importance is determined by reference to universal culture values which
are characteristic of a given epoch. Weber's requirement that in science

a strict distinction be made between establishment of empirical facts
and valuations14 went beyond Rickert's ideas. Complying with that
requirement makes it possible to acquire a true knowledge of society
with the simultaneous acceptance of the role of valuation in research.
Valuation is manifested above all in the selection of facts. Another way
of acquiring objective knowledge is causal explanation, which cannot
be replaced by intuitive understanding. But because of the interdepend-
ence of phenomena, which makes it very difficult to describe the
sequences of causes and effects in all their complexity, the historian
must resort to certain simplifications and to indicating those connections
which in a given context are of major importance. This also results in
a selection derived from the system of values by which a given research-
er is guided.
Weber wanted historiography to include more general statements
than Rickert did. He strove to achieve that by constructing what he
termed ideal types - his greatest methodological attainment. Ideal types
are idealizations (known in methodology), concepts of limiting cases,
theoretical models, etc., that is, sui generis measures to which reality is
compared. They are formed on the basis of a knowledge of facts, but
they are merely a gnosiological and methodological category that helps
us to acquire a knowledge of reality, but are not a product of such
knowledge. Weber strongly emphasized the instrumental nature of his
ideal types. The historian's task is to compare reality to ideal types as
to a form of perceiving that reality. They are not, as in Marx's works,
a given kind of a description of facts that makes use of idealizational
(abstract) concepts, but merely an instrument used to order facts and
understand human actions.
The creative and cognitive role of the historian who by resorting to the
Verstehen operation constructs an image of past events, and not merely
reproduces them, as the positivists wanted him to do, was emphasized
by many philosophers of that period who represented all the philo-
sophical traditions mentioned above: in France, by Paul Valery (1871-
1945), who coined the well-known saying about history as "the most
dangerous product of the chemistry of intellect"; in Germany, by
o. Spengler (1880--1936), who in his well-known Der Untergang des
Abendlandes (1918-22) rejected induction and generalizations as the
proper form of historical knowledge; in Britain, by the neo-Hegelian

F. H. Bradley (1846-1924);15 and in the United States, by W. James
(1845-1910). The last-named scholar, a disciple of Ch. S. Peirce, the
founder of pragmatism, stressed strongly that reality and cognition are
two disjoint entities: cognition does not reproduce reality, but provides
hypotheses as instruments of action, which are subsequently verified by
the degree of the usefulness of the results they yield.
The rejection of a direct and simple relationship between historical
reality and its cognition changed the interpretations of the concept of
historical fact. The positivist symbol of equation was no longer placed
between a fact as a fragment of reality and a fact as reported by a his-
torian. A fact is referred to as a construction made by a historian,
when his scientific experience, guided subjectively by his actual situa-
tion, creates a historical fact which does not exist outside his mind;
or else a fact-qua-construction is linked with empirical reality conceived
as a whole, and not with a fact-qua-fragment-of-reality. Such opinions
inclined scholars to treat historical facts as mental, and not material,
ones. References were being made to values rather than facts. Scholars
ceased talking about agreement between the. results of research and
facts, because the problem had lost its raison d' etre: it was only one's
cognitive experience, which takes into account facts, but not these facts
alone, that was becoming a historical fact. This, obviously, did not
mean complete arbitrariness in constructing the past. Even Croce, who
compared history to art, said that it was an art of a particular kind, i.e.,
such in which the principles of criticism are binding. It is an art be·
cause, according to Croce, there cannot be any science of something
which is individual, i.e., non-recurrent. In erudite historiography the
criticism of texts was sufficient: in Croce's terms, it was a pseudo-his-
tory, a "philological" historiography, chronicle writing not animated
by any living experience of the historian. R. G. Collingwood, one of
the strongest supporters of Croce, called those who wrote in accordance
with these rules "scissors-and-paste historians".
The stress on the "humanistic" factor in historical cognition was in-
tended to point to the independent position of history in the system of
science, i.e., to free it from the domination of the natural sciences
which apparently lack that factor altogether. The methodological pat-
terns provided by natural science were believed to be inacceptable to
historians because history strives to grasp its own world through the
Verstehen operation. It is, first, a world of facts, which are individual
and non-recurrent, and second, also a world of values, in which it is
impossible to dissociate oneself from assessments of past events. The
stress on the individual and non-recurrent nature of those facts which
form the subject matter of historical research usually yielded conclu-
sions that followed from the analysis of the actual state of historical
writing (methodological idiographism), which at that time was in fact
almost exclusively descriptive and concentrated on individual facts. In
many cases it yielded postulates which restricted the interests of histori-
cal research, and hence the tasks of the historians, to descriptions of
individual, non-recurrent facts, that is, postulates of methodological
idiographism. Preaching such postulates did not have to, but could, be
linked with objective idiographism, i.e., with ascribing historical reality
itself the nature of something which can be grasped only through
a study of individual facts that have to be "understood", because these
facts cannot be subsumed under any general laws as such laws do not
exist.
Out of the enormous literature (see the items recorded in the foot-
notes of t~ work by E. Bernheim) concerned, at the turn of the 19th
century, with the problem of the methodological structure of historio-
graphy the ideas of the neo-Kantians from the Baden school, and es-
pecially W. Windelband (1848-1915) and H. Rickert, were the best
known. Windelband in 1894 suggested to replace the classification of
the sciences into the natural sciences (Naturwissenschaften) and the
sciences of the spirit (Geisteswissenschaften), which prevailed in Ger-
man science (cf. DiIthey), and which took the subject matter of re-
search as the criterion of division, by the classification into those
sciences which describe what is individual (idiographic sciences) and
those which strive for establishing laws (nomothetic sciences), i.e., by
a classification which differentiates sciences by their aims. 16 H. Rick-
ert,11 while preserving Windelband's principal idea of individualizing
and generalizing disciplines, added the classification of sciences based
on the subject matter of research: the sciences of nature and the
sciences of culture, his criterion of distinction being the connection with
values. Nature is free from such a connection (wertfrez), as opposed to
the products of man, i.e., culture, because man, when acting, strives to
reach a goal, and his goals depend on his system of assessments (values),
i.e., on his axiology. In this interpretation, history is an individualizing
science of culture, associated with valuation. It is true that in historical
writing reference is occasionally made to general concepts, but these
serve to show individual facts, whereas in the generalizing sciences they
are the goal. Valuation lays foundations both for the construction of
concepts in history and for the selection of facts as the task which was
strongly emphasized in anti-positivist methodology; it was believed (e.g.,
Windelband) to be the foundation of the humanities.
The acceptance of subjectively individual facts constructed by link-
ing ,them with values as the subject matter of historical research had
definite methodological consequences. The neo-Kantians, who strove to
Jay foundations for a science of individual facts, did not doubt that
history is a science, even though they often compared it to art. The
same had been done by Dilthey and Simmel. Such comparisons were
frequent: we find them even in Ranke. But, parallel to this opinion, the
denial of any possible existence of a science of individual facts led to
Croce's view, mentioned above, which to some extent identified history
with art. For Croce, this view was associated with a strong emphasis
on the individual nature of the subject matter of historical research; it
was linked not only with the postulate of methodological idiographism,
but with that of objective idiographism as well. The historian was sup-
posed merely to narrate facts by availing himself of general concepts
provided by philosophy. This opinion, of course, did not have anything
in common with treating historical writing as a branch of belles lettres,18
where there is no need to stick to facts.
Objective idiographism, which emphasized that individual facts are
non-recurrent in nature, had to link up with the denial of exception-free
laws in social history; methodological idiographism pointed to lack of
interest - on the part of the historians who were describing individual
facts - in discovering laws, but did not deny the possibility that such
laws may be discovered; its postulates barred historians from no-
mothetic research without, however, prejudice as to whether such re-
search in the social sciences is possible or not. All this meant a break
with the positivist idea of the laws of progress, which in the Age of En-
lightenment was an inspiring novelty, but then, in view of its ahistorical
sense, it had gradually to evoke objections on the part of historians.
The idea of the laws of progress did not provide any place for man's
active part: his task was to "discover" unchanging laws of nature and
to behave so as not to prevent these laws from self-materialization
through a slow evolution. Obviously, if man was to play that part, he
had to develop intellectually, which would enable him to comprehend
the laws of nature, which in turn explains why the history-shaping role
of changes in the intellectual level of societies was emphasized so much.
H. Bergson was right in saying that evolutionism, which puts together
the fragments of "what has already developed", prevents us from com-
prehending the mechanism of development, and he accordingly suggest-
ed that we should refer to a "creative revolution" which, if this inter-
pretation is correct, would take into account both development and
structure. Transition from one structure to another was supposed by
him to take place as a result of a "vital drive" (elan vital), which could
be interpreted as the most general "law" of development. It would not,
of course, be a law of development in any strict sense of the term, be-
cause it does not refer to any definite relationships between facts, rela-
tionships that would explain their changes in the course of time. The
problem, which the evolutionists and the advocates of the idea of the
laws of progress had failed to notice, was not solved here, but shifted
into the sphere of metaphysics. A similar type of explanation of devel-
opment, where historical laws are replaced by the idealistic categories
interpreted in an intuitive way, was represented by M. Scheler (1875-
1928)19 who suggested the idea of a history-shaping "drive" (Drang)
that is not subject to any laws; by F. Nietzsche (1844-1900), who re-
ferred to a "will to power"; and by others. All this showed a clear
relationship with the metaphysical ideas that marked the methodological
reflection on history in the Romantic period, in particular with the
ideas advanced by A. Schopenhauer (1788-1860), who claimed that
a "will to live" is the force that governs the world. 20
All these proposals failed integrally to link the aspect of structure
with that of change in history. The rejection of historical laws (laws of
development) prevented the historians from going beyond the inter-
pretation of the past events as a chronological sequence of non-recur-
rent structures. Husserl, in his striving for logical precision and the
elimination of metaphysical assumptions, stressed clearly the superiority
of structural thinking over the genetic (direction-oriented) thinking, and
138 PATTERNS OF IUSTORICAL RESEARCH
believed the latter to be a necessary evil in science.21 Dilthey, too, re-

ferred to structural laws and denied the existence of genetic ones. 22
M. Weber tried to overcome the dichotomy of structure versus changes
in time by introducing his category of ideal types, which were intended
to help an integrated approach to the subject matter of historical re-
search. Weber treated his ideal types as sui geenris historicallaws 23 con-
cerned with human behaviour and needed to explain such behaviour.
Simmel's laws, which he thought to be "hypothetical generalizations of
typical phenomena in history'?' were of a similar nature. Rickert was
studying the problem of laws in detail. In analysing them from a formal
point of view he showed that laws are general statements of universal
validity,25 which fonnulation came to be more or less generally accepted
in science. But in history there are no such laws: as Rickert claimed,
there is an inner contradiction even in speaking about laws with refer-
ence to individual facts.26 The denial of the existence of laws in genera)
(and the principle of causality as well) and emphasis on the individual
nature of historical events (Le., objective idiographism) is to be found
in O. Spengler,27 in existentialist philosophy which stresses the aut~
nomy of the individual and lack of historical conditioning,28 and in
n~ Thomist personalists who try to bring into agreement the two
factors which they stress, namely the free will of man and the free
action of God.29 The conventionalists (H. Poincare, P. Duhem, E. Ie
Roy and others) were largely right in stressing the role of conventions
in science and suggested the acceptance of the existence of scientific
laws, but not as simplified mirrorings of what really exists, but merely
as a result of the appropriate convention adopted for the sake of the
development of science (for instance, for Ie Roy laws usually are stipu-
lating definitions),30 and hence they interpreted laws as the scientist's
own constructions. From the point of view of history this meant a philo-
sophical support of relativism and intuitionism and also idiographism
in the approach to the subject matter of knowledge.
Another type of a tentative bringing into agreement the idiographic
approach to facts and the acceptance of the category of laws of science,
an endeavour which is to justify the scientific nature of history as
a study of individual facts, is the concept of statistical laws, linked with
the concept of probability. It is self-evident that pointing to certain sta-
tistical regularities and the resulting assessment of the probability of
STRUCIURAL REFLECTION 139
certain specified events need not combine with the acceptance of the
existence of laws that apply to the real world, although, should one
reason consistently, it should lead to such an acceptance of laws.31 This
issue, however, will be treated later in a broader context.
The rejection of the positivist laws of progress which provided no
place for the active role of individuals or the masses has thus not
resulted, in anti-positivist philosophical analyses, in the working out
of the category of historical laws interpreted as the laws of develop-
ment which point to the inner mechanism of changes in structures.
Various substitute solutions were suggested; or else historians were
told to abandon all search for laws, or the possibility of discovering
any regularities in the course of events was denied. But all this was
associated, to a greater extent than this had been done earlier, with an
emphasis on the active role of man as the maker of history. But the
lack of any concept of laws of development resulted in overestimating
the role of individuals and chance events in history, and even in attri-
buting them the role of the decisive factor.
4. The characteristics of structural reflection in historical research
Methodological reflection of the period, when confined strictly to the

sphere of historiography, clearly manifested elements of the new con-
ceptions of historical knowledge, based on the Verstehen operation and
on the structural (integrated) approach. All this could be seen in the
new series of anti-positivist textbooks of the methodology of history
and in the work of some historians. But the research techniques of
average historians were still very little affected by these new ideas.
Positivism, which preached reliance on facts, and hence on the sources,
had the strongest appeal to historians, for whom the erudite approach
that tended toward the production of "contribution to" continued to be
the model of research, so that in practice they combined the require-
ments of both positivism and anti-positivism. The low standard of their
theoretical training and the political atmosphere in which they had to
work accounted for the fact that their research techniques were per-
meated not so much by the principle of integrated approaches, so im-
portant from the cognitive and the methodological point of view, as by
obscure visions of history, inspired by a reactionary political ideology.
140 PATTERNS OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH
The most characteristic in this connection was the comment by H. Berr

who. when publishing in 1953 La synthese en histoire that summed up
the forty years of his activity, wrote that his requirement of integrated
approaches was still valid: in particular the gap between history and
sociology was not bridged.
In the field of reflection on heuristics and external criticism historians
continued to develop the attainments of the earlier period. Their numer-
ous works were adding to the wealth of established facts. but no quali-
tatively new methodological postulates were formulated. In the sphere
of explanation advances were made in structural analysis. i.e., in point-
ing to the place and role of various elements in certain wholes. but
little progress was made in dynamic analysis. which explains the devel-
opment of structures. In research, the static evolutionist approach was
replaced by a static structural approach. In a given structure. it was
possible either to bring out the role of a single factor. or to treat all
the elements of that structure as being of the same importance. Those
factors which where brought out as the elements explaining the course
of past events could in fact, as it had been the case in the preceding
period, be taken as explanations of differences between specified socie-
ties at certain moments, i.e., as explanations of changes. but not as
explanations of historical development. Such factors were treated as
special elements of a given structure. which dominate all other elements
of that structure.
The factors thus selected offered no chance of serving as a path lead-
ing to the comprehension of the mechanism of development, because
the explanatory procedures covered mainly those factors which remain
outside the sphere of man's decisive influence. in particular the geo-
graphical factor (the climate, the geographical situation, etc.) and the
biological characteristics of man. These are predominantly natural and
not social factors, and the one-sided emphasis placed on them resulted
in many cases in geographical and biological determinism, interpreted
asa general theory of social development. Even when reference was
made to the fundamental role of the economic factor the latter was
interpreted not as a complex of the economic activities of a given
society. but as a specified, so to say prefabricated, economic situation,
which is to explain only the existing state of the structure under consid-
eration (this procedure resulted in so-called economism). It is obvious
that the taking intO' cQnsideration of all those factors in a structural-

and-dynamic analysis (i.e., such which is both synchrDnic and dia-
ChrDniC) would free historical research from Qne-sided determinism by
ShDWing that the natural (and hence static) factor can explain Dnly the
original orientation of a given structure, but, being passive in character,
does not suffice to explain what later happens to' the structure in ques-
tiQn. FDr instance, a favDurable geographical situation can explain the
DPPOrtunity, enjoyed by a given society, for engaging in trade, but it
does not explain why this Dpportunity was utilized and, pDssibly, con-
tinued to be so for a long time; for this type of explanation does not
grasp the mechanism of changes. This shows that taking into considera-
tion the element of develapment, i.e., combining the diachrQnic factor
with the synchronic one, averts the danger Qf ascribing a Qne-sidedly
determinant rale to any single factor. Such a mistaken determinism is
possible only in the case of static approaches, in which development
is treated as a series af ever new structures, and not as an inner pra-
cess Df transition fram Dne structure to anather. The interpretation Df
develapment as an eVDlutiDnary progress conditianed by independent
natural laws also favoured attaching absDlute impartance to' the variaus
geographical and bialogical factors. All this accaunts far the fact that
the positivist and the anti-positivist approaches were coming clQse to
one anather. Thus next to' H. Taine as a representative Df geagraphical
determinism we have to place F. Ratzel (1844-1900), the founder af
that approach, and many others whO' drew inspiratiQn from anthropo-
geography.1l2 The same may be said about bialagical determinism, in-
itiated by J. A. de GQbineau (1816-82) and resulting in racialist CQn-
ceptiDns. The simultaneous tendency to' base explanations on the demQ-
graphic factor (density Qf populatian) marked a certain dynamization
af approach, since the density of population is a varying factor.33 The
same applies to' the economic factQr, which certain economic historians
(e.g., T. Rogers) tended to overemphasize as they failed to grasp the
whole of the economic development.
The stress Qn the special role of a single factor within a given struc-
ture, interpreted statically, was a manifestation of what A. Labriola and
Y. PlekhanQv termed the theory of factors. s4 That theory faund sup-
port in the advances in the various disciplines concerned with single
factors; as a manifestation of the analytic approach it contradicted the
requirements of an integrated and dynamic interpretation of historical

,facts.
The equal treatment of all elements of a given structure resulted in
what was termed interactionism that was popular in sociology (cf. Al-
fred Weber and Max Weber) and common in structural historical re-
search, to be discussed later. Less radical forms of interactionism were
marked by a certain stress laid on one of the factors (usually the geo-
graphical one), which, however, was not treated as the unconditional
cause of specified effects, but merely as a possibility which may lead
to such consequences. This possibilistic interactionism was represented
by the Annales school in France, in particular with reference to the
geographical factor.35 In the final analysis interactionism led either to
a deterministic approach to specified factors or to the demonstration
of the complex and hardly analysable network of links between the
various elements of a given structure, an analysis which does not, how-
ever, explain transitions from one structure to another. Possibilistic in-
teractionism nevertheless marked a progress in explanation procedures
as compared with the pure theory of factors, since it did not assume,
as that positivist-born theory did, any determining and fatalistically in-
terpreted (i.e., independent of human actions) force that guides the
process of history, but left some room for action to human beings who
could avail themselves of appropriate factors. But leaving those factors
as it were outside human actions, which was a trace of positivism, in-
stead of locating man in a mutual relationship with a given factor, com-
bined with the attribution of the same importance to all these factors,
was an obstacle to an explanation of the development of structures and
to a fuII study of the laws of historical development. Psychological mo-
tives of conduct of individuals, raised especially in works on political
history, also were used as explanatory factors. Discovering such mo-
tives amounted to understanding a given event. An opposition to this
approach yielded ideas which tried to link actions of individuals with
the general characteristics of the mentality typical of a given period or
a given group. They were simply modernized ideas of "the spirit of the
time", "the spirit of the nation", etc., as the explaining factors.
In many cases both the theory of factors and interactionism resulted
in the subjective selection by historians of specified factors as the ex-
plaining elements. It was, therefore, not to be wondered at that such
a rigorous thinker as, e.g., A. A. Cournot (1801-77) claimed that as

soon as history strives for explanations it becomes philosophy rather
than science.36 Historical writing was subsequently marked by a total
arbitrariness in explanation procedures, and the confusion was made
even greater by the fact that historians failed to realize the various
meanings of the term cause (in the sense of factor, condition, etc.),
which they did not analyse more closely. But the lively discussions
concerning the explanation procedures increased historians' interest in
that aspect of the study of the past.
The new trends toward a structural integration of historical research,
manifested, for instance, in the revival of the theory of factors in ex-
planation procedures, merged with the strong current of anti-positivist
suggestions as to the interpretation of the nature of the science of
history, advanced by historians and born of the philosophical tenden-
cies listed above. The postulates forwarded by H. Berr's (1863-1954)
synthesis school in France and K. Lamprecht's milieu in Germany won
the greatest renown. Beside them almost every country saw the ap-
pearance of noteworthy studies that were characteristic of the new
trend in the theory of historical research.
5. H. Berr and the Annales school. Other trends in France

H. Berr, who was largely influenced by Bergson and by Durkheim's
school, suggested that erudite syntheses which are simple listings of
facts be replaced by a scientific one. He claimed that such a synthesis
would prove impossible if researchers were to follow the idiographic
approaches of Rickert and Croce, who believed history to be a study of
individual facts,37 whereas "the field of history and the field of laws is
one and the same" ("Ie terrain a l' histoire et des lois est Ie meme").38
Berr, unlike his contemporaries (e.g., Ch. Seignobos and A. D. Xeno-
pol), held that the problem of laws could not be separated from the
problem of causal explanation in history. A synthesis is arrived at
largely through an intuitive39 comprehension of the links between facts,
i.e., through an explanation (discovery of the causes) which in part
consists in the Verstehen operation. He was right in claiming that fur-
ther progress in historical research would consist in improving not the
theory of narration, but that of "general" research, in which the focal
issue is the concept of cause that requires profound semantic, philoso-

phical and logical analyses. Berr singled out three kinds of historical
facts and causal relations connected with them: chance occurrences
(Ia contingence) linked by ordinary determination by sequence in
time,40 necessary occurrences (Ia necessite), linked by constant relation-
s.'J.ips in the form of necessary conditions,41 and occurrences in the sphere
of "the logic of history", linked rationally in the ways dictated by the
requirements of that logic. 42 No laws are established in the first group
of facts, to which idiographic history would be confined. Hence in that
field it would be impossible to explain structure and evolution, i.e., to
pass to a general approach. The second group reveals structural laws,
which are typical of sociological research, and the third - here Berr
entered the by then already obsolete ideas of the teleological ap-
proach - includes the laws of evolution and progress, which differ from
structural laws by pointing to the emergence of novel elements, laws
which previously had been analysed by the philosophy of history of the
Age of Enlightenment or positivist type. We can clearly see here the
inspiration of Berr's requirement of an integrated approach, i.e., the
requirement that historians be concerned with sociology and philo-
sophy. The idea of progress, taken up by Berr, which is governed by
its specific logic (that is an outcome of an a priori approach, and not
of any historical research) was suppoSed to make his synthesis dy-
namic and to become the criterion of the selection of facts. Actually,
however, it did not go beyond the concepts of abstract laws of pro-
gress or evolution, without revealing the secret of development. The
said "logic of history" was supposed to have its only source in the
principal cause or the motive power of history, which Berr identified
with the creative will of individuals, that is, with a factor which re-
sembled very much Bergson's elan vital. 43 The old idea of progress was
thus intertwined with the emphasis on the active will of individuals. In
Herr's approach, history (in the sense of the course of events) is in the
last analysis the development of the spiritual factor (['esprit).
Berr tried to restore the unity of natural and social science and advo-
cated for this purpose a unification of the language of science." He thus
revealed a sui generis amalgam of positivism and structural intuition-
ism. He criticized in this way the belief, inherent in the evolutionist
approach and made fairly popular by the theoretical works of A. D. X6-
srRUCIURAL REFLECTION 145
nopol (1847-1920, that history differs from natural science by study-

ing sequences of facts, and mot recurrent facts. Those sequences of
facts are results of the operation of unspecified "historical forces", i.e.,
1lactors which remain outside historical data (materiel de l'histoire).
Historical laws may thus be interpreted as a manifestation of those
forces. 45 In France it was the programme of structural history, originated
by L. Febvre and M. Bloch (1886-1940) and their Annales school,46
which was intended to free reflection on history from the implications
of Berr's synthesis, even though that programme itself evolved from
that synthesis. History was conceived in that programme as a science
which strives for general and many-sided formulations and opposes,
especially in the sphere of economic history, practical idiographism
(methodological, and sometimes also objective), i.e., history concerned
with events (histoire evenementielle) and not with explanations. The
principal method of that criticism consisted in drawing attention, as it
had also been postulated by Berr, to durable phenomena of history, that
is, to structures. This in turn suggested connections with more theoret-
ical disciplines, above all economics and sociologyY In concrete terms,
this meant falling under the influence of the Durkheim and the post-
Durkheim school in sociology and of subjective political economy. This
also explained the lively interest shown by the Annales school both in
economic history and in the history of "collective ideas". i.e., the his-
tory of social mentality (G. Duby).48 Berr's teleological approach was
replaced by interactionism, in which the various elements of structures
are treated in the same way. Structures are shaped within frameworks
made by what is termed permanent forces (les forces permanents, les
permanences), above all by the natural environment. Structures them-
selves (i.e., economic, social, psychological conditions) form facts and
forces of long duration (de longue duree). Also singled out are events
(evenements) , that is, human activities, which are linked causally and
are subject to chance. Structures are metaphorically compared to canvas,
with the shape of what is embroidered on it dependent on chance.
Human activities find manifestations in "conjunctures", i.e., in data on
changes in the population, the amount of goods producel, prices, etc.
The separation of events (conjunctures) from structures, which recurs
in the works of the historians from the Annales school, reveals traces
of the positivist difficulties of linking facts with changes. What was
146 PATTERNS OF msroRIcAL RESEARCH
novel in this approach consisted in focusing attention on the study of

structures and in interpreting events over long periods, which makes
it possible to trace the "shape" of changes, i.e., a given conjuncture.
The approach to the issue of laws was a result of that standpoint. Laws
were obviously held to operate in the sphere of structures, and not in
the sphere of events. L. Febvre claimed that the concept of law could
not cover those laws through which the past weighs on men, nor those
which force men to act (i.e., directional laws); it could cover only
those which are interpreted as "general formulas which group hereto-
fore isolated facts".49 Drawing attention to structures assumed a more
theoretical and interdisciplinary approach, and accordingly the rejection
of the formula, which Febvre termed dangerous, stating the "/' histoire
se fait avec des documents", because historical research had to reach
beyond documents. This meant the validation of hypothetism in histor-
ical research.
We also have to emphasize the SUbjective character of the structural
approaches. It was manifested in reflection on the subject matter of
history as interpreted by M. Bloch (human consciousness) and in the
treatment of historical facts "which are essentially psychological
facts".5o Human conduct is very often dictated "by the mysterious
depths of man's spiritual life".51 As can be seen, the bridge connecting
that approach with Bergsonism had not been destroyed.
As compared with Berr's group and the Annales school other pro-
posals for the interpretation of history as a science advanced in France
did not suggest any major novelties, but rather referred to the idea of
traditional historiography, "understood" in the intuitive manner. We
can mention here, on the one hand, R. Aron, a sophisticated philoso-
pher who writes in the spirit of HusserI and M. Weber, and, on the
other, H. I. Marrou, an excellent historian who is a helpless eclectic in
making use of the most specUlative philosophical systems. Both Aron52
and Marrou are mainly concerned with historical cognition. Aron is
inclined to confine research to the study of single facts and their causes,
and to leave to sociologists the study of general relationships between
facts. 53 In his opinion, causal explanation implies laws, i.e., acceptance
of constant relationships between facts, relationships which are prob-
abilitic (statistical) in nature. 54 For him, historical cognition assumes
STRucruRAL REFLECTION 147
the necessity of adopting certain theoretical constructions, one of which

is that of a historical fact. 55
H. I. Marrou on one occasion described his own philosophical gene-
alogy,56 which includes Bergson, neo-Kantians, neo-Hegelians, Husserl,
existentionalists, and alsQi R. Aron. The anti-positivist armour-plate of
his book is made of an alloy of specifically selected gnosiological the-
ories contained in those philosophies. The pivotal role is assigned to
Husserl's phenomenological category of epocM, but Marrou has vul-
garized that category, which was intended to denote a sui generis sus-
pension Qif one's approach to the objective world and freeing Qineself
of convictions in the process of cognition.57 He adopted emphathy,
a gradual identification of one's own personality with that of the person
studied, to be the principal means of cognition, which thus is not exact,
but merely intuitive, in nature, since "God alone" can know the past
fully.58 Cognition is thus for him a subjective act in agreement with
St. Augustine's principle that nemo nisi per amicitiam cognoscitur.
Cognition is assisted by certain categories worked out by the mind,
such as ideal types, technical terms, etc.59 Historical cognition is totally
a historian's construction; the greater "the quality of the soul" and
"the openness of the historian's mind (esprit)", the better the said con-
struction. 60 Marrou takes all structural wholes to be fictions: for him the
individual is the only true organism. 61 Explanation in history does not
consist in the search for causes, since that would mean a simplification
of reality, but in an intuitive comprehension of all the complex links
between facts. Concerning history Marrou accepts the uniqueness of
phenomena and denies the existence of laws of deVelopment.
Many other - though less renowned - works concerned with reflec-
tions on history might be quoted; for instance, 1951 saw the appearan-
ce of Initiation a fa critique historique by L. E. Halkin (it has had two
impressions more), extremely valuable in the sections on textual criti-
cism, but - which Berr still had an opportunity to point out - "irritat-
ing" and "depressing" in its philosophical sections.62 According to Hal-
kin, history becomes scientific by being critical, and not by being a stu-
dy of "the general" and the establishment of laws of social develop-
ment. History is concerned with unique facts which are to be under-
stood "subjectively". Among other items the pride of place goes to the
works by P. Aries,63 L. Halphen,6( and A. Choulguin.6S The renowned
study by J. M. Romein,68 who strove to imbue historical research with

theory, differs from the above by its ambition.
6. Methodological reflection in Britain and in America
In Britain the new approach to history was associated, apart from the
above-mentioned F. H. Bradley, with J. E. Acton (1834-1902), known
for his principle: srudy problems and not periods,67 intended to draw
attention tD the cognitive limitations Df the erudite apprDach, and also
with J. B. Bury in the later periDd Df his activity (especially from
1909 00),88 and with M. B. Oakeshott.89 Their ideas, born of the con-
temporary intellectual trend and marked mainly by Croce's philosophy
and methodology of history, were later developed by R. G. Colling-
wood (1889-1943) (see above). His work, The Idea of History (publish-
ed posthumously in 1946, with four impressions more up to 1961), was
characterized by its author's strong dislike of the erudite approach.
Collingwood opposed all those trends which compared history to the
natural disciplines. 70 History is a science of the unique, but it forms
a class for itself. Its subject matter is conscious human actions. and
not any "process Df history" resembling natural processes. This
means that, in the last analysis, all history is a history Df ideas: in this
sense nature has nD history. We would have tD do with the unity of the
natural and the historical process only on the assumption that both are
determined by God. 71 Since a historian investigates acts of thinking, he
cannot acquire any knowledge of them by observation, but must resDrt
to intuitive cognition (based on an a priori Kantian-like category of
imagination), which means that he must re-enact the past in his own
mind. A historian's work differs little from literary activity, with the
provision that his picture of the past ought to be in agreement with the
sources, coherent, and located in time and space.711 For him, facts were
nothing, interpretation was all. As M. Heitzman was right in pointing
out, Collingwood's approach led tD the acceptance of a primary, ex-
tra-temporal and extra-spatial, act of thought, which can revive in the
minds of the variDus individuals. 73 It was in this way that Collingwood
tried to oppose the erudite approach which, as he put it, was a simple
listing of facts and resulted in that, for instance, when it comes to de-
scriptions of the Peloponesian War there was no difference of approach
between The Cambridge Ancient History and Thucydides. Many con-

flicting O'pinions have been formulated concerning Collingwood's stand-
point, which, however, were in agreement as to' the general assumptiO'ns
of his methodology. Less radical, but similar, ideas on the interpreta-
tion of historical research (individualism, relativism, anti-naturalism)
are to be found in the works of Ch. Oman,74 G. J. Renier,75 and many
O'thers. One of the most interesting is that of E. Hallet Carr,76 whO'
avO'ids extreme formulations.
The American milieu has been more active in reflections of histori-
cal research. It gave rise to some nO'vel approaches by J. H. RO'binsO'n,
E. P. Cheyney, and F. J. Teggart, which in some cases resemble Berr's
school; O'n the other hand, European prO'posals for engaged historio-
graphy (e.g., Croce's) have been brought to' the extreme, yielding as
a result open relativism which was termed presentism.
J. H. Robinson in his idea of a "new history"77 suggested an exten-
sion of the subject matter of historians' interests beyond the traditiO'nal
PO'litical history. But, in his opiniO'n, fO'r a proper selection O'f facts to'
be investigated it is necessary to' "recO'nstruct" O'ur O'wn minds, which
in turn requires the development of the prO'per knO'wledge O'f society in
Ol'der to' change one's "cO'nservative" approach into a "radical" one.
The inner radicalism of nature (something like a "drive" toward chan-
ges and PO'gress) gives impulses fO'r improvements, impulses which are
at work even idependentIy of man's possibly passive attitude. This is
why a person whose approach is radical (in this case identified with
scientific) can remO've blocks on the path to' progress. This apprO'ach
.shO'WS certain references to Cartesian, Age-of-Enlightenment and PO'si-
tivist ideas,78 with the provisO' that a mechanism of progress in the
form of mysterious impulses has been added.
E. P. Cheyney79 opposed the opiniO'ns which took the cO'urse of events
to' be a play of chance. He claimed that all changes seem to' take place
as a result of being fully determined, and that it seems that there is an
independent sequence of events, an inevitable necessity which cO'ntrols
the prO'gress of human affairs. "History, the great course of human
affairs, has not been the result O'f voluntary efforts on the part of in-
dividuals or groups of individuals, much less chance, but has been sub-
ject to certain laws" .80 While accepting the existence O'f laws Cheyney
nevertheless wanted fully to' preserve the principle of free will. He
150 PAlTERNS OF msroRlcAL RESEARCH
claimed that man can act "freely", but the results of his actions would
depend on the agreement of his actions with laws. He also formulated
several such laws (continuity, variability, interdependence, democracy,
free social contract, and moral progress),81 which resemble the earlier
concepts of laws of progress, especially as interpreted by Buckle.
In the light of these theories history is a science not confined to de-
scriptions, but concerned also with discovering laws. This opinion was
also defended by F. J. Teggart, author of one of the most profound
studies on the methodology of history which have ever been written.82
He advocates the principles of integrated history, and wants historians
to combine the study of changes with the study of facts, thus offering
novel analyses of the foundations of historiography on this issue. He
thinks that the problem would be solved by a distinction between the
belief in progress as a Cartesian heritage and the belief in the possi-
bility of progress.sa The former implies a passive and fatalistic attitude,
whereas the latter assumes an active role of man and leads to the com-
prehension of the truth that in order to ensure progress we have to
promote knowledge. And knowledge is not acquired by an act of good
will alone, but by the full use made of the resources stored by society
in scientific institutions. 84 Thus he offers an exlanation of social de-
velopment by the development of knowledge. Teggart, who for all his
erudition programmatically failed to notice dialectics, could not over-
come the separation of the study of facts from the study of changes,
even though he explained changes not in terms of abstract progress, but
in terms of an inclination of human nature, namely a "belief in the
possibility of progress".
Presentism, preached by many historians in various countries (F. H.
Bradley, G. Simmel, M. B. Oakeshott, J. Ortega y Gasset, R. G. Colling-
wood, J. H. Robinson, and others) and originating mainly from B. Croce
(who claimed that all history is present-day history), has found very
good support in American pragmatism, which measured the importance
of knowledge in terms of its effectiveness in attaining specified goals.
The presentists drew ultimate conclusions from the interpretation of his-
tory as a science of individual facts which are not governed by any gen-
eral laws, are comprehended intuitively, and are thus constructed by
historians. 85 For them history was a subjective product of historians, and
thus was part of the present constructed by historians. Many elements
PATTERNS OF IDsrORICAL RESEARCH 151
of these opinions can be found in Ch. H. Beard, who in 1934 published

his study Written History as an Act of Faith,88 in C. L. Becker, author
of Everyman His Own Historian (1935), in C. Read,87 and many others.
Up to this day we can see a large mass of various forms of historical
writings which have a presentist tinge. According to the representatives
of that trend history is always being written anew, not because of our
acquiring, through cognitive processes, an ever better knowledge of ob-
jective historical facts, but because historians, being themselves products
of specified conditions and needs, are permanently producing history in
their own subjective way.
7. Methodological trends in German historiography
Politically intrusive presentism was particularly active throughout the

19th century in German historiography, and that regardless of its trends,
i.e., beginning with L. RankeB 8 and G. Droysen to K. Lamprecht and
F. Meinecke to many contemporary West German historians who try
to rehabilitate the old ideas (idealism and nationalism) and at the same
time to look for the responsibility for Nazism outside the German na-
tion. Both in theoretical reflection and in practical activity the science
of history has almost never been treated in Germany as a discipline
subject to an objective examination as natural science is. Characteristi-
cally enough, German historians have been little influenced by posi-
tivism: in their political tendencies they followed almost directly from
Romanticism to anti-positivism, to which, as we have seen, they have
contributed very much philosophically.
This reveals certain distinct characteristics in the development in Ger-
many of methodological reflection on history. To grasp these character-
istics it is worthwhile to note the two basic methodological contro-
versies among German historians: over the collectivist approach to the
past and over historicism. In each of these ideas we see manifestations
of positivist thinking and also, more clearly, various forms of structural
reflection. K. Lamprecht (1856-1915),89 availing himself of the attain-
ments of social psychology (especially those of J. F. Herbart), suggest-
ed, as H. Berr did in France, an integrated approach that would go
beyond political history, an approach in which events would be ex-
plained by motives of action of groups, and not of individuals. It would
152 STRUCTURAL REFLECTION
not be a unique description of individual facts, but a science which

establishes laws that govern the course of events. Such laws would have
the nature of those which are valid in social psychology. Changes in
the past depend on changes in the phychological attitudes of the masses.
Lamprecht thought that he in this way explained historical develop-
ment. In fact, he barely took a small step on that path: he even did
not consider the problem of the origin of changes in the attitudes of
the masses, the latter, by the way, being treated by him simply as the
sum of individuals. His idea offered a method of explaining changes,
but not development. He replaced Ranke's formula: wie es eigentlich
gewesen by his own formula: wie es eigentlich geworden, which points
to his interest in the causes of changes.
The criticism of Lamprecht's opinions made the advocates and the
opponents of what was termed German historicism join hands. Histori-
cism, which had its roots in early 19th century historiography, was - in
the interpretation given to it especially by E. Troeltsch (1865-1923)90-
an amalgam of genetic evolutionism and the idiographic approach to
history. Historicism stressed the constant variability of events and the
uniqueness of non-recurrent facts. Hence in history everything is rela-
tive. There are no absolute standards of valuation, which is expressed
in the formula: veritas et virtus filiae temporis. 91 Thus the course of
events is not governed by laws. although the principle of cau,saIity is
at work; changes are a result of actions of individuals and States, of
reason of State, geographical environment, etc. Historicism in this way
declared itself against the Age-of-Enlightenment and positivist ideas
of progress, without replacing them by other directional laws. It was
most vigorously defended by F. Meinecke92 and K. Mannheim. 93 Histor-
ical relativism was criticized, among others. by Troeltsch and K. Heus-
si,94 but they, too, opposed the acceptance of the existence of laws oti
development. They opposed the positivist views by explaining the
course of events by the development of ideas. They also shifted the
focus of interest from ontology to gnosiology, advocated the intuitionist
approach, and believed history to be a subjective product of a given
historian. It was in this way that in Germany both historicism and
anti-historicism favoured the growth of cognitive relativism, which was
preached both by the entire Prussian school (J. G. Droysen, H. Sybel.
R Treitschke) and the neo-Rankeans, whose objectivism made them
PAITERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 153
abandon the narrow Prussian view of German history but who never-
theless in practice followed the old trend of politically engaged historio-
graphy.
The positivist opinions which compared history to natural science and
recommended the search of laws, and hence, obviously, also the opin-
ions of Lamprecht, were most vehemently attacked by E. Bernheim.9&
In view of the popularity of his textbook on the historical methods
this had wide repercussions in the shaping of the popular opinions of
history.
The views of E. Meyer, who defended the ideas of free will in human
behaviour, the working of chance, and the unique nature of historical
events,lJII went in a similar direction. When discussing anti-positivist
ideas in Germany we have to stress the influence of F. Nietzsche, who
advocated the principle of non-objective historical research that would
have practical ends in view. 91 The influence of J. Burckhardt, who was
one of the first to doubt the positivist idea of continuous progress, was
also still strong.
Some of Lamprecht's ideas were defended by E. Gothein, K. Breysig,
and O. Hintze, while today historians who have dropped some of the
traditional concepts and support that of Strukturgeschichte also refer to
him. Breysig assumed unity as a series of socio-psychological states in
the development of mankind, which accordingly can be studied as an en-
tirety. That entirety passes from one state to another and thus yields
a series of levels or types. The passing of society through the various
levels is the most general historical law. Breysig also listed other laws,
which were in fact more or less substantiated historical generalizations.
Contrary to Lamprecht, he held that it is individuals, and not the
masses, who play the creative role in history.1JII
Economists who were members of the historical school also came out
against the dominant status of political history, and advanced the
above-mentioned idea of levels of development, this time in the eco-
nomic field. D9 Obviously, the theory of levels of economic development
replaced the idea of progress by the concept of change, but it was still
far from comprehending the category of development. Its defenders
were not very good at explaining how transitions from one level to
another were supposed to take place, since for them the various levels
emerged as it were "ready made", without any transition periods.
154 STRUcruRAL REFLECTION
Elements of a teleological approach were sometimes used to instil some

life into the process. tOO
8. Structural historiography in other countries. Concluding remarks
The ideas inherent in the anti-erudite approach. as described above.

have had responses in nearly all countries. In Russia mention is due to
the propagation of the comparative method, the striving to link histor-
ical research with sociological studies. and also to outstanding advances
in economic history. The Russian school of social history has been
widely known; its last representative was P. A. Sorokin. a sociologist,
economist and historian, for many years working in the United States,
who carried out his programme of the integration of sciences. One of
its first representatives was M. M. Kovalevsky (1851-1916). whose
works were used by F. Engels. tOt Sorokin strove to construct a historical
sociology; in doing so he inclined toward typological approaches. In
his opinion the decisive force in the course of events is the develop-
ment of science and technology, and not the economic factors. tOt
In Poland, in the early 20th century there was little of interest in the
field of methodological reflection on history. Mention might be made
of L. Gumplowicz's criticism of Lamprecht's ideas. tOa controversies over
Lamprecht between his opponent (B. Dembinski) and his advocates
(W. Sobieski and others),104 and to numerous very speculative claims
made by historians marginally in connection with their main studies
(e:g.• J. K. Kochanowski and F. Koneczny). but the pride of place ob-
viously goes to M. Handelsmans's Historyka (The Methodology of His-
tory).t05
The last-named work was. and to a large extent still is. the principal
textbook of the methodology of history in Poland. It resembles the
book by Marrou. An eminent historian, M. Handelsman (1882-1945)
gave an excellent introduction to heuristics and historical analysis, but.
enmeshed in various speculative philosophical theories. in the sections
concerned with historical cognition gave an exposition of the subject
which is hardly acceptable. It reflected, above all. the views of German
intuitionists of the Simmel and Dilthey type: thus it is the "understand-
ing", i.e., an "indirect vision of the whole",t°6 or a "creative vision of
the individual whole"107 which. is the decisive factor in historical c0-

gnition.
Handelsman distinguished between the process of "examination",
concerned with historical sources. and that of "cognition", concerned
with the process of history. Cognition consists in construing reality by
the historian who "enlivens" the results of his study. The main elements
of construction are: time and space (both interpreted as forms of con-
sciousness) and the genetic approach which consists in the "understand-
ing" of connections between facts. In historical research the point is
not to obtain an answer to the question why something was so and so,
but merely an answer to the question. how something occmred. i.e.. the
point is to offer "genetic explanations".108 Following Rickert. Handels-
man distinguished between general causality (as the relationship of the
type of a sufficient condition). as established in natural science. and
individual causality, when it comes to "a specified cause and a specified
effect". The genetic relationship is a "fuller form of individual causal-
ity". and it points to all that without which a given fact could not have
taken place. i.e.. to a set of necessary conditions. Since in historical
research we study individual phenomena. hence such research is not
concerned with general causality, but at most with searching for genetic
relationships. Genetic explanation, however. is only part of the process
of cognition in historical research, whose effect is to be "historical
understanding". All that which is connected with man must be learned
"in itself" as "something unique", i.e., experienced through a "direct
vision of the whole".
For Handelsman. historical reality was above all mental in nature,
unique and non-recurrent in its every element. It cannot be grasped in
teleological nor deterministic terms. and it is basically different from
natural facts. In his works Handelsman stressed the great importance of
the development of nationalities as a "historical factor". but later came
to be more and more inclined to ascribe the decisive role in history to
prominent individuals (see his study of A. Czartoryski).
Such opinions led him to an anti-naturalistic treatment of the science
of history. and to interpreting the historical method as opposed to the
method used in natural science. since the f~er is concerned with the
study of "the individual origin of phenomena". and moreover history
includes many elements of art (even though Handelsman did not go in
156 PATI'ERNS OF IDSIORICAL RESEARCH
this respect so far as Croce did). Yet Handelsman did not hold history
to be a purely idiographic discipline. since next to ordinary descriptions
it also strives for "formulations valid for developmental sequences".
But. on the other hand. such formulations do not state any "general"
causality. and are merely a fuller form in which "individual" causality
manifests itself. Such formulations may also include laws, which Han-
delsman interpreted possibilisticaJly as certain "causal trends" which
express the possibility of the recurrence of certain phenomena under
specified circumstances.loD
Against this background the methodological analyses carried out by
J. Rutkowski (1886-1946)110 and F. Bujak (1875-1953) stand out by
their exceptional precision.
Their studies were concerned both with the specific issues of the re-
search methods used in economic history and the broader problems of
the methodology of history in general. In his paper Zagadnienie syntezy
w historii (The Problem of Synthesis in History)111 Bujak came out
against confining history to description and postulated that general
analyses be broadened. which was also claimed by some positivists. He
thought that there is no essential difference between history and other
social sciences: historical phenomena are social phenomena. and these
in turn are psychological phenomena, and since psychological pheno-
mena are governed by regularities, hence history, too, must reveal re-
gularities. Bujak conceived them statistically: historical events cannot
be predicted, but their respective probabilities can be indicated. Bujak's
opinions thus corresponded to the tendencies dominant in anti-positiv-
ist methodology.
The reflection which we have ·termed integrated or structural found
support in the trends which then came to prevail above all in anthropo-
logy, sociology, and economics. Evolutionism, which had been dominant
in anthropology and sociology, gave place to functionalism. Functional
analysis is mainly concerned with establishing the respective functions
of the various elements of a given whole, while it disregards the de-
velopment of that whole in time. The functional approach is usually
associated with B. Malinowski, and next with R. Brown and R. Mer-
ton, but it obviously takes on various forms, some of them less and
some of them more radical in character.ll2 In sociology, functionalism-
which is dominant in many groups - is to be found in the very inftuen-
STRUGrURAL REFLECfION 157
tial theory of the working of social systems, formulated by T. Parsons,us

a disciple of Malinowski.
Because of the exceptional popularity of the anthropological ap-
proaches advanced by C. Levi-Strauss114 we have to point to their struc-
turalist inspirations, which go back to the opposition (originated main-
ly by F. Boas) to evolutionism in culture theory. Uvi-Strauss, fascinated
by the primitive societies, which he was investigating and which are
unable to think in historical terms but act on the basis of certain durable
systems (structures), concluded that this attitude of the mind is natural
and fundamental. Hence the course of events is to be viewed as a se-
quence of structures that lacks continuity and as development which
is a sui generis illusion. Uvi-Strauss suggests that we "free ourselves"
from history by treating it as a method: history is to be merely a
method in our striving to structure facts.
Statistical theories also drew their inspirations from economics, even
though the endeavours to make research more dynamic, undertaken
above all by the Swedish school, developed markedly only after World
War II in connection with the theory of eoonomic growth. The impact
of those theories upon research in the field of eoonomic history is in-
creasing systematically. They facilitate the introduction to such research
of various analyses which explain changes in systems. Thus they make
us expect that the structural approach to eoonomic history, as pursued
in France, will beoome more varied.115
Structural reflection in historical research has been manifesting itself
in methodological considerations rather than in the writings turned out
by historians. As has been said earlier, most scholars have shown no
interest in theoretical discussions and have been spontaneously prac-
ticing idiographism and succumbing to speculative philosophy.
REFERENCES
1 J. Legowicz speaks about a "positivist philosophy of life" (see his Zarys

historii filozofii (An Outline of the History of Philosophy), ed. cit., pp. 316 ff).
But the present writer is not inclined to classify it as a branch of positivism,
and finds W. Tatarkiewicz's classification (see his Historia Filozofii (A History
of Philosophy), vol. III, Warszawa 1958, pp. 258 ff) more convincing.
2 Cf. H. Bergson, L'evolution creatrice, Paris 1912, p. 24: "L'evolution, elle
implique une continuation reelle du passe par Ie present, une duree qui est un
trait d'union".
a Cf. H. Bergson, op. cit., p. 393: "En realiU:, il n'y etait question ni de
devenir ni d'evolution ( ...). L'artifice ordinaire de la methode de Spencer con-
siste a reconstituer l'evolution avec les fragments de l'evoluee".
4 See E. Husserl, "Die Krisis der europaischen Wissenschaften und die trans-
zendentale Pbanomenologie", Philosophia, 1936, p. 14.
5 E. Cassirer, Zur Logik der Kulturwissenschatten, Funt Studien, Goteborg
1942, p. 85. "Was das Gedachtnis an Tatsachen und Vorgiingen aufbewahrt, das
wird zur historischen Erinnerung erst dadurch, daB wir es in unser Inneres ein-
beziehen und in dasselbe zu verwandeln vermogen". G. Santayana (1863-1952)
reduced symbolism to poetic contemplation thus presenting an irrational view
of the world.
6 Out of those works on post-positivist philosophy which have been used by
the present writer, the most penetrating ones are: M. Mandelbaum, The Prob-
lem ot Historical Knowledge, New York 1938 (the authors discussed by Man-
delbaum include Croce, Dilthey, Mannheim, Simmel, Rickert, ,Scheler, Troeltsch);
R. Aron, La philosophie critique de l'histoire, Paris 1950 (2nd ed.); L S. Kon,
Die Geschichtsphilosophie des 20. lahrhunderts, vol. I, Berlin 1964 (revised and
enlarged as compared with the Russian original); F. Kaufmann, Geschichtsphilo-
sophie der Gegenwart, Berlin 1931.
sa I. S. Kon, op. cit., "Die Krise des bUrgerlichen Geschichtsdenkens".
7 The opinion that the 20th century has been marked by a de-Hegelization
of philosophy is now common. Cf. Morton White's introduction to The Age ot
Analysis, 1st ed. 1955, 4th ed. 1958.
8 Historicism will not be discussed separately, but only in connection with
relevant broader issues. This is done so because the concept of historicism is
one of the most ambiguous in the methodology of history. Its principal mean-
ings can be listed thus:
(a) general historicism, i.e. stress laid on the constant movement and change
in the course of events (not denied by anyone); the stress on the changes varies
obviously, according to the pattern of historical research;
(b) absolute historicism (also termed relativism), common mainly in works
of German historians, which F. Meinecke believed to have been the main pro-
duct of "the German spirit" since the Reformation; it is marked, as a result of
the claim that all historical facts are unique, by an absolute relativism with
respect to truth (it is impossible to arrive at the objective, i.e., true, image of
the past events) and to values (as there are no eternal standards and laws of
nature, any teleological trend of events, etc.); absolute historicism is antipodally
opposed to the idea of the invariability of human nature; it was the State which
was supposed by the followers of that trend to be the measure of values (see
G. G. Iggers, The German Conception of History. The National Tradition of
Historical Thought from Herder to the Present, Middletown 1968).
(c) Popper's historicism was intended to cover those various philosophies of
history which aspire to the discoveries of historical laws that make predictions
of future trend of events possible, and which Popper criticizes (see K. Popper,
The Open Society and Its Enemies, vol. II, p. 242);
(d) historicism as synonymous with "the philosophy of history" (used in
this sense by M. C. D'Arcy in The Meaning and Matter of History, New York
1959);
(e) existential historicism, as part of the general doctrine of existentialism,
which stresses man's "historicity" (Heidegger, Ortega y Gasset, Sartre in his
early writings) (see I. Ortega y Gasset, History as a System), New York 1962;
this interpretation, too, is in total opposition to the idea of man's changeless
nature (compare in this connection Ortega y Gasset's saying that man has no
nature, and what he has is history);
(f) dialectical historicism, originating from K. Marx and F. Engels, as the
doctrine which states that it is possible to arrive at a true image of the past,
because the world is knowable, and points to the fact that systems of values
are neither totally absolute (eternal, changeless) nor totally relative.
The basic category of Marxist historicism in its ontological version is that of
dialectical development. Interpreted in this way, development is not guided by
any external forces, nor is it a sequence of events with a predetermined direction
of changes; it is a process which affects systems and takes place through inter-
actions, varying in strength and direction, of elements of which those systems
consist. As applied to society and its development, the concept of ontological
historicism is concretized by the joining to it of the category of human practise,
which enables us to have an active approach to the process of history. The
theses of Marxist historicism in its methodological version include at least two
statements: that the explanatory value of those universal theories which dis-
regard qualitative differences between systems (especially social formations) is
small or nil or negative; and that accordingly universal statements can be re-
duced to statements about qualitatively different systems on a very limited
scale only.
g In particular in Der Aufbau der geschichtlichen Welt in den Geisteswissen-
schaften (1920), and previously in Einleitung in die Geschichtswissenschaften

(1883). Recent works on Dilthey's viewpoint include W. Kluback, Wilhelm
Dilthey's Philosophy of History, New York 1956, and H. Diwald, Erkenntnis-
theorie und Philosophie der Geschichte, Gottingen 1963. On "understanding" see
I. Wach, Das Verstehen. Grundziige einrer Geschichte der hermeneutischen
Theorie im 19. lahrhundert, Tlibingen 1926-9 (2 vols.). For Dilthey's collected
works see Gesammelte Schriften, vols. I-IX, XI-XII, Leipzig-Berlin 1914-36,
vol. X, Stuttgart 1958.
10 M. Mandelbaum, The Problem of Historical Knowledge, ed. cit., p. 56.
11 I. S. Kon, op. cit., p. 171; M. Mandelbaum, op. cit., pp. 102 ff. Simmel's
opinions on the issues of interest here were expounded by him in his book
published in 1892 (Die Probleme 'der Geschichtsphilosophie).
12 Rickert failed to observe consistently the principle of the formal classifica-
tion of the disciplines concerned with the same set of facts, into those which
160 PATIERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
follow the procedure used in natural science (fonnulation of general concepts)

and those which do so on the historical (individualizing) basis. He ultimately
arrived at ascribing to facts only those characteristics which individualize them.
This has been demonstrated by K. Bakradze, Ocerki po istorii nowiejszej i so-
wremiennoj burzuaznoj filozofii, Tbilisi 1960, p. 302-5.
18 See F. Kaufmann, Geschichtsphilosophie der Gegenwart, Berlin 1931, p. 78.
There is in all an immense wealth of studies on Max Weber's methodological
ideas. In addition to those already mentioned the following were consulted:
Max Weber on the Methodology of the Social Sciences, E. A. Shils and H. A.
Finch (eds.), Glencoe 1949; R. Bendix, Max Weber. An Intellectual Portrait,
New York 1960; (unfortunately, Interpretation of Conduct and History (1946)
by the same author was not available); Max Weber und Soziologie Heute, Til-
bingen 1965; K. Bosl, "Der 'soziologische' Aspekt in der Geschichte. Weltfreie
Geschichtswissenschaft und Idealtypus", Historische Zeitschrift, vol. 201, No. 3/
1965, pp. 6l3-50; E. Pitz, "Geschichtliche Struktur. Betrachtungen zur angeb-
lichen Grundlagenkrise der Geschichtswissenschaft", Historische Zeitsschrift,
vol. 185, No. 2/1958, pp. 265-305; S. Kowalski, "Krytyka teorii nauki Maxa
Webera" (A Criticism of Max Weber's Theory of Science), Studia socjologiczno-
polityczne, No. 17, 1964, pp. 127-162. See also Max Weber, Werk und Person.
Dokumente ausgewiihlt und kommentiert von E. Baumgarten, Tilbingen 1964,
and the major works of Max Weber, published in Tilbingen, 1921 to 1924. Here
mention is also due to the structural ideas of Alfred Weber (Bewegungsformen
der Geschichte, concerned with changes in human types throughout history) and
E. Spranger (Lebensformen, first published in 1907, 7th ed. in 1930). W. G. Run-
ciman, A Critique of Max Weber's Philosophy of Social Sciences, Cambridge
1972.
14 cr. M. Weber, Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Wissenschaftslehre, Tilbingen
1922, pp. 54 ff.
lS Author of The Presuppositions of Critical History, London 1874.
16 This view was expounded by Windelband in his well-known rector's lec-

ture "Geschichte und Naturwissenschaft", published in: Priiludien, 5th ed., vol. II,
Tilbingen 1915, pp. 136--60, in particular pp. 142-3, 145, 151. See also A. Ma-
lewski and J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii historii (Studies in the Methodo-
lo~ of History), ed. cit., pp. 24--6; G. Klaus and H. Schulze, ''Windelband und
die Methodologie der Geschichtswissenschaft", Historische Zeitschrift, vol. 201,
No. l3/1965, pp. 1125-47.
17 See in particular his works Die Grenzen der naturwissenschaftlichen Be-
griffsbildung, 1846-1902 (the edition consulted was the 5th, Tilbingen 1929) and
KUtturwissenschaft und Naturwissenschaft, 1899 (the edition consulted was the
7th, Tilbingen 1926).
18 An example of the treatment of history as both art and science is provided
by B. Russell, History as an Art, Kent 1951. In a more literal sense it is treated

as poetry by O. Spengler in Der Untergang des Abendlandes, MUnchen 1923,
vol. I, pp. 129-31 (some paragraphs published in Theories of History, pp.

190-2(0).
18 On M. Scheler see M. Mandelbaum, The Problem of Historical Know-
ledge, pp. 147-56.
20 Cf. I. S. Kon, Die Geschichtsphilosophie des 20. Jahrhunderts, p. 74.
21 Cf. Filozofia i sociologia XX wiekp (philosophy and Sociology in 20th

Century), Part I, Warszawa 1965, p. 297.
!I These laws are, obviously, mental in nature.
28 M. Weber, Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Wissenschaftslehre, Tllbingen 1922,
pp. 204-5; W. Bienfait, Max Webers Lehre von geschichtlichen ~rkennen, Ber-
lin 1930.
24 G. Simmel, Die Probleme der Geschichtsphilosophie, Leipzig 1907, p. 95.
11& These statements later came to be termed general statements with specific
generality (cf. K. Popper, Logik der Forschung, Wien 1935, pp. 28-9) or strictly
general statements (cf. A. Malewski and J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii hi-
storii (Studies in the Methodology of History), ed. cit., p. 16).
III H. Rickert, Die Probleme 'der Geschichtsphilosophie, Heidelberg 1924,
p. 90; see also S. Ossowski, ''Prawa 'historyczne' w socjologii" ('Historical' Laws
in Sociology), Dziela (Collected Works), vol. IV, Warszawa 1967, p. 64.
117 Cf. O. Spengler, Der Untergang des Abendlandes, M1lnchen 1923, vol. I,
pp. 129, 131.

lIB One of the main objections raised against existentialism is its radical his-
toricism (which in fact amounts to ahistoricism); this is manifested above all in
the claim that society is a sum of individuals each of hich is a self-contained
entity whose existence has a history of its own. J. Ortega y Gasset wrote: ''His-
tory is a systematic science of that radical reality. It is, therefore, a science of
the present in the most rigorous and actual sense of the word. Were it not
a science of the present, where should we find that past that is commonly
assigned to the theme? The opposite - and customary - interpretation is equi-
valent to making of the past an abstract, unreal something lying lifeless just
where it happened in time, whereas the past is in truth the live, active force
that sustains our today. There is no action in distans. The past is not yonder,
at the date when it happened, but here in me. The past is I - by which I mean
my life". (History as a System and Other &says Toward a Philosophy of His-
tory, New York 1962, p. 223). See also K. Jaspers, Ursprung and Ziel der Ge-
schichte, ZUrich 1949, French-language version published in Paris in 1954.
18 J. Maritain (1882-1973) claimed that "God is absolutely innocent. He is
in absolutely no way the cause of moral evil". Man, when making history, can
choose the means, and hence he can do good or evil. (See his On the Philoso-
phy of History, New York 1957, in particular pp. 27,28, 32, 119, 123.) The idea
of history interpreted as singular facts and man's free thought was also advanced
by Ch. Peguy, who influenced some groups of French historians. Represen-
tative for the Christian philosophy of history is J. Danielou's Essai sur Ie
mystere de l'histoire, Paris 1953. In Poland it was S. Swiefawski who came out
in favour of an idiographic programme based on the "understanding" of sin-

gular facts (see his "Koniecznosc i wolnoSc w dziejach" (Necessity and Freedom
in History), Roczniki Nauk Humanistycznych, No. 4/1964).
30 In the period between the two world wars radical conventionalism was re-
presented by K. Ajdukiewicz.
31 Characteristic of this trend was P. Vandryes's De la probabilite en his-
taire, Paris 1949. This endeavour to make history more precise by reference to
the concept of probability was viewed sceptically already by H. Berr in La
synthese en histoire (1953), p. X.
32 Among many authors, mention is due to E. Demolins, L. I. Meenikov, and
E. Reclus.
33 Representatives of demographic determinism included M. Kovalevsky
(1851-1916), and A. Coste (1842-1901). See T. Szczurkiewicz, Rasa, srodowisko,
rodzina (Race, Milieu, Family), Warszawa 1938.
34 G. V. Plekhanov, 0 materialisticheskom ponimanyi istoryi, in: Izobrannyie
filosofskye proizvedenyia, vol. 2, Moscow, pp. 238 ff.
A. Labriola, Del materialismo storico. A proposita della crisi del marxismo, Rome
1902, p. 30 ff.
35 Cf. L. Febvre, A Geographical Introduction to History, London 1932, in
particular p. IX.
86 H. See, "Quelques remarques sur la philosophie de l'histoire de Cournot".
La Revue de Synthese Historique, vol. XLVI (vol. XVI of the new series),
Paris 1926, pp. 15-8. The factors theory covered the major endeavours of "ex-
planations". For instance, R. Bruck linked the consecutive development of
various centres of civilization with changes in magnetic activity (cf. H. Berr, La
synthese en histoire, Paris 1911, p. 33).
37 H. Berr, op. cit., p. 24.
38 Ibid., p. 26. The publication Evolution de l'humanite, initiated by H. Berr,

was intended to give, by referring to the achievements of historians, an inte-
grated image of the evolution of mankind. It was to be a new interpretation of
universal history. H. Berr was the founder of La Revue de Synthese Historique,
which first appeared in 1900 and was later transformed into Revue de Synthese.
39 Ibid., p. 227.
40 Ibid., pp. 55 ff.
41 Ibid., pp. 113 ff.
42 Ibid., pp. 138 ff.
43 Cf. F. J. Teggart, Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., p. 272;

K. Gorski, 0 interpretacji i wartosciowaniu w historii (On Interpretations and
Valuations in History), Lublin 1948, p. 12.
" Cf. I. Dllmbska, "W stulecie urodzin Henri Berra" (On the Hundredth
Anniversary of the Birth of Henri Beer), Ruch Filozoficzny No. 1-2/1954, pp.
33-6.
45 A. D. Xenopol, Theorie de l'histoire, Paris 1911 (the 1st ed., entitled
Principes fondamentaux de l'histoire, appeared in 1899), pp. 71, 163, 300, et

STRUCTURAL REFLECTION .. 163
passim. See also H. Berr, La synthese en histoire, pp. 24, 26, 31, 41-2, et passim;
A. G. Widgery, Interpretation of history, pp. 243-4.
46 The periodical started to appear in 1929 as Annales d'Histoire Economi-
que et Sociale, from 1939 to 1941 it bore the title of Annates d'Histoire Sociale,
and from 1942 to 1945 that of Melanges d'Histoire Sociale; after World War II
it appears as Annales. Economies. Societes. Civilisations to emphasize the inte-
grated approach. On M. Bloch see Ch. E. Perrin, "L'oeuvre historique de Marc
Bloch", Revue Historique, 1948, vol. CXCIX, pp. 161-88. On the Annales school
as a whole see K. E. Born, "Neue Wege der Wirtschafts- und Soziolgeschichte
in Frankreich. Die Historikergruppe der Annales", Saeculum, vol. 15, No. 3/
/1964, pp. 298-309 and G. G. Iggers, New Directions in European Historio-
graphy, Middletown 1975, pp. 43-79.
47 Cf. F. Braudel, "Histoire et Sociologie" in: G. Gurvitsch, Traite de so-
ciologie, vol. I, Paris 1958.

48 Connections with the Durkheim school are analysed by W. Kula in his
introduction to the Polish-language version of M. Bloch's Apologie pour
l' histoire ou metier d' historien (Warszawa 1960).
4!1 L. Febvre, Combats pour l'histoire, Paris 1953, pp. 15-6: "(...) ces for-
mules communes qui, groupant des faits jusgue la separes, en forment des
series".
50 M. Bloch, op. cit., p. 101.
51 See J. Topolski's paper on M. Bloch's book in Kwartalnik historyczny,
No. 2/1961, pp. 460-1. The trends to combine the study of "conjunctures" with
that of "structures" by pointing to the various processes of development are
manifested in F. Braudet's lecture delivered in Warsaw when he received the
honorary doctor's degree in Warsaw University. "I accordingly reject", he
said, "both the history of events and the history of conjunctures. And then, in
what is Jeft, that is, in my select and privileged history, it is systems which
appear: social or socio-economic, cultural or demographic, systems whose pace
of life is slow, and whose duration is age-long. (...) Socio-economic systems are
those which are the most important issue. We have to distinguish in them above
all short-term fluctuations from development processes of long duration. (...)
By laying emphasis on socio-economic systems 1 believe 1 refer to the most
durable achievements of Marxist thought". (Quoted after the Polish-language
version published in the Warsaw weekly Kultura, issue No. 26 of June 25,
1967).
Ii! Mention is due to his books: La philosophie critique de l'histoire (2nd ed.
in 1950); Introduction a 10 philosophie de l'histoire, Paris 1938; Dimensions de
la conscience historique, Paris 1961.
sa R. Aron, Introduction ala philosophie de l'histoire, ed. cit., pp. 190, 229.
54 R. Aron, op. cit., p. 226.
55 C, Bobmska, op. cit., pp. 50-1.

58 H. I. Marrou, De 10 connaissance historique, Paris 1956. There are several
Polish-language reviews, the most comprehensive one being that by W. Mosz-
164 PATI'ERNS OF lflSfORICAL RESEARCH
czenska, "0 sprzecznoSciach wewn~trznych 'programowego' subiektywizmu" (On

the Inner Contradictions of 'Programmatic' Subjectivism), Kwartalnik Histo-
ryczny, No. 2/1958, pp. 440--63.
67 Cf. E. Husserl, Die Krisis der europiiischen Wissenschaften und die trans-
zendentale Phanomenoiogie, p. 14.
M H. J. Marrou, De la connaissance historique, p. 58.
59 Ibid., pp. 146 iI.
60 Ibid., p. 103.
61 Ibid., 177.
112 H. Berr, La synthese en histoire, ed. cit.,pp. 293-4. In his 3rd ed. (Paris
1963) L. E. Halkin reciprocated with the statement that Berr's work "contributes
few constructive elements" (p. 99). D. Harsin's handbook, Comment on ecrit
I' histoire, Liege 1933 (3rd ed. 1949), mainly concerned with research techniques,
was better assessed by Berr.
68 P. Aries, Le Temps de I'Histoire, Monaco 1954.
64 L. Halphen, Introduction a l'histoire, Paris 1948 (2nd ed.). He holds that
it is useless to search for laws of development, and comes out directly against
Marx (pp. 44-5).
6J; A. Choulguine, L'histoire et la vie. Les lois. Le hasard. La volonte hu-
maine, Paris 1957. Works of this group also include P. Ricoeur, Histoire et
verite, Paris 1955.
66 1. M. Romein, Theoretische Geschiedenes, Groningen 1946.
67 J. E. Acton, A Lecture on the Study of History, Cambridge 1895. Acton's
disciples included G. M. Trevelyan (1876-1962), who also preached a retreat
from positivism. A historian, in his opinion, ought to "understand" the past and
to share its passions. On Acton see H. Butterfield, Man on His Past, ed. cit.,
pp.62-99.
68 We have in mind his essay Darwinism and History (1909), in which he
criticized the idea of laws of progress and evolution. He arrived at total in-
dividualism and the acceptance of chance as the decisive factor in history.
69 Best known for his Experience and Its Modes, Cambridge 1933, in which
he declared himself in favour of a difference between the methodological struc-
ture of the exact sciences and that of history. He interpreted history not as the
world of objective facts, but as a world of actual ideas, and claimed that these
two approaches, which the positivists had failed to note, should be distinguished
from one another. Like B. Croce he held that historical facts are contemporary.
70 R. G. Collingwood, The Idea of History, ed. cit., pp. 205 iI, in particular
pp. 215-8, 228. On Collingwood see M. Heitzman, "Collingwooda teoria pozna-
nia historycznego" (Collingwood's Theory of Historical Knowledge), Teki Histo-
ryczne, vol. II, No.4, London 1948, pp. 233-55; E. E. Harris, "Collingwood's
Theory of History", Philosophical Quarterly, vol. vn, 1957, pp. 35-49; N. Ro-
tenstreich, "From Facts to Thought: Collingwood's Views of the Nature of His-
tory", Philosophy, vol. XXXV, 1960, pp. 122-36. Of these Heitzman's paper is
the most precise. See also Theories of History, ed. cit., pp. 249-51.
SI'RUCI'URAL REFLEcnON 165
71 R. G. Collingwood, op. cit., p. 216.

72 R. G. Collingwood, op. cit., p. 245.
78 M. Heitzman, op. cit., p. 254.
74 Ch. Oman, On the Writing of History, London 1939.
75 G. J. Renier, History. Its Purpose and Method, London 1950. In this con-
nection note J. Huizinga, "The Idea of History", in: F. Stem, The Varieties of
History, New York 1957.
76 E. H. Carr, What Is History, London 1962.
77 J. H. Robinson, The New History, New York 1912; The Mind in the
Making, New York 1921. On Robinson see F. J. Teggart, Theory and Processes
of History, pp. 199-205.
78 Positivist opinions obviously still have their supporters, even though they
have not been characteristic of methodological reflection in the 20th century. In
France, A. Piganiol in his "Qu-est-ce-que l'histoire", Revue de metaphysique et
morale, 1961, opposed the opinions of H. I. Marrou. Note also the anti-relativ-
istic analysis of the laws of nature by L. Strauss (Natural Right and History,
Chicago 1953).
79 E. P. Cheyney, Law in History and Other Essays, New York 1927.
80 Ibid., p. 7.
81 Ibid., p. 11.
82 F. J. Teggart, Theory and Processes of History, Berkeley and Los Angeles

1962. This is a joint edition of his two books, Theory of History, Yale 1925,
and The Processes of History, Yale 1918. These two books were for the first
time published together in 1941.
83 F. J. Teggart, Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., p. 220.
84 Ibid.
85 See also M. A. Destler, "Some Observations on Contemporary Historical
Theory", The American Historical Review, No. 3/1950; C. Strout, The Prag-
matic Revolt in American History: Carl Becker and Charles Beard, New Haven
1958.
86 The American Historical Review, vol. 39, No. 2/1934, pp. 219-29. His
paper was later discussed in vol. 40, 1934, pp. 339-349, and in vol. 41," 1936,
pp.74-87.
87 C. Read, "The Social Responsibilities of the Historian", The American
Historical Review, vol. 55, No. 2/1950. The following is a quotation from
Becker's Everyman His Own Historian, "American Historical Review" (vol. 37,
1931-32, p. 247): "every generation our own included, will, must inevitably,
understand the past and anticipate the future in the light of its own restricted
experience". This principle guides the selection of facts and the construction of
syntheses.
88 The new edition of Ranke's PreuBiche Geschichte by the H .. J. Schoeps
Publishing House (Darmstadt 1956), intended to rehabilitate Prussia, was a signal
fact. In this connection see J. Krasuski, Z dziej6w niemieckiej mySli politycznej
XIX i XX wieku (Issues in the History of German Political Thinking in the
19th and 20th Centuries), Poznan 1965, pp. 7 ff. Krasuski also describes German
historicism (cf. pp. 56 ff and 107 ff).
89 Cf. K. Lamprecht, "Was ist Kulturgeschichte?", Deutsche Zeitschrift fiir
Geschichtswissenschaft, vol. I (new series), 1895; Einfiihrung in das historische
Denken, Leipzig 1912. Lamprecht's views were criticized by Y. Plekhanov, Ober
die Rolle der Personlichkeit in der Geschichte, Berlin 1945, pp. 17 ff. The
problem has been recently discussed by G. G. Iggers. Lamprecht's idea de-
veloped from positivism, but it seems more to the point to classify it as a
structural pattern of historical research. There is a wealth of publications con-
cerned with German historicism. Some major items are referred to in various
places in this book. On Troeltsch see M. Mandelbaum, The Problem of Histor-
ical Knowledge, ed. cit., pp. 155-6. When defending himself against the re-
lativism of the "historists" Troeltsch arrived at a Crocean absolute historicism.
In his system, the ultimate criterion is to be seen in "God's truth", that is, some-
thing like the Crocean "absolute". The historian's "conscience" is supposed to
be helpful in making him comprehend that truth. On the neo-Rankean school
see Studien iiber die deutsche Geschichtswissenschaft, ed. cit., pp. 264-70.
90 E. Troeltsch, Der Historismus und seine Probleme, Tiibingen 1922. Com-
pare also the very interesting analyses to be found in F. Wagner, Moderne Ge-
schichtsschreibung, Berlin 1960.
91 Cf. A. Stem, Philosophy of History and the Problem of Values, ed. cit.,
p. 13: "Historicism may be defined by the formula: veritas et virtus filiae tem-
poris"a
92 Die Entstehung des Historismus, Miinchen 1938.
93 K. Mannheim, Historicism. Essays on the Sociology of Knowledge, Lon-
don 1952 (the German-language version appeared in 1924).
94 K. Heussi, Die Krisis des Historism~s, Berlin 1932.
95 E. Bernheim, op. cit., pp. 101, 113, 121, 126, 159, 166, et passim.
96 E. Meyer, Zur Theorie und Methodik der Geschichte, in: Kleine Schriften,
vol. I, Halle 1924.

97 F. Nietzsche, Vom Nutzen und Nachteil der Historie fiir das Leben, 1873.
98 Cf. K. Breysig, Der Stufenbau und die Gesetze der Weltgeschichte, Berlin
1905. Breysig's memoirs (Aus meinen Tagen und Triiumen, Berlin 1963) are of
interest, too.
99 See footnote 43 to Chap. VI and the relevant section of the main text.
100 The Germans have been publishing many textbooks on the historical
method. Cf. W. Bauer, Einfiihrung in das Studium der Geschichte, Tiibingen
1921 (2nd ed. in 1928); A. Meister, GrundriB der geschichtswissenschaftlichen
Methodik, 1923; A. Feder, Lehrbuch der geschichtlichen Methode, Regensburg
1924; W. Gorlitz, Idee und Geschichte. Die Entwicklung des historischen Den-
kens, Freiburg Badischer 1949; P. Kim, Einfiihrung in die Geschichtswissenschaf-
ten, Berlin 1947 (2nd ed. in 1952, 3rd ed. in 1957); K. G. Faber, Theorie der
Geschichtswissenschaft, Miinchen 1974 (1st ed. in 1971). This is an important
attempt to write about theory of history in its present-day meaning.
STRUGrURAL REFLECTION 167
101 Among M. M. Kovalevsky's works mention is due above all to Ekono-

miceskiy rost Evropy do vozniknovenia kapitalisticeskogo khoziaistva (The
Economic Growth of Europe up to the Advent of the Capitalist Economy),
vols. I-III, 1898-1903. Concerning Kovalevsky see S. I. Krandievsky, Ocerki
po istorii ekonomiceskoy istorii (Notes on the History of Economic History),
ed. cit., pp. 266 ff.
102 Cf. P. A. Sorokin, Social and Cultural Dynamics, New York 1937-41.
103 L. Gumplowicz, "Historia a socjologia" (History and Sociology), Przeglqd
Historyczny, vol. I, 1905.
104 Cf. M. H. Serejski, Historycy 0 historii (Historians on History), Warsza-
wa 1963, pp. 408 ff.
105 M. Handelsman, Historyka (The Methods of Historical Research), Part I.
The Principles of the Methodology of History, Zamosc 1921; Historyka. Zasady
metodologii j teorii poznania historycznego (The Methods of Historical Re-
search. The Principles of the Methodology and Theory of Historical Know-
ledge), 2nd ed., revised and enlarged, Warszawa 1928.
106 M. Handelsman, the 1928 edition of the book quoted above, p. 314.
107 Ibid., p. 316.
108 Ibid., p. 308.
109 In post·1945 Poland we can still find a programmatic propounding of the
idea of idiographic history writing. Cf. K. Gorski, 0 interpretacji i wartoscio-
waniu w historii (Interpretation and Valuation in Historical Research), Lublin
1948; S. Swiezawski, "Koniecznosc i wolnosc w dziejach" (Necessity and Free-
dom in History), Roczniki Nauk Humanistycznych, No. 4/1964, pp. 3-12, in
particular p. 7 ("In historiography, nomothetism is not only out of place, but
even dangerous (...) as it creates an illusion of predicting the future".); M. Wa-
chowski, "Przedmiot pedagogiki porownawczej" (The Subject Matter of Com-
parative Pedagogy), Kwartalnik Pedagogiczny, No. 1/1965 (he claims that "or-
dinary historiographical standards" do not postulate "the obsolete principle" of
establishing "so-called laws"). C. Bobmska (op. cit.) also comes close to idio-
graphism when she postulates that history writing be "concrete", and that gen-
eral statements do not disregard any particular features of specified past
events. In this connection see J. Kmita, "Celiny Bobmskiej 'Historyk. Fakt. Me-
toda'" (Celina Bobmska's 'Historian. Fact. Method'), Nurt, No. 1/1965, pp. 73-4.
110 Cf. J. Rutkowski, Historia gospodarcza Polski (An Economic History of
Poland), "Wst~p do gospodarczych dziejow Polski" (Introduction to Poland's
Economic History), vol. I, Poznan 1946, p. 1-26. Cf. J. Topolski, "Badania his-
toryczno-gospodarcze w Polsce" (Studies in Economic History in Poland), Rocz-
niki Dziej6w Spolecznych i Gospodarczych, vol. XXV, 1963.
111 F. Bujak, "Zagadnienie syntezy w historii" (The Problem of Syntheses in
Historiography), Kwartalnik Historyczny, 1923, pp. 1-23.
112 Some functionalists reveal a tendency toward dynamic approaches (e.g.,
A. L. Kroeber). See A. Kloskowska, "Socjologia a historia" (Sociology and
History), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 3/1964, pp. 661-74.
113 See Studia Filozoficzne, No. 4/1962, pp. 71-93. See also J. Topolski, ''In-
tegracyjny sens teorii materializmu historycznego" (fhe Integrating Function of

the Theory of Historical Materialism), Stpdia Metodologiczne, No. 1/1965.
114 See in particular C. Levi-Strauss, Anthropologie structurale, Paris 1958;
La pensee sauvage, Paris 1962; Sens et usage du term structure, L. Bastide (ed.),
The Hague 1962; E. Leach, Claude Levi-Srauss, New York 1970; J. Topolski,
"Levi-Strauss and Marx on History", History and Theory, vol. XII, No. 2/1973,
pp. 192-207.
115 Cf. J. Topolski, "Historia gospodarcza a teoria ekonomii". (Economic
History Versus Economic Theory), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 1/1964.

169
VIII. LOGICAL REFLECTION
1. The rise of the logical reflection on science
The types of the methodological reflection on history, i.e., both on the

past events and on historical research (whether formulated explicitly or
applied by historians in practice). which have been discussed so far.
were mainly concerned with ontological and epistemological issues.
The clear priority given to analyses of the characteristic features of
past events, seen in pragmatic. critical. erudite and genetic reflection.
was followed - under the impact of structural reflection - by increased
interest in historical cognition. But the study of methodological problems
in the narrower sense of the term, i.e., the ways of arriving at the state-
ments made by historians, the formal nature of such statements and the
types of relationships between them still was only a side issue. But
this required the acceptance of the fact that a logical analysis of science
was necessary.
The birth of the logical analysis of science had been prepared both
by a gradual development of logic itself, and by interest, manifested
in various philosophical systems, in the language of science and in the
ways science is pursued. But the rise of specialized research on the
logical foundations of science, fairly independent of any philosophical
school, was a matter of the recent decades and was due above all to
inspirations coming from conventionalism. pragmatism, the trends to
axiomatize and to formalize mathematics. analytical philosophy. and
logical positivism. These inspirations, as can be seen, rather varied in
nature, resulted in an increased interest in logic and in the birth of the
modem methodology of sciences and the methods of investigating
science itself, methods in tum based on logical concepts. Further, only
in recent years, we can watch the impact on the methodology of sciences
of such new disciplines as information theory, cybernetics, the theory
of games and of decision-making, and above all semiotics, the latter
becoming a meeting place of scientists who represent various traditions
in the science of science.
The main attack. which was ultimately to provide information on

the real state of science, came - as is known - from the exact science.
The advocates of conventionalism were mainly engaged in mathematical
and physical research, but they originated a way of thinking which,
radical as it was by destroying links between facts, on the one hand, and
theories and theoretical statements. on the other (the latter being treated
as scientifically convenient conventions, and hence neither true nor
false), was important for the promotion of research on science. When
we study the history of conventionalism we see that it did not originate
with H. Poincare. The critical attitude toward "absolutely" self-evident
statements made in the various disciplines had been manifested earlier
and was gaining in strength. The discovery that geometry. which seem-
ingly had been solid as a rock. could have various systems in ad-
dition to Euclid's. contributed particularly much to reflection on science.
AU this made researchers master the logical foundations of science.
even though the conventionalists' ending up in the narrow study of the
syntax of languages used in science marked their reaching a blind alley
rather than the finish of the race.
The positive aspects of conventionalism yielded the striving for the
investigation of the logical foundations of mathematics. which proved
~tremely important for the shaping of the logical reflection on science.
The pursuits are associated mainly with D. Hilbert (1862-1943). G. Pe-
ano (1858-1932). B. Russell (1872-1970). and others. They pointed to
the great role played in science by the formal structure of theories and
by the study of the problem of consistency, and stressed the fact that
questions about the truth or falsity of statements are not absolute. in
nature and can be posed only within a given theory. The fact that the
work of purifying the language of science began with mathematics, that
is, the discipline which offered the greatest difficulties in that respect,
proved fertile for progress in general methodology. A vast field of
studies was born, which Hilbert termed metamathematics and which in
fact amounted to the rise of apragmatic methodology (in the termino-
logy of K. Ajdukiewicz). Its basic achievements included the use of
artificial (symbolic) languages in methodological analyses and the dis-
tinction. due mainly to Hilbert. between object language and metahm-
guage. B. Russell's contribution was the reduction of the fundamental
concepts of mathematics to those of logic.
LOGICAL REFLECTION 171
An important role in the study of logic and the methodology of

sciences was played by the Poles S. Lesniewski (1886-1939), A. Tarski
(b. 1902), K. Ajdukiewicz (1890--1963), J. Lukasiewicz (1876-1956).
L. Chwistek (1884-1944), and T. Kotarbmski (b. 1886), who founded
what came to be known as the Polish school of logic and who made
many original contributions to syntactics and semantics.
Additional inspiration for the logical reflection on science was due
to analytical philosophy, originating from G. E. Moore (1873-1958).
Some of the authors of the foundations of mathematics (e.g., B. Russell)
philosophically were in that trend, which is sometimes held to be
characteristic of present-day non-Marxist philosophy. Representatives of
the fairly differentiated approaches to analytical philosophy are linked
by the immense importance they attach to the analysis of (scient-
ific and current) language, the extremists believing that to be the prin-
cipal task of philosophy. Such an analysis is often simply identified
with philosophy. In this way the essentially logical considerations,
which are concerned with certain narrow (syntactic only) problems of
science have been assigned the role of a philosophical system, with
the conviction (typical of all systems and in fact metaphysical) about
its crucial function in intellectual history.
For some twenty years analytical philosophy had its renowned man-
ifestation in logical positivism, which, by gradually losing its character-
istics of a separate system and its illusions about a thorough recon-
struction of science, has merged in the various trends. But at the same
time many logical positivists, by ridding themselves of their sense of
mission of reforming science, have concentrated on various technical
issues of the methodology of sciences and implanted in research in that
field the principles of conceptual rigour, precision, and insight.!
Logical positivism originated, as is known, from M. Schlick (1882-
1936), the founder of the Vienna Circle, who as the point of departure
took the (misinterpreted) postulates formulated by L. Wittgenstein in
his Tractatus Logico-philosophicus (1922). Schlick thought that by
adopting the methods of logical analysis we participate in the final
revolution in philosophy and are fully justified to consider the sterile
conflict of philosophical systems as terminated.!
172 PA'ITERNS OF IllSTORICAL RESEARCH
2. The problem of the logical-positivist demarcation of science and

metaphysics
Out of those trends, as mentioned above. which have developed logical

reflection on science logical positivism was 'the only one to engage in
most far-reaching. even though rare and usually random. excursions
into the humanities. This was due to the principal Positivist demand
that all metaphysics be eliminated from philosophy. and hence also
from every specialized discipline. Examples of obscure statements. full
of metaphysics. can best be found obviously in those sciences which
make use of everyday language. In the course of formulating this idea
logical positivists have advanced many statements which have since
been included in the study of the methodology of the social sciences.
In the works of the founders of logical positivism (M. Schlick. R. Car-
nap. O. Neurath, and others) the problem of separating science from
metaphysics had at first a very radical formulation.
By referring to the empiricism of Bacon. Hume, Locke, and especially
19th century positivists they concluded that the only knowledge which
counts is that acquired by experience (observation), and that the sub-
ject matter of experience which they would not analyse any more are
impressions (in the subjective approach that leads directiy to Berkeley)
or facts (in the objective approach that leads to mechanistic material-
ism). This restored the positivist opinion that what is knowable breaks
up into separate facts as its elements. Logical positivists used to for-
mulate statements about such facts. that is. statements which are verifi-
able empirically, often termed protocol or observation statements. with-
out explaining in any greater detail how such statements are verified.
All more general (theoretical) statements are constructed of observation
terms and statements, so that the totality of statements (and terms) in
science can be divided into those which are observation-based and
those which are theoretical (and hence reducible to the former category).
Since the construction of statements is based on logic. the study of the
results of cognition must consist in a logical analysis of the language of
science, i.e., an analysis of the relationships between statements (meta-
linguistic analysis). Such an analysis may yield a simple description of
the logical procedure used. or it may go further by formulating stand-
ards of scientific procedures. Logical positivists differed from one an-
other in the treatment of the tasks of such an analysis. The programme

of logical positivism, as outlined here, shows that its representatives
treated as metaphysics all that which could not be reduced to protocol
statements,3 that is, all those statements which cannot be verified em-
pirically.
The verification criterion of the demarcation line between science and
metaphysics has proved dangerous to the development of science as it
eliminated from the latter as metaphysical various sets of theoretical
statements that go' beyond simple conjunctions of observation state-
ments; to make matters worse, it did not take into account the existence
of a certain initial knowledge (which in the case of history we suggest
to term non-source-based knowledge) which is indispensable above all
for a selection of facts or events that must precede observations. Ob-
viously, this is not to be any a priori knowledge (e.g., as interpreted by
I. Kant); the said initial knowledge in the last analysis is empirical, too,
but is such only with respect to knowledge (or cognition) as a whole,
and not with respect to any specified section of that knOWledge. i.e.,
those observations which are just being carried out by a given research-
er. Logical positivists came to realize that difficulty at a rather early
stage.
The requirement of verification. i.e., the search for a complete, ob-
servation-based (and hence inductive) confirmation of theoretical state-
ments (that is, the requirement that they be reduced to observation
statements) has been accompanied by the requirement of. falsification,
i.e., negative decidability, advanced by K. Popper.' Instead of looking
for positive confirmations researchers ought. in accordance with the
latter requirement. look in their observation-based data for negative
cases which refute (falsify) a given theoretical statement. Should a nega-
tive observation be made, the falsification of such a statement would
amount to its rejection as false. Popper, who opposed one-sided induc-
tionism, was quite explicit in saying that a theory cannot be constructed
on the basis of observation statements alone. 5 Research should begin
with the formulation of a hypothesis, which would have to be sub-
stantiated. In practice, falsification often was replaced by the principle
of exemplification as a method of testing hypotheses: to verify a hypo-
thesis it would suffice to quote a number of empirical cases which are
in agreement with it.s
The founders of inductive verificationism themselves have since mod-

ified their opinion,7 so that today it probably does not have many
supporters. This evolution can be illustrated by Introduction to Seman-
tici3 by Carnap himself, who refers there to abstract entities9 that go
beyond observation statements and justifies their existence in science.
3. Methodological issues in analytic philosophy
Advanced methodological analyses are now being carried out in analyt-

ical philosophy,1D which largely originates from logical positivism. Its
representatives suggest various, often opposing, solutions. The differ-
ences of opinions within analytical philosophyl1 pertain to such fun-
damental issues as the method of approaching the subject matter of
research, the method of constructing science, the methodological unity
of science, and the limits of logical analyses. The opinion on the first
issue listed above is of major importance for the approach to historical
research.
All these differences, of course, directly affect the approach to the
methodological problems of history. Thus when it comes to the method-
ological nature of the subject matter of research, next to the individ-
ualistic approach,u which follows naturally from the empiricism that
marks logical positivists and stresses that in the social sciences (socio-
logy, history) we study individual human actions, and any possible reg-
ularities may pertain solely to the behaviour of individuals, the holistic
approach has its advocates. too. That latter approach points to social
"wholes", irreducible to individual acts of behaviour, as the proper
subject matter of research,18 or to the fact that statements about social
facts are not fully reducible to statements about the behaviour of in-
dividuals.
On the issue of the ways in which science is being constructed logical
positivism has since its very inception witnessed a marked difference
between the programme of the inductionists (Carnap) and that of the
anti-inductionists (popper). By referring to an analysis carried out by
J. Giedymin14 we may broadly describe inductionism as the approach
based on the individual method (the mind reflects the reality through
the accumulation of observations); the generalizations based on individ-
ual observations are to be verified by the search for those facts which
LOGICAL REFLECITON 175
confirm them. Thus this approach is linked with the requirement of

verification. as mentioned above. Anti-inductionism (or hypothetism)
opposes the idea suggesting that the mind is merely a passive gatherer
and classifier of observations; it is claimed that neither scientific nor
pre-scientific cognition consists in collecting data obtained by unguided
observation. and in generalizing the results. Science can develop only
on the basis of the method of criticism of hypotheses: we have to
formulate the hypotheses. which need not be generalizations of obser-
vations. and to criticize them by recurrently trying to falsify them by
means of rigorous tests. The anti-inductionists point to the fact that
extreme inductionism may very easily admit to science even most glar-
ing metaphysics. especially in the case of historical research.
The methodological nature of the social sciences and the humanities,
and hence history. too. has different interpretations in analytical philos-
ophy. The advocates of that trend do not universally share the opinion.
advanced by logical positivists. that science is one. that is, that there
are no basic divergences between social and natural sciences. 1s The
anti-naturalists. i.e.• the advocates of the opinion that the social sciences
have their distinct characteristics so that the methods used in natural
science cannot be applied in them. have come up with the already
known and essentially anti-positivist set of arguments (the non-recur-
rent and individual nature of facts. impossibility to avoid valuations,
etc.). The naturalists, who have at their disposal much stronger argu-
ments, seem to form the majority. They accept the methodological unity
of the sciences and thus treat history as a science which may formulate
laws. even though. when applied to historical research, their standpoint
may be associated with the methodological programme of idiographism.
Discrepancies as to the limits of the applicability of logical methods
are significant. too. Although all representatives of analytical philo-
sophy see the primary task o~ philosophical research to be an analysis
of language, yet we can see (note J. Kotarbiriska's18 studies in this
connection) that there is a difference of approach between the recon-
structionists and the descriptionists. The former (Russell, Carnap. and
others) treat the analysis of language mainly as a method of improving
the language from the logical point of view, so that next to a recon-
struction of types of reasoning they also suggest a programme of
a consistent logical transformation of science. The latter (Wittgenstein
in the last period of his activity and the Oxford school) are sceptical
about the programme of making natural language precise (and the use
of artificial languages in methodological studies) and think that we
have to confine ourselves to the examination of the ways in which that
language which is actually used in science functions in practice, without
trying to improve it logically, the only possible concession being their
support for "useful" terms. They question above all the usefulness of
definitions, and suggest that these be replaced by "rules of use" (i.e.•
descriptions of semantic functions). They hold that the laws of formal
logic are not applicable to practical reasonings formulated in natural
language.
4. Misunderstandings over the struggle of analytic philosophy against

metaphysics in history. K. Popper and I. Berlin
Methodological individualism was aimed mainly at the theories stat-

ing that man's fortunes are not decided by himself, but by forces which
are independent of him, i.e.. by a "historical necessity", whatever its
interpretation be. The opponents of methodological individualism, in
this case other representatives of analytic philosophy, also oppose the
fatalistic theories of social development, theories which preach historical
"inevitability". Although reference is made to many conceptions, it can
easily be seen that it is historical materialism which is their principal
adversary. The resulting discussion included many fertile statements
and profound comments, which advanced logical reflection on history.
but at the same time many formulations concerning historical material-
ism were based on erroneous simplifications and misconceptions. Three
claims were ascribed to historical materialism, which in fact are op-
posed by that theory and are at variance with the dialectical concept
of the course of events.
The basic and flagrant error is the treatment of the materialist inter-
pretation of history as a continuation of the Cartesian, Age-of-Enlight-
enment, and positivist concept of "progress" as a factor which is in-
dependent of human actions. Moreover, characteristically enough, such
an identification has never been substantiated in the light of an analysis
of the Marxist theory. Marx's theory is listed in a row together with
the conceptions of Turgot. Condorcet, Comte. Spencer, and others, con-
LOGICAL REFLEcnON 177
ceptions based on the idea of "inevitable" progress.17 Since the idea of

"inevitable" progress is usually criticized along with the various cyclic
interpretations of the course of events (0. Spengler, misinterpreted
A. Toynbee, H. B. Adams, V. Pareto, and others), hence historical ma~
terialism, because of its supposedly metaphysical content, is put in the
same bag with the said theories.
As is known, the idea of progress replaced the providential inter~
pretation of events, and thus played an important part in making histor-
ical research scientific. In other words, it was a rationalist, lay concept
of Providence, under which man was in a position (and even had the
moral duty) to contribute with his own activity (especially the develop-
ment of science) to putting that progress into effect.18 Linking the con~
cept of progress with the biological concept of evolution (Spencer, Gum~
plowicz, Ratzenhofer), which ascribed to society the property of d~
veloping, as an organism does, "by itself", did not change the meta-
physical nature of the idea of progress, which, as before, was unable to
explain why history was as it was.
Nor was such an explanation provided by the various theories of
a cyclic course of events, theories which were not free from various
irrational implications. Ancient Greeks had developed an astronomical
model of such theories, which in modern time came to be based on
biological 8IIlalogies. Cyclic interpretations became fashionable, they
gave appearances of explanations, and allowed one to be either pessi-
mistic or optimistic about history. P. Sorokin drew a long list of various
"social cycles", on the strength of which he claimed that history moved
like a pendulum.1t
The dialectical conception of social development is a continuation
of the idea of progress only thus far as any new theory - which ex~
plaims facts better than earlier ones did - is a continuation of its pr~
decessors. The idea of progress could be treated. in two ways: (l) re~
searchers could try to free it from. its metaphysical and evaluating el~
ments (progress as something which materializes indepedently of man,
and progress as constant changes to bring about a moral improvement,
the rule of science, etc.); (2) they could construct a new concept of the
process of history, a concept free from fatalism.
As will be shown in the next part of the present book. Marxism was
the only theory which has suggested the second of these two solutions.
To the interpretation of the course of events it has contributed the

category of autodynamic development, thus doing without recourse to
forces that would be external to 'historical facts. Under this interpre-
tation, development can be explained completely as a process within
social systems under investigation.
Representatives of analytic philosophy and many other authors who
opposed mataphysics did not try to see the dialectical nature of that
concept of history and rested satisfied with some metaphorical formu-
lations used by Marx. Ridding the concept of progress of its metaphys-
ical aspects, combined with the lack of suggestions as to any new inter-
pretation of the course of events, resulted in the situation in which the
said authors had to accept only changes in history, without looking for
the substantiation of those changes in any permanent regularities of
development. Marxism did, however, suggest such a substantiation by
pointing to a number of universal regularities, confirmed by numerous
studies (such regularities being of the type: if a occurs, then b will
occur also, and not of the type: a or b will occur inevitably). But the
direct and indirect supporters of the theory which accepted changes
confined themselves only to pointing to the existence of certain trends
or tendencies in the course of events.
As interpreted by various authors20 such trends prove to be nothing
else than observable and permanent sequences of events which indicate
directions of changes in history. They have nothing to do with the reg-
ularities in the form of conditional statements, the knowledge of which
makes it possible to predict future events; they just inform ex post facto
about certain aspects of what has occurred so far. Thus, they point to
the processes of "rationalization" and laicization of human life, the
increasing role of science and technology, etc. Jt can easily be noted
that discovering such trends is not in any contradiction with the ac-
ceptance of the concept of development in history. Marxist historians
have made many similar generalizations. Extrapolations of trends even
make it possible to formulate certain predictions, but then we have to
assume that regularities exist. Some authors (especially sociologists, e.g.,
F. Znaniecki, R. M. Mac Iver, K. Mannheim) have noticed that the
discoveries of trends result "inevitably" (which, however, is a logical,
and not historical, "inevitability") in the acceptance of regularities in
the course of events. They even point to a "third phase" in the de-
velopment of the theory of social change, which consists in the search

for an inner mechanism of changes. 21
The statements made by K. Popper,22 I. Berlin,28 and F. A. Hayek24
are the best known forms of criticism of the metaphysical interpretation
of history. with which term. they have wrongly covered the Marxist
theory as well. As far as history is concerned the problem has been
treated most extensively by K. Popper. He has applied the term histor-
icism to the whole of what he described as "metaphysics" in history.
and thus tried to discredit the artificial conglomerate of opinions2&
which, together with Popper's own additions, is a mixture of various
views (those of Marx, Spencer, Toynbee. Mannheim. and others) whose
common characteristic is a holist approach to sPciety and the accept-
ance of historical laws, trends, historical "rhYthms", etc., in a fatalistic
interpretation. In fact, as conceived by Popper, this is basically a crit-
icism of the Marxist viewpoint, which can als~ be seen in his other
book, The Open Society and Its Enemies (1915), that continues his
earlier ideas. .
The model of historicism as reconstructed by Popper and subse-
quently criticized by him is alien to the Marxist theory, and hence the
conflict takes place in vacuo. First of all, historiI'sm need not, contrary
to what Popper suggests, be linked with claim which he calls anti-
naturalistic, such as: non-recurrence and comple 'ty of social facts and
the resulting impossibility of formulating general statements applicable
to long periods; impossibility of predicting future events (since man's
deliberate actions may prevent the predicted event from taking place);
intuitive interpretation of social facts (indication of their causes, point-
ing to ,their role in a given whole, their evaluation from the point of
view of historical regularities); impossibility of making experiments;
and holism which points to the fact that social groups are not ordinary
sets of elements, which allegedly eliminates t~e possibility of using
quantitative methods and makes researchers ~etaphysically look for
the "essence" of a given social whole ("essentialism" in Popper's ter-
minology). Out of all these statements the Marxist theory is in favour
of the holistic approach and of essentialism. which it, however, inter-
prets dialectically (i.e.• empirically and dynamically). Popper says that
the advocates of historicism are wrong in referring to examples drawn
from natural science and intended to substantiate their claims that it is
possible to make predictions based on the knowledge of historical laws,

such predictions being treated by them as the principal practical task of
the social sciences. The same applies to the main goal of social re-
search, which consists in the detection of the forces that cause social
change. All this is alleged to result from an erroneous interpretation of
natural science.
It can clearly be seen that Popper's main assault on historicism is
directed at the treatment of social history as a whole which is subject
to specified historical laws that guide its changes. He thinks that such
an ontological statement about historical reality is detrimental to his-
torical research because it introduces into it elements of metaphysics
(fatalism), whereas, according to Popper, the main task of history is to
establish individual facts. Popper accepts the establishment in the social
sciences of laws interpreted as strictly universal statements (without any
temporal and spatial determinants), but this as a purely methodological
approach, which does not imply any specified opinion about historical
facts. According to Popper there are no historical laws that would ex-
plain the mechanism of the course of events. If the process of history
reveals a development trend in the past, then this is simply a statement
of fact, and not a universal statement that would make possible to con-
clude what will happen if appropriate conditions take place.1e
"There exists no law of evolution", Popper says, "only the historical
fact that plants and animals change, or more precisely, that they have
changed. The idea of a law which determines the direction and the
character of evolution is a typical 19th century mistake, arising out of
the general tendency to ascribe to the 'Natural Law' the functions tra-
ditionally ascribed to God".27 This is perfectly correct, but - as we have
said - this criticism cannot be applied to the Marxist laws of historical
development, which explain the inner mechanism of the changes and
have nothing in common with fatalism.
I. Berlin's criticism, as formulated in his Historical Inevitability, which
explicitly approves of Popper's views, is aimed above all at the natura-
listic statements of the positivist theory. One can agree with Berlin when
he writes that "the notion that history obeys laws, whether natural or
supernatural, that every event of human life is an element in a necessary
pattern has deep metaphysical origins",28 if we have in mind the posi-
tivist interpretation of laws. But if we consider the Marxist laws of
LOGICAL REFLECIION 181
dialectical development, then such a conclusion turns out to be an

obvious misunderstanding. Berlin, himself an excellent expert on Marx's
works,29 who has proved that he appreciates - to a large extent - Marx's
greatness,30 does not link positivism with Marxism on the issue of laws
as explicitly as Popper does. His objections are mainly moral in nature:
all those philosophies of history which have a deterministic substratum
are incompatible with the idea of free will, and if an individual is sub-
ject to laws that govern "wholes", then he cannot be held responsible
for his conduct.aI It is obvious that this opinion, too. does not under-
mine the Marxist position, since the Marxist theory also opposes re-
lativistic evaluations which lay the whole burden of responsibility on
"historical forces" which are independent of man and are working
fatalistically.32 This is why a follower of Marxism fully subscribes to
the criticism of such historicism, a criticism which revived after World
War II together with the problem of moral responsibility for the hei-
nous crimes of Nazism. Among better known formulations of such crit-
icism mention is due above all to the excellent book by G. Barra-
clough38 who opposes relativist historicism. I. Berlin in his other works
preaches objective idiographism and defends the idiographic programme
of historical research."
5. Trends in the logical analysis of history
The strong growth of methodological reflection on science was followed

by an increasing interest in the science of history. which, combined with
advances in the general methodology of sciences yielded more and more
tangible results in various fields. We may speak in this connection about
the study of the relationship between the language of historical research
and the facts under investigation (semantics), the language of historical
writing itself (syntactics), and the researcher's attitude toward his state-
ments (pragmatics). Logical reflection drew attention to the fact that by
studying the assumptions which underlie research procedures we arrive
at investigations of the valuation systems represented by the various
researchers. It has thus given us new tools both for the study of the
subject matter of research and the research and cognitive procedures.
It goes to the credit of logical reflection that it has consolidated our
conviction that it is impossible to speak about objects (e.g., the process
of history) without analysing the language used. We can take into con-
sideration only that which can be described in a language.
We shall now point only to some specified issues, namely those which
are wportant for historians and which have been advanced by logical
reflection.
As we have seen, the criticism of metaphysics in opinions on the
course of events and on the science of history, which was largely in-
tended to discredit historicism, has above all revived the claims that
historical facts are non-recurrent and that it is accordingly impossible
to establish laws of historical development; this has resulted in the
conclusion that history is a science of "the unique". Logical reflection
on history, which developed from the empiricism of logical positivists,
strove - in the negative part of its programme - to deprive history of
attainments of other forms of reflection, namely those of structuralism
(holism), the concept of laws of development (of course in their non-
fatalistic interpretation), and, generally speaking, those beliefs which
held that it is possible to apply, in historical research, patterns drawn
from natural science. Certainly, not all representatives of logical re-
flection have been sharing these opinions, which after all correspond
to the numerous differences within analytic philosophy.85
Investigations focused above all on what was the most controversial.
namely the problem of explanation in history, i.e., the fundamental issue
of historical synthesis. The study of that issue was also intended to
establish the methodological status of history. It is, therefore, nothing to
be wondered at that the reconstruction of the explanations carried out
in history became that issue which was being most hotly discussed in
connection with the logical reflection on history. It was concluded that
the study of the understanding (Verstehen), which the intuitionists held
to be the characteristic trait of cognition in the social sciences and the
humanities, belongs to the field of psychology. and not to that of logic,
which must be concerned with the procedures of explanation.38 It is
also said that one comes to understand facts by explaining them.37
The first studies in the logic of historical research38 appeared shortly
before World War II. This statement applies above all to the general
studies by M. Mandelbaum (The Problem of Historical Knowledge,
New York 1938) and by H. Comparez (Interpretation. Logical Analysis
of a Method of Historical Research. The Hague 1939).39 The year 1942
saw the publication of The Function of General Laws in History by

C. G. Hempel,40 which has initiated the said discussion of the problem
of explanation in history. It has resulted, to this day, in a large number
of papers which refer to the most intricate issues of historical synthesis.
The problem of laws emerged at the very start of the discussion: the
question arose (sporadically raised even earlier, e.g., by H. Berr) whether
it is possible to formulate explanations in history if it is firmly assumed
that history is a science of unique facts, and hence a science which is
concerned neither with establishing laws nor with making use of laws
established by other disciplines; that is, whether, or how far, the cate-
gory of laws can be included in the methodological characteristics of
history. In other words, this amounted to the solving of the problem
how far the deductive model of explanation. which is characteristic of
natural science, where single facts are explained by being subsumed
under an appropriate law which states a general relationship, is ap-
plicable in history.
The said deductive model works so that a researcher on the strength
of his knowledge of a given law (1) states that the facts a1> ..., an (2) ex-
plain the occurrence of the facts bI , ••• , bn (3). Statement (3) is here
deduced from the conjunction of statements (1) and (2). This schema
of explanation, which was given by K. Popper (1934, 1945) as the gen-
eral schema of explanation in science, was transferred by C. G. Hem-
pel (1942) to the field of historical research.
This approach, which in the English-language literature of the sub-
ject is termed the "covering-law theory", has been accepted by some
participants in the discussion (of course with proposals of certain modi-
fications), and rejected by others, who claimed that methodological
models of natural science are not applicable to history. Self-evidently,
the said approach must have been inacceptable to openly idealistic
theorists of history, such as M. Oakeshott (who did not accept even the
concept of cause in history, not to speak of that of laws) and R. G. Col-
lingwood. It was accepted by M. Mandelbaum in his previously quoted
work of 1938. In 1961, the same author1 classified the participants in
the discussion into "covering-law theorists", Le., advocates of the de-
ductive model of explanation, "reactionists" and "idealists". In the last
group he included theorists like Croce, Oakeshott and Collingwood,
and added that they have very much in common with the second group.
184 PATrERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCa
When approaching the issue from another point we might class the
"reactionists" as representing the descriptive trend in analytic philos-
ophy. i.e.• as those who tend to describe the actual state of events. and
the "covering-law theorists" as reconstructionists. who tend to impart
to explanations in science (in our case. in history) the highest possible
standard of precision. They adopt the natural science model of explana-
tion as that which is to be imitated in the case of all kinds of explana-
tions. With a far-reaching simplification. we might also say that the
"idealists" tend to explain by reference to a genetic description. the
"reactionists" accept causal relationiships without any reference to
laws. and the advocates of the deductive model link the concept of
cause with that of law.
The advocates of the deductive model of explanation included above
all M. White. J. W. N. Watkins. M. Mandelbaum, W. W. Bartley."
and-with many reservations-Po Gardiner." Hempel's model was more
or less firmly criticized by W. Dray. W. B. Gallie, A. C. Danto. F. A:
Gellner, A. Donagan, A, L. Ryle. N. Rotenstreich. J. Agassi, and
others." The "reactionists" looked for the support of their mostly idio-
graphic approach to the subject matter and tasks of historical research
mainly in the practical activities of historians. They claimed that for-
mulations of laws are not to be found in historical writings. and even
if ,they sometimes are. then they have the form of statements that lack
precision and thus differ from the formulations used in natural science.
This issue will be discussed later in broader context.
The problem of generalizations, which to some extent was raised in
the controversy over explanation in historical research. was also being
examined without connections with the said controversy. The most in-
teresting in that respect is the collection (with L. Gottschalk as editor)
of papers by historians themselves." The point was to realize. first of
all. how historians introduce general concepts into their writings. and
what are the types of such general concepts. This led to the question
whether generalizations in history reveal any peculiar properties, i.e.•
whether there is at all aIIly separate problem of generalizations in his-
tory. or whether it reduces to that of generalizations in all the sciences.
L. Gottschalk divided historiographers into descriptive and theoretical
historians. and added that. according to the type of his work, a historian
predominantly belongs to one of these two groups." Each of them has
LOGICAL REFLECfION 185
to cope with 'the problem of generalizations. From that point of view

Gottschalk: classified them into six groups: (1) those who shun gener-
alizations ("the school of the unique"), (2) those who introduce gener-
alizations deliberately but cautiously (the narratively descriptive ap-
proach), (3) those who try to generalize on the strength of their know-
ledge of trends, i.e., genetically, be comparing facts with antecedents
(in genetic approach), (4) those who make generalizations by comparing
facts in different periods and in different areas (the comparative ap-
proach), (5) those who make generalizations in the form of laws (the
nomothetic approach), and (6) those who make generalizations that
cover the whole course of events (Philosophers of history). In the last-
named group Gottschalk included Condorcet, Hegel and Marx. He
added that also with respect to this classification one and the same his-
torian may belong to various groups, each group playing its own dis-
tinctive role and being indispensable in historical research.47 The dis-
cussion pointed to the difficulties in separating generalizations from
reports on facts, but left the problem of laws in history unexamined.
Next to the logical analysis of the nature of explanation, the issue
of evaluations, i.e., the issue of the objectiveness of historical research,
also became a point of universal interest on the part of methodologists
of history. For the positivists the fact that historical writings include
evaluating statements was not an obstacle to treating history as an "ob-
jective" science which resembles the exact sciences. Anti-positivist re-
flection took the value factor to be that element which distinguishes
history (and other sciences of culture) from natural science. When it
came to logical reflection, especially that which saw its origin in the
logical positivist tradition (from M. Schlick on), historical evaluations,
so burdened with speculative thinking, were viewed with much suspi-
cion. The unrealistic requirement that historical research be freed from
evaluations was being raised, or else it was stated that historians should
strive to separate reports on facts from evaluations.
The opinion which prevailed was that "a disinterested social science
is (...) pure nonsense",48 and the elimination of metaphysics from his-
torical thinkig should take place not through avoidance of evaluations,
but by their deliberate use. The acceptance of such opinions was facili-
tated by increasingly frequent analyses which demonstrated that natural
sciences are not free from evaluations, either.49 Historians who were
mainly engaged in history writing have contributed very little to the

controversy over evaluations. They have made a number of general
comments in favour of various approaches, but the emphasis on the
possibility of making history an objective science was laid by philos-
ophers, and not by historians. 50
While logical reflection has developed exceptionally well in the sphere
of historical synthesis, the problems of analysis in historical research,
that is, the methods of establishing facts, have come to be investigated
more closely (from the methodological point of view) in recent years
only. 51 So far the greatest achievements in the logical analysis of source-
based knowledge, i.e., the type of knowledge specific to historians, go
to the credit of J. Giedymin, who has been concerned with the logical
classification of sources, the role of hypotheses in the analysis and
criticism of sources, the logic of source-based inference, and the issue
of the reliability of informants.52
REFERENCES
1 On the history of logic see the brief but instructive outline by H. Scholz,
Geschichte der Logik, Berlin 1931.
2 M. Schlick, Umschwung in der Philosoph ie, "Erkenntnis", No.1, 1930.
3 Cf. R. Camap's well·known paper on "Ueberwidung der Metaphysik durch

die logische Analyse der Sprache", Erkenntnis, voL 12/1932; see also Philosophy
and Logical Syntax by the same author (London 1935).
4 K. Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, New York 1959 (first pub-
lished in 1935 as Logik der Forschung). In this connection see I. Giedymin,
"Uogolnienie postulatu rozstrzygalnosci hipotez" (A Generalized Version of
the Requirement that Hypotheses Be Decidable), St~dia Filozoficzne, No. 4/1959,
pp. 139--60. See also W. Mejbaum, "Falsyfikacja hipotez" (Refutation of Hypo-
theses), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 3/1964, pp. 49-57.
5 In recent methodological research the division into observation terms and
statements and theoretical terms and statements has been criticized. Such cri-
ticism has been advanced, among others, by I. Giedymin (cf. the report on the
conference on "theory and experience", Studia Filozoficzne, No. 3/1964, pp. 229-
30; it was pointed out in the discussion that "in any case those terms and state-
ments which in current research practice are treated as observational as a rule
contain more or less latent theoretical elements").
8 Cf. H. Albert, "Probleme der Wissenschaftslehre in der Sozialforschung",
in: Handbuch der empirischen Sozialforschung, ed. cit., pp. 52-4.
7 Cf. I. Giedymin, "Indukcjonizm i antyindukcjonizm" (Inductionism and
Anti-inductionism), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1959, p. 8.
a R. Camap, Introductiavt to Semantics, Cambridge 1942.
9 The further evolution of Carnap's views is reflected in his work "The Meth-
odological Character of Theoretical Concepts", Minnesota Studies in the Phi-
losophy of Science, vol. 1, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis 1956, pp. 38-
75.
10 The term analytical philosophy was intended to indicate dissociation from
"all" metaphysics.
11 On the general assumptions which underlie analytical philosophy see The
Age of Analysis, Morton White (ed.), lst ed. 1955, 4th ed. 1958.
12 When it comes to history the standpoint of methodological individualism
is defended, for instance, by F. A. Hayek, J. W. N. Watkins ("Ideal Types and
Historical Explanation", British Journal for the Philosophy of Science), 1. Ber-
lin, K. Popper. Note the following instructive description of methodological in-
dividualism given by A. Danto: "So we see that Methodological Individualism
has nothing whatsoever to do with a number of interesting and exciting posi-
tions it might be thought to resemble. Very briefily, it appears to hold (a) that
sentences about social individuals are logically independent of sentences about
individual human beings, (b) that social individuals are ontologically distinct
from individual human beings, (c) that social individuals are causally dependent
upon the behaviour of individual human beings and not the other way about,
(d) that explanations of the behaviour of social individuals are always to be
rejected as ultimate unless these explanations are framed exclusively in terms
of the behaviour of individual human beings, and (e) that the explanation of
the behaviour of individual human beings cannot be framed in terms of the
behaviour of social individuals; (a) is a thesis about meaning, (b) and (c) are
theses about the world, and (d) and (e) are theses about the ideal form of a
social science". (Analytical Philosophy oj History, Cambridge 1965, pp. 267-8.)
Methodological individualists have been particularly keen on demonstrating that
(misinterpreted) historical materialism is "logically impossible", but they have
not had any major successes in that respect, since even those critics who are not
in favour of materialism have largely discredited individualism from the meth-
odological point of view.
13 Methodological holism is defended, among others, by M. Mandelbaum
("Societal Facts", British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 1955, reprinted
in Theories of History, ed. cit., pp. 476-88) and L. Goldstein ("The Inadequacy
of the Principle of Methodological Individualism in History and Sociology",
Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1956, reprinted in Theories of History,
ed. cit., pp. 501-9; the last-named publication also carries his reply to Watkins).
The best known concept is that of "societal fact", formulated by Mandelbaum,
who says that societal facts are "facts concerning the organization of the society"
(cf. Theories of History, ed. cit., p. 481). Methodological holism rejects pure
psychologism (i.e., explanations which refer only to motives that guide individ-
uals) inherent in the theory of methodological individualism, which stresses that
psychological statements (Le., statements about human behaviour) cannot be
deduced from non-psychological ones (Le., statements about forms of the organ-
ization of society). A. Danto emphasizes that neither approach is adequately

substantiated, and he accordingly suggests "logical disarmament and peaceful
philosophical co-existence" (op. cit., p. 277).
14 J. Giedymin, "Indukcjonizm i antyindukcjonizm" (Inductionism and Anti-
inductionism), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1959.
15 Cf. J. Giedymin, Problemy, zalozenia, rozstrzygni~cia (problems, Assump-
tions, Solutions), Poznan 1964, pp. 249-70. The methodological unity of science
is consistently defended by E. Nagel in The Structure of Science. Problems in
the Logic of Scientific Explanation, London 1961.
16 J. Kotarbmska, "Sp6r 0 granice stosowalnosci metod logicmych" (The
Controversy over the Limits of the Applicability of Logical Methods), Studia
Filozoficzne, No. 3/1964, pp. 25..47.
17 This is done, for instance, by R. Aron, 1. Berlin, R. von Daniels, A. Dan-
to, L. Gottschalk, G. G. Iggers, K. Popper. In all their works we find the in-
correct opinion, based on schematic interpretations, which fails to see the dia-
lectical nature of historical materialism which repudiates all fatalism.
18 This was said already by J. Bury in The Idea of Progress, New York
1955, Chap. IX et passim. See also K. Lowith, Meaning in History: The Theo-
logical Implication~ of the Philosophy of History. Chicago 1949. Bury singles
out three stages in the interpretation of the concept of progress: (1) prior to
the French Revolution, (2) prior to Darwin, (3) after Darwin. He admits that
this is a temporary classification. See also G. G. Iggers, "The Idea of Progress.
A Critical Reassessment", The American Historical Review, No. 1/1965, pp. 1-
17; K. E. Bock, "Theories of Progress and Evolution" in: Sociology and His-
tory, W. Y. Cahnman and A. Boskoff (eds.), Glencoe 1964, pp. 21..41.
19 P. Sorokin, Social and Cultural Dynamics, New York 1937-1941.
110 This is claimed by K. Popper, G. G. Iggers, W. H. Walsh (An Introduc-
tion to Philosophy of History, 5th ed., London 1958), E. Kahler (Meaning of
History, New York 1964), and others. Such trends were also referred to by
M. Weber.
21 Cf. A. Boskoff, "Recent Theories of Social Change" in: Sociology and
History, ed. cit., p. 150.
22 K. Popper, The Poverty of Historicism, London 1957 (first published in
Economica, 1944-5; the edition consulted by the present writer was the French-
language version, Misere de l'historicisme, Paris 1956). See also K. Popper,
Objective Knowledge. An Evolutionary Approach, Oxford 1973. For its critical
discussion see M. Gordon, "Uj~cie prawdy i wiarygodnosci w nowej ksillZce
Poppera" (The Interpretation of Truth and Credibility in Popper's Recent
Book), Studia Filozoficzne, No.1, 1975, pp. 101-17.
28 1. Berlin, Historical Inevitability, London 1954 (2nd ed. 1955, 3rd ed 1957).
24 F. A. Hayek, The Counter-Revolution of Science: Studies of Reason, New

York 1952.
25 The artificiality of Popper's model of historicism is stressed by J. Giedy-
min ("Model historycyzmu prof. K. Poppera" (K. Popper's Model of Histo-
ricism), Studia Filozo/iczne, No. 3/1958, pp. 205-14) and R. Dyoniziak ("Histo-
ryzm w uj~ciu Karola Poppera" (Historicism as Interpreted by Karl Popper),
Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 4/1959, pp. 1254-(1).
28 K. Popper, "Prediction and Prophecy in the Social Sciences" in: Theories
of History, ed. cit., p. 266.
27 K. Popper, op. cit~, p. 280. D. E. Lee and R. N. Beck ("The Meaning of
'Historicism' ", American Historical Review, vol. 69, 1954, pp. 568-78) also fail
to notice differences between Marxism and fatalism. On the other hand, A. Stern
(Philosophy of History, ed. cit., in particular p. 169) does notice them. R.D.
Bradley in his "Causality, Fatalism and Morality", Mind, vol. 73, October 1963,
pp. 591-4, also is inclined to make such a distinction. Popper made the said
mistake even though he had been interested in dialectics (see his "Was ist Dia-
lektik" in: Logik der Sozialforschung, E. Topitsch (ed.), Koln-Berlin 1963,
pp. 262-90, which was a reprint from Mind, 1949, and was also reprinted in
Conjectures and Refutations, London 1963, pp. 312-37).
28 I. Berlin, Historical Inevitability, London 1953, p. 13.
29 Cf. I. Berlin, Karl Marx. Sa vie, son oeuvre, Paris 1962 (translated from
English; the original was written by Berlin in 1939; the theory of historical
materialism is expounded on pp. 175 ff).
80 I. Berlin, op. cit., pp. 12, 206, et passim.
81 I. Berlin, op. cit., p. 42.
82 a. M. Fritzhand, Czlowiek, humanizm, wolnosc (Man, Humanism, Free-
dom), Warsaw 1961. See also A. Stem, Philosophy of History, pp. 164 fI.
83 G. Barraclough, Geschichte in einer sich wandelnden Welt, Gottingen
1957 (this was the version actually consulted; the original is in English). See
also M. C. D'Arcy, The Meaning and Matter of History, New York 1959 (a
Christian interpretation of the concept of history and an assessment, of histo-
ricism).
84 Cf. I. Berlin, "History and Theory. The Concept of Scientific History",
History and Theory, vol. 1, No.,I/I960, pp. 1-31. His paper was criticized by
G. S. Murphy in "Sir I. Berlin on the Concept of Scientific History", History
and Theory, vol. 4, No. 2/1965, pp. 234-43.
35 Some of these issues will be analysed in greater detail in the correspond-
ing parts of the present book.
118 This was formulated explicitly by H. Reichenbach in Experience and
Prediction. An Analysis of the Foundation and the Structure of Knowledge,
Cambridge 1938. He made a distinction between the "context of discovery" (for
comprehension) and the "context of justification" (for explanation).
87 a. W. H. Dray, Philosophy of History, 1964, p. 5.
83 This leaves aside more general studies which go beyond the methodology
of history, such as K. Popper's Logik der Forschung (1935).
89 The more general studies include K. Lowith, Meaning in History, Chicago
1949; W. H. Walsh, Philosophy of History: Ani lntroa",ction, New York 1960
(first "published in 1950); Philosophy and History, S. Hook (ed.), New York
190 PATTERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
1963 (papers and discussions by philosophers and historians of some issues in

the methodology of history); Evidence and Interference in History. D. Lerner
(ed.), Glencoe 1959; W. H. Dray, Philosophy of History, 1964 (in the Prentice-
Hall Inc. philosophical series). A special mention is due to two selections: Theo-
ries of History, P. Gardiner (ed.), New York 1961, with an excellent biblio-
graphy, and The Philosophy of History in Our Time, H. Meyerhoff (ed.), Gar-
den City 1959. Note also Meyerhoff's critical review of Gardiner's selection
(History and Theory, vol. I, No. 1/1960, pp. 90-7).
40 C. G. Hempel, "The Function of General Laws in History", Journal of
Philosophy, vol. 39, 1942 (reprinted in Theories of History, pp. 344-56).

~ M. Mandelbaum, ''The Problem of 'Covering Laws' ", History and Theory,
vol. I, No. 3/1961, pp. 229-42.
41 M. White, "Historical Explanation", Mind, 1943 (reprinted in Theories of
History, pp. 357-70); J. W. N. Watkins, "Ideal Types and Historical Explana-
tion", The British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, 1932; W. W. Bartley,
"Achilles, the Tortoise, and Explanation in Science and History", The British
Journal for the Philosophy of Science, No. 49/1962.
" P. Gardiner, The Nature of Historical Explanation, London 1952.
« W. Dray, Laws and Explanation'in History, London 1957; W. B. Gallic,
"Explanations in History and the Genetic Sciences", Mind, 1955 (reprinted in
Theories of History, pp. 386-402). Mention is also due to A. Montefiore's com-
ment "Professor Gallie on Necessary and Sufficient Conditions", Mind, 1956,
pp. 534--41. A. Danto in his Analytical Philosophy of History tried to give a
synthetic appraisal of the discuSsion and to advance a theory that would satisfy
all parties concerned (pp. 201-32). See further F. A. Gellner, Explanations in
History, "Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society", supplementary volume;
A. Donagan, "Explanation in History", Mind, 1957 (reprinted in Theories of
History, pp. 428-43); and "Historical Explanation. Tie Popper-Hempel Theory
Reconsidered", History and Theory, vol. IV, No. 1/1964, pp. 3-26; A. L. Burns,
"International Theory and Historical Explanation", History and Theory, vol. I,
No. 1/1960, pp. 55-75. These issues, including the problem of explanation, will
be discussed later in this book.
4$ They are mostly American historians (in the order of statements):
Ch. G. Starr, M. J. Finley, A. F. Wright, D. Bodde, R. R. Palmer, W. P. Metz-
ger, Th. C. Cochran, L. Gottschalk, R. F. Nichols, W. O. Aydelotte, D. M. Pot-
ter, M. Klein. H. Meyerhoff, the philosopher, was also consulted; in his opinion,
there are no specific problems of generalizations in historical research as opposed
to other sciences; there is merely the issue of generalizations as such. General-
izations, explanation, and causality, when seen from a logical point of view,
form a single syndrome, and this is why philosophers have been treating these
matters jointly (cf. Generalisation in the Writing of History, Chicago 1963,
p. VI). The last-named book includes a bibliography of works on the methodo-
logy of history.
48 Generalisation in the Writing of History, ed. cit., p. v.
47 Ibid., pp. 113-29.

48 G. Myrdal, Value in Social Theory. A Selection of Essays on Methodo-
logy, London 1935, p. 54. Among those items which are more directly related
to historical research note M. Mandelbaum, The Problem of Historical Know-
ledge (criticism of the relativist approach which eliminates valuations); I. Berlin.
Historical Inevitability ed. cit., (historiography cannot be objective); Ch. Blake.
"Can History Be Objective?" (in: Theories of History, ed. cit., pp. 329-413.
points to the difficulties connected with the elimination of valuations); J. A. Pass-
more, "Can the Social Sciences Be Value-Free?", in: Readings in the Philosophy
of Science, H. Feigl and M. Brodbeck (eds.), New York 1953. Discussions on
evaluations in historiography are summed up by A. Stern in Philosophy of His-
tory and the Problem of Values, The Hague 1962. Further bibliographical in-
formation will accompany the discussion of valuations in historiography.
49 See the analysis of these problems in Part Five of this book.
50 This has been noticed by many authors; cf. W. Dray, Philosophy of His-
tory, ed. cit., p. 23, who quotes in this connection the opinion of H. Meyerhoff.
61 Cf. A. Malewski and J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii historii (Studies in
the Methodology of History), ed. cit., Chaps. II and III. The lack of such an-
alyses was pointed to by the present writer in his paper "0 metodach badaw-
czych historii gospodarczej" (Research Methods Used in Economic History),
read at the 8th Congress of Polish Historians and included in Historia gospodar-
cza Polski (An Economic History of Poland), Warszawa 1960, pp. 13 ff). In
that paper he also mentioned An In'troduction to Logic and Scientific Method
by M. R. Cohen and E. Nagel (successive impressions in 1934, 1949, 1951) as
an exception in this field. See also J. Giedymin, "Problemy logiczne analizy his-
torycznej" (Logical Issues of Historical Analyses), Studia Zr6dloznawcze, vol. II,
1958, p. 22, where a similar opinion is to be found.
52 J. Giedymin, Z problem6w logicznych analizy historycznej (Some Logical
Issues of Historical Analyses), Poznan 1961; "Wiarogodnosc informatora. Pr6ba
eksplikacji dw6ch poj,<c z analizy i krytyki zr6del historycznych" (Informant's
Reliability. A Tentative Explanation of Two Concepts in the Analysis and
Criticism of Historical Sources), Studia Zr6dloznawcze, vol. VII, 1962, pp. 1-13;
"Problemy logiczne analizy historycznej" (Logical Issues of Historical Analyses),
Studia Zr6dloznawcze, vol. II, 1958, pp. 1-39. Further bibliographical data will
be given later. It is worthwhile noting that, since the time when the present
book was being written (1964-6), research on the general methodology of
sciences, fundamental fOf the methodological reflections on historical studies,
has developed very finely in the Poznan centre. That research has covered, in
particular, the principles of abstraction and concretization, and hence the issues
of construction of models (Leszek Nowak) and the procedure of explanation of
human actions, i.e., what is termed humanistic interpretation (Jerzy Kmita). Out
of the numerous recent publications mention is due above all to Zalozenia me-
todologiczne 'Kapitalu' Marksa (The Methodological Assumptions in Marx's
'Capita!'), by various authors, Warszawa 1970; L. Nowak, U podstaw marksis-
192 PAITERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
towskiej metodologii nauk (The Foundations of the Marxian Methodology of

Sciences), Warszawa 1971; J. Kmita, Z metodologicznych problem6w interpre-
tacji humanistycznej (Selected Methodological Problems of Humanistic Inter-
pretation), Warszawa 1971; Elementy marksistowskiej metodologii humanistyki
(Elements of the Marxist Methodology of the Humanities and the Social
Sciences), J. Kmita (ed.), Poznan 1973; L. Nowak, Zasady marksistowskiej /i1o-
zo/ii nauki (principles of the Marxist Philosophy of Science), Warszawa 1974.
The present writer is co-author of both collective works listed above.
IX. DIALECfICAL REFLECfION
1. A review of the earlier types of reflection on history
All the types of reflection on history which have been analysed here
thus far were marked by formulations of specified guidelines which
advanced the science of history. As shown above. the process was ex-
tremely complex and did not at all follow any C()nstantly rising path
of progress. Usually a development of reflection on history in one
sphere was accompanied by stagnation in the remaining ones, which
in tum resulted in an excessive focusing of attention on those fields
which had been neglected previously. It might be said that methodolo-
gical reflection on historical research was developing in accordance with
the principles of dialectics: disproportions in reflection on the various
fields hampered the general progress of methodological reflection on
historical research, and this in tum yielded tendencies to level off the
disproportions, which meant development through inner contradictions.
The development of the various types of reflection gave rise to a set
of rules of historical description, i.e., to a specified model of descrip-
tion. The characteristics of such a model could be reconstructed thus:
reference of the description to time and space co-ordinates, a critical
use of the sources, an appropriate terminology which makes the de-
scription easier, a possibly integrated approach to the subject matter of
the study which would reveal its structure, and the striving for logical
precision. Thus when it comes to descriptions historians had at their
disposal a set of results of age-old reflection, which, taken together,
formed a complex body of specialized knowledge and offered broad
opportunities for a precise establishment of facts. In particular, histo-
rians received a set of methods indicating how to analyse the sources
and what techniques to use when describing facts on the strength of
the sources.
Under the assumptions of scientific history, which sets itself cogni-
tive goals, a description amounts, however, to only a part of the histo-
rian's tasks. The other part, which is much more difficult as it requires
going far beyond the sources, consists in explaining the facts revealed
by the sources. That explanations are included in the historian's
tasks has been realized since the birth of pr:agmatic reflection. That
type of reflection did not, however, favour the development of thinking
on explanations in historical research. It gave two models of explana-
tion, which usually occurred jointly: the providential and the psycholo-
gical. Under the providential model, the transition from a state a 1 to
a statea2 was explained by divine intervention, since the deity, in ac-
cordance with its nature, works in a specified way in spec~ed situa-
tions: for instance, it punishes or rewards a certain type of behaviour.
Under the psychological mode, human behaviour is explained by being
tacitly subsumed under a sui generis psychological law which states
that man (or possibly a man with specified traits of character) under
given circumstances usually acts in a specified way. Moreover, until the
collapse of the idea of an invariable human nature, man was treated as
an unchanging and passive element. His acts could therefore comply
with that pattern. But these two patterns of explanation did not eluci-
date the mechanism of the process of history.
In the period of pragmatic reflection, which sought patterns of con-
duct, reflections on the course of the past and on the events which
actually did take place were very little developed, which adversely
affected progress on the issue of explanations. This was so because in
the case of explanation, which requires going beyond the sources, non-
source-based knowledge of the subject matter of investigations was
needed more than in the case of establishing facts.
The conviction, developed by the modern reflection on past events,
that the course of events is oriented and continuous broadened the
issue of explanations in history, and at the same time made it more
complex, for alongside the question concerning the cause of the transi-
tion from a state a 1 to a state a2 the question arises about the factors
whjch account for constant transitions from state to state, i.e., about
the mechanism of the course of events. The old models, which were
not abandoned, were joined by the various models of genetic explana-
tion, by explanations by factors of change (concerning transitions from
state to state), and by models of explaining the course of events by
means of various laws (interpreted in various ways). In the genetic
DIALECTICAL REFLECTION 195
model, explanation consists simply in a description of the consecutive

stages of a system. which follow one another in time. Explanation by
reference to change factors brings out the role of one or more factors
(e.g.• the climate). treated as external to the system under considera-
tion. which resulted in the danger of an overestimation of the influence
of that factor (hence. for instance. geographical determinism). But, as
has been shown earlier. all those models offered no opportunity for ex-
plaining development in the course of events. i.e., the mechanism of
transitions from state to state (a1 -+ an). The models of explanation by
reference to laws. as suggested in those types of reflection discussed
above, were of two kinds: based on the adoption of a concept of pro-
gress. which is evolutionary, independent of any specified events, and
taking place in accordance with some law of nature, or based on the
assumption of some unspecified inner forces that set a given system in
motion (e.g.• the elan vital. the spirit of the nation, etc.• i.e.• sui generis
laws). In both cases the problem was not solved. but merely shifted to
the sphere of metaphysics (in the latter case we have in fact to do with
a mechanistic variation of the model based on change factors, because
even the elan vital presupposes an external prime mover). Obviously,
those historians who did not accept the existence of any laws govern-
ing history confined themselves to explanations by descriptions or by
indicating the causes of single facts. Thus in all those types of reflec-
tion on history which have been discussed so far the issue of explana-
tion remained open. This meant that the development of the science
of history required. first. that a universal model which would explain
both transitions from state to state and the mechanism of the entire
course of events be constructed, and, secondly. that such a model be
constructed without recourse to metaphysical speculations.
These tasks were undertaken by representatives of the dialectical
reflection on the past and on the method of reconstructing it, but the
model of the complete solution of these two problems taken together
has been constructed by the founders of dialectical materialism. Other
types of dialectical reflection gave, as we shall see, partial solutions
only.
In the sphere of dialectical reflection the question that was posed
first was: what is the mechanism of events? or, more precisely, what is
the mechanism of development? This was required for the construction
196 PATI'ERNS OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
of a model (in the sense of a theory) which a historian could apply in

every case of research work. Tentative answers to that general question
given by representatives of dialectical reflection differed from case to
case, but their tentative models of the explanation of development
(movement) in the course of events had one common element, namely
autodynamism (relative or complete) and holism (idealistic or materi-
alistic) as an indispensable component of the former. Autodynamism
means the search for the explanation of the process of changes (move-
ment) i11 the inner mechanism of transformations of the systems under
consideration, that is, of transitions from. state to state. Thus, in the dia-
lectical approach the subject matter of research takes on the form of
a dynamic whole which is in a state of internally conditioned move-
ment and development. It is suchan approach only which sets historical
facts in motion, that is, turns them into active elements of the process
of history. There arises an opportunity for linking ,the study of facts
with that of changes, and the problem of explanation in historical re-
search thereby acquires a new meaning (as it is the changes which are
explained): it is shifted from a position in a sense external to the pro-
cess of history to an internal position, which means that the explana-
tion of the secret of movement and development is being sought in the
process of history itself. Since. as we have seen, autodynamism assumes
the knowledge of the internal mechanism that accounts for movement
and development, the autodynamic theories do not include Bergsonism,
and the concept of the spirit of the nation, since these theories rest satis-
fied with the assumption of the existence of unspecified forces which
account for a spontaneous movement. These forces are supposed tQ
be in some way inherent in historical facts. but it is not known how
they set those facts in motion. Such theories usually assume the inter-
vention of a divine factor (and if they do not do that explicitly, they
lead to such a conclusion), so that they in fact offer an "improved"
model of explanation by reference to Providence. Such a model is also
teleological. Spontaneous autodynamism is found already in Leibniz's
concept of the variability of the monads, but in his times this idea had
a mark of inspired foresight.
Pointing to a given mechanism of internal development, that is, to
autodynamism m.ay result in the same if the model includes a super-
natural factor, for instance a Maker of that mechanism who sees to it
DIALECITCAL REFLECITON 197
that the wholes set in motion by that mechanism move in the proper
direction. In such a case autodynamism turns into a relative one, which
always is idealistic in nature. Moreover. such an operation changes
radically the concept of such an idealistic autodynamism. because-
whether its authors want that (cf. A. Toynbee) or not - it makes the
model teleological or even fatalistic in character. If. in the final anal-
ysis, everything is being guided. by a supreme "clockmaker". then very
little room can be left in such a model for any real role of historical
facts in the shaping of the process of history. Yet, regardless of such
idealistic consequences, dialectical conceptions include results of many
penetrating investigations that testify to the constant striving of the hu-
man mind for the solution of the extremely difficult problem of change
and development in history.
2. The rise of dialectical reflection on history
Dialectical ideas in opinions on the past (and on nature) were taking

shape rather slowly. so that. before they had been fully formed. in the
works of K. Marx and F. Engels. they usually appeared. in a nuclear
form. very often intertwined. with opposite views. It was in that form
that they could be observed. in the works of Ibn Khaldun. and later,
more clearly, in the philosophical and historical conceptions of
J. G. Herder. The mechanism of movement and development as inter-
preted. by Ibn Khaldun consists in bearing out the fact that social
development is based. on conflicts. and in particular on the opposition
between the nomadic and the urban way of life. As H. Becker and
H. E. Barnes wrote. the cyclic processes of Ibn Khaldun's social dyna-
mics take place between these two poles.1 In Herder's works we find
both elements of the Age-of-Enlightenment theory of constant progress
and strong elements of a dialectical interpretation of the course of
events. He ascribed. a great role to the various rival forces and inter-
preted the process of history as "a result of the working of antipodal
forces which fight one another and yield as a result a new and better
unity".!
As is known. the philosophy of dialectical processes was founded
only by G. W. F. Hegel (1770-1831). The science of history, which at
that time, after having been processed. rather superficially in the period
of critical reflection, was entering the period dominated by the erudite

approach. was not yet ready ,to assimilate those ideas which pointed
the way of solving the most difficult problem of history. namely. that
of development. At that time it seemed more urgent to acquire skill and
scientific precision in establishing facts. But positivism. which drew the
historians' attention above all to the task of establishing facts and at
the same time preached faith in constant progress in history. was never-
theless raising doubts in the minds of more penetrating scholars as to
the correctness of such an explanation of the course of events, the more
so as empirical data provided. as it seemed, proofs to the contrary.
It was J. S. Mill who first pointed to temporary regressions in the his-
tory of mankind. and the pessimistic trend in positivism was originated
by J. Burckhardt (1818-97), the author of Die Kultur der Renaissance
in ltalien (1860). The criticism of the laws of progress, suposedly tunc-
tioning independent of facts as an inavertible force, which was raised
by representatives of structural reflection, was indisp~~~ble in shift-
ing that problem from a field outside historical facts to the inside of
the course of events. This shifting of the problem was in turn necessary
if the questions of the explanation of the course of events were to be
solved. That criticism was not tantamount to the adoption of the dialec-
tical point of view of development in history. It merely introduced
holism as a necessary, but not a sufficient, element in the interpretation
of human society. As we have seen (cf. Chap. VI). holism, or the
various structural approaches, could serve as a basis for various types
of explanations, the pattern being either the model of explanation by
reference to Providence, or the psychological model (e.g., in the spirit
of social psychology, as in the case of Lamprecht), or the model of ex-
planation by reference to factors. The dialectical model, first construct-
ed by Hegel, and later modified by Marx and Engels and included by
them integrally in materialistic philosophy, served then as a pattern of
explanations only to a small group of historians connected with the
nascent labour movement.
It seems self-evident that political opposition or enmity to the entire
Marxist conception, which pointed to the fact that growing contradic-
tions were working to bring about the collapse of capitalism, was the
main obstacle to the adoption by broader circles of historians of the
model of dialectical explanation both in research techniques and in
more general analyses. Hegelian dialectics repulsed traditionally-mind-

ed historians by its rationalist and progressive (from the social and
political point of view) consequences whose scope came later to be
comprehended by the Hegelian leftists. Another reason for the fact
that dialectical thinking was being poorly assimilated by historians was
to be seen in the general state of the science of history (as described
above), marked by a low level of theoretical reflection. witnessed so
tellingly by textbooks on the methodology of historical research, writ-
ten by Marrou. Handelsman, Halkin, and others, even if they revealed
a high standard of research techniques.
Hegel, while indicating the path to the solving of the puzzle of de-
velopment in the course of events, could not dispense with the meta-
physical concept of absolute spirit. According to Hegel, the nature of
both being and thought is logical. Being can be grasped only as a whole.
Being is in the course of incessant changes which are subject to logical
laws, so that each state follows logically from the preceding one. Hence
in Hegel historical development is the development of thought, the
development of the absolute idea,S and not just a collection of random
facts. It strives for its ultimate goal, which is the victory of reason.'
According to Hegel, that victory would mean the consciousness of free-
dom. Hegel believed the State to be the "embodiment of rational free-
dom", fully accepting. as is known. the conditions prevailing in the
Prussian State, because for him what is real is both necessary and ra-
tional. Stages in historical development are stages in the development
of the spirit. Hegel singled out four stages in the history of mankind:
the Oriental. the Greek, the Roman. and the Germanic one, which he
claimed to be the stage of the gradual development of the objective
spirit.
Let us disregard this entire idealistic historiosophical superstructure,
and concentrate on Hegel's dialectical logic. For Hegel the principal
thesis of that logic was the dialectival principle which states that every
true statement has as its counterpart its no less true negation. This
means that something both is and is not. Hegel singled out two op-
posite directions of the ontological process, namely becoming and pass-
ing away. which together account for the unity of that process.s It is
contradiction which is the source of autodynamism, i.e., self-develop-
ment. In Hegel, the statement on contradictions as the source of move-
200 PATIERNS OF msrORICAL RESEARCH
ment occurs in a clear formulation. although only the founders of ma-

terialistic dialectic came to emphasize that contradictions are the main
source of movement. and development. An interesting study of that
principle of Hegel's logic has been written by L. S. Rogowski,8 who
pointed to the difference between Hegel's conception of movement and
the static theories of movement as formulated by Bergson and Russell. 7
It is obvious that we could not accept the principle of autodynamism
without accepting the equally important principle of conditioning and
causality (the latter being a special case of conditioning), which means
that autodynamism is based on both contradiction and conditioning.s
The combination of these two principles is made possible by the
holistic approach, in which wholes are treated as sets of interconnected
elements. As L. S. Rogowski wrote about Hegel's ideas, movement als
Selbstbewegung is a movement of such a whole. For instance, the fact
that a body B ceases to be at a place L is a condition of the fact that
the body B begins to be at a place other than L. In this case, two
states of one and the same physical body condition one another recip-
rocally; note that these states do not follow one another, but - since
each of them is in the stage of becoming - are simultaneous, so that
each of them by its becoming (in opposite directions) "fills" the same
present moment. If that conditioning, which in a sense is internal in
nature, is in turn conditioned by something else, then we have to take
into consideration a more comprehensive whole, and so on. In this way
the various forms of relatively spontaneous movement may be treated
ultimately as manifestations of movement in the most general sense of
the term, i.e., the process which is autodynamic par exellence, the auto-
dynamism of the world. 9 Causality as a special form of conditioning is
interpreted by Hegel not as separate things or events which follow one
another, but so that the cause vanishes in the effect while the effect
remains in the cause.10 Hegel also pointed to the fact that development
is not (uniformly) continuous: relatively quiet periods are followed by
ones which are marked by more violent changes.
Thus, in Hegel's works we find, in a more or less expanded form,
most of those principles of dialectic which were later to be merged
into a single whole by the founders of dialectical materialism, treat-
ment of the whole as the unity of opposites, interconnectedness of the
elements of one and the same whole and of different wholes; acceptance
of the inner contradictions of a whole as the source of autodynamic

movement. treatment of movement and development as non-continuous
processes, in which quantitative changes yield new qualities. These prin-
ciples were also a set of methodological rules.
Hegel's impact on the development of reflection on the past was
many-sided, but historians themselves were on the whole unable to
make use of the opportunities for an integrated approach, inherent in
the dialectic principles; they referred more often to Hegelian idealism
than to his method of approaching the object of study.
In present-day historical thinking it is probably A. Toynbee's (1889-
1975) proposal which is the most widely spread and the most ambi-
tious idea of an idealistic dialectical autodynamism. It has aroused, since
the publication of the first volumes of his 12-vol. A Study of History,
comprehensive discussions or rather tentatives of interpretation of the
statements contained in Toynbee's opus.ll Today, we are in a convenient
situation since 1961 saw the appearance of the twelfth volume of that
work, entitled Reconsiderations, in which Toynbee himself writes about
the comments to his book, and in some cases corrects his earlier opinions
as a result of criticism or subsequent researches. The said volume also
offers the latest formulation of Toynbee's methodological opinions.
Even though his opinions - both those formulated explicitly and those
which emerge from his analyses of the various civilizations - show cer-
tain inconsistencies, or perhaps just omissions which make it possible to
draw different conclusions from his statements, yet the whole of Toyn-
bee's vast conception must be interpreted as a manifestation of a dia-
lectical reflection on the past and on the methods of reconstructing that
past. It seems that many misunderstandings between Toynbee and his
interpreters and critics are due to the fact that (as far as the present
writer can see the issue) the disputants have failed to notice the dialec-
tical sense of Toynbee's idea. Certain points which Toynbee has in
common with O. Spengler,12 but which are of a secondary importance
for the problem of explanation in historical research, make many pe0-
ple associate Toynbee with Spengler, against which Toynbee himself
firmly protested.1S And in fact Spengler's idea has nothing to do with the
concept of autodynamism, which characterizes Toynbee's system. It is
true that in Spengler's interpretations civilizations rise and perish and
in the process pass through certain stages like animals and plants do,
but all this takes place in accordance with inevitable destiny,14 which
resembles positivist laws. Toynbee, when protesting against being linked
with Spengler, dissociated himself explicitly above all from Spengler's
fatalism. He emphasized that he was not a determinist (in the sense of
fatalism) and that, contrary to Spengler, he did not accept the idea
that civilizations exist in isolation.
Toynbee indirectly admitted to have been inspired by Hegel, and
explicitly referred to the effect which Teggart's profound study (cf.
Chap. VI) had had on him.15 When explaining his basic concept of
"challenge-and-response", which we may take to be a specific inter-
pretation of the strife of the opposites within a given whole, that is, the
source of autodynamism, Toynbee wrote: "The idea of challenge-and-
response, which plays a key part in my picture of the course of human
affairs, is not just a 'private interpretation' of my own. The pair of
words came to me from the English poet Robert Browning, though
I had forgotten that I had not coined the expression myself till I redis-
covered the source of it by chance after I had published my first six
volumes. The idea that the words express, came to me, as I have always
been aware, from the Old Testament; and considering how overwhelm-
ing the influence of the Bible has been on all Western thought, includ-
ing thought that has consciously been in revolt against the Bible's
domination, I have no doubt that this was the source from which
Browning, too, received the idea, and was also the source from which
Hegel obtained his concept of dialectic, Malthus his concept of the
struggle for existence, and Darwin, through Malthus, his concept of
evolution".18
According to Toynbee, what is new in history is exactly born of
man's responses to the various challenges that come from the natural
environment or from other peopleP Toynbee broke off completely
with the positivist interpretation of progress, and came to interpret pro-
gress (growth) as development. "I have seen it as a series of acts in the
drama of challenge-and-response in which each act results in a success-
ful response to the challenge with which this act has opened, while each
of these successful responses results in the presentation of a new chal-
lenge which produces a further act".18
Toynbee's dialectic is deeply permeated with religious metaphysics.
which mainly accounts for the fact that he is treated as a poet rather
than a scholar, or even as a visionary and a prophet, against which he

also protested. Toynbee claimed that his principle of challenge-and-re-
sponse. which is the source of development, is a manifestation of God.
even if the challenge comes from man or nature.19 On this point Toyn-
bee encountered difficulties in reconciling autodynamism, God's will
and man's free will. He spoke about man's partially free will,20 and at
the same time stated that this complex of relationships is probably
beyond human comprehension.
Toynbee's case shows clearly the consequences of idealistic dialectic,
which turns into religious mysticism. and comes close to agnosticism.
3. The novel ontological and epistemological elements in materialistic

dialectic
The novel dialectical element in Hegel's system, which revolutionized

the earlier interpretations of the past, was fully appreciated by K. Marx
(1818-83) and F. Engels (1820-95). But they transferred that dialec-
tic from the level of idea or spirit to the level of the material world of
nature anu society. that is, they transformed indealistic dialectic into
materialistic dialectic. "Thereby", as Engels wrote, "the dialectic of con-
cepts itself became merely the conscious reflex of the dialectical motion
of the real world, and thus the dialectic of Hegel was placed upon its
head; or rather turned off its head, on which it was standing, and
placed on its feet".21 This also meant abandoning the opinions of the
Hegelian left group, to which Marx and Engels had been close at first~
that group rejected Hegel's idealism, but also rejected the dialectical
method as it failed to see that materialism without the dialectic which
explains movement and development must lead to an idealistic inter-
pretation of the past. From the epistemological point of view, too,
mechanistic materialism was in fact more primitive than dialectical
idealism as it interpreted the real world in a passive manner, without
assuming the active role of the cognitive subject. Marx, when criticizing
Feuerbach's materialism, but at the same time drawing inspiration
from this opinions, pointed to the fact that this was the main short-
coming of the earlier materialistic approaches. He wrote that ''The
chief defect of all hitherto existing materialism - that of Feuerbach in-
cluded - is that the thing reality, sensuousness, is conceived only in the
form of the object or of contemplation, but not as human sensuous

activity, pratice, not subjectively. Hence it happened that the active
side, in contradistinction to materialism, was developed by idealism-
but only abstractly, since, of course, idealism does not know real,
sensuous actiity as such".22
Dialectical materialism, by integrally merging materialism with dia-
lectic, linked, within one and the same system, the thesis on material
reality as the object of cognition with the thesis on the active role of
the cognitive subject, which in a way "shapes" the object of cognition
in the course of the cognitive process. What the intuitionists tried to
arrive at in a mystic way by suggesting an "understanding" of facts,
especially the social ones, which would make it possible to "penetrate
the essence of facts", was solved in a fully rationalist way by the
method of dialectical materialism.
Dialectical materialism avoided, on the one extreme, the approach
characteristic of positivism, which assumes a passive "reflection" of the
real world by the cognitive subject, and, on the other extreme, the
opinion which states that reality is being created by the cognitive sub-
ject in the process of cognition. As interpreted by dialectical material-
ism, cognition is a process in which there is a constant contradiction
between the subject and the object of cognition, that contradiction
being the source of the development of the cognitive process. We come
to know the real world in the course of practical activity, that is, when
we transform the real world which is the object of our cognition. Every
actual state of the real world is a stimulus which makes man undertake
cognitive activity and at the same time serves as the criterion of the
validity of the earlier acts of cognition. For historical cognition this
means that we acquire the knowledge of past events in the course of
constant transformations of the consecutive images of those events
(historiographic facts, see Chap. XI), yielded by the process of cog-
nition, because past events themselves cannot be transformed. We also
acquire knowledge of past events when we verify the guidelines based
on the study of the past and intended for tranformations of now ex-
isting conditions. H our activity, based on the knowledge of the past,
yields the expected results, then this points to the reliability of that
knowledge of ours; if it does not, then this fact is an additional stimulus
to undertake studies intended to modify (wholly or in part) the image

of the past obtained so far.
In this way the dialectical idea of overcoming contradictions as the
source of movement and development has made it possible, on its
ontological level, fully to change the model of explanation of history
as a result of the new interpretation of the past events, and thus to
explain the puzzle of development. On the epistemological level, it has
made possible the avoidance of errors of mechanistic inductionism and
a priori deductionism, thus paving the way for the integrated approach
that combines inductionism with deductionism. Dialectical reflection
has thus combined into a whole 'the contradictory requirements of
several types of methodological reflection on the past and on the meth-
ods of reconstructing the past; the merging of those various types of
reflection, each of 'them born of its own distinct philosophical tradition,
has yielded an entirely new type of reflection on historical research. Out
of the said philosophical traditions only some can directly be linked
with the origin of materialistic dialectic.
When referring to the sources of dialectical materialism, Engels in
his Anti-Dilhring pointed to the materialist and rationalist traditions of
the Age of Enlightenment; to the Utopian ideas of C. H. Saint-Simon
(1760-1825), Ch. Fourrier (1772-1837) and R. Owen (1771-1858), who
preached the kingdom of reason and eternal justice (interpreted differ-
ently and ahistorically by all of them), which could immediately be
turned into reality when comprehended; and to modern materialistic
thought. He also mentioned in this connection the dialectical trend in
philosophy, which originated in antiquity and was crowned by Hegel's
conceptions.23 In this conception the whole world of nature, history and
spirit was shown as a process, that is, as subject to incessant movement,
change, transformations and development,and an endeavour was made
to show the inner connection in that movement and development.
"From this standpoint the history of mankind (... ) appeared (...) as the
process of development of humanity itself. It now became the task of
thought to follow the gradual stages of this process through all its
devious ways, and to trace out the inner regularities running through
all its apparently fortuitous phenomena".24
There is still one problem left, which is of considerable importance
for the establishing of the methodological structure of historical re-
search, namely the problem of the interpretation of the process of

nature, on the one hand, and the process of history, on the other. The
standpoint on this issue affected opinions on history as a science which
either differs methodologically from natural science or reveals essential
similarities with the latter. Now dialectical materialism has also estab-
lished links between these two standpoints. The result is a uniform view
of development in both nature and society, which allows for the specific
traits of historical development and, on the other hand, does not imply
the fatalistic consequences of the opinion which sees in historical de-
velopment the working of "implacable" laws that resemble the laws of
nature.25
"But what is true of nature (...) is likewise true of the history of
society in all its branches (...) the history of the development of society
proves to be essentially different from that of nature. In nature - in so
far as we ignore man's reaction upon nature - there are only blind, un-
conscious agencies acting upon one another, out of whose interplay the
general law comes into operation. Nothing of all that happens - whether
in the innumerable apparent accidents observable upon the surface, or
in the ultimate results which confirm the regularity inherent in these
accidents - happens as a consciously desired aim. In the history of
society, on the contrary, the actors are all endowed with consciousness,
are I;llen acting with deliberation or passion, working towards definite
goals; nothing happens without a conscious purpose, without an in-
tended aim. But this distinction important as it is for historical in-
vestigation, particularly of single epochs and events, cannot alter the
fact that the course of history is governed by inner general laws".26
Since historical development, for all its peculiarities, is in principle
a natural process which in either case takes place in conformity with
the principles of dialectic, that is, since the history of society is in the
final analysis treated as the history of nature, the methods of studying
the history of society need not differ essentially from those of studying
nature. This substantiates in a new way the opinion that all sciences are
uniform from the methodological point of view. Marx wrote that "in
the future, natural science will absorb the science of man in the same
way as the science of man will absorb natural science: they will become
a single discipline".27
The principles of dialectic - the latter being understood as the theory
of the development of the real world and as the method of interpreting

that theory - were worked out above an by Marx and Engels,1S and
later developed by the most eminent representatives of Marxist thought:
V. Lenin,29 Y. Plekhanov, A. Labriola, A. Gramsci, and others.
Textbooks usually list several principles, features, or laws of dia-
lectic, but in most cases they simply enumerate them, without offering
amy endeavour to single out those which are the most important ones
and those which are subordinate to the former group. Yet the works
of the founders of dialectic explicitly authorize us to state - which also
follows from an analysis of Hegel's dialectic - that what is novel in the
theory and the method of dialectic is the solution of the problem of
movement and development. This means that the principle of auto-
dynamism (which says that movement and development take place
through contradictions) or the principle of development ought to be
brought to the fore. 3o The necessary condition of such an interpretation
of movement is, as we have said previously, the treatment of the real
world as a whole (a system) whose elements are linked with one another
and affect each other. This is thus the principle of holism. The closely
interconnected principles of autodynamism and holism, which state that
"the whole" moves and develops as a result of inner contradictions,
point to the fact that such "wholes" contain contradictory "parts"
(subsystems, elements) which reciprocally condition one another's ex-
istence. Their strife causes movement and development. This is termed
the principle of the unity of opposites. The principles of autodynamism
and holism yield directly 'another principle, too, namely that which
states that in the course of movement and development quantitative
changes result in qualitative ones, that is, in the birth of new qualities.
If we accept self-development, then we assume that phenomena are
born, take shape, and vanish, and thereby we assume that at a certain
moment a phenomenon which is taking shape attains a state in which
it is fully shaped and hence occurs as a new qUality. That new quality
may be the negation of a former quality, and the negation of this new
quality may somehow resemble that earlier quality.
These issues will be discussed again in the next part of the book.
when the characteristics of the subject matter of the study of the past
will be analysed. The same applies to those problems of historical
208 PATTERNS OF msroRlcAL RESEARCH
materialism which form the core of subsequent considerations of history

and the method of explaining it.
4. The rise of historical materialism
The method of materialistic dialectic, when applied to the study of

social history. gave rise to the theory and the method of historical
materialism.31 When referring to historical materialism as a theory we
mean by it the set of general statements on past events. statements
which explain movement and development in society. and when refer-
ring to historical materialism as a method we mean by it the set of
research guidelines which fOl'Rl a specified model of the explanation
of the past. The theory and the method of historical materialism just
as materialist dialectic were originated by K. Marx and F. Engels,"
whose theses were later developed mainly by V. Lenin38 and Y. Plekha-
nov. Moreover. many theses were also developed by K. Kautsky. A. La-
briola, H. Cunow. N. I3ukharin, L. Krzywicki. K. Kelles-Krauz,
A. Gramsci, G. Lukacs. L. Goldman," and others,as who. while on the
whole using the same concepts. have introduced many controversial
elements. The latter refer. among other things, to the defining of the.
place Of materialism in the system of sciences and in the Marxist
theory.as
The following schema shows the mutual relationships between dialec-
tic and historical materialism:
I Materialist dialectic
./ '\,
r-------------~ ~--------------------~
Materialist. dialectic Materialist dialectic
(theory of nature, (method of interpreting nature,
society and thought) society and thOUght)
'"
Historical materialism
./
I
./ '\,
~--------------~ r--------------~
Theory of Method of
historical materialism historical materialism
The founders of historical materialism were led to conclude that the

development of society is dialectical in nature when they had examined
the history of mankind. This is clearly stated in The Communist Mani-
festo, which summed up the formation stage of historical materialism.
The further stage is that of developing the ideas which explain history.
The theory of social development as the development which takes place
through the strife of contradictions has thus acquired a broad factual
basis and a set of general statements on the most varied issues in hu-
man history. Specific problems will be discussed later;37 for the time
being we point to the fundamental manifestations of contradictions
which are the source of autodynamism in history and which had been
indicated by the founders of Marxism. In order to avoid associations
with historical development interpreted as an "automatic" process,
that is, as taking place independently of human actions, we shall use
the term "Marxian activism" for the purpose of studying society.
With reference to the real world as a whole (i.e., nature and society)
we may, of course, retain the term "autodynamism", which indicates
that the whole system works "independently". The development of s0-
ciety through contradictions not only does not disregard, but explicitly
assumes the shaping of the image of the past by society itself. Of course,
such activity can take place only under specified natural conditions,
which are not constant, but - in accordance with dialectic - are in the
constant process of movement and development, the process which in
this case, too, takes place through the overcoming of contradictions.
The natural and the social wholes are, as Marx and Engels emphasized,
interconnected. Next to the sum of those contradictions which "set
nature in motion" and the sum of those contradictions which "set so-
ciety in motion" there must be a point of contact of these two sub-
systems. And it is in that point of contact that the founders of historical
materialism discovered the basic stimulus of development of the history
of mankind.
This is so because the main contradiction which conditions social
development is situated just on the border-line between nature and
society. It is the contradiction between man and nature, the solution of
which results in the development of the productive forces. s8
[ Nature 1~IMan I-I Development of the productive forces I

210 PATIERNS OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH
Note in this connection the following statement by Marx which ex-

plains the process of labour (i.e., that of man's activity): "Labour is,
in the first place, a process in which both man and Nature participate.
and in which man of his own accord starts. regulates and controls the
material reactions between himself and Nature. He opposes himself to
Nature as one of her own forces. setting in motion arms and legs, head
and hands, the natural forces of his body, in order to appropriate
Nature's productions in a form adapted to his own wants. By thus
acting on the external worM and changing it. he at the same time
changes his own nature. He develops his slumbering powers and com-
pels them to act in obedience to his sway".39 The contradiction between
man and nature is dynamic since the productive forces that emerge as
a result of that contradiction tend to develop constantly.
The second contradiction which conditions social development and
is closely linked with the first pertains to the relationship between the
productive forces and the relations of production. "In the social pro-
duction of their life, men enter into definite relations that are indispen-
sable and independent of their will, relations of production which cor-
respond to a definite stage of development of their material productive
forces".40 Now a contradiction arises between the forces of production,
which are more dynamic. and the relations of production, which are
more inert, since those social groups which have at their disposal both
property and power and thus determine the nature of production and,
consequently, social relations as well, are opposed to changes which
would be unfavourable to them. The overcoming of this contradiction
results in the development of relations of production (I) which, by ad-
justing themselves to the level attained by the forces of production,
change into new relations of production (II).
IProductive forces I;:::!I Relations of production (I) I- Relations of

production (II)
The contradiction between the productive forces and the relations of

production takes on various forms. In its most manifest form it is re-
vealed in olass struggle, i.e., in the conflict between groups of people

some of which are interested in changing existing relations of produc-
tion, that is, in paving the way for the development of new productive
forces, and the others strive to preserve the existing state of things.
The third fundamental contradiction in the macrosystem which is
society takes place between the relations of production and what is
termed the social superstructure, i.e., "the legal and political super-
structure to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness".41
Marx wrote that the state of institutions, opinions, and ideas as it ex-
ists in a given society, that is, generally, the state of human conscious-
ness, "must be explained ra~er from the contradictions of material life,
from the existing conflict between the social productive forces and the
relations of production" .42 While the relations of production are mark-
edly inert as compared with the forGes of production, the superstructure
(as a whole) in turn reveals this feature as compared with the relations
of production. Changes in the relations of production result in adap-
tive changes in the superstructure, because the old superstructure (1)
hinders transformations of the relations of production. Thus there is
conflict, at the superstructure level, between those elements which
serve the existing relations of production and those which are in favour
of changes. This results in the formation of a new superstructure (11),
which, however, retains many old elements.
1Relations of production 1;:::::1 Superstructure I I-I Superstructure III

These three contradictions may also be interpreted as the basic laws
of social development. This issue will be discussed later in this book.
The theory of historical materialism, by discovering the mechanism
of development, provides a specified model for the explanation of his-
tory. This model is dialectical (development-oriented), and hence
holistic-and-dynamic (or structural-and-genetic). This model indicates
the path to the solution of one of the most baffling problems in social
science, namely that of linking the study of structure with the study of
changes. It must, however, be emphasized, that all this is still largely
a methodological postulate. In practice, historical research still is either
structurally-oriented only, or genetically-oriented only, and little has
been done so far to oombine these two approaches into one. Since the
212 PATTERNS OF HISI'ORICAL RESEARCH
genetic approach is self-evident in the eyes of historians. it seems that

in order to link the study of structure with that of origin (genesis) it
is necessary to integrate historical research with sociological and other
(e.g., economic) researches, promoted by those social sciences which
are more theoretically oriented. The last-named disciplines can provide
conceptual categories which are indispensable for making the methodo-
logical approaches structure-oriented. It is, of course, assumed that the
dialectical model. i.e.. the model which indicates that explanations are
to be looked for in contradictions in the systems (structures) under
investigation. is taken as the point of departure, that is, as the heuristic
hypothesis. Where those contradictions are to be looked for in the
study of the past of mankind is indicated by the theory of historical
materialism.
Researches based on the dialectical model of explanation are winning
an ever greater recognition throughout the world. Beside historians in
the socialist countries considerable groups of historians in other coun-
tries. too. are in favour of the Marxist interpretation of history and the
dialectical method. The first to write a history after the pattern of dia-
lectical materialism were working olass leaders. of whom Lenin was
the most prominent. M. Pokrovsky was one of the first professional
historians to develop theoretical reflection on the past as inspired by
materialistic dialectic." After World War II there has been a marked
increase in this type of research, stimulated anew by the rejection of the
personality cult (associated with Joseph Stalin). which meant dogmatism
in social science.
The tentative reconstruction of the various types of methodological
reflection in historical research. as made above, shows that each one of
them was in favour of a specific form of historical science. Each of them
accordingly gave its own model of narration and explanation, usually
to be assessed as rational from the point of view of the requirements
set historiographers at a given period.
But regardIesss of the type of model. which for a given historian
means a specified set of rules for research procedures, rules which are
rational from the point of view of a given research goal, we may speak
about certain basic elements, steps or forms of such procedures. which
are characteristic of all reconstruction of the past. Thus. in every model
the results depend, apart from the sources, on the goal and no non-
DIALE~CAL REFLE~ON 213
source-based knowledge. The ideal situation would be such in which the

goal not only would be not in contradiction with the requirements of
scientific research, but would stimulate such research, and in which the
historian would have such non-source-based knowledge that it would
facilitate his research to a maximum degree.
If we assume that the goal of all scientific. and hence also historical
research is to acquire the knowledge of the real world in order to satisfy
man's age-old interest in the world around him, of which he is part,
and in order to modify that real world, then we may say, in most gen-
eral terms, that the degree in which that goal can be attained depends
on the source-based and non-source-based knowledge which the his-
torian has, and on his ability to make use of all that knowledge.
REFERENCES
1 H. Becker, H. E. Barnes, Social Thought from Lore to Science, ed. cit.,
vol. 1.
2 E. Adler, Herder i Oswiecenie niemieckie (Herder and the Age of Enlight-
enment in Germany), Warszawa 1965, p. 234.
a Cf. W. Tatarkiewicz, Historia filozofii (A History of Philosophy), vol. II,
Warszawa 1958, pp. 297--8. Many detailed analyses concerned with Hegel's phi"
losophy of history are to be found in studies by T. Kronski, Rozwazania wok61
Hegla (Reflections on Hegel), Warszawa 1960; and "Hegel i problemy filozofii
historii" (Hegel and Problems of the PhiloSQphy of History), Studia Filozoficz-
ne, No. 3/1958, pp. 42-76. See also J. Kudrna, Studie k Heglovi pojeti historie
(Studies on Hegel's Concept of History), Prague 1964.
4 A similar interpretation is to be found in Fichte's works.
5 Cf. G. W. F. Hegel, Wissenschaft der Logik, vol. I, Leipzig 1951, p. 58.
6 L. S. Rogowski, Logika kierunkowa a heglowska teza 0 sprzecznosci zmia-
ny (Directional Logic and Hegel's Thesis on Contradictions of Changes), Torufl
1964.
7 Ibid., p. 17.
8 Ibid., pp. 19-20.

9 Ibid., p. 20.
10 G. W. F. Hegel, Wissenschaft der Logik, p. 191.
11 A. Toynbee, A Study of History. Vols. I-ill appeared in 1934, vols. IV-V,

in 1939, vols. VII-X, in 1954, vol. XI, in 1955, and vol. XII, in 1961. The
number of works concerned with Toynbee's opus is immense, considerably ex-
ceeding 200 (Toynbee himself in his Reconsiderations quotes 210 items). The
major iteIns are listed below: Toynbee and History. Critical Essays and Reviews,
M. F. Ashley (ed.), Boston 1956 (includes statements by historians and methodo-
logists, among them P. Geyl, W. Kaufmann, P. A. Sorokin, W. H. Walsh,
H. Trevor-Roper, L. Walker, G. Barraclough, E. Barker); L'Histoire et ses in-

terpretations. Entretiens autour d'Arnold Toynbee sous la direction de Raymond
Aron, Paris-La Haye 1961 (proceedings of the conference organized by the
Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes; includes statements by M. Crubellier, R. Aron,
H. Marrou, L. Goldmann and otheT'S); E. F. J. Zahn, Toynbee und das Problem
der Geschichte, K6ln 1954; J. Ortega y Gasset, Eine Interpretation der Weltge-
schichte, Miinchen 1964. In Polish historiography, history was interpreted as
the development of conflicting civilizations by F. Koneczny (1862-1949); see
his 0 wielkosci cywilizacji (The Greatness of Civilizations), 1935.
12 Cf. M. Crubellier's paper in L'Histoire et ses interpretations, pp. 8 if. The
said conference revealed an inadequate comprehension of Toynbee's ideas. Even
L. Goldmann (ibid., pp. 76 if) claimed that Toynbee's conception is catastrophic,
like Spengler's.
13 Cf. A Study of History, vol. XII, pp. 5, 238, 245, 256; L'Histoire et ses in-
terpretations, ed. cit., p. 18 (in the last-quoted book Toynbee points to the
fallacy of Spengler's treatment of the various civilizations in isolation); "Can
We Know the Pattern of the Past? -A Debate" in: Theories of History, ed. cit.,
pp. 312 if.
14 Spengler says in The Decline of the West (quoted according to Theories
of History, ed. cit., p. 199): "The morphology of the organic, of history and
life and all that bears the sign of direction and destiny ( ...)".
15 It might be said that Toynbee took up Teggart's ideas at the point where
the latter had left them.
16 A. Toynbee, A Study of History, vol. XII, ed. cit., pp. 254-5.
17 Ibid., pp. 254-63.
18 Ibid., p. 268.
19 Ibid., pp. 256-7.
20 Ibid., p. 259. Toynbee's approach to the issue of laws is analysed by
W. Dray, "Toynbee's Search for Historical Laws", History and Theory, vol. I,
No. 1/1960, pp. 32-54.
21 F. Engels, Selected Works, V. II, p. 350 (English Edition, 1949).
22 K. Marx, Selected Works, vol. II, p. 365 (English Edition, 1949).
23 F. Engels, Anti-Diihring, Berlin 1948, pp. 17-32.

24 Ibid., p. 25.
25 The structure of the process of history and development in history are
discussed in detail elsewhere in the present book. In this place the stress is laid
on the principle of activism, which excludes a fatalistic interpretation of regu-
larities.
26 F. Engels, Selected Works, vol. II, pp. 353-354 (English Edition, 1949).
27 K. Marx, Kleine okonomische Schriften, Berlin 1955, p. 38.

1!8The pride of place goes to K. Marx and F. Engels, Die deutsche Ideologie
(1845-6); K. Marx, Misere de la Philosophie (1847); K. Marx, Postscript to the
2nd edition of Capital (1873); F. Engels Anti-Diihring (1878); F. Engels, Lud-
wig Feuerbach and the Outcome of Classical German Philosophy (1886); F. En-
DIALECITCAL REFLECITON 215
gels, Dialectics of Nature (1873-88). Marxist writing on the dialectical method

include W. Krajewski, Ontologia (Ontology), Warszawa 1965; M. Cornforth,
Dialectical Materialism, vol. I, London 1952. The dialectics of the process of
history (in nature and society) is analysed by B. A. Grushin, Ocerki logiki
istoriceskogo issledowania (An Outline of the Logic of Historical Research),
Moscow 1961, Note also J. P. Sartre, Critique de la raison dialectique, Paris
1960, which is concerned with society (social group) as a whole, approached
from the holistic point of view.
29 See in particular V. Lenin, "Filosofskie tetradi", Socinenya, Moscow 1958,
vol. 38
80 V. Lenin wrote explicitly that the essence of dialectics consists in the
comprehension of the contradictory elements of every phenomenon (cf. M. Corn-
forth, Dialectical Materialism, ed. cit., p. 84). The formulation of this principle
(which refers to conflicting tendencies) does not invalidate the logical principle
of contradiction: the fact that something develops in a certain way does not
imply a pair of contradictory statements (cf. K. Ajdukiewicz, "Zmiana i sprzecz-
nosc" (Change and Contradiction) in: J~zyk i poznanie (Language and Cogni-
tion), vol. II, Warszawa 1965, pp. 90-106.
81 The term historical materialism covers both the interpretation of history
and the method of its study.
82 The theory and the method of historical materialism were developed by
Marx and Engels in practically all their works. Among Marx's works note Zur
Kritik der Hegelschen Rechtsphilosophie (1844); Misere de la philosophie (1847);
Zur Kritik der politischen Oekonomie (1859); and those works which were prac-
tical applications of the principles of historical materialism to the study of
history: The 18th Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1851); The Civil War in France
(1871) and Capital (vol. I in 1867, vol. II and III published by Engels in 1885
and 1894, respectively), the latter being the fundamental opus of the Marxist
theory. Among Engels's works note Ludwig Feuerbach and the Outcome of
Classical German Philosophy (1886); Anti-Diihring (1878); Origin of the Fa-
mily, Private Property and the State; The Development of Socialism from Uto-
pia to Science; and The Peasant War in Germany, where the principles of his-
torical materialism are applied in practice. The works written jointly by Marx
and Engels include Die deutsche 1deologie (1845-6) and The Communist Mani-
festo (1847). Many formulations are also to be found in Marx's and Engels's
correspondence.
83 Among Lenin's works note The Development of Capitalism in Russia
(1899); The State and the Revolution (1917).
34 Y. Plekhanov, A Contribution to the Problem of the Development of the
Monistic Interpretation of History (1894); The Materialistic Interpretation of
History (1897); The Role of the Individual in History (1905); K. Kautsky, Die
materialistische GeschichtsaufJassung, Berlin 1927; A. Labriola's most important
work is Del materialismo storico (1896); H. Cunow, Die Marxsche Geschichts-,
Gesellschafts- und Staatstheorie (1923). N. Bukharin, The Theory of Historical
Materialism (1921). Polish contributions include many works by L. Krzywicki,

which include statements on the theory of social development, and K. Kelles-
Krauz, Materialism ekonomiczny (Economic Materialism), Krakow 1908.
A. Gramsci, various works; G. Lukacs, Geschichte und Klassenbewu/3tsein, Ber-
lin 1923 (many further editions). L. Goldman, Sciences humaines et philosophie,
Paris 1952.
35 Recent works concerned with an analysis and interpretation of the prin-
ciples of historical materialism include: K. V. Konstantinov, Istoriceskiy ma-

terialism, Moscow 1950. J. Hochfeld, Studia 0 marksistowskiej teorii spoleczen-
stwa (Studies in Marxist Social Theory), Warszawa 1963; O. Lange, Political
Economy, vol. I, Chap. II, Oxford 1963 (first published in Polish in 1959);
1. J. Wiatr, Szkice 0 materializmie historycznym i socjologii (Essays on Histo-
rical Materialism and Sociology), Warszawa 1962; A. Malewski, "Empiryczny
sens materializrnu historycznego" (The Empirical Meaning of Historical Ma-
terialism) Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1957, pp. 58-81; the applications of the
method of historical materialism in historical studies is analysed in: A. Ma-
lewski, J. Topolski, "Metoda materializrnu historycznego w pracach historykow
polskich" (The Method of Historical Materialism in Works of Polish Histo-
rians), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 6/1959. The integrating function of historical
materialism is indicated in: J. Topolski, "Integracyjny sens materializrnu histo-
rycznego" (The Integrating Meaning of Historical Materialism), Studia Meto-
dologiczne, No. 1/1965. See also O. Monter, "Die philosophischen Grundlagen
des historischen Materialismus", Saecu/um, 1960, pp. 1-26 and Poznan Studies
in the Philosophy of the Sciences and the Humanities, Amsterdam.
36 A penetrating analysis of this issue is to be found in J. Hochfeld, "Ma-
terializrn historyczny a socjologia" (Historical Materialism and Sociology), in-
cluded in Hochfeld's book quoted in footnote 35 above.
37 Moreover, the terminology to be used will be slightly different.
38 Cf. J. Topolski, "Aktywistyczna koncepcja procesu dziejowego" (The Ac-

tivistic Concept of the Process of History), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1972,
pp. 121-135. .
39 K. Marx, Capital, vol. I, Chicago 1915, pp. 197-198.
40 K. Marx, Selected Works, vol. I, p. 328 (English Edition, 1949).
41 Ibidem. "( ... ) worauf sich ein juristischer und politischer Ueberbau erhebt,
und welcher bestimmte gesellschaftliche BewuBtseinformen entsprechen".
42 Ibid., pp. 13-14. "( ... ) sondern muB vielmehr dies BewuBtsein aus den
Widerspriichen des materiellen Lebens, aus dem vorhandenen Konflikt zwischen

gesellschaftlichen Produktivkraften und Produktionsverhiiltnissen erklaren".
43 Characteristic of Pokrovsky's views is his work Istoriceskaya nauka i bor-
ba klasov (The Science of History and the Class Struggle), vols. I-II, Moscow
1933. See also S. M. Dubrovsky, "Akademik N. M. Pokrovsky i ego rol v raz-
viti sovetskoy nauki" (Academician N. M. Pokrovsky and His Role in the De-
velopment of Soviet Science), Voprosy IstorU, No. 3/1962, pp. 31-40 (including
a discussion).
PART THREE
THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY

X. HISTORICAL FACTS
1. Preliminary remarks
When a historian proceeds to study a selected fragment of the past he

has at his disposal, among other things, a specified general knowledge
of the process of history and a more detailed knowledge of the prob-
lems of the period and the region under investigation. That general
knowledge of his, whatever its standard may be and however it helps
him in his research, is one of the major elements of what is termed
a historian's non-source-based knowledge. Its structure and functions
will be investigated in greater detail in Part Four, when procedures in
historical research will be studied.
In Part Three attention will be focused on the range of that general
knowledge of the process of history which is indispensable for any
historian. That process is to be interpreted so as to cover both direction-
al changes and problems of structure, that is, to make use of the con-
cept of development, which is the synthesis of changes and structure
and is fundamental in all historical research. Further, the concept of
development is to be interpreted so as to dissociate it not only from
all conceptions which see in the past just chaos" and nothing else, but
also, and perhaps even more firmly, from many theories of a cyclical
course of events, evolution and progress that is independent of human
actions.
While bearing in mind the fact that the issue of development in the
course of events is focal in our enquiries, we shall carry out the anal-
ysis of the subject matter of historical research as it were on two
levels:
(1) the first level, more abstract one, will pertain to the concept of
historical fact, which, as it is usually assumed, is the primary element
of a historian's interest;
(2) the second level will be that of a direct approach to the basic
problems of the process of history and its mechanism.
220 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
Certain cybernetic concepts will be found useful in the analysis to be

carried out.
2. The controversy over the concept of historical fact
A none too clear concept of historical fact is encountered very often.

Those concerned usually realize the difficulties connected with the ex-
planation of the term, but they do not decide to replace it with any
other. A historical fact is treated as a component part of the process
of history, i.e., as an element of the subject matter of historical research.
The attainments to date in the analysis of the concept of historical
fact do not go beyond the sphere of certain traditional problems. On
the whole, they are confined to some general, sometimes contradictory,
classificatory proposals.1
A historical fact is interpreted in two ways in the literature of the
subject. Its ontological interpretation points to a historical fact as "an
object of historical research" which exists objectively, i.e., independ-
ently of the cognitive subject, as "an event in itself", as "that which
really was", etc. In this interpretation, history, which is the subject mat-
ter of historical research, is a specified set of facts, which a historian
reconstructs by "reflecting" them in his consciousness. The epistemo-
logical and methodological interpretation pertains just to that process of
reconstruction of the past, i.e., it refers to a historical fact as "a scien-
tific construction" or "an interpretation of an event" by a historian. To
distinguish it from a fact-event, its reconstruction made by a historian
(but not a historical statement, but rather "the stuff" of which such
a statement can be formed) came to be termed a historiographical fact.
In turn, the interpretation of the relationship between these two as-
pects of the comprehension of a historical fact is twofold. Sometimes
a historical fact is treated both as an ontological category and as an
epistemological one, i.e., so that a historiographical fact is taken to be
a more or less approximate reflection of a fact treated as an objective
subject lllatter of cognition. But, on the other hand, there is also
a strong trend to treat the concept of historical fact exclusively as
a scientific construction, i.e., to refer to a historiographical fact only,
without looking for its direct analogues in past events. The former ap-
proach is characteristic of the positivists, who were the first to intro-
HISTORICAL FACTS 221
duce the concept of historical fact to the methodology of history. The

latter is connected with the anti-positivistic structural reaction in re-
flection on historical knowledge, a reaction which stressed the active
role of the cognitive subject in the process of "creating" the past.
The positivist interpretation of historical fact is the most popular one
among historians; this is presumably so because at first glance it is the
closest to common sense. Now the past is supposed to consist of an
adequate number of facts - elements of the past - which a historian
simply reconstructs. Such a reconstruction should be in agreement with
those facts and that agreement is, in turn, the criterion of the verity of
the reconstruction.
The approach which sees in a historical fact merely a scientific con-
struction is sometimes criticized as a manifestation of subjectivism, i.e.,
a historian's tendency to "create" his own historical reality.2 Such a
criticism is correct only if the acceptance of a historical fact as a mere
scientific construction is linked with a denial of the existence of objec-
tive reality independent of the cognitive subject, because in such a case
we have to do in fact with a subjective construction of the past by
a researcher.
Yet it is possible to accept the existence of objective reality, inde-
pendent of the cognitive subject, and at the same time to hold that this
reality is not in the least a set of "ready-made" facts which only have
to be reflected in one's consciousness and thus reconstructed. It is
possible to suggest such an interpretation of the concept of historical
fact which would accept both the existence of objective historical reality
as an object of study and the creative cognitive function of a historian's
mind. Let this interpretation be termed dialectical. It assumes that
historical events are so complex and varied in their diversity and inter-
connections that construction of facts (based on simplifying assump-
tions) is an inevitable method of acquiring a simplified knowledge of
them (which can take on the form of models) so that we approach the
absolute truth through relative and approximate truths. This has nothing
to do with subjectivism. On the contrary, it is the opposite standpoint
which is a manifestation of a sui generis subjectivism in the interpre-
tation of historical facts as it makes us view a complex and not fully
known subject matter of research through the intermediary of a re-
construction of facts which coincide with that subject matter of research
222 THE OBJECITVE METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY
only in the opinion of the researcher. In the dialectical interpretation,

there is a constant confrontation of historical realities, the knowledge
of which steadily improves, with historical facts as they are constructed
by the researcher. This means that, on the strength of a growing or
changing store of data, we modify our constructions, which change
from less soundly substantiated or less concretized hypotheses into
better substantiated ones. A historical fact as interpreted by the posi-
tivists, i.e., as a fragment of the past, in the dialectical interpretation
loses its raison d'etre, because a historiogaphical fact is referred not to
a historical fact as its analogue or original pattern, but to all complex
reality which we endeavour to come to know - by resorting to pro-
cedures which are, perhaps, not the best ones - by construing facts. The
dialectical interpretation requires that if the concept of historical fact
as the subject matter of research is to be preserved in the process of
construction of historiographical facts, then that concept must be given
the appropriate meaning. This will be analysed below.
Diagrammatically the dialectical interpretation of the concept of his-
torical fact might be represented as follows:
Past events as
the subject matter ;::= Historical (Historiographical) fact
of historical research
The classification of historical facts raises controversies only when

it comes to their division into simple (unit, partial) facts and complex
ones (phenomenon, large-scale fact, fact as a process). Simple facts are
sometimes interpreted as natural (physical, biological) ones, which form
the natural content of a more or less complex historical fact, and some-.
times as those historical facts which are less complex when compared
with others. Only the classification into simple and complex facts seems
to be useful, provided that we bear in mind that it is relative. The
wounding of a soldier on a battlefield during World War II would ac-
cordingly be classed as a simple fact, whereas World War II as a whole
would, in this context, be a complex fact. Reference to natural facts as
simple elements of historical facts, into which the latter ones can be
"resolved", does not improve the classification from the historian's
point of view. What profit can he derive from the statement that such
a complex fact as the battle of Grunwald and Tannenberg between the

Poles and the Teutonic Knights in 1410 included a number of such
"simple" facts as various deformations of metal objects when swords
clashed with shields?
Thus the natural-science interpretation of simple facts does not seem
useful in historical research. Much more obvious classifications of facts
according to the spheres in which they belong do not require any closer
explanation: we mean the classification of facts into economic, political,
cultural and so on. It is self-evident that each such category .may give
rise to various discussions.
Controversies also arise when facts are to be classified according to
their importance. Differences of opinion focus on the issue whether all
facts in the past are "historical", i.e., whether everything that has hap-
pened belongs to history, or whether only those facts which are some-
how more "important" are historical. The standpoint that certain facts
in the past should be eliminated as non-historical is at variance with
the basic requirements of the objectivism of scientific research. A small-
est fact, which is in no way conspicuous, is part of a "more compre-
hensive" one, which certainly has historical importance in the eyes
of all.
We also have to point to the concept of source-based fact, which is
sometimes encountered in methodological analysis. The term means a
reflection of a historical fact in a historical source. This concept may
be adopted only on the strength of a convention, since in the case of
a historical source we do not have to do with a fact as such: a source
merely provides data about a historical fact which we construct using
also our non-source-based data. These relationships can be diagrammed
as follows:
I Non-source-based data
,j..
I
Past events Source- Reconstruction of past events
as the subject -. based -. through the intermediary of historical
matter of research data (historiogra,phicaI) facts
We thus come to the conclusion that a historical (historiographical)

fact is based on the use made by the historian of source-based and
224 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY
non-souree-based data when he engages in a scientific reconstruction

of the past. But such a reconstruction cannot, by definition. be the same
in the case of all historians, since historians differ from one another be
it alone by their non-source-based knowledge. Reconstructions are con-
cerned with past events. It may be said that the past consists of his-
torical facts. but only on the condition that those facts are properly
understood.
A historian thus reconstructs the past by constructing historical facts,
but he is, in a way, the "maker" of historical facts: by constructing
them he brings them to societal life. i.e.. to existence in the form of
a historical narrative that is accessible to society. Had it not been for
the work of the historian we would know nothing about the past ex-
cept for vague information derived from oral tradition. The past, even
though it had had its objective existence at one time. would remain un-
known. and in that sense it could not exist for us. Every historical
work, whether it reconstructs historical facts that had been unknown. or
sheds more. and different, light upon facts which are already known.
does not merely describe the past. but also "creates" it. The verb create
is written in quotation marks in order to indicate that this form of
creating has nothing to do with subjective idealistic conceptions of
cognition.
Finally, there is the issue of the relation between historical fact and
societal fact. The prevailing, positivist. interpretation of historical facts
is basically static, and hence in contradiction with the very nature of
the process of history and historical research. The concept of historical
fact is a concretization, as applied to history, of the concept of societal
fact, made popular above all by Durkheim's school and structuralist
(functional) sociology. Sociology is concerned with societal facts, and
history is likewise concerned with historical facts. But this statement
has not been followed by an analysis of the difference between the
structural (functional) approaches in sociology. and the necessity of
dynamic approaches in historical research.
What is the relation between societal facts and historical facts? At
any rate it is obvious that every historical fact, whether simple or
complex, is a societal fact. the more so if we realize that (see below)
only the past and the future exist. whereas the present is a conventional
concept. Hence it would be covered by the definition formulated by
S. Czarnowski and stating that a societal fact is a fact which "in its
origin, process, or outcome is conditioned by the existence of a human
community".3 Thus, for instance, the death of Napoleon I, like the
death of any other person, is a societal (and a historical) fact, because
we are concerned here not just with a biological fact of the death of
a human being, but with the death of a person who had a surname,
a first name, a profession or trade, etc., and thus was a member of
a given community. Every societal fact is also historical in the sense
that it is a product of development.
This kind of "historicity" is inherent in any societal fact. But a so-
cietal fact need not be historical, if it is examined only as an element of
social structure, without consideration of the development factor.
In conclusion it may be said that the concept of historical fact re-
quires the consideration of both its place in a structure and its role in
the process of change. This is more than a mere reference to space and
time, since the location in space and time alone is not tantamount to
movement and development.
3. The main characteristics of the dialectical interpretation of historical

fact. A fact as a system
In order to modify the earlier schema thus:
Historical fact Historical

Source-based
interpreted ---->
data ----> (historiographical)
dialectically fact
t J
i.e., to link the historical fact with the historiographical fact so as to
preserve the whole oomplexity of historical reality as a structural whole
which is in a state of constant movement and development, we have,
as had been said, to interpret facts dialectically. The static fact, as in-
terpreted in positivist theory, must be imbued with holistic and dynamic
meaning, Le., the meaning which integrates the different viewpoints.
Such an interpretation of historical fact is made possible by the set
of concepts provided by historical materialism, with the additional sup-
226 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
port of the concepts provided by cybernetics. We can single out the

following characteristics of the dialectical construction of historical
fact, as based on historical materialism: (1) holism and dynamism,
(2) relative nature of temporal and spatial determinants, (3) the material
nature of a given fact. These features will be discussed one by one, but
stress must be laid on their interconnections, since all of them are based
on the materialist dialectic.
Historical materialism may be described as a particular case of a
theory concerned with the development of certain structural wholes.
Human society, which goes from one development stage to another, is
such a structural whole analysed by the theory of historical materialism.
The importance of holism for integration processes, which make it
possible to link results of various researches, becomes evident if, for
contrast, we point to the principal characteristics of the opposite trend,
namely methodological atomism or individ'Ualis~ in social research.
Such individualism is represented mainly by some supporters of logi-
cal empiricism and analytical philosophy. They claim that to speak
about "wholes" which are something else than simple sums of their
respective elements is to engage in metaphysics, that is, to discuss
pseudo-problems. Accordingly, in the case of methodological individual-
ism no reference can be made to any laws applicable to "wholes" and
to any scientific predictions applicable to such wholes. In accordance
with methodological individualism, "the ultimate constituents of the
social world are individual people who act more or less appropriately
in the light of their dispositions and understanding of their Slituation.
Every complex social situation, institution or event is a result of a par-
ticular configuration of individuals, their dispositions, situations, beliefs,
and physical resources and environment".' In that theory, it is claimed
that wholes cannot be observed, but the fact is disregarded that such
wholes may be theoretical in nature, and hence "real", even though not
observable.
The adherents of holism and dynamism have recently found a vigor-
ous ally in cybernetics: the set of concepts used in this new discipline,
which has developed mainly as a manifestation of the need of broad
integrated approaches, works on the feedback principle, thus facilitating
the integration of science. But, while cybernetics can co-operate ex-
cellently with that holism which is characteristic of historical material-
msrORICAL FACfS 227
ism, it is a blow to both individualism and idealistic (metaphysical)

holism, most often taking the form of a teleological approach which as-
sumes that the wholes are governed by a non-material force (idea, God,
etc.).
The concept of a whole has, in cybernetics, its analogue in the con-
cept of a system, which means a set of interconnected working elements,
and in the concept of the structure of a system, i.e., the network of the
connections between the elements. In the cybernetic approach, the fact
that a system may include heterogeneous elements is not an obstacle.
and thus one of the principal objections raised by individualism against
holism is just disregarded.
As has been shown by O. Lange,5 and which-in the opinion of the
present writer - deserves to be quoted at least in general terms, cyber-
netic analysis offers a mathematical proof of the fact that neither the
functioning nor the properties of a given system can be inferred from
the functioning and properties of its elements alone. Thus, to find out
the functioning of a system it does not suffice to know the matrix
which shows the functioning of its elements (the transformation matrix
T), but it is also indispensable to know the matrix of the structure of
that system, i.e., the network of connections (couplings) between the
elements (the structure matrix S), because the functioning of the system
as a whole depends on that factor, too. Thus, if the joint vector of the
input states of the elements of a given system, consisting of the input
vectors of the various elements, be denoted by X, and the correspond-
ing vector of the output states, by Y, then as O. Lange shows, the
functioning of that system is shown by the formulas:
X' = TS(X).
Y' = ST(Y).
The introduction into the functioning of the system and its elements
of the time factor (termed the response time lag), and hence an analysis
of the development of that system in time, shows that the explanation
of the concept of development does not require any reference to im-
material forces or to any immanent teleological factor of development.
The cybernetic approach strictly defines the concept of dialectical con·
tradiction inherent in a given system (in the sense of the contradiction
among certain input and output states of certain elements) and provides
the explanation which states that such a contradiction is the source of

the movement and the spontaneous development of the system in ques-
tion. The mathematical law of movement of a system, with the con-
sideration of the time factor, takes on the form of vector equations
which determine relations between input and output states at a moment
I and the corresponding input and output states at later moments. In
the cas'e of a single process in time the equations are
Xt+t' = TS(Xt ),
Yt+t' = ST(Yt )·
where I stands for the initial moment, and I', for the response time lag.
If the process, whether discrete or continuous, is prolonged, the law
of movement of a given system with the consideration of the time factor
takes on a more complicated form, namely that of difference vector
equations of higher degrees, which illustrates the set of transformations,
or, in the case of prolonged continuous process, the form of integral
vector equations. The solutions, which show the process of the develop-
ment of a given system, are termed by Lange the law of the develop-
ment of that system. In the process of development the various wholes
combine into more complex systems which are qualitatively new as
compared with the earlier ones.
The concept of system, which is focal in cybernetics, might be com-
pared to that of historical fact when the latter is interpreted statically.
A historical fact, when interpreted dynamically, that is, a historical fact
in the proper sense of the term, would have its analogue in a system
which is in a process of transformation, i.e., goes from one state to
another. It is self-evident that the concept of dynamic system is a very
general one: a system may be comparatively small, or extremely large,
marked by the wealth and complexity of its elements. 6 Examples of
historical systems may be provided by a given socio-economic for-
mation or the Peloponesian War, by a given 18th century manufacture
or a given peasant farm.
Constant changes in the states of a system correspond to the process
of their development. The concept of development process is closely
linked to the very concept of dynamic system. When we point to the
process of the development of a system, we imply that we see· the
constant transformation of its states. A socio"economic formation may
be seen as a historical fact interpreted as a state and as a historical fact

interpreted as a process. Thus the concept of system makes it possible
to combine the static and the dynamic interpretation of a historical
fact. This reduces considerably the difficulty of grasping historical facts,
the difficulty which results from their constant change. It seems that the
interpretation of events in terms of a system is more fertile than that
made in terms of facts, unless a historical fact is interpretd as a system-
which is suggested in this book. It seems that the distinction between
the state of a system and the development of that system reflects the
distinction between facts interpreted as states and facts interpreted as
processes.
A system is not a homogeneous entity, and that property of it cor-
responds to historical facts interpreted as systems each with a very
complex structure. A system may be termed a set of interconnected
elements at work. Each element of a system is affected by other ele-
ments (the enviroilment of the system) and in tum affects that en-
vironment. The elements, influenced by the environment, take on
various specified states, termed input states. These states, in turn, in-
fluence the environment of a given element by what is termed output
states. 7 It is obvious that smaller systems function as elements of larger
systems. Thus, if something is called a system or an element, such a
term must be treated in relation to the point of reference. The clas-
sification into systems and elements might correspond to that into
simple and complex facts. It seems that if the concept of fact is made
to cover both a system and its elements, then that concept becomes
broad enough to cover "wholes" and their component parts, and also
the universe as the greatest macrosystem.
The concept of historical fact might be reserved for active elements
only, but that would be neither convenient nor appropriate. First of
all, because the classification into elements and systems is relative, since
a system may in a given case function as an element, and vice versa,
and, secondly, should we even try to single out elements, we would
fail to grasp all that with which history is concerned. We would inter-
pret it only individualistically, and not holistically. The laws of the
movement and development of "wholes", as is also shown by cyberne-
tics, are not deducible from observable elements as the sum of their
actions. A dynamic interpretation is possible only if we grasp a "whole"
by taking into account both the structure and the development of a

system. Thus, comparison of elements to facts would still leave facts at
the static level.
The mechanism of the development of systems shows that some ele-
ments or systems dominate others. Such a domination occurs when the
feedback effect of the other element is weak or nonexistent. When
watching the process of history we often find that some elements or
systems affect others more strongly than they are in tum affected by
them. Such stronger systems or elements are usually termed develop-
ment factors. In the interpretation suggested in this book, this applies
to historical facts as well. They may be analogues of at least some of
what are termed major (important) facts. Such factors are often treated
as something else than historical facts, but the arguments adduced
above do not substantiate such an interpretation.
To sum up, the present writer is in favour of a very broad interpreta-
tion of historical facts, so broad as to cover all of historical reality both
in its static and in its dynamic existence. In this way historical facts
would become the analogue of the subject matter of historical research
and. in the form of what are termed historiographical facts. a tentative
reconstruction of that subject matter. But, in tum, that subject matter
of historical research would not be just the sum of facts, as has often
been claimed, but an immensely complex and intricate macrosystem of
smaller systems and elements that incessantly change and develop in all
their complexity and innumerable interconnections, in accordance with
the laws of dialectic. Were any other interpretation adopted, the con-
cept of historical fact in methodology would lack arguments in its
favour.
4. Spatia-temporal determinants of historical facts
Regardless of how we interpret historical facts (positivisticalty, structur-

ally, dialectically), each fact has its spatio-temporal determinants which
assign to it space and time as its inseparable characteristics. Thus some
knowledge of the philosophical issues of space and time must be in-
cluded in a historian's body of knowledge.
With reference to time and space we shall concentrate attention on:
IDSTORICAL FACTS 231
the material and objective nature of time and space,s the direction of
time How,e and the temporal limits of a historical fact.
The principle that time and space are material and objective in char-
acter has, as is known, found a new support in the theory of relativity,
which is a dialectical transformation of the classical theory of time and
space. The statement that a time interval between any two events is
constant has been replaced by the statement that that interval is such
only in a given system: in the universe as a whole it is not absolute.
but relative. Events which seem to be simultaneous if observed from
a certain system, may prove non-simultaneous if observed from another
system. Spatial distance between events is relative, too. Distances both
in time and in space depend on the velocity of the motion of the bodies
concerned.
In addition to the statement that time and space depend on the veloc-
ity with which physical bodies move the theory of relativity points to
an interdependence between time interval and spatial distance. This is
reflected in the concept of a (four-dimensional) space-time in which
time has one dimension, and space, three, i.e., such in which the dis-
tinctive characteristics of time and space are preserved. Next to the
different number of dimensions, space is isotropic, and time is aniso-
tropic (it flows in a specific direction). The linking, in the theory of
relativity, of time and space with material bodies, without which neither
time nor space could exist, and the pointing to the interconnection
between time and space give a dialectical substantiation of the objec-
tive nature of these categories. Time and space exist objectively, but
only together with material objects (events); they are thus both material
and objective (with respect to the cognitive subject) in nature. A differ-
ent interpretation of the objective nature of time and space was given,
e.g., by I. Newton, who held that time exist objectively, but independ-
ently of events; his view was criticized already by G. W. Leibniz. The
theory of relativity has thus confirmed the materialistic conviction that
time and space are attributes of matter. It must, however, be borne in
mind that in historical research, which is concerned only with one
system (our globe, possibly with its "nearest environment") we use in
practice the absolute categories of time and space, which are character-
istic of classical mechanics, valid in the environment we know from
everyday experience.
But we may also speak about the relativity of time and space as
applied to the study of the past in a quite different sense. In that inter-
pretation the velocity with which time moves and the dimensions of
space depend on the criterion by which the duration of a given process
and the spatial distance between given events are assessed. In such
a case that criterion is based on the historian's non-source-based know-
ledge, which forms his criteria of valuation. In the light of these criteria
it may turn out that in some periods timelO flows "more quickly", and
in others, more slowly, because in some periods the changes which take
place in the direction valued positively by that historian are quite rapid,
whereas in other periods no such changes are clearly visible. On the
whole, historians agree as to the cumulation of changes in certain
periods, since they all agree that time (be it termed historical time)
flows more quickly during revolutions, wars, etc., when every hour may
bring new systems. It may be said generally that the acceleration of the
flow of historical time is felt with reference to those time intervals in
which small quantitative changes are transformed into qualitatively
new systems. This applies above all to such systems which clearly mod-
ify the previous conditions of social existence. In such periods the flow
of historical time is being felt almost in the literal sense of the word.
The linking of historical time with the rhythm of development, the
latter taking place as a result of clashing contradictions, implies the
feeling of a non-uniform rate of time flow, which in the image of the
past seems to pulsate together with events. That pulsation is even re-
flected in the outward form of narration: compare the number of pages
assigned in text-books of history to the French Revolution or the Octo-
ber Revolution (if the author of a given textbook knows how to ap-
preciate their role in the past) with the number of pages assigned to
quiet times, and then compare the results with the actual duration of
both periods. The problem of historical time from the point of view of
the study of the structure of social consciousness has a comprehensive
literature of the subject, mainly sociological in approach,l1 but histor-
ians, too, have studied the sense of time flow in different periods and
in different social groupS.12 These issues are largely associated with the
shaping of social ideas about the direction of time flow, but their study
is rather in the field of the history of historical consciousness than in
that of the methodology of history.
IDsrORICAL FACTS 233
Nor is the sense of space a simple analogue of its objective dimen-

sions. The historian must be perfectly conscious ofJhe fact that the role
of distance between events has varied from period to period and from
territory to territory. W. Kula is right in stating that "If we are to
understand the spatial aspect of changin~, past and present, relation-
ships between human individuals and groups, we cannot rest satisfied
with computing the distance in kilometers from present-day maps. The
task is much more complex".18 Advances in communications and trans-
port have resulted in a relative shortening of distances, which in a way
has made space shrink. If, for instance, we speak about merchants
who used to visit Champagne fairs in mediaeval France, we must
bear in mind that some of them would have to carry their goods to
the fair for a number of weeks. A visit to a town a few dozen miles
away was tantamount to an expedition, and sending news to a person
was a problem, even though some postal systems emerged in modem
times.
The shortening of distances meant the feeling that time was flowing
more quickly. Easier contacts between people increased the intensity
of societal life, and hence contributed to a cumulation of changes. To
sum up, to modern man time flows more quickly, and space is "small-
er" (for all his achievements in the exploration of the globe) than for
his ancestors, who usually had a shorter life span, but their pace of life
was slower. It must also be borne in mind that even maps as such (e.g.•
if they differ in scales) may suggest different ideas about the spatial
distribution of objects and events: a small-scale map may suggest a
greater concentration of events than it is in fact.
In general terms, historical facts interpreted as analogues of past
events refer to the past. The concept of the past assumes our belief that
time flows in one direction only, the past always being restricted to
a given person. For a man who lived in the 18th century World War I
did not exist in the past. For a man born. say, in 1905 it belonged at
first to the future. later to become for him an element of the past. Thus
every person has his location in time. In the case of scientific predic-
tions the historian crosses the point that separates the past from the
future and becomes concerned with the latter. The concept of the
present is equally relative. The present has no point of its own on the
time axis, unless we treat it as a point of no dimensions or define it by
a convention which may be that, for instance, the last year or the last
five or ten years be treated as the present. This shows that such a con-
vention may be quite arbitrary. It also assumes that the division into
the past and the future is conventional, too (that convention being
adopted not for a single person, but for a given social group which
adopts it).
As far as the historian's non-source-based knowledge is concerned
his acquaintance with the arguments in favour of a directed time flow
is not indifferent, since the issue is associated with that of reversibility
or irreversibility of historical processes. The feeling that time flows in
one direction only is one of the most fundamental in man, but it jg
based only on his limited experience confined to the common-sense ap-
proach. It turns out, however, that we are today not in a position to
give an unambiguous answer to the question whether time forms a
closed or an open continuum.
I. Szumilewicz classified the theories of a directed time flow into
three groups: causal theories, theories referring to entropy, and theories
based on specified cosmological models.14 She says that the first group
theories. based on the principle of causality (which assumes that the
cause is earlier than the effect) do not suffice to decide what is the
direction of time flow; they merely make it possible to define the rela-
tion of "lying between", which orders the set of events symmetrically,
without any direction. Present-day causal theories of time flow have
their main representatives in H. Weyl and H. Reichenbach (in their
earlier periods of activity). They claim that the division into the past
and the future is conditioned by the objective properties of the world,
whose structure is causal. The theories based on entropy start from the
assumption that entropy in systems tends to increase (which is stated by
the second principle of thermodynamics): this means a tendency to
a scattering of energy in systems, and hence also in the universe. In
physics, the concept of entropy is used in describing (measuring) that
scattering of energy. In the last analysis we have to do with the pro-
oess of the scattering of thermal energy, a process which is irreversible.
But the development of natural science has drawn attention to pro-
cesses which are not based on entropy. At the present level of analyses
it seems justified to adopt the division into the past and the future on
the assumption of the concept of a "local" direction of time. which
suffices to study the history of mankind. The theories based on cosmo-

logical models will be disregarded here since that would take us into
a mesh of extremely controversial opinions.ls
The spatio-temporal determinants of a given historical fact may be
defined with a varying degree of precision. Advances in the measure-
ment of time and space (cf. Chaps. N and V) have made it possible to
define such determinants with fair accuracy. These issues are in the
sphere of chronology (measurement of time) and historical geography
and metrology (measurement of space) as auxiliary historical disci-
plines, with which we are not much concerned here.
It is not easy to define the chronological limits (the beginning and
the end) of a historical fact, i.e., to refer that fact to its temporal deter-
minant. This is so because we treat a fact (except for what are termed
simple facts) as a system which is undergoing incessant transforma-
tions. When then does a fact end, and another, which may eventually
be the result of the former, begin?16 This depends on how we construct
the historiographical fact which is a simplification of an unknown his-
torical fact (system), i.e., on how we draw those limits ourselves. We
can only call attention to the fact that the demarcation of such limits
is facilitated by our reading in the past of the process of transition from
small quantitative changes to new qualities. The concept of a new
quality is, of course, relative. A fact may be a new quality with respect
to some "lesser" facts, but may in turn be a manifestation of a quanti-
tative change when seen from the point of view of "major" qualities. 17
For instance, the Battle of Stalingrad in 1942-3 was a new quality as
compared with its various stages, but if referred to the history of
World War II it was one of its most important changes, quantitative in
nature but resUlting ultimately in the victory over Nazism.
There are facts whose chronological limits are very easy to define.
They cover, for instance, the period of the reign of a given ruler, which
is usually demarcated by the date of his taking power and the date of
his death or being deprived of power. But, on the other hand, we can-
not say with precision when capitalism began in Europe or when the
Age of Enlightenment ended. In practice the historian refers to three
kinds of time: short (measured with a clock), medium (measured with
a calendar), and long (measured in terms of years).18
The treatment of time and space as attributes of matter implies the
acceptance of historical facts as something material in nature. A his-

torical fact is a particle of the universe. The treatment of the universe
as something material, which is the fundamental principle of dialectical
materialism, also implies the acceptance of historical facts as something
material. In this connection it is essential to realize what the very con-
cept of matter means. When we analyse the concept of matter, espe-
cially as found in the works of Engels and Lenin, we can conclude that
matter has an objective existence which is in specified relationships to
the cognitive subjects, and that it has specified ontological properties
which enable us to conclude that its existence is physical in character.
When we reflect on matter as having a physical existence we usually
point to the fact that its properties are intersubjectively given in sense
data and that the physical existence of matter applies to its spatio-tem-
poral and dynamic features, and that the various fragments of matter
interact on one another. That dynamic nature of matter, and hence of
the universe, determines the historian's approach to the concept of
historical fact, the latter being understood as a dynamic and holistic
system which is in the process of incessant changes. In this interpreta-
tion, the holistic nature of systems is emphasized more than that is
usually being done in the Marxist literature of the subject.
The dynamic nature of matter, and hence also of historical facts,
which has been discussed in greater detail earlier, makes it difficult to
state their identity in the various stages of their respective transforma-
tions, i.e.• in moments t l , t 2 , ... , tn. The problem arises, up to which
transformation stage we still have to do with the same fact, and from
when on with a new one, i.e., whether a fact ends, e.g., at t12 or at t35
or at some other moment. The genetic relationship speaks in favour of
the identity of a given fact a in moments t l , t 2 , ... , tn' whereas the
differences in the characteristics of that fact in the various stages of
the process of transformations speak against such an identity. It may
be said in general that a fact a remains practically (i.e., for the purpose
of historical research) a fact a as long as it preserves a set of properties
without which it cannot exist as fact a from the point of view of the
problem under consideration. For instance, feudalism as a socio-econo-
mic system (fact a) exists as long as it preserves its fundamental pro-
perties (the ownership of land by the nobility or gentry and the serfdom
of peasants). As soon as transformations markedly disrupt these two
IDSTORICAL FACTS 237
characteristics, feudalism ceases to exist as feudalism and becomes

transformed. e.g .• into capitalism: fact a (a given socia-economic sys-
tem) has been transformed into fact b. In such a case we may no longer
speak about identity, despite the genetic relationship between the two.
In most general terms, the treatment in historical research of a chang-
ing historical fact as a single entity is a necessary simplification. The
historian's task is not to transgress the limits of such a simplification.
limits which are indicated by the essential characteristics of a given
fact, adopted for the purpose of the research in question.
REFERENCES
1 Cf. W. Kula, Rozwaiania 0 historii (Reflections on History), Warszawa
1958, pp. 61 ff.; K. Budzyk. "Fakt historyczny, prawa rzl!dZllce historil!" (His-
torical Facts, Laws Governing History), Przeglqd Humanistyczny, No. 5/1958;
J. Dutkiewicz, "Fakt historyczny" (Historical Facts), Sprawozdania 1.6dzkiego
Towarzystwa Naukowego, vol. XIV, No. 5/1959, pp. 1-6; G. Labuda, "0 meto-
dyce ksztalcenia mlodych historyk6w" (The Methods of Training Young His-
torians), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 3/1960, p. 766; C. Bobiflska, Historyk.
Fakt. Metoda (The Historian. The Fact. The Method), Warszawa 1964, pp. 21 ff.
2 Criticism in this sense has been advanced by C. Bobiflska, op. cit., pp. 21 ff.
3 S. Czarnowski, "Definicje i klasyfikacja fakt6w spolecznych" (Definitions
and Classifications of Social Facts), Dziela (Collected Works), vol. II, Warszawa
1956, p. 227.
4 J. N. Watkins, "Historical Explanation in the Social Science", in: Theories
of History, ed. cit., p. 505.

5 O. Lange, Wholes and Parts, Oxford-Warszawa 1965, in particular pp. 1, 2,
17, 27, 29-32. The analysis given here is based on that work.
S W. Ross Ashby, An Introduction to Cybernetics, London 1958, p. 62. Con-
cerning social system see also F. Znaniecki, Wst(!P do socjologii (Introduction
to Sociology), Poznan 1922, pp. 346 ff.
7 O. Lange, op. cit., p. 4.
8 Cf. Z. Augustynek, "Czas i przestrzen a materia" (Time and Space Versus
Matter) in: Jednose materialna swiata (The Material Unity of the World), War-
szawa 1961, pp. 205-54.
9 Cf. 1. Szumilewicz, 0 kierunk~ upiywu czasu (The Direction of Time
Flow), Warszawa 1964. See also Z. Zawirski, "Rozw6j poj~cia czasu" (The
Evolution of the Concept of Time), Kwartalnik Filozoficzny, vol. 12, 1936, and
H. Reichenbach, Philosophie der Raum-Zeit-Lehre, Berlin-Leipzig 1928, and,
by the same author, The Direction of Time, Berkeley 1956. The last-named
book marks the greatest achievement of present-day philosophy on the issue of
time.
10 A distinction is to be made between the various meanings of the term
238 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF IllSTORY
time. K. Ajdukiewicz singles out four such meanings: (a) time as a moment,
a point event; (b) period of time (e.g., the period of the rule of Charlemagne);
(c) duration, i.e., the length of a period of time (different periods of time can
have the same duration); (d) the all-embracing period of time, the limitless time
axis. All these concepts can be found in historical narratives.
11 This point has been stressed in particular by cultural anthropologists.
12 Cf. J. Le Goff, "Temps de l'eglise et temps du marchand", Annales E.s.C.,
No. 3/1960. See also G. Beaujouan, "Le temps historique", in: L'Histoire et ses
methodes, Paris 1963, pp. 52-67, where he stresses the non-homogeneity of his-
torical time.
18 W. Kula, Problemy i metody historii gospodarczej (problems and Methods
in Economic History), Warszawa 1963, p. 61.
14 Cf. I. Szumilewicz, op. cit. (footnote 9 above), p. 9.
15 Ibid., pp. 101 if.
U This difficulty has been pointed to by W. Kula in his Rozwazania 0 hi-
storii (Reflections on History), ed. cit., p. 64.
17 The present writer discussed that issue in greater detail in Historia Gospo-
darcza Polski (Poland's Economic History), 8th Congress of Polish Historians,
Warszawa 1960, pp. 73-5.
18 A similar classification is to be found in A. Cordolani, "Comput, Chrono-
logie, Calendrier", in: L'Histoire et ses methodes, ed. cit., pp. 37-52.
XI. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (CAUSALITY
AND DETERMINISM)
1. The principle of causality as the basis of the statement on the re-

gularity of historical facts.
The treatment of matter as a dynamic entity and the resulting similar

treatment of historical facts results in the acceptance of the principle of
causality, which states that every change in nature and society is a result
of the working of specified causes.1 The principle of causality is in turn
the basis of the statement on the regular (nomological) character of the
world. The latter statement means that there are no facts that would be
non-conditioned. In a more radical formulation, that conditioning is
linked with the assumption of regularities (statements on such regu-
larities being termed laws - see Chap. XII below), which govern changes
in nature and society. A less radical formulation is confined to the
acceptance of a causal conditioning. The latter, less radical, statement
results in practice (as can be seen in many philosophies of history) in
a denial of regularity of facts. The statement that facts are governed
by regularities does, however, have a strong substantiation in results
of scientific research. What is meant here is that results of research can
in fact be interpreted in terms of regularities. This enables us to draw
conclusions about regularities governing the subject matter of research.
and hence governing historical facts as well. This does not mean, how-
ever, that the assumption of regularities in the gnosiological sense
means for all researchers the acceptance of all resulting ontological
conclusions.
The necessary step now is a tentative explanation of such terms as
change, development, conditioning (dependence) and cause (factor).
which are of utmost importance for the historian. To formulate precise-
ly the meaning of the term change we first introduce the concept of
difference between facts which combine to form the image of the
actual conditions at a given period (at time i). The concept of difference
between social situations (historical facts) is static and refers to record-

ing the differences between given societies (historical facts) as observed
at a given time i. If such facts (societies) be denoted by a, b, c, ... ,
then the different conditions prevailing at time i may be denoted by
{al' bl' CI , ••• }.
In the early period of reflection on social facts attention was paid above
all to differences between actual conditions of the various societies, etc.
Hence the ancient tentative explanations of such differences by the
climatic factor (cf. Plato, Aristotle). The differences between the condi-
tions of the various societies proved the most striking of all.
The concept of change implies additionally that of direction: when
changes are being watched, we are concerned with successive observa-
tions of the same historical facts at successive moments. This can be
written down as vectors which in an expanded form yield a matrix of
changes, to be denoted by Z:
a1, 01' c1• •••
a2 , b z, c2 • •••
Z= a3 • b 3 , c3 • •••
But the mere recording of a change does not in any way explain the
transition from a 10 b10 C 10 ••• , to a 2, b 2 , C2 , ••• , i.e., the mechanism of
transformation.
The description of changes plus the indication of their mechanism
form, as has been said earlier, a description of development. When ten-
tative explanations of development are made, the first step consists in
the assumption that the elements of a given developing system condi-
tion one another. Such a conditioning implies some form of linking of
one element to another and is, presumably, an analogue of the cyber-
netic concept of coupling. The knowledge of the network of such cou-
plings (i.e., the knowledge of the structure of the systhem in question)
makes it possible to find out the functioning of that system, and hence
its movement and development. The knowledge of the functioning of
its elements alone does not suffice for that purpose.! The conditioning
may apply to two elements or two systems only, and then the know-
ledge of that conditioning suffices to describe the functioning of one
THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 241
element, but does not suffice to describe the movement and develop-
ment of the whole system. The concept of conditioning, which corre-
sponds to that of coupling, is, obviously, not identical with that of the
network of couplings, even though it is its essential component part.
The process of the development of a system may be interpreted, after
O. Lange, as a product of the transformations matrix (the mode of the
£unctioning of elements) and the structure matrix (the network of
couplings between elements). This will be written down by joining to
the matrix of changes an appropriate rule which after O. Lange will
be termed the transformation operator:
TXZ."
In cybernetics, several basic types of couplings are singled out, which
we may take as an example of the classification of conditionings of
different types. They include: serial couplings (direct and indirect), feed-
back couplings (negative and positive), which may be direct or indirect,
and parallel couplings.3 In the case of serial couplings the relationship
between the two systems involved is in one direction only. In the case
of feedback couplings (or simply: feedback) there is not only a serial
coupling of a system a with a system b, but also vice versa. A direct
feedback can be diagrammed thus:
A feedback can thus be broken up into at least two serial couplings

such that each links some systems or their elements in one direction
only:
A feedback coupling of certain elements may also denote a parallel

coupling, to be discussed below. Serial couplings illustrate the situation
in which at least one output of a system (element) a is at the same
time an input of a system (element) b. The linking of a and b here
means an action of a upon b and assumes a transition from a to b,
and hence a flow of time. Serial couplings are that type of conditionings
among which we have to look for the causal nexus, i.e., for those inter-
actions between facts which are in agreement with the direction of time
242 THE OBJECI'IVE METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
flow. The conditionalists' have tried to identify conditions with causes.

thus postulating the elimination of the concept of cause from the lan-
guage of science; this followed from their claim that all conditions of
the occurrence of an event are equally important. But we have to make
a distinction between a conditioning and a causal nexus, and that not
only in historical research. The concept of condition is broader than
that of cause. and hence not every working of a 'fragment of the mate-
rial universe upon another fragment (one historical fact upon another)
may be termed a causal nexus.' The concept of cause, both principal
and additional (which in its broader sense covers the concept of regular-
ity [see Chap. XIII below)), must be reserved for those conditionings
(couplings) which are the most essential for the occurrence of a later
fact (effect), even though there are degrees of such essentiality. It is the
task, and also attraction, of research to look for such essential con-
ditionings. The methods of finding them will be discussed in Part Five
of the book.
This concept of cause agrees on the whole with the procedures used
in practice by historians who are most interested in finding out what
are called principal, essential, etc., causes. The effectiveness of such
a search and of the beliefs of the various historians who are ready to
swear that it is they who have discovered the real cause of a given fact,
is a different story. Among the antecedants of specified facts (effects)
M. Bloch singled out the most general and the most constant ones
(such as the gravitation law which determines the trajectories of mis-
siles in a battle - which may be taken into account when the causes of
the victory of one side are investigated). and next, conditions and
causes. "More detailed antecedents, but still endowed with some dur-
ability, form that which is usually termed conditions. It is only the most
specific condition, which in the set of generative forces as it were rep-
resents the differentiating factors, that is usually termed the cause. It
is said, for instance, that in the time of Law inflation was the cause of
the general rise in prices. The existence of the French economic milieu,
homogeneous and at that time quite consolidated, was merely a con-
dition: it facilitated the circulation of money, which process, by dis-
tributing banknotes everywhere, made the rise possible, preceded it and
survived it".8 Thus the historian as it were cuts the cause out of the
mesh of conditions working on the serial coupling principle.
Parallel conditionings or couplings, singled out next to serial condi-

tionings or couplings, among which we may look for causes, usually
are (or at least some of them are), together with feedback couplings,
analogues of those simultaneous relationships which we may term
structural or morphological. Those relationships reflect the stmcture of
the world. They do not point to causal C20nditionings, but merely bring
out the fact that specified elements or systems cannot exist alone, but
only on the condition of co-occurrence of other elements or systems.
For instance, the existence in the capitalist system of the working class
is not a cause of the simultaneous existence of the class of capitalists,
or vice versa, even though neither class can exist alone.
A parallel coupling (of two elements) is shown by the following
(simplified) schema:
As can be seen, the co-occurrence of a and b in this type of coupling

is due to (or affected by) an additional factor p. In the cybernetic ter-
minology the schema shown above is that of a replicating system. It
can easily be noted that we have here to do with serial couplings, but
occurring simultaneously between p and a and between p and b. It
follows therefrom that there is a causal conditioning between p and a
and between p and h. The parallel coupling is only between a and b.
In other words, the occurrence of a given stmcture of that fragment of
the universe which is being investigated is evoked by specified causes.
The co-occurrence of the labour class and the class of capitalists, for
instance, has its cause in those factors which have brought about the
rise of capitalism. The occurrence of a parallel coupling between a and
b does not preclude a simultaneous feedback coupling between them:
there is, for instance, such a feedback coupling between the labour class
and the class of ca?italists, and it is manifested, e.g., in class stmggIe.
Not all parallel couplings are structural conditionings. Here again it is
the historian's (or perhaps rather the sociologist's) task to find, in the
mass of trivial parallel couplings, those couplings which are of funda-
mental importance; he must do that in order to be able to classify them
properly, and thereby properly to stmcture the historical facts he is
concerned with. The pointing to the system p brings out tht; ultimate
unity of serial and parallel couplings, that is, their unity as examined
from the directional and structural point of view. This is an important
research directive which, as we have shown, has been fully taken into
account only in the dialectical model of historical research. The said
unity of couplings implies, however, that serial conditionings are the
primary ones, and among these the strongest of them, that is, the causal
ones, must be given priority. This seems to substantiate the earlier state-
ment that the principle of causality underlies the statement that the
universe is governed by regularities.
Feedback couplings, emphasized in cybernetics, prove very useful in
historical research, since they enable historians more fully to interpret
facts. The said concept brings out the active character of all elements
of a given system and thus eliminates the inclination to interpret the
effect as something passive. Here is an example. The money rent, which
in the 18th century began to replace the peasants' duties reSUlting from
their status of serfs, makes us ask the question about the causes of that
interesting fact. One of the causes usually advanced in this connection
is the development of economy based on money and marketable pro-
duction. But, in turn, when the development of that kind of economy
in the 18th century is explained, we refer to the fact that in the rural
areas money rent began to replace prestations resulting from the serf-
dom of peasants. It seems that the problem can be explained by the
consideration of the parallel couplings which shows that we have to
look for a common cause which accounted for the co-occurren~ of the
growing economy based on money and marketable production and the
growing importance of money rent, and also for a feedback between the
growth of rents and the said type of economy. This is visualized by
--
the following schema:
Growth of economy Growth of importance

based on money and of money rent in
marketable production rural areas
Causes of growth
both of economy
based on money
~
f----
and marketable
production and
of money rent
While pointing to the role of the feedbacks we emphasize again that

causal conditionings are the principal manifestation of relationships in
nature and society. The principle of causality proves to be an integral
part of the dynamic interpretation of matter. It must be borne in mind
that even random events have their causes and are manifestations of
the regularities that govern facts. This is so because a random event is
a relative concept: it is a random event only when referred to a given
fact, and when referred to other facts it may prove to be a normal mani-
festation of a regularity. This issue will be discussed later.
2. Determinism and indeterminism in history

The problem of determinism, i.e., the problem of the principle which
states that all fragments of the universe have their conditioning. is close-
ly linked with the principle of causality as the foundation of the state-
ment that facts (whether natural or societal) are governed by regulari-
ties. The principle of causality is the essence or the main manifestation
of determinism. It may be said, however, that determinism implies more
than causality does, because next to causality itself it also assumes the
existence of regularities which determine the functioning of causes. It
is thus a concept which links the problem of causes with that of laws,
that is, causality with the nomothetic interpretation.
The statement, formulated at the beginning of this chapter, that con-
ditionings imply the acceptance of causality and the existence of re-
gularities is deterministic. The statement confined to the acceptance of
causal conditionings is causalistic. In this case we have to do with onto-
logical determinism and ontological causalism.
But the question arises, whether causalism which does not accept re-
gularities always implies indeterminism, and. in general, where is the
demarcation line between determinism and indeterminism. This requires
certain preliminary explanations, with which we shall n:ow begin our
analysis. Next we shall proceed to examine one by one the particular
problems of determinism in history: random events in the past, the role
of the individual, free will, fatalism, and teleological approach. as com-
bined with what is called determinism in the explanation of the past
events. Only all those analyses will enable us to formulate in outline
our standpoint on the issue of determinism in history.
K. Ajdukiewicz distinguished between ambiguous determinism and

non-ambiguous determinism. 7 In a current-language formulation, we
have to do with ambiguous determinism when for every case of a spe-
cified behaviour of an object x (Le., an event x) we always have one or
more events y whose occurrence is always accompanied by an occur-
rence of x, but so that in the different cases of the occurrence of x there
may be different events y. The principle of non-ambiguous determinism
requires that the events y depend on x only and do not vary regardless
of the different forms of the occurrence of x. 8 It seems that this dis-
tinction plus the assumption that a determinist assumes that all events
are governed by some regularities or by fairly constant causal condition-
ings (interpreted as non-ambiguous or statistical) enable us to point to
a further difference between ambiguous and non-ambiguous determin-
ism: thus, non-ambiguous determinism assumes the existence of non-am-
biguous regularities which preclude statistical (probabilistic9) regularities.
whereas ambiguous determinism does not preclude the latter group of
regularities.
The problem arises whether we could also speak about ambiguous
and non-ambiguous causalism. The answer seems to be in the affirm-
ative. And if the differences in the interpretations of determinism have
been linked with the types of regularities assumed, then the differentia-
tion of causalism must be linked with the types of specified causal ac-
tion, which may be non-ambiguous or ambiguous. In this sense, ambi-
guous determinism is reinforced when combined with non-ambiguous
causalism. Non-ambiguous causalism (which makes use of the concept of
cause as a physical action of one system upon another) states that the
physical actions (e.g., through the use of energy) to which a given
system is exposed at a moment t1 non-ambiguously determine the state
of that system at a moment t 2 • Non-ambiguous causalism admits pro-
babilistic determination in such cases. Thus, we could make distinctions
between ambiguous and non-ambiguous determinism combined with
ambiguous and non-ambiguous causalism. All these four interpretations
may be formulated as either methodological or ontological statements.
Some researchers, while accepting determinism in the methodological
sense, do not accept it as a statement about the structure of the universe.
The materialistic approach consists in the acceptance of determinism in
both its forms.
Non-ambiguous determinism combined with non-ambiguous causalism

might be termed radical detenninism.lO Ambiguous determinism, espe-
cially when combined with ambiguous causalism, might, in the present
writer's opinion, be termed moderate indeterminism, on the condition
that such indeterminism assumes causalism.
The interpretation which denies that the universe is governed by re-
gularities, i.e., accepts neither the existence of non-ambiguous regulari-
ties and laws, nor even that of statistical regularities, might be termed
radical indeterminism. For a radical indeterminist, the universe is a set
of events which are not subject to any regularities whatever. He usually
accepts the principle of causality, be it alone for the fact that it is one
of the principles of knowledge based on common sense (see Chap. X),
but he often restricts it to immediate causes and refuses to accept in-
direct causal conditioning. Thus, a radical indeterminist will say that
World War I was caused by the assassination at Sarayevo, and possibly
will push his analysis a little further, but will refuse to look for the
causes, for instance, in economic and political conflicts among the
Great Powers. In practice we encounter various degrees of radical in-
determinism. This fact is often due to the historian's insufficient non-
source-based knowledge, especially his knowledge of the mechanism of
the process of history. Spontaneous research, fairly frequent in the study
of history, must of necessity be confined to the discovery of direct
causes, which are of small significance and, usually, of little interest.
Progress along the chain of causes is not possible without the light
which is shed by the proper non-source-based knowledge.
Radical indeterminism usually appears in its combined ontological
and gnosiological version. Moderate indeterminism in its gnosiological
version may, on the contrary, co-occur with the ontological version of
radical indeterminism. At any rate, the principle of radical indetermin-
ism in its combinedgnosiological-and-methodological version is not
advanced in contemporary science. since that would be incompatible
with the principle that scientific research may not be confined to simple
descriptions of facts.
Now, if we reject radical indeterminism,as it has been universally
rejected on the epistemological level, the issue remains. which of the
remaining two approaches, determinism and moderate indeterminism
(that is such which admits statistical regularities next to unambiguous
regularities), better reflects the structure of the world. In dialectical

materialism, the issue is controversial. Many authors are in favour of
moderate indeterminism, which they even term determinism (e.g.,
G. A. Svechnikov). Their approach is mainly due to the recent achieve-
ments of natural science in the study of microprocesses, in particular
quantum mechanics, which is statistical in nature, and also W. Heisen-
berg's indeterminacy principle, which states that when investigating
microparticles it is impossible to make measurements that would not
themselves affect the particle in question.
The issue must be left open, for it is not possible to exclude the ex-
istence, both in nature and in human societies, of ambiguous inter-
actions, that is situations in which the same causes yield different effects
under the same circumstances. Future research, especially that con-
cerned with physical processes, will show whether giving such freedom
to facts is justified. The problem is clearer when it comes to human ac-
tions: difficulties encountered in social research consist in constant
changes in social conditions, which, combined with the intricacy of
societal life that includes conscious human actions, prevents us from
making sure that we compare exactly the same situations.
The knowledge of the world is acquired gradually, even though
T. S. Kuhn is not wrong in claiming that the development of science
takes place mainly through successive revolutions in science. The
wealth of facts does not become immediately manifest in toto, and
probably never will. It is, therefore, not to be wondered that progress
in our knowledge of the world reveals vast areas which seem non-de-
tlermined to us, but need not be such in fact.
When it comes to the study of societal facts, it seems necessary to
distinguish between radical and moderate determinism. In the radical
version we would have to do with an absolute determinism of all human
actions; this would point to the necessary nature of every human act,
and hence also of every historical fact, since" every historical fact is an
effect of human action. In its most radical form this approach may
change into fatalism, which has two versions, a materialistic and an
idealistic one. In its moderate version determinism points to the general
conditioning of human actions, without predetermining the definite
form of actions of a given man.
THE PROCESS OF lflSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 249
3. Regularity and chance in history
We have thus come to the much discussed issue of chance. Our stand-
point on that matter follows from the above-described opinion on
determinism and indeterminism. The problem might be summed up as
follows, with special reference to the issue of chance events:
thesis (1) - radical indeterminism: there are no regular events, and
hence all events are chance events, even though they are evoked by
causes;
thesis (2) - moderate indeterminism: there are both regular events,
which are unambiguously determined, and chance events, i.e., non-de-
termined ones, which fill the margin between considerable probability
and certainty;
thesis (3) - radical determinism: all events are regular, there are no
chance events;
thesis (4) - moderate (dialectical) determinism: both regular and
chance events occur, but chance events are such only apparently, being
in fact also determined; this means that every event is both a regular
c;vent and a chance event; it is regular because it is linked with specified
regularities; it is a chance event because it may not appear at the "sur-
face" of events as a result of 'the effect of disturbing factors, or it may
manifest itself in a disfigured form.
Thesis (4), which to the present writer seems the most convincing of
all, requires further elaboration. The following reasoning may be ad-
duced in favour of the claim that chance events in history are only ap-
parently. such. First of all, the relative nature of the concept of chance
is stressed. The starting point is the staltement that the occurrence of
a given eveIllt (historical fact) must be due to causes (in their broader
sense), which can be classed into the principal (significant) and the
secondary ones. The principal causes or factors (which here include
the regularities; see Chap. XII) are necessary for the occurrence of
a given class of facts, whether individual or collective, because they
determine the essential characteristics of a fact and thus justify it being
inoluded in a given class. For instance, there is a set of principal causes
which condition the emergence of workers' strikes in the capitalist
system. But any giv~ strike, i.e., its occurrence, the moment of its out-
break and its individual history, which make it differ in some respect
from all other strikes, depends on a set of causes which "eo-operate"

with the principal ones and which might be termed secondary. Such
secondary causes never occur by themselves with respect to a given
class of facts; they are linked with a given fact by the principal cause
Or a set of principal causes. It is obvious that principal causes, too, do
not occur in isolation, and their functioning is man.ffiested on the sur-
face level in the interplay of secondary causes. The founders of Marxist
philosophy formulated this in the succint formula which states that
"necessity manifests itself through chance events". Principal causes as it
were put together a number of specified facts, which are links in the
various chains of causes, and thereby make possible that a given fact,
which is an element of a given class of facts, occurs. But it may be so
that a given principal cause (a set of principal causes) "fails" to put
together those specified facts, which process is necessary for a given
historical fact to occur. This is so if the different secondary causes,
which are potential in the case of the fact in question, succeed in over-
coming the working of the principal ones. In such a case the event in
question does not occur. Hence, it occurs only if the said disturbing
factors do not prevent the principal cause from manifesting itself. ~f
a given event does not occur we may suspect that another, stronger,
principal cause was at work and succeeded in preventing potential ad-
ventitious causes from serving that rival cause. Such a principal cause
may be termed an impeding condition.
As can be seen, what is termed necessity intertwines with chance.
Adventitious causes are chance events with respect to principal causes,
but they are equally indispensable for the occurrence of a given fact.
It may be said that the outbreak of a strike on a given day is a chance
event which, however, manifests the necessity of the workers' struggle
for better living standards or for political rights. The form of such
a struggle, its duration, etc., are chance events, too. We thus come to
the conclusion that all facts (both the causes and the effects) are both
regular (necessary) and chance events. They are chance events because
their individual characteristics are effects of the working of adventitious
causes, which are links in various chailIls of causes; their regularity con-
sists in their being manifestations of the working of the principal cause,
which conditions the very occurrence of an event of a gIven category,
THE PROCESS OF mSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 251
and also in the fact that adventitious causes are also conditioned by
specified principal causes.
It is often said that those events which are due to principal causes
are necessary, and those which are due to adventitious causes are
chance events. What has been said above shows that such a distinction
is incorrect. What are termed principal (significant) causes (factors)
never manifest themselves in their pure form: they evoke events only
through the intermediary of what are termed adventitious causes. In
other WOJ.1ds, indiJ.1ect (or "hidden") causes, to which principal causes
might be compared, work only through the intermediary of more direct
relationships, which have here been termed advep.titious, although it
would, perhaps, be better to lay stress on their being more direct.
In the final analysis, for a given historical fact to occur it is both
necessary and sufficient that:
(1) principal causes exist, and
(2) adventitious causes, which work on behalf of the principal causes
involved, also exist.
The set of adventitious causes may be of various kinds. The meeting
point of the various causal chains, which include the various adventi-
tious causes, conditioned by the working of the principal cause, yields
a specified historical fact, which thus is necessary from one point of
view, and a chance event from another point of view.
That double nature of historical facts often remained unnoticed. The
materialists active in the Age of Enlightenment (e.g., Holbach) stood
for mechanistic determinism and believed all causes to be equally
necessary, without making any distinction between principal and ad-
ventitious ones. The obvious result was that they emphasized the role
of chance. Many representatives of objective idiographism, who rejected
determinism (e.g., E. Meyer), believed all historical events to be chance
events, to be located at the meeting points of various independent
chains of causes and events. Such an oscillation of viewpoints between
extremes reflects the relative nature of the concept of chance, and at the
same time joints to the ambiguity of ~at concept. From the subjective
point of view, the less a fact, or its consequences, is expected, the more
it is a chance event. Hence the concept of chance is subject to gra-
dation.
252 THE OBJECnVE METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
4. The problem Q/ an individual's free will
The next problem which arises here is that of how to reconcile the
detern:llnistic viewpoint, as applied to societal (i.e., historical) facts, with
the conscious nature of human activity. The traditional formulation of
the problem consists in asking about the range of the effect of man's
free will upon the course of events and about the role of the individual
in history. The first of these two questions is the more essential one:
for if we do not accept aIIly effect of man's free will upon the course of
events, then it is pointless to speak about the individual's role in history,
since in such an interpretation that individual's free will cannot mani-
fest itself.
The problem of man's free will has for centuries vexed the followers
of various religious system. In particular, Christian philosophers have
been facing the dilemma of the acceptance of man's free will (since
man must be given an opportunity for choosing his correct conduct)
and the omnipotence of God's will which determines human actions.
Varioos ways out of that dilemma have been suggested; they range
from St. Augustine's doctrine of predestination and St. Thomas Aqui-
nas' opinion which admits a certain degree of man's free will. J. Mari-
tain's viewpoint was mentioned earlier (Chap. VII). The position adopt-
ed by H. Butterfield is clearly deterministic. Christian philosophers
usually allow for man's free will in spite of the above said inner con-
tradictions; when doing so they blame historical materialism for fatal-
istic conclusions; namely for the elimination of man's moral responsibil-
ity for his deeds: man may not be held responsible for what "historical
inevitability" forces him to do.
Moderate (dialectical) determinism firmly dissociates itself from such
fatalistic implications. This is an obvious consequence of the dialectical
model of historical development, a model which assumes an active role
of all elements of a system which develops through overcoming its own
inner contradictions. Human actions have a specified margin of free-
dom: on the one hand, that margin is large enough to make it possible
to see in man the "maker" of history, and on the other, it is limited so
that it confines human actions within a framework of the objective con-
ditions (which. in their societal part. are the results of human actions).
In establishing goals of actions men must take these objective condi-

tions into consideration (see Chap. XXI).
Restrictions on man's free activity are twofold: natural and societal.
The former ones are due to the fact that man is part of Nature and
hence is subject to its various laws. If he wants to live, he must eat,
drink, etc. In his activities he must take into account the working of
gravitation, the ~act that radioactivity (over a certain level) is detriment-
al to health and even dangerous to life, etc.; all this applies to an im-
mense number of various cases. It is well known that in the course of
history man increases his mastery of the forces of Nature, yet this does
not consist in changing laws of Nature, but in acquiring a better know-
ledge of such laws and iIi using them to serve man's goals. Thus man's
growing mdependence of Nature (which consists in the fact that man
acquires a better knowledge of Nature and can, therefore, more effec-
tively avoid many surprises) is combined with his growing dependence
on Nature, since he finds Nature, which he is using on an increasing
scale, more and more indispensable.
Societal restrictions on man's free activity vary in character, but two
types of such restrictions come to the fore. First, man has to act under
conditions which he has received, and which he cannot choose. Thus,
even a most ingenious inhabitant of ancient Rome would not have any
chance of building an airplane, or even much simpler devices, because
the level of social production at that time did not provide conditions
for such undertakings. Secondly, man, being a member of society, does
not act in isolation, but always is a member of certain social groups, of
which the social class to which he belongs is the most important one.
Thus, man's activities are to a large extent conditioned by his group
and class membership. This simply states that man's opinions and con-
duct depend on their societal situations.u Moreover, as a citizen of a
given State man is to comply with the laws that are in force in that
State.
These restrictions are not absolute. Man is much more constrained by
natural conditions than by societal ones, especially those of the second
type mentioned above. Man can disregard many of such constraints. If
he acts against the laws of Nature, if that is possible in a given case, he
risks impairing his health, sufferings and annihilation. He may disre-
gard the cold outside and go out without adequate clothes, but then he
risks impairing his health. He may try to boil water while throwing
pieces of ice into it. but then he will fail in his purpose. Thus man's
free will may manifest itself even with respect to certain restrictions
imposed on him by Nature.
When it comes to societal restrictions. man's free will has little op-
portunity for manifesting itself with respect to the conditions of life he
has inherited. He can move ahead of his times. but the distance cover-
ed will not be a long one. His chances are better when he tries to act
against a class or a group, i.e.. against the interests of such a class or
group. .
But. while we, of course. have to keep in mind that man's free will
does not manifest itself absolutely. but in a manner which is determined
by the said constraints. we do not have to see the main field of action
of man's free will in the incompleteness of the natural and societal re-
strictions. The main sphere of the action of man's free will is to be
seen in the field of adventitious causes, referred to above, that is. in
the field of chance. Now natural and societal conditionings form the
substratum of human actions. That substratum consists of various
(more or less universal) laws of Nature and social (hilltorical) laws, and
also the principal causes, mentioned previously. which, of course, also
may form a system of their own. Thus it turns out that man's free wil.l
has been left a gamut of actions through which principal causes (and.
through their intermediary. historical laws as well) manifest themselves.
The way in which those causes manifest themselves. and possibly the
problem. which of them manifest themselves. depend on definite human
actions. In this case, the working of free will is as follows. Man's ac-
tions are goal-oriented. Hence. the first decision he makes is that con-
cerning the choice of such a goal. Next, when striving to attain that
goal, he infinitely many times faces the possibil.ity of choosing various
strategies. i.e.• he plays a game with the world. In the same situations
different people may choose different goals and different strategies by
which to attain them. The better our knowledge of the world. and,
above all, of the regularities which govern the world, the greater our
chances of choosing a better strategy, that is such which takes those
regularities into account. Hence our freedom is greater, as it would be
difficult to say that freedom to grope in the darkness of ignorance
means full freedom. We thus arrive at the well-known formulation that
freedom means comprehended necessity. This statement. to be found in

the works of Spinoza and Hegel, was elaborated by Marx and Engels.
who included it in their dialectical model of the process of history.
To sum up. we may say that human actions reveal the effect of prin-
cipal causes and of regularities which focus those actions. But does not
the individual's possibility of making various decisions. as mentioned
abovC? refute the principle of dialectical determinism? It may be replied
that it does not. For regardless of the fact that human actions are link-
ed with principal causes and regularities. every decision is a result of
specified motives, or rather a resultant of a large number of various
motives. Human decisions are thus both regular and chance-based: they
are regular as they are intertwined with a network of conditionings.
and chance-based as they may vary from individual to individual.
There is also another constraint on free will: when striving to attain
their respective goals, individua:1s are usually unable to foresee the real
societal consequences of their actions. Their predictions are in most
cases confined to results of individual actions. and, moreover. results
which are not very remote in time. In the long run and on the societal
scale, individuals lose control of the consequences of their actions.
Hence. societal effects of actions become one of the fundamental con-
ditions of new actions by the same or other individuals.12 Thus it may
be said that every human action has its subjective (goals and know-
ledge) and objective (results) components.
5. The role of prominent individuals in history

What, in the light of analyses made so far, is the role of prominent in-
dividuals, that is, the function of the will of such individuals? While
disregarding, for the time being, those characteristics which make us
single out such prominent individuals from among the totality of mem-
bers of a given society, let us begin with the statement that their role is
great and. above all. strictly defined and indispensable for the course
of events. In the non-Marxist literature on the subject the appraisals of
that role have oscillated between two extremes. one of them being
Th. Carlyle's concept of heroes, and the other, the fatalistic approach
of such historians as Guizot, Mignet, and Thierry. who opposed the
interpretations. common in the Age of Enlightenment. stating that, as
256 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF lflSTORY
Plekhanov put it, "opinions (i.e., conscious activity of individuals-

J. T.) govern the world". None of these approaches revealer an under-
standing of the process of history. At that time the mechanism of de-
velopment was comprehended only by Hegel, who initiated the dialec-
tical interpretation of the role of prominent individuals. But he linked
their role too closely with the working of the inherited conditions and
the functions of the laws of development, leaving very little room for
the creative initiative of such individuals. It was only Marx and Engels
who overcame the contradiction between the acceptance of the principle
of determinism and the recognition of individuals' role in history.
Those Marxist authors who came to develop the views of Marx and
Engels (Y. Plekhanov, K. Kautsky, N. Bukharin, A. Gramsci, and
others) agree on two basic issues: the conditioning of the actions of
prominent individuals and the recognition of their definite and con-
siderable influence on the course of events. On the other hand, there
are differences of opinion on whether that function is recognized with
respect to prominent individuals in general, or to specified persons. In
other words, some (who form a majority)13 hold that it is inessential
which individual appears on the stage of history, since historical re-
gularities will anyway find an instrument of action in an individual,
whoever he may be. Thus, should CromweH have not appeared at a
given moment of history, his role would have been played by someone
else; likewise, should Napoleon have lost his life early (e.g., in the battle
of Arcole), the basic trend in the history of France would have remain-
ed the same. Others tend to ascribe more importance to specified per-
sons and claim that exactly Cromwell and Napoleon made events take
a given course. Without them the course of events could have been
quite different. This interpretation assigns an important role to partic-
ular persons, and not just to prominent individuals in general.
In the writings of the founders of Marxism we find a confirmation
of the standpoint which combines these two interpretations. It could be
described thus:
While everyday actions of people, i.e., all members of a given society,
reflect adventitious causes, through which principal causes manifest
themselves, actions of prominent individuals have an additional focus-
ing function. In this way prominent individuals are as it were organizers
who to a lesser or greater degree initiate and bring together actions of
THE PROCESS OF lflSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 257
other people. Obviously. both prominent individuals and other people

do not act in isolation. but as members of certain social groups, of
which the class is the most important one. The sum of their actions
makes the actions of their respective classes. As Lenin wrote. "the ac-
tions of 'living individuals' within every socio-economic fonnation.
actions which are infinitely varied and seemingly not subject to any
systematization. have been generalized and reduced to actions of groups
of individuals (... ), actions of classes (...)".14
Y. Plekhanov called great men "initiators",ts thus emphasizing one
of the two functions. as mentioned above, which prominent individuals
perform in history. This role of initiators, whioh also brings together
actions of others, is ascribed to prominent individuals in general. With-
out them society would be doomed to stagnation. and development (i.e.•
transformations of systems) would be extremely slow, mainly in ac-
cordance with the rhythm of the laws of Nature. But the very fact that
man must cater for his elementary needs makes him oppose Nature. that
is, to strive to make use of her forces.
As man's struggle with Nature intensifies organization (that is, initia-
tion and concerting of efforts) becomes more and more important, since
without organization the catering for man's elementary needs proves
impossible even at a very early stage of the history of mankind. There
is a demand for organizers who may be predominantly initiators or
predominantly oo-ordinators or may equally wen combine the two
functions. In the course of history their places always had to be filled.
since otherwise society could not ~unction and would be subject to
self-destruction. The way the leaders are recruited differs, however, from
period to period. Sometimes it opened opportunities for talented indi-
viduals who thus could rise on the social ladder. but it often put a brake
on the manifestation of their talents and thus contributed to a slowing
down of the pace of development. The latter process could consist not
only in preventing outstanding people from mling the places of leaders.
but also in opening too few such places in a given social system. It is
class barriers which are the main obstacle to the rise of talented in-
dividuals to functions of organizers; this is to say that class barriers are
an obstacle in the selection of most useful individuals.
On the other hand. the degree in which man controls Nature, i.e.•
the degree of development of production and, accordingly. the whole
of societal life, bas been the major condition for the opening of new
places for organizers.. These two conditions: ,the type of selection of in-
dividuals to leading positions and the degree of man's control of Na-
ture, whioh increases the number of such places, are closely ilntercon-
nected; one is a function of the other, so that a better caliber of the
organizers helps to increase the number of organizers places. This can
be shown by the following diagrams, which reveal the feedback in
question:
Number of positions Number of positions

for organizers or for organizers
This feedback might be called the law of progress in history. We shall

return to that issue, and for the time being we confine ourselves to
pointing to the said role of organizers. in the process of history,18 that is,
the role of those whose functions are more important than those of the
other members of society. It turns out that the enterprise and co-ordi-
nating abilities of others, that is, progress interpreted as the emergence
of ~ncreasingly complex systems, oriented to a more comprehensive
satisfaction of growing human needs, depend exactly on the organizers,
provided that these have good opportunities for action, i.e., that they
are numerous enough and their standards are adequate.17 Suoh progress
thus may be quicker or slower according to the status of the organizers..
This brings 'US closer to bringing out the role of specified individuals,
and not just only the role of organizers as a group. More or less prom-
inent individuals, that is, those who are more or less effective in carry-
ing out their functions of organizers and in bringing together actions of
other individuals, may rise t9 the positions of organizers, positions
whose number increases as society develops. Now the more prominent
the individuals which rise to such positions, the greater the development
of societal activity and the stronger the focusing of such activity, which
thus receives better guidance. The force of the societal effect of such
a focusing is, as we know from history (note the October Revolution),
often enormous. Activities of different individuals, so far oriented in
various directions, are replaced by a fairly ordered activity, oriented in
one direction, which marks the main novel element of the new situa-
tion. The sum of the forces represented by many-directional activities
THE PROCESS OF ffiSTORY (CAUSALrry AND DETERMINISM) 259
of the various individuals before a prominent individual becomes an

organizer need not be less than that sum is after he appears on the
stage: as has been said, the effect consists in the fact that the drive is
unidirectional. Such a drive, whose strength is in proportion to the
prominence of the individual in question, changes the network of cou-
plings in a given section of the system and makes that system develop
new inner contradictions, which must in turn be overcome, and this,
as we have seen, is the source of the system's movement and develop-
ment. It is self-evident that the activity of every individual, and not
only of a prominent one, results in changes in systems, but the systems
involved are in those cases relatively small, so that the contradictions
are of a lesser importance. On the other hand, organizational decisions
made by prominent individuals set entire systems in motion, provided,
of course, that their decisions succeed in attracting the masses and
make these adopt as their own the goals formulated by a prominent
individual. This implies that the masses are to adopt the ideology (in-
terpreted as the formulation of the goal of action and a justification of
that goal) that serves the attainment of the goal in question and accept
that ideology as the system which guides their actions. Such a system
ensures understanding between the organizers and the rest of society.
The more durable and the better formulated the system, the longer and
the better the understanding 'in question.
There is, of course, no abyss of the type suggested by Carlyle be-
tween the masses and the prominent individuals. First, the activity of
prominent individuals is impossible without the activity of the masses.
The individuals must take the activity of the masses into account and
cannot be in contradiction with the latter in the long run. Secondly, pro-
minent individuals come from a:ll strata of society in fairly large numbers.
It is a simplification if, when referring to prominent individuals, we men-
tion only Caesar, Charlemagne, Cromwell, Napoleon Bonaparte, and
Karl Marx. It is true that these rank among the most eminent person-
alities in the history of mankind, and without them social history would
be quite different: it may be doubted whether the Napoleonic "epic"
would have taken place without Napoleon, and whether the transition
from the bourgeois-democratic to the socialist revolution in Russia
would have been so rapid without Lenin.
Alongside those who are the most visible on the arena of history we
must notice great hosts of prominent individuals of various caliber

(even closer to the masses) as they appear in society. They do not, of
course, include all the organizers of societal life, since some of them
may turn out not to contribute anything, but simply to follow others.
But, be this as it may, we shall look for such individuals among the
organizers of production, scholars and scientists, politicians, and the
military.
Thirdly, we have to point to the relative meaning of the concept
"prominent individual". A person may be prominent (in the sense that
he initiates or organizes actions) in a specified system, whereas in other
systems he may be guided by other organizers. Fourthly, the fact that
a person becomes a prominent individual in history is usually due to the
existence of specified conditions. Mediocre and even grotesque figures
often happened to enter the arena of history.
Marx in The Eighteenth of Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte wrote that
he wanted to show "how the class struggle in France created circum-
stances and relationships that made it possible for a grotesque medio-
crity to playa hero's part".lS The conditions which favour the forma-
tion of a sphere of action of a prominent individual are the work of
society as a whole, and moreover such an individual develops in the
course of action, that is, in the course of his OO'-operation with the
masses. It would be absurd to assume that an individual is fully formed
even before he begins to act. The way in which he is affected by his
actions obviously depends ,to a large extent on the characteristics of
that individual.
Nothing has been said thus far about why certain prominent indi-
viduals are great, that is, are able to act as initiators and OO'-ordinators.
We shall point here to their basic property the degree of which, as it
is shared by a given person, accounts for his rising above the average.
We mean his ability to foresee the societal consequences of his own
actions concerted with the actions of those whom that person intends
to influence. As has been said earlier, it is usually so that individuals
foresee the more or less direct consequences of their actions, without
realizing what the societal effects would be. A prominent individual,
however, owing to his better developed ability to predict future develop-
ments, can make proper decisions about his actions, and when carrying
these actions into effect, can choose the most effective strategies. It is
THE PROCESS OF ffiSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 261
self-evident that the degree in which various prominent individuals

share that ability to predict future developments. varies from person to
person. H the degree is greater, then a prominent individual follows in
his actions those trends (that is, laws and principal causes) which are
likely to win, even if their victory may at first seem problematic. This
group includes above all the leaders of victorious revolutions, such as
Cromwell, Robespierre, and Lenin. They associated themselves with
those forces which could give them victories, or at least immense his-
toric successes. It is obvious that if decisions had been made by other
people, the course of events could be different.
H his ability to predict future development is not so remarkable, and,
moreover, if he is unable to go beyond the interests of his class. he may
link himself with visible trends which tend to develop, but have no
chance of a permanent ,triumph. In such a case the person in question
acts to some degree against the masses whose daily activities determine
the trends of events. The past offers many examples of such individuals
who served aims ,that were at variance with the interest of the masses.
Such persons oontribute to the materialization of certain processes in
history, which later, in the face of the greater strength of the masses,
must be modified.
We can point to another characteristic of prominent individuals: they
realize when the most advantageous moment for action comes and know
how to avail themselves of this. This property of theirs is due to the
ability to comprehend existing situations with their far-reaching impli-
cations. As can be seen, the nature of the abilities we look for in
prominent individuals consists above all in the ability of linking their
activities with those of the masses.
We have thus reached the sources of the mechanism of that auto-
dynamism of development which has been already referred to on many
occasions. We can see that dialectical autodynamism as applied to so-
ciety is closely linked with emphasis on the active role of all individuals,
prominent individuals (organizers) being assigned a special role. With-
out the latter category of persons the scattering of actions of various
individuals could remain so great that development and progress would
be extremely slow. The active attitude of the masses and of the prom-
inent individuals makes us replace, where societal development is
ooncerned, the term autodynamism (which is reserved for ,the world
as a whole) by that of activism, since this removes all allusions to auto-

matism in societal life. It turns out that, for all the constraints, man's
free will is given such a wide margin that we do not see any exagger-
ation in the claim that history is made by human beings who are not
subject to any "inevitable necessities".
6. Fatalism and teleologism. The problem of determinism in the ex-

planation of past events
The principles of dialeotical determinism, which accepts both the role

of chance and of the free will of individuals in the course of history,
but assigns to these .two categories their specified place in the process
of history, differ markedly from fatalistic (or crypto-fatalistic) views and
their teleological (or crypto-teleological) variation. Fatalism assumes
that events will move in a specified direction regardless of human ac-
tions. This is not to say, however, that the fatalistic approach always
results in the abandonment of all activity (except for those actions
which are absolutely indispensable). That approach may imply an active
attitude, if it is accompanied by the conviction that specified actions are
a predetermined necessity, or a passive (quietistic) attitude, if it is ac-
companied by the conviction that people have to comply passively with
the working of a superior will. The former approach results, for in-
stance, in religious fanaticism (e.g., that of Mohammed's followers), and
the latter, in the various contemplative ideologies.
Teleologism claims that everything in Nature and society has been
arranged by a superior force (e.g., by God) so as to serve a certain pur-
pose. Every element of the world has its strictly assigned place. and
human beings can only acquire a knowledge of that order of things, but
cannot change it in any way. In practice this amounts to fatalism roo,
though in a perhaps less extreme form. The teleological approach may
have several versions. The extreme one (plato, St. Augustine, St. Thom-
as Aquinas, and others) claims that intervention of the superior force
with the course of the world is constant; according to the less extreme
one (Descartes) a "prime move" sufficed for the goal-oriented mecha-
nism to function by itself. The room between ,these two appro.aches is
filled by those finalistic conCepts of historians (see Chap. VI) who claim
that the course of events is guided by a "spirit of the epoch" ot.: a "spirit
of the nation". In biology, a similar theory was formulated by the

vitalists, who saw the factor that guides the development of organisms
in what they ca1led. the vital force.
Fatalism (together with te1eologism) was for centuries the dominant
view of history as it was inevitably connected with the spiritualistic ap-
proach which acoepts the omnipotence of spiritual forces. But mecha-
nistic materialism, too, in the final analysis yielded fatalistic conclusions,
which may be illustrated by the theory of the laws of progress, ex-
pounded by 18th century materialists (cf. Chap. VI): in that theory no
room was left for an active role of individuals in history.
But emphasis will not be laid on these matters, which are more or
less known. We shall now discuss the problem of determinism in the
explanation of the past events by reference to various factors (geogra-
phical, biological. and economic determinism). All these varieties of
determinism. if they are not an integral part of the dialectical model of
the process of history, are in fact manifestations of fatalism.
Our analysis here will cover only geographical determinism and will
to some extent recall and expand the comments made in Part II. The
interpretation of the other types of determinism is analogous, and hence
we may confine ourselves to what has been said in general in Part II.
As far as geographical determinism is concerned, there have been many
misunderstandings and things passed over in silence.
First of all, we have to make a distinction between that geographical
determinism which is synonymous with fatalism. geographical possibil-
ism, and dialectical geographical determinism. which is part of the
theory of historical development. The latter is opposed to fatalism,
whereas the implications of possibilism may vary according to the
opinions its representatives have of the course of history. Attention
must also be drawn to the varying role of geographical determinism
in the different periods of the development of social and historical
ideas.
Our point of departure will be the classification (cf. \Chapt. X) of
categories: differences (between systems observed at the same time),
changes (of systems observed at different times), and development
(which takes the change factor into account). The emphasis placed on
the geographical factor in explaining differences in the situations of
societies has played a special role. Pointing to the geographical environ-
ment, and especially to the climate, as a factor which explains differ-

ences in the situations and characteristics of various societies has had
the oldest and longest record. Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.) is usually the
earliest author quoted in this connection. He thought that people who
inhabit territories marked by wide changes in the climate are more
varied than those who inhabit quieter territories. References to the effect
which the climate has on the nature of the population are to be found
in Plato's (427-347 B.C.) Republic and in particular in Aristotle's
(384-322 B.C.) Politics, where the climatic factor is used to explain
supposedly exceptional intellectual and political abilities of the Greeks. 19
It is worth noting, however, that even the antiquity saw the emergence
of the opposite view, which was centuries ahead of the prevailing social
ideas. It was Strabo (c. 63 B.C. to c. 25 A.D.), the intellectually pene-
trating geographer, who, while taking the geographical factor into ac-
count, recommended the search of other causes that would explain dif-
ferences in art, forms of government, customs and manners, national
character, etc. Moreover, he believed those differences to be due to cer-
tain "inner sources".20 At that point he in a sense almost touched the
puzzle of development. Strabo treated the geographical factor as one
of the many elements of a given structure, a factor which plays its role
in the process of development, but not as an outer geographical force
whose impact upon society takes on various forms, but as unidirectional
and inevitable.
For all these limitations, the bringing up in antiquity of the geogra-
phical factor as an explanation of differences in the situations of the
various societies was a considerable achievement of scientific thought.
It testified to the formulation of rational questions about the causes of
the differentiation of the world of man. It is self-evident that, when-
ever in the search for answers to the said questions no references were
made to social history and to explaining later conditions by earlier
situations, attention was understandably drawn by man's natural en-
vironment as the (or at least an) explanation.
In the Middle Ages the ultimate explanation was sought in super-
natural factors. Interesting ideas are to be found only in the works of
Arab authors, in particular Ibn Khaldun (cf. Chap. IV). In the present
writer's opinion he anticipated what is 'termed geographical possibilism,
namely the theory which takes the geographical environment to be the
set of those conditions and possibilities of which man can make use.
They determine the choice by man of a certain behaviour, which, how-
ever, may have numerous variations. This meant rejection of the fatal-
istic implications of ancient geographical determinism. As was the case
with the authors mentioned previously, Ibn Khaldun was interested
mainly in the climate. In his opinion, a good climate was a sine qua
non of the existence of societal life, but not a sufficient explanation of
the forms that societal life assumes.
In modern times, discussion on the role of the geographical factor
in history was initiated by J. Bodin. That factor drew the attention of
scholars as a result of the European expansion and the period of great
discoveries. When scholars came to realize the existence outside Europe
of different peoples with their varied ways of life, they strove to explain
the differences they noticed. They also thought it self-evident and ra-
tional to associate those differences with differences in the geographi-
cal environment, the more so as they were still mainly concerned with
differences in material civilization, types of consumption, as well as
national and ethnic characteristics rather than with modes of produc-
tion. Bodin followed the same pattern.!t His main emphasis was on the
differences in mentality between the inhabitants of the Northern and
those of the Southern Hemisphere. From his times on, the geographical
environment was gaining in importance in explanations of differences
in the situations and the character of the various peoples. This meant
an opposition to the providentionalist interpretation of history, and in
that sense had a consider~ble significance in the evolution of opinions
on society and social history.
From the Renaissance on, the terminology used in reflection on past
events gradually incorporated the concept of progress, and later, in the
period of the domination of positivist ideas, that of evolution. Charac-
teristic of the former development were the works of Ch. Perrault (17th
cent.) and J. A. Condorcet (18th cent.), and of the latter, those of
A. Comte, Ch. Darwin, H. Spencer, and many cultural anthropologists,
SlUch as E. B. Tylor. While the theory of evolution revolutionized the
development of natural science, as it had earlier been believed that
Nature has no history, in the sphere of the social science, especially
in history, it meant the resuscitation of the Age-of-Enlightenment con-
cept of progress. But in the second half of the 19th century that con-
cept was much less stimulating than it had been earlier. The domina-
tion in the methodology of the social sciences of models drawn from
natural science meant a step backward. especially when it came to the
adoption, in historical research, of the concept of development. The
problem of explanation of the specified course of events remained open.
People knew that events follow the path of progress, but they did not
know on what the successive changes in the situations of societies de-
pend. This gave rise to the problem of explaining those changes which
had been found as a result of studies. All these circumstances gradually
contributed to the formulation of the factors theory!! in the explanation
of the past (cf. Chap. VI). That theory consisted in pointing to a speci-
fied factor (such as geographical environment. race, density of popula-
tion, state policies, economy, etc.) as the latent cause of changes. The
factors theory was an important addition to the concept of progress.
but it also meant the danger of attaching excessive importance to such
factors, and accordingly the danger of geographical determinism in the
explanations of changes. This was so because emphasis on any of the
factors was not accompanied by an integrated approach to society as
a specific internally coherent structure.
Ch. Montesquieu was an eminent advocate of the factors theory who
laid the main stress on the climate. His comments on the effect of the
climate on man and his history were based on the then comprehensive
literature of the subject. As F. J. Teggart wrote, "In disoussions of the
theory of the influence of climate. it is usual to pass at once from the
work of Bodin to that of Montesquieu. This procedure overlooks, how-
ever, the important fact that the theory was commonly entertained, and
frequently set forth, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, by such
persons as Bonhours, Chardin, Fontenelle, Madame Decier. and more
especially by Abbe Du Bos".2lI The names of Montaigne, Bacon, and
Vico could be added to that list.
Montesquieu used J. Arbuthnoth's Essay Concerning the Effects of
Air on Human Bodies (1733) as his basic source, and in his Esprit des
Lois (1748) was more concerned with analysing differences in the char-
acteristic traits of people who live in different climates than with en-
quiring into the causes of changes. This was, after all, though in
a varying degree, typical of the representatives of the factors theory.
In Montesquieu's analyses, explanations of changes were linked mainly
THE PROCESS OF mSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 267
with the laws of progress, and explanations of differences, with the

effect of factors. Montesquieu referred to the climate to explain un-
changing religions, customs, and laws in the East, because the climate
there does not incline people to efforts. He also noticed the influence
of other factors, but held the climate to be the most important of all.
To some extent he did notice relationships between the geographical
environment and the type of production, but he did not elaborate that
novel idea of his.!4
Climatological determinism, animated by Montesquieu, became very
popular among Age-of-Enlightenment writers. There were, of course,
direct references to ancient authors, with Hippocrates in the first place.
Montesquieu's one-sided approach came also to be criticized, and that
criticism contributed to a better comprehension of the role of the geo-
graphical factor in historical explanations. Criticism came above all
from A. R. J. Turgot, who pointed to the fact that the geographical en-
vironment changes very little, whereas societies can change quite ra-
pidly. Such changes are due to contacts between peoples on a low level
of culture with those who had reached a higher level of intellectuaI
development. Similar ideas were set forth by D. Hume (1711-76).!5
Montesquieu was also criticized by C. A. Helvetius (1715-71) and
P. H. D. Holbach (1723-89),26 who believed that factors other than the
geographical environment are decisive for social changes.
J. G. Herder's27 criticism followed a different path: not only did he
analyse the climate as a possible cause of changes, but, as mentioned
above, he anticipated the dialectica:I interpretation of progress, later to
be worked out by Marx and Engels. He accepted the important role
of the climate which contributes to the fact that "the fortunes of the
world, the whole of that which mankind all over the globe does and
sustains, change",28 but he also pointed to man's impact on the geogra-
phical environment. He stood for possibilism when he wrote that "the
climate does not compel, but induces and develops (in human beings-
Tr.) a slight disposition".29 To sum up, in Herder's works we find
a mixture of ,the acceptance of the laws of progress which work like
Moira, of the factors theory applied to an analysis of social change, and
ofa nuclear formulation of the theory of the dialectical development
of human societies. Herder did realize that to comprehend the course
of events it does not suffice to know the state of given societies at a aer-
268 THE OBJEcnvE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
tain moment - next to the knowledge of the change factors and the laws
of progress - since the researcher must first of all take into considera-
tion the whole history of the societies in question. In the 19th century,
historical materialism was the only theory to take up and to develop
the dialectical elements formulated in the Age of Enlightenment.
The positivist period was marked by the dominance of the factors
theory in its pure form, which complemented the laws of progress. the'
latter being interpreted ahistorically. Many examples could be quoted.
The characteristic case is that of H. Taine in the study of cultural
history, and that of H. T. Buckle for (material) civilization. His History
of Civilization in England. as is known, influenced considerably the
writing of history by its rationalism and epistemological optimism.
Apart from formulating laws of progress which, in the last analysis, in
his opinion depends on the advances of science, Buckle took into con-
sideration the effect of the various factors. the geographical factor (cli-
mate) above all. Buckle was not a geographical determinist in the full
sense of the term, unlike F. Ratzel, the founder of antbropogeography
and geopolitics (Anthropogeographie. 1882-91; Politische Geographie,
1897). From the scientific point of view his opinions on explanation of
facts at that time marked a step backward. whereas politically they be-
came the theoretical cover for German imperialism with its struggle
for Lebensraum. so Geopolitics penetrated into many scholarly works;
this pointed to the practical consequences of the factors theory, since
the role of the various factors can be exaggerated in a way uncontrolled-
by other historical considerations. That was so because factors re-
mained as it were outside the stream of historical facts.
Anti-positivist reaction consisted. above all, in pointing to the issues
of structure, neglected thus far. As compared with evolutionism, this
marked a clear progress in the comprehension of historical facts. Yet, as
we have shown, in the interpretation of structurally-minded historians
the course of events forms a series of structures, and their investigation
in the chronological order of appearance becomes observation of
vaiious states at different periods of time. Thus it is still a study of
changes, and not a study of development. The geographical factor ex-
plains a given configuration of elements of a structure in some way, but
it does not explain development. In such a case, like in the case of the
evolutionist approach, the geographical factor may be assigned ex-
cessive importance, so that a possibilistic interpretation moves toward

determinism. These consequences can be found in many works which
postulate a historical study of climatic conditions. 31 In France, it is
E. Le Roy Ladurie who has recently become well known in this con-
nection. a!
The emphasis placed by French historians on the importance of the
geographioal environment in the course of history is partly due to their
close co-operation with those geographers who represent what is termed
geographie humaine (as opposed to Ratzel's determinism) and propound
possibilism. This applies above all to P. Vidal de la Blache (Tableau
de la geographie de la France. 1903).33
The puzzle of development. the intuitive solving of which has since
antiquity often been almost attained (this applies in particular to Her-
der), came to be solved. as is known. only by Hegel. Marx and Engels.
In his view on the role of the geographical environment Hegel came
close to historical materialism.34 In his interpretation. the geographical
environment is a set of po'ssibilities. which man can turn into specified
actual conditions. His approach might be termed dialectical possibilism,
as distinct from evolutionist or structural possibilism. It pointed to
a constant interaction between man and his geographical environment.
Such an interaction could be demonstrated on the condition that purely
climatological considerations were abandoned and that the nlltural re-
sources, which condition production of goods, are borne out as the im-
portant element of the geographical environment. This was accomplish-
ed by Hegel. Non-dialectical possibilism did not see in such an inter-
action the source of development, but merely a factor which conditions
the linking of the elements of a given structure at a given moment.
Hegel's conception was largely blocked by the opinion that Nature is
changeless and has no history. But. on the other hand, that opinion
could have become a stimulus which helped to develop the dialectical
concept of the interrelation between man and Nature. Later. when-
following the advent of the evolutionist theory - Nature became a his-
storical phenomenon, too, the idea that social change is to be explained
by natural factors became more evident.
Dialectical and historical materialism, by unifying the directional and
the structural interpretation of history and overcoming thereby the one-
sidedness of both evolutionism and structuralism, offered an interpreta-
tion which leaves no room for geographical determinism. because ele-

ments of every system are supposed to be coupled with one another:
elements act one upon another and, by giving rise to contradictions,
bring about a development of the system. Hence, in this interpretation,
the geographical environment cannot be treated as an autonomous ex-
ternal factor: with respect to the whole system it is always an object of
incessant action by man who thereby as it were draws it into the system.
In a static interpretation, such an external location of the geographical
environment was possible, because no constant interaction of elements
was iml"olved. Man's dependence on Nature results from his necessity
to satisfy his own needs, and thus above all with the process of produc-
tion. Man's dependence on Nature is dialectical, which is to say that
the more he controls Nature, the more he needs from it and the more
he depends on it. In this connection the opinion, which is a remnant of
geographical determinism and states that the lower the level of social
development the greater man's dependence on Nature, is not correct.
Man is gradually making use of the various spheres of his natural en-
vironment, which in turn results in an expansion of the concept of
geographical environment.as The dialectical contradiction between man
and his natural environment manifests itself in the constant develop-
ment of production, that development being both the foundation of
social development and the source of further contradictions, which re-
flect - on the feedback principle - upon the process ~ production and,
through its intermediary upon the geographical environment. This
shows that the geographical environment plays an essential role in the
theory of social development, but is not an independent factor, as it is
involved in the functioning of such a vast system as society is.
As can be seen from the foregoing analyses, the geographical en-
vironment has been interpreted by social thinkers in various ways. For
a long time it was used (this applies mainly to climate) to explain
differences among the cultures and characteristics of various societies.
This was certainly an achievement of human thought, since explanation
of social facts by reference to natural phenomena liberates man from
thinking in terms of the supernatural. That opinion also was a natural
consequence of disregarding, in the explanation of differences, the pro-
cess of history.
As people were coming to realize that the process of history means
incessant changes and that. acoordingly. the course of events must be

interpreted dynamically - even though they still lacked the concept of
historical development - the geographical environment (including ele-
ments other than climate) was treated as a factor which explains suc-
cessive changes. This was one of the manifestations of the factors the-
ory. In its evolutionist (directional) version that theory complemented
the a priori laws of progress with analyses of concrete forms of the
process of history. The treatment of factors as autonomous entities
brought the danger that excessive importance would be attached to
some of those factors. and hence the danger of geographical determin-
ism. In the structural version. in which the geographical environment
was interpreted in connection with the activity of man. it was claimed
that it does not determine human actions fatalistically. but merely de-
fines the conditions in which human activity develops. In that inter-
pretation the appraisal of the impact of the geographical environment
varies from case to case, but in general it inclines towards possibilism.
It was only when the theory of social development was accepted that
it became impossible to propound geographical determinism (fatalism).
Development, treated as the motion of the system caused by constant
inner contradictions of its elements, bars us from attaching excessive
importance to any single factor. All factors are interconnected, man
acts upon ,all of them. and all of them act upon man. The role of the
geographical environment is considerable. but not independent. That
environment comes to influence man in an essential way only when the
social process of production begins.as
Next to geographical and economic determinism, which explains
human actions by referring to external factors, historians have often
assumed determinism of other kinds. We mean here theories which
use a model of man being guided by psychological mechanisms which
he does not realize (cf. S. Freud and his followers, American psycho-
historians) or by universally valid structures of human mind (cf.
e. Levi-Strauss).
REFERENCES
1 This is not to say that the assignment of events to specified causes must
necessarily be unambiguous. It seems that we must not always expect the same
effects to follow the same causes. The issues ought to be discussed above all by
philosophers.
272 THE OBJECI'IVE METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
2 Cf. O. Lange, op. cit. (footnote 6 in Chap. X above), p. 30.

a Cf. H. Greniewski, Cybernetics without Mathematics, Oxford 1960, pp.
31-44.
, Conditionalism. has its founder in M. Verwom (1863-1921).
5 The materialist concept of cause refers to such an action of one material
object upon another in which a transfer of energy is involved (cf. W. Krajew-
ski, "Istota zwi~u przyczynowego" (The Essence of the Causal Nexus), Studia
Filozoficzne, No. 1/1964, pp. 75-98). The same author makes a distinction be-
tween the spiritualist (voluntarist), the rationalist, and the phenomenalist concept
of cause.
8 M. Bloch, Apologie pour ['histoire ou metier d'historien, Paris 1949, p. 100,
"Les antecedents dejA plus particuliers, mais doues encore d'une certaine perma-
nence, forment ce qui on est convenu d'appeler les conditions. I.e plus special,
celui qui, dans Ie faisceau des forces generatrices, represente, en quelque sorte,
l'element differentiel, ~oit de preference Ie nom de cause. On dira, par ex-
emple, que l'infl3ition du temps de Law fut la cause de la hausse globale des
prix. L'existence d'un milieu economique frantrais, deja homogene et bien lie,
sera seulement une condition. Car ces facilites de circulation qui, en repandant
les billets de toutes parts, permirent seule la hausse avaient precede l'inflation
et lui survecurent".
7 K. Ajdukiewicz, "0 niekt6rych sposobach uzasadniania wlasciwych naukom
przyrodniczym" (On Certain Methods of Substantiation Which Are Specific to
Natural Science), in: lezyk i poznanie (Language and Cognition), vol. I, War-
szawa 1960, pp. 72 ff.
B Ibid., p. 74.
8 The concept of probability as seen in historical research will be discussed
below.
10 E. Nagel's definition is: "Determinism in history is the thesis that for
every set of human actions, individual or collective (...) there is some system
which is deterministic with respect to these items". (The Structure of Science,
London 1961, p. 595).
11 A. Malewski held the theory of relantionships between situations in hu-
man life, on the one hand, and human opinions and behaviour, on the other, to
be one of the fundamental theses in historical materialism.. (Cf. A. Malewski,
"Empiryczny sens teorii materializmu historycmego" (The Empirical Sense of
the Theory of Historical Materialism), S~udia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1957, pp. 63-8.
It The problems of chance and necessity and free will were treated exten-
sively by K. Marx and F. Engels, who emphasized the interconnections between
human actions and existing conditions. Purposeful human actions bring results
which in tum affect those ac.tions. These results of human actions on a mass
scale are, in other words, the said principal causes and regularities (laws) which
influence further human actions. In On Feuerbach (1875) Marx wrote that "the
mat~alistic doctrine that men are products of circumstances and upbringing, and
that therefore changed men are products of other circumstances and changed
THE PROCESS OF lUSTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 273
upbringing, forgets that it is men that change circumstances and that educator
must himself be educated". Selected works, vol. II, ed. cit., p. 365-6. It is in
this way that regularities work through the intermediary of chance events.
18 Cf. J. Wiatr, Czlowiek i historia (Man and History), Warszawa 1965, pp.
203 if. The book is popular in character, but includes an interesting summing
up of opinions on the role of eminent individuals.
14 V. Lenin, "Ekonomiceskoe soderzanie narodnicestva i kritika ego v knige
B. Struve" ([he Economic Sense of the Narodniki Theory and Its Criticism by
Struve), in: SoCineniya (Works), vol. l.
15 G. Plekhanov, Ober die Rolle der Personlichkeit in der Geschichte, ed.
cit., p. 43.
16 This concept is interpreted here very broadly.
17 The concept of an organizer's "quality" will be explained below.
18 K. Marx, Der achtzehnte Brumaire des Louis Bonaparte, Berlin 1927, p. 18.
19 See the analysis of those sections of ancient works in: F. 1. Teggart,
Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., p. 174.

20 For an analysis of Strabo'~ opinions (which does not, however, bring out
the factors indicated here) see H. Becker, H. E. Barnes, op. cit., pp. 250--2.
21 Cf. Methodus ad facilem historiarum cognitionem, 1566, and Les six livres
de fa republique, 1576.
22 The term was introduced by A. Labriola (see his "Del materialismo sto-
rico" in Saggi sui materialismo storico, 1946, pp. 99 if., and later by G. Plekha-
nov in Materialisticeskoe ponimane istorii ([he Materialistic Interpretation of
History), 1897.
22 F. J. Teggart, Theory and Processes of History, ed. cit., p. 176.
24 Cf. J. Litwin, Szkice krytyczne 0 determinizmie geograficznym (Critical
Essays on Geographical Determinism), Warszawa 1956, p. 14
25 Cf. F. J. Teggart, op. cit., pp. 180 ff; H. Becker, H. E. Barnes, op.
cit., pp. 526-7.
26 Cf. J. Litwin, op. cit., p. 33.
27 Cf. E. Adler, Herder i Oswiecenie niemieckie (Herder and the German
Enlightenment), Warszawa 1965, pp. 222-38.
28 Quoted by E. Adler, op. cit., p. 225.
29 Ibid., p. 227.
80 In this connection note a similarly determinist work by E. Huntington,
Civilisation and Climate, New Haven 1915.

31 Cf. J. Topolski, "0 tak zwanym kryzysie gospodarczym XVII wieku
w Europie" ([he So-called Economic Depression in 17th Century Europe),
Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 2/1962, pp. 370--1.
82 Cf. E. Le Roy Ladurie, "Histoire et Climat", Annales, No. 1/1959, pp.
13-14. Historical studies of climate now have an immense literature, largely
marked by geographical determinism.
83 Cf. L. Febvre, A Geographical Introduction to History, London 1932 (the
present writer used the above English edition instead of the French original).
34 A detailed analysis of Hegel's views on geographical environment was

made by J. Litwin, op. cit., pp. 35 ff.
35 K. Marx included the constitution of man himself and the surrounding
. nature in the natural conditions of production. Cf. Capital, vol. I, ed. cit.,
p. 562.
36 R. D. Bradley, in his "Causality, Fatalism and Morality", Mind 1963,
October, vol. LXXII, p. 594, introduced the following distinction between deter-
minism and fatalism: "Causal Determinism is consistent with saying that my
morrow is in part determined by what I do today while Fatalism is inconsistent
with it, there can be no valid inference from the former to the latter". This is
correct, since IrO scientific prediction is possible if fatalism is accepted.
XII. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (HISTORICAL
REGULARITIES)
1. The concept of historical regularities and their tentative classifica.

tion
Dialectical determinism in the interpretation of facts means, as we have

seen, causalism which assumes the existence of regularities, that is,
deeper conditionings, to which principal causes of historical facts are
subordinated; through the latter that subordination reaches the chains of
direct or accidental causes (which we have also termed adventitious).
It must be pointed out here that the concept of regularities is referred
directly to the process of history, and statements about such regularities
are termed laws.
The standpoint which accepts only direct causal conditionings has
been called common sense (or phenomenalistic) causalism. If the prin-
ciple of causality covers the principal causes, i.e., conditionings which
are more fundamental, but are "hidden below the surface" of visible
historical facts, we may speak about anti-positivistic causalism, since
that standpoint makes it possible to go beyond idiographism in the
description of past events. But, as has been said, only the statement that
the course of events is governed by specified regularities, when com-
bined with causalism that accepts the active role of human actions in
history, may be called the s~andpoint of dialectical determinism.
The classification of regularities will be linked to the systematization
of conditionings as suggested in Chap. XI, that is, couplings among ele-
ments of a system and systems (i.e., among historical facts, both simple
and compound). The following types of historical regularities can be
singled out:
(1) synchronic (structural) regularities,
(2) diachronic (causal, directional) regularities,
(3) synchronic-and-diachronic regularities (regularities of develop-
ment, structural-directional regularities).l
The first of these three categories corresponds to parallel couplings,

which point to the mutual relationships between simultaneous historical
facts, and also condition the existence of a specified network of coup-
lings among the elements of the system. The diachronic (causal, direc-
tional) regularities can be interpreted as serial couplings, which assume
a time lag between the output of the element which is the cause, and
the input of the element which is the effect. As has been demonstrated
earlier, these regularities are reducible to causal ones. The third cate-
gory of regularities, which combine the properties of the first two, is
the most important one in the course of events, since it is these laws
that determine historical development. This is why we have called them
the regularities of development (structural-directional laws). These are
the regularities which set the system in motion and account for develop-
ment, that is, reveal the mechanism of the dynamism of history. They
manifest themselves as feedbacks (cf. Chap. XI). In such feedbacks
the impact of a on b causes changes in b, which means that a contra-
diction emerges between a and b. If it is to be overcome, there must
in turn be a change in a, etc. As can easily be seen, this is as it were
a synthesis of a negative and a positive feedback. We observe here the
tendency to preserve a state that comes close to that of equilibrium, as
in the case of a negative feedback, 2 but at the same time we have the
effect of a positive feedback: those states of equilibrium rise to ever
higher levels, so that they move away from the original state of equi-
librium.a
The synchronic-diachronic regularities (that is, the regularities of
development) have a superior status with respect to the two other
groups, as they pertain to the very mechanism of history. They are thus
the most general ones and their operation is most varied.
2. Historical regularities and principal causes

The ooncept of principal causes, as introduced in this book (see Chap.
XI), entails a demarcation between such causes and regularities. The
structure of conditionings of historical reality seems to have many levels.
The term regularities and laws should in this connection be reserved
for relationships concerning the deepest structures of reality and thus
of la special importance for the oourse of events. General causes, in
turn, would apply to less deep ("inner" in L. Nowak's terminology-
THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (HISTORICAL REGULARITIES) 277
see Chap. VIn above) structures, while adventitious causes would apply
to surface phenomena. It is an open issue whether only those statements
which refer to the deepest-level regularities should be termed laws.
Those universal relationships which remain valid with respect to the
whole of known human history may certainly be classified as regulari-
ties. These universal relationships (of all the three categories specified
above) are, to put it metaphorically, the foundations of history, and
their investigation is the basis of the theory of social development. Next
to the universal ones we may mention those relationships which appear
over shorter periods of varying duration and of differing importance.
Here, too, we may look for regularities, but in our search we probably
have to stop at a more fundamental division within a given social for-
mation. 4 Universal relationships cover facts which are observable at
every stage of the development of mankind. Such facts include, for in-
stance, the use of tools, production (in the broadest sense of the term,
which covers, e.g., the gathering of food), procreation, etc. Lower-level
relationships cover facts which are observable in certain periods only,
with the further proviso that certain of these facts may occur in some
areas only. For instance, social classes appear only at a certain stage
of social development, demand is possible only when exchange of goods
and markets exist, the serfdom of peasants appears in the feudal period,
etc. Obviously, all relationships pertaining to this kind of facts have
a more or less limited historical scope, which means that they are con-
fined to specified periods.
These regularities are termed historical not only because they per-
'tain to historical facts, but also because (except for the universal ones)
they are applicable to a strictly specified spatio-temporal frame, as they
refer to facts which have spatia-temporal determinants. Yet even the
universal regularities turn out to be historical in the latter sense, al-
though their spatial and temporal frame is much wider. Such a frame
nevertheless does exist: it is determined chronologically by the emer-
gence of mankind and spatially by our globe, which is not the only
planet in the Universe, and may prove to be just one of many planets
inhabited by intelligent beings which have their own history.
We shall now proceed to discuss the major synchronic, diachronic.
and synchronic - diachronic regularities, that is, those which form the
main body of the dialectical materialist theory of social development.
3. Synchronic regularities
Problems of structure are not usually <liscussed in nomological terms,
which means that when describing the basic social and economic par-
allel couplings researchers do not point to the fact that they are syn-
chronic (structural) regularities.
The theses on the basic structural regularities are known in the anal-
ysis of the process of history as:
(1) the law of macrostructure,
(2) the law of economic structure,
(3) the law of social structure,
(4) the law of the structure of the superstructure.
The first of the four is universal in nature, whereas the remaining
three may be formulated with some degree of historical limitation.
The law of macrostructure applies to the J,argest (most comprehen-
sive) historical system, namely that macrosystem which mankind is.
The basic network of couplings in that system was discovered by Marx
and Engels, and later investigated by many representatives of the
theory of historical materialism.
The said macrosystem has the following elements: productive forces;
relations of production; and superstructure.
Social productive forces consist of three elements: tools; human
beings who know how to use them; and the objects to which those
tools are applied, i.e., raw materials and the soil.5 Productive forces can-
not exist without relations of production, with which they are always
coupled parallelly, with the proviso that in this case that parallel cou-
pling also works on the feedback principle, since - being the fundamen-
tal coupling in the mechanism of historical development (the starting
point of autodynamism) - it does not depend on any replicating system.
(For the spiritualist who does not accept autodynamism it is usually
God who acts as such a replicating system, i.e., a system which ac-
tivates both the system of productive forces and that of relations of
production.)
Relations of production are a very broad concept. In most general,
terms, they are those relations (couplings) between human beings which
develop in the course of production processes. They form the main ele-
ment of social bonds,6 that is, a macrosystem whose development is the
subject matter of historical research. Among those couplings which

combine to make relations of production and which form a very intri-
cate network we single out those which are of primary importance for
determining the nature of relations of production. They are those
couplings which refer to the ownership of the means of production. the
tools and the objects to which these are applied in the process of pro-
duction, i.e.• raw materials and the soil. As O. Lange wrote: "The
ownership of the means of production is the social relation on which
the entire complex of human relations developed in the social process
of production is based. For it is the ownership of the means of pro-
duction which decides the ways in which they are used and which
thereby determines the forms taken by co-operation and the division of
labour. Moreover the ownership of the means of production determines
the issue of who owns the products. and hence decides how they are
distributed". 7 The ownership of the means of production is in turn de-
fined by him thus: "The basic relation arises from the ownership of the
means of production. This ownership is not mere possession. It is
property, i.e., possession which is recognized by members of society.
which is protected by generally respected social standards in the shape
of laws and customs, and which is guarded by the exis,tence of sanc-
tions against the violation of these social rules".8
While productive forces cannot exist without relations of production,
the latter likewise cannot exist without the former, for the process of
production cannot take place without productive forces. The necessary
co-existence of productive forces and relations of production is reflected
in the category of mode of production. introduced by Marx. 9 Modt:)
of production means the unity of productive forces and relations of
production. In human history five modes of production are singled out.
the ownership of the means of production being taken as the criterion:
primitive community. slavery. feudalism. capitalism, and socialism. This
classification will be discussed later.
Another element of the macrosystem. that is, the superstructure. has
been defined with utmost precision and clarity by Marx. who wrote
that "the sum total of these relations of production constitutes the eco-
nomic structure of society. the real foundation. on which rises a legal
and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of
social consciousness".10 In the institutional part of the superstructure it
280 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY 'OF HISTORY
is the state which plays the principal role. It works as a regulator of

social relations, i.e., it functions so as to preserve social order while
defending the interests of the ruling class.ll It attains that goal, among
other things, by means of legal norms, i.e., that element of the super-
structure which is closely linked with the state. Next to the state and the
law the institutional part of the superstructure includes the family and
the nation12 as well as the set of moral norms by which individuals are
guided when taking part in societal life. It is obvious that such moral
norms develop precisely in the process of social interaction of individu-
als within society.
All these institutions are closely linked with social consciousness,
which is a very heterogeneous concept. In most general terms, and
with various reservations, it may be broken up into ideology and
science. We are concerned here with two interpretations of ideology:
(a) the set of those views which are useful to a given social group in at-
taining its goals; (b) the set of views which indicate what to strive for,
what goals to pursue, and what values to cherish.13 Such opinions may
be of the most varying kinds: economic, legal, philosophical, religious,
artistic, etc. These opinions, which valuate facts, develop in human
beings specified attitudes which determine their actions, including their
decisions in scientific activity.
Ideology cannot be strictly separated from science, and this is why
theendeavou.rt; to separate science from the whole of social conscious-
ness (Le., the superstructure) in order to include it, e.g., in the produc-
tive forces, do not seem justified, although science might be interpreted
both as an element of abilities within the productive forces and as
a part of the superstructure. As has been mentioned above (cf. Chap.
IX), the process of decision making, which is the starting point for all
action, and not only for scientific activity, is closely connected with
valuation. This applies not to the social sciences alone, but, though on
a somewhat different plane, to the natural sciences as wel1.14 Hence it
is fully justified to regard science as a part of the superstructure, irre-
spective of its possible inclusion in the productive forces. The difficult
problem of definition of science, which is not needed at this moment, is
disregarded here, but the issue will be ,discussed later (cf. Cbap. XIII).
To sum up, the law of macrostructure could be formulated thus: no
element of the macro system (i.e., the totality of societal facts), that is,
productive forces, relations of production and superstructure, can exist

independently of the others; they can function only if synchronically
interconnected. Since hereafter certain regularities will be described by
statements on them, the term law will be used alternately with that of
regularity.
We have to bear in mind that whenever we use such terms as pro-
ductive forces or relations of production and whenever we speak about
relationships among them, we use abbreviations which veil the intrica-
cies of human action. All laws may be formulated both in terms of
historical processes and in terms of goal-oriented human actions.
We can in turn proceed to formulate structural laws concerning
smaller systems, i.e., elements of the macrosystem as described above.
The law which we have termed that of economic structure points to the
co-existence of two spheres of economic relations: relations of produc-
tion15 and of distribution. 16 While we disregard here the dependence -of
distribution relations on production relations we have to say that there
is a structural relationship between the two. Marx wrote that the rela-
tions of distribution are "the reverse side" of those of production.l1
They are interconnected by material objects which serve to satisfy hu-
man needs, that is, goods (means of production and products). The sat-
isfaction of needs is the goal of man's economic activity. The striving
to satisfy needs is in this case a replicating system which links togeth-
er these two elements of economic relations, as the following schema
shows:
Striving to
satisfy needs
There is here no "pure" parallel coupling: as in the case of the

couplings in the macrosystem we have a combination of parallel cou-
plings with feedbacks, such that the forces of action of the various
elements differ from one another.ls
The problems of these couplings are studied by political economy,
which Lange defines thus: "Political economy, 01" social economy, is
the study of the social laws governing the production and distribution
of the material means of satisfying human needs" .19
The problem of the laws of social structure brmgsus to the field of

sociology.20 At this point. however. we are interested only in the basic
law of the social structure, which states that in the process of social
production human beings are mutually interdependent, which means
that that process could not take place without their simultaneous action.
If we confine ourselves to model situations. then thenarure of that in-
terdependence may be twofold: only in the sphere of production tech-
nology (co-operation) or both in the sphere of production technology
and the societal aspect of production (property). Synchronic relation-
ships of co-operation only take place when the means of production
equally belong to all those who participate in the societal process of
production. that is. when there is public ownership of the means of pro-
duction. This applies to the primitive community and the socialist
system. If the various people differ from one another in their relation-
ship to ownership (i.e.• the basic element of the relations of production).
which means that there is private ownership of the means of pro-
duction. next to the relationships which result from co-operation. then
we have to take into account the property relationships. This means
'that people differ from one another not only by their place in the
process of production (i.e.• profession or trade). but also by being. or
not being. owners of the means of production. The last-named criterion
makes it possible to single out the two basic (and opposing) social
groups. or classes. which may be termed the basic social classeS.11
The law of social structure then becomes the law of class structure.
It states that in a society in which there is private ownership of the
means of production ilhere are two basic and opposing classes. whose
existence depends upon the existence of each other. This can be shown
by the following sChema:
Class of owners Class of people

of means of deprived of means
production of production
Private ownership ~
of means of production
The law of class structure was discovered by Marx and Engels and
discussed by them in detail in many works. from The Communist Mani-
festo to Capital to Ludwig Feuerbach and the End of Classical Ger-

man Philosophy.22
The dichotomous interpretation of the social structure, as described
above, has been intentionally given the nature of a model, since that
enables us to bring out .the fundamental issues and to simplify highly
complex facts. Huma:nhistory does not provide examples of a simple
dichotomous social structure. It is usually variegated and such that its
more detailed description requires the adoption of a number of addi-
tional criteria of differentiation. This applies in particular to the prob"
lem of what are called intermediate classes and of intraclass divisions
(divisions of classes into strata, groups, etc.).
Conditions prevailing in various societies and in various periods
combine to form an exceptionally rich mosaic of many possible struc-
tures. Moreover, divisions which are typical of different historical
epochs may overlap.
As distinct from the dichotomous model of the basic social structure,
the real structure (which, however, is based on that dichotomy) will be
as in J. Hochfeld,23 called an expanded class structure. The dichoto-
mous structure, when seen in the light of the specified modes of pro-
duction based on the private ownership of the means of production,
yields the following pairs of basic classes:
slave owners slaves,

feudal lords serfs,
capitalists workers.
In the Marxist class theory, the functionally integral nature of the

divisions of sooiety is strongly emphasized. This is due, among other
factors, to the holistic approach in dialectical social studies.
Another fundamental structural law concerns the couplings among
the various elements of the superstructure. The problem is an intricate
one, above all because of the heterogeneous nature of those elements.
In most gener'al terms, it may be said that there isa parallel coupling
(in some cases completed with feedbacks of varying strength) between
the institutional part of the superstructure and those elements of it
which are consciousness-based. If all those elements which are loosely
connected with relations of production are eliminated from the super-
structure (this applies mainly to the family, the nation, and science),
then the following schema of the inner structure of the superstructure
may be suggested:
Further structural laws apply to the various elements (systems). For

instance, within the system "State" we have to do with the co-existence
of those who govern and those who are governed. with various rela-
tions between them and the authorities as a definite societal fact.24
4. Diachronic regularities
Like all causal nexus. the diachronic regularities point to the flow of
time necessary for a stimulus. coming from an element or a system a
(in cybernetic terminology, a designated output state of a) to evoke
a response in an element or a system b (a designated input state of b).
It is self-evident that in this interpretation the causal theory of time
flow (cf. Chap. X), which tries to explain the principle of causality just
by the flow of time, must be rejected. But, for the construction itself
of the concept of cause, it is necessary to adopt the principle of a di-
rectional flow of time; this decision must be justified in some other way,
be it by entropy. Otherwise, as has been said, a cause is a concept
which refers only to the fact that an element (or a system) is situated
between other systems; it may then equally well act upon any of the
two directions, or simultaneously, both upon the element "to the left"
of it and upon that "to the right". This is illustrated by the diagram:
G--1 The cause r---B

If we add to it the principle that time flows in a designated direction,
the diagram turns into:
IThe past 1-1-~~ The cause --~~I The effect

1-1 1
The past is here excluded from the system which functions as the cause,
but it remains connected with it because of the principle of interdepend-
ence of historical facts.
The diachronic (causal) regularities describe the ways in which cer-
tain classes of facts are directionally dependent on other classes of
facts.25 In other words, they state that specified facts (systems) always
give rise to other facts (systems), or that changes within certain facts
(systems) are stimuli that evoke responses in other specified facts (sys-
tems). In the former case, a fact (system) causes such a far-reaching
transformation of the earlier system (or its element) that we may speak
about the emergence of a new system (element). In the latter, a change
in the state of couplings within a system a brings about a transforma-
tion of another system. namely b. This takes place by the emergence
in b of new elements, which process is due to the influence of ele-
ments of a.
In the case of the directional regularities, we believe it concerns
mainly one system which brings about transformations in another
system. For instance, if we say that a rise in prices causes a decline of
the demand for the commodity whose price has risen, that is, if we
formulate such a directional regularity, we have to do with a system a
(a system of prices) which brings about a transformation in a system b
(demand). Obviously, at a certain moment the transformation goes so
far that the system transformed becomes a new one (a new quality).
J1he greatest credit for discovering social directional regularities goes
to Marx and Engels, whose works include many statements on regulari-
ties (laws) of that type. The most important two are:
(1) the law of changes in relations of production,
. (2) the law of changes in the superstructure.
According to the former, each change in the (system of) productive
forces results in a change in the (system of) relations of production,
which shows that relations of production are directionally dependent
upon productive forces. Their mutual parallel dependence has been dis-
cussed earlier.
The latter law states that changes in the superstructure depend upon
relations of production, i.e., each change intbe (system of) relations of

production results in a change in the (system of) superstructure.
These two directional laws are parts of laws of development (except
for the law of the development of the productive forces), to be dis-
cussed below.
It is worth-while quoting formulations of laws, extracted from the
writings of the fOUllders of Marxism, as given by A. Malewski. 26 Con-
cerning the relationships between situations in which people live and
the opinions and behaviour of the people in question (as presented on
a time scale) A. Malewski mentions the following laws:
"If the adoption by a group of a specified ideology requires renuncia-
tion of certain privileges that group enjoys, the majority of the group's
members will reject that ideology".
"If the followers of a political system programmatically propagate
a definite religious, philosophical, artistic or other ideology, then among
the opponents of the system the percentage of followers of opposite
ideologies increases".
"If there is a conflict between interests and the professed ideology,
then over a long period of time people en masse tend to act in accord-
ance with their interests, and not in accordance with the ideology".
"If, over a long period of time, there is a conflict between the in·
terests of a group and that group's ideology, then en masse the ideology
is modified by being adjusted to the group's interests".
These laws are rather more specific instances of the said law of
changes in the superstructure. The following law falls under the same
category:
"If a class (or any other social group) which is gaining strength faces
legal and political conditions that restrict its aspirations and are at
variance with its interests, then those ideologies which justify the need
of changing these conditions tend to become popular".
The following formulation pertaining to the law of changes in the
social structure might also be quoted from A. Malewski:
"If the owners of the means of production, guided by their short-term
interests, introduce new sources of energy which replace human labour
and develop new branches of production, they thereby cause changes
in social stratification; such changes consist in certain classes rising in
THE PROCESS OF InSTORY (InSTORICAL REGULARITIES) 287
numbers and importance, with other classes losing their previous im-
portance" .
5. The regularities of historical development (synchronic-diachronic

regularities)
As has been said earlier, the regularities of historical development are
both synchronic and diachronic and can be interpreted as feedbacks.
The dynamism of development can be borne out only when the dual
nature of these regularities is emphasized. A pure directional regularity
sets a system in motion once; to put it metaphorically, it assumes a con-
stant inflow of energy which is to ensure prospective (in ,the sense of:
future-oriented) operation of that system. A sui generis self-induction in
a system, i.e., its development, can take place only if the system which
functions as the cause and the system upon which the former system
acts are interconnected synchronically, that interconnection being rein-
forced by a feedback. In the case of unidirectional action self-induction,
as is quite obvious, cannot occur. In a macro system such as society
is, there is one basic cource of its self-development, which is accom-
panied by three additional sources, all of them being the subject matter
of the regularities of historical development.
The statements on these regularities are:
(1) the law of the development of the productive forces (together
with the law of historical progress and the law of the development of
science),
(2) the law of the development of the relations of production,
(3) the law of the development of the superstructure,
(4) the law of class struggle.
The law of the development of the productive forces is primary: its
effects manifest themselves in the working of all other laws of develop-
ment. Moreover, it is the only law of development which connot be
broken up into directional laws, since in its case we have to do with
a special instance of feedback, namely a self-coupling of a system.27
The law of development of $e productive forces shows how contra-
dictions between man and Nature (cf. Chap. IX) result in a constant
(sel~evidently, with possible regressive changes) dialectical develop-
ment of the productive forces.28 The law might be formulated as follows.
Every change in man's natural environment, that is, his every step for-
ward in gaining control over his environment. stimulates further human
actions. in other words, a further change in that environment. In this
way. to use L. Krzywicki's formulation. the material possessions of
mankind increase. The energy needed for that process is drawn from
the great reservoir which is Nature. In this way the equilibrium between
man and Nature each time is established 811: a new level. and the rela-
tionships between the two become more and more complex. Consider
a simple example: a canal is built to connect a sea with a river basin
which thus far was cut off from that sea. The canal can be used for
the transportation of crops that can be grown in that river basin. This
will increase the cultivation of certain plants; new areas will be culti-
vated, etc. The new situation may induce people to construct silos for
grain storage or a plant producing means of transportation to carry
the crops. etc. This reasoning could be extended practically into in-
finity.
The law of historical progress. referred to earlier in this chapter, is
closely connected with that of the development of the productive forces.
It speaks about the contradiction, which is constantly being overcome,
between the number of places for the organizers, that is, those who in
some way guide the process of mastering Nature, and the number of
those who are engaged in that process. The more able those people are,
the quicker the above process, which means that the number of places
for organizers, and hence the demand for them, increases. The law
under consideration indicates that historical progress is in the hands of
human beings: it is not, as thinkers in the Age of Enlightenment be-
lieved, a force whose place in history is independent of human actions.
In gaining control over Nature man is assisted above all by science.
The quality of an organizer on an increasing scale depends on his
ability to make use of the achievements of science. Scientific knowledge
thus becomes an important factor of historical progress. The relation-
Man
I
A
,
-
Number of Development
Development Quality of
1---+ organizers
r places for ~ Nature ~ of productive
of science organizers I+- forces
T I
THE PROCESS OF IDSTORY (IDSTORICAL REGULARITIES) 289
ships involved are shown in the schema above. As can be seen, it is

an expansion of the law of the development of the productive forces
in that part which refers to human activity.
Science thus turns out to be a factor which is closely linked with pro-
ductive forces. It affects the development of those forces through human
skills, and hence may be treated as part of the system "productive
forces", on the condition that we at the same time take into account
its role as a factor in social consciousness. The place of science in
the process of history is quite exceptional. It is therefore not to be
wondered that 17th and 18th century rationalists, confident of the
power of reason, believed science to be the independent and principal
factor of historical progress (the concept of historical development was
not yet known).
Science is coupled with both relations of production and productive
forces, in both cases on the feedback principle, as shown below.
r::.-:----,.---.J Remaining elements

of the superstructure
The law of the development of the relations of production is some-

times defined as the law of necessary conformity between relations of
production and the character of the productive forces. 29 The law states
above all that relations of production depend upon the productive
forces. Metaphorically, Marx formulated it in his saying that the quem
gave rise to the society of feudal lords, and the steam mill resulted in
the society of industrial capitalists. It is true that a feedback exists
between the productive forces and relations of production, but the
coupling: productive forces --+ relations of production works much more
strongly than the reverse one. This results in contradictions between
the state of the productive forces and 'the character of relations of pro-
duction.
The productive forces are always ahead of relations of production.

and the latter constantly adjust themselves to the level of the former.
The law of the development of relations of production might be for-
mulated thus: Every change in the system "productive forces" results
in changes in the system "relations of production" in such a way that
the character of relations of production is made to correspond to the
level of the productive forces. This would be so if all the inputs and
outputs of the systems involved were in operation. but this does not
occur in fact. Hence the law now under consideration merely points to
the tendency toward such a situation which gives the productive forces
opportunities for development.
The law of the development of the superstructure is called the law of
necessary conformity between the superstructure and the economic base,
or the second basic law of sociology. It states that changes in the sys-
tem "productive forces" result in the corresponding changes in the sys-
tem "superstructure". The latter changes are to adjust the superstruc-
ture to the situation in relations of production so that it would not hin-
der the development of those relations. The adjustment may consist in
a change in a number of elements of the superstructure; such a change
may consist in the emergence of new elements or a more or less essen-
tial transformation of existing ones. Some elements of the old super-
structure may remain unchanged as far as they still comply with the
requirements of the development of relations of production; in such
a case they are taken over in their previous (though, of course, develop-
ing) state by the new superstructure. This applies above all to science.
family relations. the institution of nation. although this lack of change
should not be interpreted in an absolute sense. As a result the super-
structure is a system which includes old elements and those which are
qualitatively new (as compared with the superstructure characteristic of
the previous period). needed for the preservation of the· new relations
of production. The elements taken over from the old superstructure
include those which develop continuously and serve the successive sys-
tems of relations of production (e.g.. science. and - to some extent-
religion). and those which remain in the new superstructure inertially,
although the new relations of production could develop freely without
such obsolete forms. An example is provided by the sphere of manners
in the various fields of societal life. Both old and new elements may
include ideas which are ahead of the actual state of development of

a given society. They may be ideas which have no chance of being put
into effect (Utopias) either because of their content or because of the
methods they suggest. For instance, Utopian socialism propounded
ideas which, generally speaking, would dominate the future, but at the
same time suggested that they be put into effect by methods which had
no chance of implementation. But those ideas which are ahead of their
times may also include those which have a chance to materialize and
thereby to "speed up" historical development. The verb is placed in
quotation marks because without them it would suggest that historical
development in principle takes place so to say "normally", and that in
certain cases it can be "speeded up" . Yet, if we assume that history is
made by human beings themselves, then everything they do in that
sphere is "normal", since there is no historical development without
their actions. to speak about speeding up development is a remnant
of the opinion that progress takes place independently of human ac-
tions.
Ideas may become an active element of the process of history omy
through the intermediary of human actions; but this requires people
who know how to formulate such (realizable) ideas and to turn them
into directives of action for large social groups or into (some other)
systemth.at guides human actions. An outstanding example is provided
by the activity of Lenin and the Russian communists who knew how to
bring about the socialist revolution that started the spreading of the
socialist system in the world. The essence of success was a system of
ideas which under the given historical circumstances had chances of
materialization, on the obvious condition that social activity would in-
tensify enormously.
Conflicts of interests between antagonistic social classes, which man-
ifest themselves in the fact that these conflicts incessantly emerge in
the form of class struggle,are usually not treated as laws of historical
development. !tis usually said that class struggtel'° is a factor of social
development, and that class struggle reflects the contradiction between
the productive forces and relations of production. These statements are
correct, yet it seems that they place too little emphasis on the role of
the class struggle in the process of history. This emphasis on the active
role of the class struggle in historical development might be raised to
292 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF HlSI'ORY
the status of a law of historical development, even if it would base its

existence on the working of the law of the development of the produc-
tive forces and relations of production. The formulation might be as
follows. In a society which consists of opposing classes that represent
conflicting interests antagonistic attitudes develop. These in the final
analysis result in the fact that one of the classes tends to maintain the
existing type of relations of production, whereas the other class strives
to change them, which means that actions of one class must evoke
counteractions of the other, which in turn results in social changes. We
have here to do with a feedback combined with a parallel coupling, a
phenomenon which is typical of historical development. This can be
illustrated by the diagram below, which is simply another version of
one given earlier.
I The exploiting
class
L I The exploited
class
I
Conflict of interests
'-- resulting from -
relations of production
This schema obviously applies to the model situation of a dichoto-

mous society, and not to any real society with a developed class struc-
ture. The schema is merely intended to show that actions of one class
incite the other class to action. In this way, in class societies class
struggle becomes a source of changes. It is, however, to be stressed ex-
plicitly that this is not the fundamental source: the latter is referred
to by the law of the development of the productive forces. That law
reflects man's striving to satisfy his needs. The necessity to satisfy one's
needs is a stimulus to endeavours to control Nature. This fundamental
striving gives rise to an adventitious one, namely that to satisfy one's
needs as fully as possible. In a class-based society it manifests itself in
the conflict of interests, as mentioned above, which results in antagonis-
tic attitudes and class struggle.
Yet class contradictions are not a universal factor of social develop-
ment. In a class-based society they are a secondary source in the sense
that they ultimately help to overcome the propertied class' striving to
preserve the status quo.
Class struggle takes place on various levels, which are reducible to

the principal three: economic. ideological. and political. It is often so
that the conflict develops on all the three levels. but sometimes we may
observe a clear predominance of a conflict at one level only. An ex-
ample of class struggle at the economic level can be seen in the peas-
ants' resistance to pay feudal rents; the conflict between the Jacobins
and the Girondists. between the Church and heretic groups. between
the logical positivists and the Marxists. etc.• can serve as examples of
ideological struggle.
Struggle at the political level is the highest form of class struggle as
it pertains to the very core of the conflict between the classes, that is.
the wielding of power, and is accordingly a manifestation of a corre-
spondingly high level of class consciousness. That is a struggle in which
the seizure, consolidation, or regaining of power is at stake. As J. J.
Wiatr says. the contribution of Marxism to the study of political move-
ments consists in "a determined and consistent adoption of the sociolo-
gical perspective, that is, in linking the interpretation of those move-
ments with mass phenomena of ,long duration. in particular with the
changes which take place in the class structure of society. In the
Marxist interpretation, all political movement is a more or less clear
crystallization of strivings and demands of given social class, a group
of aliied classes. or part of a class".31
Class struggle may take on different forms at different levels. Some
of them are fairly quiet. whereas others are violent. In the case. for
instance. of the class struggle waged by peasants in the feudal period
we can single out its latent and manifest forms; while evasion of work
on the lord's fields was one of the latent. peasant uprisings were the
highest of the manifest forms.
At the political level. revolution is the most violent form of struggle:
it consists in the striving to abolish the ruling class and to seize power
by force. A revolution indicates that the contradiction between the
development of the productive forces and that of relations of produc-
tion was very far reaching and that there were no more peaceful ways
of overcoming it. It often occurs that the state succeeds. by its refor-
mist policy. to defuse a revolutionary situation and thereby to postpone
the settling of the fundamental conflict.
The theory of revolutions was worked out fully by the founders of
Marxism. The process took place in two stages: the Marxian and the
Leninist. Marx studied the mechanism of revolutions mainly on the
data provided by the situation in France in 1848-51 and in 1871, and
formulated many important theorems referring to the socialist revolu-
tions.
The theory of socialist revolutions was further developed by Lenin,
whose contribution consists above all in proving the important role
played by the working class party in the struggle for power and in for-
mulating the concept of two stages - the bourgeois-democratic and the
socialist - of revolutions in those countries which lag behind in their
capitalist development. He also stressed the fact that in both stages it
is the working class which plays the leading role.
It may be said generally that the law of class struggle points to the
outstanding role of the masses in history: the masses form the most
numerous groups which struggle to change existing conditions, and
thus promote historical development.
To sum up, we have to stress the strong interdependence of the regu-
larities of historical development. History is so rich and complex: that
the formulation of laws and their interdependence implies always a cer-
tain simplification (abstraction). These laws always apply to facts in
their simplified forms. The following schema accordingly also is a sim-
Superstructure
Institutions
----l Science Ideology other than
the state
The state
(regulatory factor)
1 Relations of productIOn
1 Social
formation
Class struggle
I
-J
Class of owners
of means of production Exploited class Mode of
T .J,
p",doction
Productive forces
----l
Man
./. T
Nature
THE PROCESS OF IDSTORY ~IDSTORICAL REGULARITIE~ 295
plification of the mechanism of development (the direction: from the

productive forces to relations of production to the superstructure indi-
cates a stronger influence than those in the other directions). The
schema applies to a class society, that is, that type of society which has
most often been studied by historians.
6. Stages in the process of history (social formationsJ!
The totality of the productive forces, relations of production, and super-

structure, considered in a given period, constitute a social formation (d.
the diagram above). In other words, a social formation is a social mac-
rosystem as analysed from the point of view of development. O. Lan-
ge defined a social formation as "the mode of production together with
its superstructure",sa but since he does not identify superstructure with
the totality of phenomena of social consciousness, in his interpretation
social formation does not include certain elements of consciousness.
J. Hochfeld wrote thus: "What I call a socio-economic formation is the
totality of social relations in a specified place and time, which is sin-
gled out because of its specific economic system (also termed its eco-
nomic base) and because of its ideological and institutional super-
structure, which is functionally subordinated to that system. An eco-
nomic system is dominated by a mode of productiQn which is character-
istic of a given formation".34 This complies with O. Lange's approach,
who wrote: "The mode of production together with its superstructure is
called the social formation or social system, and the relations of
production proper to a given social formation are called its economic
base". And the superstructure "embraces only those conscious social
relations (.. ) and those social ideas and socio-psychological attitudes
which are necessary f9r the existence of a given mode of production
(...)".35 This is not clear, as we do not know whether the permanence of
social consciousness performs the ancillary function referred to above.
J. J. Wiatr's position is a middle one: he criticizes Stalin for his limi-
tations of the concept of superstructure, but on his own part does not
include in the superstructure "those opinions and institutions which are
neutral in relation to the existing economic base" .86 In the present
writer's opinion, the concept of social formation, if it is to be useful to
historians, who strive for an integrated approach to historical develop-
ment, ought to include - in conformity with Marx's opinion on the

issue - the totality of phenomena of social consciousness.37
Historical studies carried out by the founders of Marxism, confirmed
by later research, have revealed in history five social formations, which
in their "pure" forms are theoretical models of more complex relations
that exist in fact. That complexity is due to a constant process of trans-
formation (development) of a given social system. which accounts for
the fact that - within a given formation - elements of !he earlier forma-
tions vanish and elements of the new one begin to appear. In order to
facilitate comprehension of that constant dynamism of development
Marxist historians have made a distinction between the two stages of
the emergence of a new formation within an old one. In the first, only
loose elements of the new formation emerge; in the second, those ele-
ments combine to form a new system which gradually makes the old
formation collapse. When it comes in turn to the development of a new
formation, historians see two or three stages mthat process. In the
former case, they refer to the period of an upward trend and that of
a downward trend (in which the formation under consideration de-
clines).38 In the latter case, reference is usually made to the periods of
emergence, stabilization, and decline. But the adoption of any of these
concepts is a matter of convention, since each of them is equally well
substantiated. The latter, however, lends itself better to translation into
the language of cybernetics and information rt:b.eory. Now, if a social
formation is treated as a stable system which through ergodic pro-
cesses89 strives for a state of equilibrium, then we can study that for-
mation's resistance to disturbances in its development in the various
stages of its existence. Now an emerging system shows little resistance
to disturbances; it becomes resistant in the period of its stabilization, to
lose that resistance in the period of decline.
A formation can also be analysed from the point of view of the or-
dering of its elements, that is, the entropy of that formation treated as
a system. In the first stage the degree of entropy is considerable; it
decreases with the process of internal ordering of the system (period of
stabilization) to increase again in the period of the formation's decline.
The said five formations, as observed in historical research, and
hence standing for appropriate generalizations of facts., are: primitive
community; slavery; feudalism; capitalism; socialism. 40 The theory of
historical materialism defines the respective places of the various for-

mations in the process of historical progress (i.e.. the increasing con-
trol of Nature by man). The order of formations. as given above, re-
flects their actual order in the past. Thus formations are the principal
stages of the process of history and may accordingly be taken as the
basic criterion for periodization (cf. Chap. XXII). This is not to imply
that every society goes through every formation: such an opinion would
border on fatalism. In most cases, development in fact consist in the
passage from a certain formation to the next one, but often a formation
is passed over. For instance, Slavonic peoples did not go through slav-
ery formation, even though elements of slavery were sometimes quite
strong. Transition from formation to formation is the essence of the
process of history.
The process of history, as outlined in this chapter, is the subject mat-
ter of historical cognition, which has its reconstruction in view.
REFERENCES
1 The division into synchronic (functional) and diachronic (directional) laws
(the latter being applicable to the whole of social development or to some ele-
ments of it) is to be found in M. Mandelbaum (see The British Journal for the
Philosophy of Science, XI, 1957). He does not mention, however, the category
of synchronic-diachronic laws. In the Polish literature on the subject O. Lange
refers to three kinds of laws: causal laws, structural laws, and functional laws
(for quantitative relationships only) (cf. Political Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 49).
This classification is fairly universally accepted, with the proviso that the causal
laws are held to be the most fundamental ones. J. J. Wiatr holds that "social
laws are specified and historical in nature", i.e., that they have spatio-temporal
determinants, and classifies them by the degree of generality: those which are
valid during the whole period of human development as we know it; those valid
over several socio-economic fonnations; those valid for one fonnation only;
and those valid over shorter periods of time (cf. Szkice 0 materializmie histo-
rycznym i socjologii (Essays on Historical Materialism and Sociology), Warszawa
1962, pp. 24-5).
2 H_ Greniewski, Cybernetics without Mathematics, ed. cit., pp. 37-9.
3 Ibid., pp. 39-41.
4 We use the tenn social formation instead of socio-economic fonnation, be-
cause the modifier social is taken here in its broadest sense, whicb. covers the
whole of human history.
5 Sometimes mention is made only of instruments and human beings with
their skills (cf. J. J. Wiatr's book quoted in footnote 1 in fine, p. 80).
6 On social relationships see J. Szczepanski, Elementarne pojfJcia socjologii
(The Elementary Concepts of Sociology), Warszawa 1970.
298 THE OBJECTIVE METHODOLOGY OF HlSI'ORY
7 O. Lange, Political ECfNIomy, vol. I, ed. cit., pp. 16-7.

8 Ibidem.
9 K. Marx, "A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy", Selected
Works, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 329.
10 Ibidem. Further Marxist analyses of the issue of base and superstructure
tended to reduce the concept of the latter to those elements only which are
connected with a given base; this implied the exclusion of (a) constant elements
which are transmitted from one epoch to another (e.g., language, family, rela·
tionships, science); (b) relics of the old superstructure; (3) elements which are
anticipations of a new superstructure. This approach was marked in particular
in J. Stalin's Marksizm i voprosy yazykoznaniya (Marxism and the Problems of
Linguistics), Moscow 1950.
Discussions about the inclusion of certain elements (e.g., science) in the super-
structure were extensive. The problem may be approached in two ways. One
would be to assume that the superstructure covers all that in social conscious-
ness and social institutions which serves a given mode of production (cf. O. Lan-
ge, Political Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 26), but then we would have to do
with the superstructure of a given mode of production, and not with that super-
structure which is to be observed in a given historical period or epoch. The
other would be to assume that the superstructure covers the whole of social in-
stitutions and social consciousness in a given period or epoch. The latter ap-
proach, which was represented by K. Marx, seems to be more useful from a his-
torian's point of view as it does not break up a system which ought to be in-
vestigated as a whole. This does not, of course, exclude other subdivisions of
the superstructure conceived in this way, subdivisions which might take into
account the said constant elements, the relics of an old superstructure and anti-
cipations of a new one.
11 Such is the formulation given by G. Klaus in his Kybemetik und Gesell-
schaft, Berlin 1%4, pp. 60-1.
12 The frequent distinction between nationalities (supposed to have existed
before the advent of capitalism) and nations (from capitalism on) is held by the
present writer to give rise to an unnecessary confusion in historical research. If
we accept a nation to be a historical institution, we also accept the fact that its
elements have been shaped gradually. It is not clear why should we speak about
the Polish nationality during the reign of Sigismundus Augustus (16th cent.-
Tr.), and not about the Polish nation, even though we fully realize the differ-
ence in the inner consolidation of that nation in the various periods. The issue
of the characteristics a given group must have to deserve being called a nation
is not analysed here as it is both extremely complex and beyond the needs of
our present considerations. Note only that we hold the consciousness of specific
bonds, consciousness shaped by a common past, to be the main (and necessary)
element of the existence of a nation. This is the only element observable in all
those cases in which we may speak about nations. Neither the territorial nor
the linguistic factor is necessary or sufficient in that respect. An interesting ex-
ample is offered by the Atlas narodov mira (An Atlas of Nations throughout
the World), Moscow 1964, which uses the criterion of language and conscious-
ness in singling out nations and ethnic groups.
13 This distinction was introduced by A. Malewski (see his "0 rozbiei:nos-
ciach w pogl~dach socjologicznych i 0 rozbiewosciach w pojmowaniu nauki"
(Differences in Sociological Opinions and in the Concept of Science), Studia
Filozoficzne, No. 2/1958). He also singled out a third interpretation of the con-
cept of ideology, namely all those statements which merely have appearances of
theorems, and emotions that lack cognitive values. Such also is the definition of
ideology advanced by W. Stark (see footnote 14 below). J. J. Wiatr uses the
definition which resembles Malewski's first formulation: "An ideology is a set
of opinions and beliefs which serve social classes, political movements, na-
tional- and all other - groups as the foundation and substantiation of their ac-
tivites". (Cf. ldeologia i zycie spoleczne, Warszawa 1965, p. 7.)
14 There are very few works concerned with ideological conditionings of
science, even though the problem calls for special investigations. The major
studies are: K. Mannheim, ldeologie und Utopie, Frankfurt a. Main 1952;
Th. Geiger, ldeologie und Wahrheit, Stuttgart-Wien 1953; W. Stark, The Socio-
logy of Knowledge, London 1958. G. Myrdal's work has been mentioned earlier.
15 Note that here the term production relations as linked with the term
distribution relations is narrower in its extension than the term production rela-
tions as used earlier to denote the base.
16 O. Lange says that "there are two kinds of economic relations. Those of
the first kind appear in the process of production and are called relations of
production or production relations, those of the second kind appear in the pro-
cess of distribution and are called relations of distribution or distribution rela-
tions; where, at a particular stage of historical development, distribution takes
the form of exchange, distribution relations are called exchange relations". (Poli-
tical Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 9).
17 The corresponding quotation from Zur Kritik der politischen okonomie is
to be found in o. Lange, op. cit., p. 12.
18 The problem will become' clearer in the forthcoming analysis.
19 O. Lange, op. cit., p. 1.
20 Opinions on the subject matter of sociology are widely divergent in both

Marxist and non-Marxist literature of the subject. This is reflected in numerous
works and, papers on the issue. All definitions, both those which refer to the
study of the group structure of society and those which stress that sociology is
the science of the laws of social structure and social development, lack clarity.
This, however, is a consequence of the rapid growth of that discipline and the
resulting varying interpretations of its subject matter. In Poland, the existing
situation is reflected by the range of problems discussed in Studia Socjologiczne.
Yet, whatever definition be adopted, the issue of social structure is one of the
focal points of interest of sociology. In Poland, J. Szczepanski's Elementarne
pOjlicia sociologii (Elementary Concepts of Sociology), Warszawa 1970 (rev. ed.)
is that outline of sociology which is the most useful of all for a student of his-
tory. J. Szczepanski says that the subject matter of sociology covers "the mani-
festations and processes of the formation of the various aspects of communal
life of human beings; the structure of the various forms of human communi-
ties; phenomena and processes taking place in such communities as a result of
interactions between human beings; the forces which bring such communities
together and which break them up; the changes and transformations which
take place in such communities". (Op. cit., p. 12).
21 Note Lenin's definition of a social class: "Klasarni nazyvayutsia bolshie
grupy ludey, rozlicayusciesia po ikh mestu v istoriceski opredelennoy sisteme
obscestvennego proizvodstva, po ikh otnoseniyu (bolsey castiu zakreplennomu
i oformlonnemu v zakonakh) k sredstvam proizvodstva, po ikh roll v obscestven-
noy organizatsii truda, a, sledovatelno, sposobam poluceniya i razmeram toy
doli obscestvennego bogatstva, kotoroy oni raspolagayut" (Classes are large
groups of people which differ from one another by the place they hold in a his-
torically determined system of societal production, by the relation (usually
sanctioned and fixed by law) to the means of production, by the role in the
social organization of labour, and, consequently, by the type and the size of
participation of that part of social wealth which they have at their disposal).
(Y. Lenin, Socineniya (Collected Works), vol. 29, p. 388).
22 In the Polish literature of the subject the Marxist theory of classes has
been most comprehensively treated by J. Hochfeld in "Marksowska teoria klas:
pr6ba systematyzacji" (fhe Marxian Class Theory: a Tentative Systematization),
Studia Socjologiczne, No. 1/1961, pp. 29--47, and No. 3/1961, pp. 55-85, and in
Sturiia 0 marksowskiej teorii spoleczenstwa (Studies in Marxian Social Theory),
Warszawa 1963, See also S. Ossowski, Struktura klasowa w swiadomosci spo-
lecznej (Class Structure as Reflected in Social Consciousness, L6dz 1957. For
non-Polish works see R. Bendix and S. M. Lipset (eds.), "Karl Marx' Theory
of Social Classes" in: Class, Status and Power: a Reader in Social Stratification,
Glencoe 1957. Interesting comments on social structure can also be found in
B. Gali(ski, "Niekt6re problemy struktury spolecznej w swietle badan wiejskich"
(Some Issues of Social Structure as Reflected by Studies in the Rural Areas),
Studia Socjologiczne, No. 1/1963. See also A. Jasmski, L. Nowak, "Foundations
of Marx's Theory of Class: A Reconstruction" in: Poznan Studies in the Philo-
sophy of Sciences and the Humanities, vol. I, No.1, 1975, Amsterdam, pp. 91-
119.
28 Cf. J. Hochfeld's paper in Studia Socjologiczne, pp. 42 ff (quoted in foot-
note 22above)
24 The problem of power has been discussed widely in sociological works.
The various standpoints are analysed in W. Wesolowski, Klasy, warstwy i wla-
dza (Classes, Strata, and Power), Warszawa 1966. A number of structural laws
can be found in A. Malewski, "Empiryczny sens materializmu historycznego"
(fhe Empirical Sense of Historical Materialism), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1957,
pp. 69 ff.
25 This obviously assumes the acceptance of the principle that historical facts
can recur. The problem will be discussed in Part Five of the book, when the
methodological structure of history, and hence its place in the system of sciences
is analysed, for that requires certain comparisons with natural science, and also
reference to the nature of the subject matter of historical research, i.e., the struc-
ture of the past.
26 Cf. his paper quoted in footnote 24 above, pp. 58-81.
27 U. H. Greniewski, Cybernetics without Mathematics, ed. cit., p. 42.
2S O. Lange calls this law the law of the progressive development of produc-
tive forces (Political Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., pp. 34-6).
29 O. Lange calls it the first basic law of sociology (Political Economy, vol. I,
ed. cit., p. 23). His term is not clear to the present writer.
30 In his foreword to the third German edition of K. Marx's "The Eight-
eenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte", F. Engels wrote: "It was precisely Marx
who had first discovered the great law of motion of history, the law according
to which all historical struggles, whether they proceed in the political, religious,
philosophical or some other ideological domain, are in fact only the more or
less clear expression of struggles of social classes, and that the existence and
thereby the collisions, too, between those classes are in turn conditioned by the
degree of development of their economic position, by the mode of their produc-
tion and of their exchange determined by it". Selected Works, vol. I, ed. cit.,
pp. 223-224. In non-Marxist sociology the studies of the class struggle are con-
tained in, or replaced by, the studies of social mobility, which is a broader
concept than that of class struggle.
31 U. J. J. Wiatr, Szkice 0 materializmie historycznym i socjologii, ed. cit.,
p. 114. Some findings made by that author will be used below in the comments
on revolution .
• 32 The current term is: soci~-economic formations. The term: social forma-
tion will be used here, since in the present writer's opinion social development
tantamounts to the whole of historical development. Should we pay a special
attention to economic issues, then why should we disregard political, ideologi-
cal, and other problems, which also are elements of a given formation? The
term social formation is used by O. Lange, too.
33 U. O. Lange, Political Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 26.
34 J. Hochfeld, Studia 0 marksowskiej teorii spoleczenstwa (Studies in Marx-
ian Social Theory), ed. cit., pp. 171-2.
35 O. Lange, Political Economy, vol. I, ed. cit., p. 26.
36 J. J. Wiatr, Szkice 0 materializmie historycznym (Essays in Historical Ma-
terialism), ed. cit., pp. 71-2, 81.
37 K. Marx, "A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy", vol. I,
ed. cit., p. 329.

38 U. Voprosy istorii, No. 3/1955.
39 Cf. O. Lange, Wholes and Parts, ed. cit., pp. 58 ff.
PART FOUR
THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY

THEORY OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-
BASED KNOWLEDGE
XIII. THE NATURE OF HISTORICAL COGNITION
1. General description of the process of cognition
Reflections on the foundations of historical knowledge, interpreted here

as the knowledge of the past events in the history of mankind,! should
begin with a general description of the process of cognition. Acquiring
the knowledge of the past, which takes place through historical re-
search, is - regardless of the properties which might be ascribed to it-
part of the process of human cognition.
Cognition can be approached from two points: either as the process
in which the subject of cognition (the knowing subject) acquires in-
formation of the object of cognition, or as the result of that process. In
the latter case the process of cognition becomes knowledge. The know-
ledge of the object of cognition is thus a result of the process (act) of
cognition, which, however, assumes a system of memory.
Between cognition and lmowledge there is a feedback-type relation-
ship: knowledge depends on the process of cognition, since without that
process (that is, the sum of the single acts of cognition) there is no
result of cognition; on the other hand, the process of cognition itself
takes place on the basis of existing knowledge. But the latter relation-
ship is not universally and equally accepted in epistemology. Hence at
this point we enter the sphere of controversies between the various ap-
proaches to cognition. On the who~e,the differences in philosophical
opinions on the problem of cognition can be reduced to those in the
interpretation of the object of cognition, of the relationship between
cognition and knowledge, and of the scope of man's cognitive possi-
bilities.
The object of cognition is treated either as existing independently of
the knowing subject and outside that subject (that is, as it is often said.
as existing objectively) or as a product of the mind of the knowing
sUbjeot. The former opinion is upheld by materialism (which accepts
the material world as the object of cognition) and objective idealism
306 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
(which assumes the spiritual nature of the object of cognition. but ac-
cepts the existence of the latter as independent of the knowing SUbject).
The latter is upheld by subjective idealism. The controversy is in the
sphere of ontology, and its sense forms as it were a bridge between on-
tology and epistemology.
The nature of the relationship between the process of cognition and
knowledge belongs strictly to the sphere of epistemology. Two basic
situations are possible. (1) We first have some a priori knowledge which
is independent of· experience. and a properly structured mind, and the
process of cognition starts from that base. Once it has started, the feed-
back between cognition and knowledge begins to operate. (2) It is ex-
perience which serves as the starting point; it gives us knowledge which
in turn becomes a more or less indispensable condition of the further
process of cognition. The former case is assumed by apriorism (Carte-
sian Platonism, Kantism, conventionalism). and the latter, by epistemo-
logical empiricism (Bacon, Locke, Hume, Mill), which usually appears
together with sensualism (Condillac). Epistemological empiricism has
two versions: positivist (which treats the knowing subject as a merely
passive perceiver) and dialectical, which assumes an active role of the
knowing subject in the process of oognition and his growing knowledge
of the object of cognition.
We disregard here what is called intuitive cognition. since in that
case neither an a priori nor an a posteriori process of oognition taking
place through the intermediary of the knowing subject is assumed. Such
cognition is olaimed to consist in some direct intuitive view of the
object of cognition. obtained by a "penetration" into that object.
Marxist epistemology. which assumes the existence of an objective.
material world that is independent of the knowing subject, takes the
standpoint of materialistic (sensualistic) empiricism in its dialectical
version, i.e., the version which emphasizes the dialectical relationship
between cognition and knowledge and' thus assumes the essential role
of knowledge in the process of cognition.
Opinions on the scope and the quality of that knowledge which hu-
man beings can acquire vary, too, according to standpoints. Agnosticism
denies the possibility of any complete knowledge of the object of cogni-
tion. Its Kantian version states that we acquire a knowledge of pheno-
mena only, without grasping "the essence of things" (noumena), while
THE NATURE OF HISTORICAL COGNITION 307
radical philosophical scepticism stresses the impossibility of arriving at

the truth. Positiviy'lm (or naive realism), which opposes agnosticism,
fails to notice the complexity of the process of cognition and assumes
that sensory perception can give us an immediate and faithful reflection
of the object of cognition, thus resolving the problem of the knowa-
bility of the world. A. J. Ayer is right in emphasizing that the assump-
tion that "the physical objects which we commonly perceive are, in
a sense to be explained, directly 'given to us' " means in fact an intui-
tive approach.2
These two extreme views are rejected by dialectical materialism,
which raises against agnosticism the claim that the world is knowable,
but emphasizes that this is not to imply that it is already fully known
or that the knowledge of it can be acquired in a finite number of acts
of cognition.3 If we acquire some knowledge of the world and act
effectively on the basis of that knowledge, then this means that the
world is knowable, even though the process of cognition is a complex
and difficult one. It blames positivism for the denial of the active role
of the mind "of the knowing subject and points out that the world be-
comes knowable only if we take that factor into account. The human
mind both enables human beings to acquire a knowledge of the world
by contributing forms of perception of facts as a result of experience
and frees the content of human knowledge from deformations due to
the imperfection of human senses. This approach finds reflection in the
distinction made between the stage of sensory perception and that of
abstract thinking, in which language is used as an instrument of
thought. 4
For all the divergences in the opinions on the process of cognition
and its results, there is a common acceptance of the view that know-
ledge depends on the process of cognition, which means that know-
ledge is acquired in the process of cognition.
2. Characteristics of scientific cognition
In respect to scientific cognition (to which the previous statements ap-

ply) we should inquire about the difference between scientific and "or-
dinary" or "everyday" cognition. To be more specific, we could ask
whether the difference consists in the process of cognition or becomes
308 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
manifest only in the sphere of the knowledge acquired through cogni-

tion.
The answer turns out to be dffiicult to give, but the starting point
seems simple. Since the main difference between cognition in general
and scientific cognition is that the goal of the latter is not to acquire
a knowledge of the world in general, but a scientific knowledge of it,
we could define scientific cognition as that whose goal is to acquire
scientific knowledge. But then the problem arises, what that scientific
knowledge is,and what the process of acquiring it is or ought to be.
Science, or scientific knowledge, has boon defined .in various ways.6
F. Bacon (in his Novum Organum) emphasized its pragmatic aspect by
stating that science helps man to control Nature and satisfies his striv-
ing for self-knowledge. From that point of view, scientific knowledge
would be defined by its goal. The same criterion is used to single out
scientific knowledge if the latter is defined as the true knowledge (that
is, the knowledge which is based on the "truth versus falsehood" prin-
ciple).6 In the latter case, the goal of scientific cognition consists .in
acquiring true knowledge. It is emphasized that such a knowledge must
have certain characteristics which, taken together, might be described
as the requirement of precision. One of the earliest definitions which
pointed to the methodological structure of scientific knowledge was that
given by W. S. Jevons in The Principles of Science. He wrote that scien-
1Jific knowledge is generalized knowledge as distinct from the sensory
knowledge of facts, and such generalizations are made through the
detection of identity and classification. "Science (...) is the detection of
identity, and classification is the placing together, either in thought or
in actual proximity of space, those objects between which identity has
been detected". 7 Contemporary authors also stress the general and ab-
stract nature of scientific knowledge.8
Knowledge is sometimes classed into scientific knowledge and ideo-
logy. But the demarcation line cannot be drawn clearly. This is not only
because valuation (that is, classification by the criterion: good versus
bad, and not by the criterion: true versus false) underlies all decisions,
the scientific ones included, but even more because what is commonly
understood to be science may in certain cases function as ideology, i.e.,
as knowledge which serves the interests of specified groups.
For instance, the Copernican theory for a long time played an ideo-
logical role by undermining the dominant system of religious valuation. 9

In view of the strong links between science and ideology it is often
emphasized that scientific knowledge is (or ought to be) neutral with
respect to the interests of various social groups. This is only partially
correct, and even that on the condition that the relationships between
science and ideology are not denied, and that distinction is made be-
tween those relationships which make it easy and those which make it
difficult to arrive at the truth.
Tentative definitions of scientific knowledge strongly bring out the
sociological aspect of the issue. From that point of view, scientific
knowledge would be that which is acquired by a properly recruited
group of people who are professionally concerned with science (men of
science, scholars). They are guided by certain specialized standards of
conduct which are aimed at gaining true knowledge. Such standards
may be interpreted either as existing or as postulated. Many endeavours
have been made to formulate them, the common point being the prin-
ciple of the supervision of research by the totality of scientists. Scientific
knowledge would thus be a knowledge which is subject to public ap-
proval by specialists, that is, subject to supervision.
Scientific cognition, that is cognition which yields scientific know-
ledge (as described above), is a variety of cognition in general. Like all
cognition, it takes origin in sensory experience, in which, as has been
said, we acquire a knowledge of the external world not directly, but
only as the cause of our sensory experience,1° i.e., as a set of data about
that world. In scientific cognition, a man of science has at his disposal
specialized instruments which enable him to decipher information usu-
ally inaccessible to ordinary people. Some of those instruments over-
come the natural limitations of our senses. An example of an instru-
ment which makes it possible to decipher information that is inac-
cessible to ordinary human beings is provided by the microscope; the
knowledge of palaeography, which enables one to read old texts, also
plays the role of such an instrument. But the principal characteristics
of scientific cognition are not to be sought at the level of sensory cogni-
tion: it consists in the abstract nature of scientific cognition, manifested
to a large degree even at the level of sensory cognition in the decipher-
ing of data which require a special knowledge in order to be decoded.
At that level of cognition we cannot, as has been said earlier, do with-
310 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF I:USTORY
out language. Language thus becomes a necessary instrument of scien-

tific cognition and of description of the world.l l The rules of research
indicate that the language of science should facilitate to the maximum
the conveying of information both within and without the milieu of
scientists. Scientific cognition is not an isolated fact, but forms part of
the general process of the development of science and in that sense is
largely indirect in nature as it requires taking into account the results
obtained by other people both within and without the scientific milieu.
If scientific cognition is to perform its principal task which is to pro-
vide true knowledge, then it must include the procedure of substantiat-
ing statements by means of verifying them. Only substantiated know-
ledge can become scientific. While in everyday cognition the issue of
substantiating the knowledge acquired is clearly of secondary im-
portance, in scientific cognition that stage of the process of cognition is
clearly marked and becomes one of the main sections of the methodo-
logy of sciences or broadly interpreted epistemology.
3. The controversy over the nature of historical cognition

Although the claims that scientific cognition is a variety of cognition in
general, and that historical research means scientific research would not
apparently provoke protests, serious issues of interpretation arise when
reference is made to historical cognition. The reason seems self-evident:
historical cognition has as its object various past events which, as it is
universally agreed, because of our location in time we cannot observe,
that is, in a sense, retrieve. On the contrary, when it comes to knowing
present (observable) facts we do observe them, or at least can do so,
because our position in time is simultaneous with the occurrence of
those events.
The problems of interpretation which are involved here can be group-
ed around different answers to the two basic questions:
(1) is it at all possible to make meaningful statements about the past
(i.e., statements which have a logical value)?
(2) even if we assume that that is possible (i.e., that our statements
about the past in fact refer to that past), is it possible to give a true
(objective) description of the past?
Two kinds of doubts have been raised with respect to the first ques-
l'HE NATURE OF IDSTORICAL COGNITION 311
tion. 12 The logical positivists. or at least the supporters of verifica-

tionism (who claim - cf. Chap. VITI - that only such a non-analytic
statement can be meaningful which can be verified empirically), were
bound to make the paradoxical claim that statements about the past are
beyond the· demarcation line which separates science from metaphysics.
Several, more or less ingenious, ideas have been advanced to avoid that
conclusion. One of them is that historical statements are in fact state-
ments about the future, because they predict what will be the results
of research (substantiations); those statements (both in their positivist
and pragmatic versions) accordingly acquire meaning by being future-
oriented, and not past-oriented. This saves the criterion of verification
(because we can verify in the future what will occur), but, as can easily
be seen, the link with the past as something real is broken. In that in-
terpretation, historical statements do not refer to the past, but to the
foundations of our knowledge of that past. Hence, if a historian states:
"In 1865-71. Florence was the capital of Italy" he does not. in
that interpretation, refer to the past. but merely predicts that historical
sources (further research) will substantiate this hypothesis. The state-.
ment accordingly acquires meaning from .prediction, and not from its
agreement with the past. As can be seen, the fact whether Florence
existed at all and whether it was the capital of Italy in the period men-
tioned above need not be taken into consideration.
This solution, being so paradoxical, has not satisfied the verification-
ists either. Another idea has been that of the reducibility of statements
about the past to statements about the present. C. J. Lewis says that
any past event can be analysed as extending in time. so that its conse-
quences continue up to the present, and these can be verified. A. C.
Danto pointed to the absurdity of that opinion. If the battle of Hastings,
which obviously is not its own consequence, is not knowable (as we
cannot verify it), then how can we know its consequences which are
consequences of something which is not knowable. Moreover, he asked,
on what do we base our belief that an earlier event is linked with an
event which is being observed by the historian and that it forms a whole
with other earlier events (if we move back as far as the original event),
if all earlier parts of that whole are not knowable? Lewis tried to cir-
cumvent that by saying that the "marks of pastness" which existing
312 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF ffiSTORY
objects have, lead us to find our way to their earlier parts, but Danto
correctly pointed to the insufficiency of such an explanation.18
A. J. Ayer rejected the endeavours to reduce statements about the
past to statements about the future or to statements about the present
and claims that past events are verifiable "in principle". At the present
moment, too, we observe those events only which take place near us,
but not those which occur elsewhere. Yet our location in space does not
make those latter events unverifiable. This assumes, which Ayer states
explicitly, that events as such are neither present nor past; they are
events in general, deprived of the temporal dimension,a and hence state-
ments about events refer to events as such, and not to past, present,
or future events. Yet - and this is raised by Danto, too - the logical
value of statements is not independent of the moment at which they
are formulated. Consider the following example:l~ the statements
(1) Caesar will die; (2) Caesar is dying; (3) Caesar died, are "facto-
graphically" synonymous, and are thus all true if one of them is true,
or all false, if one of them is false. But they lose that property when we
analyse them as to who made them and when. If Brutus makes the state-
ment (2) and if at that time Caesar is already dead, then that statement
is false. Thus, this method, too. fails as an argument in favour of veri-
ficationism (or methodological phenomenalism), which seems to be most
vulnerable exactly when it comes to methodological considerations of
historical research (not confined to what has just been said).
Scepticism as to the possibilities of historical cognition has also found
a different formulation, namely the second of the types of scepticism
referred to earlier. Even if we accept that we can make true statements
about the past, then doubts arise (voiced mainly by B. Russell) as to
whether we can be sure that they in fact refer to the past. For a state-
ment which describes a fictitious state of affairs (e.g., "Robespierre was
a king of Poland") does not differ outwardly from a statement formu-
lated by a historian and referring to facts (e.g., "Stanislaus Augustus
Poniatowski was a king of Poland"); nor does i! differ so from those
statements which refer to its sources. This apparently prevents us from
arriving at what the statement is about, that is, reaching the past. This
kind of scepticism is criticized by Danto. In his analysis of language he
makes a distinction among those terms and statements which refer to
the past, those which are neutral as to their temporal reference, and
those which refer to the future. For instance, the statement: "This is
a scar" refers to an earlier wound and points to a certain causal nexus.
Our language, as Danto is right in pointing out, is full of predicates
which refer to the past. 18 Let it be mentioned in this connection that
their number is probably still greater than Danto assumes, since for him
the statement "This is a man" is neutral as to its temporal reference,
whereas for the present writer both the statement in question and the
term "man" are temporally-conditioned and refer to the past. On the
other hand. the predicate "is red" seems to be temporally neutral. But
the restriction of language to time does not fully refute scepticism as
to whether those statements which refer to the past really speak about
the past, since that scepticism may cover the concept of causality by
referring to Hume's principle that post hoc non est propter hoc. Danto
shows that, contrary to what Russell claims, predicates which refer to
the past cannot be totally reduced to predicates which are neutral as to
their temporal reference: what Russell calls knowledge of the past con-
sists of statements which are logically independent of the past and can
hence be analysed from the present point of view as if the past never
existedY
Apart from this kind of criticism Danto suggests to neutralize scep-
ticism as to whether historical statements in fact refer to the past by ex-
tending the instrumentalistic approach18 so as to cover historical state-
ments. In his opinion, statements which refer to the past play - in the
light of instrumentalism in historical research - a role similar to that of
theoretical statements which order (our knowledge of) facts. Hence, the
term "Julius Caesar" plays in a historical work a role which is similar
to that played by the term "electron" in a paper on physics or the term
"Oedipus complex" in a psychoanalytical study.19 It is just an instru-
ment - whether better or worse - used to order facts, and it is inessen-
tial whether it refers to anything real, since historical statements are not
statements about facts. Thus the problem of the truth and falsehood of
historical statements vanishes.
It can easily be seen that instrumentalism does not provide a satis-
factory solution of the problem. Instrumentalism neutralizes the con-
troversy over the logical value of historical statements by eliminating
their frame of reference, that is, the past which is their model; hence
it eliminates something real which the historian does not want to lose.
He accordingly rejects scepticism as to the possibility of making state-

ments about the past, and accepts that possibility and considers it para-
doxical to reduce statements about the past to statements about the
future of about the present, or to neutralize the temporal value of such
statements, or to abandon the claim that the past was something real.
4. Arguments against scepticism. The characteristic traits of historical

cognition
We shall now be concerned with the analysis of the two kinds of scep-
ticism mentioned previously: as to the possibility of making statements
about the past and as to whether the past is in fact the subject matter
of our considerations.
The most radical argument against scepticism as to the possibility of
making statements about the past consists in demonstrating that episte-
mologically there is no difference between actual and historical cogni-
tion, for if no such difference exists, then the doubts raised in connec-
tion with historical cognition would cover all cognition in general. In
our case such a conclusion is sufficient, since we are mainly concerned
with demonstrating that specific characteristics of historical cognition
do not exist, which is very important for reflections on the science of
history.
To substantiate the claim that there is no difference between actual
and historical cognition we have first of all to scrutinize the indirect
nature of cognition of past events, which is due to the impossibility of
making direct observations of the past and which causes the unrest of
verificationists.
Two questions arise: are we in fact totally deprived of the possibility
directly to observe the past? and: is the indirectness ascribed to histor-
ical cognition a pecUliarity of historical cognition only?
Before we proceed further it is necessary to make two distinctions:
historical cognition in the broad sense of the term versus scientific his-
torical cognition, and historical cognition in general (whether scientific
or in the broad sense of the term) versus the cognition of the past by
an individual (whether a historian or not). Historical cognition in the
broad sense may be interpreted as any cognition of the past, and hence
next to scientific cognition also all types of cognition to which we often
resort in everyday life whenever we need some knowledge of what had

been. Scientific cognition of past events is intended to provide us
a scientific knowledge (in the sense explained previously) of those
events. We could give one more characteristic which distinguishes an
everyday cognition of the past from scientific historical cognition; this
characteristic is to be added to the already known differences between
cognition in general (except for the scientific one) and scientific cogni-
tion. Now in what we call everyday cognition we almost exclusively use
memory, which in this case serves as an information channel. Other
sources, such as letters and other personal documents, play a mere
auxiliary role. When it comes to scientific cognition, the reverse takes
place: using one's own memory of past events is of secondary impor-
tance only. In the analysis that follows we shall be concerned with
scientific historical cognition.
The opinion that the indirect approach is a peculiarity of acquiring
knowledge of the past is widely spread among historians.!O But is the
link between the past and the present broken so completely that we
have no possibility to make direct observations of the past even though
the actions of human beings which combined to form that past are
over? The link would be broken completely only if it were possible to
make consistently a distinction between perception of objects and
events which are the direct causes of our sensory experiences and ob-
servation of (observable) past events. But such a distinction cannot be
fully carried out, since cognition of the past includes observation of
still existing physical objects, including human beings, and that not only
in the form of human remains, but their present actions as well. A his-
torian can observe living people whose actions embody, more or less
clearly, experience of the past as transmitted from generation to genera-
tion. It is often said that a living man is a bearer of tradition or an
image of the past. Observation of behaviour of people who live under
conditions which undergo little change (rural communities, primitive
peoples, etc.) are especially instructive in that respect. Such observations
are the principal source of many studies carried out in cultural anthro-
pology. This covers the study of the language used by the groups under
observation; language is here understood not only as a specified form
of behaviour (namely communication), but also as sequences of sen-
tences uttered and utterances with definite meanings. If such sentences
and utterances refer to the past, the memory of the person who utters
them becomes a (historical) source. But it may also happen that we
learn so'lnething about the past from sentences which refer to actual
situations. In such a case the man whose behaviour is being observed
acts on the strength of habitual memory which follows rather auto-
matically from past experience.
Observations of human actions may have in view either only informa-
tion about the actual behaviour of the persons in question, without any
attempt to discover in that behaviour traces of the past, and are thus
a source of knowledge of the present, or else better knowledge of the
past Cultural anthropologists for a long time have confined themselves
to the former type of observations, and historians have usually avoided
including observations of human behaviour in the set of the sources
which enable them to reconstruct the past. Only advances in the inte-
gration of science have brought these two approaches to the observa-
tion of human actions closer to one another. By now the understanding
of the fact that the two approaches may be brought close to one an-
other has become fairly common and well-grounded. When we speak
about observations of human behaviour we must bear in mind that the
technique of sound-recording makes it possible for us to hear the voice
of a dead man as we hear voices of those who are still living; likewise,
films and photographs enable us to make (more or less exact) observa-
tions of past events and people who are no longer alive.
Such observations, which at the same time are observations of traces
of the past, border on observations of living people and on observations,
often resorted to by historians (especially archaeologists and historians
of material civilization). of inanimate physical objects which are left-
overs from the past. These may include all kinds of material objects
which are products of human labour (e:g., an old plough kept in a mu-
seum or still used by peasants) and all other traces of man's existence
on the globe. The latter category covers traces of all activities which are
not labour in the economic sense of the term (e.g.• traces of games.
entertainments. etc.) and of human remains '(e.g.• skeletons in graves).
Among inanimate physical objects which may be the subject matter
of historians' observations there may be remnants of organic sub-
sta-nces. and their knowledge can contribute to historians' knowledge
of human activity. Thus, for instance, pollen analysis may help us re-
construct man's plant environment, within which we may single out the
plants which man cultivated. The knowledge of the way trees grew
offers us information of changes in the climate, and animal skeletons
enable us to reconstruct man's occupations (the relationship between
hunting and animal breeding) and food. The limits of direct observa-
tions of physical objects which a historian can make are difficult to
define. It suffices to mention in this connection the immense opportuni-
ties offered by aerial photography which reveals traits of physical ob-
jects (landscape) that would otherwise remain unnoticed and thus ena-
bles us to reconstruct old boundaries between fields and location of
settlements. It is also worth mentioning that observation of old sources
of law (e.g., acts of parliaments) also means direct cognition if such
sources have been preserved in the form of original documents. In such
cases no other person acts as an intermediary. This shows that histor-
ians of law to a larg~ extent base their research on direct cognition.
All the forms of historical cognition listed so far consist of a direct
observation of physical objects21 and point to the possibility of a direct
observation of the past. The only argument against such a reasoning
has been found in A. J. Ayer's book. He does not deny the existence
of remnants from the past (which have the label of belonging to the
past), but claims that it is impossible to acquire any knowledge of them
as sources of information about the past without having a concept of
the past.22 This, however, is not to the point, for it could be said that
we cannot acquire any knowledge of present events without having
a concept of the present, that is, without having some knowledge that
enables us properly to classify the objects we observe. It would, how-
ever, be erroneous to deny the immense area of indirect historical
cognition, although indirect cognition is often cl~arly linked with
direct one.
Direct observation of physical objects takes place to some extent in
the case of those sources whose cognitive value consists not so much in
the very fact of their existence as remnants of past events as in the data
they contain. For instance, an old plough is a direct object of historical
cognition only as a specified physical object from the past, but a docu-
ment is of interest to us above all as a carrier of a certain content, and
much less as a specific sheet of paper or parchment covered with script
and having a seal affixed to it. The last-named external characteristics
318 "tHE PRAGMATIC METHODO~OGY OF HISTORY
may, however, often be important for the decoding or interpretation of

the content of the document in question. They may also be the subject
matter of special research concerned with the production of paper, or-
ganization of chancelleries, the standard of literacy and the types of
script. In those cases we have, of course, to do with a direct observa-
tion of a physical object. Every autopsy is such a direct observation.
But when it comes to the past events to which that document refers the
historian's observation is indirect. The same applies to other sources
which are semantic, or non-semantic, records of observations made by
other people. In all those cases the historian acquires information not
about the event itself, but about some report that pertains to it. These
may be reports made intentionally for the purpose of reconstructing the
past (a chronicle) or observations recorded for some practical purposes
(a private letter, a list of tax-payers). It must be emphasized that the
historian finds himself very often in a situation in which he has to rely
on reports made by other people. Some authors, e.g., M. Bloch, adopt
that existence of intermediaries between a past event and the historian
as the criterion of distinction between direct and indirect cognition. As
we shall later see, this distinction seems useful. In the case of indirect
cognition, based on reports made by others, we can distinguish degrees
of indirectness. The further the informant was removed from the event
about which he reports, the higher that degree. This type of historical
cognition includes the use of scientific observations made, directly or
not, by other historians. For, as we have said earlier, it is customary to
examine sources only in part, some statements being based on the
knowledge acquired by others.
Cognition based on the memory of others also is indirect in nature.
We often refer to what others remember, and we usually combine that
with observations of the behaviour of living persons." The issue
becomes more complicated when it comes to our own memory. which
after all is a source of historical cognition. too. Unlike A. J. Ayer. the
present writer holds that in such a case we may speak about direct
cognition. This is so because we are the person who has at one time
observed a given event. and we merely recall it at an appropriate
moment. Such reminiscences may be distorted by our experiences which
followed the event under consideration. so that the directness of remi-
niscences may be dimmed. and yet directness prevails over indirectness.
Thus, historical cognition is a combination of direct and indirect

cognition. Whenever cognition is based on data provided (in various
ways) by others we may speak, as M. Bloch does, about indirect cogni-
tion. Since this occurs very often, and is typical in the case of those his-
torians who work on written sources mainly, hence pointing to the
indirectness of historical cognition as its characteristic property seems
approximately to correspond to facts.
But, let us ask again, are historians the only researchers who in their
work mainly (or largely) rely on sources (interpreted as data about
observations made by others), and not on their own direct observa-
tions? Now, when the problem is examined more closely, the indirect
nature of historical cognition is not in the least specific to research pro-
cedures used by historians. W. Kula has shown that the study of con-
temporary social facts is indirect, that is, based on the use of sources,
tOO.24 We can go one step further and say that situations in which, next
to our own observations, we make use of those made by others are spe-
cific to all scientific cognition. It is indisputable that physicists and
chemists also base their research on observations made by other peo-
ple. Of course, the directness-indirectness ratio may vary from one type
of research to another, but then historical cognition may turn out to
be just more indirect than other types of scientific cognition are.
Regardless of what has been said above it must be noted that the
arguments used so far were confined to observable objects and events.
And yet it is very well known that not all present events are directly
observable at all (or at least in the present state of research instruments
and methods). They are accordingly observed through the intermediary
of inferential indicators (to use the terminology suggested by S. Nowak).
Thus a dental surgeon infers from the patient's behaviour whether his
patient feels pain; a chemist may infer about certain reactions taking
place by studying certain external characteristics of the substances he
investigates; a physicist infers about certain intraatomic processes by
watching a photograph made under specified conditions, etc. For his-
torians, too, some sources at least, on which they base their researches,
serve as sui generis inferential indicators from which they conclude
about certain events. A contract of lease which has escaped destruction
is an indicator of the transaction made; remnants of dwellings are an
indicator of the fact that the territory was settled at a certain period;
320 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lUSTORY
Roman coins found on the present territory of Poland testify to certain

trading activities in the past, etc. In all these cases the way of reasoning
is the same, although in the former group of examples we infer about
present events, and in the latter group, about past ones. But they all
share one common trait, namely the indirect nature of cognition. That
indirectness may be due to the circumstances that some facts are unob-
servable by their very nature, that others are unobservable because of
technical difficulties, and still others are observable in principle, but are
not observable now because of the lapse of time. The latter group of
facts is studied not by historians alone, since an event which occurred
at a moment to ceases to be observable to a physicist or chemist at
a moment t1> although its nature does not preQlude its observability in
general. When the event is over it may have only left a trace (the path
of an electron as recorded by a photograph).
Thus indirectness, although frequent in historical cognition, is not
specific to it. Various authors who notice it, point to other aspects of
historical cognition, which they hold to be specific to it. They refer to
the historian's inability to create sources, that is, to the limited character
of his sources of cognition, which is partly compensated by his know-
ledge of the subsequent effects and consequences, which a student of
the present lacks.
The statement that historians cannot create sources because, as
G. M. Trevelyan correctly observed. the past is implacable in its silence.
would be so remote from the truth if formulated in a radical way
that no one advances such a radical formulation. W. Kula refers it to
earlier history concerning which we can at the best find new sources or
interpret existing ones anew.25 Earlier history would begin at the mo-
ment when there are no witnesses of the events we are interested in.
Since, however, on the whole there are always some witnesses of some
events, the process of making sources is one of the important tasks of
those historians who study a sufficiently recent past. It follows there-
from that inability to create sources is a partial limitation only, and
hence it would be erroneou~ to see in it a specific characteristic of all
historical cognition. On the other hand, it is a characteristic trait of the
historical study of fairly remote· periods, but even in that case certain
doubts might arise if we tried to define the concept of "making sources"
with a greater precision .. After all, an interview with a liVing person
THE NATURE OF mSTORICAL COGNITION 321
merely reveals some knowledge which has been accumulated earlier and
not yet recorded, but does not in any way make a new knowledge of
given facts. Be this as it may, the issue remains open.
The claim that the knowledge of effects (consequences) of events is
specific to historical cognition, especially as opposed to the study of the
present times, also requires explanations. Because of the lapse of time
the historian (cf. Chap. XXIII) has a knowledge of the consequences
of certain events, which enables him to acquire a fuller knowledge of
facts as he can avail himself of a perspective in time. It is true that re-
search procedures in the study of history usually are postgnostic: the
point is to find out causes of certain facts which are believed by us to
be effects. On the contrary, a prognostic procedure is intended to find
out relationships from which we could, with a possibly high degree of
probability, predict the effects of a fact which we assume to be the
cause. The last-named procedure is encountered in theoretical disci-
plines which have the formulation of scientific laws in view. Yet, neither
can history remain indifferent to the function of formulating laws (cf.
Chap. VI), nor can other disciplines be indifferent to the postgnostic
procedure. Enquiry into the causes of facts on the strength of the know-
ledge of other facts, which we hold to be effects, is fairly common in
science. The historian cannot claim that an ordinary knowledge of
consequences (effects) of earlier events is specific to his discipline. The
diagram below points to the specific methodological issues of post-
gnosis and prognosis. The amount of information required for postgno-
sis need not at all be smaller than in the case of prognosis, and, more-
over, in order to explain a fact (i.e., to indicate its cause or causes) we
have to refer to a prognostic statement (scientific law).
[C£Gff}-i Effect I (postgnosis)
ICause Ki~~i] (prognosis)
In postgnostic procedure we may speak about the knowledge of

effects only in so far as we know the causes, because the concept of
effect acquires meaning only when it is an element of the ordered pair:
cause - effect. But we are only in search of causes and we can but rarely
know for sure whether the event we examine and hold to be an effect
of some cause or causes has correctly been linked by us with other

event(s), and whether, accordingly, we may speak about the knowledge
of effects as a special prerogative of historical cognition. We might do
SO, but only under an explicit consideration of the time factor (d.
Chap. XXIII).
The general description of historical cognition is shown by the follow-
ing diagram:
own memory
Like all scientific cognition, scientific historical cognition can begin

only when an adequate amount of knowledge lIas been accumulated,
and progress in that cognition can hardly be imagined if at least part
of that knowledge is not scientific in nature. This means that scientific
cognition is, in a sense. an a priori cognition, since its point of departure
always is some previously accumulated knowledge, which in this case
is a necessary category of cognition (which in the last analysis has its
origin in induction). In historical cognition, the role of knowledge
(which we have termed non-source-bas«l) takes on various forms, an~
that according to the origins of that cognition. If we use our own
memory. then the process of cognition consists in our reconstructing
a given fragment of our lcnowledge, acquired at an earlier time, that is,
our own direct observations; such a reconstruction, however, takes
place with the participation of our knowledge which has been acquired
later. That knowledge, on the one hand, ~akes recollection easier as it
facilitates formulation of questions, but, on the other, may, by its per-
manent presence in the process of cognition, make it difficult for us to
single out the desired fragment of knowledge so that it should conform,
as far as possible, to our earlier observations (that is, that it should

remain undistorted by subsequent experiences).
It is only in the case of observation of physical objects coming from
the past that we have to do with fully direct cognition, even though it
differs from everyday direct cognition by the fact that we have to resort
to a large amount of previously accumulated knowledge. Without ade-
quate knowledge we are either at all unable to classify a given object
or, should we even recognize in it something like a plough, we are un-
able to extract from it any information about the past. Indirect histori-
cal cognition, that is one which is based either on the memory of other
persons or on observations made by others and recorded in sources,
also requires a large amount of non-source-based knowledge. Other per-
sons' memory can be "revived" only by our asking questions, and
these cannot (cf. Chap. XIV) be asked without some previous know-
ledge. The same applies to other sources of historical cognition, which
can provide information only if we are able to interpret them and to
extract from them the data we are interested in.
We thus come to the conclusion that all problems of historical cogni-
tion are at the same time problems of all cognition in general. The
historian is not totally deprived of the possibility of directly observing
the past, because, as we have seen, there are many categories of sources
for historical cognition which both are parts of the past and lend them-
selves to direct observation. On the other hand, cognition of present
events involves indirect observation on a large scale (we either make use
of other person's observations or infer on the basis of inferential indi-
cators). Thus the indirect nature of cognition, which is often ascribed to
historical cognition, proves not to be any peculiarity of the latter.
All cognition is both historical and present-oriented. Note also that
all the systems we observe are in a constant movement, so that a state-
ment about a contemporary event which took place at a moment t
cannot in any way be verified by observation, because such observation
could occur only at a moment t+k, that is, at any rate later than t. We
would thus verify a statement about a system At by confronting that
statement with another system, namely A t + k • Thus, verification by direct
experience is impossible in the case of all factual statements, regardless
of whether they pertain to past events or to contemporary ones (as re-
ferred to the researcher). Hence in both cases we have to resort to

various forms of indirect verification, to be discussed later.
But the issue must also be raised now in connection with arguments
to be used against scepticism as to whether statements about the past in
fact refer to what had occurred, that is, if there is a logical nexus be-
tween those statements and past events. As has been mentioned earlier,
no historian practically concerned with research doubts that he talks
about real events which took place in the past, and he calls parado~cal
all those constructions which point to the lack of a logical nexus be-
tween statements about the past and their real substratum. This com-
mon-sense approach, which rejects excessively sophisticated ideas, seems
fully substantiated.
The concept of temporal language, worked out in detail by A. C.
Danto, is an important argument for the impossibility of breaking the
nexus between past events and statements about them. "By a past-re-
ferring term I shall mean a term whose correct application to a present
object or event logically (italics - A.C.D.) involves a reference to some
earlier object or event which may not be causally related to object to
which the term is applied".26 A. C. Danto is only concerned with those
objects and events which are linked causally with objects and events to
which past-referring terms apply. If we say "destroyed during the war"
or just "destroyed", then it is obvious that those predicates are only true
if we assume that the past was something real. In our everyday lan-
guage which describes contemporary objects and events we always
tacitly assume. the existence of certain facts and events in the past.
The argument based on temporal language loses, as has been said,
its significance if we adopt Hume's approach that the concept of effect
has no logical nexus with that of cause. In order not to engage here in
philosophical specUlations about the concept of cause (as far as histor-
ical research is concerned the problem will be discussed in greater de-
tail later on) let us mention that for the historian the concept of cause
is closely linked with that of the past. He usually does not treat causes
and effects as an ordinary sequence of events, but he sees in them
a closer nexus (whether material or spiritual) that consists in a sui ge-
neris exchange of energy. A. C. Danto's suggestion that historical state-
ments be treated as theories which we do not interpret as reflections of
reality only because we have no epistemological access to the past is so
much at variance with the historian's striving incessantly to correct their

image of the past (through confrontation of various direct and indirect
observations and non-source-based knowledge) as not to be an interest-
ing proposal. It is true that the process of correction is always open,
which means that specified historical statements can never be taken as
fully confronted with facts, but there are differences in the degrees of
their substantiation. If they were all treated as instruments which order
the process of cognition without being referred to the truth-falsehood
axis, the said differences would be disregarded.
To defend his viewpoint that historical statements usually refer to
past but real objects and events the historian can quote the general ar-
gument about the effectiveness of our actions undertaken on the strength
of the experience acquired in the process of cognition and in practical
activity. Practice tells us that in order to bring about a certain effect we
have to undertake a specified action (sufficient condition) or that the
lack of certain actions precludes the occurrence of certain effects (ac-
tion as a necessary condition). This may be interpreted as holding with-
out exception (if a then b always occurs; b occurs only if a has occurred
or statistically (if a then b occurs with a specified probability; b does
not occur with a specified probability if a has not occurred). All this
points to real links between facts. Practice thus justifies the opinion that
there is a link between the concept of the past and that of causality:
for if we want to pass from effect to cause, which procedure is, as we
have pointed out, typical of historical research, and if we assume that
between cause and effect there is something more than an ·ordinary se-
quence of events, then we have to assume that should we even speak
about the present we are also concerned, accordingly, with the past
treated as facts. Should it be otherwise, we would have to reject the
statement that when we consider present events we are concerned with
present facts. If a person says, "A motor-car is now passing by", then
he also assumes a past, because the motor-car must have started from
a place, must have been produced before starting, etc. (the possibilities
of regression being practically unlimited). Hence if we accept that such
a statement about a passing car refers to something real, and if we at
the same time reject Hume's scepticism as to causality, we also have to
accept logically that statements which refer to earlier stages of the event
mentioned in the statement refer to something real. Should we disregard
326 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllSTORY
the criterion of practice, we would at best be doomed to instrumen-

talism.
5. Epistemological relativism and the problem of objectivity in histori-

cal cognition
As has been said, historians are not sceptical as to whether we can

make meaningful statements about the past and, at the same time, state-
ments which would have the past as their subject matter, yet many of
them are inclined towards relativism. That viewpoint is, too, in its
vulgarized form, popular in the broad public. In the latter case it takes
on the form of a conflict between one's own vision of the past, based
on one's knowledge and experience, and the picture offered by the
science of history. If these two are at variance, people often make scep-
tical comments about the lack of truth in the narratives constructed by
historians, which, curiously enough, does not prevent them, while being
sceptical about the cognitive possibilities of historians, from believing
that their own vision of a section of the past, even though based on
a very limited experience, is true. This applies most often to contempo-
rary history, on which comments are made by those who are still alive
and in some way participated in the events.
A relativist, while usually not questioning the possibility of making
meaningful (true or false) statements about past events and at the same
time statements which have the past as their subject matter, is sceptical
as to whether we are in a position to arrive at a significant degree of
the truth in such statements or their sequences (historical narrratives).
In other words, a relativist does not deny that historians make state-
ments about objective past events (i.e., events which were or are inde-
pendent of those historians), but he holds in very little esteem the ob-
jectivity (i.e., agreement with facts) of those statements and blames
historical narratives for lack of objectivity (i.e., for subjectivity). Now
that subjectivity for which history writing is blamed and which refers
not to past events but to statements about them is to be interpreted in
two ways: (a) as a degree of falsehood, introduced by the historian who
draws his picture of the past, into his statements about past events, or
rather falsehood of the picture of the past drawn by him in his histori-
cal narrative, and (b) as the impossibility of verifying such statem:mts
or their sequences in a satisfactory intersubjective manner.27 We might

say that we have here to do, on the one hand, with epistemological sub-
jectivism (and objectivism), namely the problem of truth, and, on the
other, with methodological sUbjectivism (and objectivism), namely the
problem of substantiation and verification. It is self-evident that the
latter derives from the former: in the eyes of the relativists, the ascrib-
ing to historical research of subjectivity is due to the fact that the
efiects of historical cognition greatly depend on the knowing subject.
That weak point of cognition, which is ascribed to historical cognition
and which cannot be eliminated, is responsible for the fact that histori-
cal research yields non-objective knowledge; this, the relativists claim,
accounts for the fact that the results of historical research cannot be ob-
jective. The subjective element which the historian contributes to the
process of cognition is strong enough to result in considerable differ-
ence between facts and their descriptions contained in historical narra-
tives.
Four factors which account for the dependence of the results of his-
torical cognition on the knowing subject are usually listed: the histo-
rian's social position that determines his research perspective; reference
to values; the general or theoretical knowledge which the historian has
when he starts his research; the historian's personality. These factors,
closely interconnected as they are, are usually examined separately.
As far as all scientific cognition is concerned, they are studied by the
sociology of knowledge (pursued in various ways), the theory and phi-
losophy of values, and methodology and psychology. The sociology of
knowledge, which continues the Marxist idea of the social conditioning
of human consciousness, can be seen in both earlier (e.g. K. Mann-
heim28) and more recent (e.g., W. Stark29 ) interpretations as the science
which investigates the social conditioning of human knowledge. But
while Marx did not think this conditioning to be a factor which pre-
vents human beings from arriving at a true description of given facts,
Mannheim is a pessimist in that respect, that is, a relativist in the sense
defined previously, since he claims that subjectivity is inherent in the
social sciences whereas natural science is free from it at least in its
quantitative aspect.ao
Links between historical cognition and the problem of values, that
is, the impact of the opinions held by the knowing subject upon the
results of his research, on that which in his opinion should be (what is

good or evil, useful and detrimental, progressive and regressive, etc.),
that is, links between cognition and ideology (in one of the senses of
the term) are commonly emphasized. Some authors think this to be
a sui generis necessary evil, largely specific to the social sciences, and
call for "pure", "objective" research, which - in the case of history-
should be guided, as far as that is possible, exclusively by the sources
actually used. Others do not feel alarmed as they hold that in natural
science, too, there is no pure research; hence, if they formulate any
requirements, they do not suggest that valuation be eliminated, since
that is impossible, but that it be used consciously. The acceptance of
the impact of valuation upon the results of historical research in the
sense that such results cannot be objective since they are interpreted in
the light of the system of values which a given researcher has, means
epistemological relativism.
To sum up what has been said about the sociology of knowledge, we
may have to with relativism which bears out either the social position
of the knowing subject or his system of values as the factor which de-
forms cognition.
When it comes to the general knowledge that the historian has when
he starts his research and which also affects his narrative, then authors
who stress that factor do not always arrive at relativistic conclusions.
It is usually said that the selection of facts depends on the general
categories of thinking and the specific categories of historical thinking
(cf. A. Stern), on the theory the historian represents (cf. R. Aron), on
the vision of the world or of the past which he has. More or less the
same applies to the emphasis laid on the impact of the historian's per-
sonality upon the picture of the past which he reconstructs, or, accord-
ing to some authors, constructs (cf. H. I. Marrou, Paul Valery).
Two closely interconnected problems arise in view of what has been
said:
(1) Does the dependence of historical cognition on the historian's
social position, on his system of values, on theoretical principles which
guide his process of cognition, and on his personality result inevitably
in epistemological relativism that negates the possibility of arriving at
the truth in history?
(2) Is this situation, which is characteristic of historical cognition,
THE NATURE OF lllSTORICAL COGNITION 329
a peculiarity of that type of cognition, or is it merely a variety of a gen-

eral epistemological situation?
The dependence of historical cognition on the social (class) position
of the historian, on his systhem of values, on the theoretical principles
which guide his process of cognition, and on his personality is beyond
doubt, and the relativists are assuredly right when claiming that. But
three reservations must be made in this connection. First, the relation-
ship between the said factors and the results of research as assumed by
the relativists is much more complex than it would seem at the first
glance. Secondly, that relationship is not a peculiarity of historical (or
sociological) cognition alone, and, thirdly, it need not result in a denial
of the objectivity of that type of cognition, provided that we do not
mean absolute objectivity. An analysis of these three issues will provide
arguments against scepticism as to the possibility of arriving at the true
picture of the past and will thereby answer the questions posed above.
The social position of the knowing subject, his system of values, the
theoretical principles by which he is guided in his process of cognition,
and his personality form an intricate network which must be shown in
some detail if the role of these four factors is to be revealed. This is
shown by the following diagram; the arrows indicate the direction of
influences.
Historian's
1
knowledge I
1 T
Historian's
1
Historian's
social system Results of research
position of values (historical narrative)
.I,
Historian's r r I
personality
Numerous feedbacks and indirect influences can easily be noted. The

social position of the knowing subject affects the results of research
(cognition) through the intermediary of his system of values as shaped
by that social position, the knowledge he has at his disposal, and his
personality. Thus it is not an independent factor which could be ana-
lysed without the consideration of the knowledge so far acquired by the
historian and his mental characteristics. In this connection it may be

said briefly that, if for the time being we disregard the object of cogni-
tion and the direct impact of personality upon the result of cognition,
the results of historical research (cognition) depend on the historian's
general body of knowledge and his system of values; obviously we have
to bear in mind that that system of values is a function of the his-
torian's social position and his general knowledge, or a function of his
general knowledge alone, since his social position, before affecting his
system of values, must first find a reflection in the historian's general
body of knowledge. It may accordingly be claimed that the results of
cognition depend on the knowledge which the historian has when he
starts his research. It is self-evident that the said knowledge must be
interpreted very broadly so as to cover his system of valuations, i.e.,
above all, his system of axiological norms (standards). Every act of
cognition, by adding to his knowledge, affects his system of values and
the resulting system of valuations. Cognition thus turns out to be a
continuous process of interactions of various factors. It can clearly be
seen that the impact of the knowing subject upon the results of cog-
nition is considerable, which yields a picture of the process of cognition
that deviates much from the positivist belief that a knowing subject can
passively reflect the outside world.
But this does not apply to historical cognition alone. The basic defect
in the relativist approach (cf. Ch. Beard) was not so much an exaggera-
tion in stressing the role of the knowing subject in the case of historical
cognition, as the erroneous opinion on the epistemological and meth-
odological situation in the exact sciences: in the relativist interpretation,
historical cognition was treated separately from the process of human
cognition in general.
Yet all human cognition, as we have repeatedly emphasized, is guid-
ed, to some extent, by the knowing subject's general body of know-
ledge, which obviously includes specified valuations. We do not acqurre
any knowledge of that which is barred from us by our general body of
knowledge, too limited in a given sphere. Everything else is acquired
through the intermediary of that general knowledge which, by providing
us rules of selection in the process of cognition, shows us the world, but
as a world some parts of which are more, and others less, strongly
mru:ked. Thus the picture we obtain is neither detailed nor uniformly
shown: it is a picture which is interpreted by our previous knowledge,

and hence full of light and dark patches. This is so not only because it
is very difficult to acquire any adequate knowledge of the world and be-
cause our body of knowledge is full of gaps, but also because not every-
thing in the world around us seems to be equally important - and hence
valuable - and it is a well-known fact that those things which we for
some reason believe to be of a lesser importance do not attract our
attention as much. In this respect there is no difference between the
study of the past and the present: our previous body of knowledge
intervenes in both cases. For a man who lacks appropriate knowledge
a picture by Giotto, for all his role in the history of European painting,
will merely be a piece of canvas covered with paint. Similarly, a cyclo-
tron will be for him just a non-descript instrument. This has conse-
quences in the sphere of valuation, although this is a function of the
whole body of knowledge which the knowing subject has, and not
only that part of that general body of knowledge which is used actively
in the study of a given object. For instance, because of a gap in his
knowledge a person may conclude that the cyclotron which he has an
opportunity to watch is of little importance for human beings; but he
can ascribe to it an immense role if his previous knowledge makes him
attach great, or even excessive, importance to unknown and "myste-
rious" objects. Likewise, in historical cognition a person's body of
knowledge, especially his historical knowledge makes him ascribe more
or less importance to given objects, individuals, groups, or events. A his-
torian whose comparative knowledge is rather small and who therefore
has a "distorted" system of valuations, is inclined to attach excessive
role to the past of the region, country, individual, or event he investi-
gates.
It must be pointed out that as far as historical research is concerned
the relativist approach does not base its scepticism on the claim that
historical cognition is "relative" (subjective, conditioned, etc.) because
it somehow depends on that general body of knowledge, but above all
on the claim that such cognition is not objective, because it is inter-
preted by the system of values which the knowing subject upholds. It
might be said that the relativist approach, while it emphasizes - in his-
torical and in all other cognition - the role of knowledge understood as
a set of statements about facts (which have each a given logical value,
i.e., are situated on the truth-falsehood axis), claims historical cogni-

tion - as specifically distinct from cognition in the exact sciences - to be
additionally guided by a system of values, that is, by rules situated on
the good - bad (useful- detrimental, progressive - reactionary, etc.)
axis, which gives historical cognition a value-biased tinge. The fact that
these two axes as it were cross in historical cognition (which is claimed
to be specific to that type of cognition) is said by the relativists to be
an obstacle in our arriving, in historical research, at a knowledge which
we may claim to be true. Since the knowledge of facts, is, as has been
said, largely dependent on the nature of the knowing subject's position
in societal life and thus forms the basis for the formation of his system
of values, the relativists often speak about a deformation of the pro-
cess of cognition by living conditions, or, more abstractly, about a dis-
tortion of the past by the present, which, as we have seen, leads them
to assume all history to be present history (cf. B. Croce).
This standpoint was a result of anti-positivist opinions on the specific
nature of historical research as opposed to research in the sphere of the
exact sciences. In fact, the relativists, by stressing (correctly, but too
radically) the dependence of historical cognition on the system of values
held by the knowing subject, came to assume the issue which is com-
mon to all disciplines to be specific to historical research. The opinion
(upheld, among others, by H. Rickert) that some sciences are value-
dependent while the others are value-free, which is an exemplification
of that standpoint, was extremely common at one time, and is to be
encountered also now.
Yet valuation rests at the foundation of all science, and hence both
the natural and the social sciences,81 and this cannot be otherwise, be-
cause science is a product of man who lives in society. Man must have
first come to the conclusion that it is worthwhile to search for the
truth, and that conclusion of his (that is, specified valuation) became
the starting point for the undertaking of scientific research. Thus all
the endeavours to draw a strict demarcation line between the world of
science (whatever discipline may be concerned) and the world of values,
or to contrast one with the other, must fail from the outset. Some meth-
odologists emphasize this fact quite strongly. For instance, K. Kauf-
mann says that scientific activity can be interpreted as the striving for
certain goals which cannot be "defined exclusively in terms of (...) em-
THE NATURE OF HIS'TORICAL COGNITION 333
pirical procedure". Such a goal may be seen by a scientist in increasing

the living standards and happiness of mankind, in securing material
profits and social prestige for himself, or in deriving satisfaction from
research. s2 All decisions in scientific research, even those which seem to
be completely free from valuation, can in the last analysis be reduced
to such a general goal due to which research has been undertaken,
whatever the description of that goal may be. Even a person who is
making a chemical experiment and decides to evoke a chemical reaction
in order to obtain the desired result, when asked about the grounds for
his decision, must go back to that basic decision which has induced
him to undertake research of a given kind. 33
The common point of departure does not mean a total lack of differ-
ences between the various disciplines in their approach to values; those
differences do not, however, consist in the fact that some are value-free
while the others are value-dependent (e.g., history), but merely in the
degree in which that valuation is apparent.
In order better to analyse the problem we have first to point out that
decision making in research (which in practice is reduced above all to
issues of selection) is simultaneously influenced by several valuation sys-
tems, which differ from one another in the degree of generality. They
are the system of universal values, that of group values (among which
class values come to the fore), and that of individual values. 34 The uni-
versal values (which are not to be indentified with absolute and hence
ahistorical values propounded, as we have mentioned, by H. Rickert
in his campaign against German historicism) are on the whole accepted
by all, which obviously does not mean that everyone accepts all the
universal values at all times; this is to say merely that he accepts them
in general, regardless of his group or class status. A person may accept
that the striving for better living standards is a more important guide-
line than the striving for satisfaction from one's work; another person
may hold the principle of protecting one's health to be superior to the
striving for better living standards, which does not prevent us from
including all these rules of conduct in the system of universal values.
The research goals listed earlier also are in that system. In the case of
the universal values which underlie decisions both in social (and hence
also in history) and in natural science valuations are convergent, which
accounts for the fact that they are not revealed outwardly as valu-
ations. as
If universal values are to materialize it is necessary to undertake
specified actions. Since in a society which is split into classes and strata
the different situations of those classes and strata induce their members
to undertake actions which are often different even though oriented to
the same general goal, hence certain values emerge which may be ac-
cepted by a group (i.e., the majority of its members), but differ from
the values accepted by another group. If we consider the following
universal value (i.e., a certain general goal): "one should improve one's
material living standards, and at least not to deteriorate them", then a
capitalist accepts the group value which makes him defend the capital-
ist system, whereas an employee accepts the group value which makes
him attack that system. Group (and even class) values need not be in
conflict with one another: the implementation of the universal value
"protect your health" makes people undertake various similar actions
(cultivation of appropriate personal habits, etc.) regardless of group
membership. Thus among the group values we can single out those
which indicate a simple acceptance by a given group of universal values
(group values t ) and those which are transformations of universal
values, such transformations being necessary if a given group in its
particular situation is to implement the universal values in question
(group values 2 ). Taken together, group values t and group values 2 form
a system of group values which is the foundation of valuations made by
group members. A scientist, being objectively or subjectively a member
of a certain social group usually accepts that group's system of values.
When scientists who are members of various social groups implement
group values t we shall have to do with convergent valuations, like in
the case of universal values.
On the other hand, the striving to implement group values 2 may com-
bine with divergent valuations of the same facts by scientists who are
members of various social groups, which may have some effect (more
or less realized by the researcher, and sometimes intended by him de-
liberately) on the results of research. au If a scientist believes that the
capitalist system is to be preserved (because he values it positively),
whereas another believes that that system should be abolished (because
he values it negatively), then these divergent group valuations (groups
THE NATURE OF IllSTORICAL COGNITION 335
being classes in this case) are likely to affect their research work, even
in the form of selection of issues. But in the striving to implement
group values not all the facts are valued divergently. Valuations are
usually convergent when it comes to natural phenomena (e.g., floods,
which worsen the living standards of many people. are valued nega-
tively by various classes. which makes them all engage in preventive
measures), and usually divergent when it comes to societal facts (e.g., an
opponent and a supporter of the capitalist system will differ from one
another in their respective appraisals of a strike). But there are also
natural phenomena which are valued divergently by the various classes
(e.g., bumper crops which bring the prices down), as well as societal
facts which are valued convergently (e.g., in many cases a rise in per
capita national income, or a victory in a war waged in defence of one's
country). The belief that events in the world of Nature are valued con-
vergently (or, in other words, are not valued at all) whereas societal
facts are valued divergently has given rise to the opinion on the differ-
ent position with respect to values in natural science. on the one hand.
and social science (with history taking the pride of place), on the other.
This opinion is, as we can see, largely substantiated. Moreover, since
group values 2 (and class values in particular) usually refer to societal
facts, the identity of the subject matter of research provides better op-
portunities for their influencing research in social science than in natural
science. But on the whole no valuation-based demarcation line can be
drawn between these two groups of disciplines. Both groups are in-
fluenced by convergent and divergent group valuations alike.
The system of individual values is even more complex and intricate
than that of group values. It includes the universal values accepted by
a given individual (through the intermediary of group values 1), group
values 2 , and those individual values which are specific to the person in
question. Those individual values are associated with that person's ex-
perience and mentality. They can usually be derived from universal and
group values2 • but they sometimes may be at variance with the latter.
For instance, a negative appraisal of tobacco smoking will be classed
as an individual value associated with a person's experience (self-evi-
dently, not necessarily his own tobacco smoking), while a positive ap-
praisal of hazardous undertakings, as an individual value associated
with his mentality. Individual values have the same effect upon research
336 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY
in social and in natural science. For instance, the said negative apprais-
al of tobacco smoking by a medical expert may affect his interpretation
of the data on the incidence of lung cancer, and the praise (or con·
demnation) of risk taking may affect a historian's appraisal of a person-
ality who was active in the past. In the last analysis. all universal and
group values, and individual values proper, become amalgamated into
a system of individual ones.
When summing up the discussion concerned with the dependence of
historical cognition on values we have to conclude that such a depend-
ence is not any peculiarity of historical research. since it is charac-
teristic of all scientific cognition. Natural science does not differ in that
respect essentially from social science. In the case of the former, being
value-free applies only to a part of group values. namely divergent
group values 2 , whereas the universal values, group values!> convergent
group values. and individual values proper are specific to all disci-
plines. We also have to add that in a society which is divided into
classes all science. and hence both the natural and the social sciences.
plays a class role since every discipline is an instrument of specified
classes of groups. In such a case science functions as an ideology and
there is no difference between the various disciplines in that respect.
For instance, in our times we witness an immense ideological role of
the development of the technological sciences.
Our conclusions, directed against epistemological relativism which is
ascribed to the social sciences only (and to historical research in partic-
ular), are not intended. as has been said earlier. to make that relativism
cover the whole of scientific cognition and thus to eliminate the prob-
lem by denying the objective nature of that cognition. The arguments
against relativism, as listed above, at all times apply to what might be
termed absolute relativism. In the light of the last-named interpretation
history always turns out to be "a product" of the historian who con-
structs the past, his "confession of faith"; it always means present his-
tory, etc., and cannot arrive at the truth. It is not admissible to sug-
gest that absolute relativism be replaced by positivism because, as we
have seen, the latter approach simplifies the process of cognition too
much. But, in the light of what has been said, we can outline an ap-
proach which might be termed moderate, or dialectical relativism. That
latter type of relativism, while admitting a reiationship between scien-
tific cognition and the world of values (and the body of knowledge
which a given knowing subject has in general), is not so pessimistic as
absolute relativism is about the fact that the said relationship irrevers-
ibly distorts the results of cognition, that is, about the possibility of
objective historical research which would provide narratives that would
both be true and intersubjectively verifiable. 37 This is not to deny that
in practice we could, and still can, encounter such cases of history
writing which follow the pattern ascribed by absolute relativists to his-
toriography in general.
The following three arguments can be brought up to support the
claims of moderate relativism; all of them point to the fact that the
"liquidity" of the variable factors of cognition has its limits. They are:
(1) non-uniform nature of the impact of the researcher's social posi-
tion upon the results of his research;
(2) group values specific to scientists;
(3) expansion and growing uniformity of non-souree-based know-
ledge of historians.
While absolute relativism claims that the researcher's social position
always deforms the results of his research, dialectical relativists main-
tain that the effect may be either negative or positive, according to
what his social position is. The classes which promote social progress
change at the various stages of historical development. It is to the bene-
fit of those rising classes to change existing conditions, and this induces
them to investigate facts as thoroughly as possible. Thus it does not
suffice to say that one's social position affects the results of one's re-
search: we have to find out whether the researcher (as a member of
a given class) is interested in discovering the truth or in obscuring it.
"The more ruthless and impartial science is, the more it complies with
the interests and aspirations of the workers". Karl Marx was the first
to formulate this idea. 3s
The divergent class-based valuations mentioned earlier can be toned
down, to a considerable degree, when it comes to research: scholars and
scientists form a specified social group which has its own distinctive
group values. Certain general valuations within that group yield speci-
fied systems of group values which are characteristic of researchers
working in the various disciplines, and hence historians as well. The
respublica docta, while still divided along class lines, gradually produces
338 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF msroRY
an increasing number of standards that -are common to all its members

and which cannot be waived aside if a researcher is not to risk his re-
putation. These standards apply to honesty in research. basing all cases
of inference on foundations which are verifiable by others, clarity and
precision of formulations, competence in the sphere of one's research,
critical approach to data, etc. While they do not eliminate differences
in the selection of problems to be studied, yet they mark fairly well the
boundary line beyond which we have to do with intentional distortions
of facts. This does not, of course, bar the possibility that quasi-scien-
tific production beyond that boundary may have all outward appear-
ances of being genuinely scientific, but such works cannot be blamed
on objectively-minded historians.
While the first argument was meant to oppose a fatalistic interpreta-
tion of class position, and the second pointed to certain technical cir-
cumstances which mitigate the divergences of group values, the third
has a wider scope of application. It has been said that the results of
historical cognition (we disregard for the time being the quality of the
sources) depend on a broadly conceived body of knowledge (including
a system of values) which a historian has when he starts his research;
we have termed that knowledge, conventionally, non-source-based. That
body of knowledge can expand almost infinitely, and can be made more
and more uniform for different persons, which process will ensure an
increasing convergence of results of research. When historians avail
themselves of the attainments of other disciplines and thus add to their
set of concepts with which they start research, they will thus develop
certain theoretical structures common to all, which will bar excessive
divergences in results of research. In some natural sciences (e.g., phys-
ics) such a commonly accepted set of theoretical concepts has already
developed. This does not mean that their level of development is high-
er: it merely testifies to the fact that the subject matter of research
in the social sciences is much more complex and requires different re-
search procedures and has a way of development of its own.
Thus, in the present writer's opinion, non-source-based knowledge
is the main support for objectivism in historical research. As we shall
see later, when analysing the concept of truth in history (that is, the
goal of objective historiography) and that of non-source-based know-
ledge, there are no unsurmountable obstacles which could prevent us
from making history writing objective. Its objectivity will never be ab-
solute as it would be nonsensical to assume that the non-source-based
knowledge of all historians would ever be made uniform. The spec-
tacles through which historians will look at shapes and colours of the
world will always remain differentiated, be it alone because of differ-
ences in individual experience. This means that the description of a fact
or a system as made by historian A will differ, regardless of their basi-
cally common non-source-based knowledge, from the corresponding de-
scription made by historian B. From a certain point in the development
of the science of history this fact will be viewed as good and contrib-
uting gradually to the objective (true) picture of the past. We shall
always have to write history anew, but not because history is a "sub-
jective product of the historian" who is unable to discover the truth;
we shall do so because non-source-based knowledge, both individual
and that which is common to all historians and which brings us closer
to the truth, will accumulate with the lapse of time. As A. Gramsci
wrote: "Objective always means 'humanly objective', which strictly
corresponds to 'historically subjective', so that 'objective' means the
same as 'universally subjective' ".39
6. Truth in history
The question arises what is truth in the interpretation of dialectical rela-

tivism and what is the relationship between the concept of truth and
that of probability, which is often used with reference to historical re-
search. Now moderate relativists assert that the historian in his research
work arrives at a relative truth (partial truths), which is a stage on his
path to the absolute agreement of his statements with facts (perfect iso-
morphism), that is, the absolute truth. The absolute truth is a kind of
a limiting concept, an idealization. In view of the infinite complexity of
the ever-changing world we can only strive for the absolute truth. Agree-
ment with facts is the criterion of relative truth, too, but we assume
in advance that in all forms of cognition that agreement is relative only,
and not absolute because it applies either to regularities and principal
causes or to their surface manifestations. The methodological concept
of truth (not modified by any adjective) thus covers both the concept
of absolute truth and that of relative truth. It is needed in methodology

as the formulation of the goal of scientific cognition.
One of the basic methodological and logical principles which says
that the concept of truth applies to statements only (that is, that only
statements can be true or false, i.e., in agreement or at variance with
facts) requires a certain modification when it comes to historiography.
Now, when it comes to history writing, in the case of penetrating meth-
odological considerations it is necessary not only to discuss the truth
or the falsehood of single statements, but also the truth or the falsehood
of historical narratives, i.e., sequences of statements which together form
pictures of the past (cf. Chap. XXIII). We are interested not only In
the truth of such single statements as "The Bastille was taken on July
14, 1789", "The Constitution of 1791 marked a victory of revolutionary
ideas", etc., but also in the truth (agreement with facts) of the entire
picture of the French Revolution (or its fragment) as shown in the
work of a given historian. We know perfectly well that in a historical
narrative the sum of a number of true statements need not in the least
yield a true general picture of events. On the other hand, it may also
be so that single false statements, co-occuring in a narrative with the
true ones, do not necessarily invalidate the truth of that narrative as
a whole. This raises the problem of the concept of the logical value of
narratives, to be used in methodological analyses next to that of the
logical value of statements.40 Objective history writing strives not only
for the truth of statements but, above all, for the truth of narratives: the
point is that the structure of events and the historical processes should
be reconstructed in agreement with what took place. Obviously, not
everyone realizes the importance of that task, and this is why many
reviews of historical studies are often concerned solely with the logical
value of single statements, and not a narrative as a whole, which often
renders a correct appraisal of important contributions impossible.41 It
is self-evident that in each case the truth of both single statements and
narrative should be checked, since only this enables us to appraise the
contribution of a given scholar to historical research.
But then the basic question arises: what is a true narrative? The reply
would be, as far as we uphold the classical definition of truth, that-
like in the case of statements - a narrative must be in agreement with
facts. But what does this mean in the case of a historical narrative? The
problem does not raise doubts with reference to single statements, but
when it comes to narratives it gives rise to extremely intricate issues.
We can give at least three possible (and abbreviated) explanations of
the concept of a "narrative in agreement with historical facts". It would
be a narrative which:
(1) offers a faithful description of facts (that is, one which is detailed
and consists of true statements);
(2) does not offer a fully detailed description, but does not include
statements which are at variance with facts;
(3) does not offer a detailed description, but not only does not include
statements which are at variance with facts, but offers an integrated
interpretation of facts that reveals the structure and the movement of
a given system as a whole or in part (see Chap. XIV).
The first explanation must be rejected out of hand not only because
of the physical impossibility (regardless of the lack of sources) of giving
a fully detailed description of facts, but also because historiography (as
a science) is not chronicle writing (cf. Chap. XXIII). The requirements
formulated in the second explanation are too limited; they may be
found sufficient by the supporters of the erudite type of research, which
stresses the formulation of the greatest possible number of rigorously
established true statements. The third explanation has of necessity been
couched in very general intuitive terms. As can easily be seen, it in-
cludes the requirement that historiography should pay attention to both
the structure and the movement of systems, that is, should explain
development (and hence comply with the dialectical pattern - cf. Chap.
IX). A narrative concerned with systems (which may differ from one
another in size) and their elements has to take into account both the
forces which set the system into motion and the position of the various
elements in that system. This requirement, to be satisfied, calls for
a more comprehensive non-source-based knowledge and for higher stan-
dards of such knowledge, since only s~ch knowledge can make true
pictures out of single true statements. This leads to a somewhat para-
doxical conclusion: it is possible that as historical cognition improves,
statements which used to be accepted as true come to be rejected as
false; likewise, historical descriptions which used to be classed as true
narratives can - following a development of the science of history, which
means above all the development of non-source-based knowledge-
prove to be false in view of the changed time perspective. It is also

possible to admit the simultaneous truth of a number of descriptions
(narratives) of the same fragment of the past provided that such de-
scriptions (narratives) are compatible with one another. In such a case
all such descriptions. taken together. mark a step forward in the attain-
ment of the truth, if they satisfy the condition of an integrated ap-
proach. This applies to other disciplines as well.
To sum up, we may say that the concept of "being in agreement
with facts", when applied to a historical narrative, does not merely
mean the label "how it really was" (which is possible in the case of
single statements), but also an additional explanation how those "facts"
are to be interpreted. At this point we see a close connection between
considerations in the field of the pragmatic methodology of history and
those in the field of objective methodology. The explanation of how
"facts" are to be understood (at a given stage of the development of
science) is in the sphere of objective methodology (see Part ID).
But then how do we conclude that a given historical statement or
narrative is true or false. or. in a somewhat different terminology. that
it is meaningful? We are still engaged in the study of the past. so how
can we demonstrate - still in the course of the study - that a given state-
ment is an agreement with facts (which is required by the classical
definition of truth) if those facts are still not known to us? On the other
hand, should those facts be known to us, we would not have to study
them.
Rules of directly and indirectly finding out the logical value of state-
ments, also termed criteria, that is, methods of distinguishing true state-
ments from false ones, have been developed in the course of scientific
research and are fully applicable in historical research, too. Of these, we
are not interested here in the semantic rules (such as truth tables) which
show how the truth value of compound statements depends on the truth
va1ue of the component simple statements.
Out of those rules with which we are concerned here the greatest
importance is to be ascribed to the criterion of practice, since this is
the only criterion which enables us to find out what is the relation be-
tween a statement about a fact and the fact itself. We may accordingly
call it the semantic criterion. All other criteria are either syntactic or
pragmatic in nature: the former ones refer to the statements themselves
or to relationships between them, whereas the latter ones describe the

relation between statements and those who make them and must in the
last analysis be confirmed by the criterion of practice.
The criterion of practice, which is the only direct test of truth since
it reaches beyond statements and establishes a direct "contact" with
facts, can be understood both as a general one, which in the light of
the knowledge of effectiveness of human actions enables us to find out
the truth of statements about facts, and as a technical one, to be used
in everyday research practice.
The general criterion of practice is the fundamental one in all disci-
plines. Man is gradually transforming the world by making use equally
of the attainments of the natural and the social desciplines, and his
being successful in transforming the world means that he relies on
knowledge which is basically true and has been acquired in the course
of cognition (both in the sphere of natural and social science). We can-
not imagine the violent development of present-day technology without
the existence of organized society that bases its actions on the cognition
of social facts and remembers its actions in the past. The role of history
in such transformations is exceptionally great: it co-operates with other
social disciplines in the process of acquiring the knowledge of society
and in finding out regularities, and moreover serves as social memory.
Imagine for a moment that the world as we know it has existed for five
minutes only, so that it has neither a history of its own nor historians
who could tell us something about the past. Human minds would be-
come void. All the concepts shaped throughout the ages would lose
their meanings; there would be no foundations for any actions except
for the daily activities that are vital to human existence, etc. Further
analysis would show us an apocalyptic picture of a world in stagnation.
Thus the fact that the world differs from such a vision is, among other
things, a criterion of the truth of historical cognition.
Yet we have here to do with a very general criterion that cannot be
treated as an absolute one. It is worthwhile recalling that Lenin wrote
"(... ) the criterion of practice can never, in the nature of things, either
confirm or refute any human idea completely. This criterion also is
sufficiently 'indefinite' not to allow human knowledge to become 'ab-
solute' ".42
In everyday research activities (this applies to both history and other
344 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllSfORY
disciplines) we use the non-professional criterion of practice almost

universally; it enables us to find out (though not absolutely or defini-
tively) whether a given statement is true or false. That criterion is iden-
tified with what is called empirical, or observational, decidability of
statements, although we have to realize that the criterion in question is
relative. In this connection we may quote Engels who wrote that "from
the moment we turn to our own use these objects, according to the
qualities we perceive in them, we put to an infallible test the correctness
or otherwise of our sense perceptions".43 The technical criterion is, of
course, the most widely used in the experimental disciplines, but it also
happens to be fairly often applied in other sciences, including history.
The historian uses it (mostly together with other criteria) whenever
there is a possibility of direct cognition, or, in other words, of deciding
empirically the truth value of a stateptent. Obviously, statements which
were empirically decidable in the past are no longer such today. But,
fairly often, when the object under observation practically does not
change, statements about it retain their empirical decidability. Such an
object may even, following a change in the extension of the concept of
observability (such a change was, e.g., brought about by the advent of
the electron miscroscope), reveal the so far latent possibilities of empiri-
cally deciding the agreement between hypotheses and facts.
Thus, for instance, the statement: "This document was made in 1624"
may be subject to the professional criterion of practice (criterion of
empirical decidability) if we scrutinize that document and check its
date, the paper on which it is written or printed, the type of the script
or print, etc. Likewise, the statement: "The Polish Constitution of 1791
includes only one article concerned with the pea.sants" can be con-
firmed as true if we read the text of that Constitution. A visit to a
museum enables us to determine the truth value of many statements
about material civilization.
As we know, the supporters of logical empiricism (also termed veri-
ficationism) confined themselves to that criterion only and accordingly
discredited as meaningless all those statements which were not subject
to positive empirical verification, which has proved to be fatal for the
development of science. It has turned out that if difficult problems are
to be solved, then science cannot be put into the strait jacket of observ-
ability and empirical verification at every step. Stress on this point is
THE NATURE OF lllSTORICAL COGNITION 345
of special importance for historical research, to which the empiricist

approach meant a serious danger.
The indirect methods of finding out the truth (or the falsehood) of
statements, methods which play the fundamental role in that procedure,
can generally be described as substantiation of statements by mutual
confrontation; in other words, newly formulated statements are con-
fronted with the body of knowledge (the set of already accepted state-
ments) we already have at our disposal. The newly formulated state-
ments can either be deduced from those accepted earlier, or they can be
acknowledged in view of other accepted statements in conformity with
a scientific procedure. In this way statements so substantiated can be
accepted at first by a single scientist, and later by a group or the totality
of scholars. In historical research a fairly intricate procedure of sub-
stantiating statements (a procedure which is closely linked with that of
formulating statements), to be discussed in detail later on, has been de-
veloped. It includes the examination of the authenticity and reliability
of sources, a gamut of direct and indirect fact-finding methods, and
causal explanation, accompanied by the constant assistance provided by
non-source-based knowledge. For the time being let us confine ourselves
to finding out how to label those statements which in historical research
are proved to be true in an indirect manner only. To do so we have to
analyse the concept of probability as interpreted in history.
7. The concept of probability in historical research
The term probability, which is a subject matter of lively discussions, is

given several meanings, each of them interpreted in different ways."
The fundamental classification is that into probability applied to state-
ments and that applied to events. In the former case we may have to
do with logical probability (in R. Carnap's terminology: probabilitYl)'
which states (in the interpretation which we adopt here) with what de-
gree of certainty (that is, rational certainty in J. M. Keynes's termino-
logy, or epistemological certainty in B. Russells' terminology) a person
may accept statement A if he has accepted statement B, or with psycho-
logical probability, which indicates the degree of certainty with which
a person actually accepts a given statement (possibly without referring
it to the body of knowledge he has).
346 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF ffiSfORY
Logical probability may coincide with psychological, but in most

cases probabilistic statements (not only those made by historians) show
a certain reinforcement of the former by the latter. The probability of
an event from a given class of events equals the quotient of the number
of favourable events by the number of all possible events in that class.
If n stands for the number of the favourable events of type A (e.g.,
drawing an ace from a full pack of cards), and N for the number of all
possible events (e.g., the number of the cards which may be drawn from
the pack), then the probability of A is shown by the formula:
n
peA) = N'
The measure of probability given by this formula is in the closed inter-
val [0,1] (the modification "closed" meaning here that the measure may
also take any of the limiting values 0 and 1), which means that the
value 1 of A indicates certainty (Le., the certainty that A will take
place). The probability of drawing an ace from a pack of 52 cards
would, accordingly, be
4
peA) = 32'
The above is what is called the classical difinition of probability.
There is, however, another definition of the probability of events, which
is termed statistical or frequency definition of probability. In the latter
case no reference is made to the concept of a favourable and a possible
event, since those are not known in advance. In such a case the proba-
bility of an event A can only be fixed experimentally (for instance, by
mUltiple sampling). Frequency probability thus amounts to the relative
frequency, found in this way, of the occurrence of an event W among
a fairly large number of other events. Since, in the prevailing opinion
of experts, frequency probability applies only to events which occur on
a mass scale, that is such which can be subjected to statistical opera-
tions, some of the experts (e.g., R. von Mises) -- namely those who
claim that historical research is concerned with singular facts only-
restrict the applicability of frequency probability to natural science (and
mathematics) only. This reveals a clearly marked asymmetry in the
classification of types of probability: logical and psychological probabil-
ity are applicable to statements about all events, and hence, indirectly,
to all events, whereas statistical (i.e., empirical) probability is applicable

to those events only which occur in large numbers. The language be-
haviour characteristic of historians, which in this case complies witb
everyday usage, shows the gap that consists in the lack of a concept of
probability that would be applicable to singular events. But, as will be
shown later, that concept of probability which applies to singular state-
ments and is so common in historical research is subject to frequency
interpretation, too.
Historians have been using all the concepts of probability as mention-
ed above; all those concepts, too, seem to be validated in historical re-
search. But now, when analysing the methods of finding out logical
values of statements, we shall mainly be concerned with logical proba-
bility as referred to statements, and not to events. It will also be demon-
strated tentatively that logical probability is closely linked to empirical
probability.
There are, in science, two different interpretations of logical proba-
bility. One of these (used, for instance, by H. Reichenbach) assumes
logical probability to be a semantic category (concept) like truth is, and
hence to be the measure (degree) of the truth of statements, i.e., the
measure of their approximation to facts. In this interpretation, the con-
cepts falsehood - probability - truth form a single sequence. Hence the
certainty of the validity of a statement A in the light of other state-
ments, i.e., a given body of knowledge, that is, the certainty of its truth,
is identified with its truth.
This confusion of concepts is avoided in the other interpretation
(J. M. Keynes, B. Russell, R. Carnap, J. Nicod, K. Ajdukiewicz), which
treats logical probability not as a degree of truth (of a statement), but
as a degree of the rational certainty of the truth (inductive substantia-
tion) of a given statement. In this interpretation the falsehood - truth
axis is distinct from the axis of the varying degrees of probability.
Hence the acceptance of a statement as certain need not result auto-
matically in labelling it as true. As follows from the definition of logical
probability, given in the opening paragraph of this section, the present
writer considers the second interpretation to be more to the point. The
issue will be discussed later.
Both interpretations assume that a definite degree of the probability
of a statement depends on the degree of its substantiation, with the pro-
viso that in the case of the former interpretation we immediately come

to demonstrate the corresponding degree of the truth of that statement,
whereas in the case of the latter we only arrive at the corresponding de-
gree of the certainty of its truth. At any rate, it may be said that,
regardless of its interpretation, the concept of logical probability is con-
nected with indirect demonstration of the truth of statements and thus
is a measure of the success of such a demonstration.
But are we then, be accepting the second interpretation, doomed to
always calling statements substantiated in some degree to be only
certain. in the same degree. as to their truth, that is. probable. and tq
keeping the label of truth only for those statements which have been
directly confronted with facts? In other words. is there no possibility of
passing from the apparently purely pragmatic (and syntactic) level to
the semantic one. which considers the relationship between statements
and facts? In the present writer's opinion such a possibility exists. and
its consideration enables us to avoid the endeavours of making science
in general. and history in particular, more "exact" by eliminating the
concept of truth in favour of that of probability. which has been sug-
gested by some supporters of the first interpretation. That possibility is
not noticed by the second interpretation. which stresses the analytical
nature of probabilistic statements (which means that such statements
are supposed not to refer to facts).
There are two arguments in favour of making no distinction. on the
part of the historians. between those statements whose truth is demon-
strated directly and those whose truth is demonstrated indirectly, that
is. in favour of calling true those statements which are certain as to
their truth.
The first of these two arguments points to the close relationship be-
tween probabilitic comments about statements. on the one hand. and
the facts to which statements refer, on the other. that is. the relation-
ship between logical and empirical probability. Consider the following
statements, which we have so far failed to substantiate with data drawn
from sources: "Zyndram of Maszkowice was not the Polish commander
in the Battle of Grunwald" (the battle in 1410, in which the Poles de-
feated the Teutonic Knights; in English-language texts also called the
battle of Tannenberg",. Tr). This statement has its degree of certainty
of being true, that is, its logical probability. Its acceptance is based on
its confrontation with other statements, such as: "In the Middle Ages
people of low condition and small fortune usually did not exercise com-
mand over their social superiors", "Zyndram of Maszkowice was of
a relatively low condition", "He was not rewarded after the battIe",
"Commanders used to be rewarded after victorious battles", etc. The
above-quoted hypothesis about Zyndram of Maszkowice follows from
these statements with some probability (the example under considera-
tion will be analysed again in greater detail, but in another context).
But the theorem on the logical probability of a statement is not based
solely on such a confrontation of statements, from which it follows
that our hypothesis H has, in the light of those statements, a probabil-
ity p. Such a confrontation would not be possible without certain facts
which make it improbable for a man of a low condition to have been,
in the Middle Ages, a commander of his social superiors. This structure
of facts accounts for our possibility of finding arguments in its favour:
facts provide arguments in their own favour. The statement "The Battle
of Crecy was won by gnomes" has no acceptable testimony of its truth
just because it is incompatible with (the structure of) facts. We some-
times formulate a hypothesis without any special substantiation (possible
in some other way, but without strong arguments in its favour drawn
from the sources) and we consider it acceptable; moreover, we do not
evoke protests of other researchers. Apparently the commonly known
structure of related facts makes that hypothesis fairly probably. We are
accordingly convinced of a large degree of the probability of its being
true, that is, we formulate a statement with a correspondingly large psy-
chological probability. The discrepancy between logical and psychologi-
cal probability is in this case due to a lack of an adequate number of
statements required for a confrontation with the hypothesis.
It may be said generally that every statement which has its logical (or
psychological) probability may have its analogue (model) in empirical
probability, which obviously does not mean that our finding out its
logical probability in each case corresponds to the unknown probability
of events. In other words, probability can be expressed both in object
language and in metalanguage. The statement: "Arguments adduced by
the author substantiate, with a large probability, the statement that Zyn-
dram of Maszkowice was not the commander in the Battle of Grun-
wald", refers to the probability (degree of certainty of the truth) of
a given statement, and not to facts. It is accordingly a metastatement.

Its object language equivalent is: "It is highly probable that Zyndram
of Maszkowice was not the commander in the Battle of Grunwald", or
"It is not probable (it is unlikely) that Zyndram of Maszkowice was
the commander in the Battle of Grunwald". It may also be said that its
empirical equivalent is, "Zyndram of Maszkowice was the commander
in the Battle of Grunwald with a probability p", since there are two
possibilities only: he either was the commander (p = 1) or was not
(p = 0); but this bears out the difference between the real degree of
probability, which we do not know, and the degree of probability which
we ascribe to the statement under consideration. That difference is the
measure of our ignorance. The relationship between the probability
which refers to statements and that which refers to events can clearly
be seen in the definition of statistical probability transformed by
K. Ajdukiewicz so that it should refer to the probability of statements:
"The probability of a statement which says about an object that is A.
relative to a statement which says that that object is B, equals the
relative frequency of objects A among objects B".45
In many cases that definition would make it possible to compute the
probability of statements.
The concept of logical probability, which refers to various historical
facts (and at the same time to statements about facts) can be interpreted
in terms of frequencies which obviously does not mean that the rela-
tive frequency of the occurrence of objects (or statements) A in the class
of objects (or statements) B can in each case be established. Historians
follow this intuitive interpretation by often using such formulations as
"unlikely", "very likely", "almost certain", etc., which J. Giedymin
calls quasi-metric. We could stipulate a greater precision of such for-
mulations, some of which could be given a numerical interpretaton. Our
claim that the probability of singular events can be interpreted in terms
of frequency is based on the fact that, as J. Giedymin was right to note,
a historian is in a position to establish the probability of an event only
if he can refer to a general statement about a class of events, in which
the event in question can be included. We have said that it was unlikely
for Zyndram of Maszkowice to have been the commander in the Battle
of Grunwald because his holding the command would be at variance
with our knowledge of the Middle Ages. This confrontation is, as we
can easily see, based on frequency considerations: we refer to nothing

else than the fact that the relative frequency of commanders in large
battles in the Middle Ages being people of a low condition and little
fortune is small, that the relative frequency of rewarded commanders in
the class of commanders in victorious battles is large, etc.
The interpretation of the truth of a factual statement (in our case
that about Zyndram of Maszkowice) in terms of frequency is based on
the above-mentioned frequency interpretation of events. It is the latter
which as it were cedes its degree of probability to the former. A state-
ment about an event is probable only so far as the fact to which it re-
fers is probable. Well substantiated statements can refer to those facts
only which did, or did not, occur. The unlikely fact of a mediaeval
commander in an important battle being a man of a low condition and
small fortune, who would have to give orders to lords and princes, im-
plies that it is unlikely to find arguments which would substantiate the
statement that a man of a low condition and small fortune commanded
his social superiors in a important mediaeval battle. Hence inferring
from the fact that a person was of a low condition that he was not
a commader in an important battle would yield conclusions very likely
to be true.
The possibility of substantiation of a statement, determined by facts,
does not mean actual substantiation. The degree of an actual substan-
tiation (that is, of the probability of a statement) depends on our know-
ledge with which that fact is confronted. This may refer to what we
know about the informant (his reliability), about the source involved
(its authenticity), and to general historical, psychological, sociological,
etc., knowledge. We can thus imagine a true statement whose degree of
substantiation (certainty of its being true) is very small. As our know-
ledge expands that statement may, under certain circumstances, have
the chance of becoming better substantiated. Reference to our know-
ledge consists in the search for the substantiation determined by facts;
such a reference is, as has been said, frequency-based. But a reference
to a source or an informant can be interpreted in terms of frequency,
too. In the latter case we are interested in the frequency with which
true information comes from a given source (or a given type of sources)
or a given informant in relation to the total of items of information
involved.
The second argument that justifies the practice of accepting state-

ments which are certain to be true (well substantiated) as true ones
consists in reference to the non-professional criterion of practice. As has
been pointed out earlier, that criterion shows us that we acquire true
knowledge gradually; this validates both the professional criterion of
practice and our ways of indirectly demonstrating the truth of state-
ments. It guarantees that if we accept a statement which is (rationally)
certain to be true as true we practically do not commit a significant
error. As we have said, this is an agreement with the practice observed
by historians.
What statements are then accepted by historians as probable if they
accept as true those which are certain to be true? We are concerned
here with positive (and not comparative) formulations in which the con-
cept of probability occurs, and hence not with statements like: a state-
ment A is more probable than a statement E, but statements of the
type: a statement A is probable (in the light of our source-based and
non-source-based knowledge). Now we may include in the class of prob-
able statements those which we hesitate to call certain to be true, but
which we nevertheless decide to accept as sufficiently substantiated (this
is also the practice followed by historians).
This applies to statements about the past which are based on more
or less numerous and exhaustive indirect data, statements concerned
with establishment of facts, and hypothetical statements about the past
concerned with causal relationships and laws, but not to well established
statements about the past, based on direct data about the facts to which
they refer. Thus, for instance, no historian will say that the statement
that The Bastille was stormed on July 14, 1789, or that World War II
began on September 1, 1939, or that The Aeneid was written by Virgil,
or that William The Conqueror won the Battle of Hastings, is merely
probable. In those cases the facts to which these statements refer have
been established on the basis of direct, sufficient and reliable source
data, that is, data which convey direct information about those facts.
The historian accordingly accepts these statements as certain to be true
and includes them in the body of (relatively) true ones. Such is the
status of the overhelming majority of historical statements, that is, those
which form a sui generis empirical, observational, or inductive basis of
historical considerations as a whole. On the contrary, since there are
no direct proofs of the fact that Martin Bormann died in Berlin in 1945,
the historian concludes that such or another hypothesis in that matter
can at most be probable. It must, however be borne in mind that if we
base statements about the past on direct data, then we have to establish
the authenticity of the source in question and the reliability of informa-
tion before we proceed to extract from that source the direct data on
the facts we are interested in. If such authenticity or reliability is estab-
lished only with a probability which is less than 1, then that label of
probability applies also to the statement based on the data contained in
the source whose authenticity or reliability is not quite certain. Since
the reliability of source-based data is often established by probability
inference (cf. Chap. XIX), some statements, based on direct data as
they are, may have a margin of uncertainty. In practice, however, if
a historian accepts given direct data in accordance with the rules of
scientific procedure in historical research (that is, in accordance with the
appropriate rules of source criticism), his knowledge obtained in that
way is substantiated well enough to be treated as certain.
On the other hand, the concept of probability is fully applicable to
statements based on indirect data derived from the sources and on non-
source-based data which refer both to the establishment of facts and to
causal explanations. We usually arrive at such statements through prob-
ability inference, which is unreliable; this means that conclusions may
not be treated as certain. Historians label such conclusions in various
ways; they often do not hesitate to call them certain, fully certain, more
than certain, doubtless, irrefutable, correct, true, etc. It is well known
that parties to a dispute, excited by a controversy, describe very fragile
constructions as certain. Note also that even the greatest certainty is
relative only as it is based on our actual knowledge, which must change
with the lapse of time.
The concept of logical probability (interpreted as the degree of the
certainty of truth) can be applied both to single statements and to
longer historical narratives. If we say that the description of the Battle
of Grunwald, as made by historian N, is probable, we mean that his de-
scription is adequately substantiated in the light of the knowledge we
have, or, in other words, that the objective analogue of that probabil-
istic statement formulated in metalanguage ("It is probable that the
Battle of Grunwald followed the course given by historian N") does
not differ much from that statement, or rather that the statement does
not differ from its objective analogue (model). The probability of a his-
torical narrative might be interpreted as the weighted mean of the prob-
abilities of the single component events that combine to form the com-
posite event covered by the narrative. The problem, however, is more
complex in view of the issues which have been discussed in connection
with the truth of a narrative, and it would be safer to consider it an
open issue.
As follows from the above, the concept of logical probability is very
useful in characterizing the effects of cognition in historical research
(and in research in general). It makes it possible to characterize those
statements which we hold to be true in a specified degree of certainty
(that degree of certainty being established by the confrontation of the
said statements with the body of knowledge we have). In other words,
logical probability informs us about the degree of substantiation of
given statements and serves as a basis for their acceptance or rejection.
It also enables us to make a distinction between (relatively) true state-
ments (i.e., those confronted with facts) and those concerning which we
have a corresponding rational certainty (i.e., those confronted with our
body of knowledge). But, as we have mentioned above, logical proba-
bility can both be in a way translated into empirical probability, and,
when combined with the probability of singular events (at least in
a large number of cases which are significant in historical research), in-
terpreted in terms of frequency probability.
As has also been said, we are much less interested in the concept of
empirical probability. In its statistical version it is not used explicitly
by historians too often, except for those cases when they are concerned
with historical statistics (and especially with demography) and have to
consider the probability of a person's attaining a certain age in a given
epoch. Yet it seems that, although historical research consists above all
in postgnosis, and not in prognosis, more studies on the probability of
the occurrence of certain events in the past could interestingly broaden
the field of historical description and explanation. 46 On the other hand,
historians quite frequently use the concept of empirical probability as
applied to single events, especially when they advance suggestions as to
the occurrence of certain facts in the past. In such cases, if language
is not distinguished from metalanguage, such suggestions also mean
statements about logical probability. In historical works we can often

encounter statements like: "It is probable that Julius Caesar visited
Britain". "It is unlikely for Mieszko I (the first ruler of Poland - Tr.)
to have been satisfied with his conquests and to have retreated without
occupying the Qdra estuary area". "It is unlikely that grain crops in
Poland in the first half of the 17th century should be so poor", etc. As
can easily be noted, they express the following opinions: "The proba-
bility of the statement that Julius Caesar visited Britain is substantiated
in a degree p". "The probability of the statement that Mieszko I was
satisfied with his conquests and retreated without occupying the Qdra
estuary area is very small". "No significant probability can be ascribed
to the statement that grains crops in Poland in the first half of the 17th
century were so poor". This points once more to the fact that the con-
cept of logical probability and that of the probability of single events
are very commonly used in history, and hence to the necessity of a fur-
ther analysis of these interpretations of probabilities, so often used in
the humanities.
REFERENCES
1 To be called hereafter the knowledge of the past.

2 A. J. Ayer, The Problem of Knowledge, Baltimore 1961, p. 79.
8 For arguments against agnosticism see F. Engels, Foreword to the English-
language edition of "Socialism: Utopian and Scientific", Selected Works, vol. I,
ed. cit., pp. 92-94.
4 The distinction between these stages has been made by V. Lenin.
5 There is an obvious difference between science and scientific knowledge:
the former covers both the accumulated results of research and the methods of
obtaining them, and is thus a dynamic concept, whereas the latter covers only
the results of research, and is thus a static concept.
S Cf. S. Ossowski on the requirements of scientific responsibility in his
o osobliwosciach nauk spolecznych (On the Peculiarities of the Social Sciences),
Warszawa 1962, pp. 283 ff. The comments made here refer to empirical dis-
ciplines.
7 W. S. Jevons, The Principles of Science, vol. II, New York 1877, pp.
673-4.
8 Cf. Q. Gibson, The Logic of Social Enquiry, London 1960, p. 3.
D The term ideology has many different interpretations. It seems the most
appropriate to stress both its genetic and functional nature. Hence, if a state-
ment has a clear class origin, which points to its connection with specified
social groups (that have common interests), and if it also formulates the
objectives of those groups (or the entire class), then it is to be treated as an

ideology.
10 a. A. J. Ayer, The Problem of Knowledge, ed. cit., vol. 3.
11 a. K. Ajdukiewicz, Jgzyk i poznanie (Language and Cognition), 2 vols,
Warszawa 1960-5. See also W. P. Alston, The Philosophy of Language, New
York 1964 (with the basic bibliography).
12 Those types of scepticism are analysed by A. C. Danto, The Analytical
Philosophy of History, ed. cit., pp. 27-111. The present writer does not agree
with him on many points, but also finds many of his analyses to be convergent
with his own.
13 A. C. Danto, op. cit., pp. 34-44.
14 A. J. Ayer, The Problem of Knowledge, Edinburgh 1961.
15 a. A. C. Danto, OlJJ. cit., pp. 54-6.
16 IbM., pp. 73 ff.
17 This view has been formulated by B. Russell in The Analysis of Mind,

London 1921. It is quoted here after A. C. Danto, op. cit., pp. 77 ff.
18 In the methodology of sciences, instrumentalism is the viewpoint "accord-
ing to which scientific laws and theories are not true or false statements about
facts, but are merely instruments used in ordering and predicting observable
facts". (a. J. Giedymin, Problemy, zaloienia, rozstrzygnigcia (Problems, As-
sumptions, Decisions), ed. cit., p. 175.)
19 A. C. Danto, op. cit., p. 79.
20 The fact that historical cognition is specifically indirect has been stressed
(next to the old handbooks by Ch. V. Langlois and Ch. Seignobos, M. Handels-
man, and the more recent one by S. Koscialkowski) by A. Gieysztor, Zarys
pomocniczych nauk historii (An Outline of the Auxiliary Historical Sciences),
Warszawa 1950; R. Lutman, "Podstawy metodologiczne historiografii" (The
Methodological Foundations of Historiography), Proceedings of the 8th Con-
gress of Polish Historians, vol. I, Warszawa 1948, p. 19; H. C. Hockett, The
Critical Method in Historical Research and Writing, New York 1958, p. 8;
H. J. Marrou, De la connaissance historique, Paris 1956, p. 143. The last-named
author is of the opinion that because of the indirectness of historical cognition
we may not speak about history as a science in the full sense of the term, as
we have here to do with cognition based on faith (connaissance de foj). R. Lut-
man also writes that in historiography "the researcher's attitude is basically
fideistic" (op. cit., p. 24). See also C. Bobiflska, Historyk. Fakt, Metoda (The
Historian. The Fact. The Method), pp. 112 ff. This standpoint is criticized by
W. Kula (Rozwaiania 0 historii (Reflections on History), ed. cit., pp. 42-60),
who points to the fact that cognition is indirect also when it comes to contem-
porary facts, and not only those of the past.
21 M. Bloch holds that when we have to do with physical objects that are
relics of the past cognition is direct: "Quelque jugement qu'on porte sur e1le,
c'est indeniablement une induction du type Ie plus classique; elle se fonde sur
la constatation d'un fait et la parole d'autrui n'y intervient en rien". (Cf. Apo-
THE NATURE OF IllSTORICAL COGNITION 357
logie pour I' histoire ou metier d' historien, p. 20.) His approach has been at one
time criticized by the present writer, but not concerning the forms of historical
cognition, but concerning the methods of establishing facts. Direct data may
be used for both direct and indirect establishment of facts. The example given
by Bloch is a typical case of indirect establishment of facts (Le., by deduction).
Cf. Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 2/1961, p. 458.
2.2 Cf. A. J. Ayer, The Problem of Knowledge, ed. cit., p. 151.
2.2 Memoirs, once they have been written, are treated not as a source of the
"memory" type, but as a third person's relation about certain events.
24 W. Kula, Rozwazania 0 historii (Reflections on History), ed. cit., pp. 42 ff.
25 Ibid., pp. 52-5.
26 A. C. Danto, The Analytical Philosophy of History, ed. cit., pp. 63-87.
27 Note that the modifier objective is used here in two different senses: when
we say that facts are objective in nature, it refers to facts (and occurs in object-
language formulations); in the second sense, it refers to statements about facts
(and occurs in metalinguistic formulations).
28 He is the author of the phrase about the "research perspective" defined
by a given social situation. Cf. K. Mannheim, Ideology and Utopia. An Intro-
duction to the Sociology of Knowledge, New York 1936, pp. 240 ff. L. Wirth's
foreword to that work also deserves attention.
29 W. Stark, The Sociology of Knowledge. An Essay in Aid of a Deeper
Understanding of the History of Ideas, London 1958.

30 K. Mannheim, op. cit., p. 261.
31 It is worth while mentioning here M. Weber's penetrating comments on
value in science. As is known, he advocated a strict distinction between state-
ments which have a logical value and norms, which are neither true nor false.
Cf. M. Weber, Gesammelte Aufsiitze zur Wissenschaftslehre, Ttibingen 1922,
which includes "Der Sinn der Wertfreiheit der soziologischen und okonomischen
Wissenchaften". See also V. Kraft, Die Grundlagen einer Wissenschaftlichen
Wertlehre, Wien 1937. The literature concerned with the problem of values in
science is very rich. We mention here two items which in a sense sum up the
issue, namely G. Myrdal, Value in Social Theory, New York 1958 (concerned
with the social sciences in general), and A. Stern, Philosophy of History and the
Problem of Values, The Hague 1962 (concerned with history). Myrdal claims
that valuation is part of science and that we cannot imagine any "disinterested"
social knowledge, which fact, he emphasizes, is not in contradiction with the
striving for rationality in thinking. Stem's opinion on history is similar; he also
comes against the radical disregarding of differences between the social and the
natural sciences. Yet, as the present writer has to stress, valuation applies to
both categories of disciplines.
32 F. Kaufmann, The Methodology of the Social Sciences, 2nd ed., New
York 1958, p. 67.

33 The term Basenentscheidungen is found in H. Albert, "Probleme der Wis-
senschaftslehre in der Sozialforschung", Handbuch der empirischen Sozialfor-
schung, p. 48. See also R. Rudner, "Value Judgements in the Acceptance of

Theories" in: The Validation of Scientific Theories, New York 1952.
34 A similar classification is found in A. Stern, op. cit., pp. 132-3 (universal
values, collective values, individual values). The various works concerned with
the problem of values, beginning with Nichomachean Ethics and Politics, had
divisions into various classes of values. For the time being we are concerned
only with classifications based on the scope of social acceptance. H. D. Lewis
makes the distinction between "personal predilection" and "general presupposi-
tions" (cf. Freedom and History, London 1962, pp. 202-6).
35 The problem of convergence and divergence in valuation is discussed by
J. Bailka, Ideologia i nauki humanistyczne (Ideology and the Humanities), Adam
Mickiewicz University Publications, The Philosophy, Psychology and Pedagogy
Series, No.9, Poznail 1966.
36 The manifestations of the valuating attitude in historical research will be
treated later, when valuations in history are discussed. The criteria of valuation
(absolute valuation, radically relativistic valuation and moderately relativistic
valuation) will be discussed on the same occasion.
37 Among the books on objectivism in historical research note M. Mandel-
baum, The Problem of Historical Knowledge, ed. cit.; F. Kaufmann, The Meth-
odology of the Social Sciences, New York 1958; I. Berlin, Historical Inevita-
bility, ed. cit.; Ch. Blake, "Can History Be Objective?" (in: Theories of History,
ed. cit., pp. 329-413); Blake's approach is discussed by D. H. Lewis, Freedom
and History, London 1962, pp. 201 ff. On the same issue see also J. A. Passmore,
"Can the Social Sciences be Value-Free?" (in: Readings in the Philosophy of
Science, H. Feigl and M. Brodbeck (eds.), New York 1953); W. Kula, Rozwa-
iania 0 historii (Reflection on History), Warszawa 1958.
38 K. Marx, Das Kapital, vol. 1, Stuttgart-Berlin 1922, p. 7.
39 A. Gramsci, Pisma wybrane, vol. I, Warszawa 1961, pp. 132-3.
40 This is merely a suggestion, which has to be worked out separately.
41 The problem deserves detailed research; in fact it must be treated in a
broader context, namely that of methods of argumentation.
42 V. Lenin, Materialism and empirio-criticism, English Edition, Moscow,
1947, p. 142.
43 F. Engels, Preface to the English-language edition of "Socialism: Utopian
and Scientific", ed. cit.
44 So far the concept of probability in historical research has been most ex-
tensively treated by J. Giedymin, Problemy logiczne analizy historycznej (Logical
Issues in Historical Analyses), pp. 26-38. General works (except for mathemat-
ical ones) include as the most important ones: J. M. Keynes, A Treatise on
Probability, London 1948; R. Carnap, The Two Concepts of Probability. Read-
ings in Philosophical Analysis, New York 1949, and Logical Foundations of
Probability, London 1951; H. Reichenbach, Theory of Probability, Berkeley
1949; R. von Mises, Probability, Statistics and Truth, 2nd ed., London 1956;
E. Borel, Probabilite et certitude, Paris 1961; M. R. Cohen, Reason and Nature,
London 1964, pp. 125-35. Works by Polish authors include K. Ajdukiewicz,

Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., pp. 120-130, and J. Los, "Semantyczne reprezentacje
prawdopodobienstwa wyrai:en w teoriach sformalizowanych" (Semantic Repre-
sentations of the Probability of Formulas in Formalized Theories), Rozprawy
logiczne, pp. 91-102. Los makes a distinction between the probability of the
occurrence of a causal nexus and the probability of the existence of that nexus.
The latter is not - when it comes to the possession of a certain property (namely,
that A is a cause of B) - a probability in the proper sense of the term (that
would make sampling possible). The problem of probability is predominant, as
is known, in H. Reichenbach, The Rise of Scientific Philosophy, Berkeley 1951.
45 K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., p. 124.
46 M. Bloch puts it thus: "L'historien qui s'interroge sur la probabiliU: d'un
evenement ecoule, que tente-t-il, en effet, sinon de se transporter par un mou-
vement hardi de l'esprit, avant cet evenement meme pour en juger les chances,
telles qu'elles se presentaient a la veille de son accomplissement? La proba-
bilite reste donc bien dans l'avenir". (Apologie pour l'histoire ou metier d'his-
torien, ed. cit., p. 60.)
XIV. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. A GENERAL
RECONSTRUCTION OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
1. The problem of decisions
We have so far been mainly concerned with historical cognition, and

now we shall more and more concentrate on the concept of historical
research, which does not want to say that the latter will be opposed to
the former. The point is that when we speak about historical cognition
we investigate more general issues, which by their very nature apply to
all kinds of human cognition, whereas the examination of historical re-
search brings us much closer to practical or even purely technical issues
which a historian has to face when he is to answer a question which he
has posed himself or which has been posed to him by others. Such
a question might be termed a research question, not only because it must
be distinguished from diagnostic questions (which include, for instance,
examination questions), but mainly because we require such an answer
to that question which is preceded by research conducted in accordance
with the rules that are binding in the world of historians. This calls,
above all, for a general reconstruction of the process that might be
symbolized thus: "question -+ answer", and hence an explanation of
the concepts of question and answer.
A decision made under specified conditions is the starting point of all
human action. The same applies to the procedures used in science, per-
haps with the proviso that in scientific procedures we usually much
better realize that we incessantly make some decisions than we do in
everyday life, where we usually do not realize that at every step we
choose one from the many possible courses of action. The methodology
of sciences may rest satisfied - and is, in its purely descriptive version -
with a simple description of the research operations performed by scien-
tists, without considering the effectiveness of the decisions they make,
or, to use the language of the theory of games, the effectiveness of the
strategies they choose. 1 But it can also go further, and it does so in its
A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 361
normative version: by accepting scientific research to be a variation of

rational action in general (i.e., a goal-oriented action) it may try to find
out the latent rules by which scientists are guided in striving for the
attainment of their epistemological goals and eventually to define a
strategy which is optimal for a given action. It might be said that in the
former case the methodologist remains in the descriptive stage and is
as it were an idiographer of scientific methodology. In the latter, he
makes use of the results of descriptions in order tentatively to explain
cognitive procedures in science, that is, to answer the question, why
does a researcher (e.g., a historian) make some decisions and not the
others? By including the decision problem in methodological considera-
tions he moves them from the level of description to that of explanation
and appraisal. By doing so he brings methodological analysis closer to
the problem of valuations. If a decision is made to perform an action
relative to a certain goal (under the assumption of a rational, i.e., goal-
oriented action, which covers scientific activity), it follows therefore
that there is an underlying basic decision, associated with the re-
searcher's system of values (axioms concerning the fundamental philo-
sophical, social, political, etc., issues, current at the time), which defines
that goal. Thus the choice of the field of research, largely conditioned
by the researcher's system of values, is the starting point of all research.
The decision as to the choice of the field of research is the first step in
the process of posing questions (formulation of interrogative sentences),
the latter being the essential action in research,2 an action which
might be termed the guiding one. The next step is the search for the
answers to the questions posed. Hence socientific research might be
reconstructed as the process of posing questions and seeking answers
to them.
2. Basic concepts in the theory of historical questions and answers
In historical research the totality of the questions which a historian

poses himself can be reduced to the following three fundamental types:
(1) what was? (factographic questions),
(2) why was that so? (explanatory questions),
(3) what scientific laws follow from the study of the past? (theoreti-
cal questions).
When answering questions in the first group a historian makes a de-

scription (narrative), and when answering those in the second group he
offers an explanation. The result of such an explanation, however, also
takes the form of a description. From the formal point of view these
two groups of questions (singled out with respect to the various tasks
which a historian faces) are open questions to which, contrary to closed
questions, "we are neither able to give an exhaustive (finite) list of ad-
missible answers nor to offer a schema or an effective method of con-
structing such admissible answers".3 In the case of a closed question we
are in a position to give an exhaustive list of answers or a schema of
answers or else an effective method of constructing answers to that
question.'
A historian who is an adherent of idiographism (whether methodolo-
gical or objective or both) confines himself to these two groups of ques-
tions (factographic and explanatory), the second group being interpreted
in a specific way.5 Qestions in the third group, closely linked to those
in the second group, are open, too. But whereas answers to those in the
first two groups are in the form of historical narratives (that is, referred
to time and space), in the case of the third group we expect answers in
the form of general statements, i.e., theoretical in nature. While those
historical narratives can be composed in many ways, theoretically: in
inifinitely many ways, formulations of laws (thllt is, answers to theoreti-
cal questions) are supposed to be as precise as possible.
Only those most general schemata of questions (what was? why was
that so? what laws follow from the results of research?), for which
neither a complete list of direct answers nor a schema of a direct an-
swer can be given, are open. Within such a group we often formulate
closed questions (which provide a schema of an answer). For instance,
when formulating the open question: (1) "Why did Hitler rise to power
in Germany?" we ask, among other things: (la) "Which social groups
gave support to the NSDAP in 1933?". The factographic questions to
which we answer by a narrative (e.g., how did it come to that? how did
it happen?), the explanatory questions (why did it happen?), and the
questions about laws are open ones, and factographic questions which
call for an answer in a single sentence are closed ones.
Next to open and closed questions, the theory of questions distin-
guishes the second fundamental classification. i.e., into decision ques-
tions and complementation questions. In the former case a decision is

made between two answers (or a finite number of answers) which are
mutually exclusive and such that only one of them is true ('do' ques-
tions). Multiple decision questions can be split (by the binarization
procedure) into a series of binary ones. Decision questions are posed if
we advance a hypothesis (i.e., a supposition concerning the admissible
answer). When answering such a question we choose from among rival
(two or more) answers one of which always is a denial of the other.
Here is an example of a decision question in historical research: (2) Do
manorial farms develop always when there is a good market for agri-
cultural produce and a system of strict serfdom of peasants? In this
case a hypothesis is formulated; we ask whether it is well substantiated,
and if it proves to be so, then we obtain a ready answer to our ques-
tion. Decision questions with a more complex structure are of the
following types: "which of the statements Zl' ... , zn is the only true
one?" ("is it Zl' or Z2' or...or Zn ?"); "which - at least one - of the state-
ments Zl' ... , Zn is true?"; "which of the statements Zl> ... , Zn are exactly
all the true ones?" (The symbols? Du, ?Da, ?De will hereafter be used
respectively.)
Thus we can ask:
(3) Was it Sweden, or Russia, or Poland which was victorious in the
Battle of Poltava? (the only one true statement is to be indicated);
(4) Did Poland, Sweden, Germany, Russia take part in the Thirty
Years' War? (at least one true statement is to be indicated);
(5) Did Polish peasants in the 17th century work as serfs, or did
they pay rent, or did they deliver a levy in kind, or were they free from
obligations to their feudal lord? (all the true statements are to be in-
dicated).
Complementation questions (or 'who' I 'what' /'which' questions), or
'for which x ...?", are posed when we have no hypothesis as to the an-
swer; they are essential when we search for solutions (they are also ca)-
led search questions). An answer to such a question consists in making
a choice from among a set of many (or infinitely many) elements. In
historical research this category may be represented by such questions
as: (6) "What were the causes of the Thirty Years' War?"; (7) "Who
was the commander of the Polish troops in the Battle of Grunwald?";
(8) "When did the commercial superiority of the Netherlands over Eng-
364 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lITSTORY
land end?"; (9) 'What was the structure of Polish society before the
Uprising of 1863?"; (10) "What is the significance of the Manifesto of
the Polish Committee of National Liberation?"; (11) "Why was the
Polish gentry so numerous?"; etc.
When we look for answers to complementation questions we can for-
mulate decision questions - on the necessary condition that the set of
possible answers is finite and known. For instance, when answering
question (7) we may formulate a number of decision questions:
(7a) "Was Zyndram of Maszkowice the Polish commander in the Battle
of Grunwald?"; (7b) "Was King Jagello the Polish commander in the
Battle of Grunwald?"; etc. In the case of question (9) we may ask:
(9a) "Did an intelligentsia exist at that time?"; (9b) "Were the rent-pay-
ing peasants more numerous than the serfs?"; etc. We thus split com-
plementation questions into decision questions. The types of comple-
mentation questions are as follows: "which statement in a given set of
statements is the only true?"; "which - at least one - statement in
a given set is true?"; "which are all the true statements in a given set?"
Complementation questions include part of factographic questions, ex-
planatory questions ('why' questions), and questions about laws.
In historical research it is open questions and complementation ques-
tions which play the leading role (the latter being, in the process of
research, usually split into closed complementation questions and deci-
sion questions; the last-named ones are closed questions by their very
nature, whereas complementation questions may be open (d. questions
(1), (6), (9), (10», or closed (cf. questions (7), (8», even though it is not
always possible to draw a clear demarcation line.
Answers to complementation and decision questions - if analysed in
the light of communication theory - are classified as direct and indirect,
and, from another point of view, complete and partial (formulation of
J. Giedymin). A direct answer to a decision question is in a way implied
1:?y the 'do' question. If the question is single, the answer is a state-
ment in the affirmative or in the negative: for instance, the direct an-
swer to question (2) is, "it is always so that manorial farms develop ... ",
or, "it is not always so that manorial farm develop... " If it is a multiple
question, an answer to a ?Du question is the conjunction of negations
of all statements except one, while an answer to the remaining two
types of decision questions (? Da, ?De questions) is, respectively, a state-
ment implied by a part of the multiple question or a conjunction of

such statements. This is so because in the first case we are to indicate
the only true statement in a given set of statements in the second case,
at least one true statement, and in the third, all the true statemens.
While in the case of decision questions we point to a specified direct
answer, in the case of complementation questions we can only give
a schema of the answer (datum quaestionis), which will include the un-
known of the question (a variable). The schema of the answer to ques-
tion (la) is: "In 1933, the NSDAP obtained support of the parties
Xl' ... , x n ". When looking for an answer to a complementation question
we first try to define the range of the unknown, and next we reduce it
gradually.
An indirect answer is an indirect complete answer or a partial answer.
If the question is: "Who killed President Kennedy?", then an indirect
complete answer may be: "President Kennedy was killed by a person
who was a marksman". As can be seen, this brings us closer to a direct
answer. A partial answer is such which follows logically (possibly in
conjunction with an accepted statement) from a direct answer. It thus
reduces the range of the unknown of the question. For instance, the
statement: "The document was issued in A.D. 1128", is a direct answer
to the question about the date of a certain document; but if we do not
know the exact date we construct a partial answer (which indicates
a time interval of post quem and ante quem): "The document was is-
sued between. A.D. 1124 and 1130", and strive, as far as possible, for
a direct answer. It can easily be noted that the partial answer under
consideration is a consequence of a direct answer (which in our case
requires point estimation).
The distinction between direct and indirect answers is important for
the methodology of history as it is connected with the problem of direct
and indirect establishment of facts (cf. Chap. XIX). If we have direct
information about the facts we are interested in, then we are more often
in a position to give a direct answer from the outset, but if our data
(items of information) are indirect only, then we strive for a direct
(hypothetical) answer by formulating a series of intermediary indirect
partial answers. The case of the dating of a document (cf. the example
in the preceding paragraph) applies to a situation in which no direct
(reliable) information about the date of issue is available. Since causal
366 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSfORY
explanation usually also takes place through a substantiating procedure,

hence an answer to an explanatory question is usually constructed
through the intermediary of indirect answers. For instance, when posing
the question: "why was England ahead of the Netherlands in economic
development in the 17th and 18th centuries?", we first give partial an-
swers, such as: "because England developed her industry which was
competing with the Dutch"; "because England neglected neither her
trade nor her agriculture"; "because England was investing more", etc.,
to arrive ultimately as a general direct answer, such as: "England was
ahead of the Netherlands in economic development because her econo-
my was developing more harmoniously". Quite often, of course, we rest
satisfied with partial answers.
Hypotheses, which must be discussed at a greater length, are a special
category of direct and indirect answers. When used in historical re-
search, hypotheses may most generally be termed tentative answers to
research questions. Such tentative answers end by being either accepted
in science or eliminated from it.
3. The concept of hypothesis in historical research
The posing and the substantiation .of hypotheses is a procedure which

accompanies the historian throughout all his work, because it is the
very essence of the search for answers to questions posed by him to the
past. Even the stage at which source information is read (in the broad-
est sense of the word - Tr.) provides opportunities for making hypo-
theses. The very reading of a source, especially when we have to do
with codes that are hard to decode, is a sui generis hypothesis. But even
if a given item of information has been read and if we are convinced
about the correct result of that reading, that information is not accepted
as a basis for further steps in research procedure before we subject the
source in question to external and internal criticism, that is, before we
solve the problems of its authenticity and the reliability of the infor-
mation it provides. In this we cannot do without formulating hypo-
theses. Later on, hypotheses are made as we establish facts and proceed
to explain them. In all this we accept as elements of further research
those hypotheses only which have been subjected to verification. Thus
the research procedure used by the historian, which we have recon-
structed on another occasion as the process of formulating questions

and seeking answers to them, may - from a different point of view - be
interpreted as the formulation, substantiation, and verification of hypo-
theses. Hypotheses are treated as tentative answers (before they are
substantiated) and as answers (after they have been substantiated) to
the question posed. We disregard here the issue that a question is in
itself hypothetical; this will be discussed later.
In writings on methodology the concept of hypothesis used to be
constructed above all in reference to the experience acquired in natural
science. The complementary approach was contributed by J. Giedy-
min, who studied problems of the formulation and verification of hypo-
theses in social science, and in history in particular. s We have to agree
with him that the concept of hypothesis in historical research goes far
beyond the natural science approach, in which a hypothesis is inter-
preted as a non-accepted reason of a statement which confirms the fact
to be explained, which meant that the concept of hypothesis was con-
fined to the procedure of explanation. In historical research we formul-
ate hypotheses not only when seeking answers to explanatory questions
('why' questions), but also when answering factographic questions
('what was' questions), the latter procedure covering also the reading
of source information and the examination of the authenticity and re-
liability of sources. It may be said that in historical research any state-
ment about the past is a hypothesis if it has not yet been subjected to
a verification procedure, and also after it has been subjected to it, if no
sufficient degree of substantiation has been obtained. 1 For instance, we
formulate a hypothesis about the place of origin of the author of Gal-
lus' Chronicle (the earliest Polish chronicle, written in Latin by an un-
known author and covering events up to A.D. 1118 - Tr.) or about the
meaning of the word Shinesghe in Dagome Iudex (a document dating
from the late 10th century and concerned with Poland's early political
history - Tr.), and however we try to substantiate it, it nevertheless re-
mains a hypothesis, because in both cases the degree of verification can
hardly be accepted as sufficient.
Hence it is worth-while to make a distinction between heuristic hypo-
theses (hypotheses before verification) and more or less substantiated
hypotheses. Of course, substantiated hypotheses may under certain con-
ditions (e.g., after the discovery of new sources) be taken as the starting
.368 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
point for a further verification procedure and may thus play the role of
heuristic hypotheses. Substantiated hypotheses usually do not bear the
label of hypotheticity, as they are statements about facts which are ac-
cepted as true, with the proviso that, in accordance with the principle
that our knowledge of the world is acquired gradually, all statements
about facts always retain a degree of hypotheticity.
Next to the most general classification into heuristic and substantiated
hypotheses we can point to at least two other classifications of historical
hypotheses. One classification takes as its criterion the type of the re-
search procedure used by the historian; in this case the formulation and
substantiation of hypotheses applies in turn to: decoding of source in-
formation, external and internal criticism of a given source, which in its
broader sense cover decoding, establishing facts, and explanation (to-
gether with the formulation of laws), and construction of historical
facts. We have here to do in turn with hypotheses about the reading of
source information, about source criticism, about the establishing of
facts, about causal explanation and the formulation of laws, and hypo-
theses which suggest the integration of the totality of the obtained items
of information about the past under consideration, that is a specified
I
narrative (a picture of the past). The first three are factographic hypo-
theses, the next two are explanatory hypotheses, and the last one is a
construction hypothesis. This is summed up in the following schema:
hypotheses formulated in the reading of source information

hypotheses formulated in the course of external and internal
factographic
criticism of the source
hypotheses
hypotheses formulated in establishing facts (whether simple
or included in genetic sequences)
hypotheses which explain facts } explanatory
hypotheses which formulate laws hypotheses
hypotheses which integrate the data about the past (period-
ization, classification of the data) } construction
hypotheses
The classification into factographic and explanatory hypotheses does

not, of course, mean that when reading the sources, engaging in source
criticism, and in establishing facts we do not resort to procedures that
are typical of causal explanation.s The above classification is used to
bring out the task of a given procedure. In the first case we are con-
cerned with establishing facts, and in the second, with causal expla-
nations.
The second classification of historical hypotheses takes as its criterion
the types of the question to which a given hypothesis is to be an answer.9
In this classification, the most frequent hypotheses are:
'who/what' hypotheses,
'where' hypotheses,
'when' hypotheses,
'how' hypotheses,
'why' hypotheses.
(Each group includes its derivative hypotheses, too.)
Note also that historians constantly formulate and verify hypotheses
in the course of research, but use explicitly the term hypothesis or its
analogue in some cases only. They do so mainly when they are concern-
ed with establishing (less frequently: explaining) facts which in the
process of history are more important for a given study, but which do
not have sufficient source data about them. It was in this way that
numerous claims about the authorship of various texts, letters, etc.,
have been included in the science of history with the label of hypo-
theses; in other cases, this applies to hypotheses which ascribe certain
actions to given persons, establish the nature of certain social groups,
suggest descriptions of events concerning which data are lacking, etc.
Sometimes such weakly substantiated statements are called claims,
views, opinions, suppositions, etc., these terms being used alternately.
Usually a statement which has been classed as a hypothesis, that is,
a rather weakly substantiated one, remains such for a long time, even
though the degree of its substantiation may increase. The discovery of
sources that give new and essential information offers the greatest op-
portunity for such a statement ridding itself of the hypothesis label.
Unless this happens we remain within the sphere of ever new hypo-
theses, which have various arguments in their favour but nevertheless
remain hypotheses. Such is the case, for instance, of the hypotheses
which are to explain the meaning of the term narocznik, found in a few
Polish mediaeval records, or those which are to establish what was the
population of Paris before the Hundred Years' War.
The frequently used term working hypothesis is a specific variation
of the term hypothesis, used in the case when a researcher wishes to
emphasize its heuristic character, i.e., when he does not (or pretends not
to) treat it as a substantiated hypothesis.
4. The structure of historical theories and methodological models

Historians use the term theory quite often. For instance, they refer to
such or another theory of the formation of towns, the appearance of
unoccupied land in mediaeval European villages, or the emergence of
the manorial and serfdom economy. While hypotheses are often formu-
lated without being called so, alongside less numerous statements which
are explicitly termed hypotheses, in the case of theories we are only
concerned with those sets of statements which historians call theories.
Hence we are interested here only with theories classified by historians
as such. They might simply be called historical theories. The problem
of the theoretical tasks of historical research and the role of theories
therein will be discussed separately (cf. Chap. XXVI).
On the whole, but with a reservation to be analysed below, historical
theories are a subclass of hypotheses. It is true that historians usually
do not call theories hypotheses, but the formal structure of historical
theories and hypotheses is the same. Hence all comments on hypotheses
apply to theories. What then singles out theories from among other
historical hypotheses? From a detailed analysis of a fairly large number
of theories extracted from historical studies of various kinds we have
to conclude that it is not possible to indicate such properties of theories
which would make it possible to distinguish them from other hypo-
these with adequate precision.
We can only point to three traits which are usually characteristic of
historical theories. The first of them refers to the content of statements,
the second, to their structure, and the third, to the stage in the historian's
research which they represent. First of all, theories refer to certain
events which are more significant from the point of view of the process
of history. The degree of their substantiation, in comparison with hypo-
theses (even those which are explicitly called such), is not at all greater,
and in many cases turns out to be very small, even smaller than in the
case of substantiated hypotheses which are explicitly termed so. The
second trait refers to a slightly different structure of theories, to be dis-
cussed later. The third is that they usually are hypotheses which offer
A GENERAL RECONSTRUCfION OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 371
causal or genetic explanations (Le., point to causes or describe unknown

sequences of events), although some ot them refer to a simple establish-
ment of facts. Thus theories usually are answers to 'why' or 'how' ques-
tions, and sometimes also to 'who' /'what', 'where', 'where from', etc.,
questions pertaining to issues that are significant to the process of
history.
This suggests the classification of historical theories into factographic,
genetic, and causal, that is, a classification that comes close to that ap-
plied to hypotheses. Ail these types of theories offer a hypothetical de-
scription of what happened in a place I in the time fl' ...• In. possibly
with an object o. if no one watched or was able to watch the events or
if reliable reports on observations that might have been made do not
exist. The formulation "what happened" means, in this case, either the
description of a given system in the period 11> ••• , In alone, or the defin-
ing of the cause(s) of the difference between the state of the system at
the moment 11 and that at the moment In' It may also include both
a description of the transformation of the system and a definition of
the causes of that transformation.
Opinions on the place of origin of Indo-European peoples may serve
as an example of a factographic theory. The Asiatic theory. which
claimed that the place of origin had been in Asia. prevailed up to the
middle of the 19th century. It was followed by another theory. in which
the alternative: Asia versus Europe, was replaced by the alternative:
forest zone versus steppe zone; in the latter case it could be either
Europe, or Asia, or both.10 In the case of the latter theory we have to
do with an indirect (as direct data on the place of origin of the Indo-
Europeans do not exist) establishment of a specified historical fact. The
point is not to answer the question, why did the Indo-Europeans settle
in the steppe region of Europe or Asia, but to find out where their place
of origin had been.
The tentative explanations of the formation of towns in Poland (and
in many other countries) can be indicated as an example of a genetic
theory, that is, one which suggests a hypothetical description of the
successive stages of an event, or of its first stage alone. The develop-
ment of large-scale studies, especially' archaeological ones, of town
formation had been preceded by the domination of the colonial theory
(Koloniallheorie) of the origin of towns, sponsored by German histo-
372 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lflSfORY
rians. That theory linked the origin of Polish towns with settlements
based on German law (i.e., West European law which reached Poland
via Germany), which meant that a town took its origin in rights granted
to settlers (locatio civitatis) and an inflow of German population. That
theory came to be questioned when facts that were incompatible with it
had been found out: it was shown that towns had existed in Poland
long before the settling of Germans, and that the spreading of German
municipal law could not be identified with a much more restricted pro-
cess of the inflow of German settlers. This meant that the colonial
theory did not describe properly the development stages in the history
of Polish towns, and especially the initial stages of their formation.
Hence the colonial theory came to be replaced by several variations of
the theory of the native origin of towns, out of which those applicable
to Poland are the fair-place theory which points to fairs as the first
stage in the development of towns) and the stronghold theory (which
points to settlements around strongholds as the nuclei of towns). These
are not rival, but complementary theories.
In historical research, we most frequently find causal theories which
formulate hypothetical causes of certain historically important events.
Examples are provided by the tentative explanations of the price rev-
olution in 16th century Europe, originated in 1568 by the well-known
discussion between J. Bodin and M. Malestroit. Some are in favour
of the metallic theory, which links the price revolution mainly with the
inflow of precious metals from America to Europe, while others are
inclined to emphasize the role of the economic boom in Europe as the
principal cause of the general rise in prices.l l Another example of
causal theories can be seen in the explanations of the emergence of
manorial and serfdom economy in Central and Eastern Europe. The
discussion has been going on for some 100 years,12 and the causes of
the emergence of the manorial and serfdom economy have been seen in
a change in the nature of the armies, which is supposed to have forced
the gentry to engage in farming (the military theory), in the decline of
the value of ground rents in the Middle Ages, which reduced the in-
comes of the gentry (the rent theory), in the existence of unoccupied
areas in villages, which had to, or could be, tilled (the deserted areas
theory), in good natural conditions for agricultural production (the
natural conditions theory), in the market situation which was favourable
A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF mSTORICAL RESEARCH 373
for the export of grain crops (the market theory), and jointly in the
nature of serfdom and the market situation (Rutkowski's theory). It
may be said that at least many of those causal explanations which per-
tain to important events concerning which precise information is lacking.
are called theories.
The structure of some historical theories deviates from what is known
as theories in the sense of general methodology. In the latter, a theory
is understood to be (1) a deductlve system (such as set theory), (2) a
coherent set of theorems, in which all or at least one hypothesis is
a strictly general statement (is a law or is in the form of a law).
In this sense, historical theories are a variation of empirical theories.
but this applies to those historical theories only which can be included
in the latter group. That group can thus include only those historical
theories which consist of strictly general statements (cf. Chap. XXV).
but in historical research we also encounter theories (i.e., statements
called so by historians) which are conjunctions of (historical) observa-
tion statements and do not include strictly general statements (cf. Chap.
XXV). Out of the above three groups of historical theories, factographic
and genetic theories (that is, those which formulate suggestions as to
the establishing of certain facts) may consist of historical statements
alone, whereas causal theories must include - be it only as latent as-
sumptions - statements which are laws (this does not apply to causal
explanation which is not termed a theory, in accordance with the needs
of causal explanations, cf. Chap. XXI). Laws, however, may also be
included in factographic and genetic theories. Thus historical theories
are mixed in character: they range from sets of historical statements
alone to conjunctions of historical statements and strictly general ones.
without, however, becoming sets of strictly general statements alone.
This can be illustrated by the schema below, which shows the extensions
of empirical theories in the sense of general methodology, on the one
hand, and historical theories, on the other.
Within a historical theory we can single out a hypothesis (which sug-
gests the establishing of facts in the case of factographic and genetic
theories, or a specified causal nexus in the case of causal theories) and
arguments in its favour (which are premisses of corresponding cases
of inference). This means that the structure of the theory here differs
somewhat from the concept of hypothesis, which usually does not cover
374 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF' HISTORY
Historical theories
Empirical theories
in the sense of general
methodology
(Historical) Strictly
observation general
statements statements
arguments in its favour, unless we use the term "hypothesis" in the

sense of a historical theory. This is the other general trait (mentioned
previously) of theories that distinguishes them from historical hypo-
theses. It does not, however, refute the statement that the ways of their
formulation, substantiation, and verification are common to historical
theories and historical hypotheses.
Next to the concept of theory, which historians have been using for
a long time, they are more and more commonly resorting to the con-
cept of model. They do not, however, mean a semantic model, i.e., the
concept of domain in which the statements formulated by a historian
would be true (cf. Chap. I), but a model which we have termed method-
ological (cf. Chap. II). In this connection we speak about the model
method in the various historical disciplines, and above all in economic
history, which makes use of economic theories (cf. Chap. XX). On the
whole, in historical research a model has the same structure as a theory;
although strictly general statements which have the nature of laws (i.e.,
statements on regularities) are the basic elements of both theories and
models, yet historians, unlike, e.g., theoretical economists, accept theo-
ries (and models) which consist of strictly historical statements only.
This is so because those statements, by making a structural whole (term-
ed narrative, cf. Chap. XXUI) may form - if that narrative is approx-
imately true (cf. Chap. XVI) - a more or less isomorphic reflection of
the structure of facts, even if they do not refer directly to strictly general
statements.
The isomorphism, of a narrative and historical facts may vary as to
degree: it may pertain to the most fundamental (deep) regularities, or
to relationships and facts described in terms that come closer to surface
phenomena, or to the surface itself. While historical theories enable us
to reconstruct various fragments of the past regardless of their place and
A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 375
role in the entire structure of the past, the model is concerned with
discovering those relationships (and facts) which are essential from the
point of view of a given fragment of the past. The procedure thus con-
sists in the reconstruction of a multi-level (hierarchical) structure of
the world, in which we have singled out such kinds of historical facts
which serve to explain the process of history as regularities, primary
causes and secondary causes (cf. Chap. X, XII). This is achieved by
means of a specific selection (which K. Marx called abstraction, and
for which L. Nowak has popularized the term idealization) which is
guided by both the researcher's system of values and his general know-
ledge (cf. Chap. XVII); in the course of that selection we disregard the
working of the secondary causes (and even some primary causes), that
is, we adopt a number of idealizational assumptions. This yields a set
of statements about a fragment of the past (a historical fact) that is
deprived of some of its characteristics. Such a fact is often termed an
ideal type, and the set of statements (theorems) about it is a model. In
a symbolic notation it could be recorded thus:
(x) (Ti(x)..-.a 1 (x), ... , an (x»
where TI stands for a description of a fragment of the past once its

secondary characteristics have been disregarded (an ideal type), and
aI' ..•, an stand for the various kinds of behaviour of that ideal type.
It is to be noted, however, that we are speaking here about realistic
models, i.e., models which - in the researcher's intention - are to be
isomorphic to facts. Such is the nature of K. Marx's method of ab-
straction, so fully exploited by him in his Capital. But we also encounter
models which are termed instrumental and which serve only to order
facts. In their case the isomorphic reflection of the structure of the
ever-changing world is not important. Such models may be constructed
intentionally; this applies to M. Weber's ideal types (cf. Chap. VII) and
Levi-Strauss' "structures" (cf. Chap. Vll), which classify facts by certain
arbitrary criteria. But they may also result from a lack of a theory tha~
would be adequate to facts; this applies, for instance, to J. Marczew-
ski's endeavours (cf. Chap. XX) to squeeze the 18th century economy
into the framework of a model that would reflect the conditions pre-
vailing under present-day capitalism.
In historical research, we also have to do on an increasing scale with
what is called counterfactual models (d. Chap. XXIII). They are being
suggested mainly by American economic historians who represent New
Economic History (R. W. Fogel, S. L. Engerman, P. Temin, A. Fish-
low, and others). In their case, the assumptions made about regularities
remain realistic; they only assume that certain facts (e.g., the existence
of railways in North America in the 19th century) did not take place,
and they investigate what the process of history would have been with-
out those facts. This enables them better to bring out the role of those
factors in the past. Historians who are members of the group called
New Economic History do not, of course, confine themselves to using
counterfactual models. Their works offer a broad variety of models of
various kinds, inspired by economic theory. They also contribute in this
way to the present development of quantitative methods (cf. Chap.
XXV 3
5. Schemata of hypothetical procedure in historical research
A hypothesis, when posed, acquires the status of a scientific statement,

that is, comes to be included in the accepted body of scientific know-
ledge, only as a result of a substantiating procedure. The problems of
criticism, verification, decision, confirmation, and substantiation (also
termed: foundation) of hypotheses are among the focal ones in general
scientific methodology and have been very much discussed lately.14 In
historical research, that procedure is identified with historical criticism
or the critical method. The detailed issues in the substantiation of hy-
potheses belong, of course, to the techniques of source criticism, the
methods of establishing facts, and causal explanation, and will be dis-
cussed in the corresponding sections of the book.
Next to the stages in the handling of hypotheses we have to distin-
guish the methods and schemata of handling them. The methods, most
broadly, include: acquisition of new data (the principle of expansion
of one's knowledge) and inference, i.e., acceptance of certain statements
(conclusions) on the basis of acceptance of others (premisses) (the prin-
ciple of inference). The appropriate methods are used in the various
stages, which form the most general structure of the schemata.
In the handling of hypotheses (not only in historical research) we
have to single out three stages: the formulation of a hypothesis, its
substantiation, and its verification. The term "substantiation" can be

interpreted more broadly so as to include the process of verification.
The schemata of hypothesis handling in historical research differ from
one another, on the one hand, according to whether we seek an answer
to a decision or a complementation question, and on the other, accord-
ing to whether we have to do with a direct, or an indirect,. establishing
of facts (cf. Chap. XIX). Since the sources do not directly refer to
causes of facts, and if they provide such data, then these usually are of
a secondary importance for the historian, hence causal explanations are
included, together with the indirect establishing of facts, in the indirect
procedures of constructing historical narratives.
In the case of decision questions (whether simple or multiple) the
schema of handling a hypothesis (which, of course, does not mean the
order of steps) is as follows:
(1) We formulate a question which pertains to a given domain.
(2) We establish the type of the question (?Du, ?Da, ?De).
(3) We verify, in the light of the body of knowledge we have (with
respect to ?Da and ?De), whether at least one direct answer is true (i.e.•
whether the positive assumption of the question is satisfied) and whether
at least one direct answer is false (i.e., whether the negative assumption
of the question is satisfied), and with respect to ?Du, whether we can
expect that only one direct answer is true (the assumption of unique-
ness). This means that we verify whether the question has been posed
correctly; such a verification may be hypothetical in nature. It may be
that the answer obtained abolishes the positive assumption of the ques-
tion (when that assumption is not satisfied); it may also abolish the
question.
(4) We choose the answer (on the basis of direct or indirect data).
(5) We substantiate and verify the hypothesis by finding out whether
its consequences are acceptable in the light of the body of knowledge
we have.
Points (1), (2), and (3) correspond to the stage of the formulation of
the hypothesis in question, and points (4) and (5), to its substantiation
and verification.
In the case of complementation questions points 0). (2). and (3) are
the same. But then we do not choose one answer out of the many ad-
missible ones, but (4) find out the unknown of the question (if we obtain
complete direct information about it) or try to come close to that un-
known (if no such direct information is available). This "coming close"
is based on the data which indicate what values the unkown of the
question can take on. Such data may narrow down the range of the
unknown, and are partial answers to the question posed. If only indirect
data are available, then such partial answers are hypotheses. Answers
to them do not mean certainty that the problem has been solved cor-
rectly. Yet such a hypothesis, as distinct from that formulated at an
early stage of our procedure, might be called a substantiated one.
In historical research, decision and complementation questions are
posed alternately as a problem is being solved. The degree of the cer-
tainty of the answer we arrive at and the modification of the general
schemata of the handling of hypotheses depend above all on whether
the sources provide direct or merely indirect data about the fact(s) we
are interested in. The nature of such data also largely determines the
schemata of inference (reliable or unreliable) which we use in the sub-
stantiation.
If we establish facts which are substantiated and verified mainly by
reference to the direct data contained in the sources, then we have to
examine the authenticity of the sources and the reliability of the data
they provide (cf. Chap. XVIII). Since this usually takes place before
the hypothesis is formulated, the examination of authenticity and re-
liability (of the sources and data, respectively) might be included in the
stage of the formulation of hypothesis (this is what J. Giedymin is in-
clined to do). The present writer is rather inclined to include the ex-
amination of authenticity and reliability as elements of the process of
substantiation. If we are convinced that the source which contains per-
tinent data in fact dates back to the corresponding period in the past,
and hence can contain the said data, and if these data are relatively
certain, then we assume that the facts to which they pertain are equally
certain. We have to do with putting together the following statements
which will be reconstructed in full because the inference involved is
enthymematic in nature (that is, includes premisses which are assumed
tacitly):
Premisses:
(1) If the source is authentic and contains reliable data, then we may
(or, in the weaker version: we usually may) assume that the facts about
which it informs did take place (the tacit premiss).
(2) The source x is authentic and contains reliable data (and the data
pertaining specifically to fact A are reliable).
Conclusion:
(3) The fact A, referred to by the source x, did take place (or: took
place with and adequately high probability, so that the statement about
it is adequately well substantiated).
As can easily be seen, this is deductive inference (what is termed
weakened deduction may occur, toO).15 The premisses are obviously con-
clusions drawn from a number of more or less complex cases of in-
ference. The examination of the authenticity of the source and the re-
liability of the data is a more intricate procedure, to be treated separately
(see Chap. XVIII). For the time being let it be mentioned that the
mental processes involved are similar to those involved in the indirect
establishing of facts and causal explanation. If the examination of the
authenticity of the source or the reliability of the data yields a negative
result, the fact we are interested in must be established indirectly.
In the case of an indirect establishing of facts and causal explanations
hypotheses are substantiated and verified in two steps. The first pertains
to the examination of the authenticity of the sources and the reliability
of the data they provide, and thus is identical with that analysed above,
with the proviso that the facts substantiated at that stage only indirectly
refer to the fact we are concerned with, i.e., are - as we have agreed to
say - its symptoms.
The second step of the examination of authenticity and reliability
consists in finding out the consequences of the adoption of a given hypo-
thesis16 (should it be so as the hypothesis H states, then we would have
to assume that a, ... , n) and in making sure whether these consequences
took place in fact or at least with a large degree of probability.
If they did, and if they are not at variance with other source-based
data and the knowledge we accept (the set of statements we accept as
true), then the hypothesis is usually accepted. The last-named condition
is not absolute: bold researchers do not hesitate often to accept hypo-
theses which induce them to modify the corresponding parts of their
non-source-based knowledge (thus acting against what is called the
380 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HI~"ORY
principle of conservatism); such hypotheses usually stimulate the de-

velopment of historical science.
In the case of the examination of the consequences of hypotheses
reasoning usually takes on the form of reductive inference or the schema
of the modus tollendo tollens in deductive inferenceY Here is a schema
of reductive inference as applied to the handling of a historical hypo-
thesis.
Premisses:
(1) If we assume that a fact A did occur ina place p and at a time t
(or that it was a cause of an event), then we have to assume that the
facts a, ... , n occurred, too.
(2) The facts a, ... , n did occur (or are very likely to have occurred).
Conclusion:
(3) The fact A is likely to have occurred.
If the premiss (2) is not satisfied, then we cannot conclude about
the occurrence of the fact A, which means that the hypothesis is under-
mined.
Here is an example of the application of the schema of the modus
tollendo tollens in the substantiation of the hypothesis which says that
Zyndram of Maszkowice was the Polish commander in the Battle of
Grunwald.
Premisses:
(1) If we assume that Zyndram of Maszkowice was the Polish com-
mander in the Battle of Grunwald, then we also have to assume that, in
the Middle Ages, a person of a low condition and a small fortune, who
did not have any significant military record, was not awarded after the
battle and was not a member of the war council could be a commander
in a big battle.
(2) In the Middle Ages such a person was unlikely to have been
a commander in a big battle.
Conclusion:
(3) Zyndram of Maszkowice was not (or: is most likely not to have
been) the Polish commander in the Battle of Grunwald.1s
As we see, the hypothesis has been refuted, as a result of the process
of verification, because of the incompatibility of its consequences with
the body of knowledge we have.
Mediaeval studies provide extremely interesting and sometimes very
A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 381
complex examples of substantiation and verification of hypotheses. In

most cases verification (in order to be made stronger) is linked with ten-
tative refutation of rival hypotheses. The falsehood of the consequences
of such hypotheses is demonstrated, in order to indicate the more
likely probability of the consequences of the hypothesis under consid-
eration. When analysing the description of the Polish ethnic area to
be found in Tacitus' Germania H. Lowmianski wrote that the fact that
the ancients had very little knowledge of the river Odra, which offered
little of attraction along its course, and the lack of any mention of the
Burgundi, who at that time lived near the Odra, exclude the possibility
that Tacitus' description follows the course of that river; likewise, it is
not probable that it follows the course of the Elbe, since we would not
encounter there the Burl and the Cotini, and we would hear of the
Semnoni and the Longobardi, whom, however, Tacitus described on
another occasion. It seems, therefore, that the amber route from the
Moravian Gate (or the Klodzko Pass) along the lower Vistula is the
only possible course of Tacitus' description. 19 The last-named hypo-
thesis is, of course, substantiated by H. LowmiaIiski much more ex-
tensively.
As can easily be noted, the adoption of the amber route hypothesis
does not imply the acceptance of any consequences that would be in-
compatible with otherwise known facts. This is not so in the case of the
other hypotheses .
. The Odra hypothesis: we would have to assume that (a) the Odra
was well known to the ancients, (b) that is offered attractions along its
course, and (c) that Tacitus should have mentioned the Burgundi, who
lived on that river (since he does mention other tribes). Non-souree-
based knowledge shows that the consequences (a) and (b) are unac-
ceptable, while source-based knowledge shows that (c) Tacitus does not
mention the Burgundi.
The Elbe hypothesis: we should have to expect Tacitus to mention
the Semnoni and the Longobardi, whereas he mentions the Burl and
the Cotini.
The amber route hypothesis: it does not assume the consequences
that follow from the foregoing hypotheses and is in agreement with
Tacitus' description of the various tribes (that is, is in agreement with
our body of knowledge).
Examples of such an indirect verification of historical hypotheses are

not to be sought exclusively in studies concerned with earlier history.
It suffices to recall the murder of President Kennedy and the related
controversy over the person of the assassin.
Substantiation and verification of historical hypotheses take place in
at least two stages. The first stage (whose termination can be indicated
and defined) consists in substantiation and verification carried out by
a given researcher. It is on his knowledge and scholarly ethics that the
precision and thoroughness of that substantiation and verification de-
pend. At any rate a researcher ought to present the results of his work
so that they could be subject to inspection above all by the community
of scholars.
Once the results of research have been made public the second stage
of hypothesis verification begins and - theoretically -. never ends. While
even a most conscientious historian is more concerned with accumulat-
ing arguments in favour of his hypothesis than with searching for its
possible false consequences and focuses his efforts on substantiating his
theoretical claims, in the second stage the attention of critics focuses on
the search for possible false consequences of the hypothesis under con-
sideration, that is, on the refutation of that hypothesis.
Both the formulation of a question and the formulation of an answer
to it require data. Information can be defined in various ways. For the
needs of historical research it is very useful to interpret the concept of
information as broadly as possible so as to cover by it both semantic
and non-semantic (non-linguistic) information, an interpretation which
is also characteristic of information theory. A typical example of
semantic information is offered by formulations to be found in written
sources, and that of non-semantic information, by artefacts obtained by
archaeological excavations.
Information becomes "animate" only after a question has been posed.
It may be said that the amount of "inanimate" items of information is
enormous; the problem usually consists in the lack of appropriate ques-
tions. In science in general, and in historical research in particular,
questions are formulated in traditional codes, and hence it is obvious
that as long as the code used remains unchanged visible changes in the
items of information obtained can hardly be expected, which blocks
progress in research. It is self-evident that a query is in itself an item
of information, but this is what might be termed guideline information.

which consists in the formulation of a specified research task. 20
Hence, in most general terms, the historian's research procedure con-
sists in the formulation of questions in a given field and in seeking ap-
propriate answers to them. Since neither of these operations is possible
without items of information (Le., data), it is an essential task, when we
reconstruct the historian's research procedure, to establish the source of
his data, the place of the data in his research procedure, and the nature
of such data. In their research (that is, in posing questions and in seeking
answers to them) historians use two kinds of data, which we might call
source-based and non-source-based, respectively. The former are drawn
from historical sources, and the latter from that body of knowledge his-
torians have which we call non-source-based. We have accordingly to re-
flect on the concepts of historical source, source-based knowledge, source-
based data, non-source-based knowledge, and non-source-based data.
REFERENCES
1 For the corresponding concepts see R. D. Luce and H. Raiffa, Games and
Decisions, New York 1957.
2 The analysis of questions and answers in research procedures is one of the
most extensively treated branches of methodology. One of its pioneers was

K. Ajdukiewicz (Zdania pytajne (Interrogative Sentences), Warszawa 1934,
reprinted in h:zyk i poznanie (Language and Cognition), Warszawa 1%0), from
whom a number of terms has originated. Special studies of the problem have
been undertaken by J. Giedymin (Problemy, zalozenia, rozstrzygnil:cia (Prob-
lems, Assumptions, Decisions), Poznan 1964), whose results are amply used in
the present book. The same applies to J. Giedymin and J. Kmita, Wyklady z 10-
giki iormalnej, teorii komunikacji i metodologii nauk (Lectures on Formal
Logic, Communication Theory and the Methodology of Sciences), Poznan 1%6,
Chap. IV. See also Z. Cackowski, Problemy i pseudoproblemy (Problems and
Pseudo problems), Warszawa 1%4, which is philosophical rather than methodo-
logical in nature. Among English-language works a special mention is due to
D. Harrah, ComT/1f.lnication: a Logical Model, Cambridge (Mass.) 1%3.
8 J. Giedymin, Problemy (... ), ed. cit., pp. 15-6.
4 Ibid.
5 This issue will be discussed on another occasion.
6 See in particular the following works by J. Giedymin: "Hipotezy w analizie
i krytyce Zr6del:" (Hypotheses in the Analysis and Criticism of Sources), in:
Z problem6w logicznych analizy historycznej (Some Logical Issues in Historical
Analyses); Problemy logiczne analizy historycznej (Logical Issues in Historical
Analyses), pp. 24 ff; "Uogolnienie postulatu rozstrzygalnosci hipotez" (General-
ization of the Postulate of Decidability of Hypotheses), Studia Filozoficzne,

No. 5/1959. The first of the two works was criticized by J. Dutkiewicz (see
Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 4/1959), to whom J. Giedymin replied in Kwartal-
nik Historyczny, No. 4/1962.
7 J. Giedymin gives the following analytic definition of hypothesis in the
social sciences and the humanities: "A hypothesis is a statement which is not
sufficiently substantiated in a given discipline and which is treated as an answer
to a certain question posed within the sphere of that discipline". (Problemy 10-
giczne (...), ed. cit., p. 30.)
8 Attention to this fact was drawn by J. Giedymin in his reply to J. Dutkie-
wicz (see footnote 8 ;'n fine).
9 This classification was introduced by J. Giedymin with reference to his-
torical analyses (Problemy logfczne (...), ed. cit., p. 32).
10 The example has been drawn from H. t.owmianski, Poczqtki Polski (po-
land's Earliest lIistory), 2nd ed., vol. I, Warszawa 1964, pp. 39 if. Its author is
in favour of the steppe theory (in its Euro-Asiatic version), cf. p . .49.
11 The problem is treated extensively by W. Kula, Problemy i metody histarii
gospodarczej (problems and Methods in Economic History), ed. cit., pp. 529 if.
12 For details see I. Topolski, Narodziny kapitalizmu w Europie (The Rise
of Capitalism in Europe), Warszawa 1965, pp. 135-6.
18 Cf. L. Nowak, U pods taw marksowskiej metodologii nauk (The Foun-
dations of the Marxian Methodology of Sciences), Warszawa 1971, pp. 17-109;
L. Nowak, Model ekonomiczny (Economic Model). A study in the methodo-
logy of political economy, Warszawa 1972; J. Topolski, "Marx et la methode
des modeles", Merhodologie de l'histoire et des sciences humaines, Melanges en
l'honneur de Femand Braudel, Toulouse 1972, pp. 435-042; J. Topolski, "The
Model Method in Economic History", The Journal af Eurapean Economic His-
tory, vol. I, No. 3/1972, pp. 713-26; H. Van Der Wee (with the co-operation of
H. Drems and E. Cauwenberghe), Methodes et techniques nouvelles en his to ire
economique quantitative in Methodologie de l'histoire et des sciences humaines,
Melanges en l'honneur de Femand Braudel, pp. 443-52; R. W. Fogel, S. L. En-
german (eds.), The Reinterpretation of American History, New York, Evanston,
San Francisco, London 1971. The literature of the subject has by now become
fairly comprehensive, and the items listed above are given by way of example.
For discussions on New Economic History see R. L. Andreano (ed.), The New
Economic History: Recent Papers on Methodology, New York, London, Sydney,
Toronto 1970. On new methodological trends in historical disciplines other than
economic history see R. P. Swierenga (ed.), Quantification in American· History,
Theory and Research, New York 1970. Opinions of historians from various
countries on the present state in the methodology of historical research are
collected in: F. Gilbert, S. R. Grabaud (eds.), Historical Studies Today, New
York 1972.
14 This is illustrated by the International Colloquium on Scientific Methodo-
logy, held in Warsaw on September 18 to 23, 1961. The papers read there were
published in The Foundation of Statements and Decisions, Warszawa 1%5. The

general issue was presented there by K. Ajdukiewicz in his paper "The Problem
of Foundation", pp. 1-1I.
15 Deductive inference can, among other things, take on the form of the
modus ponendo ponens and the modus tollendo tollens.
Modus ponendo ponens: Modus tollendo tollens:
If p, then q if p, then q
p notq
hence q hence: not p
Deduction will be discussed later (see Chap. XIX).
16 Examples of substantiation of historical hypotheses by the deduction of
their consequences are given by J. Giedymin in Z problem6w logicznych onalizy
historycznej (Some Issues in Historical Analyses), ed. cit., pp. 40-3.
17 The schema of reductive inference is as follows:
If p, then q
q
hence (presumably) p
This is an unreliable mode of inference, also called subjectively uncertain (see
K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., pp. 130-7).
18 The example has been drawn from S. Kuczynski, Wielka wojna z Zakonem
Krzyzackim w latach 1409-1411 (The Great War with Teutonic Order, 1409-11),
Warszawa 1955, p. 147.
19 H. LowmiaiJ.ski, Poczqtki Polski (Poland's Earliest History), vol. I, ed. cit.,
p: 232.
20 Cf. J. Giedymin, Problemy logic~ne (...), ed. cit., p. 20.
XV. THEORY OF SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE
1. The general concept of historical source
Source-based knowledge is drawn from historical sources in the sense of

sources for a given problem. There is, however, a general concept of his-
torical source in addition to that restricted to a given issue.l The general
concept is used by historians when they try to define a historical source
in general. E. Bernheim gave two different definitions of a historical
source, the first of which has so far been disregarded (except by J. Gie-
dymin); it refers to sources in general as "the material from which our
science draws cognition".2 The second, more expanded, says that
sources are "results of human activity which either by their very
destination or by their very existence, origin or other circumstances are
particularly suited to inform about and to verify historical facts".3
A similar definition is given by many German scholars who in that
respect follow Bernheim quite obviously.4 Ch. V. Langlois and
Ch. Seignobos follow their famous statement that "l'histoire se fait
avec de documents" by the formulation that "they are traces left by
human thought and needs in the past (d'autre-fois)".5
Among Polish authors M. Handelsman says that a source is "a fixed
and preserved trace of human thought, activity, or most generally, life".6
S. KOScialkowski calls a source to be "any trace of human existence or
activity in the past, in other words, any trace of a historical fact that
serves to acquire information about that fact and to reconstruct it".7
A more expanded definition is given by G. Labuda, who says that:
"A historical source can be any psychophysical and social relics which,
by being products of human labour and at the same time participating
in the development of societal life, acquire thereby the capacity of re-
flecting that development. Because of these properties (i.e., being a pro-
duct of labour and having the ability of reflecting phenomena) a source
is a means of cognition that enables us scientifically to reconstruct so-
cietal development in all its manifestations".8 The new elements have
THEORY OF SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 387
been added here to Bernheim's definition: the "participation" of the

sources in societal development and their "ability" scientifically to re-
construct that development. The former merely reinforces the statement
that a source is "a product of human labour", and the latter, being
a consequence of the property "a product of human labour" (as shown
by J. Giedymin), does not bring out any other property by which we
could distinguish a historical source from all that which is not a source,
and hence is superfluous in the definition.9
All those definitions, and many other as well,lO which by reference to
their content can be classed into those of one part and those of two
parts, point (in the case of one-part definitions) only to "traces", "re-
sults", "products", "relics" of human activity (or human existence only)
or (in the case of two-part definitions) also to the fact that such "traces"
and "results" "serve" or "enable" the cognition (reconstruction) of his-
torical facts. This means that, according to two-part definitions, only
those "traces" and "results" are sources which contribute (or: signally
contribute) to the cognition of the past. In G. Labuda's definition, the
very fact that a "relic" is a "product" of human labour automatically
imparts to it the ability to "reflect" societal development. In other defi-
nitions we do not know how to separate those "traces" etc. which do
not lend themselves to historical cognition from those which serve that
cognition. This part of those definitions is accordingly very obscure.
This is why one-part definitions seem better. They include, e.g., La-
buda's definition, too, when the latter has its superfluous elements re-
moved and points to the fact that all results of human labour automat-
ically acquire the ability to "reflect" the past.
Such definitions, both those of one and those of two parts, can have
narrower or broader extensions. The narrower ones (Bernheim's second
definition and those advanced by Langlois and Seignobos, and by La-
buda) refer exclusively to "traces", "results", etc., of human activities
(human labour) and leave out vast fields of natural phenomena, such
as human and animal skeletons, remains of plants, annual rings of trees,
etc. The broader ones either cover all the data which help us acquire
some knowledge of the past (Bernheim's first definition) or - in the
case of the incomplete broader definitions - restrict the data to the
remains of human existence (Handelsman, Koscialkowski) and thus ex-
clude other natural phenomena.
The restrictions imposed by the narrower definitions and the incom-

plete broader ones are not justified in the light of what has been said
about historical cognition and its sources; nor do they comply with the
actual research procedures used by historians, who, as is known, avail
themselves of natural sources, too.
Hence further considerations must start from a broad definition. It
must be said explicitly in this connection that the concept of data, which
it contains, must cover not only things (in the sense of material ob-
jects), but also properties of things and, possibly, relations among
things;l1 human memory (tradition) must also be included in the con-
cept of historical source. This brings us to the conclusion that the con-
cept of historical source covers all sources of historical cognition
(whether direct or indirect), that is, all information (in the sense of in-
formation theory) about the human past, wherever such information can
be found, together with the ways in which such information has been
transmitted (information channels). The human past is interpreted
broadly, and hence covers the natural conditions in which people lived.
Thus the concept of historical source covers all information about hu-
man life in the past, including information channels. Hence both the
information that an event e took place at I and at a time t and the paper
(the chronicle) through the intermediary of which this information
could have been received are sources. Likewise, both the information
that the years Xl> ••• , x" had severe winters because this follows from
the observation of the annual rings of trees and the trunks of those
trees which contain this information are sources. In the case of human
memory (tradition) it is living human beings who are the information
channel.
It is also worth-while to introduce the differentiation between poten-
tial and effective sources (in connection with the general concept of
historical source). In our analyses we have been using the concept of
effective source (information about the past plus information channels),
whereas Bernheim refers to all those data from which the historian
"draws his knowledge". Thus, on the one hand, we have an ocean of
data, and on the other, only all that which can be drawn from it. The
concept of historical source as restricted to a given problem is still more
limited, as it applies to a small part only of all that which can be drawn
from the said ocean of data.
THEORY OF SOURCE.BASED KNOWLEDGE 389
A potential source is anything from which a historian can draw in-

formation about the past, and an effective source is the set of items of
information already drawn by him or ready to be drawn.
2. Earlier classifications of historical sources
We shall now refer mainly to the concept of effective historical source,

required in the study of the problem of the classification of historical
sources, which is, in this case, an extension of definitional analyses. It
is no exaggeration to say that the problem was very much disputed (as
is the case of classification issues in general), especially in the German
literature of the subject and those historical writings which were in-
fluenced by German authors. Various scholars used to work out new
classifications and tried to persuade their colleagues and general readers
that each new suggestion was better or more useful than all the pre-
vious ones.
The beginnings of reflection on the kinds of historical sources go
back to the turn of the Middle Ages, but it was only the erudite school
in the 17th century, headed by Papebroche and Mabillon, which
grouped documents mainly from the point of view of their being
genuine or forged; and it was the erudite approach in the 19th century
which gave the first complete classification of sources. Among those
handbooks of history writing which date from the first half of the 19th
century an important place on the European scale is held by J. Lele-
weI's considerations. In his Historyka (The Methodology of History,
1815) he classified the sources into: (1) tradition (oral relations);
(2) "non-written sources, that is, silent monuments of the past"; (3) writ-
ten sources. He also pointed to the fact that the first two groups can be
transformed into written ones (a record of an oral narrative, a descrip-
tion of a material source).12 Similar classification were later suggested
by other historians, such as P. C. F. Daunou (1842). Still later, the best
known classifications were by J. G. Droysen and E. Bernheim. In the
Polish literature of the subject, next to the classifications made by
M. Handelsman and S. Koscialkowski we have a critical study by
G. Labuda, who gave an entirely new systematization of historical
sources.
J. G. Droysen classified the sources into three kinds, too, but he did
so in much less clear manner than Lelewel had done. His three cate-
gories are: (1) monuments (Denkmiiler); (2) remnants (Ueberreste);
(3) sources (Quellen). The remnants meant for him all material (written
and non-written) traces of human beings and events, with the exclusion
of reports made on purpose, which Droysen called sources. The monu-
ments covered those remnants which were made on purpose to be trans-
mitted to later generations, yet not with the intention of giving testi-
mony to past events, but to serve the needs of specified individuals,
families, etc. (e.g., legal documents, medals, tombstones).13
E. Bernheim divided the sources into two groups: (1) remnants, and
(2) tradition.14 J. Giedymin, when analysing his classification, pointed
to the burden of terminological mannerisms but emphasized that this
was a valuable classification as it pointed,- on the one hand, to those
sources which use conventional signs to present past events which no
longer exist (tradition), and, on the other, those which do not do so
(remnants).15 It is also worthwhile pointing to the replacement by Bern-
heim of Dreysen's term "sources" with the term "tradition", which thus
acquires a very broad sense, namely that of transmission of infor-
mation.
Bernheim's classification has been criticized, especially by German
scholars (A. Feder, W. Bauer, E. Kayser, and others16), yet their criti-
cism contributed more confusion than improvement to the theory of
historical sources. M. Handelsman's suggestions17 were derived from
the ideas of Droysen and Bernheim. He replaced Bernheim's "tradition"
by the term "indirect sources", and "remnants" by the term "direct
sources".lS According to Handelsman, direct sources are "preserved
direct traces of man's existence and activities in the past", which cover
material remnants (monuments) and non-material ones (relics), whereas
indirect sources are "documents intended to preserve the memory of
the past". Thus, Handelsman, like Bernheim, points to the difference
between those sources which were intended to convey information (that
is, through the intermediary of a third party), and those which convey
information about the past without any such intermediary. Among the
indirect sources he distinguished oral, iconic, and written tradition,
using the term "tradition" (after Bernheim) in a broad sense of the
word (transmission of data).
Next to his division into direct and indirect sources Handelsman also
introduced the division into written and non-written sources. The latter
division is as important as the former, even though based on different
criteria. Handelsman called it practical, in distinction from the former,
which he called scientific. There is, however, no reason why the division
into written and non-written sources should be less scientific than that
into direct and indirect ones.
S. Koscialkowski took Handelsman's second division to be the fun-
damental one. He classified the sources into (1) non-written (real
objects, physical remnants), and (2) written, which he subdivided into:
documentary or direct, narrative or indirect, and epistolary.19 His clas-
sification thus also reflects the division into direct and indirect sources,
which, however, applies to written sources only.
G. Labuda broke away from existing classifications and suggested the
division of sources into: ergotechnic, sociotechnic, psychotechnic, and
tradition. 20 The criterion of the division is based on the degree in which
given sources "reflect" specified forms of human activities. Thus, ergo-
technic sources directly "reflect" man's economic activities, and in-
directly, his social and mental activities; they accordingly include above
all monuments of material civilization, but also all those which refer to
the demographic development of mankind. Sociotechnic sources are
those which "emerged as a result of social interactions among human
beings" and are thus able to "reflect" those processes directly, while
they indirectly "reflect" economic and mental activities. Psychotechnic
sources are defined as "all remnants resulting from material manifes-
tations of consciousness, intended to record or to transmit one's ideas;
they objectively reflect contradictions to be found in Nature, in society,
and ill individual thinking"; they are accordingly "able to reflect directly
the share of consciousness in transforming material and social conditions
of human existence". The fourth category singled out by G. Labuda
combines the characteristics of the first three categories, as it directly
re·flects physical, social, and mental phenomena. That fourth category is
called by him tradition, and thus covers "only that which is inherent in
living human beings in the form of relics from, and memory of, the
past".
They are also many other classifications of sources, based on view-
points which are of a lesser interest here (e.g., the division into prin-
cipal and secondary sources).
3. A tentative solution of the problem of the classification of sources
Those classifications of historical sources which have been suggested so

far have suffered from a number of errors in classification: formal er-
rors (which consist in such classifications being non-disjoint and inade-
quate), semantic errors (due to inadequacies of language), and material
errors (which consist in such classification being unsuitable for certain
purposes).21 Nor has it been noticed that different classifications are
acceptable simultaneously, to be used according to the tasks we set them.
Likewise, it is jarring to watch the incessant striving to pUblicize one
classification as "the best", accompanied by the dismissal of others as
"erroneous". Further, the disputants could not resign themselves to the
idea that certain sources can be viewed from different points and thus
simultaneously belong in different classification groups. For instance, if
the sources are divided into written and non-written ones, a tombstone
with an inscription is, because of that inscription, treated as a written
source, but because of its significance as a monument of material civi-
lization (or as a work of art), is included in the category of non-written
sources. A chronicle is classed as a direct source because of the infor-
mation it conveys, and as a remnant, and hence an indirect source,
when viewed as a literary work.
If we interpret the most frequent classifications so as to free them at
least from formal and semantic errors (classifications which suffer from
material errors cannot be corrected in this way), then we have to give
priority to the following two dichotomous classifications:
(1) direct and indirect-sources; addressed and non-addressed sources,
(2) written and non-written sources.
These classifications seem to be well grounded: they are connected
fully with peculiarities of historical cognition and with the research pro-
cedures used by historians. The first of them, which might be termed
epistemological or methodological, reflects the two basic kinds of his-
torical cognition: direct and indirect. The division into "remnants" and
"sources" (or "tradition") also points to the fact that those sources
which are intended to convey information can be found only in the
group of indirect ones. In Droysen's classification, they were called
precisely "sources" (Quellen), which shows that he saw in them (with
much reason) sources in the strict sense of the word. Note also that
THEORY OF SOURCE·BASED KNOWLEDGE 393
indirect sources present historical facts by means of conventional signs

(writing, language, and other conventional signs), and hence are in-
direct from that ppint of view, too. On the other hand, direct sources
often do without such conventional signs, because they are themselves
historical facts. (Yet the preserved text of a constitution will be classed
as a direct source.) It is another issue that when studying direct sources
which do without conventional signs a historian often prepares a de-
scription of them (by himself or through the intermediary of other per-
sons) and later uses that description, i.e., an indirect source, only. In
such a description certain historical facts are encoded by means of con-
ventional signs (writing, drawing).
It is only in the case of indirect sources that if they are to be de-
coded the interpreter's code must be brought into line with that of the
author. Moreover, indirect sources involve the immense problem of the
examination of the informant's reliability, which does not apply to
direct sources (i.e., those treated as direct), which are examined as to
their authenticity. Thus the classification into direct and indirect sources
is useful for many reasons, and mainly from the methodological point
of view. This is shown by the table below.
Direct sources Indirect sources
(1) Direct cognition (1) Indirect cognition
(2) Facts (2) Conventional signs (and the
necessity of deciphering them)
(3) No intermediary of a (3) (Possibly intended) intermediary
third party of a third party
(4) No problem of examining (4) Necessity of examining the
their reliability (authenticity reliability of the informant
must be examined)
(5) Conventional signs
It must also be borne in mind that direct cognition is such in a re-
lative sense only: watching events through a window-pane or through
the air is indirect.
The classification of sources into direct and indirect ones has had its
supporters in J. G. Droysen, E. Bernheim, B. Schmeidier, M. Handels-
man, and others. The further, inner, divisions of direct and indirect
sources can differ from one another. For instance, in the group of direct
sources we may suggest their division into written and non-written ones,
i,nto natural and man-made remnants, into natural ones and those re-
sulting from human activity, etc. A living man whose behaviour is
being observed (this may include language behaviour as well, provided
that by language we mean a code and not the information it conveys)
would be a direct source, whereas his oral relation of certain events
would be an indirect one. Indirect sources can also be divided, above
all, into written and non-written ones (the latter being subdivided into
iconic and oral), into those intended to convey information and those
which do so without having been intended to serve such a purpose.
It would also be useful to introduce another classification of sources:
(1) addressed sources,
(2) non-addressed sources.
For a historian it is extremely important to know whether a given
source was, or was not, intended to influence the opinions of some
persons, including historians themselves. Addressed sources can have as
addressees persons contemporaneous with the respective authors (this
applies to letters, announcements, etc.), posterity (inscriptions, etc.),
and historians (this applies to memoirs, etc.). Among both addressed
and non-addressed sources direct and indirect sources alike can be
found.
The second classification, which we might term source-theoretical,
points to the great importance of written sources (decisive for the his-
torians sensu strictiori). This classification takes the existence of writing
as the criterion of division. There is no need to emphasize that the aux-
iliary historicai sciences are largely concerned with the study of writing
(palaeography, neography). Non-written sources are those which convey
information by means of symbols other than writing, and also those
In symbQIs othell
than writing J
r-----~-----,~~--~
IOther I
j
which are themselves historical facts. The division into written and non-
written sources is found in J. Lelewel, P. C. F. Daunou, M. Handels-
man (second classification), and S. KoScialkowski. It is also supported
by information theory, which refers to recorded and non-recorded signs.
The basic structure of both classifications is shown by the diagram
above.
The division into direct and indirect sources, like that into direct and
indirect cognition, seems to be most essential for methodological analy-
sis in historical research.
4. The reading of source information (decoding)
If that item of information about which we ask in a question code is to

be decoded, the following conditions must be satisfied: there must be:
an information; a person ready to receive that information; a channel
through which that information can be received; a code which deter-
mines the way in which that information passes through the channel and
which must be known to the receiver. The decoding of an information
can take place only if the sender's code and the receiver's code coincide.
In practice, the two codes are but rarely in full agreement; at any rate.
the greater the agreement, the better the conditions of decoding. There
is no need to explain that the concept of code, as defined in information
theory, is very broad.22 That concept covers ethnic, individual and other
languages, writing systems, drawings, maps, chemical symbols, systems
of gestures (e.g .• those of an orchestra conductor), facial gestures, mili-
tary rank badges, academic gowns, ways of manifesting mental states.
by appropriate utterances, ways of formulating questions in specified
fields, etc., that is, all that which enables us to associate a given item
of information with a given message. If, for instance, a child who be-
gins to speak can be understood by his mother only, then this means
that she knows the code he uses, that is, his individual language. Ges-
tures of an orchestra conductor do not convey much to a layman, be-
cause the latter does not know their meanings.
In John's language the utterance "I won't" may mean something else
than in Joseph's language, if the latter person is less firm in his deci-
sions. If we do not know such discrepancies between codes, we may
make mistakes in reading (decoding) a given item of information. To
read (decode) those items of information which are contained in the

sources (and any other information as well) we have to know a variety
of codes. The more codes a historian knows and the better his know-
ledge of them, ,the better he is prepared for his research work. These
codes are, obviously, part of his non-source-based knowledge. To use
the terminology introduced in Chap. XV, we have to interpret the know-
ledge of those codes which make it possible to decode the information
contained in a source for a given problem as part of non-source-based
information, that is, that information which, together with the source-
based one, makes it possible to answer the question posed, i.e., to
associate specified items of information with that question. The first step
must, obviously, be the understanding of given items of information
through decoding them.
Which codes are of the greatest importance for the historian? The
answer is hard to find, because it depends above all on the subject
matter he is concerned with, on the period he studies, and the territory
covered by his research. Yet, whatever his case is, the knowledge of the
following codes must be considered essential:
(1) the code of the informant's ethnic language (linguistic code),
(2) the code of the language of the period (terminological code),
(3) psychological code,
(4) the code of a given writing system and possibly other recorded
symbols (graphic code).
In the case of a linguistic code we just mean the knowledge of the
language in which a given source has been written (Latin, French, Old
Polish, etc.). This code is supplemented by the terminological one. When
the latter is used to decode information the likelihood of errors is con-
siderable, and such errors are frequent in historical research. As
M. Bloch has said, language usually lags behind the changes in objects,
in their properties, and in relations among them. Very often one and
the same word is used for generations to denote different things. For
instance, what 18th century sources called a plough differs considerably
from the plough as we know it today; the Latin term servus, denoting
a slave, was taken over by mediaeval sources when slavery had vanished
and serfdom emerged. Sometimes a historian must have modified the
received terminology to bring the language into line with facts. This is
why every historical work includes many terminological suggestions;
old terms often placed in quotation marks, which indicates that they
are anachronic. We know very well how Lelewel had to struggle with
the Polish language of his time, which was not adapted to serve the
purpose of precision in research, and this, and not the alleged oddities
of his style, account for that historian's specific language.
The psychological code sometimes presents greater difficulties. Every
author has his distinctive ways of formulating statements and, in a sense,
his own language; in other words, every person has his own mental and
linguistic usages which determine his linguistic and non-linguistic be-
haviour. That mental and linguistic usage is, of course, largely affected
by the language of the period, but cannot be identified fully with the
latter. The specific phrases used by an author, the order of words (in
the case of those languages in which the word order is flexible - Tr.),
sentence structure, etc., usually point to the author's mental states. The
knowledge of the psychological code involved is of particular impor-
tance when the reliability of the informant and the items of information
he conveys are analysed.
The knowledge of the graphic code involved is, next to his knowledge
of the linguistic code, one of the historian's fundamental abilities, with-
out which he would be unable to read an old document written in
Roman capitals or minuscule, or in Gothic minuscule, cursive, or ma-
juscule. Inability to read maps, which requires the knowledge of ap-
propriate codes, also could deprive a historian of extremely valuable
information.
He sometimes also has to do with a code in the sense of a cipher; the
knowledge of such codes may be required in decoding diplomatic
documents.
Interesting comments on the importance of the ability to decode the
language of a given period are found in M. Bloch, who says that "doc-
uments tend to impose their own terminology; the historian who is
influenced by them writes in a way which is dictated by a given period,
each time in a different manner. On the other hand, however, he thinks
in terms of his epoch and uses the language of his time".23 The task is
not an easy one. "When institutions, beliefs, and manners specific of
a given community are involved, transposing them into another lan-
guage, shaped by a totally different community, is beset with dangers,
for the choice of an equivalent means the assumption of similarity".24
398 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSrORY
The knowledge of the codes used in the reading of source information

is not easy to acquire. It is not possible, as it can be done between con-
temporaries, to compare the codes used by the two parties and to cor-
rect directly the information received by consulting the informant. It.
can only be said that the more comprehensive our non-source-based
knowledge (especially the knowledge of the period studied), the more
successful we are in acquiring a knowledge of the codes involved. Since
it is the linguistic codes which are the most important of all, philological
competence is of paramount significance. This is why we often speak
about the philological method in historical research to denote the pro-
cedure which results in the reading of source information by making use
of linguistic codes.
5. The concept of source-based knowledge and source-based data
In order to explain in greater detail the concept of source-based data

we have to recall the various definitions of a historical source. That
concept may be interpreted in a general and in a relative sense. In the
general sense, a historical source is just anything from which we can
(a source in the potential sense of the term) or we do (a source in the
effective sense) derive information about historical facts. In the relative
sense, we mean those sources which can (the potential sense) or do
(the effective sense) serve us in the study of a given problem with which
we are actually concerned. In other words, a potential source for a given
problem now under investigation means all that which contains data
about historical facts which must be established, in the light of a given
historian's knowledge, to formulate an answer to the question posed.
These explanations yield the concept of source-based knowledge as the
set of data about historical facts, since such data can only be provided
by historical sources. That set may be interpreted in four ways:
(l) the totality of all possible data about historical facts, accumulated
in all the sources (general source-based knowledge in the potential sense
of the term);
(2) the totality of the. data about historical facts as extracted from
the sources (general source-based knowledge in the effective sense);
(3) the totality of the data about historical facts which can serve to
formulate an 'answer to a given research question (relative source-based

knowledge in the potential sense);
(4) the totality of the data about historical facts as extracted from
the source to provide an answer to a given research question (relative
source-based knowledge in the effective sense).
REFERENCES
1 Cf. J. Giedymin, Z problem6w logicznych (...), ed. cit., pp. 45-6.
2 E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch der historischen Methode, ed. 5/6, Leipzig 1908,
p. 252. "Das Material, woraus unsere Wissenschaft ihre Erkenntniss schopft
nennen wir schlechthin 'Quellen' ".
3 Ibid., p. 252. "Quellen sind Resultate menschlicher Betatigungen, welche
zur Erkenntniss und zum Nachweis geschichtlicher Tatsachen entweder ur-
sprUnglich bestimmt oder vermoge ihrer Existenz, Entstehung und sonstiger
Verhliltnisse vorzugsweise geeignet sind".
4 For instance, A. Feder, Lehrbuch der geschichtlichen Methode, Regensburg
1924, p. 84.
5 Ch. V. Langlois and Ch. Seignobos, Introduction aux etudes historiques,
Paris 1898, p. I.
8 M. Handelsman, Historyka (The Methodology of History), 2nd ed., War-
szawa 1922, p. 44.
7 S. Koscialkowski, Historyka (The Methodology of History), ed. cit., p. 22.
8 G. Labuda, "Pr6ba nowej systematyki i nowej interpretacji ZrOdel histo-
rycznych" (A Tentative New Systematization and New Interpretation of Histo-
rical Sources), Studia zr6dloznawcze, voL 1, Warszawa 1957, p. 22.
9 J. Giedymin, Z problem6w logicznych analizy historycznej (Some Logical
Issues in Historical Analyses), ed. cit., pp. 25-6.
10 Some definitions are not clear. This applies, e.g., to that suggested by
C. Bobiflska: "Social facts of a durable material substance (oo.) become sources
for historians". (Historyk. Fakt. Metoda (The Historian. The Fact. The Method),
p.59.
11 J. Giedymin, op. cit., p. II.
12 J. Lelewel, Dziela (Collected Works), voL II (1), p. 180.
13 J. G. Droysen, Historik, Miinchen u. Berlin 1943, p. 37.
14 E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch deT historischen Methode, ed. cit., pp. 255-9.
15 J. Giedymin, op. cit., p. 24.
18 They are analysed in detail by G. Labuda, op. cit., pp. 11 if, who also
carries out a critical analysis of E. Bernheim's classification. The shortcomings
of his criticism have been demonstrated by J. Giedymin, op. cit., pp. 7-27.
17 M. Handelsman, op. cit., pp. 44-5.
18 E. Bernheim, however, did use the terms: direct and indirect sources.
19 S. Koscialkowski, op. cit., pp. 24, 52.
20 G. Labuda, op. cit., pp. 3-52.
11 Cf. J. Giedymin, Op. cit., pp. ~7.

II Cf. J. Giedymin and J. Kmita, Wyklady z logiki" formalnei (... ) (Lectures
on Fonna! Logic ...), p. 71. There are also other definitions of a code.
.. M. Bloch, Apologie pour I'histoire ou metier d'historien, ed. cit., p. 80:
·'Les documents tendent a imposer leur nomenclature; l'historien, s'il les ecoute,
ecrit sous la dictee d'une epoque chaque fois differente. Mais il pense d'autre
part, naturellement, selon les categories de son propre temps; par suite, avec les
mots de celui-ci".
t4 M. Bloch, op. cit., p. 82: "Aussitot, par contre, qu'apparaissent des in-
'Stitutions, des croyances, des coutumes, qui participent plus profondement a la
vie propre d'une societe, la transposition dans une autre langue, faite a l'image
d'une societe difIerente, devient une entreprise grosse de perils. Car choisir
l'equivalent, c'est postuler une ressemblance".
XVI. THEORY OF NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE
1. A tentative explanation of the concept of non-source-based knowledge
We have so far found it necessary, on many occasions, to resort to the

concept of that initial knowledge with which the historian starts his
research (incessantly adding to that initial knowledge of his in the pro-
cess), formulates research problems and seeks answers to them. That
initial knowledge has proved to consist of information that cannot be
found in the sources, and also that system which the historian uses to
confront with it new statements about the past in order to accept or to
reject them. He has pointed to it as the principal indirect criterion of
accepting statements. In a word, most analyses of the procedures used
by historians cannot be carried out without reference to the set of state-
ments and guidelines he accepts and uses when studying the past. That
set of statements and guidelines, indispensable and important in all
scientific research, has been termed - when it comes to history - non-
source-based knowledge. The various interpretations of the methodo-
logy of history have so far paid practically no attention to it, being
mainly concerned with source-based data as those which are the most
characteristic of historical research. Yet, as we have tried to demon-
strate, at the present the main condition of progress in historical re-
search is not so much a further improvement of the techniques of de-
coding source-based data and of source criticism, as changes in, and
expansion of, non-source-based knowledge. Progress in those abilities
which are traditionally expected of a good historian also depends on
the said changes. The dialectical pattern of historical research, that is,
research which takes into account both structure and development, can-
not be put into effect without all-round high-standard knowledge. This
requirement implies an incessant study of the achievements of other
disciplines so as to be able, following the recommendation of integration
of science, to use it fully in historical research.
In our tentative explanation of the concept of non-source-based
knowledge we shall refer directly to the definition of souree-based

knowledge as given in the preceding chapter. The extension of the
concept of non-source-based knowledge changes, however, according to
the interpretation of souree-based knowledge, to which it is opposed.
We can thus list the following possible extensions of the concept of
non-source-based knowledge:
(1) Non-source-based knowledge as all that which we can know in
addition to:
(a) data about historical facts in general,
(b) those data about historical facts which have been extracted
from the sources;
this may be called general non-source-based knowledge in the
potential sense.
(2) Non-source-based knowledge as all that which we know in ad-
dition to:
(a) data about historical facts,
from the sources;
this may be called general non-source-based knowledge in the
effective sense.
(3) Non-source-based knowledge as all that which we can know in
addition to:
from the sources and which serve to formulate an answer to
a given research question;
this may be called relative non-source-based knowledge in the
potential sense.
(4) Non-souree-based knowledge as all that which we know in ad-
dition to:
from the sources and which serve to formulate an answer to
a given research question;
this may be called relative non-source-based knowledge in the
effective sense.
Note also that the formulations "all that which we know" and "all
THEORY OF NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 403
that which we can know" may refer either to an individual historian

(the concept of non-source-based knowledge being here analysed mainly
in this sense of the term) or to the entire community of historians.
Henee, in the case of general knowledge it is restricted either to a given
researcher or to a group of researchers, and in the case of relative
knowledge, next to its being restricted to a given problem, it is also re-
stricted to a given researcher or to a group of researchers.
It is also worth-while emphasizing that (which after all may seem
fairly obvious) the definition "non-souree-based" is relative for another
reason as well. Something is non-source-based on the assumption only
that at the same time there is something which, in a given interpretation,
we accept as being source-based, i.e., coming from a source. Hence this
definition has nothing to do with absolutely interpreted a priori know-
ledge, that is, sui generis innate categories of thinking (e.g., of the Kant-
ian type). In the last analysis, all human knowledge is source-based, its
source being observation. This statement, which would eliminate the
concept of non-souree-based knowledge, is, however, not in contradic-
tion with approaching the issue from the point of view of the historian's
research procedure, a procedure whose pivotal point is, as is known, the
analysis of historical sources.
In research practice we mostly use both the general and the relative
concepts of non-source-based knowledge in the effective sense of the
term. Note in this connection that non-souree-based knowledge in the
general sense of the term does not include by definition any statements
about historical facts.
Non-souree-based knowledge may not only be restricted to a given
research problem: we can make a step further and refer it to a given
act of cognition of a single item of source-based information. If a souree
has the following entry dated A.D. 966: "Mesco dux baptisatur" (which
refers to the first ruler of Poland - Tr.), then at the time when that item
of information is being read all the (potential or effective) knowledge
of the historian in question is non-source-based in relation to that item
of information about a single historical fact. This points to the dynamic
nature of non-source-based knowledge: onee extracted from a source
with the help of non-source-based knowledge, a given item of informa-
tion about a historical fact becomes, as soon as it enters the historian's
consciousness, part of his non-source-based knowledge to be used in
404 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF ffisrORY
the further study of sources. In addition to being constantly increased

non-souree-based knowledge as it were lives in the historian's mind
and undergoes various transformations, above all those which we might
call theory-making. Such processes are extremely important, especially
for causal explanations, when the historian has to refer to a strictly gen-
eral statement, be it even quite trivial, drawn from current knowledge.
2. The structure of non-source-based knowledge. Non-source-based data
Elements of non-source-based knowledge are either true (or false) state-

ments or valuations which state what, in the opinion of a given person,
is "good" (positive valuation) or "bad" (negative valuation). Valuations
can serve as foundations of formulation of guidelines for the historian's
research procedure. They can also be a subject matter of true or false
statements, but only if they are elements of a description of a person
who formulates valuations: for instanee, we may say that Staszic (a Pol-
ish social leader, 1755-1826 - Tr.) thought that the social system of 18th
century Poland was bad, which, however, means something else than
the valuation "the social system of 18th century Poland was bad"
treated as an element of Staszic's knowledge.
As we have seen, all knowledge a given person has taken part in his
acts of cognition, which are, obviously, limited by that person's system
of values. That knowledge he has, consists of his system of values (to
be called non-souree-based knowledge 2) and also of those statements
about facts (observation statements).and theoretical statements which he
accepts (to be called non-souree-based knowledge!). All these elements
are interconnected. The system of values is closely linked with the re-
maining two elements, for next to the social conditions in which that
person lives (which is stressed by the sociology of scienee) it is also
affected by his actual and expanding knowledge of facts and relation-
ships among facts; moreover, observation statements cannot be strictly
separated from theoretical ones, because the former also have a definite
theoretical sense.! Thus the knowledge which a person uses in his pro-
cess of cognition is in a sense integrated, and that fact must be taken
into account in all studies of its structure. Such current terms as the
knowledge of the period, theoretical knowledge, ideology, etc., accord-
ingly point merely to a fragment of that knowledge or to its specified

aspect, through which the past is "viewed".
Hereafter we shall be interested in a researcher's system of valu-
ations only so far as it is a source of what we might call valuation
guidelines.
It is also worth-while to single out the concept of non-source-based
data: it would mean all the data extracted by the historian from the
whole body of his non-souree-based knowledge. The concept of non-
souree-based data can, of course, be described in a way similar to that
of the description of non-source-based knowledge, which means dis-
tinctions between non-souree-based data in the general (potential and
effective) sense and in the relative (potential and effective) sense. Hence:
(1) Potential non-souree-based data in the general sense are those
which a given historian can obtain beyond the data about historical
facts in general or only beY9nd the data extracted from historical
sources.
(2) Effective non-souree-based data in the general sense are those
which a historian has at his disposal (at the time of carrying out his
research) beyond the data about historical facts in general or only be-
yond the data extracted from historical sources.
(3) Potential non-souree-based data in the relative sense are all those
data which can be used in formulating an answer to a given research
problem, beyond the data about historical facts in general or only be-
yond the data extracted from historical sourees.
(4) Effective non-source-based data in the relative sense are those
data a given historian has which can be used in formulating an answer
to a given research problem, beyond the data about historical facts in
general or only beyond the data extracted from historical sources.
When we analyse the research proeedures used by historians the most
convenient solution is to use the narrower concept of non-source-based
data, namely that of effective non-source-based data in the relative
sense, with the exclusion of valuation guidelines.
3. The origin of non-source-based knowledge
Non-source-based' knowledge comes, of course, from one origin only,

namely observations of facts, yet methodological considerations require
a further analysis of this unique origin.

The observations of facts (in the sense of cognition in general and
the scientific study of facts) are not made by a given historian alone.
They have been, and are, made ~y representatives of other disciplines
and by other historians as well. Thus a historian who is actually con-
eerned with the study of a specified fragment of the past can avail him-
self of:
(1) the results of his own observations of the world (including his
own observations of himself),
(2) the results of his own studies of the past,
(3) the results of historical research,
(4) the results of research in the field of other disciplines.
If we consider non-souree-based knowledge in the general sense, i.e.,
not restricted to a given research problem, then such a knowledge does
not include the elements (2) and (3), which are based on the utilization
of historical sources. But if we consider non-source-based knowledge in
the relative sense, then it turns out that it takes its origin from histor-
ical sources, too, provided that these are used through the intermediary
of historical works (mainly monographs and answers to specified re-
search problems).
In the last analysis, the data among those which form non-source-
based knowledge are the most important in historical research which
combine to form a given historian's general view of the past and its
knowability, together, of course, with his basic ontological and epistemo-
logical views. Reconstruction of that general view of the past seems
therefore neeessary for a proper analysis of historical research pro-
cesses. A historian's view of the past may be a simple resultant of the
theoretical and descriptive knowledge accumulated by contemporary
economics, social psychology, psychology, sociology, and other disci-
plines, but it may as well be little affected by the achievements of
those sciences.
The concept of non-source-based knowledge pertaining to the view of
the past and its knowability to some extent combines the earlier clas-
sifications into one. That knowledge may be analysed both as the total
non-souree-based knowledge and as that part of it which is used in
formulating and resolving a given problem. Moreover, it is both the
non-source-based knowledge drawn from historical sourees and that
which is drawn from outside historical sources. Finally, it consists of

both current and scientific knowledge_ The last-mentioned division
seems to be the most important one for us here.
The origins of non-souree-based knowledge can be reduced to:
(1) the observations made by the historian himself (his general ex-
perience),
(2) the results of historical researches carried out by other historians
and by himself,
(3) the results obtained in other disciplines.
It can easily be seen that (2) and (3) represent the scientific origins of
non-source-based knowledge, and (1), that origin of it which might be
termed current.
This classification, the criterion of which is the way a historian ar-
rives at specified conclusions. suggests the division of non-source-based
knowledge into current and scientific knowledge_
The former. which is sometimes called common-sense-based. is ac-
cumulated as a result of the researcher's everyday practical activity as
a member of society and may greatly vary in nature, according to the
kind of his activity, his involvement in societal life, and many other
factors. The latter may be varied. too, and. of course. of a varying
quality; moreover, it may be theoretical or descriptive in nature.
Historical non-source-based knowledge is used above all in de-
scribing past events; explanations, i.e.• tentative answers to the question.
why it was so, require. next to historical non-source-based knowledge,
a great amount of thorough extra-historical knowledge.
4. Current knowledge and common sense
The problem of those numerous scientific statements which are based

on current knowledge and on common sense (such statements being fre-
quent in historiography), has not so far been extensively treated in
scientific methodology. The problem consists in finding out those latent
assumptions of scientific statements in which, as we can easily see, cur-
rent information and the common sense approach are of considerable
importance. A distinction into current knowledge and that based on
common sense does not seem necessary, even though it might suggest
itself on theoretical grounds, since common sense plays the principal
408 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lllSIORY
role in the acceptance of certain statements and in including them in the

body of current knowledge.
It is worth-while recalling that in L. Chwistek's methodology the
concept of common sense plays an important role. Chwistek was con-
cerned with the "limits of common sense" in Chap. I of his Granice
nauki. Zarys logiki i metodologii nauk (The Limits of Science. An
Outline of Logic and the Methodology of Sciences).2 He says that "com-
mon sense must be distinguished from the popular view of the world,
the latter covering all that which in a given milieu is held to be self-
evident and inevitable. The popular view of the world is a sui generis
metaphysical system, whose principles are probably not formulated
very precisely, but nevertheless function quite effectively through the
intermediary of automatic responses. It is common knowledge that the
popular view of the world is always combined with backwardness and
is synonymous with the commonplace and the mediocre".3 According
to Chwistek, "common sense means that ability which provides us
truths that are independent of any revolution in the system of con-
cepts",4 that is, truths which we do not question. "A person may be
guided by a great passion or be full of expectations of a miracle which
is about to happen, but this does not mean that he need not take the
traffic into account, when he crosses a street, or the fact his car would
stop without gasoline. All these things are extremely trivial and being
concerned with them seems to be a waste of time, and yet we can easily
find out that they are the foundation of our entire intellectual activi-
ties".5
Chwistek's last-quoted formulation seems to be very much to the
point. On the other hand, the concept of the popular view of the world
seems rather obscure. In the case of common sense, too, we mean that
which is self-evident and inevitable to the members of a given milieu,
unless we assume that in the case of common sense we have to do with
those truths which are independent of social membership (milieu - in
Chwistek's terminology). Chwistek's conception could serve as an in-
spiration to single out, within what we term current knowledge (i.e., all
knowledge which is not based on scientific cognition), knowledge based
on common sense, which covers the most fundamental truths that are
not questioned by anyC?ne and are independent of a given person's social
membership. But it would nevertheless be difficult to contrast Chwistek's
popular view of the world with knowledge based on common sense.

The view of the world, as understood by the present writer, is, as it
were, a synthesis of all kinds of knowledge a person has, knowledge
based on common sense included (in the case of a historian that view
of the world becomes largely his view of the past).
It must, however, be doubted whether common sense alone, often
emphasized as the criterion of cognition, can serve as a foundation of
science, historical science included. Common sense seems to have been
based on two fundamental principles: one of them is the principle of
contradiction (which says that two contradictory statements cannot both
be true), and the other is that of causalism, which makes man search
for the causes of events. The latter principle is associated with the tend-
ency, important in the case of historical research, to interpret causes
of human behaviour by reference to their (mostly material) interests. 8
That principle might also be termed causal-psychological; it has fairly
clear connections with what is called naive materialism in the interpre-
tation of the world.
Common sense, being based on everyday experience, generalized in
the form of the principle of contradiction, and not on scientific experi-
ments, cannot serve as the foundation of science. Engels wrote in Anti-
Duhring that "common sense, that venerable but home-grown adviser
within the four walls of one's room experiences many peculiar adven-
tures when it dares to enter the vast world of research".7
The second principle imbues research with a sui generis spontaneous
materialism, which is visible in historical studies of even most idealisti-
cally-minded theorists and philosophers of history. A fine example is
provided by the comparison of B. Croce's philosophical works with his
strictly historical ones (namely those concerned with the history of
Italy). There also other serious dangers inherent in that principle.
Knowledge based on common sense, when combined with the causal
psychological principle, is in practice a set of data about individual
behaviour, and to some extent perhaps of group behaviour as well, but
it has no support in the advances in the science of psychology. It refers
in fact to the theoretically obsolete idea of changeless human nature:
some knowledge of human psychology, based on the behaviour of those
people who are actually alive and thus the best known to a given his-
torian, is projected into the past, which in many cases need not result
in erroneous conclusions, but is dangerous as a matter of principle. The

need of taking the changing nature of human psychology into account
has been emphasized by W. Kula, who called for a stronger integration
of history and psychology.B
We thus have to conclude that a historian's current knowledge, to-
gether with his knowledge based on common sense, does not ensure
sufficient conditions of scientific research even though it is in fact the
starting point of such research. This means that it cannot provide a set
of non-source-based data which, together with source-based items of
information, would suffice for the formulation of an answer to a given
research problem. It may prove to be insufficient, in the same degree,
for the formulation of a given problem, and - at an even earlier stage-
for choosing the field in which that question is to be formulated.
Current knowledge is used in establishing facts and in explanations.
When facts are established on the strength of direct source-based data
about them, current knowledge is required when we have to decide
whether to accept or to reject a given item of information. When facts
are established indirectly (cf. Chap. XIX), it often serves as a premiss
in probabilistic inference, although it is not sufficient for that purpose.
" There is a considerable difference between the role of current know-
ledge in the study of the period which a historian knows from 'his own
experience and its role in the study of earlier periods. In the former
case he finds in it the source of the general knowledge of the period and
is thus free from the risk of psychological anachronisms. The decoding
of the sources is facilitated, too. When it comes to the study of earlier
periods, a historian cannot do without scientific knowledge. If he does
not have it at his disposal, then current knowledge may prove to be
nothing more than a hindrance. On the whole, a historian who studies
recent history is, methodologically, in an exceptionally advantageous
position (9). This is why - since current knowledge that comes from the
historian's own experience and observations can intervene very strongly
in his research work - the study of contemporary history is denied a fully
scientific nature. Yet current knowledge, while it provides a historian of
contemporary times with a general knowledge of the period and thus
facilitates (sometimes in an apparent manner only) his research, cannot
replace the scientific knowledge of the period if historical research is to
develop fully. The latter kind of knowledge is provided by such dis-
THEORY OF NON-SOURGE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 411
ciplines as sociology, economics, demography, and all other disciplines

which are concerned with the present period.
5. Non-source-based scientific knowledge
There is thus no doubt that it is scientific knowledge which is the most

important for successes in the interpretation of source data and for
using them in answers to research' problems. lt is such knowledge only
which can control current knowledge and prevent common sense from
"experiencing adventures in the vast world of research". It is also here
that the key to progress in historical science seems to rest.
The range of a historian's non-source-based scientific knowledge is
extremely vast, as is shown by both the analysis of his research pro-
cedures and from normative considerations intended to determine what
that range oUght to be.
lt thus includes, above all, historical knowledge, that is, the know-
ledge of historical facts and processes; this knowledge can be assimi-
lated by him as a result of his own research or from the results obtain-
ed (with scientific rigour) by others. This is linked to his theoretical
knowledge of the structure and. the development of society, unattain-
able by a historian without his availing himself of the achievements of
other disciplines, sociology and economics above all.
Strictly historical knowledge provides foundations for the use by
a historian of the comparative method, which is so important for him
and which helps him both to establish facts and to find causal expla-
nations of them (cf. Chap. XXI) and also giv~s him that general know-
ledge of the period without which he ;finds it difficult to engage in re-
search work. That general knowledge of the period is,' of course, also
the starting point for the application of the comparative method.
Theoretical knowledge above all inspires the historian to pose ques-
tions and helps him formulate answers by prividing him with catego-
rial concepts. Leaving the strict boundaries of history as a discipline en-
ables historians to modify the traditional question codes. The results
of such modifications depend, of course, on the quality of the theo-
retical knowledge a given historian has assimilated. The set of those
sciences from which a historian can draw inspiration is practically un-
412 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISI'ORY
limited and largely depends on that historian's specialized field of re-

search.
When it comes to a historian's non-souree-based scientific knowledge
a separate mention is due to the auxiliary historical disciplines, the
methodology of history and the general methodology of sciences. While
the auxiliary historical disciplines in their traditional interpretation (that
is, those related to external source criticism) are needed mostly in
the study of more remote periods, the study of modern and contempo-
rary history requires sociology, psychology, economics, statistics, demo-
graphy, etc., as the principal auxiliary historical disciplines. The know-
ledge of the methodology of history acquires particular importance.
Sources for recent times are usually more numerous than those for the
remote past, and the problem is not how to decode them, but how to
use them properly in practice. Without a proper use of the scienees
listed above and without a thorough methodological reflection the study
of current history (Zeitgeschichte) becomes journalism, reportage or
memoirs writing, etc.
The following diagram outlines the inner structure of a historian's
(current and scientific) non-source-based knowledge.
Historian's
non-source-based
knowledge
General Popu- Theo- Factual Meth-

edge of know~ lar view iary ical retical knowl- odol-
human edge of the histor- knowl- knowledge ogy
behav- of the world ical edge edge drawn
iour period disci- from
plines other
sciences
Historian's view
of the past and
its knowability
The fact that non-source-based scientific knowledge is of essential

importance for the progress in historical research implies the require-
ment that historical research be strongly imbued with extra-historical
knowledge. It seems that that requirement can be satisfied only in con-
nection with the growing trend toward the integration of science. Hence
reflections on the paths of the integration of science should begin with
the historian's methodological considerations, especially at the present
stage of research.
6. Theoretical issues of the integration of science
If we assume that the development of science must increasingly consist

of penetrating explanations of natural and social processes, than the
justification of the usefulness, and even necessity, of the integration of
science seems superfluous. The belief in its necessity is more and more
deeply rooted in the minds of representatives of specialized disciplines,
who grow alarmed by the scattering of efforts of a growing number of
researchers, a scattering which borders on an explosion of scientific
publications that offer an immense wealth of empirical data, by now
difficult to master. They realize that this must result in researchers
being enclosed within the narrow limits of their respective fields. We
cannot, however, disregard the fact that seeking refuge within a narrow
field makes researchers feel competent and important, and even though
it has a disintegrating effect upon the development of sciences, it also
has many advocates, who usually do not realize the consequences of
their attitude.
Scientists and scholars are thus not excessively astonished to see
people who confine their research to a very narrow field and do not
show any interest in contacts with other disciplines. Thus, for instance,
a sociologist may be concerned with one professional group only, or
with delinquency only,t° and a historian, with a small region within
a rather brief period, or with one person only, without any tendency to
go beyond such narrow limits.
The alarm caused by the growing isolation of researchers and a sui
generis entropy of research, also increasing incessantly, has been strong
enough to make people reflect on the very process of integration of
science, that is, above all on the factors which condition it, and on its
414 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HlSI'ORY
forms and degrees. Yet the interpretation of the concept of integration

of science still gives rise to numerous misunderstandings. First of all,
we have to emphasize that the processes which tend to integrate various
sciences do not mean their elimination as separate discipline: on the
contrary, the various branches of research may find better conditions
of development exactly by being involved in integration processes. Even
if we disregard the important issue of technical facilities which are in-
dispensable for the integration of science (mainly the various forms of
scientific information) and the role of such disciplines as mathematical
logic in that integration, we can single out several forms of integration
processes. Their list, to be given below, will be partly descriptive (re-
porting on what we observe) and partly normative (suggesting possible
paths of the integration of science). The comments will be confined to
the social sciences in general, without singling out history in any par-
ticular way.
The most common manifestation of the integrative tendencies is the
use for explanations, in a given discipline, of facts or theories
established in other disciplines. Theories, and even facts. established in
a branch of science, can stimulate researchers to pose questions in an-
other field. The more the representatives of the various branches of
science think about the need of integration, the more fruitful that kind
of reference to research results in other disciplines. In more general
terms, that form of removing the compartmentalization of accumulated
and ever growing knowledge seems to be the basis of all integration
processes.
That, however, requires facilities in the transfer of research results
from one discipline to another. We have to emphasize here the necessity
of a constant ordering and codification of the empirical data accumu-
lated in a given specialized discipline, which is to be achieved by the
formulation of general statements of varying levels and types. This is
very important, especially in those fields where there is a growing mass
of data. In this connection we should not fear a rapid modification or
even refutation of the conclusions drawn from those data, which may
occur quite frequently because the body of data involved may be in-
complete. The development of science consists in a gradual approach to
the truth. This kind of work, indispensable for the development of the
comparative form of integration, which stimulates questions and ex-
planations within a given discipline, is needed even more when we pass

to the next stage of integration processes_
The last formulation refers to that form of the integration of science
in which we have to do with the unification and linking (and not merely
with a simple comparison) of results obtained in various disciplines in
a way which goes beyond suggestion of new ideas and explanations in
the field of a given science. This form of integration can have at least
three variations. The first manifests itself by the emergence, from the
linking of results and methods of research, of border disciplines which
cover border areas of two or more disciplines each. The second consists
in the construction of sets of theorems (theories) of a high level of gen-
erality, which unite the viewpoints of several sciences (e.g., behaviour
theory). The third, closely associated with the second, takes the form of
the emergence of separate disciplines, which are superordinated to others
because of the generality of their theorems; this applies, for instance, to
cybernetics with information theory, and to communication theory.
The said theories and disciplines cannot be treated merely as results
of integration processes. To use cybernetic language we may say that
there is a feedback effect between those general theories and disciplines.
Those feedbacks are parts of the general schema which reflects a ten-
tative illustration of integrative processes in science.
Increased use of concepts typical of sciences

of a high level of generality (mathematical
-
logic, cybernetics, etc.)
! ~ IH
The comparative Generalizations Construction Integration of
method (explanations of empirical ~ of theories ~ results of
within a single ~
data ~ or sciences ('-- research in
science) with a high many sciences
level of
I generality
., r
Development of various forms of scientific
information and other technical facilities
conducive to the integration of science
The importance in that schema of theories whose theorems are mark-

ed by a high level of generality can easily be seen. It is possible to pre-
dict that integration processes in science will make use of, or give rise
to, new theories that would link the viewpoints of various sciences,
since such theories are a necessary meeting point of such different dis-
ciplines. If a given theory or discipline is metaphorically called an inte-
gration platform, this means that it produces such methodological guide-
lines which direct specialized research by putting together scattered in-
formation and by confirming or, in the last analysis, modifying or even
refuting those theories from which research started in a given case. The
more comprehensive such a theory is, and at the same time formulated
at a correspondingly high level of generality, the vaster is the platform
it provides for such a meeting. The degree of the hypotheticity of the
theories involved may vary; it is obviously better if it is not too great.
The point is thus to select theories which would be based sufficiently
on the results obtained in specialized disciplines and constructed so as
to serve as a platform for a real, and not merely formal, integration of
the largest possible number of disciplines, thus contributing to a better
knowledge of the world.
When it comes to the social sciences, it is above all the theory of
dialectical materialism which, among the theories marked by a very
high level of generality, satisfies the said conditions best. This will be
seen later, when the various concepts connected with the interpretation
of the past are discussed.
REFERENCES
1 Cf. J. Giedymin, "0 teoretycznym sensie tzw. termin6w i zdati. obserwacyj-
nych" (The Theoretical Meanings of Observation Terms and Observation State-
ments), in: Teoria i doswiadczenie (Theory and Experience), Warszawa 1966,
pp. 99-l10.
2 The post-war edition is included in L. Chwistek, Pismo filozoficzne i logicz-
ne (philosophical and Logical Writings), vol. II, Warszawa 1963. Introduction
and comments by K. Pasenkiewicz. (The book was first published in 1935, and
there is an English-language version (1946), which is said to be a rather free
rendering of the Polish original. - Tr.)
3 Ibid., p. 1.
4 Ibid., p. 2.
5 Ibid., p. 1.
6 An analysis of the explanation of human actions by reference to interest is
given by W. Kula, Rozwazania 0 historii (Reflections on History), Warszawa
1958, pp. 79 ff.
7 F. Engels, Herrn Eugen Dilhrings Umwiilzung der Wissenshaft, (Anti-DUh-

ring), Berlin 1970, p. 21.
B W. Kula, op. cit., p. 94.
9 We do not consider here the access to the sources and the necessity of tak-
ing into account the reason of state.
10 See pertinent comments by A. Malewski in his 0 zastosowaniu leorii za-
chowania ... (The Application of Behaviour Theory .. ,), Warszawa 1964,
pp. 4, 6.
XVII. THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND
NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE
1. An analysis of the historian's procedure from the point of view of

the role of source-based and non-source-based knowledge
The important role played by non-souree-based knowledge in the histo-

rian's research procedure can be seen clearly jn the light of what has
been said in the preceding chapter. Yet its real role can be seen in full
relief only when we reflect deeply on the various stages of that proee-
dure and at the same time compare its role with that of source-based
knowledge. On the other hand, a firm reservation must be made against
construing this statement as a way of belittling the role of sources in
historical research. Sources will always remain the greatest treasure of
the historian, without which he simply could not be one. The point here
is to put an end to treating sources and souree-based knowledge as
fetishes, an approach which is quite common among historians, but
which is nothing else than a manifestation of the anti-integration at-
titude of scholars and a defence of the purely eruditional approach.· The
essential thing is, while not disregarding the fundamental (in a sense)
importance of the sources, to realize that sources alone do not suffice,
nor does historical erudition alone. We have to realize that the infor-
mation extracted from the sources is more instructive if we pose more
varied questions, and that requires vast knowledge.
THE FUNCIIONS OF SOURCE·BASED AND NON·SOURCE·BASED KNOWLEDGE 419
The above diagram shows the role of source-based and non-source-

based knowledge.
The choice of the field of research and the posing of questions are
related mainly to the problem of selection, and the criteria of selection
are in turn closely related to a given system of values (which is a func-
tion of human knowledge). A change in the system of values as a rule
results in changes in the accepted criteria of selection and also in
changes in the assumptions of questions and the methods of explana-
tion. When choosing a field of research we do not yet have to do with
source-based data as we have not yet proceeded to study the problem
in question. That problem (question) itself has not yet been formulated.
When formulating it we also refer to our criteria of selection based on
our system of values, but we also make use, in an at least equal degree,
of our knowledge of historical facts and general theoretical knowledge
as well.
Once a question has been posed the exclusive role of non-source-
based knowledge comes to an end, and when searching for an answer
to that question we must resort to source-based data. Their role, how-
ever, varies according to the stage and type of the procedure used to
find an answer to the question posed. In the course of source criticism
(the study of the authenticity and reliability of the sources involved) we
refer mainly, or at least in an equal degree, to our knowledge derived
from outside the sources studied, since we can conclude about their
authenticity and reliability by comparison only. Even if we do not go
beyond a given source, the data it contains (both about facts and about
itself) are accepted only due to certain statements which are part of the
body of knowledge we have. If such data are at variance with our know-
ledge we continue our research in order to decide whether our non-
source·based knowledge ought to be modified on that point.
The role of source-based knowledge is the greatest at the time when
facts are being established, as we establish them on the strength of
sources, even though, as we can easily realize, we would be unable to
extract given data from sources without appropriate non-source-based
knowledge. It is one of the fundamental theses of information theory
that each item of information must be "paid for", in other words, each
item of information costs. Moreover, the reading of a given item of in-
formation requires the knowledge of the appropriate code(s). It is also
420 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF InSTORY
worth recalling that the very acceptance of something as a source rele-

vant to a given problem takes place only relative to the researcher's
knowledge. As J. Giedymin was right in saying: "An object is a his-
torical source only if there is a person for whom it is not merely an
'ordinary' object, but also a sign, that is, if that person has appropriate
knowledge which enables him to associate that object with objects or
events in the past".1
When it comes to causal explanations, non-souree-based knowledge
comes to the fore, for it is but rarely that we find in our sources an in-
dication of the causes of the events we are interested in, and even if
we do, such information is not authoritative from our point of view. To
make causal explanations we need an intricate research proeedure,
which makes use of the comparative method above all. As has been
SoURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE IN TIm lllSTORIAN'S

RESEAROI PROCEDURES
Type of research procedure Source-based Non-source-

No. based
knowledge
knowledge
1 Choice of the field of research II +

2 I Formulation of the question (problem) +
3 Establishing of sources for that problem +
4 Reading of source-based data +
5 Study of the authenticity of the sources
(external criticism) + +
6 Study of the reliability of the sources
(internal criticism) + +
7 Establishing of those facts on which the
sources provide direct information +
8 Establishing of those facts on which the
sources do not provide direct infor-
mation (including verification) +
9 Causal explanation (including verific-
ation) +
10 Establishing of laws (including verifica-
tion) +
11 Synthetic interpretation (answer to the
research problem) +
12 (Proper) appraisal of historical facts +
THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 421
shown in particular by C. G. Hempel,! in order to find out that eertain

circumstances are the cause of the fact we study we must refer to a
scientific law. In explanation we link facts with one another, and we do
so by referring to laws, i.e., non-souree-based (theoretical) knowledge.
The various facts we know suggest the possibilities of referring to certain
specified laws. Non-source-based knowledge also enables us to formulate
laws and to synthesize results of research. Likewise, historical facts are
assessed in the light of non-source-based knowledge, which in this case
functions as a system of values.
In order to visualize the role of souree-based and non-souree-based
knowledge we give below a table in which the symbol "+" is inserted
in the line indicating a given research procedure and in the column
which indicates whether it is souree-based or non-souree-based know-
ledge that prevails in that procedure. If both kinds of knowledge are of
the same importance, the symbol '+' is placed in both columns in that
line. It is obvious that the importanee of the various stages of the
historian's work may be assessed differently from the point of view of
the goal of his research, yet, on the other hand, all the proeedures listed
in the table are indispensable for the attainment of research goals.
2. The functions of non-souree-based knowledge l • The problem of the

nominal model of questions
Non-source-based knowledge, that is, the observation and theoretical
statements about the world, accepted by a given researcher, can - if
viewed in a relative sense, i.e., restricted to a given question - be treated
as an analogue of the assumptions of that question (cf. Chap. XIV) or
the model of that question. According to J. Giedymin's distinction, it is
what he terms the nominal model of the question, which is the set or the
system of assumptions, as opposed to the real (semantic) model of the
question, i.e., the class of those objects which satisfy the system of as-
sumptions that makes the nominal mode1. 3 Non-souree-based know-
ledgel which from the logical point of view consists of new premisses,
rules of inferenee, etc., increases the repertory of the ways of inferenee
that make the resolution of a given problem possible.
As is known (cf. Chap. XIV), in a system of assumptions of a ques-
tion we have to distinguish, above all, the positive assumption, the
422 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllsrORY
negative assumption, the assumption of uniqueness, the positive restrict-

ing assumption, and possibly also the assumption of decidability and
the criteria of a satisfactory answer.
As has been said earlier, the positive assumption corresponds to the
conviction, which is part of non-source-based knowledge!, that there is
a true answer to the question posed. The negative assumption, which
also is part of non-source-based knowledge!, is general in nature, too:
it states that not every answer is true. Non-source-based knowledge!
also provides grounds for the possible assumption of uniqueness, which
states that one and only one direct answer is true.
The positive restricting assumption, which requires more specified
non-source-based knowledge! and in many cases is connected with ad-
vances in our making use of source-based data, brings us closer to the
answer we seek. The better our non-source-based knowledge, the great-
er the precision with which that assumption indicates the subset in which
the answer to the question is to be sought. A certain set (of possible
answers) is narrowed down to its certain subset. This assumption also
is one of the criteria of acceptance of the answer: it states that an an-
swer that comes from outside the said subset or the range of the un-
known is not to be accepted. This holds for decision and for comple-
mentation questions alike. It is obvious that this assumption, like any
other, may prove false. Assumptions are merely a system of initial hypo-
theses, which are necessary for a certain formulation of the question.
False assumptions of a question, which are due to insufficient or faulty
non-source-based knowledge, very often hinder research work to a con~
siderable extent. Yet it is but rarely that we can speak of the absolute
truth of the assumptions already at the initial stage of research (the
absolute truth of the assumptions meaning here their truth as later con-
firmed in the course of research). But we can require that the non-
source-based knowledge a historian has should expand incessantly,
since that is an indispensable element of his work.
Captious questions are a good example of questions with latent false
assumptions. Should we ask, for instance, what Polish territories were
annexed by Austria in the Second Partition of Poland?, we could not
except a direct true answer to this question as Austria did not partici-
pate in the Second Partition of Poland.
The assumption of decidability, that is, the conviction that the an-
THE FUNCfIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 423
swer to the question posed can be verified by observation, is complex

in nature. In the researcher's mind it usually co-occurs with the positive
assumption.
3_ The functions of non-source-based knowledge 2 _ The problem of

methodological model (selection)
The system of values upheld by a given researcher, which in our clas-

sification is marked as non-souree-based knowledge 2, functions as the
set of guidelines which that researcher follows in his work. Above all,
valuation is one of the principal sources of inspiration when it comes
to distinguishing principal factors from secondary ones. The valuations
are usually very general guidelines of the type: "sinee A is good, one
has to stress its good aspects, to propagate the knowledge of A", etc_
Such guidelines also are, in a sense, a system of the assumptions of
a given question. They might be termed axiological assumptions of that
question.. In many cases, they may hinder the researcher in arriving at
the correct answer to the question he has posed. For instanee, his con-
viction that the Counter-reformation played a positive role in the history
of Poland, a conviction which follows from his non-source-based know-
ledge and which is part of his system of values (non-source-based know-
ledge 2 ), may greatly restrict his field of vision. An axiological assump-
tion works as a sui generis filter which selects the data that reach the
researcher, and also accordingly guides him in his effort to acquire new
information. As has been said, the guidelines which result from a system
of values in many cases open up new vistas for research by pointing to
new fields that have been unnoticed so far.
Thus advances in research are determined not only by that part of
non-source-based which is involved in the very formulation of a given
question, but also more latent knowledge, namely that which underlies
the decision about posing that question. Fortunately, there is a con-
sensus of scholars on many fundamental issues so that decisions about
posing questions are made efficiently; moreover, certain differences
between systems of values, that is, systems of non-souree-based know-
ledge 2 , result in a variety of questions, which yields a fuller vision of
the world. That fuller vision is arrived at, as is known, in the dialectical
development of research_
This is why, let it be said once more, the problem of non-source-

based knowledge2 must not be disregarded in methodological analyses
in general, and not in historical research alone. In the latter, the func-
tions of non-source-based knowledge 2 are particularly important. It is
on that knowledge that decisions about posing questions in a given field
are largely dependent. This means that even at this stage it affects se-
lection processes, which are of extreme importance in all kinds of his-
torical research.
A change in the system of values, which results from changes in the
body of our non-source-based knowledge, usually implies changes in
the criteria of selection. It is self-evident that changes in the body of
non-source-based knowledge l result in modifications of assumptions of
the questions we pose.
For instance, the changes which resulted from the adoption of the
theory and the method of historical materialism were changes in the
criteria of selection, assumptions of questions (factographic questions,
explanatory questions, and questions about laws), and methods of ex-
planation. In the sphere of selection, incomparably more attention came
to be paid to changes in production technology, in property relation-
ship, the proprietary status of the various classes, the interests of such
classes and their subdivisions, class conflicts (e.g., the various forms of
resistance on the part of the peasants and the conflicts between the
patricians and the poor urban population), the class function of the
state, state legislation, ideologies and the organizations which propound
them (such as the Church), relationships between struggles to abolish
social privileges and struggles for independence, traditions of egalitarian
strivings and protests against privileges of the rich and the wielders of
power, etc. 4
The interpretation of the assumptions which underlie selection is
sometimes very easy. For instance, issues related to the patriotic attitude
of the clergy were often being taken up by those historians who were
connected with the Roman Catholic groups. On the other hand, those
issues which tended to bring out cases of treason, oppression of peasants
and luxury in the way of life of church dignitaries were often taken up
by historians convinced of the negative role of Roman Catholicism in
Poland. More often, however, this applies to more fundamental ques-
tions (research problems). In the case of simple questions the assump-
THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE 425
tions underlying selection (i.e., the latent non-source-based knowledge

of a given researcher) become clear only if we can locate such a ques-
tion in a system of questions that combine to form a more compre-
hensive problem.
For instance, the question, "How numerous was Napoleon's army
in the Battle of Waterloo?", may be part of a more comprehensive
question about the causes of Napoleon's defeat in that battle, the latter
question being posed because of its significance (at least in the eyes of
a given researcher). A person may be convinced of the significance of
that question regardless of whether he believes Napoleon to have played
an important role in human history (whether positive or negative) or
not. Thus the assumptions which underlie the decision about posing
such a question point to the valuations inherent in the general view of
human history on the part of the person who poses them, such a gen-
eral view being a result of his non-source-based knowledge!.
Such iterative procedure seems to be a rule when it comes to an
analysis of the assumptions of interrogative decisions. A fairly large
number of steps is sometimes required if we are to find out what those
assumptions are, yet, on the whole, in historical research the number of
such steps is smaller than, for instance, in natural science.
Let us analyse the above example in greater detail:
Step 1: We find a gap in our non-source-based knowledge, and, on
the other hand, we are convinced of the importance of the problem as
a whole. We have selected that problem because we hold Napoleon's
activities to be very important for the comprehension of the history of
the world.
Step 2: We decide to formulate a question intended to fill the said
gap (on the basis of non-source-based knowledge! and non-source-based
knowledge 2)·
Step 3: We pose the question: What was the numerical strength of
Napoleon's army in the Battle of Waterloo? We do so by setting our
non-source-based knowledge! in operation. This is part of a more com-
prehensive question, e.g., that about the causes of Napoleon's fall.
The positive assumption: we are convinced that an answer to the
narrower question can be found (because Napoleon did exist, because
the Battle of Waterloo did take place, etc.).
The negative assumption: we are convinced that not every answer
426 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOOY OF IDSTORY
would be true (for instance, we are not inclined to accept answers which
point to Napoleon's numerical superiority in that battle).
The assumption of uniqueness: we know that only one direct answer
should be exact, possible within an interval (unless we think of Napo-
leon's army at the various stages of the battle).
The positive restricting assumption: we will look for the answer in
the subset: Napoleon's army was less numerous than that of his ad-
versaries; its numerical strength could not go into millions, etc.
Step 4: The question formulated in accordance with the foregoing
assumptions is included in our research programme.
4. The functions of non-souree-based data
In the formulation of answers, non-source-based data play above all

an inferential role, which consists in their serving as premisses in cases
of inference in historical research. That function of theirs manifests
itself very often, especially in the deductive establishment of facts and
in the construction of causal explanations. Examples will not be quoted
here, as they will be discussed in the appropriate chapters of the book.
For the time being we shall confine ourselves to showing the role of
non-source-based data in a purely schematic manner.
Suppose that (to take a very simple case into account) we have to do
with a set of various situations which is defined by the following de-
cision questions:
PI """"PI
P2 ,...., P2
Pa ,...., Pa
We are in possession of source-based data which state that PI and
'" P2' i.e., that PI did occur, whereas P2 did not. Further, non-source-
based knowledge tells us that the following general relationship holds:
PI -+ '" Pa, which means that a fact of the type PI implies the lack of
facts of the type Pa. As far as we make use of source-based data only,
we restrict the set of questions thus:
THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE·BASED AND NON·SOURCE·BASED KNOWLEDGE 427
The answers in the boxes are those which can be eliminated.

If we add to this the above-mentioned non-source-based information,
then the set can be restricted even more:
Pl I'" Pli
IPzl "'Pz
IPal '" Pa
It thus turns out that the answers to the above decision questions are:
Pl; '" pz; ,...., Pa·
Another function of non-source-based data in the construction of nar-
rative and explanatory answers is that of linking source-based data into
a coherent picture. Consider, by way of example, the following state-
ment in R. H. Tawney's Religion and the Rise of Capitalism:. "For the
arts by which men amass wealth and power, as for the anxious pro-
vision which accumulates for the future, Luther had all the distrust of
a peasant and a monk".5
In this example, Tawney used the concept of "distrust of a peasant
and a monk", which is a typical case of non-source-based information
available in the light of our knowledge of the characteristic features of
peasants and monks. That concept enables him to integrate the various
source-based data about Luther's attitude towards the economic trends
that marked nascent capitalism.
REFERENCES
1 J. Giedymin, "Problemy logiczne analizy historycznej" (Logical Issues in
Historical Analyses), Studia zr6dloznawcze, voL II, Poznan 1958, p. 28.
2 Cf. C. G. Hempel, "The Function of General Laws in History", in: Theo-
ries of History, ed. cit., 'Pp. 345-6. For the problem of explanation see
Chap. XXI.
3 J. Giedymin, op. cit., pp. 94--5, 177.
4 Cf. A. Malewski and J. Topolski, "Metoda materializmu historycznego
w pracach historyk6w polskich" (The Method of Historical Materialism in
Works by Polish Historians), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 6/1959, p. 130.
5 R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, London 1927, p. 92.
PART FIVE
THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY:

THE METHODS OF RECONSTRUCTION OF THE
PROCESS OF HISTORY
XVIII. THE AUTHENTICITY OF SOURCES AND THE
RELIABILITY OF INFORMANTS
1. The general concept of source criticism
Textbooks of historical research usually distinguish between the ex-

ternal and the internal criticism of the sources. The former is often
termed (after Langlois and Seignobos) erudite criticism or (after Bern-
heim) lower criticism; the latter is called higher criticism or, as has been
mentioned earlier, hermeneutics. Assimilating the principles of criticism,
especially those of external criticism, was for a long time - from the
birth of the erudite approach in the 17th century - the main component
of the methodological training of historians. It has remained so to this
day, but as we move away from the positivist and idiographic approach,
which attaches excessive importance to source-based knowledge, histo-
rians must be given more and more elements of the general methodol-
ogy of history.
The study of the external characteristics of a source (that is, every-
thing except the meaning of the information it conveys), as external
criticism is usually defined, can be interpreted in a broader and in a
narrower sense. If that task is interpreted more broadly, it has to in-
clude both the reading1 (decoding) of the data contained in a given
source, and the investigation of the source itself, which serves as an in-
formation channel (in the sense of information theory). In its narrower
(or strict) sense external criticism is concerned only with the external
characteristics of a given source interpreted as an information channel,
which thus excludes the decoding procedures. It may occur, however,
that in analysing the external characteristics of a source it is necessary
to analyse the code (e.g., when we want to establish the date of a doc-
ument from the script or to identify the author from the style of writ-
ing). In such a case the study of the code is included in external criti-
cism proper, yet the process of decoding as such is not involved.
The concept of external criticism has not been defined so far with
432 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lflSIORY
sufficient clarity. The same applies to the division into external and
internal criticism. If providing source data with labels which state how
close these data come to historical facts were taken to be the main goal
of source criticism, then many statements which are not directly related
to the problem of the certainty of such data would have to be excluded
from source criticism so conceived. The said statements, however, are
included in the usual process of establishing historical facts. Since a
thorough criticism of sources often requires very intricate procedures,
during which we sometimes have to establish facts otherwise loosely
connected with the goals of source criticism, the entire operation is
traditionally treated as a whole.
It seems that source criticism in the proper sense of the term could
be defined with a greater precision if the following four statements were
adopted:
(1) Source criticism, both external and internal, is to answer the ques-
tion: are the data provided by a given source in agreement with facts?
This implies that the question about the reliability of the informant
comes to the fore.
(2) The first stage in the criticism of a source consists in investigating
its authenticity (external criticism).
(3) The second stage in the criticism (this pertains to indirect sources)
of a source consists in finding out whether the informant is reliable or
not (internal criticism).
(4) In order to determine the reliability of the informant we must
first examine the authenticity of the source; yet the study of its authen-
ticity sometimes also requires information about the reliability of the
informant, that is, about the truth of the data he conveys.
This suggests that the study of the reliability of information be taken
as the main goal of both external and internal source criticism, and that
external criticism be identified with the study of the authenticity of
sources, and internal criticism, with the study of the reliability of in-
formation.
The principles of source criticism, which have been worked out labo-
riously from the 17th century on, when the Benedictines and the Bol-
landists started their research, to be raised to a very high level by the
positivists, form today a vast reservoir of knowledge, which is being
used mainly by the students of mediaeval history. Yet it is obvious that
THE AUTHENTICITY OF SOURCES AND THE RELIABILITY OF INFORMANTS 433
even a most detailed knowledge of those principles cannot replace the

all-round general (non-source-based) knowledge which a historian must
have. The said principles merely indicate how that knowledge is to be
used. We shall be concerned here with the most general of those prin-
ciples and rules, especially with the issues of the authenticity of sources
and the reliability of informants.
2. The authenticity of sources
The study of the authenticity of sources is the starting point of all re-
search operations undertaken by a historian who refers to sources. Yet
the concept of authenticity has not been defined with adequate clarity.
The text-books of critical methods used in historical research usually
refer separately to the establishing of the time and place of origin of
a given source and the establishing of its author, and separately to the
study of its authenticity, which is usually interpreted in a narrow sense
as the establishing of the original text of a given source.2 It is suggested
here to make a distinction among several concepts of authenticity. Now
a source would be called authentic in the sense of authenticity 1 if the
time of its origin and the place to which it refers are known, because
only such a source can provide data about historical facts with their
time and space determinants, which are the fundamental characteristics
of those facts. In this sense, authenticity means the knowledge of the
time and the place of the origin of the source. In this interpretation,
every source whose time and place of origin are known to us is authen-
tic.3 The more extensive and reliable that knowledge is, the more
authentic the source. If a source which on the whole gives true informa-
tion (and if the establishing of the time and place of origin of this type
of sources usually involves no difficulties) informs, directly or indirectly,
about its own time and place of origin, then it may be classified as
authentic (in the sense of authenticity1) with a high degree of prob-
ability.
But, next to authenticity v we should - in order to comply with the
language behaviour of the historians - single out the concepts of authen-
ticity2 (pragmatic authenticity), authenticitY3 (authenticity proper), and
authenticitY4 (authenticity in the sense of the knowledge of sources).
While in the sense of authenticity 1 every source which is reliably assign-
434 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOC1Y OF JilSTORY
ed to its time and place of origin is authentic, this does not suffice in
the case of the remaining meanings of authenticity, since there may be
sources which have their dates and places of origin well indicated, and
yet are not authentic in another sense.
Authenticity 2 is restricted to the nature of information for which we
look in the source. In that sense, a source which is authentic for the
solution of a problem may be non-authentic for the solution of another
problem. Numerous spurious mediaeval documents (e.g., grants of land
and rights) are non-authentic for the study of the original state of
various properties and the cessions of lands and rights, because in these
spurious documents the real donations were extended so as to coverl
later acquests, not always legally obtained; they are, however, fully
authentic if we are concerned with the study of the expansion of the
estates held by the sponsors of such falsifications, or with the study of
socio-economic and other conditions prevailing at the time when the
document was drawn. In connection with authenticity 2 we have the
concept of the range of authenticity, that is, the sum of those questions
(problems) to which a given source can provide true answers.
AuthenticitYa (this is the sense which is usually adopted in textbooks
of historiography) refers to the issue of the possible spuriousness of
a given source, and authenticity 4 has been singled out because of the
problem whether a given source is primary or secondary. In connection
with authenticitY3 we have the concept of the degree of authenticity,
which in a way is the converse of the degree of spuriousness.
When it comes to authenticity3' three cases are possible: a given
source may prove fully authentic, partly authentic, or non-authentic.
A primary source is one which is an original document (i.e., drawn
by the person specified in the source); a secondary source is one which
is in some way dependent on the original (e.g., a copy, an excerpt, etc.).
In this interpretation, the original is (fully) authentic, while with respect
to those sources which are not original documents we may speak only
about a degree of authenticity.
3. The rules of the examination of authenticity (external criticism)
Each of the above concepts of authenticity, which have been singled

out in accordance with the procedures actually used by historians, gives
rise to research problems of its own. Age-old experience, stimulated by

the principle of scepticism, which dates back at least to L. Valla, has
helped historians to work out a large number of rules which are used in
more or less sophisticated reasonings. They are those non-formal rules
which, together with the rules of logic, make it possible to carry out
those reasonings which ultimately yield definite conclusions about the
authenticity of given sources. 4
The study of authenticitYl (authenticity in the general sense), which
in many cases means the study of the authenticity of a given source to
be published, is confined to the establishing of the date and the place
of its origin. The establishing of its authorship, which is usually treated
as an external criticism procedure, is not included since it is a separate
problem, to be linked above all with determining the informant's relia-
bility and, on the other hand, belongs to the procedure of establishing
historical facts. The establishing of authorship is not an indispensable
condition for the study of authenticity, even though it may be required
(similarly to an analysis of the content, and hence reliability of data).
No one would say that the Chronicle written by Gallus Anonymus (the
oldest Polish chronicle, written in Latin by a monk of presumably
French origin - Tr.) is not authentic (in the sense of authenticitYl) nor
doubt its authenticity (in the sense of authenticity3) although its author
is not known (in the sense of his proper name, and not a definite
description).5 Of course, it cannot be denied that the issue of author-
ship is closely connected with the study of authenticity. Sometimes the
finding out who the author was may answer the question about the
genuineness of a given source. The notorious manuscript from Hradec
Kralove must have lost the status of an authentic document (although
its authenticity was being questioned by Dobrovsky from the outset)
when Vaclav Hanka was identified as its author. Yet on the whole the
issue of authorship is a distinct one and goes beyond the issues of the
authenticity of sources far enough to be treated separately.
The date and the place of the origin of a document is established by
a direct or an indirect procedure, or else in part directly and in part in-
directly. The direct examination of the document consists of the follow-
ing two stages: (1) the reading of the direct information about the time
and place of origin as stated in the document itself; (2) the verification
of the statement thus obtained. The reading itself is a very simple issue,
436 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lDSTORY
unless the establishing of the date requires the use of intricate codes
(which are the subject matter of historical chronology), and the identi-
fication of a plaee name, that of special research procedures. Even
a direct reading requires verification, in which we use - as has been
rightly pointed out by M. Bloch - the same procedures which serve us
to establish the date or the place of origin in an indirect way.6 One of
the methods consists in making sure whether there is no contradiction
between the date and the place as preliminarily established and other
elements of the source in question. If such a contradiction is found
(e.g., between the date of the document and the type of the script or the
period of origin of the paper), this makes us question the veracity of
the document and thus indicates that the document is not authentic
(in the sense of authenticity 3)' In such a case it must be investigated by
an indirect procedure, which may consist in formulating and substantiat-
ing appropriate hypotheses. Another method of verifying hypotheses
about the date and the place of origin of a given source consists in
a comparison with other sources.
An indirect establishing of the date or place of origin of a souree is
based on probability-increasing inferenee (cf. Chap. XIX) with the use,
as premisses, of souree-based and non-source-based data and various
extra-logical rules. The souree-based and non-souree-based data in-
volved may be of various kinds, and their nature depends on the nature
of the souree. As far as non-souree-based data are coneerned, those
which we use to make comparisons with other sources are the most
valuable of all. The similarities or the differences which we find may,
as the case may be, refute or confirm a given hypothesis. Extra-logical
rules, which form directives formulated on the basi., of eertain general
relationships, confirmed in the age-old research practiee of historians,
include7 the following: (1) if a document is externally closely connected
with others (by being bound into a single codex), then its date may be
established by comparing it with the other documents in that codex, it
also being necessary to examine the history of the document itself, that
is, to find out how it came to be linked with the other documents;
(2) the external characteristics of a document reflect the state of civili-
zation of a given period and thus may serve as a base for a tentative
establishing of its date; (3) an analysis of the content of the document,
when combined with non-souree-based knowledge, makes it possible to
THE AUI'HENTICITY OF SOURCES AND THE ltELlABILITY OF INFORMANTS 437
establish its date or at least some terminal dates (post quem and ante
quem) between which the date of the documenf is to be located. The
same applies to the place of the origin of a document.
We often try to reconstruct the date of a document, or another
source, which had been lost but which we know for sure to have
existed. But in those cases we rather enter the sphere of establishing
historical facts. Yet the procedure is the same as in the case of the third
rule mentioned above.
An example is provided by a tentative establishing of the date of the
document of the granting of municipal rights (locatio civitatis) to Gniez-
no. The document was lost in a fire in 1512. The reasoning carried out
by the historian may be reconstructed thus:
(1) The document for the town of Powidz, dating from 1243, states
that the rights granted to that town are similar to the rights granted to
Gniezno. Hence we know that the date of the document applying to
Gniezno must have been earlier than 1243, which year is the terminus
ante quem (or the terminus post quem non).
(2) On February 26, 1235, Ladislaus, son of Odo, purchased from
the Gniezno Chapter a tract of land which was adjacent to the settle-
ment, and it is known that a similar transaction was a preliminary to
the locatio of Poznan, Hence we may adopt the year 1235 at the earliest
date, before which the date of the locatio is not to be looked for (the
terminus a quo).
(3) It is known that in 1234 to 1237 Ladislaus was building a stone-
and-brick settlement on the Lake Jelonek, which probably was related
to the said locatio civitatis. Hence the date of that locatio would be
between 1234/5 and 1243.
(4) On April 25, 1239, Ladislaus issued a document for the cloister
at Lubil!z in Gnieznensi civitate. The term civitas must have referred to
the recent locatio"since that term does not occur in earlier documents,
whether issued by Ladislaus himself or by other dukes of Greater Po-
land. Ladislaus died in 1239 and did not issue any other documents.
(5) Thus the limiting dates of the document of the locatio civitatis of
Gniezno would be 1238/ April 25, 1239 and 1243, but if we assume
that the location civitatis was granted by Ladislaus, then the year 1238
or early 1239 is the most likely date (in the light of the body of
knowledge we have).8
As can easily be seen, the historian's procedure consists in a gradual

restricting of the range of the unknown (in this case: the date of the
locatio civitatis of Gniezno), which brings him closer to a complete
answer, which he, however, could not obtain. The unknown has lost its
original indefiniteness to be confined within a specified interval. The
procedure in question corresponds to that used in seeking an answer to
a complementation question (in which year?). In his search for the an-
swer the historian resorted to appropriate data and thus obtained suc-
cessive partial answers (treated as what is termed potential confirma-
tions), which narrowed down the range of the unknown. He was, how-
ever, not in a position to give a complete answer.
A similar procedure is resorted to when we want to define the place
of origin of a document. Usually, the data contained in a given source
provide more or less valuable premisses for the final conclusion. The
most important data are the special mention made by the author of the
source regarding certain localities and regions, and the presence in that
source of data which are specific to some regions and places only. The
finding of such indications often becomes the point of departure for
further research.
When we study the date and the place of origin of a given source we
have to make a distinction between establishing the date of origin of
that source and the dates of the various items of information contained
in the source. Proper dating of data is of the greatest importance in
historical research. The study of the date of origin of a source, if not
a goal in itself (e.g., because of the historical importance of that source),
is subordinated to the principal goal which is to establish the dates of
the data provided by the source. We often have to do with sources
whose dates of origin cannot be established with satisfactory precision,
and which nevertheless are very valuable, because the data they contain
have sufficient spatio-temporal determinants. For instance, its editor
comments on Kronika Wielkopolska (The Chronicle of Greater Poland)
thus: "The time of its origin is debatable (...), its author or authors is
(are) unknown, the transmission of the text in manuscripts is partly
obscure. And yet nothing is in a position to replace that wealth of know-
ledge about mediaeval Poland".9
The study of (pragmatic) authenticity 2' that is, one restricted to the
issue under investigation, is rarely linked with the external criticism of
a given source. It is usually so that the historian uses an authentic

source (in the sense of authenticity1) to decide whether that source (or
a source-based information - in the case of indirect sources, but then
the concept of authenticity coincides with that of reliability) is authentic
for specified research requirements. In most cases, such a decision is
made as it were automatically: the historian knows from his experience
that a source of a specific type cannot be authentic as far as specified
questions are concerned. But sometimes, when engaged in external crit-
icism, the historian comes to certain conclusions which restrict the
range of the authenticity of that source and thus formulates an item of
information for other researchers. An example can be seen in G. La-
buda's findings on the authenticity of the sagas (e.g., Hervarasaga) as
sources for the study of the early political history of Poland. He came
to the conclusion that because of the difficulties encountered in the
chronological and territorial separation of the data contained in the
sagas their authenticity for the study of the question mentioned above
is problematic.10 On the other hand, those sagas are fully authentic for
the study of the various issues of mentality in the period in which they
were written.
A. Dopsch has proved that the well-known capitularies, ascribed to
Charlemagne, are ordinances for estate management, originate not from
Charlemagne but from his son Pepin, and apply not to the whole of his
state, specifically not to Germany, but to the royal estates in Aquita-
nia. l1 He has thus determined the authenticity of that source in the
sense of authenticity l ' and defined the range of its authenticity in the
sense of authf'.nticity 2' It has turned out that that source cannot be takeQ
as authentic for answers to specified questions (those pertaining to the
activity of Charlemagne, and those which go beyond the problems of
royal estates and the territory of Aquitania).
The study of authenticitY3' i.e., the establishing of the agreement be-
tween the data contained in a source (and referring to its external char-
acteristics other than content) and facts is, as has been said, the essence
of verification when we want to find out the date or the place of origin
of a direct source. The problem has provided us, in the history of his-
toriography, an immense number of interesting cases. If that what
a source "says" about itself agrees with facts, then we have to do with
a (genuine) authentic source. Any disagreement with facts can be due
only to an intentional action by a person who wanted to derive some

gain or advantage from such a disagreement. Two cases are possible:
(1) a source is non-authentic in part (forgeryl);
(2) a source is non-authentic as a whole, i.e., is fictitious (forgery2)'
Thus the study of authenticitY3 is to answer the question (once a
source has been found to be non-authentic) whether it is non-authen-
tic in part or as a whole, i.e., whether we have to do with forgeryl or
forgeryz'
Achievements in finding out forgeries of historical sources, achieve-
ments which gave rise to the birth and development of diplomatics, de-
pend on the degree of precision with which a source has been forged
and on the knowledge which a given historian has at his disposal. If
we disregard those forgeries which are easy to discover and thus do not
present any major problem to a researcher with an average training in
his field, we may say that, on the whole, forgeries}> which disturb the
harmony of a fairly uniform source by various modifications of the orig-
inal (omissions, alterations, interpolations), are easier to discover than
forgeries 2, which make completely fabricated, and hence uniform, wholes.
We know how long the forgeries by J. Macpherson (The Works of
Ossian) and by V. Hanka (especially the manuscript from Hradec Kra-
love) were believed to be authentic texts. The same applies to forged
letters of eminent personalities (e.g., those fabricated by the notorious
Vrein-Lucas and, to quote a recent case, the much debated letters al-
legedly written by F. Chopin to Delfina Potocka). Equally interesting
cases are provided by forgeries of non-written sources, the most cele-
brated being the mitre of Saitaphernes and the Piltdown skull; the for-
mer found its way to the Louvre, and the latter to the British Museum.
The mitre has turned out to have .been forged in the late 19th century,
and the skull, fabricated from ape bones.
The rules of discovering forgeries 2 form a vast body of specialized
knowledge; they might be classed into preliminary and basic ones. Pre-
liminary rules include that which recommends caution if a new source is
discovered unexpectedly and in obscure circumstances, and also if only
a copy is known and the original has not ever been seen by anyone. The
basic rules might be reduced to the following ones: 12 (1) the external
characteristics of the document should not be anachronic (which some-
times can be ascertained only by the use of most modern research
methods); (2) the content of the document (analysed from the point of
view of what it does and what it does not contain) should not be at
variance with what we know from undoubtedly authentic sources and
what we could expect in a source of the given kind. Special attention
in this connection should be paid to possible anachronisms in the con-
tent of the document.
When looking for partial forgeries we may face two situations: the
original exists, or it is missing. In the former case any alterations can be
found out by direct scrutiny and, additionally, be content analysis; in
the latter, only a detailed analysis of the content is left to us as a possi-
ble foundation for the conclusion as to the authenticity of the docu-
ment.
Large numbers of ever emerging forgeries has sharpened the critical
sense of the historians, but this often results in their being hypercritical.
This gives rise to apparent forgeries, that is, to authentic sources which
have been taken to be forgeries because of their exceptional nature.
The discovery of palaeolithic paintings of unexpected beauty made
some historians at first doubt their authenticity.13
Many rules have also developed in the study of the primary (and
secondary) nature of sources, i.e., authenticity4. It is not always easy to
say which copy of a given source is authentic in this sense, i.e., is the
original. If we find out that a given copy is the original, this is of con-
siderable ipIportance for the study of authenticity. But there may be
also originals, i.e., sources which are authentic in the sense of authen-
tiCitY4' which are not authentic in the sense of authenticitYa (copies
could have been made of the original which was a forgery).
If we can establish which copy is the original one, the problem is
resolved; if the original is not extant we have to establish the original
text (in the case of written sources) from extant secondary texts (copies,
excerpts, etc.); in the case of non-written sources we have to establish
what they originally were like. This is usually done by comparing ex-
tant copies. Examples of intricate procedures in that field are offered
by publications of sources. The general principle observed by historians
is to give priority to those copies which are chronologically closest to
the original.
4. The concept of reliability14
One of the first questions which comes to the fore is that about those
types of sources to which the concept of reliability (of information and
informants) is applicable. So far, the study of reliability has been re-
stricted to written sources, and in particular to those which were intend-
ed to convey information. This was due to the fact that all external and
internal criticism was concerned with written sources only, with a spe-
cial preference given to some types of such saurces.
While it is not correct to confine criticism to written sources and
accordingly almost to neglect, in text-books of the methodology of his-
torical research, analyses of non-written sources, certain restraint in
using the concept of reliability too broadly seems largely justified. Usu-
ally it is not said that the provisions in Hammurabi's Code are reliable
or unreliable, because a norm can be neither true nor false.15 But we
can investigate whether the norm with which we are concerned is au-
thentic in the sense of authenticity3' whether it can be linked with such
a place and such a period in the past which can be derived from the
analysis of the content and other characteristics of a given source.
Obviously, the use of the modifier "reliable" is also possible, in a sense,
with respect to data obtained from direct sources, if we mean the fact
that the source, and hence also the data it contains, is authentic, i.e.,
enables us to acquire knowledge of specified facts. In other words, they
are data which can "be trusted" when it comes to specified facts. In
this sense, reliable information would mean information extracted from
an authentic source. This applies to both direct and indirect sources.
with the proviso that in the case of the latter the study of their au-
thenticity does not suffice to safeguard knowledge about the reliability
of information.
References to the reliability of information, even though they are in
agreement with the language behaviour of historians, do not seem justi-
fied. since the concept of reliability should be restricted to the inform-
ant. and not to information. This is why it is correct to speak about
the reliability of informants. The concept of informant's reliability is
essential not only in historical research, but in all those cases also in
which relations of informants are used (e.g., questionnaire studies, ob-
servers' relations in various disciplines. etc.). If. following S. Nowak. we
THE AUTHENTICfIY OF SOURCES AND THE RELIABILITY OF INFORMANTS 443
order the links in the communication chain thus: facts; the content of
the informant's view of those facts; the formulation of the informant's
message; the content of the receiver's view of the facts, and if we,
respectlvely, term the conformity relations of the various links thus: the
cognitive relation (which refers to the degree of agreement between the
content of the informant's view of the facts and the facts themselves),
the expression relation (which refers to the degree of agreement between
the content of the informant's message and his view of the facts-), and
the communication relation (which refers to the degree of agreement
between the informant's message and what reaches the receiver),16 then
we may say that the informant's reliability is either the relation between
facts and his message, or the relation between the informant's view of
the facts and his message. In the former case we investigate the degree
of agreement between the message and the facts (the degree of the truth
of the message, which may be termed complete reliability) and in the
latter (the expression relation) we investigate the fact whether the in-
formant intentionally strove to convey true information (this may be
termed reliability proper or the informant's truthfulness). When we are
concerned with the degree of the truth of the message (complete relia-
bility) we may consider: the means at the informant's disposal of acquir-
ing the knowledge of facts (whether he was in a position to acquire
that knowledge); the intention by which he was guided (whether he
wanted to tell the truth); and, if possible, the frequency of the true and
false data obtained from the informant in a given field. When investi-
gating the informant's intention to convey the truth (reliability proper)
we are only concerned with the intention by which he was guided, so
as to find out whether in view of his intentions it would be rational on
his part to tell the truth. When speaking about the reliability of infor-
mation historians mean what we call here complete reliability; the con-
cept of the informant's reliability is often restricted to reliability proper.
J. Giedymin introduced two concepts of reliability in historical sci-
ence: reliabilitYt and reliabilitY2' ReliabilitYt is linked with the fre-
quency of the true and the false data obtained from a given informant
in a given field. In this case our opinion about reliability is based on
our assessment of the informant's messages from the point of view of
their truth. On the contrary. reliabilitY2 refers to the informant's in-
tentions and means. We pose ourselves the question whether he delib-
erately strove to convey the truth and whether he was in a position to

obtain true information; thus, unlike in the case of reliability!, we are
interested in the informant himself rather than in his messages. It is
obvious that both concepts of reliability are closely linked with one
anotherP The informant conveys true information only if he can arrive
at the truth and wants to convey it.
On the whole, the concepts of complete reliability and reliability
proper (suggested by the present writer) and reliability! and reliabilityz
(suggested by J. Giedymin) cover different interpretations of the concept
of informant's reliability in historical research (and in many other dis-
ciplines as well).
5. The study of reliability (internal criticism)
It follows from what has been said about the study of the authenticity
of sources that contrasting external criticism with internal criticism may
be a matter of convention only. It is well known that very often in
order to establish the authenticity of a source we have to penetrate
deeply into the content of the data it conveys, and in such a case the
issue of authenticity is intertwined with that of reliability. To establish
an informant's reliability we also must have an adequate knowledge of
a given source, which is then treated as an information channel. Should
even the data seem true, we do not take them into account in our re-
search if it turns out that the source from which they have been drawn
is non-authentic. To return to Vaclav Hanka's manuscripts, we know
how extensively they were used by historians as sources of information
about the social system in 9th century Bohemia. The data were taken
to be true as long as historians were convinced about the authenticity
of the manuscripts.
The study of the authenticity of a given source (which must cover all
kinds of authenticity, because the lack of authenticity in one sense does
not preclude its authenticity in another sense) as the preliminary step
in the examination of the informant's reliability applies to all categories
of sources, and hence to direct and indirect sources alike. In the case of
direct sources the procedure suffices as there is no problem of the in-
formant's reliability.
As has been mentioned, the issue is much more complicated when it
comes to indirect sources. Here the examination of the informant's re-

liability is split into: (1) the examination of the authenticity of the
source, (2) the examination of the informant's reliability in the proper
sense of the term. Since the first stage is covered by a separate proce-
dure, the focal issue of the internal criticism of a source (in the case of
indirect sources only) is that of the examination of the informant's re-
liability.
J. Giedymin was the first to take up the methodological analysis of
that problem.is In accordance with the distinction he made, we do, or
can, check the informant's reliability (1) by referring to our knowledge
of the truth or falsehood of his statements on a given issue, and (2) by
referring to our knowledge of the informant himself, i.e., our knowledge
of whether he wanted, or was in a position, to convey true information.
In the first case we decide to accept the informant as reliable if he
usually gives true information (in the relative sense of the word), i.e., if
the probability of obtaining true information from him is high, or at
least is much higher than 0,5. In practice, historians are cautious and
require a probability that comes close to 1. It suffices that false data (or
omissions) cannot be taken to be incidental for the researchers to hold
the informant's reliability in disrepute. Yet it must be borne in mind
that only an ideal informant could be fully reliable (he would have to
inform about all relevant facts and not to omit facts); but such an in-
formant can be accepted only as a sui generis model. i.'e.• the point of
departure on a scale for the assessment of reliable and unreliable in-
formants. In practice we have to do with real informants,19 whose data-
be it alone because of the lack of adequate means to arrive at the
truth - include, next to relatively true items, also distorted and false
ones.
In the second case the examination of the informant's reliability is
not based on an analysis of the truth of his statements, but on our
knowledge of that informant. Since an informant who is both willing
and in a position to convey true information is reliable if his reliability
is interpreted as the frequency with which he conveys true information,
hence our acquiring the knowledge of an informant means the exami-
nation of the probability (which may be interpreted in terms of fre-
quency) of his conveying true information. This means also that both
methods of examining an informant's reliability intertwine.20 In his-
446 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF ffiSfORY
torical research we usually examine the informant's reliability by both

methods, one method supporting the other. For instance, when exami-
ning the reliability of J. Dlugosz's chronicle - a process which went on
for decades - historians were simultaneously studying the historian's
personality and verifying the data he had conveyed. This resulted in a
specified opinion about his reliability, which in tum proved useful in
the further analysis of his information. When it turned out that Dlugosz
is relatively reliable, historians started accepting his information with
more confidence. As we can see, the examinati~n of the reliability of
information and that of the reliability of the informant intertwine
closely. When examining the reliability of given items of information
we refer such items to the knowledge we have derived from the source
in question and to our non-source-based knowledge, too.
The knowledge we must have about the informant to be able to de-
termine his reliability refers, in other words, to the informant's goals
which he wanted to attain by conveying specified information, and to
the means of acquiring and conveying information he had at his dispo-
sal. Such means may be interpreted potentially and effectively. For there
could be means which he could have used, but for some reasons did not
(e.g., because of his unwillingness to say more on a specified subject).
All those means of his can be reduced to technical ones (such as the
informant's access to certain documents, use of his own or other people's
observations, possession of precise measuring instruments, etc.), the in-
formant's general body of knowledge, and the informant's social (i.e.,
political, class, etc.) position and status. The informant's social position,
and especially his class status, largely determines his system of values
(even though his individual mental and emotional experiences may play
a considerable role), which in turn underlies the goals by which he is
guided in his information behaviour.21 Thus, the content of the informa-
tion he conveys depends on his broadly interpreted social position, gen-
eral knowledge, and the means he has used. These factors may increase
or reduce the value of his information. It is obvious that the class status
of a gentryman, owner of a village, must have prevented him from ade-
quately describing the status and the living conditions of his serfs. The
picture to be found in a complaint lodged by those serfs against their
lord would be quite different, though in this case, too, we should not be
uncritical as to its reliability.
In the case of those sources which are not intended to convey

information to the succeeding generations the examination of the in-
formant's reliability reveals certain distinct characteristics, which, how-
ever, do not differ much from the procedure used in the study of in-
direct sources as a whole. In this type of sources the identification of
the intended addressee(s) of the information is more important than in
the case of the remaining indirect sources. Here the range of the ad-
dressees is closed and more or less strictly defined, whereas in the case of
the data intended for the succeeding generations it is open and indefi-
nite, even though in each specified case the researcher also becomes
an(unintended) addressee. An extreme example of a source intended for
a closed circle of receivers is a private letter addressed to a single per-
son. Obviously, an impossibility to identify the addressee would make
the examination of the reliability of the data contained in such a letter
more difficult." It is common knowledge, too, that also in the case of
those sources which seem almost typical in being intended for the suc-
ceeding generations there were specified addressees contemporary with
the author of the source. Sometimes the consideration of those special
addressees prevails, and in such a case a given source is rather to be
classed among those which are not intended to convey information to
the succeeding generations. An example is offered by Vita Caroli Magni,
written by Einhard who had mainly Charlemagne himself in view.
The knowledge of the intended receivers facilitates the comprehension
of the goals which guided the informant in conveying such and not
other items of information. The knowledge of the intended receivers is
of extreme importance for the historian also because of the fact that
very many sources were intended to convey information to contempora-
ries, and not to posterity. In such cases the historian is an unintended
receiver of the information in question. At any rate, he knows that the
data contained in a given source were not intended for him and is,
therefore, in a better position to establish the degree of reliability of
such data by making use jointly of his knowledge of the informant and
his knowledge of the addressees (that latter knowledge serving here the
purpose of analysing the informant's goals and intentions). Such an
analysis is a typical procedure in historical research. A historian has to
resort to it whenever he examines the trustworthiness of press informa-
tion, evidence given to policemen (and police reports, too), descriptions
448 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HlSI'ORY
of real estates, and tax returns. Once we have found out who had been
the intended readers of a given newspaper we immediately obtain
a much better knowledge of the information it carried. Certain sche-
mata of assessment of receivers of information have developed by now.
Thus, for instance, historians realize that the data intended for fiscal
authorities and to be used by the latter as a basis for taxation, etc., are
distorted in a specified way; that the press is intended by the informants
not only to spread information to specified receivers, but also to per-
form many other tasks which depend on the type of those receivers;
that the owner of a real estate who wants to sell it or to find a tenant
tries to describe it as favourably as possible, etc.
The problem of the informant himself also reveals certain peculiari-
ties when it comes to the reliability of the sources which convey in-
formation to their contemporaries.22 While in the case of the sources
intended to convey information to posterity identification of the in-
formant is of greatest importance (as we want to know from whom
given items of information have come to us), in the case of the sources
intended for their contemporaries we usually rest satisfied with identi-
fication of the class of informants to which a given informant belongs,
even though we often come to establish more detailed data connected
with that informant. If we are to assess the reliability of the data con-
veyed by a certain newspaper we must, above all, know who (i.e., which
political party, social group, etc.) was sponsoring its publication; in-
formation about the editor is of lesser importance. Likewise, if we
have to do with data about a feudal village we want first to know
whether the informants were the peasants or their lords. Of cource, in
the case of sources intended to convey information to posterity we also
must know how to identify the informant with a given social group, but
in such cases we usually do not stop at that, and look for more detailed
data about the informant himself. Sometimes the identification of the
author turns into a thrilling task in itself, which, as we have said, be-
comes independent of source criticism in the strict sense of the term and
may be classed as a procedure of establishing historical facts.
We also have to emphasize that the examination of the reliability of
informants who are authors of non-written indirect sources does not
reveal methodological differences as compared with the examination of
written sources. The only difference is that of codes. Cartographic,
iconographic and other sources (including such material objects as

small-scale models of buildings, newsreels, etc.), if not treated as rem-
nants, i.e., direct sources, also may sometimes be analysed in terms of
the informant's reliability (i.e., if they include data intended to serve as
information about the past). We then pose ourselves the question wheth-
er the informant wanted or was in a position to convey reliable infor-
mation; we also ask ourselves for whom his information was intended.
Historical researches provide many examples of such analyses.
Among well-known non-written sources of intended information we may
mention one of the most fascinating mediaeval works of art, the Bayeux
tapestry, which consist of several dozen panels illustrating the history of
William the Conqueror. It is self-evident that with respect to such sour-
ces we apply all the rules of examining the informant's reliability, in-
cluding the examination of authenticity,23 which are used with respect
to written sources. Hence we try to find out the intentions by which the
informant was guided and the means he had at his disposal. Here is an
e~ample of an analysis of the reliability of the well-known drawing of
of a plough (included in Kolo Rycerskie (The Knights' Circle) by Bar-
tosz Paprocki), in which the wheels are located behind the working parts
of the plough, which is at variance with what we know about that im-
plement. When analysing the problem of the reliability of that informa-
tion we try to find some data about the informant so that we can decide
whether to modify our knowledge of the old plough or to dismiss the
information conveyed by the drawing. This is what a student of old
Polish folk drawings says on the issue: "The ploughing scene, included
in Paprocki's Kolo Rycerskie (c. 1575), must have been drawn by
a town-dweller, who had never ploughed himself and who had not been
interested in ploughing at all. For he forgot to draw the beam and the
share, that is, the most important parts of the plough, and misplaced
the tail and the coulter. Such mistakes could not have been made by
any peasant boy".24
6. Problems of authorship of sources
Authorship studies belong both to (external and internal) source criti-

cism and to "ordinary" establishing of historical facts. In source criti-
cism, the historian is interested in the author mainly because of the ex-
amination of the reliability of information. Data about the author are

thereby data about the informant. The author may convey informa-
tion about facts he had observed himself or else report observations
made by others. In the latter case there is a separate issue of examin-
ing the specified sources of the author's knowledge (transmission and
sources of information he had), such an examination being part of the
analysis of the reliability of information.
As the issues of data about the informant have been raised earlier,
and the procedure of establishing facts will be discussed in the next
chapter, we shall confine ourselves here to certain issues connected with
the concept of authorship (of a given source). The concept may be in-
terpreted in various ways. We may define the author as the creator of
written sources only, or as any person who intentionally conveys in-
formation, or as any creator of any indirect and direct sources. This is
a matter of convention. We may also speak about the nominal and
the real author, which implies the necessity of finding out whether these
two concepts coincide in a given case. From another point of view, we
may interpret the concept of author as a description of a certain person
and as a proper name. To assess an informant's reliability we find it
more important to have well-founded data about him than to know his
proper name, even though the knowledge of his proper name may add
to the data concerning his background, etc. Hence, when we examine
the authorship of sources we have to distinguish two procedures:
(1) the construction of a description of the author,
(2) the establishing of the author's proper name.
If the author's proper name is specified in the source or if there is no
difficulty in establishing it, that is, if there is no need to engage in spe-
cial research with that end in view, then the examination (once the au-
thor's name is verified) is confined to the construction of the author's
description (the term description being used here in its logical sense-
Tr.). Such is the case of Dlugosz's chronicle, where to the proper name,
which we know, we add a number of characteristics which marked the
author. We have to do that because a proper name as such does not
have any connotation (as was already pointed out by J. S. Mill), i.e.,
does not imply any characteristic that may be an attribute of an in-
dividuaI.25 As A. J. Ayer says, indication is the only function of proper
names. 26 In historical research, as we have mentioned earlier, our
ignorance of the author's proper name need not affect essentially the
informative value of a given source. This is why, if the author's proper
name is not known, the procedure of examining the authorship begins
with the construction of a description that would ascribe to the anony-
mous author certain specified characteristics. It is only at the next stage
that we try to establish the author's proper name. Research in those
matters is usually confined. to more important authors, and hence
authorship studies have been classed here, at least in part, as a proce-
dure of establishing historical facts. The endeavours to establish the
home country of Gallus Anonymus (see above - Tr.), which so far
have resulted in various hypotheses, belong to the procedure of con-
structing the author's description.
There are many special methods of establishing an author's proper
name. This applies also to pseudonyms and cryptonyms, as in those
cases when the author's (real) proper name is not known. In most
general terms, the procedure of establishing an author's proper name
can be split into the following operations:
(1) drawing a list of the traits characteristic of the author's person,
which implies adopting assumptions that restrict the range of the un-
known!7 (the search for the proper name);
(2) comparing that set of characteristic traits with descriptions of
authors whose proper names are known, which may result in formu-
lating a hypothesis as to the author's identity, that is, in identifying
the author in question with an otherwise known person, in most cases a
specified author;
(3) verifying the hypothesis through a closer comparison of both per-
sons and their works.
Note that when we examine the reliability of information then data
about the author are more important than his proper name, and when
we want to identify the author, then we use his work to a large extent
in order to find in it the greatest possible number of his characteristic
traits. Textual analyses, especially in the case of literary texts (such as
frequency analyses), which are important· for historical research, too,
have recently made enormous advances. But if the list of the charac-
teristic traits of the author and his work cannot be compared with
anything (as is the case of the above-mentioned chronicle of Gallus
Anonymus), then the endeavours of establishing the author's proper
name are usually a hopeless task, unless a new important discovery

happens to be made.2B
REFERENCES
1 Reading is interpreted here very broadly, so as to cover extracting infonna-
tion from non-written material sources (e.g., traces of an old building).
2 S. Koscialkowski (cf. Historyka, ed. cit_, p. 79) restricts the study of the
authenticity of sources to establishing whether a given source "conveys the text
in its original, unchanged and uncontaminated content, fonn, and wording, given
to it by its true author". M. Handelsman distinguishes - next to the study of the
time and place of origin and the authorship of a given source - the criticism of
the nature of a source (whether a given document is genuine or not, pp. 45 ff)
and what he calls the analysis of the sources (pp. 159 ff), intended to sort out
original, secondary, dependent, etc., sources. We find the same in Bernheim
(pp. 324-446). Langlois and Seignobos single out, within external criticism,
critique de restitution (pp. 51 ff) and critique de provenance (pp. 66 ff). The
fonner means establishing the proper text (e.g., by the comparison of several
copies), and the latter, finding out the origin of a given source. Valuable data
on external and internal criticism are to be found in Studia Zrodloznawcze.
8 We might also say that, regardless of our knowledge of their time and
place of origin, all sources are authentic. This would be a still more general,
unrestricted, concept of authenticity, but useless in our considerations.
4 On extra-logical rules see J. Giedymin, Problemy logiczne, ed cit., p. 2.
5 Cf. A. J. Ayer, "Imiona wlasne a deskrypcje" (Proper Names Versus De-
scriptions), quoted after the Polish-language text in Studia Filozoficzne, No. 5/
/1960, pp. 136-56.
6 M. Bloch, Apologie pour l'histoire, ed. cit., pp. 115-116.
7 Cf. M. Handelsman, Historyka, ed. cit., pp. 135 ff; E. Bernheim, Lehrbuch
der historischen Methode, ed. cit., pp. 391 ff. On the place of origin see Ch.
Higouet, "La Geohistoire" in: L'histoire et ses methodes, ed. cit., pp. 68-89.
B This example is drawn from Dzieje Gniezna (A History of Gniezno), War-
szawa 1965, section written by H. Chlopocka, pp. 133-5.
9 Kronika wielkopolska (The Greater Poland Chronicle), B. Kiirbis (ed.),
Warszawa 1%5, p. 16.
10 Cf. G. Labuda, trodla, sagi i legendy do najdawniejszych dziejow Polski
(Sources, Sagas and Legends Relating to the Earliest History of Poland), War-
szawa 1%0, pp. 9, 111.
11 Cf. A. Dopsch, Die Wirtschaftsentwicklung der Karolingerzeit vornehmlich
in Deutschland, vol. I, 1912, vol. II, 1913.
12 Quoted after M. Handelsman, op. cit., pp. 148 ff.
13 The example given by M. Bloch, Apologie pour l'histoire, ed. cit., p. 149_
14 The concept of reliability has been extensively treated by J. Giedymin in
numerous papers. The summing up is to be found in Problemy, zaloienia, roz-
strzygniccia (problems, Assumptions, Decisions), ed. cit., pp. 105 if. His numer-
ous suggestions and solutions are used in the present book; they are generalized
so as to cover all sources, and not only those which were intended to convey
information.
15 Cf. G. H. von Wright, "The Foundation of Norms and Normative State-
ments" in The Foundation of Statements and Decisions, ed. cit., pp. 351...67. See
also J. Topolski and J. Wisniewski, Introduction to Lustracje WojewOdztwa Pod-
laskiego, 1570 i 1576 (Inspections in Podlasie Province, 1570 and 1576), Wro-
cl:aw-Warszawa 1959, p. xxxi.
18 S. Nowak, Studia z metodologii nauk spolecznych (Studies in the Method-
ology of the Social Sciences), Warszawa 1965.
17 J. Giedymin, op. cit., pp. 106-9.
18 Ibid., pp. 105 ff.
19 C. BobiDska failed to grasp these distinctions when she criticized J. Gie-
dymin for his supposed failure to notice the fact that all written sources are
tendentious. He did notice it, but all that applies to the concept of real infor-
mant. (See C. Bobiilska, Historyk. Fakt. Metoda (The Historian, the Fact, the
Method), ed. cit., pp. 69-70).
110 The fact was also noted by J. Giedymin, op. cit., p. 108.
21 The aspect of the problem is more extensively commented on by C. Bo-
biDska, op. cit., pp. 69 ff.
Ill! Of coure, contemporaneity must be interpreted conventionally. A set of
legal provisions contains information intended for the contemporaries as long as
it is not altered.
Il8 An interesting literature of the subject is available.
24 T. Seweryn, Staropolska grafjka ludowa (Old Polish Peasant Drawings),
Warszawa 1956, p. 13.
lI5 Cf. A. J. Ayer, op. cit., pp. 136 ff. Of statements about individuals see
T. CzeZowski, Filozofja na rozdrozu-Analizy metodologiczne (Philosophy at
Crossroads - Methodological Analyses), ed. cit., pp. 62 if.
28 A. J. Ayer, op. cit., pp. 155...6.
1!7 The terminology is that of J. Giedymin (op. cit., p. 78), who was alsq
concerned with authorship studies in his Z problem6w logiczonych analizy histo-
rycznej (Some Logical Issues of Historical Analyses), ed. cit., pp. 47 if. The
problem. will be discussed again in connection with mathematical (frequency)
analyses of texts.
1!8 The summing up of the latest achievements in textual criticism is to be
found in R. Marichal, "La critique des textes" in L'histoire et ses methodes,
pp. 247-366. See also H. C. Hockett, The Critical Method in Historical Re-
search and Writing, New York 1955. J. Friedrich, Geschichte der Schrift, Heidel-
berg 1965, may also prove valuable to a historian.
XIX. METHODS OF ESTABLISHING mSTORICAL FACTS
1. A general reconstruction of the procedure of establishing facts
The problems of establishing historical facts are treated as side issues

in the best known text-books of the historical method, despite the fact
that establishing facts is one of the basic operations carried out by his-
torians. Attention has traditionally been focused almost solely on source
criticism, and hence the presentation of the principles of that criticism
was followed immediately by descriptions of the methods of working
out the data (formulation of syntheses). Some attention was paid to the
process of establishing facts in those sections which are concerned with
source criticism, the establishing of facts being treated there as the con-
clusion of the work on the "interpretation" of sources (cf. M. Handels-
man), which was usually made to include what was termed comprehen-
sion of sources. Other comments on the issues now under consideration
were discussed in sections on syntheses, thus confusing problems of the
construction of historical descriptions with those of methods of estab-
lishing facts.
While making a distinction between the procedure of examining the
authenticity of a given source and the reliability of the information it
conveys, on the one hand, and the procedure of establishing facts, on
the other,! the present writer is fully aware of the close links between
these two stages in historian's work; those links, however, cannot be
used as an argument in favour of treating the two issues jointly. The
following "division of labour" between the stage of source criticism
and that of establishing facts is suggested. In accordance with earlier
conclusions, the decoding of source-based data is, on the one hand, ex-
cluded from the two stages mentioned above since it is a preliminary
operation, even though the historian's work on the correct understand-
ing of his source-based data continues throughout his research; on the
other hand, just for the reason stated above, decoding is included in
both the stage of source criticism and that of establishing facts. These
many-sided manifestations of the problem of decoding of the sources
METHODS OF ESTABLISmNG mSTORICAL FACTS 455
(which, for historians in the strict sense of the term, are mostly written
sources) are to be found in the immense importance of the philological
method in historical research, the last-named method being sometimes
even identified with the historical method as such. The schema of re-
search procedures is shown in the table below:
J
A. Decoding of source-based data (stage 1)
--
B. Source criticism:
(1) examination of authenticity
(2) decoding (stage 2)
(3) examination of reliability
--
c. Establishing of facts
(1) decoding (stage 3)
(2) establishing of spatio-temporal determinants of facts
(3) construction of statements about facts
I (4) verification
In most general terms it may be said that the stage of establishing

facts is intended to change source-based data, qualified as authentic and
reliable, into statements about facts. This yields what is termed historio-
graphical facts (cf. Chap. X), which are scientific constructions made
by the historian, constructions through which he acquires knowledge of
the past. As has been mentioned on many occasions, non-souree-based
knowledge is indispensable for the decoding of source-based data; it is
likewise necessary for the conversion of source-based data into state-
ments about facts. The historian must know how to formulate a factual
statement on the strength of the various source-based data, on the one
hand, and his non-source-based knowledge, on the other. His work is
thus, in a sense, structural, and this partly explains why experts on the
historical method included the establishing of facts in the procedure of
working out synthetic formulations.
The said conversion of source-based data into factual statements is
often very simple. This is so when we have to do with so-called simple
facts, which are extracted from the sources that refer to them directly.
Yet even in those simplest cases it is usually necessary to reformulate
what is said in the sources; this procedure coincides with the decoding
of a source on the strength of non-source-based knowledge (stage 3 of
decoding). For instance a brief entry in the register of births is refor-
mulated into the statement: "x was born in the year t". All this be-
comes more complicated when it comes to compound facts, and even
those simple facts concerning which there is no direct information in
the sources. But this encroaches upon the field of synthetic formulations
and historical narration, that is, the process of formulating answers to
research problems, which requires a separate treatment (see Chaps. XXII
and XXIII).
We shall be concerned only with the first stage of the conversion of
data into factual statements, namely that stage in which we strive for
the formulation of those statements as it were in a "pure" form. We
shall not be interested in the procedure of giving such statements their
final form, which usually takes place through combining statements
about simple facts into more comprehensive constructions (e.g., state-
ments about compound facts) and through appropriate stylistic opera-
tions. It is obvious that in practice we cannot separate these two· stages
from one another. Statements are given their intended shape usually
already at the time they are being formulated. This is, to some extent,
a manifestation of the historian's personality.
2. Induction and deducation in research
The general opinion of the historians has it that facts are established
either by induction or by deduction. These concepts take us along into
the sphere of fairly intricate problems, since few issues in the history
of the philosophy of science and logic have been subject to such vigor-
ous controversies, with ensuing widely differing solutions, as the prob-
lem of deduction and induction has been. Apart from the classical
standpoints of Descartes and Bacon, let us mention J. S. Mill and his
implacable opponent W. S. Jevons, the great advocates of induction:
H. Reichenbach and R. Carnap, and the advocate of deduction K. Pop-
per, and the continuing discussion between the inductionists and the
deductionists (cf. Chap. VIII). These discussions, however, have resulted
in more precise formulations of the concept of induction and deduction
and of the relationship between the two.
The traditional interpretation of deduction "as reasoning from uni-
versals to particulars, and induction as the exact reverse" has been
made more precise by the emphasis on their logical and methodological
METHODS OF ESTABLISlflNG lflSTORICAL FACTS 457
status.2 Attention has also been drawn to the necessity of distinguishing

between a narrower and a broader interpretation of induction and de-
duction. In the narrower sense, they are certain kinds of inference, and
in the broader one, they are analogues of research methods which are
marked by the use of inductive or deductive inference (in order to
establish simple and compound facts and to substantiate statements
about them).
No uniform view on the mutual relationship between deduction and
induction has been reached. It has been agreed, at any rate, upon the
fact that, generally, induction is not antipodal to deduction. The wor-
ship of induction (interpreted as a scientific method), which had pre-
vailed since the positivist period, has been undermined; the immense
role of deductive procedures in scientific (and not only scientific) cog-
nition has been stressed, for which the credit goes mainly to Jevons. 3
The place of inductive inference in the system of types of inference is
being defined in various ways: from the total denial to induction of the
status of inference to the acceptance of induction as a type of reductive
inference, with the resulting conclusion that deduction (or weakened
deduction) and reduction (or weakened reduction) are the only types of
inference, to the interpretation of all non-deductive types of inference
as inductive (as has been suggested by Carnap).'
Yet, as follows from some disputes, not everything is yet clear. Apart
from the issues of classification, which require further studies, it must
be emphasized that the acceptance of deduction as the principal type
of inference in science need not have anything to do with the a priori
approach, that is, with the separation of cognition from objective facts.
This is so because a distinction must be made (which has not always
been fully realized by researchers) between the way of acquiring know-
ledge of facts and the method of constructing a system of science. In all
empirical disciplines, which include history, knowledge of facts is ob-
tained by (direct or indirect) observation. This procedure is sometimes
identified with the inductive procedure, which is the Source of misun-
derstandings, for we have here to do with the misleading use of the
terms induction or inductive instead of such terms as empirical studies,
experience, empirical, observational, etc. The controversy between the
deductionists and the inductionists consists mainly in the fact that the
former emphasize the importance of theoretical statements, that is, such
which go beyond observational data, while the latter at the most suggest
cautious generalizations of observational statements.
Thus the opinion that induction is the fundamental method of ac-
quiring knowledge of facts turns out to be true only if we identify in-
duction with observation. But even the statement that inductive infer-
ences is the main way of acquiring knowledge of facts does not seem
acceptable.
There are several important steps in scientific procedure (e.g., the
substantiation of hypotheses, cf. Chap. XIV), in which we make use of
deductive inference. 6 We could go even further and say that all kinds of
inductive inference require some knowledge of facts to be used as pre-
misses. In this sense all types of inductive inference (induction by enu-
meration and induction by elimination) can be presented in a deductive
form.7
What classification of types of inference could be suggested for the
needs of a methodological analysis in historical research (and in other
empirical sciences as well) if the opposition of inductive inference to
deductive one is problematic? It seems that the classification which is
the most useful for that purpose is that into reliable and non-reliable
types of inference.8 It is of extreme importance to realize when a true
conclusion may be expected if the premisses are true, and when the
truth of the conclusion is not guaranteed. Now, if the premisses are true,
,then the reliable types of inference ensure the truth of the conclusion,
whereas the non-reliable ones do not. It may be said generally that re-
liable inference is such in which the conclusion follows logically from
the premisses, so that if the premisses are true, then the conclusion must
be true, too. In the case of non-reliable inference the truth of the pre-
misses does not guarantee the truth of the conclusion.
The reliable types of inference include deduction with its variation
which is complete induction, since in the latter true premisses yield
a true conclusion. It is obvious that the reliable types of inference be-
come in a sense "non-reliable" if the premiss(es) which we held to be
true turn{s) out to be false. This, however, is an issue of the material
value of the premisses.
The non-reliable types of inference include induction by enumeration,
reductive inference,9 weakened types of inference (weakened deduction
and reduction),to and all statistical inference (cf. Chap. XX). All these
METHODS OF ESTABLISHING HISTORICAL FACTS 459
types of inference, which are the forms of inferential procedures at all

times resorted to by historians, are the subject matter of lively discus-
sions by experts. The present writer is unwilling to join such discussions
in view of the lack of sufficient competence. All these types are, how-
ever, usually held to be non-reliable. The truth of the conclusion in this
case. depends equally on the truth of the premisses and on the know-
ledge of related facts, which affects the choice of the premisses, since
the truth of the premisses alone is not sufficient.
It is worth-while noting that inference by analogy is a special case of
induction by enumeration, but while in the case of induction by enu-
meration the conclusion is in the form: Every 8! is P (cf. footnote 5), in
the case of inference by analogy we mean that the next element of the
set 8 will be P (will have the property P), and hence the conclusion is
in the form: 8"+1 is P. The schema of this type of inference is as follows:
81 is P
82 is P
83 is P
8.. is P
hence 8"+1 is P.
Inference by analogy plays a fundamental role when a historian ap-
plies the comparative method.l l In research, we use various types of in-
ference; the choice depends on the kind of questions and the data we
have available to answer those questions, and also on the nature of the
research procedure used in a given case. Science is being advanced both
by methods based on reliable types of inference, and those based on
non-reliable ones. The heuristic value of non-reliable types of inference
must, however, be emphasized.12
Conclusions drawn from cases of non-reliable inference are in the
nature of hypotheses (both heuristic and those which are fairly well sub-
stantiated - cf. Chap. XIV). The opinion on the role of the non-reliable
types of inference (those which increase the probability of certain con-
clusions) in science is not uniform. Some researchers do not shun risk
and are willing to go beyond observational data (historians are in such
cases said "to go beyond the sources"), whereas others are for various
reasons (which may include the lack of adequate non-source-based
knowlege) unwilling to move away from observational data (the

sources). This means that some are not afraid of formulating bold
hypotheses, whereas others feel safe when they do not go beyond the
limits of descriptions based on observational data.
3. Induction and deduction in historical research
The classificaton of types of inference into reliable and non-reliable

ones refers to concepts which are so alien to the linguistic usage of his-
torians who are convinced that induction is reliable and deduction is
not, that this discrepancy of opinions must be discussed.
When listing several dozen cases in which, in various historical works,
the terms induction, deduction, inductive, deductive, inductive method,
deductive method have been used we come to the conc1usion that in
those cases we can single out at least two shades of meaning:
(1) Deduction consists in passing from "the universal" to "the partic-
ular", while induction consists in the reverse procedure (which means
the traditional interpretation of these terms). In other words, deduction
means drawing conc1usions from certain general truths (Le., non-source-
based knowledge), while induction means restricting oneself to sources
and formulating statements based on them.
(2) Induction is something laudable, while deduction (or the deductive
method) implies dubious speculations which a historian ought to avoid.
In the former case the point is to distinguish between two specified
research procedures, and in the latter, to assess them. Obviously, not all
deduction has been appraised critically: criticism was levelled above all
at those cases of deduction which H. LowmiaIiski calls "deduction
which is not controlled by reference to source data".13 The comments
made above are not any explanation of induction and deduction in his-
torical research, but merely form a general report on the standpoint of
historians themselves.
It seems, however, that we can give the following explanation of
what in historical research is said to be deduction (or the deductive
method) and induction (or the inductive method). Thus what is called
the deductive method in historical research (1) is used in establishing
those facts to which sources do not refer directly, i.e., those which can-
not be established just on the strength of decoding the appropriate
source information; (2) resorts to non-reliable types of inference in

establishing facts. On the other hand. what is called the inductive
method in historical research is used in establishing facts if these are
directly referred to by the sources and resorts to both reliable and
non-reliable types of inference.
In this connection it does seem justified to abandon, in historical re-
search, the use of the terms "the inductive method" and "the deductive
method" of establishing facts and to keep these terms' for the appro-
priate types of inference only. It is also suggested that these terms be
replaced as follows: "the deductive method" by "the indirect method"
(or "the method of indirect establishing of facts"), and "the inductive
method" by "the direct method" (or "the method of direct establishing
of facts").u The latter method yields conclusions which are (relatively)
certain, whereas the former yields conclusions which are probable.
4. The direct and the indirect method of establishing facts
If we establish a fact on the strength of source information which

directly refers to that fact (Le.• if we have to do with a fact confirmed
by sources). then the procedure is relatively simple. The formulation of
a hypothesis and its substantiation and verification merge into a single
process: the decoding of information amounts to the formulation of
a hypothesis. which is verified by referring to the authenticity of the
source and the reliability of the information in question. and also to
our non-source-based knowledge. In doing all this we also resort to
deductive inference. which has been reconstructed in connection with
the verification of hypotheses (cf. Chap. XIV). In this type of inference
we make use of the law which sums up the historians' experience and
which states that if a source is authentic and if the relevant items of
information are reliable. then the facts to which these data refer did
take place. or are very likely to have taken place.
In the case of a direct establishing of facts the rules of verification are
often more stringent: they require that the researcher find other (or at
least one) items of direct information which refer to the same fact and
such that each item comes from a different and reliable source, all such
sources being independent of one another. i5 Some text-books of historio-
graphy, written by people who viewed historical research from the stand-
462 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSIORY
point of a historian of the Middle Ages, claimed that a fact cannot be

held as established unless it is confirmed by another, independent
source.IS Should this confirmation rule be taken literally. we would have
to reject most conclusions about facts to be found in historical studies.
On the whole. a historian cannot afford the luxury of comparing two or
more sets of sources for one and the same problem, as he would have
to abandon the study of many issues. This is why this rule must be in-
terpreted as an auxiliary one as compared with the general confirma-
tion rule which states that source-based data must be referred to our
information about the source in question and to our non-source-based
knowledge. A historian assumes a fact described in a single source to
be established if he considers such a procedure to be reasonable (ration-
al). Of course, he does so if he realizes that he has no reasons to doubt
that the source-based data about a fact had been determined by what
had really occurred.
J. Giedymin interprets the verification of hypotheses in terms of game
theory,t7 which reduces the principles of the methodology of sciences
to the general conditions of rational behaviour.
In some cases, however, confirmation by another, independent, source
is in fact necessary. We have to do with such cases if:
(1) the source from which we have drawn our data has a low degree
of reliability (this applies to all kinds of memoirs, be it alone for the
fallibility of human memory);IB
(2) the data inform about a fact which for some reasons is held to be
very significant;
(3) the fact which is being established is at variance or in contradic-
tion with that knowledge of the past which we have had so far.
This applies. for instance. to the issue of the Polish commander in
the Battle of Grunwald (which has been referred to earlier in this book).
It is true that Dlugosz states that it was Zyndram of Maszkowice who
was in command, but for reasons described under (2) and (3) above we
do not rest satisfied with that only direct information, which results in
the necessity of establishing the fact under consideration in an indirect
way.
Describing past events on the basis of those sources which contain
direct information about those events is the procedure the most fre-
quently used by historians, and as such it does not deserve any special
attention. A fragment from a historical study, which is a result of

a direct establishing of facts, is given below by way of example:
"(...) Poznan obtained its first railway connection only in 1848. Eight
years later the first train went from Poznan to Wroclaw, in 1870, to
Gubin, and in 1871, to Bydgoszcz and Torun. In this way, within
23 years, Poznan obtained several very important railway connections".19
In this case the author of the study constructed his description of
events on the basis of direct source-based data. Of course, in many
cases the data about the facts we are interested in are in some way con-
cealed in the sources. This occurs, e.g., jf on the basis of genealogical
data about gentry families we establish the (average) number of persons
in the family or in one generation, the life-span of the various members
of such families, etc.
Procedure is much more difficult of we want to establish a fact con-
cerning which we do not have appropriate source-based data. In such
a case we must resort to methods of an indirect establishing of facts,
that is, establishing them be reference to more indirect data.20 The for-
mulation "more indirect data" requires explanation: now we mean
by this those source-based and non-source-based data which do not
speak about the fact itself, but are in some way its symptoms. Those
symptoms play the role of indicators which enable us, so to say, to
translate facts which are not observable in the sources into those which
are confirmed in some way, or into certain properties of such facts.
These indicators are used as premisses in non-reliable types of inference
used to establish facts.
Such indicators in the procedure of an indirect establishing of facts
vary in nature. We extract them from the sources we have or, very often.
from our non-source-based knowledge, whether scientific or current.
To follow the study of indicators in the social sciences by S. No-
wak,21 in historical research we have to do mainly with empirical indi-
cators, that is such that the indicatum, i.e., the indicated fact, and the
indicator are both observable. In the indirect establishing of facts in
historical research an empirical indicator refers to an observable fact,
but one which has not been observed in the sources we know. For in-
stance, traces of burnt wood are an empirical indicator of the otherwise
unknown fact of the destruction of the Biskupin settlement (a prehistor-
ical settlement in Greater Poland, dating from ca. 500 B.C. - Tr.). If
we infer from a known behaviour of a person no longer alive about his

mental experiences or activities which are not known to us, we make
use of an inferential indicator. For instance, if a group of soldiers
changes sides and joins the former enemy, this is such an indicator of
a "mental experience", which is not known to us directly (in this case,
is not recorded in the sources). Definitional indicators (which form the
third type of indicators as adopted by Nowak) are not connected with
an indirect establishing of facts, but are included in the procedure of
direct establishment of facts. In such a case, a definitional indicator
defines a non-observable fact or a non-observable characteristic of
a fact. For instance, when we infer about the popularity of a person on
the basis of what has been written about him, we do not establish any
indirect fact, but we simply define the concept of popularity by the
nature of the statements about the person in question."
At one time T. Wojciechowski wanted to find out the place of origin
of the earliest annals preserved in Poland and the time in which they
had reached Poland. The sources he had at his disposal lacked any
data which would provide a direct answer to that question. Yet follow-
ing a detailed analysis of the entries made in the annal which he ex-
amined he concluded that the last entries made in Germany dated from
A. D. 969 and 970. They referred to the succession in office of three
Mainz archbishops, Wilhelm, Otto, and Robert. "This is an indication",
he wrote, "that the place of origin of the annal is to be sought in the
province of Mainz".23
Out of over a dozen dioceses in that province traces of contacts with
Poland were preserved in two episcopal cathedrals (Brandenburg and
Halberstadt) and in two monasteries (Fulda and Korbea). Of these four
localities T. Wojciechowski believed Korbea to be the most likely as
the place of origin of the annal, because he found in it several Korbean
-entries. "Their number is, it is true, very small", he wrote, "but since
these records are to be rfound in the third, that is the last, part of the
annal, the only one in which the author's original work can be expected,
hence the most likely supposition is that the source from which he had
drawn his data, that is, the Korbean annal, must have been close to
him and at his hand".24 T. Wojciechowski also noted that one of the
two anachronous entries, namely that which refers to the finding of
St. Stephen's body, "seems to be Korbean, because it is known that
St. Stephen was the patron of the Korbean monastery, and the entry,
being anachronous, is much more important, as it is obviously an in-
tentional, that is, artificial, one".25
Other facts, too, pointed to contacts between Poland and the Kor-
bean monastery. For instance, the oldest Polish churches had Korbean
patrons, and it is known that missionaries used to give to churches the
name of their original church; further, Widukind, a Korbean monk, was
the author of the earliest data about Poland, and the formulation of his
report of Wichman's death points to the fact that that chronicler must
have had his information from the Polish side. "Thus of all the Mainz
province", Wojciechowski continued, "most circumstantial evidence
points to Korbean monks, it would not be too bold to conclude that Kor-
bea was probably that unidentified place from which missionaries came
to Poland with Christian teachings and with the first church books, which
have included a code with a paschal cycle and annal on its margins".26
When describing this procedure. A. Gieysztor wrote, following the usage
which is common in the historians' methodological refllection, that Woj-
ciechowski "tried to use here the deductive method".27
In Wojciechowski's reasoning the premisses vary in nature. They
were based on researcher's experience (if a source includes detailed data
specific to a given area, then it is likely to have originated there) and
on the general knowledge of the epoch (the missionaries who were
founding churches in newly converted territories named them after the
patron of their original church). These premisses are to be found the
most frequently. But premisses based on some psychological knowledge
of a given personality are quite common, too. For instance, J. Widaje-
wicz concluded, on the basis of the source data about the battles fought
by Mieszko (the first ruler of Poland - Tr.) in A.D. 963 and 967, that
he must have conquered the Odra estuary area. He wrote that "it would
just be inconceivable if after the great victory which the ruler of Poland
won in 967 the Odra estuary still remained outside the frontiers of his
state. Mieszko was not a man who would let others fool him; if he
knew so well how to cope with his situation at the moment of his
recent defeat, how could he have lost the opportunity offered him by
his brilliant victory and not to bring to heel the smashed Wolinians?
We should not assume a contingence which simply strikes us by being
so unlikely".28
Premisses drawn from current knowledge are common, too. We have

to do with them when, for instance, Kuczynski wants to demonstrate
that Zyndram of Maszkowice was not the Polish commander at the
Battle of Grunwald and states in this connection that a victorious com-
mander was usually rewarded (and Zyndram was not).
Here is a reconstruction of such cases of reasoning. Consider one of
Wojciechowski's reasonings:
(l) if an annal includes data about the local conditions in a province,
then that annal usually originates from that province;
(2) in the annal under consideration there are entries concerned with
the successive holding of the office by three Mainz archbishops. Wil-
helm, Otto, and Robert;
(3) the annal originates from the Mainz Province (conclusion).
The above is a case of non-reliable inference (weakened deduction),
which makes the conclusion probable; it might be generalized thus:
(1) if p, then usually q,
(2) p,
(3) hence (probably) q.
This is a case of weakened deduction of the modus ponendo ponens
type. Its non-reliability is obvious, since the premisses may be true, and
the conclusion nevertheless false. For all the manifest non-reliability of
this type of inference historical studies often describe the conclusions
arrived at by such inference as very "certain", which is often inversely
proportional to the degree of their substantiation.
Some types of indirect inference make use of premisses of specified
kind. Their dominant role in such types of inference resulted in the for-
mation of special methods of an indirect establishment of facts. The list
of such methods is open, but its most important items are the philolog-
ical, the geographical, the genealogical, the comparative, and the retro-
gressive method. They will be briefly discussed one by one. A separate
mention is due to the inference from the silence of the sources (argu-
mentum ex silentio). The indirect establishing of facts which take place
on a mass scale (statistical estimates) will be the subject matter of a spe-
cial chapter. Note also that historians very often combine several meth-
ods. or at least combine the direct and the indirect method.
5. The philological (lexical) method
The term philological (or, better, lexical) method is used in at least two
meanings: first, as a method of decoding and interpreting the language
of written sources,29 and, secondly, as a variation of the method of an
indirect establishment of facts. Here we are interested in the latter
meaning. In this sense the philological method, which we prefer to call
lexical, consists in establishing past events on the basis of linguistic data,
in particular those related to place names, which are analysed in the
light of general linguistic knowledge. In Poland, this method had one
of its pioneers in T. Wojciechowski, who in his study Chrobacja (1873)
tried to base his conclusions about early Slavonic settlements on the
data provided by place names.
And here is an example of a more sophisticated application of the
lexical method. K. Moszynski tried to answer the question, which terri-
tories were the origin of the Proto-Slavs and what was the range of the
Proto-Slavonic language c. A.D. 1.30 He came to the conclusion that ca.
500 B.C. the Proto-Slavs lived in the western region of the central
Dnieper basin, and started to move westward much later, to occupy the
Vistula and the Upper Dniester basin. He substantiated his conclusions
by referring to plant geography and palaeobotany, and especially the
data provided by those disciplines concerning the range of the various
tree species.
Moszynski disregarded the names of fruit trees, which he found to
penetrate easily from one language to another, and singled out in the
remaining names of trees the following three groups of terms:
(1) very old names, which have related analogues in other Indo-Eu-
ropean languages,
(2) names which were Slavonic innovations and which do not have
analogues in other Indo-European languages, and
(3) names which neither have related analogues in other Indo-Euro-
pean languages nor are Slavonic innovations, and are relatively late
loan-words.
A detailed linguistic analysis led him to the conclusion that the third
group includes seven names of trees, viz., buk, cis, jawor, modrzew, brze-
kinia, jodla, trZeSnia (the English equivalents are: beech, yew, sycamore,
larch, sorbus torminalis, fir, cherry-tree, but they are obviously irrelevant
THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllSTORY
in the discussion - Tr.). This third group is decisive for the problem under
consideration. K. MoszyIiski stated, in the light of the data provided by
plant geography and palaeobotany, that - unlike the trees which are in
group one and group two - the trees in group three did not grow in the
Central Dnieper and Niemen basins, but they did grow, and in much
larger numbers than they do today, in the Odra, Vistula, and Upper
Dniester basins. Since the names of the trees in group three did not
occur in Proto-Slavonic, the Slavs originally did not know them as
"they lived outside the area where they grow usually, or even sporadi-
cally (...). It seems excluded that the original range of Proto-Slavonic
should cover, several centuries before the Christian are, the Vistula and
Upper Dniester basins and should expand therefrom so as to cover the
Dnieper basin; it is most likely that the range of that language was to
the east of the Vistula and Upper Dniester basins" .31
Another example of the use of the philological method (in the sense
adopted in the present book) is offered by H. Lowmialiski's study of
the economic foundations of the formation of Slavonic states, where he
analyses, among other things, the Slavonic terms for months as the in-
dicators which demonstrate that the early Slavonic economy was based
on agriculture and cattle breeding.:J2
6. The geographical method
The geographical method is commonly used by historians. We can sin-

gle out at least two meanings of the term: (1) establishing facts or rela-
tionships among facts by referring to the distribution of those facts on
the map; (2) making use of geographical knowledge in establishing (and
explaining) facts. It is often said that a historian uses the geographical
method if he just pays more attention to the geographical factor, i.e.,
the effect of the geographical environment. In such cases we do not
mean the use of geographical knowledge for a better presentation of
results of research.
An example of the use of geographical method (1) is offered by a
study by W. Semkowicz, who tried to locate on the map those villages
in the region of Cracow in which many small gentry lived at the turn of
the 14th century. In this way he visualized the fact that those knights
were concentrated along the frontier, especially on the north-east, and
METHODS OF ESTABLISlllNG lllSTORICAL FACTS 469
near the fortified settlements. Semkowicz concluded that that was a re-
sult of an intentional settling of knights. "This location of many knights
along the frontier and near fortified settlements", he wrote, "makes it
certain beyond all doubt that we have to do with a planned settling for
military purposes".33
His reasoning could be reconstructed thus:
(1) if we see on the map a concentration of military settlements near
the frontier of a state or near other centres of defence, then we may
assume that that was probably a result of a planned action undertaken
by state authorities;
(2) the location of the small gentry in the region of Cracow at the
turn of the 14th century reveals such characteristics;
(3) we probably have to do with a planned settling of knights for
military purposes.
We could in a similar manner reconstruct the reasoning of M. Bis-
kup, who based himself on the territorial distribution of the estates of
exporters of grain to formulate cOIl£lusions about the territories, from
which the grain was exported,84 and all other similar cases of establish-
ment of facts.
Geographical method (2) is used by historians who from their know-
ledge of the soil or climatic conditions prevailing in a region conclude
about the crops which were most likely to have been grown there, or
conclude about the nature of the local economy or the relative chrono-
logy of settlements from the geographical characteristics of a given area.
The geographical method is indirectly related to much disputed issues
of the relationship between history and geography, which will be raised
again in Part Five.
7. The genealogical method

The genealogical method, whose singling out as a distinct research pro-
cedure raises many doubts, is used when we avail ourselves of our
genealogical knowledge in order to establish a fact about which the
sources do not inform us. Yet, in most cases, this applies to situations
in which we as it were extract information from a source in which it is
somehow concealed, and not to those in which data about a given fact
are lacking entirely. For instance, when W. Dworzaczek posed the ques-
tion, who the Polish hetmans (military commanders - Tr.) in the 16th
and 17th centuries were,3S he did not find direct source-based data on
the subject. But the lack of data is merely apparent, and not real, as
we have direct genealogical data on the various hetmans, which are to
be used for the purpose. The problem in this case consisted in refor-
mulating the question: who were the Polish hetmans in the 16th and
.17th centuries? into: who was Hetman A, Hetman B, Hetman C, etc.?
and to arrive at an answer to the original question. The same procedure
may be applied to the philological and the geographical method. In the
last analysis this is a method of a direct establishment of facts. The
historian has here ample opportunity to display his ingenuity, for the
sources include many direct data about facts, but some of these data
are as it were in a latent form. Analogous examples are offered by the
establishing of the number of persons in a gentry family from gene-
alogical data (T. Furtak) and the establishing of the composition of the
Roman army from the extant sepulchral inscriptions (T. Zawadzki).
The genealogical method was used in the proper sense of the word,
which is on the whole much less common, that is, for an indirect estab-
lishing of facts, by W. Semkowicz in connection with the following
problem. When studying the history of the Polish Awdaniec family he
found that its forefather bore the Norman name Auda, which means
"treasure", and that accordingly the Polish names Skarb, Skarbek, Skar-
bimir were characteristic of, or specific to, the Awdaniec family (skarb
in Polish means "treasure", too - Tr.). That name also is a component
of the name of the settlement called Skarbno, situated near Krzywin in
Greater Poland. Semkowicz had established earlier that Krzywin and its
surroundings were the centre of the area in which the Awdaniec family
had settled, and that Skarbno was owned by that family and even had
probably been the earliest trace of the Awdaniec-Skarb family: its
forefather, Skarb-Auda, apparently settled there at the turn of the
10th century.38
Semkowicz's reasoning can be reconstructed thus:
(1) if we know the name of the forefather of a mediaeval family and
if, on the area settled by that family, we find a settlement whose name
includes (as its morphological component) the name of that person,
then that settlement is likely to have been the place of origin of that
family;
METHODS OF ESTABLISIDNG IDSTORICAL FACTS 471
(2) genealogical studies reveal that the name of the forefather of the
Awdaniec family was Skarb or Skarbek or Skarbimir and that the area
on which that family was settled included a settlement which had that
name as its morphological component;
(3) the settlement called Skarbno and situated on the area settled by
the Awdaniec family is likely to have been the dwelling place of the
family's forefather.
As can easily be noticed, Semkowicz's inference followed ,the schema
of the weakened modus ponendo ponens. Note also that in the case just
discussed above the genealogical method was combined with the lexical
method.
8. The comparative method (in its territorial version)
The comparative method is one of the most indispensable instruments
of historical research. It serves not only to establish facts about which
there are no direct data in the sources, but also to substantiate hypo-
theses concerned with causal explanations and to draw general conclu-
sions about historical facts and laws. J. Rutkowski, when discussing the
comparative method, wrote that for some people a simple listing of
analogous phenomena observed in the various countries amounts to the
application of the comparative method, whereas for others it is merely
a preliminary operation for making use of such comparisons in estab-
lishing facts and explaining them causally.37 It is assumed here that
comparison of facts alone, if not used in establishing facts or causal
explanations, may not be termed the comparative method.
We also find the comparative method opposed to inference by ana-
10gy.sS This is correct to some extent, but the issue requires further ex-
planations. Inference by analogy (that is, a variation of induction by
enumeration) is merely one of the types of inference (next to, for in-
stance, induction by elimination) used in establishing or explaining
facts by reference to comparative data and, be it for that reason alone,
cannot be identified with the comparative method, even though it
should not be opposed to the latter. Further, inference by analogy may
be interpreted in various ways: either as a formal logical schema only,
or together with the extra-logical rule which recommends that com-
parisons should cover those sets which are structurally similar, for in-
stance, peoples (or territories) marked by a similar stage of historical
development. In the latter sense, inference by analogy does not amount

to the comparative method, but is merely one of the logical foundations
of the latter.
The following issue also calls for an explanation. May we call a com-
parison of the same territory in different periods, with the resulting con-
clusions about certain facts, the application of the comparative method,
that is, may we call the retrogressive method comparative? Following
the practice of some historians, who call the retrogressive method com-
parative-re(rospective, the present writer accepts the latter as a variation
of the comparative method.
A schema which shows the position of the comparative method in
historical research is given below as a conclusion from the preceding
comments:
rThe comparative method1

7
r Chronological comparisons
(the retrogressive method)
I '\
rThe comparative method sensu
stricto (territorial comparisons)
I
1 /' ~
Establishing earlier Establishing facts Varifkation of hypo-
facts on the basis by inference by theses as to facts and
of later ones analogy relationships between
facts (on the basis of
deduction)
Search for causal rela-

tionships (by induction
by elimination)
The diagram clearly shows the place of inference by analogy within

the broader concept of comparative method.
A few comments will be dedicated now to the comparative method
in the strict sense of the term in the establishment of facts. Consider
G. Labuda's work on Samo's state. Labuda formulated the hypothesis
that the Great Moravian State was the direct successor of an earlier
Samo's state. Yet there are no source-based data concerning these states
between the second half of the 7th and the early 9th century which
would allow for a direct substantiation of such a hypothesis. That is
why Labuda resorts to an indirect substantiation. He points to the fact
METHODS OF ESTABLISIllNG mSTORICAL FACTS 473
that "in the second half of the 7th century sources mention Obodritian
and Veletian princes. A Serbian prince, Milidukh, probably a direct de-
scendant of Prince Dervan, Samo's contemporary, was killed in A.D.
806. One year before that date a prince named Lekh was killed in
Bohemia. At Svetopelk's times a 'very powerful prince' ruled the Vis-
tulanians, and Prince Pribin was the ruler of Nitra ca. A.D. 830. (...)
Since, as it is commonly accepted, those states date back to Samo's
times, there are no reasons to think it should be otherwise in the case
of the Moravian State".39
His reasoning might be reconstructed thus:
(1) The state of the Obodritians and the Veletians developed since
the times of Sarno's state up to the 9th century.
(2) The Serbian state developed since the times of Sarno's state up to
the 9th century.
(3) The Bohemian state developed before the 9th century.
(4) The state of the Vistulanians developed before the 9th century.
(5) The Slovak state, with its centre in Nitra, developed before the
9th century.
(6) Sarno's state also developed between the second half of the 7th
century and the early 9th century, giving rise to the origin of the Great
Moravian State.
In other words:
(1) The process Z took place on the territory A,
(2) The process Z took place on the territory B,
(3) The process Z took place on the territory C,
(4) The process Z also took place on the territory X, which in
some respects resembled the territories A, B, and C.
In the case under consideration, the process stands for the formation
of a state as a political unit. Such a reasoning is, obviously, non-re-
liable. The degree of certainty increases as the number of analogical
cases increases, and depends above all on the degree of similarity be-
tween those analogical cases which are covered by the comparison.
Comparisons must be made with caution. J. Bardach is correct in stating
that if "there are no similarities on fundarnental issues, then the ap-
plication of this (i.e., comparative - J.T.) method may justifiably be
questioned" .40
9. The retrogressive method (the chronological version of the com-

parative method)
The retrogressive method is used fairly often in t:l\e studies of old land-
scape, old settlements, and the organization of a section of the national
economy, in general terms, in all those cases in which we know that
certain phenomena tend to vanish and at the same time we may legi-
timately expect to find in the sources some records of the earlier state of
things. We can learn, for instance, that at a moment tn the state of
development of a phenomenon was at least such as at a later moment
tn+!' This occurs in the cases of stagnation; if we assume that the phe-
nomenon in question tends to vanish, then it is to be expected that the
conditions at tn+l illustrate those at tn only in part.
F. Persowski, in his study of settlements in the middle San basin, tried
to reconstruct the landscape of that area in the 15th century. To do so
he examined both 15th century sources and contemporary maps. If he
were to refer to 15th century sources alone, then the reconstructed state
of afforestation of that area would take on the form of scattered
patches, identified by reference to extant sources. Simultaneous refer-
ence to the present-day conditions, that is to afforestation as it could be
observed in the 20th century, makes it possible to reconstruct the range
of the afforested areas in the 15th century much more completely.
Such a reconstruction makes use of our knowledge of the fact that 15th
century Poland was much more widely covered by forests than in the
20th century, and that the areas which are afforested now were, with
very few exceptions, covered by forests in the 15th century, toO.41
The reconstruction of the reasoning used here is as follows:
(l) If we assume that the scope of a phenomenon X shrinks with the
lapse of time, then the scope of that phenomenon at a time tn+l (ob-
servable in the sources) is more restricted than it was at a time tn' con-
cerning which sufficient source-based data are not available.
(2) The scope of X was shrinking throughout centuries.
(3) The scope of X, as observed at the time tn+l> is part of the scope
of that phenomenon as it existed at the time tn'
This case of inference follows the schema of the modus ponendo
ponens.
As can be seen, the retrogressive method merely helps to establish
certain facts, but cannot be used to establish them independently. It

usually co-occurs with elements of the method of the direct establishing
of facts. In the case analysed above, the sources referring to the 15th
century served to establish directly certain facts.
The applications of the retrogressive method are not confined to the
study of the old landscape and settlements. For instance, K. Potkatiski
tried to reconstruct the activities of the collectors of honey from forest
bees in Kurpie Forest in the Middle Ages by making use of sources
dating from the 16th and 17th centuries. He assumed that the 16th and
17th century sources would partially elucidate earlier conditions. In this
case the application of the retrogressive method proved a failure: later
studies have shown that honey collecting in Kurpie Forest originated
in a comparatively late period, being a custom brought in by fairly
recent settlers. In this case the assumptions required for the application
of the retrogressive method were not satisfied.
On this occasion a brief mention is due to what is termed the pro-
gressive method. It is usually referred to only when opposed to the
retrogressive method, since it is otherwise the procedure ordinarily used
by historians. When a historian studies a given period then he makes
use mostly of sources which date from that period, and not those com-
ing from later times. Usually this is not mentioned at all for the same
reasons for which, when informing about a conversation, we do not
stress that the participants spoke in prose.
The method of research must, obviously, be distinguished from that
of the presentation of results. This means that the facts studied by the
retrogressive method may, and usually are, presented in accordance
with their chronological order. 43
10. Inference from the lack of data (argumentum ex silentio)
Inference from the lack of data (the silence of the sources) is a varia-
tion of the method of an indirect establishing of facts; it is used when
in view of the lack of source-based data we state something about a fact
which is not confirmed by the sources. J. Giedymin analysed the prob-
lem why in such cases we so often come to false conclusions even
though inference follows the schema of the modus tollendo tollens.«
476 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDsrORY
He concluded that if we use a premiss of the type: "For every F:

if a fact F did occur, then historical sources include a mention which
confirms the occurrence of F", then we always commit a material error,
because this premiss is false. He accordingly suggested the following
schema of inference:
Premisses:
(1) For every F: if a fact F, which is of the type of facts that usually
are recorded, did occur, then F was recorded.
(2) The fact F was not recorded.
Conclusion:
(3) The fact F probably did not occur.
Thus, we have to know not only whether the fact was in the category
of those which are usually recorded, but also whether it was recorded
(even though the sources could have been lost).
In the case discussed above the point was to state the non-occurrence
of certain facts on the basis of the silence of the sources. But the argu-
mentum ex silentio is also used to state that certain facts did take place.
It is then said usually that the lack of any records testifies to the com-
mon occurrences of facts of that type. The non-reliability of this form
of reasoning is even greater than when we conclude about the non-oc-
currence of certain facts from the lack of data in the sources. The type
of inference now under consideration could be reconstructed thus (after
the pattern suggested by J. Giedymin):
Premisses:
(1) For every F: if a fact F, which is in the category of facts that
are so common as not be recorded at all, did take place, then F was
not recorded.
(2) F was not recorded.
Conclusion:
(3) The fact F did take place.
This reveals the extraordinary non-reliability of inference based on
the lack of data in the sources, since from the non-recording of a fact
we may conclude both about its occurrence and about its non-occur-
rence. That is why, for instance, J. M. Peset and E. Le Roy Ladurie,
METHODS OF ESTABLISlllNG IllSTORICAL FACI'S 477
when reporting on the French studies of deserted villages in the feudal

period posed the question: does the lack in the sources of data about
deserted villages testify to the fact that there were no deserted villages
at all, or to the fact that they were so common as not to deserve being
recorded?45
REFERENCES
1 Attention to this fact was drawn by A. Malewski and J. Topolski in Studia

z metodologii historii (Studies in the Methodology of History), Warszawa 1960,
pp. 6, 42, 59.
2 Cf. W. S. Jevons, The Principles of Science, New York 1877, p. 11;
M. R. Cohen, Reason and Nature, p. 115; Z. Czerwmski, "0 poj~ciu wniosko-
wania dedukcyjnego" (The Concept of Deductive Inference), Studia Filozoficz-
ne, No. 4/1960, pp. 149-56.
3 Even those authors who are advocates of radical inductionism have to
admit that in inductive inference we have to take "our previously acquired
knowledge of the world" into consideration. See in this connection M. Gordon,
o usprawiedliwieniu indukcji (The Justification of Induction), Warszawa 1964,
pp.96-8.
4 Z. Ziembiiiski classifies inference into deductive and probability-based (re-
ductive, inductive, by analogy); see his Logika praktyczna (practical Logic),
Warszawa 1963, pp. 65 ff. There are various suggestions as to the classification
of types of inference.
S Distinction is usually made among: (1) induction by incomplete enumer-
ation, (2) induction by complete enumeration, (3) induction by elimination.
Sn is P Sn is P
Conclusion: {S1 v ... V Sn} = S
Every Sk is P, Conclusion:
where k may be greater Every S, is P,
than n. where 1 :s;;;; i :s;;;; n.
The first is ilustrated by schema (1), and the second by schema (2). The second
differs from the first by being a result of complete (exhaustive) observations,
which means that every SI> 1:S;;;; i :s;;;; n, has been examined. The first has an
element of risk in the conclusion because, as not every Sk has been examined
(the examination has covered only S1 to Sm and it may turn out that an Sm,
n < m:S;;;; k, is not P. Induction by complete enumeration (i.e., type (1)), does
not carry this risk. Induction by elimination is a set of rules for finding out
relationships among facts (rules based on the observations of co-occurrence of
facts) which refers to Mill's principles, formulated by him in 1843. The principle
of agreement states that if fact A occurs always accompanied by fact B, then
A is likely to be a cause of B. The principle of the only difference states that if
A is always accompanied by B and if we find that if there is no A, then there
is no B, then we may assume that A is likely to be a cause of B. The principle
of concomitant variations is a variety of that of the only difference.
S Deductive inference follows some schema which always leads from true
premisses to a true conclusion. Next to the schemata modus ponendo ponens
(if (p => q) and p, then q), and modus tollendo tollens (if (p => q) and Iq,
then -, p), already mentioned on an earlier occasion, we have to list the follow-
ing elementary laws of the sentential calculus, used by historians in practice:
(1) De Morgan's first law: I (P V q) if and only if) I p 1\ I q),
(2) De Morgan's second law: I (p 1\ q) if and only if (IP V I q),
(3) the law of contraposition: (p => q) if and only if (I q =>jl p),
(4) the law of contradiction: I (P 1\ I P ) , - - -.~
(5) the law of the excluded middle: p V I p,
(6) the law of double negation: l i P if and only if p.
The symbolism used above is to be interpreted thus:
I-negation, to be read "not",
V - disjunction, to be read "or",
1\ - conjunction, to be read "and",
=> - implication, to be read "if..., then ...".
7 Transformation of induction by incomplete enumeration into a deductive
schema is to be found in M. R. Cohen. Cf. also the analysis of Mill's principles
carried out by K. Ajdukiewicz, who shows that the principle of the only differ-
ence is a kind of deductive inference in the light of a body of knowledge which
includes the principle of causality (Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., p. 170).
8 As shown by Carnap, inductive inference is unreliable.
U See footnote 16 to Chap. XIV.
10 This term for the types of inference which follow ''weakened'' schemata
has been suggested by Z. Czerwinski ("On the Relation of Statistical Inference
to Traditional Induction and Deduction", Studia Logica, vol. VII, 1958). In
such types of inference, premisses are "weakened" by the addition of such mo-
difications as "usually", "on the whole", "in most cases", "probably", etc. The
degree of that weakening may vary; it is manifested in quasi-metric phrases,
and in the case of statistical inference, in quantitative modifiers or other for-
mulations.
l! Some new proposals concerning inference by analogy have been made by
I. D~bska in her "Kilka uwag 0 rozumowaniach na podstawie analogii"
(Some Comments on Reasonings Based on Analogy) in Rozprawy logiczne
(Dissertations on Logic), Warszawa 1%4, pp. 31-8. She pointed to the fact that
some reasonings by analogy may be deductive. J. S. Mill claimed that reasoning
METHODS OF EsrABLISIDNG IDSTORICAL FACTS 479
by analogy is the elementary form of reasoning. T. Czei:owski pointed to the

role of reasoning by analogy in prediction and verification (cf. Filozofia na roz-
droiu (Philosophy at Crossroads), ed. cit., pp. 82 ff).
12 H. Reichenbach in The Rise of Scientific Philosophy (Berkeley 1951),
Chap. 3, says that deduction is a void inference because the conclusion does not
add anything to the premisses. He does not emphasize the fact that when truth
is transferred from one statement to another, this means also a better knowledge
of the world.
11 H. Lowmiaflski, Podstawy gospodarcze formowania si, palistw slowian-
skich (The Economic Foundations of the Formation of Slavonic States), War-
szawa 1953, pp.70-1.
a This terminology was suggested by A. Malewski, and was later used by
him and by the present writer in S,,"dia z metodologii historii (Studies in the
Methodology of History), ed. cit., pp. 58-60. In his review of that book (pub-
lished in Studia Zrodloznawcze, vol. VII, 1962) J. Giedymin drew attention to
the fact that the wording that a given source contains direct, or indirect, infor-
mation is unclear. It is not known, in particular, whether non-written sources can
contain direct information; if they could not, we could not say that an archaeo-
logist used the inductive method. Now it must be said that non-written sources
also may contain direct information about facts. For instance, an urn found by
an archaeologist provides direct information about its shape, ornaments, etc.;
on the other hand, it does not contain any direct information about the societal
life of its makers and even about a given people's stay in a given territory.
When an archaeologist describes an urn, he makes use of the inductive method;
but when he states something more on the strength of his finding, he also refers
to his non-source-based knowledge and thus makes use of the "deductive"
method. J. Giedymin also pointed to the fact that this suggested classification
of methods was at variance with the classification of sources into direct and
indirect, because then the indirect method would be applicable to direct sources,
and the direct method, to indirect ones. It follows from what has been said
earlier that these two classifications are made from different points of view.
15 It was J. Giedymin who analysed the concept of the independence of
sources (cf. Problemy, zaloienia, rozstrzygni,cia (problems, Assumptions, De-
cisions), ed. cit., p. 118.
16 According to M. Handelsman, one testimony pro¥ides only the knowledge
that a fact is probable, whereas certainty can only be provided by confirmation
by other testimonies (cf. Historyka, ed. cit., pp. 197...8).
17 Cf. his "Uog6lnienie postulatu rozstrzygalnoSci hipotez" (A Generalization
of the Requirement of Decidability of Hypotheses), in Studia Filozoficzne,
No. 5/1959.
18 An interesting case was quoted to the present writer by Zygmunt Man-
kowski. In one of his works concerned with the resistance movement during
the Nazi occupation of Poland he listed the participants in a conference, in
which he mentioned a certain person. The said person, when writing his recol-
lections, referred to Mankowski's study and confirmed his attendance. It turned

out later that Mankowski's list of the participants was inaccurate, and that at
any rate the said person did not attend that conference, as was later confirmed
by Mankowski himself. Yet the person in question, when writing his memoirs,
confirmed Mankowski's mistake. Memoirs are to be written, but one must be
exceptionally cautious when making use of them. G. T. Lampedusa was certainly
right when he wrote that "keeping a diary or writing down one's recollections
ought to be a duty imposed by the state authorities; the material thus collected
over a number of generations would be simply invaluable, since many psycho-
logical and historical problems which torture mankind could be solved. No
memoirs, even if written by unimportant people, are devoid of great social and
descriptive values (quoted from a Polish-language version of his selected stories,
published in Warszawa in 1964).
19 Cz. Luczak, Zycie gospodarczo-spoleczne w Poznaniu 1815-1918 (Eco-
nomic and Social Life in Poznan, 1815-1918), Poznan 1965, p. 101.
20 These methods are extensively discussed by A. Malewski and J. Topolski,
op. cit., pp. 43 ff. Use is made of the conclusions arrived at by the present writer
jointly with A. Malewski.
21 See his Studia z metodologii nauk spolecZiflych (Studies in the Methodology
of the Social Sciences), ed. cit., Chap. "Pojl<cia i wskaZniki" (Concepts and
Indicators).
22 This and other examples are drawn from A. Malewski and I. Topolski,
op. ~it., pp. 43 ff; the same applies to specialized methods, ibid., pp. 60 ff, which
also are drawn from the same work.
28 T. Wojciechowski, "0 rocznikach polskich X-XV wieku" (polish Annals
from the 10th to the 15th Century), Proceedings of the Academy of Learning
in Cracow, Section of Philology, History, and Philosophy, vol. IV, Krak6w
1880, p. 193.
24 Ibid., p. 207.
25 Ibidem.
26 [Md., p. 211.
27 A. Gieysztor, Introduction to T. Wojciechowski's Szkice historyczne iede-
nastego wieku (Historical Essays on the Eleventh Century), 3rd ed., Warszawa
1950, p. 15.
28 I. Widajewicz, Polska i Niemcy w dobie panowania Mieszka [ (poland
and Germany at the Time of the Reign of Mieszko I), Lublin 1953, p. 60.
29 Cf. Th. Mommsen's formulation: "Die sogenannte streng philologische
Methode, das heiBt einfach die rticksichtlos ehrliche, im grossen wie im kleinen
von keiner Muhe scheuende, keinem Zweifel ausbiegende, keine Lucke der
Ueberlieferung oder des eigenen Wissens uberttinchende, immer sich selbst und
anderen Redenschaft legende Wahrheitsforschung". (Th. Mommsen, Einieilllng
in die Altertumswissenschaft, 3rd ed., Berlin 1927, p. 18).
30 K. Moszyilski, Pierwotny zasit:g it:zyka praslowianskiego (The Original
Reach of the Proto-Slavonic Language), Wroclaw 1957. On his conclusions see
METHODS OF ESTABLISIDNG IDSTORICAL FACTS 481
H. Lowmiail.ski, Poczqtki Polski (The Origins of Poland), vol. I, Warszawa 1964,
pp.97-8.
31 K. Moszyilski, op. cit., p. 260.
32 H. Lowmiail.ski, Podstawy gospodarcze formowania si~ panstw slowianskich
(The Economic Foundations of the Formation of Slavonic States), ed. cit.,

pp. 27 if.
33 W. Semkowicz, ''Wlodycy polscy na tie por6wnawczym slowiaflskim" (The
Polish Scartabelli Against the Comparative Slavonic Background), Kwartalnik
Historyczny, vol. XXII, 1908, p. 597.
34 This example is more extensively discussed by A. Malewski and J. Topol-
ski, op. cit., p. 67. On the geographical method see J. Rutkowski, Historia gos-
podarcza Polski (An Economic History of Poland), vol. I, Poznan 1946, pp. lO-
ll. Aerial photography, whose precision has been increasing greatly, may be
very instructive to historians. On this subject see the comprehensive geograph-
ical literature.
35 W. Dworzaczek, "Kto w Polsce dzierZyI bulawy" (Holders of Hetman's
Office in Poland), Roczniki Historyczne, 1951, vol. XIV, pp. 163-70.
36 W. Semkowicz, "R6d Awdail.c6w w wiekach srednich" (The Awdaniec
Family in the Middle Ages), Proceedings of the Poznan Society of Friends of
Science, vol. XLIV, Poznan 1917, pp. 257 if.
37 J. Rutkowski, op. cit., pp. 11-13.
as See, for instance, J. Bardach, "0 roli Norman6w we wczesnosredniowiecz-

nej SlowianszczyZni.e wschodniej" (The Role of the Normans in the Early
Mediaeval Eastern Slavonic Countries), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 2/1958,
p. 369. The comparative method in historical research is generally characterized
by W. Kamieniecki thus: "The knowledge of the past of any nation must be
completed by a comparative study of living standards, especially those devel-
oped by other nations. The method used in such research is called compara-
tive". (W. Kamieniecki, "0 metodzie por6wnawczej w historii" (The Compara-
tive Method in Historical Research), Kwartalnik Historyczny, R.:LV: 1948,
p. 9) Kamieniecki is also right when he restricts the applicability of the com-
parative method (in the sense he uses) to facts which "belong to the same stage
of development" (op. cit., p. 10).
39 The example is drawn from: G. Labuda, Pierwsze pans two slowianskie.
Panstwo Samona (Samon's State - the Earliest Slavonic State), Poznan 1949,
pp. 293-4. The analysis of his reasoning is drawn from A. Malewski and
1. Topolski, op. cit., pp. 49-50.
40 J. Bardach, op. cit., p. 369.
41 F. Persowski, "Osadnictwo w dorzeczu sredniego biegu Sanu. Pr6ba rekon-
strukcji krajobrazu z XV wieku" (Settlers in the Middle San Basin. A Tentative

Reconstruction of the 15th Century Landscape), in: Studia z historii spolecznej
i gospodarczej poswi~cone prof. dr Franciszkowi Bujakowi (Studies in Social and
Economic History Dedicated to Professor Franciszek Bujak), Lw6w 1931,
pp. 83-99. The case is analysed in A. Malewski and J. Topolski, op. cit.,
pp.68-9.
42 K. Potkailski, "Puszcza Kurpiowska" (The Kurpie Forest), in: Pisma po-

smiertne (posthumous Writings), vol. I, p. 234.
43 Cf. A. Malewski and J. Topolski, op. cit., pp. 71-2.
44 J. Giedymin, Problemy logiczne analizy historycznej (Logical Problems of
Historical Analyses), ed. cit., pp. 13-4.
45 Cf. Village desertes et histoire economique, Paris 1965, p. 127.
XX. QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH
1. An outline of the development of quantitative analyses in historical

research
When the historians came to realize that "they had to count" - which
occurred on a visible scale only during the last 50 years - quantitative
analyses became a legitimate element of historical narratives. Such ana-
lyses were needed very badly, for we know the astounding errors in
texts written by earlier historians, who were not accustomed to handling
figures and did not realize what precision was required on that point.
They would send to battles armies which were so enormous that the
entire adult population of a given state would not suffice to man them;
they would make towns be inhabited by immense masses. and would
send thousands to death when describing effects of plagues. Lelewel
alleged that 193,000 people died in Cracow in 1652 as a result of an
epidemic,1 which was at least 10 times more than the whole population
of that city could amount to at that time. He assumed that in the boom
period from two to five million tons of grain used to be exported from
Poland through Gdansk.2 To realize how far he overshot his mark note
that in Poland in 1961-3 the total annual four grain crops averaged
14.5 million tons; at the time referred to by Lelewel they could average
1.4 million tons,8 not more than 10 per cent of which would be ex-
ported. These data visualize the scale of the methodological upheaval in
historical research over the last few decades. Those who are willing to
use the term revolution might call that upheaval the quantitative revo-
lution in historical research.
This quantitative upheaval is not yet over. Still not long ago it could
be termed a statistical revolution, but with the advent of computers,
information theory, and data processing systems and the prospects of
applications of mathematics in the social sciences it seems to the point
to use a broader term that would go beyond statistics in the strict sense
of the word and would cover the whole of quantitative methods. Yet,
while it is legitimate to speak: about the great significance of the quanti-

tative approach in historical research, since that meant bringing out
facts interpreted en masse (as a variety of compound facts), it would
not be legitimate to overemphasize the prospects for making historical
research mathematical, at least in the near future. Much will probably
be done in that field, but it seems nevertheless that the qualitative ap-
proach cannot be eliminated from historical studies. It may even be
claimed that the quantitative approach will on an increasing scale serve
the improvement of qualitative analyses. Today we have to emphasize-
not too loudly, as the present writer attaches great importance to the
development of quantitative methods, which are still poorly rooted in
historical research - that we should not be misled by the appearances of
precision, because otherwise we shall be fascinated by them like a
novice who is given a wonderful modern instrument and fails to assess
its real possibilities. A. Soboul referred to the danger of surrendering to
"the magic of figures" and pointed to the fact that quantitative results
play a secondary role in historical research: why do" we collect and
classify numerical data if not to obtain answers to specific questions?'
The introduction of quantitative methods into historical research was
mainly due to the development of economic history (including demo-
graphy) which, if it was not to become a collection of anecdotes and
curiosities, had to study mass phenomena (by making use of sources
which had not been studied previously), and that required quantitative
methods. The philosophical basis for those endeavours was provided
above all by positivism. We could quote dozens of names of historians
in various countries who, especially from the second half of the 19th
century, focused their attention on the statistical study and interpreta-
tion of numerical data.
The first period was dominated by the processing of newly discov-
ered data. The following researchers may be mentioned by way of ex-
ample as characteristic of that stage when quantitative methods were
being incorporated in historical research while being still treated without
adequate criticism: J. Th. Rogers, the author of a six-volume history of
agriculture and prices in England (published 1866 to 1887); G. D'Ave-
nel, whose eight-volume study (1894-1931) outlined changes in prices
and wages in France from the 13th to the late 18th century; A. Pawm-
ski, who with A. Jablonowski gave the statistical foundations for the
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH 485
history of Poland in the 16th century (Polska XVI wieku pod wzglfdem
geograficzno-statystycznym (16th Century Poland: Geography and Sta-
tistics), 1883-1897). The end of the 19th century also saw an increasing
number of studies on the relationship between statistics and historical
research. The concept of historical statistics was also born at that time.
In 1882 K. T. Inama-Sternegg wrote his paper on Geschichte und Sta-
tistik,5 and ten years later Z. Daszynska-Goliliska was already consider-
ing the method and achievements of historical statistics,6 in doing which
she focused her attention, unlike Inama-Sternegg, on demographical
data.
To sum up, the first stage of the quantification of history consisted
in making use of new data and in processing them statistically in a still
elementary manner. This applied above all to prices (where the results
were less striking) and to demographical data (where the results were
scientifically more interesting).
The second stage of the development of quantitative methods in
historical research was marked by a many-sided progress, mainly in
finding theoretical foundations (especially in the field of political econo-
my) for quantitative analyses, in extending the scope of such analyses
(by expanding correlation computations), and in making use tentatively
of numerical findings in genetic and causal explanations of collective
facts which do not occur en masse, and even of single events, that is,
in endeavours to lay quantitative foundations for social and political
history and for other, traditionally qualitative, branches of history.
Theoretical foundations for, and inspirations to, new approaches
were offered, on the one hand, by Marxist political economy, and on
the other, by its non-Marxist analogue, which was gradually gaining
momentum. The most prominent work, which both had been inspired
by Marxist theory and had served as a stimulus for its expansion, was
The Development of Capitalism in Russia (1899) by V. Lenin, which
included both a statistical analysis of the social structure (the problem
of social stratification) and a chronological dynamic description of phe-
nomena, which, being accompanied by a constant combination of quan-
titative and qualitative analyses, resulted in a model form of making
use of statistics in the study of the development of a given phenomenon
(in the case under consideration, of the capitalist system), and hence
the study of structure and dynamics alike. 7 •
486 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSI'ORY
Such a combination was not arrived at in studies inspired by non-

Marxist theories (mainly J. M. Keynes's study of business cycles and his
macroeconomic approach to economic life). Studies of dynamic pro-
cesses, excessively fascinated by changes in money circulation, prices
and wages, were not integrally connected with qualitative studies of
structures. This shortcoming was most visible in the works of one of
the promoters of the quantitative approach to history (d. Chap. VII),
namely F. Simiand,8 an economist ,economic historian and sociologist
in one person, author of Le solaire, /'evolution sociale et la monnaie
(3 vols., 1932), who made stages in economic growth depend on changes
in money circulation. Yet advances made in computational methods (an
increase in the number of types of analyses) in historical research were
important in themselves. Theoretically, a big step forward was made by
E. Labrousse, who paid increasing attention to dynamic studies of social
structures. A statement made by A. Soboul on social history may be
used to show how deeply the autonomous study of business cycles (the
shape of long-term changes) and structures (organic wholes with inner
links) was rooted in the literature that drew inspiration from the eco-
nomic studies of business cycles. Social history, he claimed, assumes
"a thorough knowledge of social structures and mechanisms which
slowly ride the wave of evolving business cycles".9 Pointing to social
mechanisms next to structures was, in his statement, a clear marker
of the dialectical approach, with which, however, it would be difficult
to reconcile the formulation stating that such mechanisms and struc-
tures ride the wave of business cycles that develop by themselves. And
the fact is that waves of changes in the past were results of nothing else
than changes in structures.
Next to F. Simiand, E. Labrousse and other French historians, the
most penetrating promoters of quantitative methods in economic and
social history included: J. Rutkowski, author of many studies in agra-
rian history (from 1910 on), and in particular of one of the finest ex-
isting works based on statistics, namely Badania nad podzialem docho-
dow w czasach nowoiytnych (Studies in the Distribution of Incomes in
Modern Times) (1938); J. Hamilton, initiator of the modern studies in
price revolutions (1934); other numerous students of prices eN. Bev-
eridge, H. Hauser, A. E. Pribram, M. J. Elsass, S. Hoszowski, and
others); and many others, who could hardly be listed here. Statistics has
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN IflSTORICAL RESEARCH 487
thus become an inseparable companion of historical research; it also

began gradually to find its way into political history (e.g., electoral sta-
tistics), cultural history (school statistics), and other branches of re-
search.
The third stage of using quantitative analyses in historical research,
which we are witnessing now, began at the end of World War II. The
theoretical foundations of quantitative studies improved as a result of
a growing co-operation among the various disciplines, and in particular
among history, economics, and sociology. Economists undertook quanti-
tative research themselves to penetrate far into the past (we mean here
mainly the research carried out by the Institut de Science Economique
Appliquee in Paris), and even suggested that these be termed quantita-
tive history (histoire quantitative)/o which was to mean the most ad-
vanced form of the quantitative approach to economic history at a given
period. The understanding of the necessity of using precise measure-
ments in history became common, which obviously did not mean going
on a large scale beyond the elementary computation of averages, rela-
tive numbers, etc., even though the various measures of correlation,
coefficients of regression, measures of concentration, computations of
trends, and elements of mathematical statistics (representative sampling,
significance tests, etc.) came to be used on an increasing scale.
But the characteristic trait of that third stage of quantification of
historical research was not confined to the penetration by statistical
methods of the various historical disciplines on the basis of improved
theoretical foundations (for example the theory of economic growth),
but consisted also in the opening up of new sources of quantitative
analyses. These new sources include now above all the possibilities,
recently noticed by historians, offered by the mechanization of the
collection, storage and processing of data and the usefulness of stati-
stical studies of texts as applied by linguists (frequency analyses and
analyses of style). Discussions on the new prospects are ahead of
practical applications, even though in the latter field certain countries
have some achievements to their credit.
To sum up, we have been watching a growing quantification of his-
torical research, based mainly on statistics, for at least a century. Dur-
ing the first, preliminary, stage we saw merely the initial contacts be-
tween historical research and statistics. Difficulties in the application of
the new methods manifested themselves at that time. There were some
justified fears of a dehumanization of history as the scholars still failed
to realize fully that results of quantitative research can be integrated
into a picture of the process of history by a qualitative analysis only,
an analysis based on a well-substantiated theory of social development
that has a vast field of vision. Stage two conferred on quantitative anal-
ysis in historical research the status of legitimacy, but still failed to
suggest a satisfactory linking of qualitative and quantitative studies. Yet
it helped develop criticism with respect to statistical sources and made
it possible to distinguish between their various kinds (and resulted in
a number of valuable publications, such as the Sund customs registers).
Stage three, the integrative one, witnessed a further improvement of
quantitative analyses in historical research, which followed an increased
application of them in science in general. Advances in theory construc-
tion called for ever more comprehensive empirical studies, which also
had to cope with mass data. The issues of quantitative methods become
more and more common to history, economics, sociology, and social
psychology (regardless of the peculiarities revealed by the data in some
or these disciplines).
We shall below be concerned with the applications of statistical meth-
ods to historical research (historical statistics) and with some other
methods of quantitative analysis, all of them closely linked with sta-
tistics.
2. The concept and the objectives of historical statisticsl l
In general terms, the methods of historical statistics are nothing else

than general statistical methods applied to the study of facts (pheno-
mena) which occurred in the past on a mass scale and left traces of
themselves in sources which are still extant.
The fundamental assumptions are common to both, and the peculi-
arities of historical statistics as compared with general statistics are of
secondary importance only. The similarity of assumptions consists first
of all in the fact that in both cases we consider statistical populations
which are sets of a number of countable elements (units, facts) each.
Yet not every set of elements is an object of statistical study. For in-
stance. a statistician is not interested in a set of a number of identical
balls,12 because he cannot say anything about them except counting

them: whatever he says about one ball will be applicable to all the
remaining ones. The study would thus resemble a study of a unique
phenomenon. A, statistician, when defining a population, indicates the
characteristics which decide whether a given object is an element of
that population, but he is interested in such populations only whose ele-
ments differ from one another in some other respects. The definition of
a population depends on the goals of research. In the case of a general
census, the population (in the statistical sense of the term) consists of
all inhabitants of a given area as they form the specified class of ele-
ments, but if the registration covers only those men who are in the pre-
conscription age, then the population forms merely a subset of the set
of all people. In some studies, a village may be a population, and in
others, a single farm: in the former case we study statistically villages,
whereas in the latter, we do so with farms.
The elements of a (statistical) population differ from one another by
certain secondary characteristics (i.e., by having or by not having them,
or by having them in varying degrees). Suppose that we study peasant
farms statistically: we are accordingly interested in their acreage, the
number of farm animals, the number of buildings, the number of farm
hands they each have. All these are secondary characteristics of a given
element of the studied population of peasant farms (e.g., in a given
village or district); the basic characteristic is that of "being a peasant
farm".
It is self-evident that elements of statistical populations may range
from fairly simple (e.g., an employee in a factory X) to very complex
ones (a town). The more complex an element is, the more characteristic
traits it usually has, and hence the more detailed is the analysis of
which it is liable.
The peculiarities of historical statistics are linked mainly to the data
which are available, that is, to historical statistical sources. Statistical
sources as such do not form any distinct group which would entail
a change in the classification of sources as introduced earlier in this
book. We could only resort to one more dichotomous classification:
(1) those sources which provide data for the formation of statistical
populations, and (2) those which do not provide such data. Within the
first group we could single out statistical sources sensu stricto, i.e., those
which have been intentionally prepared for statistical research (e.g.,

census data).
The fact that a given source can be classed as statistical may often
be a matter of chance. Should no notarial documents except one be
preserved, then such a document would not have any statistical value,
even though a large number of such records could be treated as statis-
tical sources. In any case, we have to make a distinction between "the
statistical nature" of a given source at the moment that source comes
into being, and at the moment a historian intends to draw information
from it: the two need not coincide. Moreover, a source, if treated as
a single item, may be not statistical in nature; it becomes so only if
when we consider a large number of such items.
The historian ought to realize which sources lend themselves to being
used as statistical data. W. Kula has classified statistical sources into
those of statistical origin (e.g., population census data), institutional
sources concerned with mass phenomena (e.g., tax registers), and
sources concerned with individual facts which occur on a mass scale,13
and concluded correctly that the future of historical statistical research
would belong to the last-named group, which has so far been the least
exploited. The historian can look for statistical sources in all the cate-
gories singled out previously, and hence both in direct and indirect
sources, and also both in written and non-written ones. A tax register,
a set of documents pertaining to sales of real estates, and a specified
set of artefacts, all these may be used as a statistical source. Arte-
facts are analysed by archaeologists, and by historians of material civi-
lization in general. In recent years we have seen great advances, in those
and related disciplines, in making use of very sophisticated statistical
methods.14 In the criticism of that type of sources we apply all the rules
applicable in the examination of direct sources (authenticity studies).
The criticism of statistical indirect sources requires in addition the study
of the reliability of data, under the application of the rules which have
been discussed earlier.
As compared with present-day statisticians, who are in a position to
bring into existence those sources which they need for specified re-
search, historians must confine themselves to what has been left from
the past. It depends on their ingenuity how such still extant sources
can best be used for statistical purposes.
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 491
The limitations to which bistorical sources are subject may be chro-

nological and factual in nature. On the one hand, usually the earlier
tB.e period which we study, the fewer the numerical data available. In
the case of Poland, the number of the data increases more or less from
the 16th century on. On the other hand, the sources may provide an-
swers to certain questions which we pose, while giving only scanty in-
formation, or none at all, on other issues, which may be very essential
for the problem under investigation. Note also that the use of statistical
methods is largely connected with the development of the various
branches of the methodology of history (and of other types of research
as well), which makes it possible to bring to a common denominator
numerical data pertaining to the past and expressed in measures,
weights, etc. The numerical data which are put together must be com-
parable; if that condition is not met, then the results obtained by statis-
tical methods may prove devoid of scientific value.
The said limitations which affect the sources have certain conse-
quences that contribute to the specific nature of historical statistics. The
principal one is the considerable importance, in historical statistics, of
the indirect establishing of facts, in other words, of statistical estimates,
a procedure by which we use certain source-based and non-source-based
data to infer about facts which are not recorded in the sources. Thus
statistical estimation and the resulting procedures make historical sta-
tistics differ from statistics based on contemporary data.
Other consequences pertain to the wa:(s of applying statistical meth-
ods: the requirements are less stringent than in the cases of contem-
porary statistics, since the definition of a given population sometimes
cannot be as precise as it can be when we use contemporary data.
Sometimes a given set of data turns out to be sufficiently homogenous,
or not, only in the process of its examination. Requirements as to the
chronological homogeneity of data may be less rigorous, too. J. Rut-
I
kowski, one of the best experts on historical statistics, wrote that when
it comes to historical statistics "the issue of chronological homogeneity
must be treated incomparably more freely than that would be possible
in studies of contemporary facts. Sometimes, when preparing tables
which illustrate certain phenomena, we have to use sources spread over
several, a dozen, or even more years".l~
Historians use the method (or methods) of historical statistics for

several purposes.
The first is to establish facts which occur en masse. In this an im-
portant role is played by estimation, both when it comes to the estab-
lishment of facts referred to by sources and those which are not men-
tioned directly in the sources.
The second is to suggest ideas as to causal relationships between facts
and to establish statistical laws. For instance, correlation measures com-
puted during research work may be useful in finding out causal rela-
tionships between, and effects of, the various factors. This remark is
not restricted to correlation measures only.
The third is to enable or to facilitate us the description of facts which
take place en masse. According to J. P. Guilford, "mathematics and
statistics are merely a part of our descriptive language, an outgrowth
of our verbal symbols".18
3. Statistical grouping of data
Statistical grouping of data, that is, the construction of sets and subsets
and ordering them, is one of the most difficult, and at the same time
most important, stages of- applying the statistical method in historical
research.17 In most cases we have to change the grouping which we
may happen to find in the sources into one which complies with the
theoretical assumptions we have adopted. Should we, for instance, when
studying the statistics of the" influence of the various religions, rest
satisfied with declarations of allegiance, we might obtain a very super-
ficial knowledge of religious life. Hence we would be interested in a dif-
ferent set: a better solution would be to single out the set of those who
observe religious ceremonies, and among the latter, the sets of those
who do so regularly and occasionally. How difficult it is to establish what
is a small, a medium-size and a large farm. What did the concept of
hearth, to be found in many sources (in Polish dym), really mean?
Where are we to draw the demarcation line between a craftsman's
workshop and something what we could call a (small) factory? How
are we to class an owner of a farm who also works in a factory? (The
last issue refers to the Polish post-1945 conditions: the solution con-
sisted in the introduction of the category termed "peasant workers".)
Very often it does not suffice to group data in the sense of singling
out a certain set. When we consider changes in time (i.e., when we have
to do with chronological series) we have to be very careful about the
period during which we may use the adopted characteristics of set mem-
bership. For instance, when it comes to the statistics of cattle breeding,
100 cows in an 18th century village means something else (in view of
the quality and the weight of cows) than the same number of cows in
a present-day village. A comparison of these data would require a pre-
vious transformation of data (by adopting, for instance, the principle
that two cows in the 18th century equal one cow in the second half oi
the 20th century).
To sum up, we may say that success in establishing statistical sets
(i.e., in defining statistical populations) depends mainly on the histo-
rian's non-source-based knowledge, and in particular on his theoretical
knowledge. The point is to group together data which are fairly homo-
geneous ("additive", as W. Kula says); moreover, the singling out of
a set should be maximally conducive to the reconstruction of the past.
An ill-constructed population may largely obscure the past. We know
many such cases, for instance in the statistics of landed property.
Once the set (population) has been defined, we have to record the
data about its members. The recording techniques may vary; very often
we record numerical data (or we do computations ourselves) to insert
them in tables prepared especially for that purpose. In such cases we
may speak about the tabulation of the data. Yet a distinction is to be
made between such a preliminary tabulation and those tables (and dia-
grams) which are used to illustrate the data in a better way. It often
happens that when decoding the data we have to recalculate them (e.g.,
from old measures into contemporary ones). Sometimes we must rest
satisfied with approximate numbers. If we obtain partial results such
that some of them are accurate and the others are approximate, the
total must be presented as approximate: statistics is not to create illu-
sions of apparent accuracy if this is unfounded.
The recalculation of old units of measurement into contemporary
ones, or even the bringing of old units to a common denominator, would
very often be impossible without reference to results of special metro-
logical studies. "It is common knowledge", W. Kula wrote, "that old
measures, even if they bear one and the same name, stand for largely
varying quantities according to the region, the period, and the object
to be measured. (...) It does not suffice to know that; it is even not
enough to know how to calculate them each time into their metric
counterparts: we also have to understand the social meaning which
underlies those varieties".18 Because of slow advances in historical
metrology (in spite of a large number of papers published, which, how-
ever, mostly are contributions of a very narrow scope), historians often
have to engage in metrological studies themselves in order to solve their
own problems. These numerous metrological supplements advance 0llli
knowledge of old measures and weights, thus probably bringing us
closer to the day which will see the appearance of a valuable com-
pendium of metrology. Historical metrology is treated as an auxiliary
historical science.
A statistical population which consists of homogenous elements that
vary as to their secondary characteristics must be ordered, which yields
the basic element of analysis, namely a statistical series, which alone,
or in combination with other series, enables us to construct statistical
tables - the most evident manifestation of the application of the statis-
tical method.
It is worth recalling that both in modern statistics and in historical re-
search we can single out five kinds of statistical series: (1) enumerating
series, (2) structural series based on measurable characteristics (e.g.,
classification of workers on the basis of their wages), (3) structural series
based on non-measurable characteristics (e.g., division of peasants into
serfs and rent-paying peasants), (4) territorial series, and (5) chrono-
logical series, which illustrate the sequence of events in time. In histori-
cal studies, we find many examples of statistical series, mostly arranged
into tables; contrary to expectations, chronological series are by far not
the most frequent ones, since they require homogenous data from suc-
cessive years or periods. A typical example of chronological series are
listings of prices in successive years.
The data for making statistical series (sets) are taken either directly
from sources, or else elements of such series must be estimated, that
is, obtained in an indirect way. A given set under investigation may
either entirely consist of elements about which we find data in our
sources, or merely of some such elements, which represent the whole.
This necessitates an analysis of the methods of statistical estimation and

of the problem of representative samples in historical research.
4. Calculations by estimation and calculations based directly on sources
Culculations by estimation are resorted to if no direct source-based data

on the facts we are interested in are available. In such a case there are
three possibilities:
(1) recalculation of certain data which apply to the whole set into
other (wanted) data which would apply to the whole population (es-
timation by multipliers);
(2) extension of data which cover part of the set (and which are
known to us) onto the whole set under consideration (structural estima-
tion);
(3) filling the gaps in chronological series on the basis of our know-
ledge of data from earlier and later periods (interpolation) or from
earlier periods only (extrapolation).
These three types of statistical estimation will briefly be discussed
below.
In earlier periods, numerical listings usually had purely and directly
utilitarian goals in view: they were mostly drawn to serve fiscal or mili-
tary purposes. In order to make a proper use of data when seeking
answers to problems in which we are interested today we have to re-
sort to various estimations, that is, to reconstructing those data which
do not appear in the sources and which we would like to know~
The calculations made by A. Pawmski and A. Jablonowski and in-
cluded in their series of studies entitled Polska XVI wieku pod wzgl{!-
dem geograficzno-statystycznym (16th Century Poland: Geography and
Statistics),19 can serve as an example of such researches, quite frequent
in historical statistics, which make use of such data.
When computing the population of Poland as it had been around
A. D. 1578 Pawmski made use of tax registers; these sources provided
the following direct data concerning the whole area under his consid-
eration:
(1) the number of lanei held by peasants (one laneus being a measure
of land equivalent to c. 40 acres - Tr.);
(2) the number of families of cottagers and landless peasants;
(3) the number of families of tradesmen and craftsmen;

(4) the number of lanei held by petty gentry;
(5) the number of manorial farms held by the gentry;
(6) the number of parishes.
As can be seen, these data do not inform directly about the number
of the population; the number of families is known for some groups
only. In order to pass from these data to the number of the population
Pawinski made the following assumptions, based on fragmentary
source-based data obtained as a result of other researches, the general
historical knowledge of the period, and current knowledge:
(1) one laneus held by peasants maintained two peasant families
which, together with their servants averaged 11 persons;
(2) one family of landless peasants averaged four persons (this cate-
gory provided servants to peasant families, who were included un-
der (1»;
(3) one tradesman's or craftsman's family was assumed to average
five persons;
(4) one laneus held by petty gentry maintained (like in the case of
peasants) 11 persons;
(5) one manorial farm was inhabited, on the average, by 15 persons
(five persons who were members of the owner's family plus 10 serv-
ants);
(6) one parish building housed six persons (one priest plus five other
persons).
These assumptions enabled Pawmski to establish the number of peo-
ple in the various groups of the population by multiplying the adopt-
ed indicators by the data directly taken from his sources. The indicators
were: the number of peasants maintained by one laneus and the num-
ber of persons per family in the various groups of the population.
It can easily be noticed that the value of the calculations outlined
above depends primarily on the degree of certainty of the assumptions
adopted, which in the case discussed above took on the form of certain
multipliers. It is not to be wondered, therefore, that Pawinski's esti-
mates gave rise to a broad discussion, which on some points substanti-
ated his assumptions even better than he had done, while on the others
raised doubts as to his multipliers. This is what usually occurs in the
case of such and similar estimations.
A similar example is provided by the calculation of the population

of Poland in the 14th century, made by T. Ladogorski. 20 His results
also gave rise to many controversies. Ladogorski maCle use of registers
which informed about the amount of the donations for the Roman
Curia known as Peter's pence, that is, of data which did not give any
direct answer to the question about the country's population. He, too,
had to make a number of assumptions on the basis of fragmentary
source-based data and his general knowledge of the problem under
consideration. The obscure point was whether Peter's pence was paid
on the per person basis, or the per house basis, or on the per person
basis in some regions and the per house basis in the others. Should
that issue be explained clearly in the sources the estimation procedure
would be comparatively simple: the total sum collected as Peter's pence
would have to be divided by the basis of taxation. Should Peter's pence
have been collected on the per person basis, the result would be im-
mediate; should it have collected on the per house basis the indicator
of the number of inhabitants per house would have to be adopted ad-
ditionally. Those persons who were not covered by the Peter's pence
donations would, of cource, mean a separate problem, and their num-
ber would have to be estimated by a separate procedure.
In the examples given above, numerical data found in the sources
and applicable to the whole population under consideration were used
in tentative reconstructions of facts about which those sources do not
inform. As we have seen, such estimates require the adoption of certain
statistical multipliers, which make it possible to calculate certain data
which do not occur in the sources on the basis of those which can be
found in them, for instance, the number of people of a given category
from the number of lanei, the number of families, the number of houses,
the number of manorial farms, etc. Such calculations need not, of
course, apply to people only. We know estimates of the size of manorial
farms based on the amount of grain used in sowing per unit of area.
In this case the transition from the known amount of the grain used to
the unknown area required the adoption of appropriate indicators of
the amount of grain per unit of area. Such indicators were based either
on direct data available for certain manorial farms (possibly also from
other regions), completed by data on present-day standards, etc. Such
estimates usually are highly debatable.
The estimates described above were based on recalculations of cer-

tain data, pertaining to a whole population, into other data, also per-
taining to the whole population. It happens, however, that no source-
based data, even indirect ones, are available with reference to part of
a given population, whereas such data, direct or indirect, are available
for its remaining parts. For instance, J. Rutkowski, when calculating
(in his study of occupational statistics of the Polish rural population in
the second half of the 16th century) the number of bee-keepers on the
basis of the data on the special bee-hive tax in the region of Halicz,
used the following procedure to obtain data for those villages which
did not pay that tax and for Podole Province, for which data were
lacking: "The numer of bee-keepers in those villages where the tax was
not collected was calculated so that the average number of hives per
one keeper, calculated for the villages which paid the tax, was taken
for each district separately; as the number of the hives in the remain-
ing villages was known, the number of bee-keepers was calculated on
that basis. In the case of Pod ole Province, where the tax was not paid,
the average for the Halicz region was adopted".21
The computation of the number of bee-keepers in those villages
where the amount of the tax collected was known was the simplest case
and represented that type of estimates which are the easiest to make.
The estimation of the number of bee-keepers for those villages in which
the tax was not collected required the additional assumption that in
those villages where the tax was not collected the average number of
hives per one bee-keeper was the same as in those villages where the
tax was collected. These are procedures of the type discussed above.
But when it comes to the calculation of the number of bee-keepers for
Podole Province we have to do with estimation in which the ratios
found for part of a given population (in the statistical sense of the term)
are transferred upon those parts of it for which no data are available.
In the case under consideration we had to do so with a region (podole
Province) for which no data for the issue under investigation were
known.
In some cases, the point may be to fill chronological gaps in statis-
tical data, which may apply only to data for successive periods. In
such cases we have to do with the procedure termed interpolation. It
consists in finding the hypothetical values of a characteristic which do
not occur in a given statistical series on the basis of our knowledge of

the values which occur earlier and later in that series. This requires the
adoption of the assumption that no factors which could result in devia-
tions of the state suggested by the earlier and later known states were
at work in the period for which the data are missing. Interpolations may
thus be made only in the case of sufficiently smooth series; the proce-
dure is not legitimate in the case of those series which reveal numerous
turns and are thus very irregular. Calculations based on interpolation
are sometimes very intricate and require an excellent knowledge of the
period studied. An example is provided by S. Hoszowski's work on the
population growth in feudal Poland. In his work he filled by estimation
certain gaps in parish records of births, deaths and marriages covering
some weeks and months in order to arrive at complete annual data and
thus to be able to make appropriate comparisons and further calcula-
tions. We thus have here to do with the filling by estimation of those
data which are not to be found in the sources.22 Interpolation is often
resorted to in the studies of changes in prices in some periods if data
are missing for certain time segments within the statistical series under
consideration.
The procedure which consists in replacing the missing data with data
from adjacent periods is not treated as interpolation.
Interpolation can be made analytically or graphically. In the latter
case the procedure resembles that of curve fitting, it being assumed
that no major perturbations took place. in the interval for which the
data are not available.
Extrapolation consists graphically in prolonging the line which illus-
trates the trend of a phenomenon. This is, obviously, possible only
under the assumption that the trend found for the preceding period
remained the same in the period for which extrapolation is made. Such
an extrapolation was resorted to by the present writer (in a book pub-
lished in 1958) who studied agricultural issues in the real estates held
by the archbishopric of Gniezno from the 16th to the 18th century and
tried to answer the question when the reconstruction after the war of
1655-60 would have been completed had it not been for new devasta-
tions in the early 18th century. In that case the line showing the trend
up to the early 18th century was extended into the years that covered
and followed the Great Northern War.
Estimations are carried out, as can easily be seen, if direct numerical

data are lacking. We try to establish the facts we are interested in by
adopting many various assumptions based on partial source-based data
pertaining to a part of the region under consideration, or to other re-
gions, and also based on general historical knowledge and even on cur-
rent (i.e., non-source-based) knowledge as well. The reader will notice
easily that this procedure is a special case of the deductive method in
historical research, discussed in the preceding chapter, which we have
suggested to term the indirect method. For in the case of statistical esti-
mates we try to establish facts (which take place on a mass scale)
without referring to those sources which inform directly about those
facts. Sometimes we infer about facts of a certain kind on the basis of
source-based data pertaining to facts of a different kind. Sometimes we
have to do with source-based data which pertain only to parts of the
population under consideration, and we establish .relationships within
the entire population on the basis of our knowledge of the relationships
within those known parts of the population.
In the case of research based on sources that directly refer to the
facts we study - a case we do not discuss here in any greater detail - we
have to do with the direct method, analysed in the preceding chapter.
We have then called it the inductive method, that is, such which con-
sists in establishing facts on the basis of sources which contain direct
information about those facts.
Of course, like in the case of all research founded on direct source-
based information, the facts we are interested in are often given in the
sources in a more or less "veiled" form. For instance, we are interested
in grain crops (the amount of the grain harvested as compared with
the amount of the grain sown), and the sources inform only about
sowings and harvests. In such a case we must know how to extract the
fact in wbich we are interested: in the case given above it just suffices
to divide the harvests by the sowings (provided they are expressed in
the same units). In practice we often have to do with much more in-
tricate cases.
From the point of view of the mode of inference used in estimation
some examples quoted above included inference by analogy. This was
so when recalculation indicators, established on the strength of data
from a certain region, were applied to other regions under the tacit
assumption that the conditions there were more or less the same (e.g.,
that bee-keeping in Podole Province resembled that in the Halicz re-
gion). Rutkowski resorted to the same type of inference when he as-
sumed that the average number of bee-keepers was the same in those
villages in which the bee-hive tax was not collected and in those in
which it was.
5. Exhaustive calculations versus representative samples. The chi-

square test
In historical statistics the possibilities of describing a given population
as to its certain characteristics on the basis of an exhaustive examina-
tion of the appropriate data pertaining to that population as a whole are
very limited because of the state of the sources; these limitations in-
crease with remoteness in time. In most cases such fairly complete sets
of data must be analysed with utmost criticism because the techniques
of data collecting are being incessantly improved, and accordingly the
data, for instance, from the first half of the 15th century differ very
much from a present-day census or other statistical records.
Examples of fairly exhaustive studies are provided by Z. Kirkor-Kie-
droniowa's study of agricultural and demographic conditions in Cen-
tral Poland in the first half ot the 19th century,23 by H. Grossman's
study of the social and economic structure of the Grand Duchy of War-
saw (based on the censuses carried out in 1808 to 1810),24 and by T. La-
dogorski's analyses of numerical data based on what was termed Sile-
sian general statistical tables of 1787, which were an extremely valuable
record of demographic and economic data. 25 In his work Ladogorski
calculated the urban and the rural population of the various parts of
Silesia, established its vocational and social differentiation, the number
of craftsmen's workshops, buildings, etc.
The studies quoted above by way of example had one trait in com-
mon: the authors used appropriate numerical data which in each case
covered the entire population in question. Such data had been usually
recorded upon instructions from state authorities as the developing
modern state needed ever more comprehensive data about the eco-
nomic, social and demographic conditions, data which only statistical
studies could have provided.
It sometimes happens that for various reasons we are unable or un-

willing to use all those source-based data which pertain to a given
population and which we have at our disposal, and at the same time we
project the results of research based on part of the data upon the entire
population studied. This requires the assumption, which may vary in the
degree of its substantiation, that the conditions which prevail in that
part of the data which has been studied represent those prevailing in
the whole population.
J. Fierich in his work on agriculture, rotation of crops, and harvests
as recorded in the Josephine Cadaster of 1785-7 resorted to that kind
of statistical study. He did not take into account all the sources avail-
able, because that was much more than a single researcher could cope
with, and resorted to sampling and confined his study to the sample.
The region under consideration (which was the southern part of Poland,
at that time called Galicia) was divided by him into rectangles with
parallel sides of c. 36 km each and meridian sides of c. 18 km each and
he covered by his study those villages only which lay at the meeting
points of his parallels and meridians. This meant a very considerable
limitation of the data covered by the study. Consideration of a greater
number of villages along meridians than along parallels was justified
by the fact that in Galicia, a mountainous country, topographical and
physiographical conditions change much more markedly along the
North-South line than along the East-West line. His study was based
on data from 130 villages, which amounted to 2.3 per cent of the locali-
ties covered by the cadaster.28
In the examples above we have had to do with random sampling.
But in representative studies we also encounter another way of sam-
pling. In works on economic history, if not all available data are used,
it is often said that a number of villages, farms, districts, workshops,
towns, etc., was examined "by way of example", it being clearly sug-
gested that the result thus obtained illustrates the relationships in the
whole population or, at least, in that population for which sources have
been preserved. Usually the principles on which the data were selected
are not described.
Yet it does occur sometimes that we are not in a position to advance
any substantiated hypotheses as to the method of selecting data in the
case of incomplete studies. We then have to do with studies based on

quasi-representative data.
All those partial studies not based on an appropriate method of
sampling (which may obviously be that of stratified sampling, in which
the entire set is divided into subsets and random sampling is carried
out within each subset) resemble structural estimations mentioned
above. But in the case under consideration we can have data about the
whole set but for some specified reasons we study only its part. On the
contrary, in the case of structural estimation the whole set is not known
to us.
It seems that the method of representative selection of data may prove
applicable to those periods for which comparatively few data about
facts occurring en masse have been preserved. For instance, when it
comes to mediaeval social and economic conditions we extract in great
detail from the sources those items of information which refer to tax
burdens of peasants or the size of farms. The question arises, which
might be answered by stitistics experts, whether it would not be possi-
ble to consider such items of information as a sample of a total popula-
tion which is not known in detail. For in such a case the sample is
selected at random and in several stages: the first stage was that a given
fact, as selected from a vast number of other similar facts, was re-
corded in a document. The important task facing the researcher is to
explain why it was exactly that fact which was recorded. Next stages
are connected with the history of the document itself, which made it
possible for it to be preserved till our times. 27
The use of the representative method in historical research calls for
a few comments. First, it seems that the application of that method is
still too limited. This is a defect, especially in view of the fact that the
problem has a long tradition in statistical research: representative stu-
dies were used even by the founders of statistics, J. Graunt and W. Pet-
ty, as early as in the 17th century. The use of the representative meth-
od could facilitate the exploitation of certain sources which so far
have not been examined extensively just because of their massive char-
acter.
Secondly, it seems that we have to define precisely the methods of
sampling in each case of study based. on incomplete data. The point is
that we should be in a position to find out whether we have to do with
504 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISI'ORY
a study based on random sampling or a study based on a purposive

selection of data. This is of s~ial importance in the studies based on
purposive sampling. where the results depend above all on an inten-
tional- and not random - selection by the researcher of that part of
the data which is subsequently analysed.
In modem statistics. the term "representative method" is often ap-
plied only to the studies based on random sampling. it being said that
such studies are a form of partial study.28 In this chapter we have used
that term with reference to both studies based on random sampling and
to those based on purposive sampling of various kinds. This is not to
say that the present writer intends to criticize the attainments of
modem statistical theory. He realizes that there is a considerable dif-
ference between representative sampling in the strict sense of the term.
that is random sampling. and partial data which are not based on
random sampling. It is only in the case of studies based on the former
that it is possible. by applying the probability theory. to define the
precision of the results obtained.
This is achieved by the procedure which the statisticians call statisti-
cal inference and which consists in:
(1) posing a question about the structure of a given set;
(2) examination of part of that set (sampling);
(3) verification of the result (acceptance or rejection of a given statis-
tical hypothesis).
Verification of hypotheses is of a special importance in the case of
representative studies, because our lack of the knowledge of the entire
population increases the risk of an error.
The risk of a greater or lesser error is due to the fact that our assump-
tion that the part under consideration represents the whole set is merely
probable. It is assumed, under the probability theory, that those ele-
ments of the set which are the most frequent are the most likely to be
drawn by lot (and hence to be included in the sample). In addition to
the possibility - despite the assumption mentioned above - of our draw-
ing by lot a none too representative part of the set (even if the sampling
procedure be correct), we must reckon with the fact that errors in
sampling may bias the result, too. For instance, we may have resorted
to stratified sampling while the sample had to be drawn from the whole
set. or vice versa, which has led to the questionability of the results!O
When verifying statistical hypotheses we are guided by the general

principles of rational decision makingl1 and we proceed so as to mini-
mize the probability of errors. Authors who write on the methodology
of statistics (1. Neyman, J. P. Guilford, and others) refer to errors of
of the first kind, which consist in rejecting of a true hypothesis, and
errors of the second kind, which consist in accepting a false hypothesis.
How are we to avoid errors of the first kind, that is, not to reject
a true hypothesis without a due consideration? To do so we have to fix
(preferably before our research begins) what is termed a critical area,
namely the set of those results which we believe unlikely in the light of
our knowledge of facts (that is, in the case of historical research, our
non-source-based knowledge). Once the critical area has been fixed, we
are in a position to find out the probability of errors of the first kind,
which amounts to the sum of the probabilities of results in the critical
area (also called the level of significance: how many times per 100 cases
such results might occur). The lesser that probability, the lesser the risk
of our rejecting a true hypothesis.
Yet if we minimize the probability of errors of the first kind by fixing
a low level of significance (that is, a small critical area), we thereby in-
crease the probability of errors ot the second kind, namely that of ac-
cepting a false hypothesis. Hence we have to decide in which we are
more interested: in avoiding the rejection of a true hypothesis, or in
avoiding the acceptance of a false one. Guilford says that cautious re-
searchers rather avoid errors of the first kind.32 We can also say that
the other way round: the more stringent the criteria of acceptance of
a hypothesis, the greater the risk of an error of the first kind.
The probability of errors is assessed on the basis of statistical tests
of hypotheses, which are rules that indicate whether to accept or to
reject a hypothesis according to whether the value of the parameter
calculated from the sample is, or is not, within the critical area. The
tests also tell us what confidence is to be ascribed to given results.
The chi-square test83 is one of the most useful and commonly applied
as it enables us to verify at one time a hypothesis which pertains to
more than one set (i.e., statistical tables). The value of chi-square is
computed as the sum of the ratios of the squares of difference between
observed frequency and expected frequency to expected frequency. In
other words, we try to express numerically the discrepancy between our
506 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSIORY
non-source-based knowledge and the result obtained from a given

sample and to conclude from this what is the probability of the result
being accidental. In such a case we have to do with two hypotheses
which we compare: the verification hypothesis (the expected structure)
and the verified hypothesis (the observed structure):
2 _ ~ UO-fp)2
X - L.J fe '
where fa stands for'the observed frequency (verified hypothesis), and f.,
for the expected frequency (verification hypothesis).
The number thus obtained must be compared with chi-square tables
(to be found in handbooks of statistics). To do so we must introduce
the concept of degrees of freedom. The number of degrees of freedom
is the product of the rows in the table less one by the number of the
columns less one, or, in symbols:
df = (r-l)(c-l).
Once the degrees of freedom are found, we find in the tables the
value of chi-square for a given (assumed) level of significance, e.g. 0.01.
We then compare it with the value of chi-square as obtained from the
formula given above. If the value we have obtained is greater than that
found in the table, the difference between the two structures, the verified
and the verification one, must be assumed to be significant for the
assumed level of significance; otherwise such a difference is to be inter-
preted as an accidental (random) one.
6. The numerical analysis of structures
From the point of view of the needs of historical statistics, the most
important methods of describing the numerical structure of a set in-
clude averages (which are subdivided into means and positional aver-
ages), also called measures of central tendency; measures of dispersion
and concentration, also called measures of variation; relative numbers
which describe a given structure; and measures of correlation. All of
these are being extensively used by historians, and hence they will be
described briefly one by one.
Mea n s. In historical studies the ordinary arithmetic mean is that
which occurs the most often. Thus, when in a study of prices we try to
find the average price on the basis of a large number of quotations of
prices of a commodity and to do so we sum up the prices shown by the
various quotations and next divide that sum by the number of quota-
tions, then we have to do with an arithmetic mean. We have to do with
the same mean when, in calculating the number of units of land, or
that of horses or cattle per farm, we divide the total area, or the total
number of horses or cattle by the number of farms under considera-
tion. We encounter that mean in many other cases, too, for instance in
the studies concerned with the size of an average family (the number
of the population is divided by the number of the families), in assessing
the number of inhabitants per one house in the urban or the rural
areas, etc. The secondary characteristic which we consider (the price of
a commodity, the size of a farm, etc.), i.e., the variable, takes on dif-
ferent values, which we try to express by a single number.
The arithmetic mean may be rendered by the formula:
s = 2:x ,
n
where x stands for a single measurement (the value of the characteristic
1:
under consideration), n, for the number of measurements, and is the
summation symbol.
The weighted arithmetic mean, which is just an abbreviated form of
calculating the arithmetic mean when the various characteristics of the
variable recur, is very often used. It can be expressed by the formula:
where x stands for the value of the characteristic, and f, for the fre-
quencies of the occurrence of its separate values, i.e., weights. It can
easily be seen that, in the formula given above, in the denominator
1:.' = n. Here is an example.
Suppose we have 10 farms of 0.6 ha each, 20 farms of 0.4 ha each,
and 100 farms of 0.2 ha each and we want to calculate the average size
of a farm. To do so we use the formula given above and obtain:
(0.6 x 10) + (0.4 x 20) + (0.2 x 100) = ~ = 026

10+20+ 100 130· .
Simplified methods of calculating the arithmetic mean are also often

applied.
W. Kula is right in stressing that the historian must know how to use
such methods of calculating means which eliminate the effect of ex-
treme values that may be accidental in nature. His ignorance of the
circumstances in which a given record or entry was made compels him
to be cautious: it is better completely to disregard those numbers which
glaringly differ from the rest than to run the risk of having his calcula-
tion deformed by them.
The geometric mean is one of those which enable us to avoid the ex-
cessive effect of the extreme values.
S. Hoszowski wrote in 1934 (in his Ceny we Lwowie w latach 1701-
1914 (Prices in Lvov, 1701-1914), p. 66) that "When calculating price
indicators we commonly use both the arithmetic and the geometric
mean, but the latter tends to prevail in recent years. The advantage of
the geometric mean consists in the fact that in its case the effect of ex-
treme values is much smaller than in the case of the arithmetic mean".
The geometric mean is used in particular when the values of the char-
acteristic under consideration are expressed in the form of relative
changes (e.g., in percentages), because then the effect of the extreme
values could prove excessively deforming. Mathematically, the geometric
mean equals the root of the degree of the number of observations of
the product of the values of those observations, or briefly, it equals
the root of the n-th degree of the product of n values of the variable:
where n stands for the number of measurements, and Xl> •••, Xn are the
values of the characteristic under consideration.
H we wish to use logarithms, then the above formula takes on the
form:
10gG = 2)ogx .
n
The geometric mean can be weighted, too:
log G = 2:/logx.
2:1
Here is an example of the calculation of the geometric mean. S4 The
extraction of coal (in thous. of metric tons) in Poland in 1946-1949
and its increase in a given year in percentages as compared with the
data for the preceding year were as follows:
1946 47288
1947 59130 24
1948 70267 19
1949 74081 6
V
In this case, G = 24 X 19 X 6 = 16, which means that the average
annual increase amounted to 16 per cent.
The harmonic mean, which could be used in historical research more
frequently than it actually is, also deserves mention. Its formula is:
n
H=---
I~
If, for instance, Fr. 100 was paid for wheat at the price of Fr. 20 per
unit, and another Fr. 100 was paid for wheat at the price of Fr. 10 per
unit, then the average price was not Fr. (20+10)/2 = Fr. 15 per unit,
as altogether Fr. 200 was spent on 15 units. In this case the mean is:
2/(1/20+1/10) = 13 1/3.
P 0 sit ion a 1 a v era g e s. While the arithmetic mean and the
geometric mean are abstract measures (the magnitudes which they ex-
press need not occur at all in the series under consideration), the posi-
tional averages - the median and the dominant, also termed the mode-
are numbers taken from the series under consideration. The median is
the middle value equidistant from the beginning and the end of the
series which must, of course, be ordered by the relation "less than"
(or "greater than"). For instance, if we have the following ordered
series: 17,21,28,34,37,40,52, then the median here is the number 34.
It seems that descriptions of statistical series could be improved if
next to the arithmetic mean we gave the typical mean (that is, that
which occurs the most frequently in the series), i.e., the dominant or
dominants (mode(s», since a series may have more than one dominant.
It would be useful to indicate the dominant, e.g., when we calculate the
number of cattle or the number of land units per farm. In his study of
peasant farms on Church-owned real estates in 16th century Poland
L. zytkowicz35 found that the average size of the farm in 22 villages
was 1.36 lanei. Out of those 22 villages, in 13 the average size of the
farm was from 1.0 to 1.4 lanei, so that this interval was the dominant
or the typical one. This calculation shows, without need of any further
analyses, how far the abstract value which is the arithmetic mean de-
scribes the population in question: it turns out that in this case it does
so quite well as there is no significant difference between the arithmetic
mean (1.36) and the dominant interval (1.0 -1.4).
Mea sur e s 0 f dis per s ion and con c e n t rat ion. The
means and the positional averages describe a given set rather one-
sided1y. But we also wish to know the deviations of the values which
occur in sets from the central tendencies of those sets, i.e., the degree of
variation of a given set.
In statistics, variation measures include: (1) the region of variation or
the range, which equals the difference between the greatest and the
least value in the series, (2) interquartile deviation, which after the
splitting of an increasing series into four quartiles, equals one-half of
the distance between the first and the third quartile (i.e., equals one-half
of the range of central 50 per cent of observations), (3) average devia-
tion (computed thus: the arithmetic mean of the series is substracted
from each value in the series, the differences are summed up regardless
of whether they are positive or negative, and the sum is divided by the
number of terms in the series), (4) standard deviation, the most precise
of all (computed thus: the squares of differences, calculated as under
(3) above, are summed and the sum is divided by the number of the
terms in the series).
The average and the standard deviation will be illustrated by ex-
amples.
Suppose that when studying the crops gathered on various farms we
obtain the following series, where numbers stands for metric quintals
per hectare: 4, 5, 5, 7, 7, 8, 8, 10, 11, 15. In such a case the average
deviation is calculated as follows: (x stands for the value of any term
in the series, S, for the arithmetic mean of the series)
x I x-s
4 -4
5 -3
5 -3
7 -1
7 -1
8 0
8 0
10 2
11 3
15 7
-
Accordingly: LX = 80, S = 8, Llx-SI = 24, where vertical bars in-
dicate the absolute value.
The average deviation is computed by the formula:
where n stands, as before, for the number of observations. This yields

d = 24/10 =2.4.
And here is the formula for the standard deviation:
s= VL (X -S)2.
n
In the case of distributive series we have to weigh the various values

of the variable by mUltiplying them by their frequencies of occurrence
in the series. To compare deviations of different series we may just use
the square of standard deviations, so that the roots need not be ex-
tracted.
Here is an example of the computation of the average deviation.
L. Zytkowicz, in his study mentioned above, computed the arithmetic
mean of the number of cattle and horses per one peasant farm, in 1554,
as 8.2 and 5.9 heads respectively. The means for cattle for the variops
villages were: 2.8, 4.8, 5.6, 5.7, 6.3, 6.8, 7.0, 7.3, 7.3, 7.7, 8.1, 8.4, 9.2,
9.2, 9.3, 9.4, 10.2, 10.7, 10.8, 14.1, 14.4, 14.7. As can be seen, the range
of the means is fairly large. The sum of the squares of the differences
between each value and the arithmetic mean is 154.84, so that the stan-
dard deviation equals
V15;~84 = y'7.4 = 2.7.

Thus the deviation from the mean for the various villages, which was
8.2 heads of cattle per farm, equals c. 2.7 heads.
An analogous computation for the horses yields the standard devia-
tion of c. 1.8.
The standard deviation thus computed cannot be compared directly
as the number of heads of cattle per farm was greater than the number
of horses per farm, and hence the deviation in absolute figures may be
greater, too. This is why we compute variation coefficients by making
use of the data obtained above:
arithmetic standard
mean deviation
cattle 8.2 2.7
horses 5.9 1.8.
Hence the variation coefficients are:
2.7 1.8
cattIe 8.2 = 0.33, h orses 5.9 = 0.31.
This shows that relative fluctuations in the number of horses and cattle
in the various villages were almost the same, the figure for the cattle
being slightly greater. This enables us to conclude that peasant farms
were marked by certain constant ratios between the categories of ani-
mals kept.
In many cases, the measures of variation do not describe the struc-
ture of a given series with adequate precision. They are based on devia-
tions from the average, and we may be interested in the direction of
such deviations, i.e., in the asymmetry (skewness) of the series, which
may be to the left or to the right. In order to find skewness we must
kqow the arithmetic mean, the median, and the mode. In a symmetric
series all the three equal one another (8 = Me = Mo). In the case of
skewness to the right the median is greater than the mode, and the
arithmetic mean is greater than the median; the converse holds for
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN mSTORICAL RESEARCH 513
skewness to the left. Skewness can be measured by the following for-

mula:
S-Mo
sk = .
s
It is thus the ratio of the difference between the arithmetic mean and
the mode to the standard deviation. In the above example for standard
deviation the skewness for cattle would be -0.33. Negative skewness
indicates skewness to the left, whereas positive skewness indicates skew-
ness to the right.
Mea sur e s 0 f con c e n t rat ion. The measures of dispersion
and skewness are of a general nature and can be applied to most statis-
tical series. In some cases, however, we have to calculate measures of
concentration, which enables us to describe the degree of concentration
of the values that occur in a given series (e.g., the distribution of
incomes, the distribution of land, the concentration of population,
etc.). Measures of concentration appear in historical studies in in-
creasing numbers. In Poland, J. Wisniewski tried to analyse the dis-
tribution of incomes in Poland in 1929.36 To do so he described the
concentration of part of the total sum of incomes in the hands of
various parts of the population. S. Borowski's paper37 on the growing
mechanization of agriculture in Greater Poland in the period 1890-
1918 illustrates the use of concentration measures in research on eco-
nomic history. Borowski strove to find out whether the concentration
of land in Greater Poland in the period indicated above was stronger
than the process of the breaking up of estates, and for that purpose he
calculated the measures of concentration of landed property for the
years 1882, 1895, and 1907. Another example is offered by a study by
A. Jezierski, who compared the concentration of landed property in the
various regions of Poland in the early 20th century. That measure of
concentration was used by him as the point of departure for his analysis
of the stratification of the rural population at that time. as Indicators of
concentration (whose calculation is described in all handbooks of sta-
tistics but is too complicated to be explained here) enabled these authors
convincingly to compare the data contained in large statistical series.
In most cases we draw a concentration curve, also known as Lorenz's
curve. Suppose that we want to examine the degree of the concentra-
514 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDsrORY
tion of landed property. To do so we construct two cumulative series:

one of them shows the percentages of farms or estates classed by their
area, and the other indicates the percentage of the total area held by
those farms. Next on the axis of the abscissae we mark the percentages
of farms (estates), and on the axis of the ordinates the percentage of
land under given farms, and then we draw the diagram which illustrates
the percentage of the total area under a given percentage of farms
(estates).39
ReI a t i v e n u m b e r s w h i c h des crib e the s t r u c t u r e.
The structures of sets can be characterized not only by averages and
measures of variation, skewness, and concentration. Relative numbers,
which are well known to historians and which indicate ratios between
numerical values, can also serve that purpose quite well. This category
includes: (1) structural numbers, i.e., percentages and ratios indicating
relationships between parts of a given population. (2) indicators of
intensity, which simply show, e.g., the density of population per one
square kilometer, crops per one hectare of land, output per capita, etc.
Such indicators may be individual or collective (complex): the former
ones indicate a ratio between two numbers each, and the latter ones,
ratio among more than two numbers each.
If x stands for any element of a given set, and Xl' for the element
just under consideration, then the structural indicator which shows
what part of that set Xl makes (in percentages) is calculated by the
following formula:
LX xl 0o.
Xl
When we calculate the indicators of intensity of two series, X and Y,

then we use the following formula (for percentages):
-~ x 100, -~x 100, -~ x 100, ... - ~

x 100.
Yl Y2 Y3 Yn
All these are very. simple operations and yet historians in their work
very often confine themselves, especially in the case of statistical tables,
to absolute numbers only, not accompanied by relative ones.
Collective indicators of intensity facilitate the comparison of struc-
tures of different sets. To construct them we sometimes must have a very
extensive knowledge of those past events which we investigate. The

advantage of those indicators consists in the fact that they enable us to
replace non-additive quantities by additive ones. An interesting example
of such an indicator is to be found in S. Borowski's study on the strat-
ification of the rural population in Greater Poland between 1807 and
1914. When investigating the mechanization of peasant farms in 1881-2
he found that a set of eight machines was characteristic of the degree
of mechanization. Thus, if a farm had only one machine, it was taken
to be mechanized in one-eight; if it had two, it was taken to be
mechanized in two-eighths; etc. If it had eight, it was treated as fully
mechanized. By making use of these indicators the researcher could
compare the degree of mechanization in the various districts, and, hav-
ing appropriately modified his indicator, he also could analyse the
development of mechanization in the course of time.4O
7. A numerical analysis of changes
Historians are particularly interested in studying changes in sets of data

in the course of time, i.e., in operations on chronological series, which
provide information on development trends. It is in that field that we
have to record both the principal achievements and the gravest mistakes
of historical statistics. Fascination with the possibilities of constructing
curves of various kinds, which illustrate economic fluctuations that are
not always real (this type of research prevails), has contributed much
precision to historical narratives, but has also resulted, in some milieus,
in what might be termed "curve worship".
Many types of fluctuations in economic life (or just fluctuations of
curves only) have been found; they have been classed as short-term
ones, seasonal, medium, long-term ones, secular, etc.41 This has laid
foundations for analyses of those factors which account for the changes.
Since usually various real fluctuations have been affected by various
factors, the singling out; of such fluctuations illustrates the effect of
such different factors. The very important point consists in the possibil-
ity of eliminating certain factors and analysing the development of
a certain phenomenon as if a given factor did not exist.
This in turn lays foundations for establishing development trends of
the facts and processes under consideration, which is of utmost impor-
516 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDsroRY
tance for historians. Yet, because of the limited nature of historical

sources and the resulting necessity of using data which may merely be
assumed to be indicators of those variables we are interested in but
have no direct information about, there is a real danger of drawing too
far-reaching conclusions from changes in what we can observe. The
acceptance of price fluctuations' as the indicator of the fluctuations in
economic life as a whole, i.e., as the measure of economic development,
results in mistakes which are particularly disturbing.
Changes in statistical sets are measured above all by means of
(1) measures of development trends, (2) simple and compound indica-
tors, (3) mechanical fitting of statistical series, (4) finding development
trends by mathematical methods.
Development trends may be measured in terms of an absolute or rela-
tive increase. An increase may be positive or negative. An absolute in-
crease is simply the difference between the values of a variable in
a series in two successive periods. A relative increase is the ratio of the
absolute increase to the value in the preceding period. When multiplied
by 100 it yields the increase in percentages. For instance:
POPULATION OF POLAND, 1950-60 (IN 1Hous.)

Increase
Year Number
absolute I relative I per cent
1950 25035
27550
-
2S15
-
0.100
-
10.00
1955
1960 29891; 2341 0.081 8.10
The formula for absolute increase is: xz-x u x 3 -XZ' ... , xn-xn- 1•
The formula for relative increase is:
, ... ,
Xn-X n _ 1
X n_ 1
As can easily be seen, the measures of growth can describe the trend
in a limited manner only. We are often interested in a more complete
comparison of values of a chronological series. In such a case we resort
to single-reference or chain-reference trend indicators (simple or com-
plex).
In the case of a single-reference indicator we first select the period for

which the value (of a given variable) will be used as the basis of com-
parison (reference) for other values in the series. Since that indicator is
usually expressed in percentages, we may write it out thus:
Xl X2
- x 100, - x 100, -X3x 100, ... , -
X"
x 100,
Xo Xo Xo Xo
where Xo is the basis of comparison (reference), and Xl> X 2, ••• , X" are
the successive values of the variable in the series.
Historians, however, find chain-reference indicators more useful, as
these enable them to avoid the effect of an error upon the whole indi-
cator if the reference value is accidental or comes from an unreliable
source which was earlier supposed to be reliable, etc. At the same time
such indicators bring the changes in a given set in fuller relief than do
single-reference indicators.42 In the case of a chain-reference indicator
we compare each period with the preceding one, which means that the
basis of reference changes each time. The formula (in percentages) is
as follows:
~ x 100, -
X3x 100 , - X"- x 100 .
X 4x 100 , ... , -
Xl X2 X3 X"_l
For instance, te chain-reference indicator for the population of Po-
land (see above) would be:
Chain-reference Single-reference
I
Year Number
I I indicator
I indicator (1950 = 100)
1950 25035 - I 100 I

I
1955 27550 110 110
1960 29891 108 I 119
Complex indicators, whether single-reference or chain-reference ones,

which are most frequently used in price studies, are of an extraordinary
value for historians. To describe changes in the general level of prices
we have to consider simultaneously changes in prices of at least several
representative commodities in a given place and at a given time and to
make appropriate comparisons. This is made possible by the complex
indicator to be calculated by the following formulas:
100 x L qo PI (single-reference),
LqoPo
100 x .Lql XPI (chain-reference),
Lql-l x PI_I
where q stands for the quantities of the various commodities, and P, for
their prices, for i = 1, 2, ..., n.
Here is an example:
Period of reference Period studied
Com-
modity price price
in zlotys
I
quantity
in zlotys
I quantity
Po qo PI ql
I 8 7m 10 10 m
n 4 6 kg 5 18 kg
m 2 47 I 2 55 I
Hence Lqo Po = 8X7+4X6+2X47 = 174 (zlotys),

Lqo PI = 10X7+5X6+2X47 = 194 (zlotys),
so that the indicator equals 111.5; thus the price level rose by 11.5 per
cent for the quantities of the period of reference.
The fitting of statistical series (usually combined with curve fitting)
is important for historians since it enables them to eliminate extreme
values recorded (which may not have complied with facts) and to bear
out, even at that stage of the study, the development trend of the phe-
nomenon under consideration. Several procedures can be used. A simple
one consists in breaking up the statistical series into chronological seg-
ments of three, five, ten or more years (or, as the need may be, other
time units such as days, etc.) and in calculating the arithmetic or geo-
metric means for each segment. Instead of a series of real values we
thus obtain a shorter series of periodic means. This approach can be
found in some studies in the history of prices.
Series fitting by means of a moving average is a much more precise
procedure, which is performed as follows. On the strength of observa-
tions we determine the length of the period for which an average is to
be calculated; the longer the period, the smoother the fitted series, but
at the same time the more terms of the series are, however, lost at the
beginning and the end of the series. We may compute the moving aver-
age for periods of three, five, seven, nine years each (the number of
years or other units must always be odd). Once the length of the period
is determined we compute the arithmetic average of as many successive
values in the series (beginning with the first one) as are covered by the
period under consideration, and then we leave out the first value and
add the successive value and compute the arithmetic average again, and
then repeat the procedure all the time moving forward by one (succes-
sive) term in the series. If the successive terms of a series are denoted
by Xl' x 2 ' X 3 , ••• , x n ' then the formula for computing the moving aver-
age for three-year periods is:
etc.
Here is the output of wheat in France (in millions of metric quintals)

in 1919-25;" it is accompanied by three-year moving averages:
Year I Output I Moving average
1919 51 -
1920 64 67.6
1921 88 72.7
1922 66 76.3
1923 75 72.3
1924 76 80.3
1925 90 -
For a longer period of the computation of the moving average the
elimination of annual fluctuations (which are mainly due to changing
weather conditions) would be even greater.
Series fitting by means of averages is a mechanical procedure. We
could also resort to more sophisticated mathematical methods of fitting,
which consist in fitting a mathematical function to an entire statistical
series; such methods, however, are not encountered in historical studies
frequently. If a series can be represented by a straight line, such
a straight line can best be fitted to the deviations of the terms actually
occurring in the series by the method of least squares. This method
makes the sum of the squares of deviations of the actual values in the
series from the straight line which represents the trend to be the least
of all possible ones. H the successive values in the actual series be de-
noted by Xl' X 2 , X 3 , •••, Xno and the values in the corresponding fitted
series are denoted by Xu X2 , X3 , ••• , X n, and the successive time periods
by t l , t 2 , t 3 , •••, tn' then the equation of the straight line which illustrates
the trend is
X = a+bt,
where a stands for the ordinate of the value x for t = 0, and b, for
the tangent of the straight line to the axis of abscissae. 4s To simplify
their tasks historians often find a linear trend by the graphic method,
which, while it is also being done, is less precise.
The logistic curve has been much used with reference to studies of
trends in the past. The curve rises slowly at first, then very steeply, and
then its rise is reversed to be reduced almost to zero, which makes the
curve asymptotically approach the horizontal line that marks the upper
limit of the trend. While it may illustrate the real trend of certain
phenomena over shorter periods, the tendency of various researchers
(usually not historians) to use it to illustrate the demographic
(R. Pearl)46 or the economic (S. Kurowski)47 development of mankind
must be interpreted as cases of "curve worship" mentioned above,
which makes researchers select their data so that they should "prove"
a development that follows a logistic curve. This approach has been
much influenced by biological studies on the growth of living organisms.
8. Correlation analysis
The statistical method enables us not only to describe structures and

trends, but also to illustrate degrees of relationships between facts, and
thus possibly to discover such relationships. It is obvious that the find-
ing out a positive statistical correlation need not imply in each case
a real relationship. In many cases, such a relationship may be apparent
or fictitious. We treat as an apparent relationship (in which we follow
P. Lazarsfeld) a case in which a positive statistical correlation of two
series does not reflect any causal relationship between them, but merely
the fact that both have a more or less direct common cause, which
means that one of these series may for some reasons be correlated with
the real cause of the other series. 48 A fictitious relationship is simply an
accidental statistical coincidence of two phenomena which are in fact

independent of one another. In historical research, where there is no
possibility of making experiments during which a control variable can
be observed, apparent relationships can be eliminat~ through the
observation of other sets, different from the two under consideration in
a given case. The finding out of apparent relationships may often be
included in our research programmes, as we are interested in discover-
ing the degree (strength) of links between various phenomena. It is
obviously a mistake to treat an apparent relationship as a causal one.
The statistical study of relationships makes use of measures of oo,rre-
lation, which include correlation coefficients and regression lines, and
which are being used in historical studies with an increasing frequency.
Among the coefficients the most frequently used (by historians, too)
is Pearson's correlation coefficient, which is expressed by the following
formula:
where r~y stands for the correlation between the series x and y, X and Y
stand for the respective differences between the arithmetic means and
the values of terms of x and y,2:XY stands for the sum of the products
of those deviations, s'" and Sy are standard deviations of x and y, respec-
tively, S", and Sy are the arithmetic means of x and y. respectively.
and n is the number of terms in each series (it being assumed that x
and y have the same number of terms). Here is an example.
y y2
x
I y
I X
I I XI
I I XY
10 8 +2 +2 4 4 4
9 9 +1 +3 1 3 3
8 7 0 +1 0 1 0
7 4 -1 -2 1 4 2
6 2 -2 -4 4 16 8
Accordingly, S", = 8, Sy = 6, X = 0, Y = 0, LX! = 10, 2:Y2 = 34,

2:XY= 17.
522 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lliSTORY
Standard deviations are now computed by the formula given previously:

Sx = J/2 = 1.41; Sy = y'6T= 2.63.
Now
2:XY 17
YXll = 1iiS
x 11
= 5 x 1.41 x 2.63 = 0.92.
The coefficient thus computed points to a very high positive correlation.
Historians also compute multiple correlations, which indicate a rela-
tionship among more than two series. For instance, W. Kula gave cor-
relation of prices of rye in several Polish towns in the 18th century.49
A correlation can be illustrated graphically as the dispersion of points
whose co-ordinates correspond to the values of terms in the series con-
cerned, or by a correlation table, where the values of the terms of one
series are shown, in class intervals, along the horizontal line, and those
of the other series, along the vertical line. The dispersion of the points
is a graphic image of the correlation table.
Regression lines are more informative. They express the mean values
of one characteristic for the changing values of the other. It is to be
noted that in the case of a functional relationship the curve follows
a different course as it corresponds to actual values of one variable for
actual values of the other, and not to the mean values of the former.
While the correlation coefficient (and also the correlation relation for
curvilinear correlations) points to a possible (positive or negative) tela-
tionship between the series under consideration, the course followed
by regression lines illustrates the nature of that relationship. A distinc-
tion may be made between empirical regression lines, i.e., a simple pre-
sentation of the mean values taken on by one characteristic for the
changing values of the other, and fitted regression lines. In fitting them
we may use the method of least squares as mentioned previously.
The application of correlation measures requires a good "feel". When
used incorrectly they either point to apparent relationships or are an
example of a quasi-mathematization which suggests precision but con-
tributes nothing to our better knowledge of the subject matter.
An example of the examination of apparent relationships (in Lazars-
feId's sense of the term) is offered by a study by J. Purs, who compared
the output of steam engines (which characterizes the development of
commodity production) with the number of strikers (1852 to 1890) in
Bohemia and Germany.50 He obtained high positive correlation coeffi-

cient (0.9655), but his result did not add to our knowledge of mutual
relationships prevailing under capitalism. It is obvious that the growing
class struggle of the workers depended on many factors, and the same
general factors contributed to the development of capitalism and capi-
talist industry and the growth of strike movements.
S. Ossowski quotes a study by M. Rokeache, H. Toch, and T. Rott-
man concerned with correlations between the danger to the Church, the
severity of sanctions, and the degree of absolutism as reflected in the
decisions passed by twelve councils of the Roman Catholic Church,
selected from among the nineteen which took place from the Council
of Nicaea (in 325) to the Council of Trent (1545-1563).61 The result (?)
of their study was the finding that the correlation between the danger
to the Church and the severity of sanctions is 0.52, and that between
the danger and the degree of absolutism, 0.66. It turns out, as Ossowski
says, that the formula cum Dei gratia, to be found in council decisions,
was treated by the authors as one of the indicators of a high degree of
absolutism.52
Coefficients of correlation and regression can be calculated by com-
puters. The approach was used by some Soviet historians (e.g., Y. D.
Kovalchenko) in their studies of peasant farms in 19th century Russia
and yielded some very interesting results.
9. Computer applications in historical research
The theoretical foundations for a mathematics-based sorting and pro-

cessing of historical data are provided by information theory, whereas
computers account for practical possibilities in that field. 53 Going
beyond the traditional methods in the social sciences was necessitated
by the rapid growth of scientific research with the resulting information
explosion. The latter accounts for the fact that many items of informa-
tion do not reach the researchers. In their research historians do not
confine themselves to archival data (where the changes that would fa-
cilitate access to such data are necessary, too), but make an increasing
use of the growing literature of the subject. That literature can always
be used only in part unless a revolution takes place in the extraction,
sorting, and processing of data. In such a situation only the best and
most erudite scholars can avoid gross mistakes. Regardless of that fact
the working out of the data will exceed to an ever greater extent the
possibilities of individual researchers, not to mention the fact that in
many cases it is not possible to discover all the relationships involved
unless computers are used.
In view of the experience to date with the mechanization, storage and
processing of data we may single out the following basic stages of the
procedure under consideration:
(l) formulation of a research problem;
(2) fixing the set of texts (sources or results of research) the data
from which are fed into the computers to be processed;
(3) formalization of data, their coding and feeding into the computer
memory;
(4) working out a computer programme and its encoding;
(5) operations performed by the computer;
(6) decoding of the data processed by the computer;
(7) it scholarly elaboration of the data obtained in this way and,
possibly. formulation of a new research problem or working out a
modified computer programme.
To be able to formulate a research problem to be used with the help
of a computer (as we cannot assign a computer an independent role) we
must have preliminary knowledge of the hardware at our disposal (con-
sultations with mathematicians) and of the data available, and also the
conviction that the problem really requires formulation in mathemat-
ical terms.
The fixing of the material from which the data are to be drawn is ex-
pected, next to its other tasks which are usual in all historical research,
to show that data to be extracted from it can be formalized and en-
coded in a computer language.
We quote V. A. Ustinov's numismatic studies to give an example of
formatlization and encoding. The case is that of an ancient coin sub-
jected to investigation (of course. thousands of coins can be examined
in this way).53"
QUANfITATIVE METHODS IN mSTORICAL RESEARCH 525
Metal
I Shape Obverse Reverse Inscription
1 I 2 3 4 5
Silver Irregular circle, Complete pic- Void None

convex on both ture of regard-
sides ant bull
03 11 22 31 41
11 1011 10110 11111 101001
The data about the coin were first encoded in the decimal system
(under the conventions adopted for the five indicators listed at the
headline of the table above, and stating that, e.g., gold = 01, silver =
= 03, an irregular circle = 11, a picture of an inanimate object = 21,
a picture of an animal = 22, etc.), and then translated (in most cases
automatically) into the binary system (in which all natural numbers
must be rendered by sequences of O's and l's).54
The data thus encoded and fed into the computer (usually as per-
forated cards or tapes) are called the input data.
If the computer is to carry out its task it must be guided by a pro-
gramme, which is a schema of the ways in which the input data are to
be handled (processed) successively.
The programme must, of course, be formulated in the computer
language and registered in its memory. The procedure is rather intri-
cate, and must be handled by a mathematician who specializes in com-
puter programming. Ustinov says that in the field of numismatics com-
puters may be expected: (1) to classify coins on scientific principles;
(2) to indicate the class in which a given newly found coin belongs;
(3) to watch for regularities in the material it handles; (4) to test hy-
potheses.
Once programmed, the computer works automatically and yields en-
coded output data, which have to be decoded into a natural language
and then analysed.
At present we have results of many researches based on the use of
computers and carried out in various countries. Next to large-scale
research conducted in the Siberian branch of the Soviet Academy of
Sciences, among others by Ustinov, other studies are concerned with
Russia's social structure in the 18th to 20th centuries, industry in the

Kuznets Basin, demographic issues, etc. Similar research has also been
done in France, Austria, Sweden, Poland, Czechoslovakia, and other
countries.55
10. Quantitative analyses of texts

Quantitative studies of texts, which have been carried out on a large
scale in linguistics and literature,58 have also found their way into his-
torical research. Such studies also make use of computers, which in
many cases is indispensable. In those cases the procedure must comply
with the requirements set by the computer actually used.
From the historian's point of view, two types of studies are of pri-
mary importance:
(1) authorship studies based on a comparative analysis of texts;57
(2) structural studies which have a semantic interpretation in view. 58
To visualize to the readers the application of that method to his-
torical research we shall refer to E. Rostworowski's endeavour to an-
swer the question whether King Stanislaus Leszczynski really was the
author of Glas woZny (Free Voice - a Polish 18th century political
tract- Tr).59 The point was, in particular, to answer the question wheth-
er the earlier version had the same author as the later one. written
beyond all doubt by the king. Should variations in style be found, that
would be interpreted as an element of testing the hypothesis that the
king, when writing the later version, was just modifying the earlier one.
Tho two versions were marked as A and B, respectively.
First, in order to have the texts characterized in a general manner,
the researcher took samples of 4000 words each from the semantically
parallel sections of both versions (samples Ax and Bx). Other samples
were taken from texts of which King Stanislaus is an unquestioned
author (political correspondence from the same period), and marked
L. Samples of versions A and B were later expanded (Al-4. Bl-4). It
was found that B had a little more words in common with L than A had
with L, yet on the whole the language of L was largely cognate to that
of A. In order to find out whether that relationship was merely acci-
dental, or not, comparisons were made with letters of other individuals
who were the king's contemporaries. It turned out that the letters of
Stanislaus Poniatowski, Filip Orlik, and Teodor Potocki bore the same
resemblance to the language of A. Next, s~ples from their letters and
those of King Leszczynski's were co~pared with the vocabulary of B.
This yielded the result that the language of L comes closer to that of B
than to that of A. Version A turned out to be lexically richer. E. ROo
stworowski did not rest satisfied with that, but computed Yule's indi-
cators for the texts A and B, which yielded for A indicators which
point to a more variegated vocabulary of that text. Further a com-
parison was made of the frequency of prepositions and reflexive pro-
nouns (which had been disregarded in the earlier studies) and it was
found that the differences between the samples were statistically not ac-
cidental (for the significance level of 0.001). For instance, the com-
parison of the occurrence of the forms zeby and aby (both mean "in
order to", aby being more formal in present-day Polish, which did not
have to be the case for 18th century Polish - Tr.) gave the following
results:
in absolute numbers
Ax Bx
----
zeby 64 38
aby 7 36
This track was followed in the study: the whole texts A and B were
examined for the occurrence of zeby and aby and compared in that
respect with L. The result was:
in percentages
L B A
zeby 55.0 54.4 90.4
-----
aby 45.0 45.6 9.6
The distributions in Land B may be taken to be homogeneous, which

>
is stressed by E. Rostworowski, who says that "P 0,8, which means
that there are more than 80 chances in 100 that the deviation between L
and B is purely accidental. On the contrary, the difference in the fre-
quency of occurrence of the words ieby and aby in A and B cannot
be accidental, since P < 0.001, which means that there is less than one
chance in 1000 that the deviation is accidental".6o
The example given above points to one of the many possible proce-
dures in text analysi~. Because of the random sampling used (often in
the sense of stratified sampling) it is necessary to resort to methods of
statistical inference, based on probability theory.
II. Prospects for applications of mathematics in historical research
It follows from the foregoing comments that even now various methods
of statistical and other mathematical analyses are being used in his-
torical research, yet it appears that modern statistics and new mathe-
matical procedures have at their disposal many methods which enable
us very well to describe the data subjected to analysis; such methods
could accordingly be applied in historical research on a large scale. It
seems, therefore, imperative to follow carefully new advances in mathe-
matics (including statistics) and to try to apply them to the study of
specifically historical data.
The application of mathematics in historical research is thus part of
the issue of its application in the social sciences and the humanities in
general. It may by said that mathematics can be used wherever it can
help either to solve a problem or to formulate the results of research
with greater precision; historical research does offer it such opportuni-
ties.
Mathematics penetrates the social sciences in general, and historical
research in particular, mainly in the form of the statistical method, es-
pecially in those cases where representative sampling is used together
with the assessment of the degree of the probability of the results ob-
tained. The vast opportunities offered to the representative sampling by
the study of mass phenomena means further advances of mathematics
in historical research. Since representative sampling has so far been
little used in historical studies, the results are somewhat difficult to
assess, but the growing application of statistical methods does not leave
any doubt as to expansion of mathematics in historical research.
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN IITSTORICAL RESEARCH 529
When it comes to economic history, the applicability of mathematical

methods is outlined by the analyses made in economics, especially in
connection with the theory of economic growth. There are no apparent
reasons for which an economic historian, when basing research on the-
oretical economics, should abstain from presenting his results in a way
similar to that of an economist; this applies in particular to illustrating
the relationships between various magnitudes in a mathematical form.
Out of those mathematical methods whose applications may be pre-
dicted in historical research the pride of place, in the present writer's
opinion, goes to linear algebra (which makes it possible to analyse, e.g.,
relationships between the various branches of a given national econo-
my), mathematical analysis (differential and integral calculus), and
analytic geometry. It may also be expected that historians will adapt to
their needs the theory of games and decision making (for instance, to
analyse the strategies chosen by various individuals and social organ-
isms), the topological theory of graphs (to analyse intricate structures),
and presUInably other branches of mathematics as well. All these, how-
ever, will merely be instruments totally dependent upon the researcher
who uses them, and a symbolic superstructure over the ordinary lan-
guage of historical science. This will not alter the fact that the know-
ledge of the development of mankind will remain for the historian the
principal guidance system and the principal mirror (improved in the
course of time) reflecting the successive stages of his research. That im-
provement will in some way depend on the increased application in
historical research of quantitative methods and other branches of
mathematics.
Examples are provided by economics, economic geography, and so-
ciology, which are using the language of mathematics on an increasing
scale when engaging in the study of intricate social problems. It must,
however, be realized clearly that - unlike in the natural sciences - in
the social sciences it is not easy to find any generally accepted set of
easily measurable concepts. It has been found in economics, which in
tum open certain prospects for economic history. To use J. S. Cole-
man's generalizations for sociology we may say that mathematics can
be used for: (1) quantitative descriptions of certain objects, (2) con-
struction of indicators, (3) working out empirical quantitative generali-
zations which link together two or more variables, (4) imparting a for-
mal mathematical structure to social theories. The historian accordingly

faces all these (and presumably other) possibilities. For the time being,
however, it is still too early to sum up the first tentatives, many of them
highly technical in nature.
REFERENCES
1 J. Lelewe1, "Uwagi nad dziejami Polski i ludu jej" (Comments on the His·
tory of Poland and Her People) (1854), in: Polska, dzieje i rzeczy jej (polish
History and Things Polish), vol. m, Poznafl. 1855, p. 327.
I J. Lelewel, "Historia Polski aZ do kOllca panowania Stefana Batorego"
(History of Poland to the End of the Reign of Stefan Batory) (1813), op. cit.,
vol. xm, Poznafl. 1863, p. 579.
8 A. Wyczanski, "Pr6ba oszacowania obrotu Zytem w P,olsce w XVI w." (A
Tentative Estimate of the Rye Trade in 16th Century Poland), in: Kwartalnik
Historii Kultury Materialnej, No. 1/1961, p. 70.
4 A. Soboul, "Opis i miara w historii spolecmej" (Descriptions and Measures
in Social History), quoted after the Polish-language version in: Kwartalnik His-
toryczony, No. 2/1966, pp. 282-3.
6 K. T. Inama-Sternegg, "Geschichte und Statistik", Statistische Monatschrift,
VIII,1882.
6 Z. Daszyilska-Goliflska, "Metoda statystyki historycznej i jej dotychczasowe
zdobycze" (Methods in Historical Statistics and the Achievements of That
Discipline To Date), in: Ekonomista Polski, vol. XI, 1892.
7 This pioneer work is often underestimated when the applications of quan-
titative methods in the study of social structures are discussed.
8 Some French historians exaggerate greatly when assessing the role which
F. Simiand had played in giving precision to methods of historical research.
Even P. Vilar wrote (in connection with his otherwise correct criticism of
R. Aron, who fails to notice modem historical research) that Simiand, by lay-
ing foundations for historical econometrics, "avait fair passer l'histoire du stade
de la description au stade de 1a mesure" (p. Vilar, "Marxisme et histoire dans
~ developpement des sciences humaines", Studi storici, vol. I, No. 5/1959-60,
p. 1016).
9 A. Soboul, op. cit., p. 280.
10 Cf. J. Marczewski, "Histoire quantitative-Buts et methodes", Cahiers de
l'lnstitut de Science Economique Appliquee, No. 115, Series AF 1, Paris 1%2.
11 Here are some major items concerned with general and historical statistics:
S. Szulc, Metody statystyczne (Statistical Methods), vol. I, Warszawa 1952,
vol. II, Warszawa 1954; A. Piatier, Statistique et observation economique, vol. I,
Paris 1961; E. P. Heckscher, "Quantitative Measurement in Economic History".
Quarterly lournal of Economics, vol. UII, 1939; W. Kula, "Statystyka histo-
ryczna" (Historical Statistics), in: Problemy i metody historii gospodarczej
(problems and Methods in Economic History), ed. cit., pp. 343-406; S. Kumetz,
"Statistics and Economic History", Journal of Economic History, vol. I, 1941;

J. Rutkows~, "Metoda statystyczna" (The Statistical Method) in: Historia gos-
podarcza Polski (An Economic History of Poland), vol. I, ed. cit., pp. 8-11;
J. Topolski, "Uwagi 0 metodach statystyki historycznej" (Comments on the
Methods Used in Historical Statistics), in: Studia z metodologii historii (Studies
in the Methodology of History), 00. cit., pp. 79---113; A. P. Usher, "The Ap-
plication of the Quantitative Method to Economic History", Journal of Political
Economy, vol. XL, 1932; R. Mols, Introduction a la demographie historique des
villes d'Europe du XIV' au XVllle sieele, vols. I '& II, Louvain 1955; S. Bo-
rowski, "Charakter i klasyfikacja zr6dcl statystycznych" (The Nature and Clas-
sification of Statistical Sources), Studia :lr6dloznawcze, vol. IX, Poznan 1964,
and the same author's "Charakter i krytyka oceny zr6del statystycznych" (The
Nature of Statistical Sources and a Criticism of Their Evaluation), Studia :lr6d-
loznawcze, vol. X, Poznan 1965. In the present chapter we are concerned only
with the most general and elementary applications of statistics in historial re-
search, especially that concerned with economic history. See also note 53.
12 "Identity" is, of course, a limiting concept, or what is termed an idealiza-
tion; in mathematics, it is an abstract concept; in practice we have to do with
identity as restricted to a certain object under consideration, that is, with in-
distinguishability.
13 The present writer accepts that classification, even though W. Kula's ter-
minology lacks precision. First of all, it is difficult to notice any difference be-
tween mass phenomena and individual phenomena which occur on a mass
scale. Do mass phenomena not consist of individual ones? The difference is to
be sought in the origin of those two kinds of sources.
14 See J. Czekanowski's works. An example is provided by W. Kocka, "Obli-
czanie pojemnosci naczyfJ. metodl! korelacji" (Computing the Capacity of Vessels
by the Correlation Method), Slavia Antiqua, vol. I, pp. 239-46. Note also
E. Vielrose, "Zmiany w odZywianiu si~ rybakow gdanskich w wieku XII i XIII.
Pr6ba oceny statystycznej" (Changes in the Diet of Gdansk Fishermen in the
12th and 13th centuries. A Tentative Statistical Appraisal), Kwartalnik Historii
Kultury Materialnej, No. 2/1956; Vielrose analyses remnants of food found on
excavation sites to establish changes in the proportions of the various kinds of
food.
15 J. Rutkowski, Historia gospodarcza Polski (An Economic History of Po-
land), vol. I, ed. cit., p. 10.
16 J. P. Guilford, Fundamental Statistics in Psychology and Education, Lon-
don 1942 (quoted after the Polish-langUiige 1964 edition).
17 On the grouping of data in historical statistics see W. Kula, Problemy i me-
tody historii gospodarczej (Problems and Methods in Economic History), ed. cit.,
pp. 369-73, and J. Meuvret's essay in: L'histoire et ses methodes, ed. cit.,
pp. 914-24. W. Kula singles out institutional grouping (referring to a specified
institution), such as the classification of peasants according to their relation to
the manorial farm, conventional grouping (e.g., classification of farms by size:
o to 2 hectares, 2 to 5 hectares, 5 to 10 hectares, etc.), and analytical (theoret-

ical) grouping, i.e., one made by the historian from the point of view of the
requirements of his investigations. He also assumes that theoretical grouping
must be verified by the dispersion method, which takes into account the clusters
of data and draws the classificational boundaries through areas of rarification).
18 W. Kula, op. cit., p. 589. This statement comes from his excellent analysis
of problems of historical metrology (Chap. XIII of his book).
19 A. Pawinski, Polska XVI w. pod wzglt;dem geograjiczno-statystycznym
(16th Century Poland. Geography and Statistics), vols. 1 & 2 - Greater Poland,
Warszawa 1883; vols. 3 & 4 - Lesser Poland, Warszawa 1886; vol. 5 - Masovia,
Warszawa 1895; A. Jablonowski's contribution covers vol. 6 - Podlasie, Warszawa
1908-10; vol. 7 - Red Ruthenia, Warszawa 1902-3; vol. 8 - the Volhynia and the
Podolia, Warszawa 1889; vols. 9 to 11- the Ukraine, Warszawa 1894-7.
20 T. Ladenberger, Zaludnienie Polski na poczqtku panowania Kazimierza
Wielkiego (The Population of Poland at the Beginning of the Reign of Casimir
the Great), Lw6w 1930; see also T. Ladog6rski, Studia nad zaludnieniem Polski
XIV wieku (Studies in the Population of Poland in the 14th Century), Wro-
claw 1955.
21 J. Rutkowski, Statystyka zawodowa ludnosci wiejskiej w Polsce w drugiej
polowie XVI wieku (The Occupational Statistics of the Rural Population in
Poland in the Second Half of the 16th Century), Krak6w 1918, pp. 29-30.
22 S. Hoszowski, "Dynamika rozwoju zaludnienia Polski w epoce feudalnej
(X-XVIII w.)" (fhe Growth of Poland's Population in the Feudal Period, 10th
Time When the Congress Kingdom of Poland was Being Organized), Krak6w
to 18th Centuries), Roczniki Dziejow Spolecznych i GospOdarczych, vol. XIII,
p.173.
23 Z. Kirkor-Kiedroniowa, Wloscianie i ich sprawa w dobie organizacyjnej
i konstytucyjnej Krolestwa Polskiego (The Peasants and Their Cause at the
1912.
24 H. Grossman, "Struktura spoleczna i gospodarcza Ksic:;stwa Warszawskiego
na podstawie spis6w ludnosci 1808-1810" (The Social and Economic Structure
of the Duchy of Warsaw as Reflected in the Censuses, 1808-10), Kwartalnik
Statystyczny, No. 2/1928.
25 Generalne tabele statystyczne slqska 1787 roku (General Statistical Tables
of Silesia for 1787); edited and introduced by T. Ladog6rski, Wroclaw 1954.
26 J. Fierich, "Kultury roInicze, zmianowania i zbiory w Katastrze J6zefm-
skim 1785-1787" (Cultures, Rotation of Crops, and Volume of Crops as Shown
by the Josephine Cadaster, 1785-7), Roczniki Dziejow Spolecznych i Gospodar-
czych, vol. XII, Poznan 1950.
27 This suggestion was first made at the 8th Congress of Polish Historians,
held in Krak6w in 1958 (see Historia Gospodarcza Polski (Economic History
of Poland), Proceedings of the 8th Congress of Polish Historians, Warszawa
1960, p. 19.), and came to be criticized by W. Kula (ibid., p. 54, and also in
Problemy i metody historii gospodarczej (Problems and Methods in Economic
History), p. 362). The present writer's approach won the support of a statistician
(see S. Borowski, "Charakter i kryteria oceny zr6del statystycznych" (The
Nature of Statistical Sources and the Criteria of Their Appraisal), Studia :tr6dlo-
znawcze, vol. IX, pp. 1-14). See also J. Topolski's comments on W. Kula's
book quoted in this footnote in Ekonomista, No. 4/1964, p. 831.
28 Cf. S. Szulc, Metody statystyczne (Statistical Methods), vol. II, ed. cit..
p. 173.
29 We are not concerned here with the mathematical foundations of the re-
presentation method, since that would require extensive comments and expla-
nations; the reader is referred to text-books of statistics, such as Part V of
vol. II of S. Szulc's book quoted in footnote 28. The issues of probability as
related to statistical methods are discussed by J. P. Guilford (see foo.tnote 16
above). See also H. Kryilski, Matematyka dla ekonomist6w (Mathematics for
Economists), Warszawa 1964, pp. 354--67.
30 In random sampling we can use tables of random numbers.
31 Cf. K. J. Arrow, "Mathematical Models in the Social Sciences" in: The
Policy Sciences, (eds.) D. Lerner & H. D. Lasswell, Stanford 1957.

32 J. P. Guilford, op. cit., p. 226.
33 The chi-square test was used by E. Vielrose in his paper quoted in foot-
note 14 above. The present writer is obliged to Prof. Vielrose for his extensive
explanations in a personal letter.
34 The example is drawn from o. Lange and A. Banasmski, Teoria statystyki
(Statistical Theory), Warszawa 1968, p. 123.
as L. Zytkowicz. "Uwagi 0 gospodarstwie chl:opskim w dobrach koscielnych
w XVI wieku" (Comments on Peasant Holdings on Church-owned Lands in the
16th Century) in: Studia z dziej6w gospodarstwa wiejskiego (Studies in the
History of Peasant Holdings). vol. I, Wroctaw 1957.
36 J. Wisniewski. Rozklad dochod6w wedlug wysoko:§ci w rokJl1929 (Income
Distribution by Size in 1929). Warszawa 1934.
37 S. Borowski. "Rozw6j mechanizacji pracy w rolnictwie Wielkopolski w la-
tach 1890-1918" (Growing Mechanization of Agriculture in Greater Poland,
1890-1918), in: Roczniki Dziej6w Spolecznych i Gospodarczych. vol. XIX. Po-
znan 1958.
38 A. Jezierski, "Pr6ba analizy statystycznej rozwarstwienia wsi na pocZlltku
XX wieku" (A Tentative Statistical Analysis of the Stratification of the Rural
Population in the Early 20th Century). in: Roczniki Dziej6w Spolecznych i Gos-
podarczych. vol. XVIII. Poznan 1957.
39 o. o. Lange & A. Banasinski, Teoria statystyki (Statistical Theory). ed. cit.,
pp. 172-3.
40 S. Borowski, see footnote 37.
41 Among theoretical studies concerned with such fluctuations see G. Imbert,

Des mouvements de longue duree Kondratieff. Aix-en-Provence 1956.
42 The advantages of chain idicators are stressed by W. Kula in Problemy
i metody historii gospodarczej (problems and Methods in Economic History),

ed. cit., pp. 378-80.
43 The example is drawn from o. Lange & A. Banasiflski, Teoria statystyki
(Statistical Theory), ed. cit., pp. 201-2.
44 These data are drawn from A. Sauvy, Histoire economique de la France,
entre les deux guerres (1918-1931), Paris 1965, p. 462.

45 For considerations of space we do not give examples of the computation
of trends; the reader is referred to works on econometrics, e.g., O. Lange, In-

troduction to Econometrics, Oxford-Warszawa 1962.
46 Cf. S. H. Coontz, Population Theories and Their Economic Interpretation,
London 1957.
47 S. Kurowski, Historyczny proces wzrostu gospodarczego (The Historical
Process of Economic Growth), Warszawa 1%3.
48 On apparent relationships see S. Nowak, Studia z metodologii nauk spo-
lecznych (Studies in the Methodology of the Social Sciences), ed. cit., pp. 81 if.
49 W. Kula, Teoria ekonomiczna ustroju feudalnego (The Economic Theory
of the Feudal System), Warszawa 1962, p. 105. See also 1. Rychlikowa, "Nie-
kt6re zagadnienia metodyczne w badaniach cen i rynku w drugiej polowie
XVIII wieku" (Some Methodological Issues in the Study of Prices and Markets
in the Second Half of the 18th Century), Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materiai-
nej, No. 3/1964, pp. 375-405.
50 J. pur§, "Model zavilosti rustu stavkoveho hunti na rozvoji tovarni rydoby
v obdobe pfedmonopolniho kapitalismu" (A Model of the Effect of Growing
Strikes on Development of Industrial Production Under Premonopolistic Capi-
talism), Ceskoslovensky Casopis Historicky, vol. XI, 1963, pp. 34-45.
51 S. Ossowski, 0 osobliwosciach 'nauk spolecznych (On the Peculiarities of
the Social Sciences), ed. cit., pp. 253--4.
52 The applications (mostly associated with the name of J. Czekanowski) of
correlation co-efficients to studies in the history of culture were discussed by

S. Klimek, "Metoda ilosciowa w badaniach nad histori~ kultury" (The Quanti-
tative Method in the Study of the History of Culture), Roczniki Dziejow Spo-
lecznych i Gospodarczych, vol. III, Poznan 1934, pp. 57-76.
53 Books and papers on the applications of information theory and computers
to historical research are too many to be quoted here. We shall mention here
only those guides for using computers in historical research which we consider
the most useful for historians: Ch. M. Dollar, R. J. Jensen, Historian's Guide
to Statistics. Quantitative Analysis and Historical Research, New York, Chicago,
San Francisco, Atlanta, Dallas, Montreal, Toronto, London, Sidney 1971;
E. Shorter, The Historian and the Computer. A Practical GuMe, Englewood
Cliffs, N.Y. 1971. See also the elementary introduction to statistics for historians:
R. Floud, An Introduction to Quantitative Methods for Historians, Princeton
1973. Literature of the subject is given in the book by Dollar and Jensen.
54 For information's sake we give here binary system equivalents of the first
numerals in the decimal system:
QUANTITATIVE METHODS IN msrORICAL RESEARCH 535
0-0, I-I, 2-10, 3-11, 4-100, 5-101, 6-110, 7-111, 8-1000, 9-1001, 10-1010, 11-
lOll, etc. For instance, 2 in the decimal system is rewritten in the binary system
thus: 2 = 1.21 +0.2°, i.e., as a sequence of powers of 2 multiplied, as the case
may be, by 1.
55 J. C. Gardin and M. P. Garelli used an IBM computer to process mathe-
matically the data provided by the numerous cuneiform tablets dating from the
19th century B.C. and excavated in Mesopotamia; they contain data about com-
mercial transactions concluded among some 2000 merchants over a period of
about 50 years. The study was intended to establish the merchants' places of
origin, the commodities they specialized in, etc. (Cf. "Etude sur les etablisse-
ments assyriens en Cappadoce", Annales ESC, vol. 16, No. 5/1961, pp. 837-76.
J. de Launuy also used an IBM computer to study opinions to be found in
historical literature on many issues of contemporary history (cf. Les grandes
controverses de I' histoire contemporaine, Lausanne 1964). The progress in the
applications of computers in historical research up to 1970 was largely discussed
at the 13th International Congress of Historical Sciences in Moscow. Special
mention is due to the following papers: D. V. Deopik, G. M. Dobrov, J. J. Kahk,
I. D. Kovalchenko, H. E. Palli, V. A. Ustinov, Quantitative and Machine Meth-
ods of Processing Historical Information, Moscow 1970; J. Schneider, La
machine et l'histoire. De l'emploi des moyens mecaniques et electroniques dans
la recherche historique, Moscou 1970; C. G. Andrae, Sven Lundkvist, The Use
of Historical Mass Data. Experiences from a Project on Swedish Popular Move-
ments, Moscow 1970. For general comments see J. H. Hexter, History, the
Social Sciences and Quantification, Moscow 1970. Current advances in modern
quantitative methods are discussed by Historical Methods Newsletter, published
by The University Center for International Studies and The Department of
History at the University of Pittsburgh.
56 That such research has a fairly long tradition is shown by W. W. Grey,
The Calculus of Variant. An Essay on Textual Criticism, Oxford 1927. See also
Poetyka i matematyka (Poetics and Mathematics), M. R. Mayenowa (ed.),
Warszawa 1965 (reviewed in Poland by J. Kmita in Studio Metodologiczne,
No.3).
57 An example is provided by the study of the authorship of St. Paul's
epistles. See B. Jewsiewicki, "Uwagi 0 zastosowaniu maszyn cyfrowych w ba-

daniach historycznych" (Comments on the Applications of Digital Computers in
Historical Research), Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej, No. 4/1965,
p.734.
50 An example is provided by an analysis of the Koran. See K. Wyczanska,
"Prace nad mechanizacjll informacji w naukach spolecznych" (Mechanization
of Information in the Social Sciences), Kwartalnik Historii Kultury Materialnej,
No. 4/1965, p. 741.
59 E. Rostworowski, Legendy i fakty XVIII w. (Legends and Facts of the
18th Century), Warszawa 1963, pp. 68-144,

60 Ibid., p. 124.
XXI. THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION
IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH
1. The various interpretations of historical explanation
It has been said that to a factographic question (what was?) we answer

by establishing facts, and to an explanatory question (why was it so?),
by offering a causal explanation. Even though the historian's research
procedures can be reduced to answers to these two types of questions
(if we disregard for the time being questions about laws), yet the
various intuitive interpretations associated with the term "explanation"
require some comments.
Analysis of many historical studies shows that the task of historical
explanation may be interpreted in at least the following ways:
(1) explanation by description (descriptive),
(2) explanation by pointing to the origin of a given phenomenon
(genetic),
(3) explanation by indication of a phenomenon's place in a given
structure (structural),
(4) explanation by offering a definition of a phenomenon (defini-
tional),
(5) explanation by indication of a cause (causal).
The concept of descriptive explanation has the broadest extension of
all, since it may cover all the remaining types of explanation. This is so
because if a person says: please, explain to me the Crusades or the
English political system in the second half of the 17th century or
France's American policy after World War II, then he may except a
simple description of the facts involved, or information about the
development stages (origin) of those facts, or the formulation of their
definitions, or the pointing to their causes. These various possible types
of explanation may also include a simple description, not accompanied
by any endeavour to indicate the causes, a description in which it
would be difficult to find any orderly indication of the origin of the
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 537
fact in question or its place in a structure. That is the case which we

have in mind when singling out descriptive explanation. Note also that
in the last analysis all forms of explanation usually take on the form
of a historical description (narrative).
Genetic explanation (to be treated more extensively later) consists in
indicating the successive stages of development of a given historical
fact. By making a genetic explanation we answer the question: how did
it occur that ... ? Note that this is a different question from: why did it
occur? - even though when answering both questions we may take the
same facts into account. For instance, when we ask: how did it come
to the outbreak of World War I? and: why did World War 1 break out?
(or: what were the causes of World War I?) we may draw attention to
the same issues, yet when posing a genetic question we wish above all
to have a description of the successive events that had led to the out-
break of World War I. Thus we answer a question calling for a genetic
explanation by enumerating a genetic sequence of facts involved. Some
authors, who claim that historical research is concerned with "the
unique" and hence does not offer any causal explanations (unlike the
natural sciences), maintain that by answering with a description of
what occurred we at the same time offer an explanation of the 'why'
type (Collingwood).
It often happens that the person who asks about the origin of an
event does not realize clearly whether he wants to know the successive
(especially the earliest) development stages of a given fact, or the causes
of its occurrence (its characteristics, changes in its structure, etc.). When
we are asked a question, e.g., about the origin of the Polish army after
World War II, then it is obvious that the question is about the develop-
ment stages which have resulted in the situation prevailing in a given
period. But if a person asks about the origin, e.g., of Beck's foreign
policy, he doubtless wants to know something about the factors which
explain some of his moves (Le., wants to know something about the
causes), be they even some mental characteristics of that politician.
This shows that a question which is genetic in its form may sometimes
be a question about causes. A pure genetic explanation is an answer to
a 'how' question.
A structural (or functional) explanation points to the functions of
a specific element of a given whole. If a person asks: please, explain to
me the role of the Diet in Poland, then in all probability he wants us

to tell him about the way that institution functions within the entire
structure of the Polish state authorities. In such cases an explanation
answers a 'how' question. One of the historian's major tasks is to point
to the role of given facts within more comprehensive structures. For
instance, when we describe Poland's declining importance on the inter-
national arena at the beginning of the 18th century, then we offer
a typically structural explanation. We also have to do with such expla-
nations when we place certain processes within a larger setting (e.g.,
when we interpret the strikes in Russia in 1905-6 as a component of
the revolution of 1905-7).
A definitional explanation is somewhat intricate. At any rate, we
have to do with two kinds of such explanation:
(1) answers to 'what (who) is that?' questions,
(2) answers to 'why?' questions.
In the former case, the person who poses a question wants us to ex-
plain it to him, e.g., what was the Inquisition which sent Giordano
Bruno to the stake? what was the Long Parliament? what was the Cri-
mean War? who were the Gracchi (or Giuseppe Mazzini or Lumum-
ba)? who were the Roman plebeians (or the Moriscoes or the Bud-
dhists)? what is the crime of genocide? what was feudalism? what was
papal universalism? etc. When answering such questions we resort to
certain descriptions which take on the form of nominal definitions (if
we explain the meaning of a given term by referring it to the meanings
of terms which that person already knows) or real definitions (if we
try to characterize a given object in a non-ambiguous manner). Thus,
when I say that the cardinal laws in 17th and 18th century Poland were
"those provisions of law which laid down the fundamental principles of
the Polish political system and were superior of other laws",1 I offer
a definitional explanation which is both a nominal and a real defini-
tion. The same applies to the formulation: "the Libyan campaign was
the operations carried out in Libya during World War II, specifically
in the years 1940-3, by the British Army and the troops of the Axis
Powers, which ended in driving the Axis troops into Tunesia".2
In the latter case a definitional explanation is an answer to the ques-
tion: why? We mean here questions of the type: why was Adam Mic-
kiewicz (Polish Romantic poet - Tr.) in a certain period of his life called
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN msrORICAL RESEARCH 539
a Towianskian? Questions of this type are answered by the formulation

of an appropriate definition or some direct consequences of such a de-
finition. Thus, e.g., we say that Mickiewicz was called a Towianskian
because he was under the influence of Towiruiski and his messianic sect.
In this case our point of departure is a definition of the concept "To-
wianskian", i.e., "a man who accepts the views of Towiruiski" or a nar-
rower one, namely "a member of Towianski's sect". When answering
the said question about Mickiewicz we offer, as an explanation, a de-
finition of the concept "Towianskian". We have here to do with the
following case of inference:
Premisses:
(1) a Towianskian is a person who accepts Towiruiski's views,
(2) Mickiewicz accepted the views of Towianski.
Conclusion:
(3) Mickiewicz can be called a Towianskian.
Another example. The definition stating that the concept of relative
covers a son of my father's brother leads me to conclude that: John is
a relative of mine since his father is my father's brother.
Only a causal explanation may be treated as an explanation in the
strict sense of the term. Advancing causal explanations is that funda-
mental procedure which takes the historian above simple descriptions
of events and links his research with the study of scientific laws and
theories. We shall hereafter be concerned mainly with causal explana-
tions and, to some extent, with genetic explanations, which are as-
sociated with the former. But we must first make some comments on
the problem of understanding in historical research in order to be able
to define the relationship between understanding and explanation.
2. Understanding and explanation
The apparently simple formulation that in order to explain something

one has first to "understand" that something brings us into the thick
of the most lively discussions of the specific traits of historical research
and also brings out in full relief one of the most important meeting
points between the social and the natural sciences. Can the concept of
"explanatory" historiography, which does away with the introspective
principles of intuitionism, fully replace the principle of "understand-
ing" historiography which points to the necessity of "understanding"

the past events (i.e., the people who acted in the past - cf. Chap. VII),
the principle advanced by intuitionistically-minded historians (such as
R. G. Collingwood, W. Dilthey, H. J. Marrou, H. Butterfield, P. Ri-
coeur, H. G. Gadamer, and others)? Does the understanding of past
events mean their explanation? The answer depends on the meaning
which we are inclined to impart to the terms "understanding" and
"explanation". For the intuitionists, "empathy" means explanation.
They accordingly interpret explanation in a very narrow sense, as
an act of empathy and a report on its results. In their opinion (in its
radical version), no other type of explanation is possible, be it in
historical research or anywhere else where we have to do with human
beings whose actions must be "understood". The representatives of the
empirical approach deny the empathy method all cognitive value; in
their interpretation, the concept of understanding loses its psychological
sense and is identified with explanation (by description or explanation
sensu stricto) made by the historian without any reference to his own
inner experience, which is unobservable to others.
These two approaches gave rise to a lively discussion, and if we in-
clude in it the criticism by logical positivists of "intuitive" metaphysics,
then we have to say that that discussion is one of the most active in
the history of science. We are here less interested in that criticism as,
in accordance with the principles of all scientific methodology, we do
not fully accept the intuitionist viewpoint (even though we do not deny
their role in opposing positivism). It is, however, an open issue, which
calls for further analyses, whether it would not be justified to accept,
contrary to radical empiricists, a certain role of the empathy method
(which, after all, would just mean a partial description of what actually
does take place in research procedures).
Such a formulation would imply a certain extension of the empiricist
meaning of understanding as it would go beyond a mere description or
explanation of facts. The term "explanation" could, after all, be reo.
tained, but it would then have to cover certain elements of inner
experience.' Explanation would form a combination of extraspective
and introspective procedures.
The acceptance and the appraisal of the validity of the empathy
method in the study of human beings (we are not concerned here with
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH 541
controversies among psychologists) have, as has been said, given rise to

many discussions in the sphere of scientific (and hence anti-intuitionist)
methodology. The standpoints taken by the various disputants to some
extent reflect their opinions on the methodological status of the social
sciences and the humanities, including history. More radical naturalists
are inclined to belittle and to restrict the role of introspection in scien-
tific procedures; others recognize the specific nature of the social
sciences and the humanities, or be it history alone, and are willing to
make greater concessions in favoty" of the empathy method; still others
would like to bring about a conciliation between these two standpoints
by interpreting the concept of understanding so as to make it ac-
ceptable to a possibly large number of representatives of both stand-
points. But then what is the concept of understanding in question?
That of the intuitionists? For presumably not that of the radical em-
piricists, who identify it with extraspection only.
When analysing the attitudes of sociologists, some of them humani-
stically-minded and others empiricistically-minded, S. Nowak tried to
comment on the various meanings of the term "understanding" and
pointed to such a meaning of it which might be accepted in the endeav-
ours to validate the introspective method in the methodology of the
social sciences.4 While he excludes from his considerations the non-psy-
chological types of understanding; he pointed out that we might con-
sider drawing from human behaviour conclusions about the underlying
mental states; in doing so he discussed only that human behaviour
which is conscious and goal-oriented (instrumental), to the exclusion of
what might be termed symptomatic behaviour. In such cases instru-
mental human behaviour plays the role of inferential indicators, which
enable us to determine a given person's inner experience. How, how-
ever, are we to pass from such inferential indicators to which sources
refer to determining the mental states of the individuals involved? At
this point S. Nowak referred to Reichenbach's distinction between
"abstracta" and "illata", of which the former pertain to observable
phenomena, and the latter to non-observable ones, but such that their
real existence is assumed. He also found support in Carnap's concep-
tion (the language of observations versus the language of theory) and
introduced the concept of a hypothetical introspective (psychological)
542 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lllSIORY
construction as the instrument of transferring the results of one's own

introspection upon others.
This programme - under the obvious assumption that the researcher's
mentality is "sound", because otherwise his own morbid inner experi-
ence could greatly distort the results of his research - may contribute
some additional results in the study of contemporary phenomena, but in
historical research reliance on introspection in the search for the motiva-
tion of actions undertaken by individuals (and a fortiori those under-
taken by groups) would be extremely risky. It would, of course, be
very tempting to validate that which the historian usually does, but
which he usually conceals as he does not want to be blamed for subjec-
tivism or a "psychological approach". Yet making use of one's own
experiences for "translating" acts of behaviour of earlier people into
their motivations would result in anachronisms. As long as historical
research remains as remote from psychology as it is still today, i.e., as
long as there no sui generis historical psychology6 that would provide
historians with modifiers which would enable them to project their own
experiences onto people who lived in earlier epochs, the programme of
an understanding historical research (modelled after understanding so-
ciology) would mean the return to the concept of changeless human
nature. At least for the time being, when we reconstruct the mental
substratum in explaining human actions by human motives, we must
rely on behaviouristic data (which ought to be studied by historians
more thoroughly) more than on the empathy method. It is not, how-
ever, the intention of the present writer totally to reject that method,
even at the present level of integration of historical research and psy-
chology.
Making use of introspection in historical research is substantiated by
the plain statement that a historian's knowledge of himself is an ele-
ment of his non-source-based knowledge. If we make use of our non-
source-based knowledge when it comes to the external world, then there
is no reason why we should not use the results of inner cognition. The
point is, however, that - as has been said - it is extremely difficult to
make a proper use of the knowledge of oneself when describing and
explaining the actions of those who lived earlier (except for the basic
mental reactions, common to all people, called primitive motivations,
such as the necessity of allaying one's hunger, etc.).
The present writer thus does not agree with S. Ossowski who, when
referring to a discussion among methodologists of history, did not take
side with C. G. Hempel/ who restricted the application of the empathy
method to the heuristic role of an instrument of suggesting psychologi-
cal hypotheses, but subscribed to the opinion of W. Dray,S who claimed
that the historian must always resort to empathy whenever he wants to
discover the motives that guide human goal-oriented actions. Ossowski
went even further than Dray as he thought that introspection can also
help us discover the causes of reflection-free actions dictated by sub-
conscious motives. 9
Ossowski claimed that in the social sciences and the humanities inner
experience performs at least four functions: (1) heuristic, when psycho-
logical intuition helps us to formulate hypotheses; (2) interpretative,
when human utterances and other external responses are treated as in-
dicators of certain mental states; (3) explanatory, when it explains rela-
tionships in human behaviour by finding out the motivations by which
the persons in question are guided; (4) substantiating, when it supports
general statements in situations where observational data do not suffice
to make verifications that would meet scientific requirements. 1o When
it comes to historical research, at least at the present stage of its links
with psychology, this writer is inclined to adopt a clearly, though not
radically, empiricist standpoint, that is, to accept as legitimate only the
heuristic function of empathy (i.e., to emphasize the importance of what
is called intuition in research) at all stages of research, that is, in fact
finding, causal explanation, and construction of synthetic conceptions;
on the other hand, he is inclined to reject the usefulness of the empathy
method in the process of explanation and synthesis, i.e., in the proce-
dure of substantiating and verifying hypotheses.
This means that the understanding of human actions - since that is
what is only involved in the issue of understanding - means their ex-
planation, in the course of which we admit empathy as a heuristic
factor. Next to understanding treated as explanation we may also in-
terpret understanding in historical research as a kind of justification of
human actions by referring them to the system of values which is ob-
ligatory in a given social group or a given culture.
3. Types of causal explanation in historical research
We have thus come to the conclusion that in historical research the

process of understanding may be identified with that of explaining. Its
extension is, however, somewhat narrower as the term applies to human
actions only, or, more precisely, to goal-oriented human behaviour. But
did not the intuitionistically-minded historians (for whom the issue of
explanation of unintended consequences of actions undertaken by many
people did not exist) draw attention to an essential problem, namely to
a specific nature of the explanation of goal-oriented human actions
though they obviously did not use any terminology of this kind)? We
have to answer this question in the affirmative and accordingly to make
distinctions between:
(1) explanation of goal-oriented human actions which assumes ration-
al actions;
(2) explanation of unintended consequences of actions undertaken by
numerous people, i.e., of processes.
Next to the above classification we can point to other classifications
of causal explanation, based on different criteria. We thus in turn dis-
tinguish:
(1) explanation by reference to dispositions,
(2) strictly causal explanation.
In the former case we mean pointing to the disposition of the system
the changes of which we examine to undergo such changes; we do not
refer here to any factor that is external to the system in question. In
this interpretation the cause is as it were inherent in the system. In the
case of a strictly causal explanation we indicate factor(s) external to the
system. Some authors do not make any distinction between explanation
of goal-oriented human actions and explanation by reference to dispo-
sitions.
The further classification of causal explanation in historical research
is that which refers to the logical nature of their substantiation. As we
assume that the deductive model, constructed by C. G. Hempel, is a sui
generis ideal pattern of causal explanation in historical research, we
shall try to find out how far the various types of explanations, encoun-
tered in historical studies. come close to that IIlodel. We shall accord-
ingly distinguish:
(1) explanation by reference to laws which lay down the sufficient or

the necessary condition (or both);
(2) explanation which lays down one of the alternate sufficient condi-
tions (a condition which under given circumstances is a necessary one);
(3) explanation by reference to favourable conditions.
This classification also applies to those listed above (and hence also
explanations of goal-oriented human actions and explanations by
reference to dispositions). From another point of view we may refer, on
the one hand, to laws which are exception-free, and on the other, to
those which are statistical in nature (Le., indicate a degree of pro-
bability), as the basis of causal explanations in historical research.
Another classification of laws is that into less and more abstract ones;
the latter category is 'applicable to ideal types (such as capitalism or
feudalism), in which the historian takes only the essential features of
such concepts into consideration, constructed on the basis of acceptance
of a number of idealizing assumptions.
Still another classification draws attention to explanation by the in-
dication of direct and indirect causes; it is associated with the classifica-
tion into mono-causal and multi-causal explanations (the latter category
being typical of historical research).
We shall now discuss the explanation of goal-oriented human actions
and explanation by reference to dispositions. Explanation of unintended
consequences of actions undertaken by many people and strictly causal
explanation will not be singled out as separate items, since they will
be mentioned in the sections concerned with explanation from point of
view of its logical substantiation.
4. Explanation of goal-oriented human actions (humanistic interpreta-

tion)
We are concerned here with those human actions which are goal-ori-
ented and are also termed rational. This type of explanation, which the
intuitionists wanted to obtain by the specific acts of empathy, can well
be described in terms of the reconstruction of man's rational activity.
Intuitive empathy can fully be explained in terms of methodological
concepts which do not give rise to objections as to the scientific nature.
To do so we may resort to the general concepts used in the theory of
games, to what is termed the logic of situation and is associated with

the problems of historical explanation, and to the achievements of
behaviour theory. ,This approach covers goal-oriented actions under-
taken both by individuals and social groups, but, as has been said, does
not apply to the explanation of the consequences of actions undertaken
by many people. l l This is so because such consequences are not intend-
ed by these people, and hence may not be explained by reference to
concepts used in the theory of games and decisions. Historical pro-
cesses which are results of such actions resemble processes which take
place in Nature. With respect to the latter, like with respect to most
consequences of actions undertaken by large groups of people, we need
not assume rational behaviour. This is not to say, of course, that in the
future man will not be able to guide mass actions undertaken by human
beings to a greater extent than he can do it today, and to attain intend-
ed goals. It is, however, to be doubted whether such predictions could
reach into a remote future.
When it comes to explaining human actions, regardless of whether
we mean actions undertaken by individuals or by groups, the historian's
task is rather more difficult than in the case of explaining unintended
consequences of actions undertaken by large groups of human beings,
because in the former case he also has to reconstruct the mental atti-
tudes of the agent(s). This means that in addition to reconstructing the
set of those external factors which in a given case affect human be-
haviour, he also has to reconstruct inner processes in human beings.
For it is obvious that only the integration of the external stimuli with
the internal ones, that is, the filtration of the external stimuli by given
human mental systems yields given human behaviour, in this case an
action oriented to a given goal.
Specified Goal-oriented
facts or action
conditions
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN lUSTORICAL RESEARCH 547
The conditioning of human behaviour may be illustrated by the

above schema.
This schema shows how a specified situation, by producing certain
stimuli to appropriate actions (e.g., social oppression as a stimulus to
resistance against it), when confronted with the previous experience of
an individual or a number of individuals, yields - for a given mental
state or attitude - the formulation of the goal of an action and accord-
ingly an action (e.g., abandonment of resistance, because experience
recalls of cruel repressions).
When explaining human actions historians were not always equally
interested in the whole chain of relationships shown above. For a long
time they confined themselves to explaining actions undertaken by in-
dividuals (and mostly eminent individuals only) by taking into con-
sideration their internal life (usually reconstructed by introspection),
that is, the internal processing of external stimuli in the light of earlier
experience, the processing which ultimately would yield a given kind
of behaviour.
Progress in explaining human actions in the past consisted in a more
balanced treatment of the explanatory function of both previous ex-
perience and external stimuli, and also in the examination of the sub-
stratum of such stimuli. This meant explanation of hum~n actions as
linked with an adequately treated system within which that action took
place.
In the historical and methodological literature of the subject we find
numerous references to the fact that explaining human actions consists
in discovering the motives of those actions (where motives may be
interpreted as goals).!! We shall call that the motivational structure of
a goal-oriented action. The concept of motivation may be interpreted
so as to imply an analysis of the substratum of the external stimuli
which help to shape the goals of human actions.
If, in order to purify historical research from the naively psycholog-
ical approach, we restrict the role of introspection to suggesting certain
hypotheses that may help to reconstruct such motivations (goals), then
we have to face the problem how a historian is to associate with human
actions their underlying motivational structures. In some cases he has at
his disposal, as is known, the reports of the individual he is concerned
with on the motives by which that individual was guided in his actions.
Such statements, however, must be treated by a historian with utmost

caution in view of the fact that people very often do not realize the
motives of their own actions;18 those statements must, accordingly, be
treated as a certain type of behaviour that is still to be explained.
The most general schema of interpreting human actions as a sui ge-
neris game intended to achieve a certain goal, i.e., results useful for
the agent, is provided by the theory of games and decisions. That
theory can inform the historian what are the principles of the various
types of games and how decisions are made under certainty and under
uncertainty (incomplete knowledge) by individuals and by groups, etc.
The basic assumptions of games and decision making are formulated
by R. D. Luce and H. Raiffa as three postulates which are worth
quoting here:
(1) each player has a pattern of preferences over the set of outcomes
which satisfies the axioms of utility theory;
(2) each player is fuIly aware of the rules of the game and the utility
functions of e;:tch of the players; .
(3) a player will attempt to maximize expected utility.14
In other words, when acting in a goal-oriented manner a person tries
maximally to attain his expected goals, and his success depends on his
knowledge of the rules of the game and the goals of the other players;
it is obvious that facts or situations may be interpreted as one of the
players. There is no need to emphasize that people are induced to par-
ticipate in the game (i.e., to act, i.e., to behave in a specified manner)
by their goals, which reflect their respective scales of values.
The theory of games, which is given a mathematical interpretation,
might be treated as a formalization of the concept of situation logic,IS
which is closer to what a historian does in his research practice. The
fundamental terms of that logic are:
(1) a person,
(2) his milieu,
(3) a set of alternate choices of means,
(4) a set of possible outcomes,
(5) preferences for specified outcomes,
(6) the knowledge of (probabilistic or deterministic) relationships be-
tween means and outcomes.
Thus, in order to explain a goal-oriented human action, that is, to
answer the question why a given person acted so and so, we have to
know all the elements listed above. The better we know them, the
more satisfactory our explanation is. We, therefore, have no need to
resort to empathy, even though empathy may in many cases seem easier
than genuine research. The six elements listed above can be translated
into the language of historical research as follows. In order to explain
goal-oriented human actions we have to know:
(1) the mental characteristics of the agent(s),
(2) the conditions under which he (they) acted (certainty, risk, un-
certainty),
(3) the means he (they) had at his (their) disposal,
(4) the goal he (they) had in view (together with the scale of values
of the agent(s».
(5) the knowledge he (they) had at his (their) disposal (especially
concerning 2 and 3).
The agent who wants to attain a certain goal (under specified con-
ditions, by making use of the means he has at his disposal, and availing
himself of his knowledge of the existing conditions and the effectiveness
of the means) undertakes actions intended to make him attain that goal.
We therefore should be able to reconstruct that goal, the means used,
and the agent's body of knowledge.
Suppose that we ask why a commander ordered his army to retreat
from the battlefield and that we are inclined to blame him for that.
To arrive at an explanation we must first reconstruct the goal which
was to be attained by him as a result of his decision. His goal could
have been not to win the battle, but to spare his troops in order to be
able to deal his enemy a smashing blow under changed conditions. Next
we have to analyse the conditions under which the commander had to
act. This may include the terrain, the supplies, the ratio of strength of
the troops, the general goal of the war, his dependence on others, etc.
It is also important to know the means which the commander had at
his disposal to attain his goal. There could have been alternate choices
(e.g., an armistice). Finally, it is very important to find out what his
knowledge was. Did he know the supposed efficiency of his means?
Did he know all the means he could have used? Was he informed about
the conditions under which he had to act? For instance, he could have
550 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSIORY
decided to retreat because he did not know that unexpected reinforce-

ments were coming.
The historian often has very limited possibilities of acquiring suffi-
cient information about all the elements of situation logic. Such a
complete knowledge may be treated as a certain ideal state (ideali-
zation) for which he strives in the course of his explanation procedure.
Note that explanation by means of a reconstruction of elements of
situation logic consists of two elements:
(1) indication of the goal (motive) of action,
(2) assessment of whether the action was rational from the point of
view of that goal.
If we ask: "Why did commander X order his army to retreat?", we
may reply: "Because he wanted to spare his troops for a later and
a more important attack" and take this explanation as sufficient. But
we may go further and try to find out whether the retreat was rational.
That rationality may in turn be assessed from the point of view of
(incomplete and possibly faulty) knowledge of the commander or from
the point of view of our (researchers') knowledge of the conditions
under which he had to act, the means he had 'at his disposal, and the
effectiveness of those means.
Some scholars (P. Gardiner, W. Dray, and others) hold that when
explaining the past by referring to situation logic the historian does not
refer to laws. Others (Hempel and his followers, E. Nagel) claim that
it is not possible to explain actions by individuals without considering
general statements of various kinds. The present writer's standpoint is
that it is indispensable to refer to laws, such laws always being state-
ments about rational action (i.e., about performing specified acts under
specified conditions).
We shall consider two situations: (1) when the goal of action is in-
dicated by a reliable source, (2) when we have to reconstruct that goal
ourselves. In the former case, if we follow the sources and state that
the retreat was motivated by the intention to spare the troops, we tacitly
refer to a general statement of the type: very often it is much better
to spare one's troops than to gain a Pyrrhic victory. An analysis of the
various elements of situation logic should confirm our belief that such
was the case of the battle under consideration. The commander must
have kqown that he could not spare his troops without stopping the
operations. As he wanted to spare his troops, he acted accordingly.
If we reconstruct the goal of action (the motive) ourselves, we even
more need a reference to an appropriate general statement. Thus from
the fact that the commander made his army retreat even though he had
some chances of winning the battle we infer about the motives of his
decision and look for the confirmation in a reconstruction of elements
of situation logic. The inferrence follows the pattern:
Premisses:
(1) When a commander wants to spare his troops he often orders his
army to retreat thus stopping the operations.
(2) The commander X ordered his army to stop the operations.
Conclusion:
(3) X probably wanted to spare his troops.
This is a case of weakened reduction with one premiss, namely (1),
being a general statement. Statement (l) can be deduced from a still
more general statement of the type: troops are spared only if there are
conditions for the soldiers not to lose their lives.
We shall not analyse here the reconstruction of all elements of
situation logic in any greater detail. Concerning most of them we refer
to a general statement. For instance, if we are to list the means which
a' given person had at his disposal, we must in each case refer to our
knowledge of the fact that a given object, situation, etc., may be treated
as a means in a given action.
Behaviour theory (which originates from the pioneering studies by
I. Pavlov and E. L. Thorndike) may be for a historian a vast reservoir
of general statements about the mechanisms of instrumental behaviour
(mechanisms of responses to stimuli according to the consequences of
such responses) and about the regularities of classical conditioning
(responses not to stimuli only, but to signals as well). It enables, us to
subsume specified human actions under certain laws which have been
empirically verified in a sufficient degree, and to avoid reference to
various current generalizations which are verified only in one's inner
experience.16 Note also that behaviour theory explains how both normal
and neurotic behaviour patterns are formed,11
We thus can use behaviour theory to reconstruct the mental attitudes
of people who act under specified circumstances, on the obvious condi-
tion that we reconstruct such circumstances properly and accumulate

as much data as possible about the previous experiences of the people
whose behaviour we investigate. In other words, this is a method of
discovering motivations of human actions. In our schema, motivations
mean stimuli which induce people to act (or to abstain from action).
It is self-evident that behaviour theory offers us only highly abstract
schemata of explanations: it states that certain types of stimuli evoke
certain types of behaviour according to whether a given person (in the
light of his experience) knows that a given kind of behaviour results in
what is good for him (i.e., a reward or the avoidance or a reduction
of punishment - to use the terminology of behaviour theory). It is the
historian's task to describe those stimuli and that system of rewards and
punishments each time in concrete terms so as to show how a stimulus
coming from a person's external situation is transformed into his action
through the intermediary of his mental response (attitude). The theory
of historical materialism indicates that when it comes to actions under-
taken by social classes it is the class interest which is the main stimulus
(motivation).18 The concept of class interest, which is very general in
nature, must always be given its proper sense, because, as W. Kula is
correct to warn, it can easily lead to considerable deformations of his-
torical analyses. When it is being used as the theoretical explanatory
construction, its use must be accompanied - fn the present writer's opin-
ion - by the historian's knowledge of the rewards and punishments
which follow specified actions. Hence, such an action is in agreement
with the interests of a given class which brings possibly many rewards
and possible few punishments to the class as a whole (that is, to a ma-
jority of its members). The assessment of such rewards and punishments
must result from the earlier experience of a given class, and not from
the point of view of those goals of action which a historian would be
inclined to ascribe to that class ex post facto.
It must, however, be taken into consideration that the theory of re-
wards and punishments, which is based on behaviouristic psychology,
does not take into account long-term goal-oriented actions.
5. Explanation by reference to dispositions

The discussion, initiated mainly· by C. G. Hempel (cf. Chap. VIII),
which has been going on for nearly 30 years and has been concerned
with the nature of causal explanations, has been marred by the con-
fusion of the problem of reconstructing the model of explanation in his-
torical research with the actual practices of historians, which often de-
viate from the model situation. Many authors who rejected Hempel's
model as not typical of historical research, tried to oppose to it other
methods of causal explanation, which they claimed to be typical. Thus
the set of those models which were believed to be typical of explanation
in historical research came to include explanation by reference to dis-
positions (restricted to the explanation of action undertaken by in-
dividuals) and genetic explanation (restricted to the explanation of
singular events).
A more thorough analysis of the discussion enables us to bring the
various standpoints closer to one another, be it alone by treating sepa-
rately analyses of the model and strictly empirical procedures, and even
more by reference to the statements made by historians themselves,
which has not been done so far, and also by reference to the facts they
describe.
The facts show that both the model based on reference to disposi-
tions, which cannot be treated as a quasi-explanation, and the model
which points to unconditional or statistical relationship between A and
B, i.e., cause and effect. are equally valid.
Now if we watch the changes which take place in a system we may
be interested mainly in that system within which incessant interactions
between its elements make the system constantly pass from one state to
another. When doing so we remain as it were within that system, which
may be both a country (e.g., Poland) and a individual. When investi-
gating such a system we come to the conclusion that it has its specific
dispositions and hence, in other words, it is susceptible to a given type
of changes or behaviour. We thus explain the changes in the system by
its specified dispositions, i.e., structure. Historians often proceed in this
way, not only, as it is usually believed, with reference to mental dis-
positions (mental structure) of individuals, but also with reference to
many other (though, obviously, not all) systems. In this type of explana-
tions it would be difficult to resort to the formula that a fact A causes
a fact B, because the occurrence of B is treated here as a transforma-
tion of an earlier state of that B. It can easily be noted that this ex-
planation suits best the study of those systems which change in a con-
tinuous manner. Examples will be given later.
When investigating a system we may, unlike in the previous case, be
interested not in its inner structure, but in the effect of factors external
to that system or the impact of elements of other systems, that is, in
establishing relationships between facts. In other words. in the latter
case we are concerned with pointing to relationships between different
systems or between elements of different systems. To visualize the differ-
ence between explanation by reference to dispositions and strictly
causal explanation we give the following simple examples. To the ques-
tion why a certain village was destroyed by a fire we may reply because
it consisted of wooden buildings, or because an arsonist had set the fire.
Likewise. when answering the question. why Ivan the Terrible oppressed
the boyars. we may answer that he did so because he was cruel, or
because his terror was to bring about a different phenomenon, namely
a strengthening of his state. Similar examples are provided by the
discussions of the causes of the partitions of Poland, where disputants
point to internal causes (interpreted in various ways), on the one hand,
and to external factors, on the other.
The analysis of the structure of the process of history shows that we
may ask about causes of certain events (or continuous changes), that is,
states and processes (cf. Chap. XI) while having different issues in view.
We may be interested either in the structure of a system (that structure
being interpreted, from case to case, as mental. economic, etc.) with
the view of pointing to its susceptibility (or insusceptibility) to certain
changes. or in those facts (within or without the system) which, on the
strength of certain general regularities, made the dispositions of that
system to certain changes bring such changes into effect. In other words,
if we refer to the distinction made in Chap. XII in connection with the
study of the structure of the process of history, we may be interested
either in the conditionings of a causal nexus or in the very (direct or
indirect) causes of a known fact (or its characteristics) treated as the
effect. Note in this connection the example given by M. Bloch and con-
cerned with the rise in prices in France at the time of Law, in which
Bloch made a distinction between causes and conditions:
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN'IDSTORlCAL RESEARCH 555
Considerable degree of economic uniformity

of France, wich made circulation easy
(conditioning)
ILaw's inflation I
(cause) I
J
I Rise
.
in prices
J
Pointing to (1), conditioning, means explanation by reference to disposi-
tions; pointing to (2), causes, means a strictly causal explanation.
It is also worth noting that when advancing explanations by reference
to dispositions we may be interested either in the structure of the system
(fact) which we treat as the cause, or in the structure of the system
upon which a given cause, as we suppose, had acted. In other words, we
ask whether a given system was likely to develop certain changes within
itself, or likely to develop certain changes in another system. For in-
stance, if we speak about the aggressiveness of Poland's neighbours as
the cause of the partitions of Poland, this means the same as if we
spoke about Poland's weakness. In both cases we explain facts by
reference to dispositions, by pointing to conditions, and do not advance
any strictly causal explanation that would point to causes.
Even though the analysis of the structure of facts validates explana-
tion by reference to dispositions as it points to its specified role in our
acquiring a knowledge of facts, yet, as can be seen from the examples
adduced above, it forms only part onhe explanation procedure, a part
which, when it comes to the search for causes in the strict sense of the
term, may be useful or even, in some cases, indispensable. Historians
very often confine themselves in their explanations to references to
dispositions, especially when ,they point to such dispositions as the
causes of the behaviour of individuals. In the psychological model of
explanation, which prevailed in historical research for a long time and
still finds followers in those historians who are guided by "common
sense" rather than by scientific knowledge, references to dispositions,
and hence pointing to such characteristics as ambition, drive, goodness,
perversion, etc., sufficed to explain the behaviour of a given individual.
Yet it is to be emphasized that in the full explanation of an individual's
actions his mental dispositions (formed on the basis of his previous ex-
perience) ought to be taken into account, even though pointing to
dispositions does not mean discovering the causes. to
In methodological literature, explanation by reference to dispositions

(called rational by W. Dray) is treated either as a separate non-causal
type of historical explanations, which is based on the assumption that
the mental states of individuals are not interpreted as facts or pro-
cesses, and hence causes (P. Gardiner, G. Ryle), or as a variation of
causal explanation which does not, however, follow Hempel's classical
model (Le., reference to laws, cf. W. Dray),20 or as one which is reduci-
ble to that model (c. G. Hempel, W. H. Walsh).
The present writer's standpoint is as follows: Explanations by refer-
ence to dispositions are treated as a special type of explanations, which
is not characteristic of historical research alone and which is covered
by the procedure of causal explanation; it is, however, a part, and not
a variation, of the latter. The present writer holds that the opinion that
explanation by reference to dispositions is reducible to the general mod-
el of explanation better corresponds to what is actually done in his-
torical research, which is not to say that explanation by reference to
dispositions is satisfactory. In the light of the above it is claimed that
in explanations by reference to dispositions we also refer to certain laws
which state that specified dispositions (not only the mental ones, as we
are not concerned with goal-oriented human actions alone) under speci-
fied circumstances bring about (always or usually) certain states in
specified classes of objects (not in human beings alone).
W. Dray, when analysing Ryle's example of the broken glass, says
that the statement:
(1) "the glass broke when the stone hit it" can be reduced to Hem-
pel's model "because whenever stones hit glass it breaks",
but the statement:
(2) "the glass broke when the stone hit it because it is brittle" cannot
be interpreted in the same way, because the explanation by reference
to the glass being brittle does not mean reference to any law. Dray adds,
however, that we have here to do with a reference to an explanatory
generalization which is like a law. 21
In the present writer's opinion there is, however, no essential differ-
ence between the reference to laws in the former case and that in the
latter: in the explanation by reference to glass being brittle we also
tacitly assume that "brittle objects break whenever stones hit them".
The operation consists here in including glass in the class of brittle
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN IDSTORICAL ltESEARCH 557
objects (i.e., those objects which are easily broken). It is easy to note,
however, that in case (2), i.e., explanation by reference to dispositions,
the hitting of glass by a stone must have been taken into account in
the reasoning as a whole. Should we say only that glass broke because
it was brittle, we would have to classify that statement as unacceptable,
incomplete, and having little to do with explanation. This shows clearly
that explanation by reference to dispositions, even though it follows
Hempel's general pattern, which reflects the regularities prevailing in the
world, does not grasp the fundamental nexus between cause and effect.
Dray, who on the whole assumes that explanation by reference to
dispositions may be compared with Hempel's model, does not, how-
ever, extend his statement so as to cover by it the procedures used by
historians, who, after all, are concerned with human dispositions. He
says that if a historian explains a person's behaviour in the past by his
ambition (his being ambitious), then he draws attention to a possible
characteristic of an individual, whereas brittleness is a general property
of glass. His criticism is not to the point, because we can find out, which
psychologists do, too, what responses are usually linked with specified
dispositions of human beings. It is true that not all men are ambitious,
but the relationship between ambition and certain types of behaviour, as
found out by psychologists, is general in nature. After all, not all glass
is brittle as there are many kinds of reinforced glass. When it comes to
ambition as a human disposition, we have first to establish whether
a given person was ambitious, if we are to draw appropriate conclusions
from the fact. Likewise, when we have to do with broken glass, we
must first find out whether it is an easily breakable kind of glass.
Should it turn out that the glass was not of a brittle kind and it was
broken nevertheless, we would not say that its being brittle accounts
for its being broken. In such a case its being hit by a stone would cer-
tainly not suffice. Thus, when it comes to both inanimate objects and
human beings we have to do with some differences of degree: it may be
so that a human being has more individual dispositions (i.e., disposi-
tions which are not characteristic of every human being) than an inani-
mate object has. Yet we may say that in our explanations we refer to
the class of ambitious persons in the same way as we refer to the class
of objects made of brittle glass. This does not change that fact that
from some other point of view (e.g., resistance to heat) glass objects
558 tHE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF msroRY
may form a single class (which would mean that all glass objects are
heat resistant, i.e., that there is only one kind of glass as far as resist-
ance to heat is concerned).
In our interpretation, explanation by reference to dispositions is not
an analogue of that concept as it is found in the literature of the subject
(e.g., P. Gardiner). In our case it is not confined to a motivational ex-
planation of human actions and we assume it to be a kind of a general
procedure in the analysis of causes, which can be subsumed under Hem-
pel's model. Note also that explanation by reference to dispositions (in
the sense of mental states) does not exhaust all the types of explana-
tions of human actions. Next to explanations by reference to mental
states (whose scope is very limited for the modem historian as they
point to only one relationship, which may prove to be of little interest),
actions undertaken by individuals can be explained, as has been men-
tioned earlier, by the reconstruction of situation logic and in particular,
the reconstruction of (human) goals. If we say that Disraeli attacked
Peel in Parliament in 1846 because he (Disraeli) was ambitious, then
we do not exhaust thereby th~ possibilities of explaining Disraeli's
action. We can, as is more appropriate for historians to do, try to
reconstruct the goal of that attack. In this more complete explanation
the ambition factor will playa secondary role.
In explanations by reference to dispositions inference follows the
pattern:
Premisses:
(1) Ambition usually causes a person to be aggressive.
(2) Disraeli was ambitious.
Conclusion:
(3) Disraeli's aggressive attitude (and hence his attack on Peel) was
(probably) caused by his ambition.
We are l.ot concerned here with the issue whether the law stated
under (1) complies with the findings of the psychologists; what we are
interested in is the schema of inference which, as we can see, is that of
weakened deduction which refers to a law that is statistical in nature.
6. The general procedure of causal explanation. Hempel's model

The following standpoints can be singled out with regard to Hempel's
model (which we have discussed more extensively in Chap. VII!)!
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN mSIORICAL RESEARCH 559
(1) we assume that his model is applicable to natural science only

(where human actions are not analysed; in historical research there is no
causal explanation at all);
(2) we assume that there is a fundamental unity of the method of
explanation in the various science, which implies a possibility of inter-
preting causal explanations in historical research in accordance with
Hempel's model;
(3) we assume that it is possible to speak about Hempel's model with
reference to historical research, but his model must be modified (in
general, or only in the case of historical explanations);
(4) we assume that historians advance causal explanations, but they
do not do so (or: they often do not do so) in accordance with any
model that would refer to laws (and hence also not in accordance with
Hempel's model).
Standpoint (1) would be defended only by intuitionists who, when it
comes to explaining human actions, are advocates of the method of
understanding by empathy, and not by a reconstruction of goals. Those
who discussed Hempel's model in most cases dissociated themselves
from that type of metaphysics.
Standpoint (2), defended, among others, by Popper and Hempel,
assumes that the model is a s~i generis idealization of the actual prac-
tice of explanation. For instance, as Hempel says, historians do not ex-
plicitly refer to laws, but assume them enthymematically. This is why ex-
planations in'historical research, even though they can be interpreted as
procedures which follow the deductive model, might be rather termed
explanation sketches. Hempel also mentions quasi-explanation sketches,
which do not even offer any indication as to where to look for the laws
involved.
Standpoint (3), represented, among others, by M. Scriven, takes the
actual practice into consideration to a greater degree. First of all, it
draws attention to the nature of the laws to which historians (and not
historians alone) refer in the process of explanation. They are not (or:
they are not only) unconditional laws Oaws based on a sufficient condi.
tion), but also statistical laws (which lead to conclusions that are merely
probable, and not certain, as is in the case of deduction). Moreover,
historians very often refer to certain general statements, but such as do
not have the status of scientific laws; they are truisms in the form of
statements about relationships ("normic sentences" as M. Scriven calls

them)!! or "restricted generalizations" (N. Rescher, O. Helmer, and
others) and the like. A. Danto assumes that historians refer to laws,
but such laws are rather specific in nature.2lI G. Ryle introduced the
modification (which others approve) that historians do not deduce the
cause from the conjunction of the effect and laws, but deduce the effect
on the basis of certain logical rules in accordance with laws.!4 His ap-
proach may be criticized for the obscurity of the concept of "accordance
with laws". In the last analysis, Ryle's interpretation is at any rate to
be included in the schema of inference, that is, Hempel's model.
The standpoint (4) may be interpreted less or more radically. In the
former case a distinction is made between causal explanation in history,
based on references to laws, and explanation without reference to laws.
This opinion is held, as we know, by P. Gardiner, who distinguishes
between explanation by situation logic and causal explanation. The
radical standpoint denies any connection between the explanation
procedure in history and laws, so that a historian can do totally with:-
out lawS.!5
The present writer rejects the two extreme standpoints, namely (1),
as it cannot be brought into agreement with a scientific interpretation
of explanation, and the extreme version of (4), as it is at variance with
what is actually being done by historians. He accordingly accepts Hem-
pel's schema as the model of explanation in historical research. It is to
be admitted that in practice we have to do rather with explanation
sketches, with latent references to laws. even though cases of classical
explanation can also be found. Two comments are also to be made
concerning the nature of those laws to which historians refer (explicitly
or enthymematically). First, if we consider the issue from the point of
view of normative methodology, we might express the wish that as
a historian's non-source-based knowledge expands his explanations
should refer to general statements which may be accorded the status of
genuine scientific laws. If we interpret the problem in this way, then we
may accept Hempel's model as one which fully corresponds to the struc-
ture of historical research. Secondly, it follows from the actual practice
of explanation in historical research that genuine scientific laws do not
frequently underlie historical explanations. In the case of a large part
of explanations it would not, after all, be necessary to refer to such
genuine scientific laws. since we may draw substantiations from a genu-

ine current knowledge.
We have. therefore, to agree with those who point to the fact that
historians are making use "loosely" of the laws to which they refer,
which does not, however, describe all historical research as such, but
at the most sheds light upon its present state as far as some research
tasks are concerned.
Our observations based on analyses of studies by Polish and foreign
historians make us conclude that, when resorting to causal explanations,
historians in most cases (even though they do not do that explicitly)
refer to:
(l) relationships which are sufficient conditions,
(2) relationships which are necessary conditions,
(3) relationships which are both sufficient and necessary conditions,
(4) relationships which point to an element of a sufficient condition
(a condition which is necessary in a given situation).
The knowledge of those relationships may take on the form of scien-
tific laws; of statements which only formally comply with the require-
ments set to laws, but do not follow from results of research (statements
which aspire to laws, law-like statements); and of general statements
in the nature of normic sentences (M. Scriven). It is the task of meth-
odology to bear out that variety of forms.
Before he proceeds to do that the present writer would like to extend
Hempel's deductive model in one point. It is important for historians
that that model should also cover references to statistical laws. For
quite frequently, when we explain something, we do not arrive at a cer-
tain conclusion, but merely at a probable one. Hempel himself (in his
other works) singled out the inductive explanation of the type:
Premisses:
Almost all Fare G,
x is an F.
Conclusion:
Almost certainly (with much probability)
x is a G.
This is the leasoning (inference) which we have termed weakened
deduction.20
We now proceed to discuss the model and its assumptions.
On the whole a historian has only a small chance of finding out real
causal relationships, but we must warn the readers in advance that even
that method does not protect him against the possibility of arriving at
conclusions which are merely apparently true. To use a metaphor,
a cause cannot be "caught red-handed". Even in the simplest and
seemingly fully observable situations we cannot have the certainty as to
a presumably doubtless causal nexus. We all remember situations, de-
scribed in crime stories, in which it would turn out that a person was
not killed by a blow on his skull (even though this was observed by an
eye-witness who would be ready to swear that the death was caused by
the blow), but died of a heart failure which proceded the blow by
seconds.
In most cases we avail ourselves of that small chance and can never-
theless arrive at interesting results. The procedure used can be recon-
structed in most general terms in the way which follows.
(l ) We refer to the law of general conditioning as the basis of the
statement which says that facts are governed by regularities (cf.
Chap. XI) to conclude that specified regularities govern the sequence
of events. They account for the fact that events of a type A are always
(or usually, if we have to do with a statistical regularity) followed by
events of a type B.
(2) It follows therefrom that in order to explain causally a historical
fact (simple or complex), that is, in order to link that fact with another
fact, to be interpreted as the cause of the former, we have to refer
(tacitly or explicitly) to a regularity, or a number of regularities, which
states that facts of the types involved are mutually conditioned. Since,
as we know, statements about regularities are called laws, we have to
refer to laws that lay down certain regularities.
This is how Hempel approaches the issue. He writes that "The ex-
planation of the occurrence of an event of some specific kind E at
a certain place and time consists, as it is usually expressed, in indicating
the causes or determining factors of E. Now the assertion that a set of
events -say, of the kinds Cl, C 2 , ••• , Cn - have caused the event to be
explained, .amounts to the statement that,' according to certain general
laws, a set of events of the kinds mentioned, which is regularly accom-
panied by an event in question, consists of:
(1) a set of statements asserting the occurrence of certain events C 1,

... , Cn at certain times and places,
(2) a set of universal hypotheses, such that
(a) the statements of both groups are reasonably well confirmed
by empirical evidence,
(b) from the two groups of statements the sentence asserting the
occurrence of event E can be logically deduced.
"In a physical explanation, group (1) would describe the initial and
boundary conditions for the occurrence of the final event; generally, we
shall say group (1) states the determining conditions (italics by Hempel)
for the event to be explained, while group (2) contains the general laws
on which the explanation is based; they imply the statement that when-
ever events of the kind described in the first group occur, an eveDt of
the kind to be explained will take place".27 This means that the state-
ment about the event to be explained follows logically from the con-
junction of statements about all the events interpreted as the causes and
all laws. In a symbolic notation the model can be presented thus:
L1> L 2 , ••• , Ln
c 1, c 2 , ••• , cm
e
where e is a statement about the explanandum (effect), L1> L 2 , ••• , Ln
are laws (part of the explanans), c 1, C2 , ••• , cm are statements about
causes (i.e., about the initial conditions, in other words, the second part
of the explanans). The sequence L1> L 2 , ••• , Ln must have at least one
term.
The historian, when beginning his research, knows only e from his
sources (i.e., a statement about the effect), and poses a question about
C 1 , ••• , Cm (i.e., statements about the causes). As the procedures followed
in practice show, he has two possible courses to take.
(1) He associates e (the statement about the effect) with C1> ••• , Cm
(the statements about the causes) because he knows from his non-source-
based knowledge that e is in a class E (in symbols: e E E) and that
the class of statements E can always be linked with the class of state-
ments L (L = L 1 , ••• , L n), namely that L is a sufficient condition of E
(L ~ E) or that L is a necessary condition of E (,...." L ~ ,...." E).
(2) He sometimes cannot refer to any general law or any general
564 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lUSTOR'\'
law that would be precise enough. He then must look for such general
relationships himself. This is done by the comparative method:
(a) a working hypothesis as to the relationship
is formulated,
(b) it is tested by a comparison with other data (possibly from other
territories) in order to make sure whether in other cases, too,
e could be inferred from c1, •••, Cm •
In this procedure, causal explanation consists simultaneously in stat-
ing relationship of more general validity (possibly a law in the strict
sense of the term). Such a procedure was used, for instance, by J. Rut-
kowski, when he investigated the causes of the development of the ma-
norial-and-serfdom economy. That example will be analysed later. It is
obvious that in the last analysis both procedures amount to explana-
tion in accordance with Hempel's model. In practice, however, the situa-
tion indicated by the model does not always take place because ex-
planation infrequently leads us to the conclusion that a is a sufficient
condition of b.
An analysis of research procedures actually used shows that his-
torians establish arious. unconditional or conditional. relationships be-
tween facts. Hence. in order to find out what they mean when using thl}
term "cause" ("factor", etc.) we have to see, if a given statement is
clear enough,2S what kind of causal relationship links the facts which
they claim to be such that one of them causally depends upon the
other.
Some fundamental concepts will be explained first.
(1) A is a sufficient condition of B means that whenever A occurs,
B occurs, too. In the statistical interpretation: the relative probability
of B with respect to A equals unity (e.g., P(B / A) = 1}.
(2) A is a necessary condition of B ~eans that B occurs only if A
occurs. too; in other words, B never occurs if A does not occur. Sta-
tistically: P(B / --..A} = o.
(3) A is a necessary and sufficient condition of B means that B oc-
curs if and only if A occurs. Statistically: P(B / A} = 1 and P(B /
/ --..A} = o.
(4) A is neither a sufficient nor a necessary condition of B, but is
a necessary component of a sufficient condition. In other words, it is

a necessary condition in a given situation. Statistical formulas are com-
binations of those mentioned above, with the consideration of other
conditions or other component of the condition in question. Thus. A, in
a given situation. is a necessary condition of B if the other components
of that situation (without 'A) do f!ot suffice for B to occur. More pre-
cisely, A in a situation X is a necessary condition of B or a necessary
component of a sufficient condition of B if: (a) B occurs always if A
and X both occur; (b) neither X without A nor A without X suffices
for B to occur.
(5) A is a favourable condition of B (P(B / A) > P(B / ",-,A» if A is
neither a sufficient nor a necessary condition of B nor is it necessary in
a given situation, but is merely a component (not a necessary one) of
a situation X which is involved in a condition that is necessary in
a given situation.
It is worth noting with reference to (1) that if A is a sufficient. but
not a necessary. condition of B, then this means that there are some other
(alternative) conditions that are sufficient for B to occur. If we say that
whenever it rains the roadway becomes wet, this does not exclude state-
ments of the type: whenever a sprinkler car works. the roadway be-
comes wet, etc. Likewise, the statement that usually if taxes are raised
people are dissatisfied, does not exclude the statement that usually if
prices rise people are dissatisfied. etc.
With reference to (2) - A is a necessary, but not a sufficient, condi-
tion of B - it is to be noted that there is at least one category of events
such that together with A it forms a sufficient condition of B, so that
an event of that category is a necessary element of B. S. Nowak calls
that the category of complementary events. 29 For instance, having ade-
quate arms is a necessary condition of victory in a battle, but it does
not suffice to attain that goal. The condition of having adequate arms
may be complemented by such conditions as an adequate number of
troops, the high quality of the command, the good morale of the troops,
adequate supplies, etc. We may try to find out which of these and other
conditions complement the said necessary condition (having adequate
arms) so as to yield a condition which is sufficient for winning a battle.
We ask whether a battle is won always if an army has adequate arms
and an adequate number of troops. The answer is in the negative as we
566 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF ffi5rORY
know that it is not always so. We then add the condition of a good
command, then possible add some other conditions, and possibly also
remove some of them, and thus we gradually approach the statement of
the type: a battle is always won if the conditions a1, ••. , an are satisfied.
It can easily be noted that in this way we have arrived at a statement
which formulates a condition that is both sufficient and necessary. This
means that a battle is won if and only if the conditions a1, ..., an are
satisfied. We have thus come to a better explanation of (3).
Now (4) also requires certain explanations. It is more complex than
the concepts (1), (2), and (3), which alternatively apply to explanation
by reference to dispositions or to strictly causal explanation. Now the
concept of the condition which is necessary in a given situation, that
comes so close to historical explanations, covers simultaneously both
types of explanation mentioned above. A condition which is necessary
in a given situation points both to the structure of a system (given
situation) and to a factor which is somehow external to that system.
This applies, for instance, to the statement that in the situation of 18th
century Poland (Le., that of a state which was weak both politically and
economically and was surrounded by states whose strength was grow-
ing) the aggressive tendencies of neighbouring states were the cause of
the partitions. It is common knowledge that a state does not fall always,
nor does it fall only if, its neighbours are aggressive. Poland fell, when
she became an object of the violence of neighbouring states, because
she was weak as a state.
In order better to describe the favourable condition (5) let us return
to the example of the conditions of winning a battle. When analysing
the conditions mentioned earlier in that connection we find some which
we would class as neither sufficient nor necessary. Having adequate
arms may be treated as a necessary condition (an army can win a battIe
only if it is adequately armed, which is not to say that, if adequately
armed, it always wins); the same may be said about an adequate num-
ber of troops. But we may have doubts as to whether a high quality of
command (obviously, better than average or satisfactory), good sup-
plies, etc., all are necessary conditions of winning a battle. It is known
that battles have been won not only if the command of the winning side
was particularly good, the morale of the troops very high, or the sup-
plies were good. The effect of those factors (if their occurrence is estab-
lished) upon the winning of a battle is beyond any doubt, even though
we may be convinced that without them certain battles would have been
won anyway, although the victory could take on a somewhat different
form. As can be seen, favourable conditions are components of X
which are not necessary for B to occur. In a situation X such conditions
may be non-existent and yet B occurs, although in a somewhat different
form than that it would take on if those conditions had been met. Thus,
while they are not necessary for the occurrence of a given event as such,
without them that event would be somewhat different. In this sense,
favourable conditions are necessary, too. Favourable conditions are
thus, like those which are necessary in a given situation, linked with
that situation. In a different situation they could work quite differently
(cf. the different effects of poor crops upon the income of a capitalist
and upon that of a feudal producer).
Note also that every event has its sufficient and its necessary con-
ditions. This means that events (facts) are in this interpretation treated
only as elements of certain classes. Sho~dd we assume that historical
facts are absolutely unique in their nature we would have no possibility
of linking them with any sufficient or necessary condition. Laws for-
mulated in statistical terms indicate that we do not know those condi-
tions fully, or that we are unable to formulate them otherwise because
of the structure of facts.
Finally, the question arises, under what conditions we may speak
about a (relatively) complete explanation of a historical fact, or a his-
torical regularity. It follows from what has been said earlier in this
book that such an explanation should satisfy at least two conditions,
namely, to take into account:
(1) both the subjective and the objective nature of the process of
history,
(2) the hierarchical structure of facts.
In the first case the point is that an explanation should cover both
human actions (guided by subjectively fixed goals and the knowledge
of the world on the part of the agents, knowledge based on the prin-
ciple of rationality) and the largely unintended results of such actions
(the process of history). Thus, for instance, if we ask why the serfdom-
based manorial system developed in Poland at a certain period, we re-
quire an explanation in terms of historical processes. Such an explana-
tion does not tell us, however, why people (the Polish gentry in the
case just mentioned above) acted as they did, which resulted in the
emergence of the economic system referred to above. It is only the link-
ing of both types of explanations that can give us a fairly comprehen-
sive knowledge of the issue. In practice, however, researchers usually
rest satisfied with a tentative explanation of one or other type, without
trying to link the two types.
When it comes to the second condition, the point is that explanations
of the process of history and of human actions should take into con-
sideration, as fully and adequately as possible, the sequence of regu-
larities, primary causes, and facts which are initial conditions (direct
causes), that is, relationships and facts linked, as has been shown by
L. Nowak, by the relation of concretization. In such a chain of con-
cretizations those links which are closer to the fact being explained
pertain to more external structures of facts, whereas those which are
more remote from the fact being explained pertain to deeper struc-
tures. This is shown by L. NowaJCIo in a symbolic notation thus:
Tk --I Tk-l --I ... --I TI --I TO 1\ P - L E,
where P stands for the initial conditions of the theorem TO, E, for the
statement to be explained (explanandum), Tk, for the law involved, Tk-I
to Tt, for the successive concretizations of the idealizational law Tk,
-I , for the concretization relation, /\, for sentential calculus conjuction,
and -+ L> for logical consequence.
The fact to which the explanandum refers can - as L. Nowak is cor-
rect in stressing - be considered explained only if both the primary and
the secondary factors which account for its occurrence are stated. It
can easily be seen that the above model of explanation is a sui generis
expansion of Hempel's model. It consists in specifying a sequence of
laws from Hempel's model (L l , L 2 , ••• , Ln) as a sequence of laws linked
by the relation of concretization. This is, of course, connected with
a specified interpretation of the real world.
7. Explanation by indication of conditions which are both sufficient

and necessary
Complete explanations by the indication of conditions which are both

sufficient and necessary are rather infrequent in historiography.al One of
them, given by J. Rutkowski (the Polish economic historian (1886-

1949), mentioned on earlier occasions - Tr.) is quoted here by way of
example. When looking for the causes of the development of the ma-
norial-and-serfdom economy in modern times in the region to the east
of the Elbe, Rutkowski analysed the circumstances which suffice for
the development of manorial farms employing serf labour. He rejected
the easy sale of grain as the possible cause, because "the facility to sell
grain alone does not suffice for manorial farms based on serf labour to
develop".32 For the same reasons he dismissed exports of grain to re-
mote regions "because in Western Europe there had been fairly vast
areas which exported grain to remote urban centres, such as Brittany
and the region of Orleans in France, Sicily, Apulia and Marca Anconi-
tana in Italy, where serfdom did not develop". Finally, he also dis-
missed the change of the former feudal militia into mercenary troops,
which could make it easier for the gentry to reorganize their estates,
because "manorial farms employing serf labour did not develop in
Western Europe, where the same change in the organization of the
army did take place".33 As can be seen, none of the circumstances men-
tioned above was alone sufficient for the manorial-and-serfdom econo-
my to develop, as we know situations in which the same circumstances
did occur, and the said type of the agrarian system did not develop.
As a result of his comparative studies Rutkowski came to the conclu-
sion that only the co-occurrence of a good market for the grain and of
aggravated conditions of serfdom (glebae adscriptio, restriction of the
peasant's rights to land, and increased jurisdictional prerogatives of
landowners) sufficed for the emergence of manorial farms based on
serf labour, because whenever such circumstances occurred the said
type of farming developed.
In the analysis of his case Rutkowski wrote that while the facility
to sell grain plus serfdom suffice for the manorial-and-serfdom economy
to develop, each of these factors is necessary for the development of
such economy. "The facility to sell agricultural produce", he wrote,
"is a necessary condition for the emergence of large farms" and added
that "for a manorial farm based on serf labour to develop it is nec-
essary that the other of the two factors mentioned above, namely an
aggravated conditions of serfdom, exist".34
This means that if and only if it is easy to sell large quantities of
grain and if serfdom exists an agrarian system based on manorial farms

that employ serf labour develops. In the explanation above J. Rutkow-
ski specified the circumstances, or the necessary conditions, of the oc-
currence of the event in question, namely the development of mano-
rial-and-serfdom economy. He also formulated the sufficient condition
of the event.
His explanation followed the pattern:
(1) Law: If and only if facility to sell agricultural produce co-occurs
with an aggravated form of serfdom, manorial-and-serfdom economy
develops.
(2) Initial condition: In modern 'times, the regions to the east of the
Elbe were marked by facility to sell agricultural produce and by an
aggravated form of serfdom.
(3) Effect: Manorial-and-serfdom economy developed in modern
times in the regions to the east of the Elbe.
In this case, J. Rutkowski formulated a law himself and carried out
a procedure that explicitly satisfies Hempel's model. A historian has
proved to be a producer of laws, and not only their consumer, for
which historians are often blamed. The objection is statistically correct,
but it is groundless if treated as exception-free. The case just analysed
is an excellent proof of the fact that historians can, and do, engage in
formulating laws and theories.
8. Explanation by indication of sufficient conditions
In the case discussed above J. Rutkowski explicitly used the term "suffi-
cient condition", so that there could be no doubt as to the type of rela-
tionship he was concerned with. Historians sometimes do not use this
term, but we can guess that they mean that kind of relationship. Such
a condition may be surmised, for instance, when we meet with Rutkow-
ski's formulation that for those landowners who personally attended
their farms the income from a manorial farm based on serf labour must
have, as a rule. been greater than what they could obtain by making
the serfs pay rent instead of providing serf labour. and this was why (in
Rutkowski's opinion) the reform in 18th century Poland, which advo-
cated the replacement of serf labour by rent to be paid by ex-serfs, did
not on the whole cover the medium-sized gentry farms. It does seem,
in fact, that whenever a group of landowners may suffer losses as a re-

sult of a reform in their estates, the majority of its members do not
carry out such a reform of their free will.
Interpretations of causes as sufficient conditions are often encount-
ered in analyses in which explanations advanced by others are criticized.
Thus, for instance, F. Bujak wrote that the serfdom of peasants was
not a cause of Poland's fall in the late 18th century, because serfdom
existed in other countries, and if "in those countries the oppression of
the peasantry was not an obstacle to their political survival, then (...)
it could not have been in the case of Poland, too".35 In other words,
in F. Bujak's opinion, the serfdom of peasants could not have been the
cause of Poland's political fall, because we can point to other countries
in which serfdom existed and which did survive politically. Bujak's
criticism is convincing only on the assumption that he interprets the
cause as a sufficient condition.
A similar interpretation of cause is found in J. Tazbir, who writes
that the abilities and the high intellectual standard of the Jesuits do not
account for the mass reconversions of the Polish gentry to Roman Ca-
tholicism, because the Polish Brethren (a Protestant group active in
Poland in the 16th and 17th centuries - Tr.) also had able leaders and
excellent writers, and yet only a small group of the gentry followed
them. Thus. Tazbir concludes. the personal qualities of the Roman
Catholic leaders were not the cause of the triumph of the Church of
Rome and the defeat of the Reformation in 17th century Poland.36 Now
here again. like in many other cases. the conclusion is correct only on
the assumption that cause is interpreted as a sufficient condition. For
another interpretatiop of the term "cause" the same reasoning would
not be correct.
Explanation by pointing the causes interpreted as the sufficient con-
ditions of the events under consideration is to be found rather infre-
quently in historical studies. It can, however, be encountered in those
cases where mass processes, such as the spontaneous undertaking of
econoInic reforms by a large number of owners of estates or the vast
spreading of an ideology, are explained.
On the whole, it may be said that explanation by pointing to suffi-
cient conditions, if not accompanied by the knowledge of the necessary
conditions, is rather unconvicing as it does not point to other, alterna-

tive, sufficient conditions.37
9. Explanation by pointing to necessary conditions
In Rutkowski's example of the causes of the development of manorial

farms based on serf labour we also had to do with explanation by re-
ference to the necessary conditions. On the whole. however. the deter-
mining of the explanatory role of such conditions involves considerable
difficulties. While a suffi'cient condition, by pointing to a positive rela-
tionship, always provides much information about relationships in ques-
tion, the knowledge of some of the necessary conditions only is interest-
ing for the researcher and provides him with important information.
This is so because every event requires an infinite number of necessary
conditions, whereas the number of sufficient conditions of such an event
is limited. Thus. the historian disregards a limine large groups of nec-
essary conditions, and concerns himself with those only which are
"closest" to the effect he studies. In this way, by looking for necessary
conditions he approaches the discovery of sufficient conditions. This
situation could be observed in its classical form in Rutkowski's ex-
ample analysed above. The search for necessary conditions of the emer-
gence of the manorial-and-serfdom economy resulted in the discovery
of the sufficient condition which turned out to be the conjunction of
both necessary conditions (easy sales of grain and aggravated conditions
of serfdom).
Usually, however, the historian does not come so close to sufficient
conditions. On the whole, the necessary conditions he mentions outline
the area of rejection of those conditions which are of little, or no, in-
terest for his study. For instance, if we claim that the development of
towns was a necessary condition for the emergence of capitalism, we do
not want to say that that is a sufficient condition (for we know that the
development of towns was not always followed by the emergence of
capitalism), but we merely reduce to the necessary condition which is
the development of towns such conditions as the existence of a social
division of labour, the existence of a surplus of commodities, etc., up
to the existence of life on our globe, which after all also is a necessary
THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN IDsrORICAL RESEARCH 573
condition of the emergence of capitalism. This is illustrated by the

schema below:
Existence
EXistence Existence of social Development Emergence
of life - of surplus -~ division -~ of towns ---~ of capitalism
on our globe production of labour
In this chain every link is a necessary condition of that link which

follows next. The historian who analyses such causal chains cuts each
of them as close to the event under consideration as possible. This shows
that explanation by reference to necessary conditions resembles genetic
explanation.
By way of illustration we give an example drawn from a study by
E. Rostworowski, who, when writing about the reform undertaken by
Pawel Brzostowski, in the second half of the XVlIIth century, says
that "an objective condition which makes it possible to turn serfs into
tenants is that the peasants must have something to sell and must have
a market where to sell" and that accordingly "the peasants must have
larger plots of land than the feeding of a peasant family under serfdom
requires, and that their farms must be well supplied with tools and im-
plements"; the peasants "ought to have an adequate amount of man-
power" and "to be in touch with a market".38
When reading Rostworowski's text we can guess that in his opinion
serfs could be turned into tenants only if the peasants had something
to sell and had a market to sell it on, and that, accordingly, marketable
production on peasant farms was a necessary condition of turning serfs
into peasants. To put it more cautiously, a necessary condition of the
permanence of refornls which turned serfs into tenants was that the
tenants should be able to pay the rent and for that purpose should pro-
duce an adequate amount of marketable goods and had an opportunity
to sell it.
We have thus briefly discussed explanation by reference to sufficient
conditions and by reference to necessary conditions of events under
consideration. These distinctions do not enable us, however, to grasp
the meaning of very many causal explanations advanced in historical
research.
10. Explanation by reference to conditions necessary in a given situa-

tion
In historiography we much more frequently find explanations which are

concerned neither with pointing to a sufficient condition nor with point-
ing to a necessary condition; they consist in pointing to circumstances
which are necessary for the occurrence of a given event not in every
situation, as is the case of the necessary condition, but only in a speci-
fied historical situation. We have here to do with a cause which is in-
terpreted as a condition necessary in a given situation; it is also termed
a necessary component of one of the alternative sufficient conditions.
The difference between such a condition and a necessary condition is
very important, even though it is not always visualized. It can best be
illustrated by an example.
When explaining the process of the political reunification of Poland
at the turn of the 13th century J. Baszkiewicz39 wrote that the eco-
nomic development of the country, which resulted in the overcoming of
the economic isolation of the various duchies and in expanded trade
between them, was a necessary condition of that unification. At the
first glance it might seem that he meant what we call here the (ordi-
nary) necessary condition, and hence the statement that political uni-
fication takes place only if a given country develops economically. Yet
Baszkiewicz realized perfectly well that unified states developed at
times while its various regions remained economically isolated, so that
a unified state may emerge not only if economic development abolishes
the economic isolation of the various provinces. What he actually had
in mind was not the claim that the emergence of favourable market
conditions is in each case indispensable for the political unification of
a country, but merely that under the conditions which prevailed in 13th
century Poland economic development was necessary for the political
reunification of the country, so that had there been no such economic
development, the country would not have been reunified. There is no
contradiction in claiming that in a given situation a specified fact is
a necessary condition for a certain event to occur, while at the same
time realizing that (on other occasions) an event of the type under con-
sideration may occur not only if accompanied or preceded by such
a specified fact.
Such a relationship was pointed to by J. Rutkowski who, when writ-

ing about violent peasant riots in Poland (like the mutiny in 1768),
concluded that "the main cause of the intensity of those riots was to be
seen in the fact that the class antagonisms inherent in the Polish a-
grarian system were used by a neighbouring power as a means of weak-
ening Poland and thus making the partitions easier". 40 Of course, it is
well known that anti-feudal peasant movements develop not only if
inspired from abroad, but in Rutkowski's opinion had there been no
foreign inspiration, in the situation prevailing in the south-eastern part
of Poland in the 18th century these movements would not have taken
on such great dimensions. We thus have here to do with the indication
of the condition which is necessary in a specified situation.
And here are other examples, which also do not leave any doubt as
to the intentions of their respective authors. S. Zachorowski voiced his
opinion that the development of a sense of national solidarity was, in
Poland's situation at the turn of the 13th century, a necessary condition
for the country's defence against its enemies, for, as he wrote, "without
a sense of national solidarity Poland could not have emerged intact,
not to say victorious, from all the disasters she had to face in the com-
ing decades".41
Finally, it is legitimate to guess that when S. Arnold wrote that in
Western Europe "the formation of a national market (...) was the basis
for changes in the political superstructure and for the emergence of
centralized states",42 he must have meant that even though centralized
states used to emerge without a national market, yet under the con-
ditions prevailing in Western Europe such centralized states would not
have emerged without a national market, so that in the situation pre-
vailing in Western Europe the formation of national markets was a
necessary condition for the emergence of centralized states.
We disregard here, of course, the truth and the degree of substantia-
tion of the claims made in the examples adduced above. In many cases
they may seem highly debatable, but the type of the relationship implied
in those statements usually does not involve any difficulties of inter-
pretation.
When we analyse some causal explanations we do not have the
slightest doubt that their authors sometimes intended to discover the
sufficient condition, sometimes, the necessary condition, and sometimes,
the condition which was necessary in a given situation. The terminology

used in such explanations varies, but in many cases there is no doubt
as to how to interpret the relationship in question. We may engage in
controversies over how often those historians who advance causal ex-
planations look for the sufficient condition, or the necessary condition,
or the condition which is necessary in a given situation, but the fact
that they pose such questions seems uncontestable.
11. Explanation by reference to favourable conditions
Explanations to be found in historiography very often indicate as

causes those circumstances which may be interpreted as favourable
conditions (the term suggested by J. Pelc and A. Malewski) in the sense
mentioned earlier. This is very clear in those cases where historians
describe a certain process and point to many factors which are to ex-
plain it. Thus, e.g., S. Kieniewicz, when explaining why in the period
between the partitions of Poland (late 18th century) and the granting
of land to peasants in the Russian-occupied part of Poland (1864)
writes that "the actions undertaken by the peasants were becoming
more and more numerous and more and more comprehensive in scope,
their ways of acting, more and more varied, and their goals, better and
better defined", adding that "this qualitative change is explained by
many causes". Among those causes he lists, e.g., an increased exploit-
ation of the peasants and the emergence of new, next to the old ones,
methods of exploitation, increased contacts of the peasants with com-
modity markets and the profits derived therefrom by the peasants, the
collapse of the state machinery at the turn of the 18th century, the
emergence of anti-feudal-minded social groups outside the rural areas,
eiC.43 It seems that Kieniewicz's intention was not to claim that when-
ever any of the said circumstances occurred the peasants' struggle
against their lords intensified; nor did he claim that the peasants' strug-
gle intensified only if one of these circumstances occurred; finally, he did
not claim that without one of the said circumstances the peasants'
struggle would not intensify in the situation prevailing in 19th century
Poland. It seems that the relationship between some of these circum-
stances (treated as causes) and the effect studied is to be interpreted
more loosely. Increased exploitation, the collapse of the state machinery,
intensified market activities, increased strength of potential allies - all

this could encourage the peasants to rise against their lords, but it is
also well known that such situations evoke different responses. Thus
one of the possible interpretations of the relationship now under con-
sideration would be to assume that we have here to do with conditions
which were favourable for the occurrence of a specified event.
Such explanations, which may be treated as the listing of the many
circUInstances which, in the opinion of a given researcher, could have
affected the occurrence of a specified event, are very often to be found.
Thus, Baszkiewicz, when explaining why some of the Polish feudal
lords supported the political reunification of the country at the turn of
the 13th century, points to many factors which could have promoted
unification, and many those which could have worked as obstacles to
unification. Among the former he mentions the links of many secular
lords with the prince who undertook the reunification drive, the scatter-
ing of estates held by many feudal lords in the various duchies, which
made their management difficult, the dangers from without, and a
certain psychological factor, namely the expectation that in a unified
state the feudal lords would find it easier to exploit the peasants. Now,
here again it seems that Baszkiewicz does not want to claim that one of
these circumstances was sufficient, or even necessary in the specified
situation, for the support by some feudal lords of the reunification
drive. We can surmise that he wants to list those circumstances which
could have somehow influenced the effect in question, that is, to list
those conditions which we suggest to term favourable.
12. Search for disturbing factors
When reviewing the work by A. Malewski and J. Topolski, J. Giedy-

min correctly drew attention to the fact that it would be worth-while to
single out such explanations in which historians try to discover why an
event B did not occur, although an event A, which is usually followed
by B, did occur.44 In such cases a historian is interested in the cause
for which B did not occur, i.e., he wants to indicate those factors which
in methodological terminology are called disturbing (see Chap. XI).
Giedymin held the opinion that in many cases the procedure resembles
that of discovering favourable, conditions. We can agree with that and
578 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HIsrORY
accept a favourable condition to be a sui generis converse of an dis-

turbing factor. It is self-evident that each such favourable or disturbing
condition has its substantiation in a g~neral law reflecting a given reg-
ularity. If we say that a was favourable to the occurrence of b. then
we do that only because we otherwise know that events of the type A
(which includes a) favoured (always or usually) the occurrence of
events of the type B (which includes b).
If an event A did not occur even though it should have occurred in
the light of the regularities which are known to us, then this means
that the effect of some other regularities must have been stronger. This
is not to say that the regularities which should have caused A ceased
to operate; they merely did not manifest themselves in the case in
question.
Here is an example of reference to disturbing factors. "It may be
pointed out that in accordance with the principles of deductive political
economy, the repeal of the Corn Laws must have tended to bring about
a permanent fall in the price of wheat in England. Yet no such fall
occurred immediately. The explanation of the apparent discrepancy is
to be found in the interference of such circumstances as the failure of
the potato crop, the Crimean War, and especially the depreciation of
gold, which contributed to maintain the price up to 1862, notwith-
standing free trade". 45
13. Explanation by reference to more direct and less direct causes
When looking for the causes of an event historians do not always point
to those circumstances which are directly related to it. They very often
mention circumstances whose connection with the event in question is
merely indirect. This can best be illustrated by the following schema:
B':l}.x
F}C~Z
E D--.t
By way of example we shall discuss some explanations of the devel-

opment of the manorial-and-serfdom economy to the east of the Elbe
in the 16th century.
As mentioned earlier, J. Rutkowski wrote that the co-occurrence of
facility to sell grain and of serfdom was a necessary and at the same
time a sufficient condition for the manorial-and-serfdom system to
develop.'6
W. RusiIiski wrote that "while we do not in the least underestimate
the effect of other factors upon the emergence of manorial farms based
on serf labour we have to state that two factors were decisive for the
emergence of such farms. One of them was the good market for agri-
cultural produce in Western Europe, and the second was the decisive
influence upon politics and the free hand in dealing with the peasants
which the gentry obtained in Eastern Europe".47
B. Zientara wrote recently that "the main cause of the emergence of
the manorial-and-serfdom system to the east of the Elbe is to be seen
in the then prevailing balance of class forces. The foreign markets
which offered favourable terms to the gentry and the related expansion
of West European capital merely helped to change the opportunity for
the SUbjugation of the peasants by the gentry into reality".48 When
speaking about the balance of class forces Zientara meant the situation
which was characterized above all by the weakness of the towns.
The above explanations can be illustrated by the following schema:
D) Balance of-+ C) Obtaining -+ A) aggravated Emergence of

class forces by the gentry serfdom manorial
marked by of the decisive B) facility to farms
weakness of influence upon sell agricultural -+ based on serf
the t('lwns politics produce, mainly labour
grain
It can easily be noticed that the first of the authors quoted above
explains the emergence of the manorial-and-serfdom system by the
circumstances which are marked A and B in the schema above; the
second mentions Band C as the decisive factors while the third refers
to D as the main cause.
14. Genetic explanation and genetic description
One of the above-mentioned types of explanation in historical re-

search is genetic explanation, in the case of which we are concerned
with an answer to a 'how' question, and not to a 'why' question. Some
authors, who oppose the opinion that the hypothetico-deductive model
of explanation is much used in historiography, claim that genetic
explanation is the fundamental type CW. B. Gallie)49 or one of the
types (W. Dray)50 of historical explanation, espe~ially when it comes
to simple facts, and hence also actions undertaken by individuals. They
assert that in order to explain such facts it suffices to give an unbroken
sequence of events, reconstructed from sources, which - they claim-
historians usually do. Such opinions also are to provide one of the
theoretical foundations for the explanation of actions undertaken by
individuals by the empathy method: a sequence of interactions and
reactions, known to us from our own inner experience, is compared by
us with the sequence observed in the sources (of course, with some mis-
sing links) and referring to another person; we then fill those missing
links allegedly without any reference to laws. 51 W. Dray (and also
A. Donagan and others) even thinks that that is the proper way of ex-
plaining events as it offers a complete explanation. 52
The mechanism of genetic explanation is usually interpreted so that
every fact in the description of the series of facts which chronologically
follow one after the other is a necessary condition of the occurrence
of the next fact in the series (W. Gallie, E. Nagel). W. Dray is the only
author to exclude explanation in terms of necessary conditions; he
claims that we answer the question "how did it occur?" by indicating
(by reference to the sequence of events) that it could not have been
otherwise.53
It seems that we should single out two types of what is called genetic
explanation in historiograpy. The first type would consist in explaining
a fact (an event) by indicating how that fact came to occur, that is, by
listing its successive development stages. This yields a sequence of the
type F1-+F2-+F3-+F4-+ ... -+Fn (where Fn stands for the fact to
be explained genetically).
In such a sequence each successive event is treated as a necessary
condition of the next one; it is thus assumed that a later event would
not have occurred without the occurrence of the preceding one.
Here is a fragment from a book by W. Tokarz who explains how the
insurgents took hold of Warsaw in April 1794.
"(... ) after Igelstrom's retreat from Warsaw the Russians defended
themselves in Miodowa Street up to five o'clock p.m. Their long and
extremely stubborn resistance even diverted for a while the Poles' at-
tention from the fact that scattered groups of the Russians were re-
treating from Commonwealth Palace and made the task easier for the
latter. The Russian resistance was focussed in two points: in Zaluski
Palace, which was taken about five o'clock p.m., and the Capuchin
monastery, which was stormed one or two hours earlier".54
Likewise, when we give the successive development stages of a town
or a battle, we answer the questions "how did it occur that the town X
developed?", "how did it happen that the army A won and the army B
lost?", etc. These questions are important, but they cannot replace the
questions "why did the town X develop?", "why did the army A win?".
This is so because the former ones are factographic questions, which
can be fitted into the model question "what was?", and not explanatory
questions "why was it so?". In other words, this type of genetic ex-
planation must be included in the procedure of description (establish-
ment) of facts by setting off for it type of genetic description, that is,
a description of facts linked by the relation of a necessary condition.
Providing such descriptions is one of the principal tasks of synthesis-
writing in historiography (cf. Chap. XXII) and yields as a result a
specified case of a historical narrative.
The second type of genetic explanation, as singled out above, consists
in that a historian, who has established a sequence of events, tries to
fiU the gaps in it:
Fl -+ F2 -+ ... -+ Fn -+ Fn+l -+ ... -+ Fn+x'
This is practically a fragment of the former type, but there the his-
torian was interested in the last fact in the sequence, the fact to which
the description was subordinated, whereas here the point may be the
same, but the historian has first to answer questions of the type: "what
could occur after the i-th fact?" or "what fact could have preceded the
i-th fact?" Thus, in the sequence given above the historian has to esta-
blish the following facts: F3 to F n - 1, inclusively, and Fn+2 to F n + x - 1,

inclusively. Filling the gaps consists in
(1) referring to a law which states that a fact of a type Fn is always
or usually followed by a fact of a type Fn+1' or that a type Fn fact is
necessary for the occurrence of a type Fn+l fact (in the case of prog-
nosis);
(2) reference to the law stating that for a fact of the type F n it is
necessary that a fact of the type F n-l occurs first, or reference to the
necessary condition which states that usually Fn does not occur without
F n- 1;
(3) comparing the nearest known links in the series and referring to
the law which states that the path from F n to F n+ 1 always or usually
leads through Fn+(x-ll" It can easily be noticed that this amounts to
answering the factographic question about "what was?". Unlike the
first type of genetic explanation, in addition to the indication of the
sequence of facts intended to show how the last event in the sequence
came to occur, the point here is also to establish facts about which
there are no data in the source, that is, to establish facts indirectly.
Such a filling of gaps is useful for a historian especially when it comes
to the construction of an integrated picture of a given segment of the
past.
It is a basic misunderstanding to call genetic explanation the fund-
amental or one of the fundamental forms of explanation in historical
research, as this confuses the fact that historical narratives are largely
constructed so as to describe properly ordered sequences of events,
which results in the genetic nature of such narrative, with causal ex-
planation as such. As follows from the fairly numerous examples
quoted above, historians usually realize the difference between causal
explanation and genetic narration. The results of causal explanation are
often included in historical narratives: for instance, a historian first
establishes the causes of the emergence of manorial farms based on serf
labour and then proceeds to describe the development of that type of
farming in Poland in the form of a genetic narrative. He thus first
points to the facility of selling (exporting) grain and the situation in the
field of man power, and then discusses the consequences of those facts.
Only ignorance of the real problems in historical research can explain
the acceptance of a genetic description as tantamount to a causal ex-
planation. Causal explanation, even if not manifested in other ways, is

implicitly inherent in the descriptions of genetic sequences, advanced by
historians.
Thus the problem of genetic explanation does not exist as a separate
issue of causal explanation in historical research. We may only speak
about genetic descriptions or genetic explanations without adding that
causal explanation is involved. We do not include here the cases, ana-
lysed above, in which a person who asks about the origin of some
events wants to receive a causal explanation. Genetic description IS
linked with the formulation of syntheses in historiography.
REFERENCES
1 Cf. Wielka Encyklopedia Powszechna PWN ({he Comprehensive Universal

Encyclopaedia), Polish Scientific Publishers, vol. 6, p. 496.
2 Ibid., vol. 5, p. 467.
3 This interpretation is to be found in S. Ossowski, 0 osobliwosciach nauk
spolecznych (On the Peculiarities of the Social Sciences), Warszawa 1962,
pp.232if.
« S. Nowak, Studia z metodologii nauk spolecznych (Studies in the Methodo-
logy of the Social Sciences), ed. cit., pp. IS3 if (chapter on·"Observation and
Understanding of Human Behaviour and Problems of Theory Construction").
5 In the present writer's terminology, extra-psychological understanding
covers: (1) structural understanding (understanding of the role of an element in
a given system), (2) reductive understanding (reduction of a given set of solu-
tions to basic solutions), (3) information-oriented understanding (understanding
of the informant's code, e.g., the language of a given source), (4) causal under-
standing, (5) genetic understanding (understanding of the sequence of events).
6 The necessity of such investigations was stressed by W. Kula in his Rozwa-
iania 0 historii (Reflections on History), ed. cit., pp. 91 if.
7 C. G. Hempel, "The Function of General Laws in History", in: Theories
of History, ed. cit., pp. 352-3.
8 W. Dray, Laws and Explanation in History, Chap. V: ''The Rationale of
Action", ed. cit., pp. llS if, 137-42.
9 S. Ossowski, op. cit., pp. 232-51, in particular pp. 236-7.
10 Ibidem.
11 The problem has been discussed exhaustively by J. Kmita in his Problemy
metodologiczne interprecacji humanistycznej (Methodological Problems of Hu-
manistic Interpretation), who shows in detail what explanations of goal-oriented
human actions consist of; to do so he makes use of the concept of humanistic
interpretation, which refers to the agent's goal, his body of knowledge, and the
norms by which he is guided.
12 On motivation in social psychology see Assessment of Human Motives,

(ed.) G. Lindey, Grove Press 1960. E. Nagel (The Structure of Science, pp.
551 if) says that when explaining individual behaviour we have to find the rea-
sons for which a given individual behaved in a particular way under specified
circumstances, and discusses the categories of such reasons.
13 A. Malewski (0 zastosowaniach teorii zachowania (On the Applications
of Behaviour Theory), Warszawa 1964, pp. 175-6) gives an interesting example.
"When a historian wants to assess the value of the data contained in memoirs,
he must consider whether the memoirs were intended to be published, and if
so, whether they were to be published during their author's lifetime, or only
after his death. Such considerations are based on the assumption that memoirs
intended for publication may be marked by more deliberate omissions and
distortions than we would find in memoirs written by their author's for his own
sake. This assumption may be substantiated theoretically in terms of behaviour
theory. In the case of memoirs intended for the public omissions or distortions
by the author of what would discredit him enables him to avoid both those
punishments which consist in his own disapproval of his conduct, and the
punishments which consist in disapproval of his conduct by others. In the case
of secret memoirs such a behaviour enables him at most to avoid his own
disapproval" .
14 R. D. Luce and H. Raiffa, Games and Decisions, ed. cit., pp. 47-51.
15 Explanations in terms of situation logic have been most extensively used
by P. Gardiner (The Nature of Historical Explanation, London 1952), who
singles out explanation in accordance with Hempel's model (in terms of causal
effects) and rational explanation (in terms of situation logic). The distinction
deserves attention, even though the present writer does not agree with Gardiner
when the latter opposes one type of explanation to the other and says that in
explanations in terms of situation logic we do without reference to laws.
16 Cf. A. Malewski, 0 zastosowaniach teorii zachowania (The Applications
of Behaviour Theory), Warszawa 1964.
17 Ibid., pp. 14-5.
18 The problem is analysed in detail by W. Kula in his Rozwazania 0 historii
(Reflections on History), ed. cit., pp. 74 ff.
19 The present writer nevertheless does not share G. Ryle's opinion who
claims (in The Concept of Mind, ed. cit., p. 113) that states of mind (motives)
cannot be treated as facts or processes, and hence as causes of certain other
facts. In this connection see W. Dray, Laws and Explanation in History, ed. cit.,
pp. 141-5 and passim. Ryle was criticized, among others, by W. W. Bartley
in his "Achilles, the Tortoise and Explanation in Science and History", The
British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, vol. XIII, No. 49/1962, p. 22.
20 He assumes dispositions to be necessary conditions of individual actions
(cf. Laws and Explanation in History, pp. 151-2). On necessary conditions see
further sections in this Chapter.
21 W. Dray, op. cit., p. 145.
22 K. Popper's explanation of the first partition of Poland can serve as a

good example. He wrote that "If we explain, for example, the first division of
Poland in 1772 by pointing out that it could not possibly resist the combined
power of Russia, Prussia and Austria then we are tacitly using some trivial
universal law such as 'If of two armies which are about equally well armed and
led, one has a tremendous superiority in men, then the other never wins'''.
(The Open Society and Its Enemies, Princeton 1950,448 if.)
23 A. Danto, Analytical Philosophy of History, ed. cit., p. 254, His law has
the form
(X)«Fxtl A GXt2 => Hx),
which shows that the element of time is here taken into consideration.
24 G. Ryle, "If, So, and Because", Philosophical Analysis, Ithaca 1950.
25 Cf. W. Dray, Laws and Explanation in History, ed. cit., p. 57. "The alter-
native which is too much to accept is that, in the ordinary sense of the word,
the historian may use no law at all" (italics - W. Dray).
26 A translation of a inductive model into a deductive one is to be found in
M. Brodbeck, Minnesota Studies in the Philosophy of Science, vol. III.
27 C. G. Hempel, The Function of General Laws in History, ed. cit.,
pp.345-6.
2S The defectiveness of many causal explanations is demonstrated in A. Ma-
lewski and J. Topolski, op. cit., pp. 133-49.
29 Cf. S. Nowak, Studia z metodologii nauk spolecznych (Studies in the
Methodology of the Social Sciences), ed. cit., pp. 55-103.
30 L. Nowak, Zasady marksistowskiej filozofii nooki (principles of the Marx-
ist Philosophy of Science), Warszawa 1974, p. 54.

31 Use is made here of examples and conclusions drawn from A. Malewski
and J. Topolski, op. cit., pp. 115 if. This means the adoption of many ideas
advanced by A. Malewski.
land), vol. I, ed. cit., p. 125.

33 Ibid., pp. 126-7.
34 Ibid., pp. 125-6.
35 F. Bujak, Przyczyny upadku Polski (The Causes of Poland's Fall), pp. 107,
110, quoted after M. Bobrzynski, Dzieje Polski (A History of Poland), vol. II,
3rd 00., p. 280.
36 J. Tazbir, Swit i zmierzch polskiej rejormacji (The Dawn and the Dusk of
the Reformation in Poland), Warszawa 1956, p. 145.
37 See the interesting comments by A. Montefiore, "Professor Gallie on Nec-
essary and Sufficient Conditions", Mind, 1956, in particular p. 538. See also
L. Gottschalk, Understanding History, New York 1950, pp. 210-1.
38 E. Rostworowski, "Reforma pawlowska Pawla Ksawerego Brzostowskie-
go" (pawel Ksawery Brzostowski's Reform), Przeglqd Historyczny, No. 1-2/1953,
p. 105.
586 THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOOY OF HISTORY
It J. Baszkiewicz, Powstanie zjednoczonego paristwa polskiego na przelomie

XIII i XIV wieku (The Emergence of Poland as a Re-Unified State at the Turn
of the 13th Century), Warszawa 1954.
land), ed. cit., p. 264.
41 R. Grodecki & S. Zachorowski, Dzieje Polski sredniowiecznej (A History
of Mediaeval Poland). vol. I, Krak6w 1926, p. 325.
4l! S. Arnold, "PodtoZe gospodarczo-spoteczne polskiego Odrodzenia" (The
Socio-Economic Background of the Renaissance in Poland), in: Odrodzenie
w Polsce (The Renaissance in Poland), vol. I, Warszawa 1955, p. 119.
41 S. Kieniewicz, "Problem rewolucji agramej w Polsce w okresie ksztaltowa-
nia sit' ukladu kapitalistycznego" (The Problem of the Agrarian Revolution in
Poland at the Time of the Formation of the Capitalist System), in: Z epoki
Mickiewicza (The Times of Adam Mickiewicz), Wroclaw 1956, pp. 3-4.
" Studia trodloznawcze, vol. VII, 1962, pp. 145-6.
411 Quoted from J. M. Keynes, The Scope and Method of Political Economy.
after o. Lange, Political Economy, vol. I, p. 127.
46 J. Rutkowski, op. cit., p. 127.
47 W. Rusmski, "Drogi rozwojowe folwarku panszczyZn.ianego" (The Evolu-
tion of Serfdom-based Manorial Farms), Przeglqd Historyczny, No. 4/1956,
p.645.
48 B. Zientara, "Z zagadniefl. spornych tzw. 'wt6rnego poddaflstwa'" (Con-
troversial Issues of 'Recurrent Serfdom'), Przeglqd Historyczny, No. 1/1956,
p.40.
48 W. B. Gallie, "Explanations in History and the Genetic Sciences", Min'd,
1955, pp. 160-80. See also A. Montefiore, "Professor Gallie on Necessary and
Sufficient Conditions", Mind, 1956, pp. 534-41.
&0 W. Dray, op. cit., pp. 156 if.
61 On this issue see the present writer's review of S. Nowak's "Studia z me-
todologii nauk spolecznych" (Studies in the Methodology of the Social Sciences),
yvhich appeared in Studia Filozoficzne, No. 6/1965.
52 Cf. W. Dray, op. cit., pp. 66 if. His example, given on pp. 70-1, does not
in the least corroborate his opinion.

68 W. Dray, The Philosophy of History, New York 1964, pp. 18-9. See also
his ''Explanatory Narrative in History", Philosophical Quarterly, vol. IV, No. 14,
January 1954, pp. 15-27. Cf. his Laws and Explanation in History, pp. 66 if and
158 if.
6' W. Tokarz, Insurekcja warszawska (The Warsaw Insurrection of 1794),
2nd ed., Warszawa 1950, p. 249.
XXII. CONSTRUCTION AND SYNTHESIS
1. Basic and derivative research questions

The establishing of facts and causal explanation is to be distinguished
from text construction, that is, formulation of answers to basic research
questions; in the latter procedure explanations and statements about
established facts are used as structural elements from which the building
which is the answer to a given research question is constructed. The
basic research question, as distinct from derivative ones, is that to which
all other questions posed during a given research work are somehow
subordinated. In a given case there may be more such basic questions
than one; the principal among them is the question included in the
formulation of the (working or final) title of the study. It is inessential,
and rather rare, for such a title to be followed by a query; in most cases
the title is just L'Age de Louis XIV (Voltaire), Der achtzehnte Bru-
maire des Louis Bonaparte (Marx), or La Cite antique (Foustel de Cou-
langes), etc., because each such title may be changed into an inter-
rogative (factographic or explanatory) sentence.
When it comes to formulating an answer to the basic question, the
first step consists in splitting that question into derivative ones so that
answers to the latter should, when put together, provide an answer to
the former. Such a splitting of the basic question into derivative ones is
nothing else than making a plan of research. At first such a plan is very
general and highly hypothetical in nature. It is transformed only in the
course of research so that not only derivative questions but even the
basic question may be modified. The following schema illustrates that
process in a simplified manner:
Basic question Splitting Data Transformation Answer
I - - of the ~ collection ~ of the plan
basic
-:l
question
~ = plan I---:l
of research
't I
When constructing the first version of the research plan we avail our-
selves mainly of our non-source-based knowledge: the role of source-
based knowledge usually increases in the later stages of research work.
As can be seen, the plan is thus a sui generis control device in the
process of answer formulation. This means that text construction begins
at the moment the research work is undertaken, that is, at the moment
of the formulation of questions which form a more or less coherent
system intended to provide an answer to the basic question.
The procedure of establishing facts and advancing causal explana-
tions cannot in practice be separated from text construction. All sepa-
rate solutions are necessary simplifications of a methodological analy-
sis.
2. Simple and synthetic constructions
The splitting of the basic question into systems of derivative questions,

and thus formulation of partial answers to the basic question, intended
to provide a comprehensive answer, may be carried out in various
ways. At any rate, we can make a distinction between simple and
synthetic constructions.
In the case of simple constructions the grouping of partial answers
(and hence also, usually, the grouping of partial questions) is deter-
mined satisfactorily by the following three criteria: chronological, terri-
torial, and factual, which are used in different constructions in varying
degrees. In some works it is the chronological criterion which plays the
fundamental role, in the others, it is the territorial or the factual one.
According to the criterion adopted as the principal one the remaining
on,es play an auxiliary role. In most cases, which is in agreement with
one of the essential characteristics of historical research, the chronol-
ogical criterion is taken to be the principal one, and divisions based
on the territorial aild the factual criterion are carried out within the
chronological framework. Such is the case of the Historia Polski (A
History of Poland), sponsored by the Polish Academy of Sciences In-
stitute of History. The territorial criterion is very often to be found in
studies confined to a narrow chronological frame; the same applies to
the factual criterion, which moreover is largely used in studies in the
history of material civilization. .
CONSTRUCTION AND SYNTHESIS 589
When it comes to simple constructions, those criteria are interpreted

formally. This means that chronological divisions are based on a formal
principle; the same applies to territorial units and also, though here the
issue is more complicated, to factual elements. For instance, answers
are formulated so that the data are grouped by centuries, by formal
territorial units (e.g., administrative districts), and by accepted subject
classifications.
It is self-evident that in practice we do not encounter pure con-
structions of this type. Each of them includes elements of a synthetic
approach, for source-based knowledge cannot be fully separated. from
non-source-based one. 1
Synthetic constructions are thus characteristic of historical research.
But whenever text construction is determined by the above-said criteria
interpreted formally (which may also be a manifestation of a programme
of objective research, i.e., research which in the author's view is not
guided by any system of valuations), we rather should refer to simple
constructions, and reserve the term "synthetic constructions" for re-
sults of researches consciously guided by a specified system of opinions.
A synthetic construction is thus a way of formulating an answer to
the basic research question, an answer in which chronological, terri-
torial, and factual criteria are used, but in a way which depends on
a given view of the past, which, as we know, is the historian's most
important component of his non-source-based knowledge. The value
of a given synthetic construction depends on the value of that know-
ledge; hence we cannot say in advance that every synthetic construction
is more valuable than any simple one, since the latter at the worst
provides a specified amount of data, whereas an erroneous synthetic
construction may offer a completely deformed answer to the basic re-
search question. We do not mean here those constructions which
deliberately pass over inconvenient facts in silence or even distort data,
nor do we refer to poor historical journalism and to popular books,
willingly read by the broad public, which take advantage of the
readers' lack of knowledge and the common-sense approach (in the
derogatory sense of the term) that at the best serves as a condenser of
popular myths and stereotypes regarding the past.
The problem of synthetic constructions takes us to the vast expanse
of discussions, to be found in the historiography of probably every
country, regarding the synthesis of the history of one's own nation, and
also the age-old discussions of the various approaches which try to
synthesize universal history. This also covers discussions of the criteria
of syntheses of the various historical disciplines.
3. The problem of synthesis in historical research
Historical syntheses may diverge greatly in nature and thus provide

widely varying summing-up answers to the respective research questions.
It is a normal thing that answers to detailed (derivative) questions are
similar in different syntheses, but the summing-up answers differ from
one another. This is so because practically no one questions fundamen-
tal facts, but historians combine those facts into genetic series in
various ways and see them linked by various causal relationships. As
has been said, in the last analysis this is linked with the system of
valuations which a given historian represents. The issue will again be
discussed later.
Out of many different syntheses of the history of the various nations
we shall point, by way of example, to the Whig and the Tory histories
of England, the various synthesizing interpretations of the French Rev-
olution, tile syntheses of Polish history offered by Lelewel and Szujski,
respectively, and syntheses based on the theory of historical materialism
and those which in a lesser or greater degree oppose the last-named
approach. Even if historians share the same system of valuations the
differences in their non-source-based knowledge account for the fact
that their synthetic constructions are not fully convergent. That, how-
ever, is a normal phenomenon, which results in bringing the various
standpoints closer to one another. Nor is it a peCUliarity of historical
research or the humanities or the social sciences in general; even in
natural science, too, we find that the synthetic vision of specified facts
often differs markedly from researcher to researcher.
The history of the synthesis of universal history is extremely interest-
ing.1 The "philosophical" historiography in the Age of Enlightenment
contributed entirely new opinions as compared with the earlier syntheses,
and not those alone which foIl owed Bossuet's example. Voltaire's
weII-known saying that the sluices of a canal that joins two seas, a paint-
ing by Poussin, a finely written tragedy, or a newly discovered truth are
incomparably more valuable than court records and battle stories.

marked a break with the one-sided syntheses based on political history
or inspired by the Bible.
When it comes to specialized historical disciplines, J. Rutkowski's
proposals concerning syntheses in economic history have won much re-
nown.a Rutkowski suggested that the division of incomes be taken as
the basic issue in economic history, which could yield a synthetic ap-
proach to the whole of socio-economic history. W. Kula would replace
the division of incomes by the problem of living standards, which would
enable historians more fully to link the various issues in socio-economic
history with one another. The present writer is of the opinion that we
can produce most coherent syntheses by analysing, in each epoch, the
relationship between the productive forces and the relations of produc-
tion, that is, by accepting the dynamic role of contradictions in history.
These issues, like the general problem of the assumptions which underlie
various kinds of syntheses. are highly debatable. They also go--tar be-
yond the scope of the present book.
From the point of view of our needs here we have to single out three
essential kinds of syntheses; they are:
(1) structural syntheses,
(2) genetic syntheses,
(3) dialectial syntheses.
Structural syntheses are characterized by the dominance of the struc-
ture of a given system, i.e., specified links among its elements. The
authors of such syntheses are interested above all in the reproduction
of certain structural wholes in their intact form, and hence they formu-
late their answers to the basic research questions in that spirit. As an
example of a structural synthesis we may quote F. B:.-audel's well-known
work on Philip II and the Mediterrenean Basin (1946). Many studies
in the history of material civilization turn out to be structural syntheses.
The geographical environment also is the factor which very often works
as a structural link. Structural syntheses in their pure form are charac-
teristic of sociology rather than of historical research.
If a synthesis is dominated by the author's striving to disturb in the
least possible way the (causal) chronological sequences, then we have
to do with a genetic synthesis. That kind of syntheses, which is the
main manifestation of the genetic method in historical research, was
dominant for a long time. Stress is laid in such synthese~ not only on
the simple sequence of events - which was characteristic of the earliest
stages of that approach to history - but above all on the indication of
causal links.
The incompleteness of such syntheses was, in the Polish literature of
the subject, for a long time noticed only by J. Rutkowski, who wrote
in connection with economic history: "Tentative synthetic approaches
to economic history can go in various directions. At the first glance, the
causal approach is the simplest and most appropriate method: while
analytic studies would result in the simple statements that certain events
took place on a given territory and at a given time, synthetic studies
would strive for causal explanations of the origin of such facts". He
claimed that in monographic studies, dedicated each to a single prob-
lem, we can in this way possibly arrive at homogeneous constructions;
that method, however, is not the right one in the case of interpretations
of "more comprehensive wholes" (i.e., systems). If we are to arrive at
homogeneous constructions in such cases we have, as he wrote, "to
establish the existence of a single factor which fully conditions all
elements" .4
The path indicated by Rutkowski may mean either structural or dia-
lectical syntheses. Rutkowski himself was inclined toward the latter
type. He thought that those theories which ascribe the dominant impor-
tance to the geographical environment or to race cannot be accepted as
the correct solutions. Even though he did not say that those theories
pointed to factors which are as it were outside human activity (natural
factors), and accordingly they did not show how a given system moves
and how development takes place (even if they might somehow assume
movement of systems), his standpoint leads us to such a conclusion.
Dialectical syntheses are those which link the aspect of genetic se-
quences with that of structure, i.e., those which show genetic sequences
without the disruption of structures. The three types of structures could
be illustrated by the following metaphor. Suppose that the system we
investigate is a cobweb. We can show, by rolling it into a bundle, how
it was spun, that is, how the thread was becoming longer and longer.
This illustrates the procedure used in the formulation of a genetic
synthesis. When making a structural synthesis we would have to point
to the shape of the cobweb by drawing it or by making a photograph
of it at a certain stage of its formation. Should we succeed in demon-

strating, e.g., by filming the spinning process, how the cobweb changes
from a single thread into an increasingly complex object, this would
illustrate what the dialectical synthesis strives for.
In present-day historiography, the most important type of dialectial
syntheses is that based 'on the theory of historical materialism. This has
been admitted by J. Rutkowski, who wrote that the said theory may be
a foundation for a synthetic approach to the whole of human history,
even though economic history and the phenomena included in the eco-
nomic base should, in his opinion, be described by some special
methods of synthesis construction, which has been mentioned earlier.
H. I. Marrou pointed to the necessity of going beyond ordinary
structural syntheses; he made a distinction between static and dynamic
structures, yet, in his interpretation, the latter were rather improved
structural syntheses, and not dialectical ones, which explain the process
of development.
When speaking about the problems of syntheses it is worthwhile
pointing to S. Ossowski's considerations of the concept of aspect in the
social sciences. He indicated the fact that the image of the world, as
produced by researcher, is conditioned by the characteristics of his
object of study and his own dispositions. The latter "resemble differ-
ences between the various prisms, through which we look at objects and
see their colours and shapes, and not the retina, which is an indis-
pensable condition of all perception of colours and shapes".5
Here again we arrive at the concept of non-source-based knowledge,
since those optical instruments through which we view facts shape
that image of the world which we have in our minds and which we
gradually modify.
4. Periodization in history
In all historical constructions, except those which concern static systems

or short periods of time or systems which change little in the course of
time, the problem of a chronological splitting of the basic research
question, i.e., the problem of periodization, comes to the fore.
It is not a coincidence that the division of the past into periods has
been subject matter of so many controversies: the chronological criterion
adopted by a historian is determined by the whole of his opinions of

the past, that is, his non-source-based knowledge, which guides him in
his synthesis construction.
The historian's approach to the "division of a given segment of the
past into shorter periods depends on whether he strives for simple or
for synthetic constructions. In the former case he may rest satisfied
with a formal periodization, which W. Kula calls conventional,6 whereas
in the latter he strives to discover such periods whose singling out is
substantiated by the process of history. Such periodizations are called
factual by W. Kula.
It is difficult to decide in advance which periodization is berter. A
factual periodization based on an erroneous image of the past may
render the reconstruction of the process of history much more difficult
than a conventional one would.
W. Kula is right in stating that traditional text-books of the methodo-
logy of history were little concerned with the issues of periodization.
This was a manifestation of the idiographic approach of the authors or
a manifestation of genetic evolutionism, that is, an approach which pre-
vents people from noticing that systems undergo incessant transfor-
mations and become new systems, and hence new qualities (in this
connection see, e.g., E. Bernheim). If we realize that a good periodiza-
tion may help us bear out the essential changes in the systems we study,
this brings the importance of the problem of periodization into full
relief.
Frequent discussions concerned with periodization7 are thus in fact
basic discussions of the methods of reconstructing the process of history.
Progress in the approach to periodization reflected progress in historical
research. We shall not be concerned here with conventional periodiza-
tions, which after all may often be useful if treated as auxiliary but do
not raise interesting problems; we shall point to certain types of factual
periodizations. These types depend on the view of the past which a
given author represents. Generally speaking we can single out the fol-
lowing types of factual periodizations:
(1) cyclical periodizations,
(2) directional periodizations,
(3) irregular periodizations.
Cyclical periodizations usually pertain to long periods and to the
history of large territorial units. They can, however, apply to fairly

short periods, if some cyclical fluctuations (of prices, output, etc.) serve
as the foundation for the division into periods. In these cases such peri-
odizations may reflect the actual course of certain events or processes.
When it, however, comes to a broader aspect, cyclical periodizations
are usually associated with ideas which we find difficult to accept. An
example of a cyclical periodization is offered, e.g., by E. Huntington'S
work, who saw the evolution of mankind as following a sinusoid.8 In
the Polish literature of the subject we may point to a book by S. Ku-
rowski, who claimed that growth in the millenary trend followed succes-
sive logistic cycles (cf. the comments on the logistic curve ~ar1ier in the
text - Tr.).9 The ideas held by Ibn Khaldun, G. B. Vico, O. Spengler,
P. Lacombe (dichotomous processes, pendular movement) and the idea
of eternal return, known since Antiquity, belong in this group.10 The
cyclical approach to the process of history is often combined with the
directional one, thus yielding a spiral view of the past (cf. Saint-Simon,
K. Kelles-Krauz).
Directional periodizations are typical of the views which see a limit
(such as the Christian Last Judgement) that human history approaches
whether we like it or not. This group also includes views of a constant
progress in history, which takes place independent of the cause of given
historical facts. These were in particular the approaches initiated by
historiographers in the Age of Enlightenment, who opposed the earlier
theological patterns. An example is offered by Ch. Ellwood who
thought that the development of mankind followed a parabola: from
the level of animal life to the full triumph of reason.ll Among the older
penodizations of this type mention is due to the division into periods
as carried out by St. Augustine, who mentioned five epochs before the
advent of Christ, and the sixth, which began at that moment and was
to last, as it was interpreted later, until the Last Judgement. The proper
history of mankind was thus regarded as something changeless and
homogeneous.
Directional periodizations are today largely outdated. The now dom-
inant type is that of irregular periodizations, which do not impose any
geometrical schemata. Irregular periodizations may be accepted for
shorter periods also by those who are in favour of cyclical or directional
ones as applied to the whole of human history.
Irregular periodizations are marked by a strict linking of those

periods which are singled out with specified historical facts. Those facts
are complex and usually follow curves of little regularity, which those
periodizations strive to show (of course, with approximation). Such
periodizations may vary greatly according to the factor which deter-
mines a given division into periods. In earlier historical syntheses it was
usually the political factor (the political history of a state) that was
brought to the fore. Attention drawn by the founders of Marxism to
the economic factor included the latter fully as an element of the period-
ization procedure. Marxist historians have come to consider it as the
fundamental- factor of periodization, which, however, applies only to
the division of human history into its basic epochs; when it comes to
shorter periods, other factors, especially the political one, are used in
the same measure.
The division into the fundamental stages in the development of man-
kind results from the basic laws of social development, and yields the
typology of socio-economic formations analysed in Chap. XIII.l! In
this connection socio-economic formations form the main outline of
periodizations of the process of history. Divisions within formations
(that is, divisions into periods in the narrower sense of the term) are
usually associated with the general stages of the inner development of
a given formation on the territory in question.
On the whole, the criteria of periodization are one of the principal
indicators of synthetic constructions, the latter being shaped, as we know,
also by the appropriate use of territorial and factual criteria.
5. Territorial and factual scope and classification of research types·
Division into certain territorial units covered by research may also be

conventional or factual: it may, for instance, take into account ad-
ministrative districts or some other regions, singled out in some other
way. In practice, conventional divisions as applied to territory are much
less criticized than those applied to time.
The basic territorial unit usually studied is a state or a nation in its
territorial scope. This yields various histories of nations, which may be
more or less integrated if they cover the whole of history, i.e., possibly
all its aspects, or specialized, when they cover a single aspect of the
life of a given national community in the past (e.g., the economic

history of Poland). If the approach transcends the frontiers of a state or
the boundaries of the territory inhabited by a nation, it acquires a uni-
versal character. It is a larger area, e.g., a continent or the whole globe,
which becomes the geographical unit covered by the study. If only one
part of a continent or a state is studied, we have to do with regional
history. The criteria for singling out a given region may be of various
kinds, according to the requirements of research. But note that a faulty
delimitation of a region can have negative effects on the results of the
study. Regional history includes, for instance, the study of the territories
connected with the Baltic Sea, the area of the Mediterranean Basin, the
Balkans, etc. Studies concerned with the history of Greater Poland,
Picardy, Catalonia, or Eastern Byelorussia also fall under the category
of regional studies.
Regional monographs may be marked by an integrated or specialized
approach. In the case of regional economic history historians should
avail themselves on a greater scale than heretofore of the results of
those studies by economic geographers which are concerned with
regions.
The historian ought to bear it in mind that he may not separate uni-
versal, national, and regional history. When working on a study in
national or regional history he must realize it is part of a study in uni-
versal history. The comparative approach should be a sine qua non
in historical research. At the same time, when working on universal or
national history, he must have a well-substantiated opinion concerning
the regionalization of the territory whose history he studies. In that
respect historians ought to improve their non-source-based knowledge,
since on this point (especially in the sphere of economic history) they
have much to make up.
The approaches practiced so far sin by a too much generalized treat-
ment of territories. It is very often so that ideas based on the best
known region dominate a synthetic study. Genetic sequences and
various generalizations are often marked by a one-sided approach,
which is characteristic, in particular, of the studies of large systems over
longer periods.
The factual segmentation of data is also strongly connected with
a given historian's concept of synthesis, namely with the way he links
facts into more comprehensive wholes and with the importance he as-
signs to various facts.
Without enlarging on the issues of geographical and factual segre-
gation of data we shall point to the principal types of syntheses, the
classification being based on the joint consideration of the geographical
and the factual criterion. We have to do with two types:
(1) microsynthetic approaches,
(2) macrosynthetic approaches.
A microsynthesis is the final result of microanalytic studies. On the
other hand, however, microanalytic studies, such as the study of family
budgets, may serve as a foundation for a macrosynthesis, such as a de-
scription of a whole social group.
The microsynthetic approach is an answer to a basic research ques-
tion concerned with a single undecomposable element or with small
social systems. In the former case a study may concentrate on a single
material object (but shown in the setting of a given social system, since
otherwise we would not have to do with a historical study at all) or on
an individual qua member of society. As examples of studies concerned
with a single object we may quote numerous studies in the history of
art which analyse a given work (e.g., Wit Stwosz's altar in Cracow or
the door of the Gniezno cathedral), in archaeology, in the history of
material civilization. This also applies to studies which pertain to a
number of similar objects, unless the center of gravity is not in the
analysis of the objects themselves, but in the study of their role in
a given more comprehensive social system. Such studies may be con-
cerned not only with material objects, but also with elements of spiritual
culture (e.g., the study of the Gregorian chant in mediaeval Poland).
Monograph of persons are examples of studies focused on individuals
as members of society. Such microsynthetic approaches may differ
widely in nature, according to the attention dedicated by the researcher
to the person in question and to the (large or small) systems in which
that person lived. If he confines himself to the person only, he produces
a biography, which may be treated in various manners. Good exampl~)
of such an approach are offered by the items included in biographical
dictionaries (e.g., Polski Slownik Biograficzny (The Polish Biographical
Dictionary», and bad ones, by various anniversary, etc., articles.1s
Modern biographies on an increasing scale pay attention to the systems
in which an individual was active in order to show the influence a given

system had upon that individual and also the influence that individual
had upon the system. In all such cases the individual is treated as an
element of a system. 14
The concept of a small social system, such systems being, next to
single objects and individuals, the second subject matter of micro-
synthetic approaches, is not clearly outlined. There is no doubt that
a family, a craftsman's workshop, and even a village, are small social
systems; but does a town, especially a large one, fall under that cate-
gory? In order to define, at least approximately, the scope of the con-
cept of a small social system we have to distinguish it from that of
a social group, the latter concept being very current in sociology. Only
those groups will be termed social systems which are certain functional
wholes and in which the working of the various elements is so inter-
twined that those elements cannot exist in isolation. A system may be
small or large according to the point of reference. A village is a large
system if compared with a single farm, but a small one if compared
with the whole society. Hence, if a person wants to find out with what
social system he has to do, he must seek the answer to this question
each time. 15 Monographs of industrial plants, villages, social institutions
(e.g., charitable societies), political institutions (e.g., Parliament), edu-
cational institutions (e.g., a given school), cultural institutions (a given
theatre), etc., are examples of results of the studies of small social
systems. Like in the case of the study of individuals, analyses of small
social systems may be linked in a varying degree with a study of more
comprehensive systems, of which the small ones are elements. 16
The macrosynthetic approach is concerned with large social systems.
This includes integrated studies of such systems (e.g., monographs of
large towns, states, or groups of states), studies of certain elements in
given systems (e.g., the study of trade as a branch of economic activity;
the peasant issue in the 1863 Uprising in Poland; the universalist idea
in Mediaeval Europe; the participation of the Polish troops in World
War II, etc.), and analyses of the effect which specified external factors
had upon a given system (e.g., Oriental influences in 18th century Eu-
ropean art).
The finest examples of macrosynthetic approaches are offered by
studies concerned with the whole of the history of a given state over
a long period (e.g., K. Tymieniecki's Dzieje Niemiec do poczq.tku ery

nowozytnej (A History of Germany up to the Beginning of the Modern
Epoch), Poznan 1948), or with a number of states (e.g., T. Manteuffel's
sredniowiecze powszechne (Universal Mediaeval History), presenting
a synthesis of European history, Warszawa 1961; M. zywczyIiski's
Historia Powszechna 1789-1870 (Universal History, 1789-1870, War-
szawa 1964), or the comprehensive studies of the whole of universal
history, published in many countries.
REFERENCES
1 This is a manifestation of the general principle, which had been emphasized

by Karl Marx, that "there is no history without theory". The realization of this
fact has by now become universal, and the principle is being stressed by all
theorists and all historians concerned with theoretical issues. Cf. R. Aron,
"Theories and facts are integrated in such a manner that one would attempt in
vain to separate them rigorously" (in: Evidence and Inference in History, D. Ler-
ner (ed.), Glencoe 1959, p. 19); W. H. Costes, "Relativism and the Use of
Hypotheses in History", The Journal of Modern History, vol. XXI, No. 1/1949,
p. 26; J. Adamus, "Every person has a synthetic (view of the past), which he
realizes or not, and which he has worked out for himself or naively taken over
from some authorities on the subject" (0 kiel1unkach polskiej myS/i historycznej
(frend in Polish Historiosophy), L6dz 1964, pp. 42-3). The problem was treated
more extensively in connection with the analysis of non-souree-based knowledge.
2 Cf. M. H. Serejski, Koncepcja historii powszechnej loachima Lelewela
(Joachim Lelewel's Idea of Universal History), Warszawa 1958.

3 He made several statements on the issue (from 1925 on); cf. his Historia
gospodarcza Polski (An Economic History of Poland), vol. I, Poznan 1946,
pp. 15-20. His idea was criticized by W. Kula in Problemy i metody historii
gospodarczej (problems and Methods in Economic History), pp. 195 ff. See also
J. Topolski, "0 zagadnieniu syntezy w historii gospodarczej" (fhe Problem of
Synthesis in Economic History), Roczniki Dziejow Spolecznych i Gospodar-
czych, vol. XXVI, Poznan 1965, pp. 260--5.
4 J. Rutkowski, op. cit., pp. 15--6.
5 S. Ossowski, 0 osobliwosciach nauk spolecznych (On the Peculiarities of
the Social Sciences), ed. cit., Chap. III, p. 117.
6 W. Kula, op. cit., p. 173.
7 Concerning the Middle Ages see T. Manteufi'el, Sredniowiecze powszechne
(A Universal History of the Middle Ages), Warszawa 1961, Introduction. See
also H. See, "La division de l'histoire en periodes", Revue de la Synthese His-
torique, vol. XLVI, Series XVI, Paris 1926, pp. 61-7; he quotes E. Troeltsch
(Der Historismus und seine Probleme, Tiibingen 1922), who holds that period-
ization reflects a given historian's philosophy of values. See thinks that period-
ization contributes to an explanation of facts. Thus the opinion that periodiza-
tions play a role in historical interpretations has been gradually gaining ground
in the various schools of historiography. Many comments on periodization are
to be found in E. Callot, Ambiguites et antinomies de I' histoire, Paris 1962,
pp.l09-16.
8 E. Huntington, The Pulse oj Progress, New York 1926.
9 S. Kurowski, Historyczny proces wzrostu gospodarczego (The Historical
Process of Economic Growth), Warszawa 1963, p. 373.
10 Cf. M. Eliade, Le My the de l'eternel retour, Paris 1949. The same issues,
though in a slightly different context, are discussed by S. Ossowski, "Prawa
'historyczne' w socjologii" ('Historical' Laws in Sociology), Przeglqd Filozoficz-
ny, vol. XXXVIII, 1935, pp. 3-32.
11 This idea is analysed by S. Ossowski, op. cit., pp. 3-12.
12 We may speak about a theory of socio-economic formation only if we
mean a mechanism of transition from one formation to the next. If we have
to do only with a listing and a description of the various formations (possibly
in the order in which they usually follow one another), then we may speak
only about their typology.
13 The biographical method in sociology was discussed by J. Szczepanski;
cf. "Die biographische Methode" in: Handbf,lch der empirischen Sozialjorschung,
ed. cit., pp. 551-69, where also the major works on the subject are listed.
14 In Polish historiography we have an example of such a modem mono-
graph in A. Kersten's book on Stefan Czarniecki (Warszawa 1963). His work
gave rise to an interesting discussion on monographs of individuals.
15 On small social systems see R. Redfield, The Little Community, Chicago
1955, and also J. Topolski, "Problemy metodologiczne monograficznych badan
wsi" (Methodological Problems of Monographic Studies of Villages), Kwartal-
nik Historii Kultury Materialnej, No. 211966.
16 For a broad treatment of the subject matter see B. LeSnodorski, lakobini
polscy (The Polish Jacobins), Warszawa 1963. The group which he studies
obviously formed a small social system, but it is shown by LeSnodorski in the
context of many larger systems. In such a case an apparently micro-synthetic
approach becomes macro synthetic.
PART SIX
THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY

OF HISTORY
XXIII. THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF mSTORICAL
NARRATION
1. The problem of narration in the methodology of sciences

The problem of narration emerges when we pass from considerations
concerned with pragmatic methodology and focused on research pro-
cedures, to the consideration of the results of research (i.e., apragmatic
considerations). In many sciences an answer to a given research ques-
tion takes on the form of a coherent and complete verbal structure.
That verbal structure might be called a narrative, although the term
may seem somewhat shocking when applied to certain disciplines. For
all the differences in the structures of narratives in the various sciences
each narrative is a report on the results of research, that is, a coherent
sequence of statements about specified facts. From that point of view
there is no difference not only between, say, history and geology, but
also between history, on the one hand, and physics or musicology, on
the other. A physicist, a musicologist and a historian alike must report
on the results of their research, conducted by different methods, in
a certain order which is accepted in their respective disciplines. This
means that they must compose certain fragments into a readable whole
(which may prove readable only to those who know the specific lan-
guage of a given discipline), in which the results of one's own research,
one's own knowledge, and some results of researches conducted by
others, are merged into a possibly well-structured ·report.
What in pragmatic methodology maybe interpreted as establishing
and explaining facts and as synthetizing work, in a pragmatic methodo-
logy takes on the form of narration (as the formulation of narratives).
Narration raises numerous problems. It may be said that by analysing
narratives, that is, systems of statements which form answers to re-
search questions posed, we come to define the place of a given discipline
in the system of sciences. Thus the problem of narration is a focal issue
in the apragmatic methodology of sciences, and at rate in the aprag-
matic methodology of history.
606 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
When analysing narratives we have to take into account the following

three groups of problems:
(1) types of narratives (in a given discipline),
(2) instruments of narration,
(3) elements of narratives.
They will be discussed in turn as applied to narration in historical
research and historical narratives (as products of narration), beginning
with general characteristics of historical narratives.
2. Historical narratives versus narratives in general
Some authors are inclined to see the tendency to describe the course of
events as that characteristic of historical narratives which distinguishes
them from narratives in many other disciplines, where possible descrip-
tions of facts are subordinated to the task of formulating or refuting
theories. Such a standpoint. even though it reflects the actual practices
of most historians, is not correct, because among the many kinds of
historical narratives we can single out narratives which are subordi-
nated to certain theoretical tasks. 1 For instance, the peasant rebellion
led by Wat Tyler may be analysed not out of sheer historical curiosity
(what was?), but in connection with a study of the theory of peasant
rebellions or class struggle in geenraI. In 'Such narratives, description is
only one component of the whole. It must, however, be admitted that
clearly formulated theoretical statements are not a necessary element of
a historical narrative. Nor are they a necessary element of a narrative
in the sphere of any empirical discipline: there are studies in physics
which merely describe certain facts; likewise, a chemist may turn out
a paper in which he 'confines himself to describing a chemical reaction,
or an astronomer, a paper in which he describes the movements of a
planet. We mean here, of course, narratives turned out by individual
researches, and not narratives in general. since in the latter case refer-
ences to theory are indispensable in physics, in chemistry, and in astron-
omy alike. Yet even historical research, especially such as we would
like to have in the nearest future, has to strive for narratives which
include theoretical components. A narrative interpreted as the set of all
answers to a given research question in a given discipline is inconceiv-
able without connections with a theory.
THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATION 607
Since both description and a theoretical component (or reference to

a theory within one and the same discipline) are necessary conditions of
any scientific narrative (treated generally, and not from the point of
view of a given researcher), this means that these conditions do not
suffice to characterize historical narratives more closely. They are neces-
sary but insufficient conditions. What element then plays the role of that
condition which suffices to treat a given narrative as a historical one if,
as we have seen, a description and a reference to a theory alone do not
make a narrative historical in nature?
That element is to be found in time (to use a very general formu-
lation), time being also a necessary condition of a historical narrative.
We can thus suggest the following basic characteristics of historical
narratives:
(1) necessary conditions: description of facts; reference to a theory;
reference to time;
(2) sufficient condition: reference to time;
(3) necessary and sufficient condition: reference to time.
There is no history without the element of time (and this applies not
to human history alone, but to natural history as well). Time is that
factor which gives history its sense of existence and its vital force.
Time in historical research was treated more extensively when the con-
cept of historical fact was discussed (Chap. X). But then more emphasis
was placed on the relative nature of time in history and on the direction
of its flow, and here we are more concerned with that aspect of time
which differs from the treatment of time in the non-historical sciences.
Hence time, as referred to by historians, is not time in general, which
might be termed pure timet (which can sufficiently be defined by the
concepts of momentary duration and succession), but dated time, in the
case of which we have to point to some place on the chronological
scale. It is that dated time which gives historical narratives their unique
tinge: it locates each of them in its appropriate interval on the time
scale and imparts it the direction which complies with the flow of
time. 8 Even though we need not, for various reasons, follow the direc-
tion of time flow when constructing a narrative (this is what takes place
in the case of the retrogressive method), yet in the last analysis the
direction of time flow gives orientation to that narrative as if recalling
its inseparability from history. For all the expected successes of theoret-
608 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllSTORY
ical historical research, focused on fonnulating theorems, history itself

would vanish if separated from the concept of time.
As compared with many other sciences, historical disciplines are in-
comparably more saturated by dated time. Even though dated time may
be found in other disciplines, it is certainly not any peculiarity of theirs.
When a physicist says that light travels c. 300,000 kilometers per sec-
ond, he does not refer that process to the time scale, and when he
makes an experiment which involves the measurement of time, he says
that a certain process began at a time to and ended at a time t 1> and
hence makes use of dated time, but he immediately as it were forgets
that and remains interested solely in the interval between to and tl' He
thus, in the last analysis, makes use of time in general, and not of dated
time. It can easily be seen that when a historian says that "the first
partition of Poland took place in 1772" or that "World War II lasted
from September 1, 1939, to May 9, 1945", he is interested in time in
some other way than a physicist is: he specifies the date of the first
partition of Poland and the date of the beginning and the end of World
War II. Dated time is sometimes used not by historians only, but also
by palaeontologists, geologists, palaeozoologists, botanists who are in-
terested in changes in the vegetable kingdom, etc. As a result of their
researches they all produce historical narratives. While a representative
of non-historical sciences may use dated time, historians sometimes use
the concept of time in general. This is so, for instance, when a historian
says that in the 18th century Polish peasants were obliged to provide
serf labour three days a week. It can be noticed immediately that his-
torical time "in general" here applies to a time interval marked on the
chronological scale. Hence the generality of time is here relative in
nature. Time in general occurs in narratives in strictly general state-
ments, whether explicit or implicit.
3. Types of scientific historical narratives. Chronicle writing versus

historiography
Reference to time, which suffices to single out historical narratives

among all narratives, does not suffice to characterize scientific historical
narratives. Not every (explicitly or implicitly) dated sequence of state-
ments about the past would be classified by us as a product of a his-
torian's research procedure, and hence included in the store of scientific

historical knowledge. But where are we to draw the demarcation line
between scientific narratives and those which do not meet the above
condition? It seems that we may start our search for the answer to this
question in the distinction between chronicle writing and historiography,
or, in other words, between chroniclers' narratives and historical nar-
ratives, sometimes to be found in studies in the philosophy of history.
Historical narratives, on the exclusion of current historical narratives,
which are not products of scholarly research and in which we are not
interested here, may in turn be identified with scientific historical nar-
ratives.
B. Croce's well-known distinction between chronicle writing and
historiography4 is not precise enough to enable us to describe his stand-
point with clarity. In any case, in his opinion historiography is report-
ing about those facts in which we are interested (so that all history is
present history!), whereas a chronicle, even if written contemporane-
ously, is "dead history", which reports historical facts without relating
them to our interests.
This may be interpreted so that B. Croce sees the difference between
chronicle writing and historiography in the problem of selection.
W. H. Walsh5 distinguishes plain narratives from significant narratives
and believes that historical research can be conceived in two ways.
A. Dant06 is right in pointing out that a narrative (interpreted as a re-
sult of a historian's research) may be significant only, from which it
follows that Walsh's plain narratives are to be treated as chronicles. It
is true that Walsh believes that it was precisely the programme of plain
narrative which was included by Ranke in his famous formulation
which calls for "an exact description of what did occur" (and this is
how Walsh describes plain narratives), but it can easily be demonstrated
that he misjudged Ranke's programme by ascribing it the rejection of
significant narratives. If we specify the following (though not all) pos-
sible meanings of historical narratives: pragmatic, theoretical, genetic,
and explanatory,1 then it would be correct to say that Ranke opposed
pragmatic narratives only (even though, as has been said, he did not
avoid them in practice) and was not interested in theoretical narratives,
but paid special attention to the reconstruction of genetic sequences, i.e.,
he grouped facts because of their importance in those sequences, and
thus did not want to break with significant narration, which after all
gives sense to a historian's work.
Yet neither selection of facts nor going beyond Walsh's exact de-
scription (these two characteristics being closely interconnected) grasps
the difference between a chronicle and a scientific historical narrative.
We could, of course, construct the concept of Ideal Chronicler (IC)8
and ascribe him a number of characteristics next to the basic one-
namely the striving for a true reporting of events, i.e., non-selective re-
cording of events observed, which produces a narrative that has no
significance except as a description of events as they occur. The product
of that operation would be very remote from what really happens. It
seems that we even cannot imagine such an IC, because every act of
cognition involves selection. Even the recording of a simplest event (and
an IC cannot record them all) is an act of selection. We thus cannot
deprive an IC of the faculty of selection, wherefrom it follows that we
cannot imagine a chronicle, written by an IC, which does not go be"
yond a simple description. Even the recording of an event in some an-
nals goes beyond mere description: an annal conveys information
about some facts only, that is, those facts which a chronicler thought to
be sufficiently important ("significant"). Even the construction of an
Ie, if it is not to be wholly artificial, cannot assume that an Ie pro-
duces an exact description and an exact description only. And yet it
seems that the demarcation line between chronicle writing and historio-
graphy, even if an IC is endowed with the faculty of (some) selection,
is to be sought elsewhere, which means that selection alone does not
suffice to give a historical narrative the status of being scientific. In-
stead of constructing an IC we shall construct the concept of Real
Chronicler (RC) and we shall strive to list those characteristics which
he can have and those which he of necessity cannot have. Now we can
imagine that an RC not only strives for the truth and produces a selec-
tive report, but also tries (as far as he can) to explain the events he
describes, to arrange them into genetic sequences (obviously not longer
than the period of his observations), and even may be interested in
their theoretical aspects, as the works of Ibn Khaldun demonstrate. 9
An RC obviously describes only that which takes place in his lifetime
and what he himself can record, be it indirectly, on the basis of relations
of his contemporaries. Restricting an RC to his own observations only

would be a fiction very remote from facts.
It can easily be seen that even a very intelligent and perfectly well
educated RC has of necessity a very limited field of vision - on the as-
sumption that he records current events (which after all is the meaning
of the term chronicler). Since this limitation does not apply to a his-
torian, only the latter has an opportunity to produce scientific historical
narratives. The limitation of an RC's field of vision, which is the de-
marcation line between chronicle writing and historiography, results
from the fact that an RC, once he has recorded an event, does not know
what happens next and does not know its consequences. Of course, an
RC can describe past events (Le., past with respect to his location in
time) whose effects he can to some extent assess, but then he ceases to
be a chronicler and begins to act as a historian. Hence an RC could
not have written in 1454 that the Thirteen Years' War had just begun
(a war between Poland and the Teutonic Order - Tr.), or to record on
April 22, 1870, that Vladimir Lenin, the leader of the October Revo-
lution, had been born on that day.
A historian, on the contrary, when writing the history of the Thirteen
Years' War or a biography of Lenin makes use of his knowledge of
that fact as a whole from the outset of his narrative. He thus writes
under as it were the burden of that knowledge, or, in other words, from
the perspective of a past event. We know perfectly well that the con-
cept of a "fact as a whole" (a system) is relative, since smaller systems
are elements of more comprehensive ones, which in turn are elements
of macrosystems, etc. (see Chap. X), yet ex post facto it is usually
known where the boundary of a fact can be drawn, even though these
are the most debatable issues among historians. In historical research,
only a past event can be the subject matter of scientific analysis, hence
the more an event which is being described is still in statu nascendi the
more a historian resembles a chronicler. For a historian a time per-
spective is a necessary condition of grasping the development of given
systems, that is, their interconnections which indicate their respective
roles in the process of history. We can in no way analyse scientifically
an event not only before it comes to an end, but also before it yields
results.
For an RC the future is an unknown; he can at the most somehow
612 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF msrORY
foresee the course of events, which may add a specific tinge to his
chronicle, but his foresight cannot replace the knowledge of what did
occur later. That knowledge, which is a historian's share, constitutes the
principal difference between an IC and an RC, on the one hand, and
a historian, on the other, and hence also between chronicle writing
and historiography. A chronicle is of necessity written from the per-
spective of a mole, whereas history must be written from the perspective
of an eagle. This metaphor is, of course, not intended to belittle the
importance of chronicles or to swell the role of historiography: it is
only to illustrate the actual conditions. In this connection it is also worth
mentioning that some historians avail themselves of the opportunities
which their time perspective gives them in a limited degree only and
construct their narratives so as if they did not know the later course of
events; when doing so they act as chroniclers rather than historians;
they are more interested in facts than in their historical significance.
Thus, a historian who is to construct a historical narrative is en-
dowed, next to those characteristics which we may ascribe to an RC,
with the possibility of making use of the temporal dimension, whereas
an RC sees as it were flat.
At this point it is indispensable to refer to our concept of non-source-
based knowledge. It is that knowledge which above all enables a his-
torian to make use of the temporal dimension. The better and the more
complete his non-source-based knowledge is, the better it can perform
its tasks in a scientific historical narrative. Earlier methodological anal-
yses, which did not make use of the concept of non-source-based know-
ledge, were not in a position to define more closely the difference be-
tween chronicle writing and historiography. Obviously, source-based
knowledge (relative in the effective sense), which sheds light upon a
given fact, also fully participates in the historian's making use of his
temporal perspective.
Here is an example of using the temporal perspective on the basis of
a comprehensive non-source-based historical knowledge: "Compared
with the currents which raced in Italy or Germany, or the Low Coun-
tries, English life was an economic back-water. But even its stagnant
shallows were stirred by the eddy and rush of the continental whirlpool.
When Henry VII came to the throne, the economic organization of the
country differed but little from that of the age of Wyclif. When
Henry VIII died, full of years and sin, some of the main characteristics,
which were to distinguish it till the advent of steam-power and machin-
ery, could already, though faintly, be described. The door that re-
mained to be unlocked was colonial expansion, and forty years later the
first experiments in colonial expansion began".lo R. H. Tawney describes
here the economic situation in England at the time when Henry VII
(1458-1509) ascended to the throne and assesses its place in England's
economic development; in doing so he explicitly makes use of his
knowledge of the times which came later. It is self-evident that such
references need not always be so explicit; it suffices that the narrative
as a whole is written from a specified temporal perspective. Moreover,
the very fact that historians undertake certain studies shows that they
are convinced of the need of such studies, and that in turn is a result of
the assessment of the importance of given facts in the process of
history.
Consider now a text concerned with facts of a smaller temporal
scope than those discussed by Tawney in the passage quoted above.
H. Madurowicz, when investigating grain prices in the western part of
Lesser Poland in the second half of the 18th century, wrote: "A rapid
rise began in 1785. (...) The prices which rose most were those of wheat,
rye, and barley; they doubled in the next four years. (...) A fall of the
prices was observed already in 1789 (...) but the prices did not come
down to their 1780-5 level, and the fall did not last long. The prices in
1792, when they were the lowest, were fifty per cent higher than they
had been during a similar low in 1780-5".11 Even though certain facts
of the same kind are being recorded here year by year in their chrono-
logical order, yet it can easily be noted that a chronicler who would
begin making his records in 1785 could not have written at that time
that a rapid rise had begun, that the prices had risen most during the
next four years, and that 1792 had seen the greatest fall in prices, etc.
Here, too, the narrative is constructed from the perspective of a fairly
complete knowledge of the facts under consideration.
The temporal perspective is the most general criterion which distin-
guishes historical narratives from chronicles. Other, secondary, criteria
define the types of narratives. Note that those types have been discussed
extensively in Part II of the present book, where pragmatic, critical,
erudite-genetic, structural, and dialectical narration was distinguished.
4. Historical imagination
The construction of historical narratives, that is, narratives with a tem-

poral perspective, requires various instruments, which are either com-
ponents or functions of non-source-based knowledge. These instruments
include first of all:
(1) historical imagination,
(2) language,
(3) classifying and ordering concepts,
(4) counterfactual inference.
Historical imagination, which intervenes both in synthesis construc-
tion and in narration, i.e., the construction of narratives as the outward
manifestation of results of historical research, is still to be studied in
detail. In any case it is known that a set of established facts and ex-
planations advanced does not alone suffice for the construction of a
coherent narrative. If all that is to be made into a whole and to be seen
from a temporal perspective, the historian must be able to make a full
use of the knowledge he has accumulated; that accumulated knowledge
means a certain saturation of his memory, which increases with his
scholarly experience and growing erudition (including erudition in theo-
retical matters). That ability consists in associating source-based and
non-source-based knowledge, which results in a more or less clear and
integrated vision of structures. It is at this point that a historian's per-
sonality and his own contributions to the processing of the data he has
collected can manifest themselves. When in the past people argued
whether historiography is a science or an art, those who saw elements
of art in the work of a historian ascribed them to his imagination and
to his individual contributions to his work. That ability of those scholars
who were renowned for their comprehensive knowledge was often called
intuition. The present writer would rather call it historical imagination
and interpret it as a function of a historian's non-source-based know-
ledge. That non-source-based knowledge of his, which saturates his
memory, enables him to form a more or less adequate picture of the
past events lie is concerned with. That picture in turn enables him,
when constructing a narrative, to think constantly of the reconstructed
whole which is to be a reflection of that picture.
5. The language of narratives
Language is the fundamental instrument of narration. A language in-

cludes a vocabulary (that is, the set of words of which sentences are
formed), a grammar (which lays down the rules of constructing sen-
tences out of words), and semantic functions of words, functions which
ascribe specified meanings to words and sentences. To use a given lan-
guage correctly one has to know not only its vocabulary and grammar,
but its semantic rules as well (i.e., to understand the meanings of its
words and sentences).
In the methodology of sciences a distinction is made between natural
(ethnic) and artificial languages. History is one of those disciplines
which use natural languages. Self-evidently, this involves considerable
dangers as meanings of words in natural languages are vague and gram-
matical rules do not prevent ambiguities, but at the present stage of the
development of science it would be difficult to imagine that it could be
otherwise.
This suggests the requirement that the language used in historical
research and in historiography should maximally facilitate communica-
tion among researchers, on the one hand, and between researchers and
the public, on the other; this applies also to popular works.12 Two issues
are involved here; the use of possibly least vague words, of course, as
far as the subject matter of a given narrative allows,13 and the use of
various concepts in those meanings which have been worked out in
those disciplines in which they are used professionally. Thus, for in-
stance, if a historian uses such concepts as "social group" or "invest-
ments", he ought to realize that they are the subject matter of theoret-
ical interest in sociology and economics, respectively, and that he ac-
cordingly can obtain the most competent information about them from
sociologists and economists, respectively. Observance of this is a sine
qua non of all intergrating activities in the social sciences and the hu-
manities (and not only there, even though in the said two groups of
disciplines the issue is particularly acute). For the time being there is
too much negligence in these matters, due to insufficient non-source-
based knowledge. For instance, if a historian confuses ownership with
possession, this shows that he lacks fundamental legal education. Hence
the requirements set the historians are high. A historian cannot excuse
himself for not consulting sociologists, psychologists, economists, and

even natural scientists (as far as that may prove necessary). Human life
is complex, and the historian's approach to it must be possibly many-
sided. Historical research is an integrated process by its own definition,
and all its inner divisions are merely manifestations of the fact that re-
searchers specialize in various fields, which does not absolve them of
their duty to make an integrated approach to all problems.
The language of any historical narrative is not only one of the natural
languages, but it is also empirical in nature: it is decoded on the basis
of our knowledge of a given semantic-factual code which rests on a
given system of empirical knowledge.14 The knowledge of the vocabulary
and the rules of that language and orientation in that system of empir-
ical knowledge is both sufficient and necessary for the comprehension
of the language of historical research.
In historical narratives, next to empirical language we often encount-
er metaphors.1s They may be single terms, such as synecdoches (e.g.,
"the Iron Duke" for Wellington) or periphrases (e.g., "the author of
Capital" for Karl Marx) or complete sentences. Among the metaphor-
ical (non-empirical) sentences, which are decoded by a semantic-fiction-
al, and not a semantic-factual, code, counterfactual and fictional state-
ments are to be distinguished. The former are at variance with a given
system of empirical knowledge (if they are taken literally), but never-
theless, when decoded, they state something. Consider, by way of ex-
ample, the following passage, full of metaphor, which we understand
quite well, and even understand it better than if it lacked all metaphors
whatever. "Economic power, long at home in Italy, was leaking through
a thousand creeks and inlets into western Europe for a century before;
with the climax of the great Discoveries, the flood came on breast-high.
Whatever its truth as a judgment on the politics of the fifteenth century,
the conventional verdict on its futility does scanty justice to its economic
significance. It was in an age of political anarchy that the forces des-
tined to dominate the future tried their wings. The era of Columbus and
Da Gama was prepared by the patient labour of Italian cartographers
and Portuguese seamen, as certainly as was that of Crompton and Watt
by the obscure experiments of nameless predecessors. The master who
set the problem that the heroes of the age were to solve was material
necessity".16 The same may be said of the following formulations. "The
THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF mSTORICAL NARRATION 617
bond that held together the Whig and the Tory organizations respective-
ly (...) was not altogether theory or principle. (... ) but permanent reli-
gious and social cleavages to which the two parties gave political ex-
pression",t1 and "During the eight years that followed, not only the
rigid Anti-Jacobin structure of recent times, but the British Constitution
(...) began to crack and give way in unexpected places".18 Anecdotes
often work like metaphors.19 Both may be, however, only additions
which shed light upon narratives, additions which are legitimate only
once the basic ideas have been formulated in the empirical language
and non-anecdotally.
Statements about the heroes of the novels by Walter Scott are exam-
ples of fictional statements, which have no place in historical narratives.
It has been asked many a time whether historical writing should (or
does) include elements of art. In view of the lack of fictional statements
historical studies do not include literary works in the full sense of the
term, but many examples of historians who were very fine stylists show
that scholarly precision can go hand in hand with the beauty of lan-
guage. But what we mean here is not the pompous, quasi-literary style
of many authors, especially those active in the 19th century, but the
clear style which has the transparence and simplicity of crystals.
6. Classifying and ordering concepts
Various classifying and ordering concepts are common in narratives.20

They are used to sum up and to order our knowledge. A classifying
concept (term) is any predicate of one argument (is a man, is a noble-
man, is red). A predicate thus indicates the property ascribed to an
object x. It denotes the set of all those objects which satisfy the function
P(x), that is, all those x's which have the property P. If, for instance, the
function P(x) is interpreted as "x was a participant in the October Rev-
olution", then the intension of P is the property of being a participant
in the October Revolution. Any classifying concept divides the set of all
objects into two subsets: of those objects which have a given property
P, and of those which do not have that property. The criterion of clas-
sification is an equivalence relation defined on a given set. The predi-
cates "has the same legal position as (... )", "has the same income as
(.oo)", etc., are examples of relations of this type. An equivalence relation
enables us, to return to the example quoted above, to group all objects
into the following two subsets: that of participants and that of non-par-
ticipants in the October Revolution.
To make a classification we must know well the structure of a given
object in order to find out whether it is really denoted by the classifi-
cation term involved. Since classification terms develop gradually in the
course of research, which means that many terms to be found in the
sources must be replaced by modern classification terms, the task of
classifying a given object as an element of a given set often encounters
great difficulties. We may have, for instance, to consider whether a given
political party is to be classed as progressive or as conservative, whether
a given production unit is already a factory or still a (craftsman's) work-
shop, whether a locality which in a given source is called a town is to
be classed as a town or as an agricultural settlement, etc. This shows
clearly that in each case we must use mentally certain definitions or
eX'planatory terms (those of a progressive political party, of a town, of
a factory, etc.). When classifying certain objects we formulate such
definitions and explanatory terms ourselves or else we use existing
ones.
The concepts (terms) which order a given set are predicates of two
arguments each, such as "is higher than (...)", "is more advanced
than (... )", "is less modern than (... )", "is earlier than (... )", etc. They
are thus certain wholes consisting of two parts each, one part being
a formulation of the criterion of precedence (in a certain order), and
the other, the criterion of equality in some respect. Ordering concepts
do not enable us to divide a set into two subsets, but they make it pos-
sible to order its elements according to the intensity of a certain prop-
erty. Each such concept may be described logically by the following
two sentential functions:
(a) xPy (x precedes y in a given respect),
(b) xSy (x is the same as y in that respect).
Ordering terms must often be used in historical narratives. If we use
them, we are mainly interested in whether the objects under consider-
ation are distinguishable or not with respect to a certain relation, for
instance, whether a and b have the same incomes, that is, whether they
can be included in the same subset, singled out by reference to income,
etc.
The classifying and the ordering concepts bring us close to typological

concepts, which have been so much discussed in scientific methodology.
The latter are concepts (predicates) without which we could hardly
imagine historical narratives, and practically all narratives in the human-
ities and the 50cial sciences.
T. Pawlowski, when analysing typological concepts in historical re-
search, says that each such concept consists of
(1) a classifying concept,
(2) a system of ordering concepts associated with the former.
It would often be difficult to draw a demarcation line between clas-
sifying and typological concepts. Typological concepts (types) enable us
to describe the world by comparing certain phenomena to such types.
We can single out two kinds of ideal types (and also statements which
include ideal-type concepts). In Max Weber those concepts do not refer
to empirical facts; their role is merely heuristic and classificatory, as
they serve as sui generis measures. On the contrary (see Chap. XXI),
in K. Marx they are realistic (empirical) in nature: they inform us about
the empirical world and are intended to help us explain facts. They are
formed by our disregarding those properties of the constructed ideal
object which in our opinion are secondary; we thus arrive at such con-
cepts as democracy in general, a capitalist who always acts rationally,
etc. There is no doubt that realistic ideal types can perform more func-
tions in science (especially in historical research) than instrumental
ideal types can. The historian makes it the point that for all those sim-
plifications which he cannot avoid he should nevertheless inform about
the actual course of events.
In the light of what has been said above we can see rather clearly
the problem of what are called concepts proper to historical research. 21
The claim that historical research necessarily must form its own con-
cepts seems wrong from the point of view of the development of science.
It is much more to the point to ask that historians draw from the at-
tainments of other disciplines. This applies above all to those terms
which might be called ahistorical: social group, production, investments,
money, culture, revolution, machine, climate, behaviour, social self-regu-
lation, system, etc. It is otherwise when we come to those terms which
are to be called historical. These concepts are usually constructed by
historians themselves, who thus provide data for the students of ahis-
620 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSTORY
torical concepts. Historical concepts (i.e., concepts proper to the science

of history) will thus include terms such as feudalism, the Renaissance,
national liberation struggles, social left, lacobinism, etc. Many of them,
first evolved in historical research, have become a subject matter of
theoretical analyses in other disciplines, later to return, in a "processed"
form, to the sphere of historical research. It may be expected, for in-
stance, that "feudalism", which is still a historical concept, may be-
come a subject matter of economic analyses, as happened with "capi-
talism", and thus lose its status of being proper to the science of history.
It may be said that there is no constant set of concepts that would be
proper to history: there is an incessant interchange of achievements
between the various disciplines, which is also manifested in joint work
of giving precision to various concepts. Historians should participate in
that co-operation on a larger scale than they have done so far, since
that would increase the precision of historical narratives.
7. The role of counterfactual inference
It seems that E. Nagel!2 and J. Giedymin23 are right in pointing to the

cognitive importance of counterfactual inference in science. In doing so
J. Giedymin says that "a necessary condition of a positive assessment of
the cognitive function of counterfactual inference is that a given dis-
cipline should have a comprehensive body of nomological knowledge,
which is more or less universally accepted by its representatives, who
also should profess such a philosophy of science which assumes that
all scientific statements (in the empirical disciplines) are hypothetical in
nature, and that the tasks of science are not confined to recording the
results of ""observations".114 Hence the representatives of the positivist
concept of science (phenomenalists, inductionists, idiographists) will
oppose counterfactual inference, because for them observation state-
ments are the final components of science and the final criteria of truth,
which does not admit consideration of statements that contradict ob-
servation. E. Nagel also points to the considerable role of counter-
factual inference in historical research.
A distinction is to be made between counterfactual questions (both
decision and complementation questions) and counterfactual condition-
als. The question:
THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF IDSTORICAL NARRATION 621
(1) Had there been no Bar Confederacy, would the first partition of
Poland nevertheless occur?
is an example of a counterfactual decision question.
Such questions are an (usually implied) element of historical expla-
nations. For if we assume that the Bar Confederacy (an armed action by
the gentry, organized 1768, which greatly complicated the political po-
sition of Poland - Tr.) was one of the causes of the first partition of
Poland, then we thereby ask whether the partition would have occurred
without the Bar Confederacy (and in this case we answer this question
in the negative). At the same time, by posing a counterfactual decision
question we try to find out the historical significance of the fact whose
existence in the past we negate in a mental experiment (in this case, the
existence of the Bar Confederacy). This reveals the double role of the
counterfactual question: on the one hand, it substantiates a certain hy-
pothesis as to a causal nexus between two facts, on the other (provided
that a historical fact which actually did happen is negated), it bears out
the historical significance (Le., the role in the development of a given
system) of the fact which is negated in the mental experiment.
More or less the same applies to counterfactual complementation
questions, such as:
(2) What would have happened in Europe had Hitler won?
When analysing our answer to this question we want to emphasize
even more the terror and the inhuman nature of the Nazi policies. In
this case this question is not linked with any historical explanations.
But, for instance, the question:
(3) What would have been the fortunes of Europe had the Western
Power not signed the Munich Agreement?
may be linked with explanations. We may, for instance, believe the
Munich Agreement to have been one of the causes of World War II
and consider, in this connection, what would have happened (e.g. would
World War II have broken out) if the Munich Agreement had not been
signed. At the same time, by using question (3) we increase or di-
minish the historical significance we ascribe to the Munich Agreement.
Counterfactual conditionals differ from ordinary conditionals (im-
plications) of the "if p, then q" type by having the antecedent formu-
lated grammatically so that p is negated. Now if p is an accepted ele-
ment of our body of knowledge, its negation is an assumption made

against facts (hence the tenn "counterfactual"). Here are examples:
(4) If Spain had not engaged in colonial expansion, it would have
avoided economic regression;
(5) Had it not been for Napoleon's legislation, the decomposition of
the feudal system in some countries would have been still slower.
In these cases, too, counterfactual inference helps us bear out the his-
torical significance of a given fact, person, or object. While counter-
factual questions usually occur in historical narratives in a latent fonn,
counterfactual conditionals are often explicit: they include some formu-
lations which begin with "suppose that (...)", "should we assume that
(...)", etc., though in the case of the latter group we also have to do
with ordinary conditionals.
Elements of counterfactual inference are often to be found in the
substantiation of hypotheses, though the aspect of the issue is here
somewhat different from that of typical cases of counterfactual infer-
ence. In the case of hypotheses we still do not know whether a given
hypothesis refutes some accepted knowledge, because we are still in the
process of amplifying our knowledge. Suppose that we consider hy-
potheses a and not-a, and that we include in our body of knowledge the
hypothesis a as verified. In this case inference of the type "should we
assume that not-a (...)", used in the process of verification, proves ex
post facto to be counterfactual, because its antecedent negates an ac-
cepted statement.
The more comprehensive our general knowledge of relationships
among facts, the greater the practical significance of counterfactual in-
ference in the process of research. For usually, when modifying an ac-
cepted statement which is an element of our knowledge, we still make
use of our unchanged knowledge of general relationships. Hence, (4)
makes sense in the process of research only if we know relationships
between the economic growth of a country and certain activities, that is,
if we know the regularities of economic growth in the period of colonial
expansion. Likewise, when it comes to (5), we must know relationships
between legislation and other facts. We also need adequate knowledge
of the real shape of the process of history with reference to those parts
of that process which we study.
THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF mS'lORICAL NARRATION 623
REFERENCES
1 On historical narratives which have had a theoretical significance see
A. Danto, The Analytical Philosophy of History, pp. 133-4.
2 This is nnt to' say that time is treated as sDmething which exists apart from
some timeless reality. See J. TDPDlski, "Czas w narracji historycznej" (Time in
HistDrical Narrative), Studia Metodologiczne, NO'. 10/1973, p. 3-23.
3 Cf. N. RDtenstreich, "HistDrical Time" in: Between Past and Present, New
Haven 1958, pp. 51-134. The present writer's CDmments differ sDmewhat from
RDtenstreich's Dpinion, whO' explains the flDW of time in causal terms. See alsO'
G. Simmel, Problem der historischen Zeit, Berlin 1916, RDtenstreich, who treats
histDrical time as a cDncretizatiDn Df time in general, dDes not agree with Sim-
mel, whO' hDlds that time in history is a certain relatiDn between facts, while
histDry as a whole is timeless.
4 Cf. Theories of History, p. 78 (which includes a sectiDn of Teoria e prac-
tica della storiografia). See alsO' A. DantD, op. cit., p. 116.

5 W. H. Walsh, Introduction to the Philosophy of History, LondDn 1951,
p. 31.
6 A. Danto, op. cit., pp. 116 ff.
7 This distinction is made by A. Danto, op. cit., pp. 123 ff.
S In A. DantD (p. 149) the cDncept of Ideal ChrDnicler has a different sense.
9 But if we cDnsider the whole of his production, we would rather call him
a historian.
10 R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, pp. 70-1.
11 H. Madurowicz-Urbanska, Ceny zboza w zachodniej Malopolsce w drugiej

polowie XVIII wieku (Grain Prices in the Western Part of Lesser Poland in
the Second Half of the 18th Century), Warszawa 1963, p. 60.
12 The language Df pDpular works is an important but separate problem.
which will not be discussed here. Cf. B. Lesnodorski, "HistDria i spoleczenstwD.
Problemy informacji i porozumienia" (History and Society. Problems of Infur-
mation and Communication), Kwartalnik Historyczny, NO'. 3/1%5, pp. 539-63.
He links the pDpularizatiDn of histDrical knowledge with the spreading of the
scientific way of thinking, and alsO' points to' the fact that the problem varies
from CDuntry to CDuntry.
13 Cf. M. Bloch, Apologie pour l'histoire ou metier d'historien, pp. 79-97.
14 J. Giedymin & J. Kmita, Wyklady z logiki formalnej, teorii komunikacj/

i metodologii nauk (Lectures on Formal Logic, Communication Theory and the
Methodology Df Sciences), ed. cit., pp. 73 ff.
15 Cf. J. Pelc, "Semiotic Functions as Applied to' the Analysis of the Concept
Df Metaphor", in: Studies in Functional Logical Semiotics of Natural Language,
The Hague 1971, pp. 142-94.
16 R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, ed. cit., p. 67,
17 G. M. Trevelyan, History of England, London-New York 1947, p. 465.

18 Ibid., p. 624.
624 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IllSfORY
19 On the role of anecdotes see the interesting comment by Soboul, op. cit.,
p.277.
20 On this issue see J. Giedymin & J. Kmita, Op. cit., pp. 210 if. T. Pawlow-
ski, "Poj~ typologiczne w naukach historycznych" (Typological Concepts in
Historical Disciplines), Studia Metodologiczne, No. 3/1967; 1. Lazari-Pawlow-
ska, "0 poj~ciu typologicznym w humanistyce" (Typological Concepts in the
Hmnanities), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 4/1958, pp. 30-53. The classical work (next
to those by M. Weber) is C. G. Hempel & P. Oppenheim, Der TypusbegriU
im Lichte der neuen Logik, Leiden 1936. The concept of ideal types (abstrac-
tions) in Marx's works are analysed by L. Nowak in his excellent study U pod-
staw marksowskiej metodologii nauk (The Foundations of the Marxian Metho-
dology of Sciences), Warszawa 1971.
21 Cf. J. Dutkiewicz, "Poj~cia wlasne nauki historycznej" (Concept Specific
to the Science of History), Rocznik L6dzki, vol. V, 1962, pp. 25-32.
22 E. Nagel, The Structure of Science, ed. cit., pp. 588 if.
23 J_ Giedymin, "Charakterystyka pytan i wnioskowan kontrafaktycznych"
(The Characteristics of Questions and Counterfactual Inference), Saudia Metodo-
logiczne, No.1, pp. 23-45.
24 Ibid., pp. 35~_
XXIV. Components of Narratives: Historical
Statements and Laws
1. Categories of historical statements
A historical statement is the basic component of historical narratives.

It is usually described by the indication that it contains a spatio-tem-
poral determinant, that is, that it refers to a specified place and a spe-
cified time. In historiography, however, a strictly historical statement, if
it is to be a component of a narrative, must meet the additional con-
dition, namely it must refer to (a) historical fact(s). This proviso does
not apply to historical regularities formulated as strictly general state-
ments. A historical statement is thus the final (in the case of a given
historian) result of the procedure of establishing facts, or, in other
words, the last link in the chain:
Historical fact Source-based Historiographic Strictly

f--;l information f---,l fact f-.> historical
about a fact statement
The condition that a historical statement must refer to a historical

fact excludes statements about events which did not in fact occur
(mainly statements to be found in historical novels), which we shall
call quasi-historical, and statements which have spatio-temporal deter-
minants, but refer to future events. Thus we will not include in his-
torical narratives various fictitious statements about the past, such as (1)
After his victory at Waterloo Napoleon restored to Poland her political
independence, or (2) In the year 2000 the cocoa crop will be twelvefold
as large as in 1960 (a statement 'about a future event). This would re-
sult in our defining a historical statement as a true statement which
refers to facts that belong to ontologically closed classes.
Yet the second category of statements involves some difficulties, for
among statements about future events we can single out at least the fol-
lowing three groups:
626 THE APRAGMATIC MErHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
(a) statements with spatio-temporal determinants, such that each state-

ment refers both to the past and to the future and the part of the
statement which refers to the future can be deduced from the know-
ledge we accept (obviously we do not mean complex statements, which
we treat as conjunctions of simple statements);
(b) statements with spatio-temporal determinants which refer to fu-
ture events, but cannot be deduced from the knowledge we accept;
(c) statements with spatio-temporal determinants which refer to future
events and can (with specified probability) be deduced from the know-
ledge we accept (this group to some extent coincides with group (a».
Here is an example of a statement of type (a): "The rate of growth
of the developing countries, which has been observed for the past
several years, will increase signally during the next decade". Example
of a statement of type (b): the statement (2) given above and not based
on our present knowledge. An example of a statement of type (c): "In
1980, the number of students in Polish university schools will be about
150,000". It resembles (2), but it differs from the latter by the fact that
it refers to our accepted present-day knowledge (the number of students
in 1980 must be realistic as compared with conditions in 1970).
Out of these categories of statements which refer to future events
statements of the type (a) can (though rarely) be encountered in his-
torical narratives.
In view of the above we might classify historical statements, i.e.,
statements with spatio-temporal determinants, into:
(1) quasi-historical statements (about past events),
(2) historical statements sensu largo,
(3) strictly historical statements.
The last-named category, which occurs in historical narratives, would
thus cover historical statements with the exclusion of quasi-historical
ones and statements of types (b) and (c), referring to future events, and
historical regularities. If we accept this interpretation, then we assume
that strictly historical statements, which in principle refer to the past,
may also refer to events which belong to ontologically open classes.
This applies in practice to certain processes about the further course of
which historians express some opinions.
COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: HISTORICAL STATEMENTS AND LAWS 627
2. Spatia-temporal determinants
Spatio-temporal determinants usually occur jointly, but the indication

of even one determinant (that of time or that of space) implies some'
information about the other. Frequently, however, such information
does not suffice for a proper relation about a given fact in the past. If,
for instance, we say that "Poland was governed by the gentry", then
our knowledge of the period in which the gentry existed as a class
brings us close to a temporal determinant. But if we say that "the situ-
ation of the peasants in Poland was bad", then the chronological frame
of this statement is so comprehensive that the statement loses its in-
formation value. Obviously, the spatial determinant "Poland" includes
a temporal determinant ("not before the time when Poland emerged as
a specified country or State"), but this does not suffice for the formu-
lation of a correct historical statement. The indication of a temporal
determinant alone implies a spatial determinant which often covers the
whole globe. For instance, if we say that "human life changed in the
18th century", then we can refer this only to the whole globe.
Spatio-temporal determinants may be contained in statements ex-
plicitly or implicitly. In the former case we may have to do with state-
ments like "1789 saw the beginning of a revolution in France", "Nazi
Germany was defeated in 1945", "epidemics were frequent in medi-
aeval Europe". In the latter case we may have, for instance, "The
storming of the Bastille started the French Revolution", "KoSciuszko
initiated the epoch of agrarian reforms in Poland by issuing his Pola-
niec Declaration", "Tamerlane founded a powerful state with Samar-
kand as its capital", etc. In the case of the latter group other known
facts help us to define the determinants involved. The occurrence of a
proper name in a statement indicates its spatio-temporal frame. On the
other hand, every determinant can be reduced to a proper name. Since
time is counted from a fact associated with a specified person (the pro-
cedure is not much affected by the fact that existence of such a person
may be doubted): from Mohammed's flight from Mecca to Medina,
from the birth of Jesus, etc., and if it is counted from a specified event
(e.g., from the glacial period), then we usually have to reduce that to
some other system of dating.
A historical statement may perform various tasks in formulations of
results of historical research. It may be an element of a simple de-

scription, of a genetic description (this applies to factographic state-
ments), and of causal explanations (this applies to causal statements).
For instance, if we say that "the fall of the Roman Empire was caused
by the internal development of provinces", then we make a causal his-
torical statement, that is one which refers to a specified time and a spec-
ified place. Examples of factographic historical statements have been
given earlier.
3. The controversy over historical generalizations

Difficulties in assigning to historical generalizations their exact place
among historical statements, on the one hand, and in distinguishing
them from strictly general statements and scientific laws, on the other,
have given rise to many controversies over that concept. These contro-
versies, however, usually pertain to the latter issue, whereas the former
one, that is, the conditions in which historical statements become gen-
eralizations, has been little studied so far. Both problems deserve at-
tention.
At first let us recall (with slight modifications) the classification of
statements that belong in a given discipline, suggested by A. Malewski
and J. TopolskU Now all scientific statements (not in historical research
Historical
ge~neralizations
Singular Strictly Laws of

historical and science
statements universally Law-like
general statements
statements
COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: msrORICAL STATEMENTS AND LAWS 629
alone) can be classified as above by using the degree of their generality

as the criterion of classification.
The diagram shows that historical generalizations are both a subclass
of historical statements (like singular statements) and a subclass of gen-
eral statements (like the laws of science). This illustrates all the diffi-
culties involved in describing them unambiguously.2
It is not easy to answer the question, when a historical statement be-
comes a generalization. It is common knowledge that such a statement
can vary very much as to its generality. When it refers to a single fact
(be it even very "comprehensive"), it is a singular historical statement
or a statement of a singular fact, such as "The first partition of Poland
took place in 1772", "In the Battle of Grunwald, Poland defeated the
Teutonic Order", or "King Casimir the Great died in 1370". When
a historical statement refers to a number of facts which are similar in
some respect, then by bringing out their common characteristics (in
which we are interested for some research considerations), then it be-
comes a historical generalization.
The problem of the demarcation line between historical generaliza-
tions and laws of science, that is the explanation of the concept of his-
torical generalization, is closely connected with the opinions on the
structure of the laws of science. Since the latter problem will be discus-
sed later, those subsequent comments (see Sec. 5 below) must be treated
as the continuation of what is said now. The following main properties
of historical generalizations (usually as contrasted with strictly general
statements) are singled out in the methodology of sciences:
(1) numerical (or limited) generality as distinct from the strict (or
specific) generality of the laws of science (K. Popper, H. Mehlberg,
A. Malewski);
(2) occurrence in them either of clear spatio-temporal determinants or
proper names or terms which cannot be defined without reference to
proper names (K. Popper, J. Giedymin, A. Malewski, S. Nowak);
(3) having as the scope a closed class of designata, unlike the strictly
general statements, which always refer to open classes of events, that is,
such that new elements may be added to each class (J. Pelc, A. Malew-
ski);
(4) being equal, in each case, to a finite sequence of singular historical
630 THE APRAGMATlC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY
statements, which does not apply to a law (K. Ajdukiewicz, I. Lazari-

Pawlowska);
(5) the fact that general~tions, unlike laws, do not provide infor-
mation which makes predictions possible (J. S. Mill, K. Popper, J. Pelc,
J. Giedymin, A. Malewski);
(6) reference, in each case, to a set of hIstorical facts (genetic se-
quences) determined by the effect of an event (events, person), that is,
to a relatively isolated system (S. Ossowski).
Without engaging into detailed analyses we note that the criteria (1),
(2), (3), (4) in principle coincide and may be reduced to (2), so that
they describe one and the same property. Now the occurrence in a gen-
eralization of spatio-temporal determinants (criterion (2», i.e., the in-
dication of the scope of validity of that generalization (answers to the
questions: when? and where?), implies that a generalization in practice
covers a finite number of facts (criterion (1», which means that it has
as its scope a closed class of designata (criterion (3», so that, formally,
it is equivalent to a finite sequence of singular historical statements
(criterion (4».
The fact that a generalization does not make predictions possible
(criterion (5» is independent of criterion (2), for, as we shall show later,
there are laws which have spatio-temporal determinants and yet make
predictions possible. On the other hand, we cannot fail to see connec-
tions between generalizations and predictions: generalizations provide
material for the formulation of laws, and hence predictions as well.
The category of historical generalizations introduced by Ossowski3
comes close to strictly general statements. It is only when we may con-
clude that a given relatively isolated system is closed (Le., that the se-
quence of facts started by an event, is practically terminated) that Os-
sowski's generalization which refers to that system, even if it has no
spatio-temporal determinants, corresponds to the criteria (1), (3), and
(4). If the said sequence is not closed (cf. the sequence of events con-
nected with the October Revolution), and hence extends into the future,
the criteria (1) to (5) are not satisfied. Ossowski's idea can have ap-
plications in the study of the history of cultures and ideologies (cf. the
relatively isolated system determined by Islam or the Renaissance).
It may be said in conclusion that a historical generalization is a gen-
eral statement which:
COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: mSTORICAL STATEMENTS AND LAWS 631
(i) refers to past events,

(ii) contains spatio-temporal determinants or proper names or terms
which can be defined by reference to proper names,
(iii) does not provide information which suffices for making pre-
dictions.
These characteristics point only to the necessary conditions which
a historical generalization has to meet; (i) distinguishes a historical gen-
eralization from a singular statement, while (ii) and (iii) distinguish it
from a strictly general statement. This distinction is not very precise, be-
cause, as we shall see, we may speak about laws which have the prop-
erties (i) and (ii). Every law, however, must lack the property (iii), that
is, must serve as a possible basis of predictions. It follows therefrom
that out of the conditions listed above the property (iii) has the greatest
diagnostic value. Thus, a historical generalization is a general statement
which refers to a number of past events and contains spatio-temporal
determinants, but does not provide information needed for predictions.
Like historical statements, strictly historical generalizations (i.e., those
which are proper to historical research) do not refer to future events
unless they refer both to the past and to the future (type (a) historical
statements mentioned in Sec. 1 above).
4. Types of historical generalizations
Many types of historical generalizations can be singled out. M. J. Finley

mentions classifying generalizations (e.g., trade, peasant), relating to
periodization (classical, Hellenistic), and pertaining to relationships
between facts.4 If we consistently assume that generalizations are state-
ments, and not terms, then his first two types may not be treated as
generalizations. It seems justified not to confuse classification terms and
generalizations.
S. Nowak classifies generalizations (by taking the risk of an error as
his criterion) into the reporting ones (in the case of which the validity
of a given statement does not extend beyond the scope of the data
studied) and historical ones (in the case of which the validity of a given
statement extends beyond the data studied; the data may be such that
it is possible to assess how far they are representative in nature, or such
that this assessment is not possible).5 The classification is important,
with the proviso that the reporting generalizations, which are frequently
found in historical narratives (such as (1) "every Polish uprising in the
19th century ended in a defeat") are excluded from the scope of his-
torical generalizations.
The following types of generalizations, according to the criteria of
classification adopted in a given case, might be singled out:
(a) generalizations varying as to the degree of generality - according
to the scope of generalized knowledge of specified facts,
(b) factographic generalizations (which point to established facts),
(c) causal generalizations which formulate results of causal expla-
nations),
(d) exception-free generalizations,
(e) reporting generalizations,
(f) hypothetical generalizations,
(g) statistical generalizations.
When it comes to the degree of generality differences among general-
izations may be enormous. Both (2) "In that village every peasant had
a farm which exceeded 0.5 laneus" and (3) "Conquest by Rome brought
to the war-scarred Mediterranean world peace, but not at first prosper-
ity" (Y. Gordon Childe) are generalizations. Factographic general-
izations establish facts, e.g., (4) "In the 17th century Polish towns de-
clined", while causal generalizations advance causal explanations, e.g.,
(5) "The partitions of Poland were caused by her internal weakness
and by an unfavourable international situation". The statement (3)
above also is a causal generalization.
Exception-free generalizations usually include (explicitly or implicitly)
such formulations as "all", "every", etc., so that, to put it in a formal
way, they are statements with universal quantifiers ("for every x"). The
statement (1) is an example of such a generalization.
In the division of generalizations into reporting and hypothetic ones
the criterion of classification is based on the degree of the risk of an
error. Reporting generalizations pertain only to established facts (and
are thus a kind of factographic generalizations) and are simple con-
junctions of statements about single established facts. An example is
provided by (6) "Out of the 48 villages studied serf .labour amounted
to less than four days per week per lane us in two cases only", which
was obtained from the conjunction of the statements "In the village al
serf labour amounted to Xl days", etc., until "In the village a48 serf
labour amounted to Xu days".
Hypothetical generalizations remain hypotheses. They are the most
creative element of all scientific research as they show the way to fur-
ther research. S. Nowak is right in claiming that the structure of sci-
ence may not be compared to that of a pyramid, in which laying the
lower layer of stones is a necessary condition of laying the upper one.
In science we often build upper floors by advancing fertile general
hypotheses and verify them later, by laying durable foundations consis-
ting of less general statements.6 Hypothetical generalizations may refer
both to establishment of facts and to causal explanations. In the former
case they are a kind of factographic hypotheses, and in the latter, a kind
of explanatory hypotheses (cf. Chap. XIV). Quite often, in order to
stress the hypothetical nature of a generalization and the scope of its
validity historians use such formulations as "undoubtedly", "probably",
"as it seems", "it may be assumed that", etc. The restrictive value of
such formulations has not so far been described with precision. The
problem seems interesting as the subject matter of future - more
detailed - considerations.
Here are examples of hypothetical generalizations:
(7) "These three factors, namely, the distribution of settlers, the
organization of sales, and the racial factor, had undoubtedly a fairly
strong impact upon the formation of manorial farms; but should we
confine ourselves to these factors we would be unable to explain the
whole of the process of the emergence and development of manorial
farms in Poland, since other factors were at work, too".7 (An explan-
atory generalization.)
Statistical generalizations may be reporting or probabilistic in nature.
An example of the former is provided by (6), and that of the latter, by
the statement (8): "The change of serf labour into rents was only on the
whole favourable for the peasant". In such cases historians do not use
metric formulations (unless they make the appropriate computations),
but ordinarily replace them with such phrases as "in principle", "to
some extent", "in some degree", "usually", "on the whole", "frequent-
ly", "infrequently", "partially", "almost", "totally", etc. Here is another
example: "Protestants, not less than Catholics, emphasized the idea
of a Church civilization, in which all domains of life, the State and
634 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSIORY
society, education and science, law, commerce and industry, were to be

regulated in accordance with the Divine law".8
To sum up, we may say that generalizations (b) may take on the
form of (d), (e), (f), and (g); generalizations (c), the form of (f); general-
izations (d), the form of (b), (e), and (g); generalizations (e), the form
of (b), (c), and (g); generalizations (f), the form (b), (c), and (e); and
generalizations (g), the form of (b), (d), (e), and (f), and that all of
them may vary in the degree of generality.
5. The controversy over the laws of science
Before we answer the question whether the laws of science also are,
next to singular statements and historical generalizations, elements of
historical narratives, we must define our position in the much debated
issue as to what (sufficient and necessary) conditions must be met by
statements if they are to be accepted as laws of science.
The most common opinion is that all and only those strictly general
statements which are well substantiated and belong in a given discipline
are laws of science. 9 This definition, by imposing upon a law of science
the requirements that it should be substantiated and belong in some
discipline (and hence accepted by scientists) and also be a strictly gen-
eral statement, explicitly leaves outside the scope of that concept both
those statements which do not meet the requirement of being strictly
general (and hence historical statements) and those which formally
(syntactically) are strictly general, but have not yet been substantiated,
or are too trivial to be included in a given discipline (law-like state-
ments).
While there is a consensus of all that laws of science should be dis-
tinguished from purely syntactical laws (which are simply termed laws),
more and more scholars (e.g., E. Nagel and Marxist methodologists
before him) emphasize that the requirement of strict generality goes
too far as it deprives many statements which are usually called laws
of science of the status of such laws. It may be to the point to recall
that a strictly general statement is such which has a universal quantifier
prefixed to it ("for every x") and does not contain any proper name
and any spatio-temporal determinant. Hence a strictly general statement
refers to an open class of events and is not equivalent (unlike a his-
torical generalization) to a conjunction of singular historical statements.

Examples: (1) "All ravens are black", (2) "Man is mortal", (3) "Iron
is a good conductor of electricity", (4) "Worse money drives better
money out of circulation", (5) "A stronger army usually defeats a weak-
er army", etc. It is evident that all the phenomena to which these state-
ments refer are located in space - time, but that location is not indicated.
It can easily be noted that the basic condition of being a strictly gen-
eral statement - non-occurrence in it of any proper name - is not met
by such statements as the following Kepler's law: (6) "Every planet
follows an elliptic orbit, the Sun being located in one of the foci of the
ellipse", because (like all laws which refer to heliocentrism and to geo-
centrism) they contain proper names (in the case in question, "the
Sun").
Statement (6) is not strictly general, but it is universally general (un-
restrictedly general). For a universally general statement it suffices that
the occurrence of the objects to which it refers (and which may be in-
dicated by proper names) should not be restricted to a certain region
or period. Universality here means openness.
It seems that once the requirement of strict generality is mitigated
with reference to laws of science (which does not change the fact that
in the social sciences laws of science usually are strictly general state-
ments), and hence once the condition of non-occurrence in them (in
a direct or indirect form) of proper names is rejected (while the con-
dition of openness is retained), we can point to a certain characteristic
of laws of science which is shared by strictly general and universally
general statements, namely their predictive value. Now that predictive
value, i.e., providing data for scientific predictions, will be held to be
the principal diagnostic characteristic of laws of science. It is directly
associated with their openness, in contrast with the fact that historical
statements are closed, and hence cannot serve as a basis for predictions.
On the strength of the statement (1) above we may predict that every
raven which we may encounter at any time and in any place will prove
to be black; on the strength of (2), that every man will eventually die,
etc., and on the strength of (6), that every planet will (as long as the
solar system exists) follow an elliptic orbit and will have the Sun in one
of the foci of that ellipse.
The ability to serve as the basis of predictions, the real sense of
science and the instrument of its effect on society, is of such an enor-

mous importance that it can be used as the criterion which helps us
distinguish laws of science from historical statements. Those statements
which enable us to say that meeting certain conditions (being a raven,
being a human being, being iron, putting worse money into circulation,
sending a weaker (or a stronger) army than that of the enemy, etc.)
causes certain effects (having black feathers, being mortal, good elec-
tricity conductance, driving better money out of circulation, probable
defeat (or victory), etc.) deserve being singled out from the rest, be it
alone for the fact that they provide data needed to change the world
around us. "This is why", A. Malewski wrote, "those who want science
not only to describe the world, but also to provide knowledge required
to transform it intentionally, cannot confine themselves to substanti-
ating just any general statements, but must strive for substantiating
strictly general (universally general - in the terminology adopted in the
present book - J.T.) statements, and hence for establishing laws".lo
It must be noted, as this is a very important point for the historians,
that in scientific methodology prediction is usually interpreted broadly,
both as prognosis and postgnosis, and that one and the same law need
not perform both functions. l l We have to do with postgnosis when we
use laws in causal explanations. When we explain we know the effect
(the consequent of a conditional), and we do not know the cause (the
antecedent of that conditional), and when we predict from a known
antecedent we state something about the consequent. The difference is
only in the direction of the procedure used.
To sum up, we say that the s~cient and necessary conditions for
a statement to be a law of science are:
(1) its predictive value (which follows from the universal generality
of a statement which is a law),
(2) its sufficient substantiation (acceptance by at least a large major-
ity of researchers).
A law of science may be formulated either as a statement (examples
(1), (2), (3), (6) above) or as a conditional. But it is worth noting that
every statement which in traditional logic was formulated as "Every S
is P" (i.e., like the statements just mentioned as examples) in present-
day logic is transformed into: "For every x: if x is S, then x is P",
which as a symbolic notation is written thus:
COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: lllSTORICAL STATEMENTS AND LAWS 637
n[SeX) ~ P(x)].
~
A law which is formulated as a conditional may stand for a sufficient

or a necessary condition. In the former case it is in the form: "For
every x: if x is S at a tinie t l , then x is P at a time t 2", and in the latter,
"For every x: if x is not S at a time t l , then x is not P at a time t 2".
In all these cases we obtain some knowledge which makes predictions
possible.
We disregard here the problem whether only statements on "deep"
regularities are to be termed laws, or whether that term is to cover
factual statements on constant co-occurrence of certain phenomena, or
only to those which refer to actual relationships between facts. From
the logical point of view, both the statement which says that all stones
fall when dropped and the law of gravitation are to be treated as the
law which explains the fact that a given stone fell after having been
dropped.
6. Laws in historical narratives
Lack of studies on historical narratives and the opinion that the world
of history is a collection of singular, unique facts, dictated to many
authors the statement that historians do not establish laws. But the in-
creasingly strong conviction that the process of history is a regular one
as well as advances in the methodological studies of historical research
have markedly changed opinions on the relationships between historical
research and the problem of laws of science. These opinions are now
much closer to what Marx and Engels claimed as early as in the 19th
century. It has turned out that there can be no successful analysis of
causal explanations without the assumption that the world is governed
by regularities, and hence without reference to laws, which are simply
statements about such regularities. This has pointed to the fact that his-
torians cannot fail to be interested in laws, even if their interest is to
be that of consumers and not that of producers.
Yet a closer analysis of historical narratives reveals that historians
often formulate laws themselves. Sometimes they do that as it were
casually by making a general remark without substantiating it; more
frequently, they formulate laws (often quite well substantiated ones) for
the purpose of explanation. It is only in some cases that such state-

ments may be accepted as laws of science, but the very fact that his-
torical . narratives include (very few thus far) universally general state-
ments shows that historical research also contains in its structure certain
nomological elements (the issue will be discussed later). This may serve
as the starting point for strivings to re-construct historical research so
that it should manifest its theoretical tasks on an increasing scale. Close
links between historical research and laws is a necessary consequence
of the fact that the world which the historians study is governed by reg-
ularities. If that world reveals regularities, that is, has a specified
structure of its own, it would spell the doom of historical research if it
were confined to the study of the material of which that structure is
built and would neglect the shape of that structure and the factors
which account for its shape, the more so as no other discipline has so
far offered opportunities for studying those structures (systems) over
long periods of time.
Here are examples of laws, drawn from historical studies, which have
been SUbjected to systematic substantiation (and which accordingly may
be termed laws of science):
(1) "Where the similarity of natural conditions is accompanied, in
the various regions, by differences in culture, the factors accounting for
those differences are to be sought in different ethnic substrata" (H. Low-
mianski).12
(2) Co-occurrence of good markets for agricultural produce with the
serfdom of peasants is a both necessary and sufficient condition of the
emergence of manorial farms based on serf labour (1. Rutkowski).13
(3~ "The home market emerges when the commodity economy de-
velops; the market is brought into existence by the commodity economy,
and the degree of the social division of labour determines its develop-
ment; the market expands as the commodity economy extends from
commodities to man power and it is only as the latter turns into a com-
modity that capitalism covers the entire production in a given country
by developing mainly in the sphere of production of means of pro-
duction, whose importance in capitalist society increases more and
more" (Y. Lenin).14
More frequently we may come across laws which are formulated
marginally or metaphorically. Here are some examples:
(4) "Manldnd, it seems, hates nothing so much as its own prosperity.

Menaced with an accession of riches which would lighten its toil, it
makes haste to redouble its labour and to pour away the perilous stuff.
which might deprive of plausibility the complaint that it is poor"
(R. H. Tawney).15
(5) One of the commoner forms which the tragedy of violence and
ruins assumes is intoxication with victory, regardless of whether the
struggle in which that doom-spelling prize was won was an armed
conflict or a clash of spiritual forces (A. Toynbee).16
(6) "Only a co-ordination of individual efforts by a socio-economic
policy that takes general interests into account can save a nation from
the various secondary calamities which for an unspecified period of
time may intensify the consequences of a military defeat" (J. Rutkow-
ski)P
The universal (or strict) generality of laws is not in contradiction
with the fact that the scope of laws may vary greatly. Laws are applica-
ble to those periods and in those regions only in which the conditions
formulated in such laws are satisfied. For instance, law (1), which
states that facility to sell agricultural produce and the existence of serf
labour are followed by the emergence of the system of manorial farms
based on serf labour, applies to those periods and regions only in which
that co-occurrence of the two requirements was a reality. Likewise, the
statement that a rise of prices results in a decline of demand is ap-
plicable only to the period in which at least the commodity-and-money
economy prevails. It seems that the term "strictly historical laws" ap-
plies to those laws which, like statement (1), refer to the conditions
which have been satisfied at one time in the past and whose occurrence
in the future is unlikely.
When it comes to establishing other laws, historians must share the
tasks with representatives of other disciplines, such as sociology, econ-
omy, and psychology.
By taking their scope as the criterion of classification we might divide
laws into:
(a) universal laws (which describe regularities that are valid in all
socio-economic formations);
(b) general historical laws (which are valid in a single socio-economic
formation, or in more than one socio-economic formations, or within
640 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISfORY
a single epoch, or only for certain conditions that prevail. in at least

two formations, e.g., only under feudalism or capitalism, or only under
the system of the commodity economy);
(c) derivative historical laws (which are valid only in some periods
of a given formation or historical epoch) ..
The fundamental synchronic, diachronic, and development laws, dis-
cussed in Part III of the present book are examples of laws (a). State-
ments (1) and (3) above are examples of laws (b). while statement (2) is
an example of laws (c). Laws (a) and (b) are studied by historians in
co-operation with representatives of other social sciences, while laws (c)
are formulated by historians themselves, which does not exclude their
willing co-operation with economists, sociologists, etc. As in the case of
other social sciences, historians must - as mentioned at the beginning of
this book - be conscious of their nomothetic activity, which is the main
link that connects historical research with the other .social sciences. If
all these sciences are to carry out their research tasks, the empirical and
the theoretical factor must be treated as one. Possible differences be-
tween the various disciplines may result only from a justified division of
labour in the study of one and the same subject matter of research
which is society. but consciousness of nomothetic tasks must accom-
pany all research in the same degree.
7. The concept of regularities in some historical studies
The term regularity has been often used by historians. Since in our
analyses (cf. Chap. XII) that term stands for the objective counterpart
of a law (laws being statements about regularities), it seems useful to
find out how the term has been used in historical narratives.1s
One of the most common meanings of that term, usually associated
with the antinomial concept of "specific characteristics", is that a given
phenomenon is common in a given period (or in a given region in a
given period). We can thus find formulations that in the 16th and 17th
centuries the system of manorial farms based on serf labour was a reg-
ularity in the countries situated to the east of the Elbe;19 that at the
tum of the 16th century the villages owned by the town of Poznan
showed "certain national regularities, that is, phenomena which marked
the emergence of manorial farms in the whole of Poland" and "certain
COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES, IDSTORICAL STATEMENTS AND LAWS 641
specifically distinct characteristics" conditioned by local factors;20 that

the development of Gdansk reveals certain "specific characteristics" as
compared with other Polish towns. 21
As can be seen, regularities are interpreted here in some other sense
than objective counterparts of laws, as they do not refer to any con-
stant relationships among facts, but merely indicate certain events or
processes observed in various regions of a given area. The concept of
regularity is often encountered together with statements that the devel-
opment of a given region was regular, or that a certain period (e.g.,
the political disintegration of Poland in the 12th century) was a "normal
and regular period of development". In this case the concept of regular-
ity seems to imply not only that a given region was developing as was
"usual", but also that that development complied with some ontological
regularity. This regularity is neither described nor formulated as a law;
it is merely stated that a part of the process of history followed a course
in agreement with a certain regularity which must be known to us some-
how "in advance".
When speaking about regularities and specific characteristics histo-
rians often thought in terms of models. In that sense regular phenomena
would correspond to ideal objects, while specific characteristics would
correspond to territorial, chronological, or factual concretizations of
such ideal objects.
REFERENCES
1 A. Malewski & J. Topolski, op. cit., pp. 15 ft.
2 On sentential schemata see K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit.,
pp.27-30.
3 S. Ossowski, "Dwie koncepcje historycznych uog6lnien" (Two Conceptions
of Historical Generalizations), Studia Socjoiogiczne, No. 2/1963, pp. 53-61.
4 In: Generalization in the Writing of History, L. Gottschalk (ed.), Chicago
1963, pp. 19ft.
5 S. Nowak, Studia z metodologii nauk spolecznych (Studies in the Methodo-
logy of the Social Sciences), ed. cit., pp. 24-6.
6 Ibid., p. 49.
7 J. Rutkowski, Studia z dziejow wsi polskiej ·(Studies in the History of the
Rural Areas in Poland), Warszawa 1958, p. 186.
8 R. H. Tawney, Religion and the Rise of Capitalism, p. 91.
9 Cf. A. Malewski & J. Topolski, op. cit., p. 18 (the formulation is due to
A. Malewski).
10 Ibid., p. 19.
11 Cf. K. Popper, The Logic of Scientific Discovery, New York 1959, p. 60.
12 H. Lowmianski, Poczqtki Polski (The Origins of the Polish State), vol. I,
ed. cit., pp. 10..1.
13 I. Rutkowski, Historia gospodarcza Polski (An Economic History of Po-
land), vol. I, ed. cit., p. 127. The text under (2) is not a literal quotation from
Rutkowski's book.
14 V. Lenin, Razvite kapitalizma v Rossii (The Development of Capitalism in
Russia), 1947, p. 43. "Vnutrenniy rynok poyavlaetsya, kogda poyavlaetsya to-
varnoe khozyaystvo; on sozdaetsya razvitiyem etogo tovarnego khozyaystva,
i stopen' dvornosti obScestvennogo razdeleniya truda opredelayet vysotu ego
razvitiya; on razprostranyaetsya z perenesenem tovarnogo khozyaystva ot pro-
duktov na rabocuyu sHu i tolka po mere prevrasceniya etoi posledniey v tovar
kapitalizm okhvativaet vse proizvodstvo strany, razvivayas' glavnym obrazom
na scot sredstv proizvodstva, kotorye zanimayut v kapitalisticeskom obScestve
vse bolee i bolee mesto".
15 R. H. Tawney, op. cit., p. 76.
16 A. Toynbee, Krieg und Kultur, Hamburg 1958, p. 105. "Eine der allgemei-
neren Formen, in denen sich die Tragodie von Ueberdruss, Gewalttiitigkeit und
Verderben abspielt, ist der Siegesrausch - einerlei, ob dabei der Kampf, in dem
der verhiingnisvolle Preis gewonnen wird, ein Krieg mit den Waffen oder ein
Widerstreit geistiger Krafte ist".
17 I. Rutkowski, Przebudowa wsi w Polsce po wojnach z polowy XVII wie/q,L
(The Restructuring of Rural Areas in Poland after the Wars of the Mid-17th
Century), reprinted in Dzieje wsi Polskiej (A History of the Polish Rural Areas),
Warszawa 1956, pp. 106-7.
18 For an analysis of the problem see A. Malewski & I. Topolski, op. cit.,
pp. 31-4; the formulations there are due to A. Malewski.
19 B. Grekov, "Prawidlowosci w dziejach chlop6w w Europie" (Regularities
in the History of the Peasants in Europe), quoted from the Polish-language
version, Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 3-4/1948.
20 I. Majewski, Gospodarstwo folwarczne we wsiach miasta Poznania w la-
tach 1582-1644 (Manorial Farms in the Villages Owned by the Town of Po-
znan, 1582-1644), Poznan 1957, p. 265.
21 M. Bogucka, Gdanskie rzemioslo tekstylne od XVI do polowy XVll wieku
(Textile Crafts in Gdansk from the 16th to the Mid-17the Century), Wroclaw
1956.
XXV. ELEMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATIVES:
EVALUATIONS
1. Valuation versus evaluations. The logical value of evaluations
Statements which directly express a valuating attitude of the speaker

or writer are usually termed valuating statements, moral judgements,
or evaluations. They are also one of the elements of historical narra-
tives. There has been an inveterate controversy over the issue whether
evaluations, as distinct from descriptive statements, may be ascribed a
logical value (truth or falsehood). Most specialists firmly reject that pos-
sibility and stress that evaluations are logically neutral; some try to
defend the traditional concept of truth as applicable to valuating judge-
ments; and still others either suggest a specific interpretation of the
concept of truth as applied to valuating judgements, or, like M. Ossow-
ska, claim that "even if it be held that norms can be neither true nor
false in the traditional sense, i.e., in the sense of somehow agreeing or
disagreeing with facts, this does not amount yet to refusing them all
logical value".1
The present writer's opinion on the issue is as follows. In most eval-
uations2 to be encountered in scholarly works, especially those con-
cerned with history, we can find two types of information about facts:
(a) information about those facts which are being evaluated. (b) infor-
mation about the author's system of value (if he is a historian, i.e., in-
formation about an aspect of non-source-based knowledge), which also
belongs to the world of facts. Consider the following statements:
(1) "Revolutionary agrarian reforms were a more progressive form of
historical changes than a slow restructuring of the agrarian system in-
itiated by the authorities", and (2) "Freedom is the supreme good".
From (1) we can learn that revolutionary agrarian reforms were causes
of some historical changes, and also that those changes influenced the
course of events differently than a restructuring of an agrarian system
initiated by the authorities does (in general) or would do (in the case
under consideration). Further, (2) informs us that freedom, as under-

stood by its author, has properties which he holds to be good. It can-
not be denied that such information is very vague, but, as we shall see,
the informative value of evaluations is not confined to that. If we refer
to (1) and (2) and also to a certain amount of additional knowledge, we
can - to a greater or lesser extent - reconstruct the systems of values of
the respective authors. It follows from (1) that its author is in favour of
a rapid and consistent abolition of social inequalities and exploitation
of some groups of people by other groups, and it follows from (2) that
its author out of the various values gives the highest priority to free-
dom. so that. in his system of values, all that which adds to freedom
and defends and supports it is good. Once the systems of values of the
respective authors are reconstructed (which usually requires, next to
some additional knowledge, also the knowledge of other statements
made by the said authors) we can return to the question about type (a)
information, i.e., information about facts. Now (1) tells us not only that
revolutionary agrarian reforms did cause some historical changes which
somehow differently affected the course of events than a restructuring of
agrarian systems initiated by the authorities did, but also that revolu-
tionary agrarian reforms more rapidly contributed to social equality
and mitigated exploitation than the authority-initiated restructuring of
agrarian systems did. And (2) accordingly tells us not only that free-
dom is good, but (together with some additional knowledge) also that it
has certain (intersubjectively verifia1:>le) properties which the author in
question holds to be good.
Thus, an evaluating statement (except for purely emotional ones,
which merely express approval or disapproval) has, as compared with
a descriptive one, a double reference to facts, or, in other words, a
double model (one part of which is superimposed upon the other). The
first reference is to some facts which did occur so to say outside the
author of an evaluating statement, and the other is to his system of
values. In the case of either reference we can say whether it agrees with
(or: is consistent with) the model, because both references are to facts.
The difficulty consists in the necessity of separating one system of ref-
erence from the other when the logical values of evaluations are anal-
ysed. Concerrung (l) we may ask whether revolutionary agrarian re-
forms in fact did bring about social equality and mitigate exploitation
ELEMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS 645
more quickly than authority-initiated reforms did, and if we find out

that it was really so, then we may say that statement (l) is true in its
descriptive part. Next, we may ask whether the evaluation it contains
(the author's declaration in favour of rapid changes contributing to
social equality and elimination of exploitation) agrees with the author's
entire system of values; if we find out that it does, then we may say
that (1) is adequate in its moral (or emotional) part. In practice, a state-
ment may 'be true in its descriptive part and inadequate in its emotional
part; or vice versa; or it may be in agreement with both facts and its
author's system of value; or it may be at variance with both. There is,
however, an abyss of difference between the two kinds of agreement.
The truth (or falsehood) of the descriptive part is independent of the
author of the statement, because it is referred by us to facts; on the
contrary, the adequacy of the emotional part is referred by us to the
author of a given statement. This is why in the former case a given
statement is assessed either as true or as false (at a given stage of re-
search, because our knowledge of facts may change), in the latter case
it may be both adequate and inadequate, according to the person of its
author. If a consistent advocate of concrete music, who has praised it
consistently and pointed to its numerous merits, at one time says that
concrete music is bad, then we may say (on the assumption that he has
not changed his system of values suddenly) that the statement in
question is false (in a specific sense of the word) in his own language.
If the same statement is made by a supporter of traditional music, then
we say that his evaluation is true (in the specific sense of the word). In
practice we rarely make such statements about evaluating statements,
and this is why we are somewhat shocked when truth or falsehood is
ascribed to the latter. This is so because we usually compare evalu-
ations made by others neither with facts nor with the systems of values
of the respective authors of such statements, but merely with our own
system of values, which is not any system of reference whatever for
making statements about the truth (or adequacy) of evaluating state-
ments made by others. We may be ready to say about (l) or (2): "yes,
that is true!", but we hardly ever remember in such cases that by say-
ing so we only express our own evaluations. Such an attitude obviously
does not suffice for an analysis of evaluations in science.
The relative nature of the logical value of the emotional stratum of
646 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lflSfORY
evaluating statements justifies their being treated differently in scientific

methodology, and at the same time induces us to formulate the follow-
ing general requirement. As it seems beyond all dispute that in the last
analysis those statements only about which we may decide whether they
are true or false can be elements of science, it is extremely important
that evaluating statements be accompanied (directly or indirectly) by
information about their author's respective systems of values. As we
have shown, the knowledge of that system enables us to bring out
properly the descriptive part of an evaluating statement (so that we are
in a position to find out whether that descriptive part is true or false),
and also enables us to find out whether the emotional part of it is ade-
quate or not. In this way, while not opposing evaluations in scientific
statements, which would probably prove a hopeless task and an un-
necessary requirement, we can defend the precision and clarity of the
language of science in general, and the language of historical research
in particular.
Even though an evaluating attitude underlies all decisions in science,
the degree of its manifestation in reports on the results obtained varies
greatly from discipline to discipline and from researcher to researcher.
If we look, from this point of view, for differences between natural and
social sciences, then we see that they are not to be found in the fact
that the former is valuation-free while the other is not, but in the fact
that - in view of the common standards of valuation - evaluating state-
ments, i.e., linguistic manifestations of a valuating attitude, usually do
not occur in narratives concerned with the natural sciences, whereas in
those concerned with the social sciences, and with historical narratives
in particular, evaluating statements form one of their elements. The
difference is thus external rather than essential, as it applies to the
forms of the manifestation of valuations.
2. The various forms of the valuating attitude of historians
It follows from what has been said above that evaluating statements
are only one of the manifestations of a historian's valuating attitude.
Those forms have been mentioned previously, especially in Chaps. XVI
and XVII. We shall now try to list them in order to show the place of
evaluations among those manifestations of a valuating attitude. We
ELEMENTS OF mSTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS 647
distinguish six such forms8 in two main groups: non-linguistic and lin-
guistic ones.
The first of the non-linguistic manifestations of a historian's evalu.
ating attitude toward the past is his very choice of the subject matter
(or field) of research. A person decides to study a given problem be-
cause he thinks that it is worth-while for some reasons to study it. Thus,
the patriotic role of Polish bishops and archbishops was willingly taken
up by historians connected with Roman Catholicism, whereas those
facts which show that bishops betrayed their country, oppressed pea-
sants and lived in great lUxury were willingly taken up by historians
who held that Roman Catholicism was detrimental to Poland.
The second manifestation may consist in passing over in silence or in
belittling facts which are inconvenient to a' given author, even though
he ought to discuss them once he has chosen a given subject. Thus, for
instance, some Polish historia.ns, connected with the gentry, when writ-
ing a history of Polish peasants pointed above all to the reforms under-
taken in the past by owners of large estates and described them as
manifestations of magnanimity, claiming that "unlike in other coun-
tries, Polish peasants never resorted to rebellions".
The third form of the manifestation of an evaluating attitude in his-
toriography consists in the manner of explanation. By analysing the
factors which a historian considers important in explaining a given fact
we can say much about the valuation system by which he is guided.
His criteria are sometimes linked explicitly with his political ideas. Ex-
amples of differences in explanations are provided by analyses of histor-
ical studies connected with the various methodological traditions and
with different political groups. Marxist historians adopt the materialist
theory of social development (historical materialism) as the principle by
which they are guided in their explanations.
Fourthly, one's personal attitude toward the facts which are being
studied may be manifested in the different degree of significance which
the various historians ascribe to the same facts, or in pointing to some
facts only (namely those which suit one's interpretation) and disregard-
ing or belittling other facts. In a discussion among Polish historians con-
cerning the political and military significance of the successful defence
of the Pauline monastery near Cz~stochowa during the Swedish in-
vasion of Poland in the mid-17th century one historian concluded that
the defence "had played an important role in the course of military

operations",' whereas another author, renowned for his critical re-ap-
pmisal of certain interpretations of Polish history, stressed "the purely
local military and political significance" of the defence of the mona-
stery..
The linguistic forms of the manifestation of a valuating attitude in-
clude (i) the vocabulary with an approving or a derogatory emotional
tinge, and (ii) evaluating statements. In the case of the vocabulary,
which hardly ever happens to be quite neutral, an evaluation is con-
cealed in the description itself. In evaluating statements, too, evaluations
are rarely stated explicitly. Note that the whole of a narrative, be it
even as unemotional as possible, also gives some impression of the
author's evaluating attitude.
Here are extreme examples of an approving and a derogatory vocab-
ulary (italics - I.T.).
(3) W. Konopczynski, who disapproved of the peasants' struggle
against feudal lords, when describing the situation on the eve of the bat-
tle of Beresteczko wrote that "hundreds of emissaries were instigating
the peasants to join the Cossack hordes and to slay land owners".
but all this yielded results only in the Carpathian region, where "a
certain Kostka (...), accompanied by a gang of highlanders, captured
the Czorsztyn fortress".6
(4) A. M. Skalkowski, manifesting a similarly derogatory attitude,
wrote about Kosciuszko's army that "it dragged with is swarms of peas-
ants without any use. who were just laying the country bare (...)".7
The vocabulary is not always that explicit, and, moreover, the evalu-
ations may be positive.
(5) "The action taken by the people was of great significance, both
political, as it proved that the masses supported the national liberation
struggle, and military (...)",8 or
(6) "And yet in Poland herself there had been for decades a magnifi-
cent work in the field of political ideas, a work which was an original
Polish achievement and was a summing up of Polish constitutional ex-
perience, namely Stanislaw Konarski's 'On Efficient Public Debates' ".9
ELEMENTS OF .mSTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS 649
3. The kinds of evaluations in historical narratives
In science we single out two kinds of evaluations: utilitarian and proper

ones. 10 A similar classification is applicable to those which occur in his-
torical narratives. To simplify matters, we may say that utilitarian evalu-
ations are evaluating statements applied to observable objects and re-
ferred to other, more primitive, evaluations (the term primitive being
used here not in its derogatory sense, but, as in logic, in the sense of
fundamental- Tr.). They indicate that something is good as applied to
something else, or is needed for something else, or is better than some-
thing else. Such comparisons are made either with a general pattern
which we have adopted as good, or with another element of the same
class (which ultimately also results in a comparison with a pattern or
model).H If we say that a book on history should not be boring, then
we compare it with some pattern which we have approved and with
which books on history should correspond. And if we say that physician
A is better than physician B, we make our comparison within a certain
class, but we must have some idea of what, in our opinion, a "good"
physician is. In this interpretation, utilitarian evaluations will be called
comparative.
Proper evaluations, to which, in the last analysis, comparative evalu-
ations can be reduced, are more primitive (i.e., fundamental) in nature.
It is, however, merely a difference of degree, so that no major practical
importance is to be ascribed to the distinction between the two catego-
ries of evaluations. Some characteristic examples of both types are
given below. Here are some comparative evaluations (italics - I.T.).
(7) "The tendency which was favourable to the peasant intensified,
after the passing of the Constitution of 1791, under t~e influence of the
events in France and as a result of the fact that the Constitution failed
to fulfil expectations".12 The author of this passage compares that
"tendency" of activities concerned with the peasants with some pattern
of "favourability" to peasants at that time. This evaluation thus refers
to a pattern (of favourability to peasants).
(8) "Alexander himself was a pupil of ArtistotIe. His army was ac-
companied by surveyors and observers to map out the country and note
its resources. His fleet was expressly sent to explore the Arabian Sea.
These traditions were worthily maintained by his successors in Egypt
and Asia(...)".13 This evaluation is also referred to a pattern (of worthy

continuation).
In both these cases the evaluations can easily be reduced to other
ones. Thus, in (7) we can arrive at the question, why a certain be-
haviour is "favourable" to the peasants, and then we can gradually find
out the fundamental criteria of the evaluations made. Likewise, in (8)
we arrive at the question, why Alexander's conduct was worthy of con-
tinuation and approval.
Some statements may seem to include comparative evaluations, but
on a closer examination they turn out to be merely descriptive.
Here are some examples:
(9) "As far back we can reach, i.e., to the 12th century, we see
large-scale grants of estates by the rulers to knights. They even made
grants of entire fortified settlements, e.g., Lekno, Wyszogr6d, Skrzyno,
and there is no doubt that were it not for the paucity of sources, we
could quote more such examples. Later, in the 13th and 14th centuries,
the grants were smaller, because the rulers of the duchies (into which
Poland was divided at that time - Tr.) and even the last two kings of
the Piast dynasty, Ladislaus the Short and Casimir, could not afford
making large grants, but these nevertheless continued: this or that
knight was granted one or more villages for the services rendered to
the ruler".14
In this case, no reference is made to evaluations, but the size of
grants made in the various periods is compared. The same applies to
formulations like: in a country X per capita income is larger than in
a country Y. But the statement: "in a country X people live better
(less conveniently, etc.) than in a country Y" is a comparative evalu-
ation, since living conditions in X and Y are compared with our stand-
ards of "good" living conditions.
Here is another example:
(10) "(In Germany) as compared with France (Thierry and Michelet)
the concept of the nation came very timidly to be associated with that
of the people, that of the broadest masses, and even Ranke interpreted
it in the sense of the upper, educated strata".15 In this case, the intensity
of one and the same phenomenon in the various countries is compared,
but no evaluation is insolved: we have to do merely with a description
of facts.
In historical works, proper evaluations are infrequently formulated

expressis verbis. Usually they are more or less deeply concealed in
seemingly descriptive statements, so that the separation of the descriptive
level from the emotional one does not suggest itself without an ap-
propriate analysis of the text.
Here are examples of proper evaluations which are rather deeply
concealed:
(11) "(... ) in 1921, the first task of the working people in Poland was
to win social reforms".16 This statement, descriptive as it may seem, is
an evaluation. In its descriptive part it says that the working people in
Poland at that time lived in conditions which had to be improved. In
its emotional part it reveals the author's valuations: he holds that the
struggle for reforms that would improve the living conditions of the
working people was a good programme, which deserVed support, and
accordingly claims that people have to fight for reforms, because an im-
provement in the living conditions of the working people is something
good (progressive).
Further:
(12) "The 1863 Uprising in Poland was a landmark in social move-
ments, because the strivings of Polish peasants came to be linked with
even more extensive activities of peasants in Russia" P
Here is an example of a proper evaluation formulated more expressly;
(13) "The Polish Uprising of 1830 was of great international impor-
tance. Its objective role was progressive beyond all doubt. The Upris-
ing, which was one of the manifestations of intensified bourgeois-demo-
cratic and national liberation movements in Europe, protected West
European countries from an armed intervention of the tsarist regime" .1~
It can easily be noted that the opinion a given researcher has about
the process of history underlies every proper evaluation, whether for-
mulated more or less explicitly; his non-source-based knowledge mani-
fests itself in this way in its function of system of values.
4. The criterion of progress as the main element of proper evaluations

in historiography
The criterion of progress will be used here to denote the criterion by

which a historian evaluates the facts he describes. The term progress
652 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY
as used here is, of course, free from all implications which link with it
the assertion of its being inevitable, i.e., its taking place regardless of
human actions. In the sense used here, all that which a historian ap-
proves (holds to be good, proper, just, deserving support, etc.) is pro-
gressive, and all that of which he disapproves (which he holds to be
bad, unjust, contestable, etc.) is reactionary. Thus this criterion is prim-
itive in nature as it corresponds to the qualifiers (used as predicates
in the logical sense of the term) "good" and "bad", to which all evalu-
ations can be reduced. 19 It can easily be seen what criteria of progress
underlie the proper evaluations mentioned previously.
In (1) its author believes that increased equality in social relations
means progress. In (12), as we judge, those factors which combatted
feudalism and thus facilitated the advent of a new socio-economic for-
mation are held to be progressive. Statement (13) expresses approval of
the struggle against the feudal system and political reactionaries and
thus holds as progressive all that which adds to man's liberation. State-
ments (7) and (8) can be reduced to similar fundamental evaluations.
Scholars often failed to notice that divergences in their discussions
pertained not to facts, but to evaluations, that is, to the criteria of pro-
gress, which were different for various participants in such discussions.
Let us recall the controversy over the manorial farms based on serf
labour.
(14) S. Hoszowski wrote that in its first stage the progressive nature
of manorial farms was due to several factors, such as "an increased
area of cultivated land, continuity of cultivation, a better organization
of large farms, a competent organization of the sale of agricultural
produce, a better management of forests, meadows, fish ponds, and
animal breeding, an increased number of people employed in agricul-
ture, an increased complexity of the division of labour, an increased
percentage of marketable production, a growth of agricultural industries
(mills, breweries) and other types of industries connected with the man-
ors, satisfaction of the needs of consumers in large towns, a growth of
exports and imports, and above all an intensification of monetary econ-
omy as a result of an advantageous balance of trade and an inflow of
money from abroad".20
(15) J. Bardach's formulations were similar. "Personally I would take
the side of those who notice the moderately progressive role of man-
ELEMENTS OF IDSTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS 653
orial farms in the first period of their existence, above all because of an
increase in the amount of marketable grain".21
In both cases we see that economic development and increased pro-
duction are taken as the criterion of progress.
(16) A different criterion of progress accounts for the statement made
by S. Szczotka. In his opinion, the progressive nature of manorial farms
was due to the fact that "they contributed to an intensification and ex-
acerbation of the class struggle".22 Under this criterion, those phe-
nomena are progressive which accelerate the fall of a given formation
and the advent of the next one.
Another criterion has also been used in the controversy over man-
orial farms. For instance, S. Arnold treated manorial farms as reaction-
ary from their very emergence. He wrote that (17) the role of manorial
farms was reactionary "as they socially pushed the peasants down to
the level of slaves who had to live in stark poverty".23 In this case, the
criterion of progress is linked with the living conditions of the working
people. Likewise, S. Inglot claimed that (18) "the advent of manorial
farms, if regarded from the point of view of relations of production,
cannot be treated as a progressive phenomenon".24
As can be seen, at least three criteria (economic growth, speeding up
of the advent of the new formation, the status of the masses) were used
in the controversy over manorial farms. Obviously, these criteria are
not always contradictory. They may be such if one author holds that
all activity conducive to a country's economic growth is to be encour-
aged, while another author claims that attention should be paid, first
of all, to the living conditions of the masses. Moreover, we have to do
with a contradiction only as long as we examine the issue over a short
period of time, since over a long period these criteria may coincide.
For instance, economic growth may, in the long run, turn out to be a
more effective means of improving the living standards of the popula-
tion. This is why the criteria of progress usually require a very precise
analysis.
In the examples given above, the evaluated facts were not described
in terms of human actions, and merely the progressive or reactionary
nature of those facts was discussed.
But human actions and aspirations in the past also happen to be
evaluated. Such plans might never have been brought into effect, be it
alone for the fact that they could not have materialized under the his-
torical conditions in which they were made. In the case of planned
actions, whether brought into effect or not, historians evaluate them in
two ways: they compare them either with various other programmes of
actions current in the same period (the historical, or past-oriented, cri-
terion), or with various contemporary programmes (the present-oriented
criterion). In this way, a programme of action which may be evaluated
as very progressive by one criterion, may be ranked very poor by the
other criterion. In the former case, the evaluation is comparative, in the
latter, it is a proper one.
Here is an example of an evaluation of a programme by the historical
criterion:
(19) "The ideology of the Polish Brethren, and especially their ple-
beian trend, was, from the social point of view, the most progressive-
even though Utopian - programme at the time of the Renaissance in
Poland".25
And here is a case of an evaluation based on the present-oriented
criterion:
(20) "Kamieriski's social and political opinions were anti-feudal and
linked the struggle for Poland's independence with an unconditional
granting of land to the peasants who tilled it. The programme was ex-
pounded in Prawdy iywotne (Vital Truths), but was a matter of polit-
ical tactics: it left the agrarian proletarial landless and the manorial
farms untouched. In its basic formulations it was in agreement with
the programme of the Polish Democratic Society (founded by Polish
emigres in France and active in the mid-19th century - Tr.) and was,
under the political conditions of the time, certainly progressive, even
though it did not call for an agrarian revolution".26
Evaluations based on the present-oriented criterion (as accepted by
a given author) may sometimes become caricaturaI. This is what
W. Kula wrote about them when analysing works by earlier historians.
"The evaluation of the past. as made by historians. was as a rule pres-
ent-oriented. It resulted from a historian's struggle in favour of some-
thing he stood for, and from his attitude toward his society. An anti-
German-minded historian living under the Third Republic in France
would blame earlier politicians who had concluded alliances with Ger-
many and would extol those who had waged wars against Germany.
A French radical would erect statues of Danton and conceal (and even
destroy) documents which showed that Danton had been receiving
money from British agents. A French socialist would be overjoyed to
expose Danton and to extol 'The Incorruptible'. In this country, Ko-
rzon, Askenazy and Skalkowski treated Kosciuszko, Prince J 6zef Po-
niatowski, and Dl!browski, respectively, in a similar manner".27
5. Historians in face of evaluations
It is worth considering what should be a historian's attitude toward

valuation in general, and evaluations in narratives in particular. We can
encounter two extreme approaches. One is that a historian cannot dis-
sociate himself from evaluations, and the other supports the illusion
that valuation-free historical research which would be fully objective
and neutral is possible. A. Pr6chnik expressed his opinion which came
close to the former standpoint when he wrote that "when expressing his
opinions, selecting facts, evaluating events a historian cannot separate
himself from the platform on which he stands. He is unable to forget
his Weltanschauung, should he even pretend to himself that he does
SO".28 A similar viewpoint has been formulated by W. Kula, who holds
that the requirement that historiography be freed from evaluations is
impracticable, and even detrimental to historical research.29
While we hold that valuation is inseparably connected with all scien-
tific activity we may nevertheless consider which forms of the mani-
festation of a valuating attitude are compatible with the conduct of
a historian, and which are incompatible with it and must accordingly
be condemned.
Now the manifestation of a historian's attitude in the choice of the
subject matter of research is both fully legitimate and unavoidable. Ac-
cording to the various factors involved, some researchers pose certain
questions, while other researchers pose other questions, and there is no
danger to science in this. Some possible untoward effects may be partly
mitigated by the growing practice of co-ordinating and planning re-
search work.
But it is otherwise when it comes to the remaining forms of selection.
We have to ban every valuating attitude which manifests itself in pass-
ing over inconvenient facts in silence even though they have to be
656 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF lllSTORY
discussed in connection with the subject matter studied. Likewise, we

have to disapprove of all one-sided selection of the consequences of the
facts covered by research. Such an incorrect selection is sometimes due
merely to an inadequate preparation of a given historian for his task.
In such a case the cure is simple: he has to increase his non-source-
based knowledge.
And the evaluations? Two requirements might be formulated here:
(1) elimination of certain forms of evaluations,
(2) modification of their remaining forms.
In the case of (1) we mean that the vocabulary used in historio-
graphy should be selected so as to be possibly precise and unambig-
uous; in science, words must inform above all about the facts studied,
and not about the researcher's emotions. The radical requirements
mentioned above would be impracticable, and this is why the present
writer suggests moderation.
In the case of (2) we mean evaluations formulated as evaluating
statements. We have to see to it that evaluations be clear, and that can
be ascertained only if the systems of values used in valuation are as
fully revealed as possible. If that condition is met, then if a historian
'Says that a phenomenon was progressive in nature we can find out
whether he is right, that is, we can find out whether his evaluation is
true in its descriptive part. The present writer does not recommend
that evaluations be eliminated. On the contrary, he believes that because
of evaluations historiography contributes to transformations of the
world around us. Yet the task of evaluating must at no point be in con-
tradiction with strictly scientific tasks, that is, it must not result in the
undesirable forms of valuation, as mentioned above.
But what criteria of valuation, that is, criteria of historical progress,'
are to be adopted? Throughout the ages, historians manifested their
'various standpoints both by what they did as historians and what they
declared. At any rate, probably every period in the history of historical
research and historiography saw the division into activists, who were
always willing to support the aims of a given social group, and sceptics,
who were critical of the various patterns. W. Kula has termed the
former "acolytes" (since "they serve the mass in the churches of their
times"), and, the latter, "iconolasts" (since they "strive to open the
ELEMENTS OF mSTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS 657
eyes of their contemporaries so that these could see that 'the king has
no clothes' ").30
When the pragmatic pattern in historical research was dominant, the
main task of the historians was to promote certain behaviour patterns.
Axiomatic principles for the construction of such patterns were provid-
ed by mythology, the state, and religion. When rationalism came to
replace religion in historical research, or at least to take a parallel posi-
tion, unchanging human nature with its unchanging needs emerged as
the ultimate system of reference for evaluations.
In the Cartesian vision, the knowledge of man, like geometry, was to
be deduced from a number of axioms. This meant reinforcement for the
study of man from the viewpoint of the human species (even though
historiography remained hero-oriented and personality-oriented), with
the total loss of those elements of an individual treatment of human
beings which can be found even in ancient authors.
Opposition to absolute systems of reference in the sphere of valuation,
systems promoted both by religion and by the idea of an unchanging
human nature, gave rise to a total historical relativism (mainly in Ger-
man historiography). It deprived historians of all criteria of valuation
by proclaiming the principle virtus filia temporis, which means that, by
rejecting all absolute values to which evaluations could be referred, it
came to advocate extreme relativism in that respect.
The dialectical synthesis of the extreme standpoints, i.e., a synthesis
which leads to the acceptance of certain criteria of valuation while it
stresses that they are historical in nature, avoids the two extremes. The
best-founded proposals of such a synthesis is to be found in Marxist
authors, especially in Marx and Engels, and later, for instance, in
Gramsci and Lukacs. Their ideas are to be interpreted thus: when
evaluating the process of history we have to make a distinction between
(1) evaluations of events which are not interpreted in terms of human
actions, (2) evaluations of human actions (actions undertaken by indi-
viduals, groups, and institutions). This distinction, which is essential for
the issue under consideration, was not observed properly, which result-
ed in many misunderstandings. The historian who wants to evaluate
the emergence of capitalism in the 16th to 18th centuries, and one who
wants to evaluate the conduct of the pioneers of capitalist industraliza-
tion who exploited their workers mercilessly, face two different prob-
658 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF IDSfORY
lems. In the former case, the historian will probably say that the
emergence of capitalism was a progressive fact, while in the latter he
will certainly show sympathy for human sufferings. Does it mean a dual-
ity of evaluations?
How can we avoid such a duality? At any rate, it seems wrong to
subordinate evaluations of human actions to evaluations of processes,
that is, to absolve individuals, groups, and institutions of certain actions
merely because those actions originated, or contributed to, certain pro-
cesses which we evaluate positively. But it would also be wrong to
follow the other extreme, that is, to forget, when evaluating human
actions, both the process of history and its consequences to human life.
A historian must each time find a middle course between these two
extremes. The Marxist theory propagates the anthropocentric approach,
according to which man is taken to be the supreme and the ultimate
value. This approach, too, has the best chances to become the basic
criterion of historical evaluations and to help historians in finding ways
of valuation. While in the process of establishing laws, i.e., general re-
lationships, a historian must dissociate himself from man as an indi-
vidual, in the process of making evaluations he must, as recommended
by the principle of anthropocentrism, always have the individual and
his needs in view. Note that anthropocentrism, as interpreted in the
Marxist theory, does not treat man one-sidedly in the sphere of his ex-
istence; it does not separate his individual existence from the social
sphere, and a fortiori does not oppose one to the other, as some ex-
istentialist and personalist philosophies do. An individual is taken
neither in isolation, nor merely as a social product, but as a creative
factor in the process of history. These problem will not be analysed
here at any greater length since they are marginal to the issues under
consideration in the present book.
The anthropocentric approach as formulated above stands midway
between the abstract concept of changeless human nature and the re-
lativism as advocated by historicism. It follows therefrom that we have
to admit the existence of a common foundation of human nature as
far as different periods and different territories are concerned. What we
mean here is not only the biological level (even though in that respect
that common foundation seems to be most clearly marked), but the
psychological level as well. Every historian is convinced that certain
features of human nature and certain human needs are constant, and
he bases many of his statements on that conviction.
REFERENCES
1 M. Ossowska, Podstawy nauki 0 moralnosci (The Foundations of the
Science of Morals), Warszawa 1947, pp. 125--6. See also B. Mayo, Ethics and
the Moral Life, New York 1958; A. Montefiore, A Modern Introduction to
Moral Philosophy, New York 1958; J. Kmita, "Problem wartosci logicznej ocen"
(The Problem of the Logical Value of Evaluations), Studia Filozoficzne,
No. 1/1964, pp. 119-37; M. Fritzhand, "Zagadnienie prawdy w etyce" (The
Problem of Truth in Ethics), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1966, pp. 11-34; J. Ve-
tulani, "Wartose logiczna zdan wartosciujlj,cych" (The Logical Value of Valua-
ting Statements), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 2/1966, pp. 75-86.
2 This refers, obviously, to proper evaluations, and not to apparent ones, the
latter to be discussed soon.

3 Cf. A. Malewski & J. Topolski, "Metoda materializmu historycznego w pra-
cach historykow polskich" (The Method of Historical Materialism in the Works
of Polish Historians), Studia Filozoficzne, No. 6/1959. Some formulations and
examples used here are drawn from that paper.
4 T. Nowak, "Spor 0 rol~ dziejowlj, obrony Jasnej Gory w 1655" (The Con-
troversy over the Historical Role of the Defence of the Pauline Monastery in
1655), Przeglqd Historyczny, No. 1/1958, p. 164.
5 O. Gorka, Legenda a rzeczywistosc obrony Cz{!stochowy w roku 1655 (The
Defence of C~stochowa in 1655: Facts and Legends), Warszawa 1957, p. 164.
6 W. KonopczyUski, Dzieje Polski nowoiytnej (A Modem History of Poland),
vol. II (1648 to 1795), 1936, p. 11.
1 A. M. Skalkowski, Z dziej6w insurekcji 1794 (A History of the 1794 In-
surrection), Warszawa 1926, p. 24.
S Historia Polski (A History of Poland), vol. II, Part 2, Warszawa 1959,
p.426.
9 Ibid., Part 1, p. 369.
10 Cf. M. Ossowska, "0 dwoch rodzajach ocen" (Two Types of Evaluations),

Kwartalnik Filozoficzny, vol. XVI, No. 2-4, Krakow 1946, pp. 279-92.
11 Cf. J. Kmita's paper quoted in footnote 1 above.
12 A. Grynwasser, "Kwestia agrama i ruch wloscian w Krolestwie Polskim

w pierwszej polowie XIX wieku" (The Agrarian Problem and the Peasant Move-
ments in the Congress Kingdom of Poland in the First Half of the 19th Century),
in: Pisma (Selected Works), vol. II, Wroclaw 1951, pp. 34-5.
13 V. G. Childe, What Happened in History, 1960, pp. 243-4.
14 K. Potkanski, "Studia nad XIV wiekiem" (Studies on the 14th Century),

in: Lechici, Polan ie, Polska (The Lechici, the Polanie, Poland), Warszawa 1965,
p.630.
15 M. H. Serejski, KDncepcja histDrii pDwszechnej IDachima Lelewela (Joa-

chim Lelewel's Idea of Universal History), Warszawa 1958, p. 108.
16 A. Pr6chnik, Pierwsze ph;tnastDlecie PDlski niepDdleglej (The First Fifteen
Years of Independent Poland), Warszawa 1957, p. 111.
17 HistDria PDlski (A History of Poland), vol. II, Part 3, Warszawa 1959,
p.524.
18 Ibid., p. 488.
19 Cf. M. Ossowska, PDdstawy nauki 0' mDralnDsci (The Foundations of the
Science of Morals), ed. cit., pp. 40-1. For a detailed analysis of the adjectives
gDDd and bad see pp. 44-53.
20 S. Hoszowski, RDla fDlwarku panszczyinianegD (The Role of Serfdom-
based Manorial Farms), Proceedings of the Polish Historians' First Conference
on Methodology, vol. I, Warszawa 1953, pp. 489-90.
21 Ibid., p. 432.
22 Ibid., p. 491.
23 S. Arnold, PDdlDie gDspDdarcZD-spDleczne pDlskiegD OdrDdzenia (The
Socio-economic Background of the Renaissance in Poland), Warszawa 1954,
p.50.
24 S. Inglot, Introduction to K. Kluk's 0 rO'lnictwie (On Agriculture), War-
szawa 1954, p. XLII.
25 Historia PO'lski (A History of Poland), vol. I, Part 1, Warszawa 1957,
p.289.
26 Ibid., vol. II, Part 3, p. 130.
27 W. Kula, RO'zwazania 0' histO'rii (Reflections on History), ed. cit., p. 139.

2S A. Prochnik, O'p. cit., pp. 4-5.
29 W. Kula, O'p. cit., p. 144.
30 Ibid., p. 219.
XXVI. THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE
OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH
1. Criteria of classification of sciences
We have presumably accumulated enough data to answer the question

about the methodological structure of historical research, or, in other
words, about the class or the family of sciences in which history is to
be included. The most urgent of all is the answer to the question,
whether (as it is claimed by representatives of the phenomenalist, i.e.,
inductionist concept of science) historical research is idiographic, that
is, descriptive in nature and does not perform any theoretical and
nomological functions.
Classifications of sciences usually resort to the three basic criteria:
that of the subject matter of research, that of the method(s) of research,
and that of the methodological structure of the language of a given
discipline. Under the first criterion, sciences are classified as a result of
the analysis of the subject matter of their study, which means that dis-
ciplines which have a common subject matter of study are placed in one
class. Under the second criterion, sciences are classified according to
the methods they use, and under the third, according to the ways in
which the results of research are formulated and substantiated, i.e .•
according to the methodological nature of the theorems and statements
obtained (in other words, the goal of research). Classifications of
sciences usually take into consideration two or even three criteria simul-
taneously, but then one of them plays the principal role. Note also that
people who classify sciences sometimes adopt the descriptive approach,
that is, they treat a given discipline as it is, but sometimes the normative
one, i.e., they treat it from the point of view of what - in their opinion-
it ought to be. Failure to notice that difference sometimes accounts
for apparent controversies, in which each of the parties to the dispute
has something else in mind. Thus the way a given discipline is classed
may be determined by opinions on its subject matter, its methods, and
its results; moreover, in each case a given criterion may apply either to
the actual state of that discipline or to its ideal image.
The classification of sciences into the natural and the social ones,
which is the most common and also the most fundamental, uses the sub-
ject matter of research as its criterion. At the first glance this classifi-
cation seems to be very clear, but in practice, now that interdisciplinary
researches have multiplied, it is often difficult to class a given discipline
unambiguously in either groUp.l Moreover, both the formal disciplines
(logic, mathematics, general cybernetics) and those disciplines which
have other sciences as the subject matter of research (the methodology
of sciences) remain outside that classifacation. Among the natural
sciences the pride of place usually goes to physics as the "purest" of
all, since it is not encumbered by the historical point of view, which
cannot be said, e.g., of many branches of biology and geology. The
social sciences include above all sociology, economics, and history. The
classification of sciences into the sciences of nature (Naturwisseschaf-
ten) and those of spirit (Geisteswissenschaften), very common in 19th
century Germany, which came to be criticized by W. Windelband in
1894, also took the subject matter of research as its criterion.
"Windelband pointed out", A. Malewski wrote, "that the oppositiog
between nature and spirit is not at all clear and that, more important
stilI, this classification does not coincide with that according to the
methods of research. Some of the Geisteswissenschaften methodologi-
cally come very close to natural sciences. That was why Windelband
found those classifications which divide sciences into those whose re-
presentatives strive to establish laws (nomothetic sciences - Tr.) and
those whose representatives describe singular facts in their historically
determined forms (idiographic sciences - Tr.)".2 History came to be
included in the idiographic sciences.
Windelband's ideas were developed by H. Rickert (cf. Chap. VII),
whose classification of sciences makes a distinction, on the one hand,
between the sciences of culture and the sciences of nature (the subject
matter of research being the criterion), and, on the other hand, between
the individualizing (idiographic) sciences and the generalizing (nomo-
thetic) ones. From one point of view, history came to be included in
the sciences of culture (that is, those which resort to valuation), and
from the other, in the individualizing ones. Both Windelband and
THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF IDSTORICAL RESEARCH 663
Rickert took the actual state of historical research as the basis for their
classification, and not a type of historical research as could be imag-
ined. H. Rickert clearly emphasized that "all kinds of facts, including
mental facts, can be treated (... ) in a generalizing manner".8
Among other classifications of sciences mention is due to the singling
out of the experimental disciplines, that is, these which resort to labo-
ratory-like experiments. They do not include the social sciences, and
above all, history, which is concerned with past events.
K. Ajdukiewicz gave a comprehensive substantiation of the division
of all sciences into deductive and inductive ones. He wrote that "all
branches of mathematics and formal logic are deductive sciences, where-
as all the remaining sciences, whether natural or humanistic, are in-
ductive in nature".4 Here the method in which theorems are obtained
is adopted as the criterion of classification. In the deductive sciences,
a statement which is not an axiom in a given discipline is accepted as
a theorem only if it can be deduced from axioms. This is not to say,
obviously, that in the inductive sciences theorems are never deduced.
As we have seen, in historical research deductive inference is used quite
frequently. The point is that in the inductive sciences induction is on
an equal footing with deduction, whereas in the deductive ones the
role of induction is marginal and ancillary.
All this shows that history happens to be classed in various ways: it
is included in the social, idiographic, valuating, non-experimental, and
inductive sciences. Except for the usually non-controversial inclusion of
history in the social and the inductive sciences, all other classifications
are subject matters of controversies. Thus, there is no agreement as to
whether history is an idiographic discipline, and hence as to whether
valuation and lack of experimentation are in fact its peculiar features.
As we have seen earlier, the controversy over the idiographic nature of
historical research comes to the fore. And, to treat the problem more
broadly, the controversy over idiographism, valuation and experimen-
tation in historical research is a manifestation of the more general con-
troversy between the advocates of the naturalist treatment of the social
sciences and the advocates of the anti-naturalist treatment of those
disciplines.
2. The anti-naturalist and the naturalist view of the social sciences5
The anti-naturalists are convinced that there is an essential difference

(in the structure of research methods) between the natural and the
social sciences, and they believe it impossible for the latter to arrive
at that level of methodological precision and unambiguity of results
which marks the natural sciences. They claim that the social sciences
are concerned with unique, non-recurrent facts (events) or objects, which
can only be described factographically. Hence it is impossible, in the
sphere of the social sciences, to establish scientific laws, and, according-
ly, to make scientific predictions. Nor is it possible, they claim, to
obtain results that would be valuation-free and thus fully objective, all
valuation being a non-scientific, or extra-scientific factor. Further, in
their opinion, the lack of opportunity for making experiments deprives
the social scientists of the possibility of carrying out truly scientific veri-
fications, which considerably reduces the usefulness of results. The
naturalists, who stand for the unity of science, hold the opposing views.
They point to the fundamental similarity of the subject matter of re-
search in the case of both the natural and the social sciences: in both
cases we are concerned with facts which are essentially individual, be-
cause a given fact, such as the Battle of Crecy, a given eclipse of the
Sun, and the decomposition of a given atom at a given moment occurs
only once, and cannot recur in the same conditions, which obviously
is not to say that there cannot be facts that belong in the same class of
facts.
They see the basis for establishing scientific laws and making all
types of generalizations in both natural and social sciences in the pos-
sibility of combining facts - on the strength of the similarity of certain
properties of theirs - into classes of varying extensions. They also point
out that the very existence of names of facts and objects testifies to
operations of classification. When we say: this is an eclipse of the Sun,
this is a war, this is a table, etc., then we include a given fact (event)
or object in a given class. 6 Between natural and social facts there may
be at most a difference of degree only: social facts seem to us (which
does not mean that it is really so) to reveal a greater variety of secon-
dary charac~eristics than natural facts do.
The similar structure of the subject matter of research of both nat-
THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF mSTORICAL RESEARCH 665
ural and social sciences means that all facts, whether natural or social,
are unique from one point of view, and recurrent (at least potentially)
from another. This in turn implies that situation is similar when it
comes to establishing and formulating laws and making predictions,
even though (as we see that at the present stage of the development of
science) the links between natural facts and the sphere of man's free
will (see Chap. XI) account for a larger number of combinations. In
the social sciences, this gives rise to specific complications in research
work and makes unambiguous and unconditional formulations of re-
sults more difficult.
And yet in the social sciences we arrive at statements of the same
type as in the natural sciences. In both, the substance consists of ob-
servation statements, that is, statements of the type: "a fact Z occurred
at a place L and at a time T" or "what I am now watching is P",
statements based on direct or indirect observations. An observation
statement is in the form of a sentence, but since sentences of this kind
rarely become final constituents of formulations of results of research,
they are distinguished from those by which we inform about the results
of research. The latter category, as we have seen (cf. Chap. XXIV)
includes the two main types: statements of singular facts and general
statements. In the latter group we single out strictly general statements
and universally general ones.
It is among strictly general and universally general statements (the
latter contain proper names but are ontologically and epistemologically
open) that we have to look for scientific laws; and the problem of estab-
lishing scientific laws is the focus of the controversy over the possibility
of constructing the social sciences after the pattern drawn from the
natural sciences. All disputants agree, however, as to the fact that there
are different categories of laws.
Apart from being either universal (Le., valid at all places and at all
time) or restricted to some parts of space-time, laws can also be ex-
ception-free or statistical. In the case of the exception-free laws, if the
condition described in the antecedent is satisfied, the fact described in
the consequent always occurs, whereas the statistical laws (which reflects
either the nature of facts or our inadequate knowledge of them) merely
assure that the fact described in the consequent occurs in a sufficiently
high percentage of cases, that is, with a specified and adequately high
666 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF InSTORY
probability. As is known, statistical laws are formulated both in the

natural sciences and in the social ones; as far as the former are con-
cerned it suffices to mention the laws of quantum mechanics.
The possibility of formulating laws (in a general sense and scientific
laws in particular) both in the sphere of the social sciences and in that
of the natural sciences results immediately from the fact that in both
we make use of, and arrive at, strictly general statements. It is obvious
that in the various disciplines the role of those statements which lack
strictly general validity, on the one hand, and those which are strictly
general, on the other, differs from case to case. For instance, geology
and history are more interested in establishing facts which are de-
scribed in terms of statements which lack strictly general validity than
physics and theoretical sociology are.
By being open, that is, unrestricted as to their validity at least in
time, strictly general and universally general statements can serve as
bases for predictions. Such statements are the most important constit-
uent of our knowledge and guide all our conscious actions. If, for in-
stance, I do not touch a heated stove in order not to get burned, I am
guided by the strictly general statement (drawn from the experience ac-
cumulated by others and supplemented by my own experience) "all
heated stoves cause burns". I predict that if I touch a heated stove with
my bare hand I will burn my hand, and since I do not want to get
burned I do not touch it. Strictly general (and possibly universally gen-
eral statements as well) are the basis for our search for causes of those
facts which we treated as effects.
Since strictly general statements enable us causal explanations, they
thereby serve as bases for predictions. 7 In the case of explanation we
know the effect (described by the consequent of a conditional state-
ment) and do not know the cause (to be described by the antecedent of
that conditional statement), whereas in the case of prediction we know
what is stated in the antecedent and we want to formulate the conse-
quent so that it would be a true statement. The difference is in the
direction in which we proceed. Yet the similarity between the prog-
nostic and the postgnostic procedure in the various disciplines does not
mean that all disciplines are equally successful in both fields. There is
no doubt that in many social sciences, including history, both prediction
and causal explantation is, in view of the role played by man's free
THE METHODOLOGICAL srn.UCTURE OF lllSI'ORICAL RESEARCH 667
actions, more difficult than it is in the natural sciences. Yet the differ-
ence is one of degree, and not of essence. The large number of the
factors iQ.volved accounts for the fact that many predictions in the social
sciences have a very low degree of reliability; but if we consider, for
instance, weather forecasts we see that unreliability of predictions is
not a peculiarity of the social sciences.
The anti-naturalists point out that nevertheless the chances of pre-
dictions in the social sciences are practically nil, because man's con-
scious actions account for the self-implementation or self-destruction
of those predictions which are known to the humans (the Oedipus
effect), and moreover the very act of research affects the atitude of
those human beings which are covered by that research. In this con-
nection we may quote, concerning the first issue, E. Nagel's opinion
that formulation of laws as conditional statements refutes the objection
of their low predictive value;8 as to the second issue, we may point
to Heisenberg's indeterminacy principle in physics, which also refers to
the effect an observer has on the results of research.
The same applies to valuation and experimentation. The difference
is not structural but one of degree, or else is due to a too narrow inter-
pretation of certain concepts. As has been said (see Chap. XIV), de-
cision making underlies all human actions, and hence research activity
as well, and decision making is based on a specified system of values
or evaluations. The difference is in the fact that in the social sciences
we often have to do with divergent evaluations, whereas in the natural
sciences convergent evaluations are the rule, which accounts for the
illusion that no evaluations are involved in research.
It may be said that in the social sciences experiments are impossible,
but only if we understand experiments as interpreted in the same way
as in physics or chemistry, i.e., as controlled ones. There are, however,
many natural sciences (such as palaeontology) in which such experi-
ments are not possible, either, and, on the other hand, in some social
sciences (e.g., psychology) experimentation is possible to some extent;
moreover, people tend to disregard the fact that what is termed mental
experiments has much in common with controlled experiments, even
though there are considerable differences between the two categories.
In the last analysis it turns out that the methodological contrast be-
tween the natural and the social sciences raises many doubts. In both
groups of sciences researchers formulate strictly general statements and

scientific laws which serve as bases for explanation and prediction;
neither group is free from valuation; and in both groups experiments
are possible in some cases, but impossible in others. The naturalist
approach to the social sciences does not, however, mean any universally
accepted opinion on the methodological structure of history as a social
science. The differences of opinion on this point are reflected mainly
in the various approaches to idiographism.
What has been said here is, of course, not intended to imply that the
social sciences do not have their own peculiarities. The most important
ones include the specific procedure of explaining human behaviour by
their humanistic interpretation. While in natural science it suffices to
take into account the structure and the dynamics of facts, in the social
sciences and in the humanities dynamics and structure must be viewed
through the intermediary of human actions.
3. Subject-oriented and pragmatic idiographism
When we say that history is an idiographic discipline, we may refer

that both to the subject matter of study and to the methods and results
of research. This means that we may class history as an idiographic
discipline and thereby mean the classification of sciences by the struc-
ture of the subject matter of research, by the methods of research, by
the results they arrive at, and by the three criteria taken jointly. The
belief that the subject matter of historical research is such that no
strictly universal statements, and hence no scientific laws, can be formu-
lated in the course of research means the acceptance of subject-oriented
idiographism. Singling out this type of idiographism goes to the credit
of A. Malewski. 9 Next to subject-oriented idiographism he also pointed
to meta-scientific idiographism, which is concerned with the methods of
research used and the results obtained in a given discipline. In the
present book it will be termed pragmatic idiographism. Malewski also
singled out the programme of meta-scientific idiographism, which - as
applied to historical research - states what methods ought to be used
by historians and in what language the results of research should be
formulated. Subject-oriented idiographism implies, obviously, both
pragmatic idiographism and an appropriate programme of further
historical research. But the statement that historical research, as con-

ducted at a given time or in a given place, is idiographic in nature need
not be linked with the acceptance of subject-oriented idiographism nor
with the propounding of a programme of pragmatic idiographism. One
may, of course, propound a programme of pragmatic idiographism
combined with the acceptance of subject-oriented idiographism.
Subject-oriented idiographism starts from the assumption that histor-
ical facts are unique. Like all other facts, historical facts are unique
(that is, non-recurrent) from a certain point of view, because every fact
occurs only once, but facts can be grouped into similar ones. When
historians use such concepts as: king, state, revolution, feudalism, agri-
cultural implements, etc., they point to similarities between different
individual facts.lo Such and similar concepts are also being used by
human beings in their everyday life. We have seen various attempts at
eliminating such concepts from the language of historiography (cf.
J. H. Clapham), but even the proponents themselves failed to be
consistent on that point, because that proved to be impossible. Every
fact may, according to those properties of it which we take into account
on a given occasion, be included in various classes. For instance, the
rotation of crops (at a specified time and a specified place) may be
classed as (a) system of tillage, or (b) a manifestation of technological
progress in agriculture; a war (at a specified time and a specified place),
as (a) a victory, (b) a defeat, (c) a cause of devastations, etc. In each
case another characteristic of a given fact is taken into account.
The very point that facts can be classed undermines the principal
claim of subject-oriented idiographism, namely the claim that histor-
ical facts are unique (non-recurrent), and, as has been pointed out on
earlier occasions, invalidates the opinion that in historical research no
scientific laws, and hence no strictly general statements, can be estab-
lished. Since facts do reoccur, this means - if we accept the principle
of causality (see Chap. XI) - that they are caused by other similar facts
(causes), and this enables us to discover regularities, that is, to find out
which facts of a certain kind cause facts of another kind. The accept-
ance of the principle of causality, which few people reject, results in
the acceptance of the possibility of formulating strictly general state-
ments (such as: a fact of type A causes a fact B always or with a speci-
fied frequency) and scientific laws in the narrower sense of the term.
Since. as we have shown. historical research would be impossible with-

out references to laws. historians in their works refer to laws and for-
mulate laws themselves.
Subject-oriented idiographism finds some support in the fact that the
subject matter of historical research is very complex, which accounts
for considerable difficulties in explanation and prediction. It is obvious
that the easiest solution is just to describe that subject matter of re-
search. but this should not mean abandoning more difficult tasks. even
though full success may not always be expected. The situation described
above is merely a feature of a certain stage of development of histori-
cal research and not. as can be shown by the arguments adduced
earlier. a result of a specific nature of the subject matter of historical
research. The approach advocated by subject-oriented idiographists ap-
pears to be very harmful to the development of the science of history.
It bars the road of history to transcend the description of single facts
and to achieve generalizations that restrict the variety of facts. On the
other hand. however. it draws attention to the necessity of critically ap-
proaching explanations and predictions formulated in the course of his-
torical research.
Pragmatic idiographism starts from an analysis of the present state of
historical research, i.e., its methods and goals, and demonstrates that it
differs considerably from many other sciences (which in that termino-
logy are called theoretical). It is also emphasized that historians in prac-
tice show very little interest in establishing scientific laws and that what
they actually do is describing facts. Some people hold this state of
things to be the proper one, i.e., they propound the programme of prag-
matic idiographism and assign theoretical objectives to sociology, eco-
nomics, and other disciplines. Others believe that the said state of things
is merely a feature of a certain stage in the development of the science
of history, which should yield to a greater interest in theoretical issues
without, obviously, any neglect of descriptive tasks.
Note that the methodological structure of history which marked the
period when the classification of sciences into the idiographic and the
nomothetic ones was made reflected the worship of facts and source-
based knowledge. The dominance of simple descriptions, combined with
only first steps toward deliberately planned genetic descriptions, was an
excellent basis for the claims of pragmatic idiographism.
THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF lUSTORICAL RESEARCH 671
Yet those claims, even at the time of their formulation, did not any
longer reflect the methodological structure of history which was not con-
fined to pure descriptions made in terms of singular statements or ones
with a very small degree of generality. They also failed to take into
consideration the nomothetic trend in Marxist historiography initiated
by the works of Marx and Engels. Thus, even at that time historiogra-
phy was making use of all kinds of statements known in science: state-
ments of singular facts, historical generalizations, strictly general state-
ments, and laws.
Thus weighty arguments (including that which points to the effec-
tiveness of those human actions which avail themselves of the re-
gularities observed) work against the claim of subject-oriented idio-
graphism. Pragmatic idiographism to a large extent mirrors the pro-
cedures used by historians in practice, but when interpreted radically
(i.e., as a denial of the historians' contributions to the establishing of
laws) is evidently false. The development of historical science which is
more and more interested in narratives that have theoretical goals in
view refutes the programme of pragmatic idiographism, which by now
has almost been abandoned. All this is not to say, however, that history
has rid itself of its traditional patterns.
4. History versus sociology. The need for the development of social

history
If historians formulate laws and use them in causal explanations, then
what is the difference between history and sociology, which has never
been called idiographic? This issue seems to be the focal point in the
general analysis of the relationship between history and other disci-
plines. Between history and sociology there is no difference in subject
matter since both are concerned with the study of human societies. It
might only be said that historians are interested in societies in the past,
whereas sociologists are concerned with the present, but this is merely
a matter of degree. There are no obstacles for a historian to treat the
subject matter of his studies as chronologically open (i.e., extending into
the present), and for a sociologist or an economist, to look back into
the past. Even though in practice historians are more interested in the
past, and sociologists, in the present, yet the difference in the chrono-
logical scope of the subject matter of history and sociology. respective-

ly. is but a secondary one. ll
It is often said that the difference consists in the nature of the sources.
it being emphasized that a sociologist can make sources for himself.
whereas a historian cannot. Here again the difference is that of degree,
since we can quote many historical works the authors of which were
using amply the data they had obtained by direct observation, inter-
views and questionnaires. This applies, of course, to recent history.
In discussions of the relationships between sociology and history more
attention is now being paid to differences in the methods of research
than to those in the subject matter of study and the methodological
structure of the results obtained. It is true that sociologists strive to
formulate and to verify strictly general statements and laws to a larger
degree than historians do, but this applies to theoretical sociology only,
and not to all kinds of field work, which differs from historical research
mainly by the nature of the sources (observations, interviews, question-
naires) and to some extent by the scope of the questions posed. The
main difference between the historical and the sociological approach is
supposed to consist in the fact that in the historian's interpretation time
is marked by continuity which in historical research is to be disturbed
as little as possible. Ascribing to historical research concern about gen-
etic sequences, and to sociology, concern about the preservation of struc-
tures goes back to an old stage in the development of the two disci-
plines. Today, historians want to study structures, too, and sociologists
cannot avoid genetic analyses. It is true that in historical research we
still have to do with the worship of genetic order, and in sociology, with
that of structure, but this state of things need not go on endlessly.
While historians will for a long time continue to study historical facts
(which may be treated as relatively closed events), and while socio-
logists will be interested in social interactions, that difference will
certainly tend to fade with the lapse of time.
That contacts between the two approaches are fertile is best demon-
strated by the growing numbers of studies by researchers who either
approach historical research from a sociological point of view, or ap-
proach sociology from a historical point of view. The process has had
two stages; in the first, historians come to use certain concepts worked
out in sociology. and sociologists come to use historical data to illus-
THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF msrORICAL RESEARCH 673
trate sociological constructions and theories; in the second, the inte-

gration of the two types of research becomes even more advanced.
On the whole, for the time being we have more examples of search
for interrelationships on the part of the sociologists than on the part
of the historians, who are still burdened by the tradition of the erudite
approach. University courses in history are, unfortunately, still con-
ducted mostly in the spirit of that erudite approach, which is not a:
good omen for advances in theoretical research in history.
Among Polish sociologists L. Krzywicki and S. Czarnowski had ex-
cellent results in their historically-oriented studies. Historians still have
in mind the subtle analysis of the causes of the triumph of the Counter-
reformation in Poland, presented by Czarnowski in his paper read at
the 7th International Congress of Historians, held in Warsaw in 1933.12
By making use of otherwise known historical data, but also availing
himself of a sociological vision of social structure he suggested an ex-
planation which by its broadness of interpretation outdistanced all ear-
lier and later endeavours to explain that difficult historical problem.
On reviewing the various factors which had been taken into considera-
tion he concluded: "It suffices, however, to look at the facts, be it only
the most evident ones, to see that participation in the Counter-reforma-
tion drive coincided with the development of the gentry as a class".1.
Drawing attention to changes in the social structure pointed the path
of analyses which prove to be very useful to historians.
Examples can be multiplied. Those sociologists who have made best
known and pertinent contributions to historical research include Max
Weber, R. K. Merton, W. I. Thomas and F. Znaniecki,14 L. POpes,15
E. C. Hughes,a W. F. WhyteP
Among the historians who have made an original use of the sociolog-
ical approach mention is due to M. Bloch (Les caracteres originaux de
l'histoire rurale, 1931). R. H. Tawney (in particular Religion and the
Rise of Capitalism), quoted in the present book on several occasions),
J. Rutkowski, A. Fanfani, L. Febvre,18 E. Labrousse, P. Vilar, A. So-
boul, F. Lefebvre, and many others.
Most approaches to the problems of social structures have been made
by economic historians. It is not an exaggeration to say that the more
they succeeded in combining an economic analysis with a social one,
674 THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF msrORY
the better results they obtained. This is why economic and social history
are often combined in the term: social and economic history.
Today, social history is emerging as a relatively independent branch
of historical research. It may be expected to become a source of in-
spiration not only for economic history, but for all branches of histori-
cal studies, and in particular for political history, which today is the
most backward historical discipline. Social history may, of course, be
interpreted more descriptively and more theoretical; the latter approach
comes close to what some sociologists call historical sociology and
which they promote within the sphere of sociological research. 19
5. The tasks of history
Even if the gap between history, on the one hand, and sociology and
other disciplines, on the other, is narrowing (the study of relationships
between historical research and those "other" disciplines is the task of
specialized branches of the methodology of historical research), history
retains its important role in the building up of the social sciences. It is
the task which history had been performing until the advent of the
19th-century erudite approach, which was critical about the "philo-
sophical" type of historical studies. A sociologist, an economist, a social
psychologist - each studies society from a certain point of view. and
none of them would consider it self-evident if he had to integrate the
results of the various researches and to offer synthetic pictures of social
development at the Xarious stages. On the contrary, a historian simply
studies societies as they were in the past and does not confine his in-
terest to any specific field. The fact that within history there are many
specialized disciplines does not alter the situation. This is why the his-
torian's task is to contribute the integrated approach to the study of
society. The task is a difficult one, and we often refer to it in terms of
requirements rather than attainments. But if this task is formulated in
terms of a requirement, then what are the tasks of historical research
if we consider its standard functions?
The basic function is contribution to the discovery of regularities in
societal life. The discovery and knowledge of the laws of social develop-
ment is possible only with the assistance of historical studies. This is
the fundamental task of all social sciences. We cannot organize socie-
tal life by controlling its various factors unless we know the laws which
govern social development, both those which are applicable to short
periods only and those which are valid throughout many epochs. We
can control societal life only if we have grounds for predicting the
effects of our intended actions. The knowledge of the laws which gov-
ern societal life offers possibilities of such predictions, and hence op-
portunities for effective practical activity in agreement with our goals.
Thus, if we cannot doubt the importance of organized societal life,
then we cannot doubt the significant function of historical research in
that respect. Technology with its underlying sciences can develop only
in an organized society. Would the breathtaking advances in the con-
quest of space be possible without a modern organization of society,
including the intricate apparatus of the modern state? The lack of rela-
tionships between historical research and, say, moon landings is thus
merely apparent. In fact these relationships turn out to be both strong
and close. It is in this way that we have to interpret the ancient maxim
historia magistra vitae. 20
The next social function of history, which follows from the previous
one, is to satisfy man's desire to know himself. We can see how the
development of culture has been accompanied by the need for historical
self-comprehension. Even though the sources of that interest in the his-
tory of one's own country varied from case to case, it came more and
more to reflect progress in the cultural standards of societal life. It is
obvious that only a properly developing historical science can perform
these responsible cognitivite functions. The historian ought to know how
to reach the various addressees of the results of his research: he cannot
confine himself to the inner circle of the most initiated, but must popu-
larize the knowledge of history.
The cognitive function of history is linked with its educational func-
tion, which so far has been emphasized most when it comes to the
social utility of historical studies. The educational role of history has
been accepted by various groups of historians and social leaders. Histor-
ical education is one of the main foundations of shaping a society's
ideological and political consciousness. By discovering scientific truth
history should co-operate actively in the shaping of social consciousness.
In that field the tasks are enormous in view of the number of myths
which still haunt social consciousness. By contributing to the formation
of social consciousness history consolidates the bonds which link one

society with the others. History, and its knowledge, is one of the main
elements of national consciousness and one of the basic conditions of
the very existence of any nation.
If the science of history is to perform its growing and increasingly
responsible functions it must be modified appropriately. In the same
way as the industrial revolution in the 18th and 19th centuries shifted
historical research onto a new track, the present technical revolution
calls for further essential changes in historical studies. History is now
facing a far-reaching reconstruction and expansion of its methods. Its
tools become more and more precise, and it must inceasingly make use
of research methods of, and results obtained in, other disciplines if it
is fully to perform its natural integrating tasks.
There is an ever-growing need for the promotion of theoretical re-
search in history. This is not to say that the procedures used so far have
to be dropped. No, but some historians must be trained as theorists,
whose principal task will not be to turn out factographic narratives, but
to offer texts concerned with the search for regularities, with making
theoretical constructions and with formulating laws. They must be ac-
companied by historians who would concentrate on an internally co-
herent picture of the past, also not separated from a theoretical inspira-
tion. Theoretical historical research would simply have to be more the-
oretical. Perhaps historical studies will follow a different path of devel-
opment. But anyway the tasks are enormous and they cannot fail to
make the historian's heart throb more vigorously.
REFERENCES
1 Cf. A. Lewicki's reflections on psychology ("Psychologia wobec nauk przy-
rodniczych i humanistycznych" (psychology Versus Natural and Social Sciences),
Studia Metodologiczne, No.1, pp. 47 if.
2 A. Malewski & J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii historii (Studies in the
Methodology of History), p. 25.
3 H. Rickert, Kulturwissenschaft lund Naturwissenschaft, 7th ed., Tiibingen
1926, p. 51.
4 Cf. K. Ajdukiewicz, Pragmatic Logic, ed. cit., p. 191.
5 The present writer makes use here of many statements in J. Giedymin,

Problemy. Zaloienia. Rozstrzygnit;cia (probiems. Assumptions, Decisions), ed.
cit., pp. 149-70, and in E. Nagel, The Structure of Science, pp. 447-606.
THE METHODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH 677
6 Cf. C. B. Joynt & N. Resher, "The Problem of Uniqueness in History",

History and Theory, vol. I, No. 2/1961, pp. 150-62. W. S. Jevons wrote: "Nor
can we bestow a common name upon objects without implying the existence of
a class" (The Principles of Science, vol. II, New York 1877, p. 673). See also
Folke Dovring, History as a Social Science, The Hague 1960, p. 60, and P. Gar-
diner, The Nature of Historical Explanation, pp. 31-41.
7 This is emphasized also by C. G. Hempel, "The Function of General Laws
in History" in: Theories of History, p. 347. See also H. Albert, "Probleme der
Wissenschaftslehre" in: Handbuch der empirischen Sozialforschung, ed. cit.,
pp.54-6.
8 E. Nagel, The Structure of Science, ed. cit., pp. 466-73, in particular
p.470.
9 A. Malewski & J. Topolski, Studia z metodologii historii (Studies in the
Methodology of History), ed. cit., pp. 22 H.
10 Cz. Znamierowski, when criticizing Popper, wrote: "It was only once in
history that Louis XIV inherited the throne from his father, Louis XIII, but it
did happen many a time that a son inherited the crown from his father" (Ruch
Filozoficzny, vol. XXIII, No. 3-4/1966, p. 202).
11 On relationships between history and other disciplines see F. Braudel,
"Histoire et sociologie" in: Traite de sociologie, Paris 1958; A. Kloskowska,
"Socjologia a historia" (Sociology and History), Kwartalnik Historyczny, No. 3/
/1964, pp. 661-74; Sotsyologia i istoria (Sociology and History), Moscow 1964;
Sociology and History. Theory and Research, W. J. Cahnman & A. BoskoH
(eds.), Glencoe 1964. R. Aron stresses that sociology is concerned with general
relationships among historical facts (Introd;uction a la philosophie de l'histoire,
Paris 1958, p. 190). See also P. Bagby, Culture and History, London 1958.
12 S. Czarnowski, "Reakcja katolicka w Polsce w koncu XVI i na pocZ4tku
XVII wieku" (The Roman Catholic Reaction in Poland in the Late 16th and
the Early 17th Century), in: Dziela (Collected Works), vol. II, Warszawa 1956,
pp. 147-66.
13 Ibid., p. 151.
14 The Polish Peasant in Europe and America, 5· vols., Chicago 1918-20,

which is an inexhaustible source of inspirations for historians.
15 L. Popes, Millhands and Preachers, New Haven 1942.
16 E. C. Hughes, French Canada in Transition, Chicago 1943.
17 W. F. Whyte, Street Corner Society, Chicago 1941.
18 In particular Le probleme de l'incroyance au XVI" siecle, Paris 1947; see

also Studi sui Reforma e Rinascimento e altre scritti di metoda e di geografia,
Torino 1966.
19 Cf. A. Malewski, "Dwa modele socjologii" (fwo Models of Sociology),
Studia Socjologiczne, No. 3/1961, pp. 42-54.
20 Cf. J. Topolski, Swiat bez historii (A World without History), Warszawa
1972.
INDEX OF NAMES
Acton, J. E., 120, 148, 164 Bagby, P., 677

Adams, H. B., 177 Bakradze, K., 160
Adamus, J., 600 Banasmski, A., 533, 534
Adler, E., 213, 273 Banka, J., 358
Agassi, J., 184 Bardach, J., 474, 484, 485, 652
Ajdukiewicz, K., 11, 27, 33, 43, 65, Barker, E., 214
162, 170, 171, 215, 238, 246, 272, Barnes, H. E., 77, 89, 94, 95, 119,
347, 356, 359, 383, 385, 478, 630, 197, 213, 273
641, 663, 676 Barraclough, G., 2, 181, 189, 214
Albert, H., 186, 357, 677 Bartley, W. W., 184, 190, 584
Alexander the Great, 649, 650 Bastide, L., 168
Al Mussudi, 71 Baszkiewicz, J., 574, 577, 586
Alston, W. P., 356 Batory, S., 14
Andrae, C. G., 535 Battuta, Ibn, 76
Andreano, R. L., 384 Bauer, W., 166, 390
Andrews, G. B., 112 Beard, Ch. H., 151, 330
Arbuthnoth, J., 94, 266 Beaufort, L., de, 85
Aries, P., 147, 164 Beaujouan, G., 238
Aristotle, 1, 23, 61, 62, 66, 69, 70, 76, Beck, R. N., 189, 537
80, 83, 240, 264, 649 Becker, C. L., 151, 165
Arnold, S., 575, 586, 653, 660 Becker, H., 77, 89, 94, 95, 197, 213,
Aron, R., 52, 56, 76, 128, 146, 147, 273
158, 163, 188, 214, 328, 600, 677 Bede, Venerable, 48, 72
Arrow, K. J., 533 Below, G., 119
Ashby, Ross W., 29, 237 Bendix, R., 160, 300
Ashley, M. F., 213 Bentham, J., 115
Askenazy, S., 655 Bergson, H., 126, 137, 143, 144, 147,
AuglJstinus Aurelius, 71, 147, 252, 157, 158, 200
262, 595 Berkeley, G., 91, 172
Augustynek, Z., 237 Berlin, I., 176, 179, 181, 187-189,
Aydelotte, W.O., 190 191, 358
Ayer, A. J., 307, 312, 317, 355-357, Bernheim, E., 31, 52, 56, 66, 76, 93,
453 135, 153, 166, 386-391, 393, 399,
431,594
Berr, H., 61, 99, 100, 119, 140, 143-
Bacon, F., 79, 81, 82, 172, 266, 306, 147, 149, 151, 162, 163, 183
308 Beutin, c., 43
INDEX OF NAMES 679
Beveridge, W., 486 Bujak, F., 156, 167, 571, 585

Bielawski, J., 77 Bukharin, N., 208, 215, 256
Bienfait, W., 161 Burckhard, J., 40, 153, 198
Blake, C., 191, 358 Buret, E., 106
Bloch, M., 3, 52, 56, 145, 146, 163, Burns, A. L., 190
242, 272, 318, 319, 356, 357, 359, Bury, J. B., 43, 148, 188
396, 397, 400, 436, 554, 623, 673 Butterfield, H., 44, 66, 93, 120, 164,
Boas, F., 157 252,540
Bobiflska, C., 163, 167, 237, 356, 399
Bobrzyflski, M., IS, 121, 585
Bock, K. E., 188 Cackowski, Z., 382
Bodde, D., 190 Cadaster, J., 498
Bodin, J., 50, 80, 81, 92, 265, 266, Caesar Julius, 259, 312, 355
372 Cahnman, W. Y., 188, 677
Bogucka, M., 642 Callot, E., 52, 56, 601
Bolland, J., 82, 93 Canfora, L., 76
Bonhours, 266 Cantor, 24
Borel, E., 359 Carlyle, Th., 104, 107, 255
Borkowski, L., 29 Camap, R., 27,28,40, 172, 173, 175,
Born, K. E., 163 186, 187, 345, 347, 358, 456, 457,
Borowski, S., 513, SIS, 531, 533 478, 541
Boskoff, A., 188, 677 Carr, E. H., 149, 165
Bosl, K., 160 Casimir the Great, 629, 650
Bossuet, J. B., 71, 89, 590 Cassirer, E., 127, 158
Bouquet, 85 Cauwenberghe, E., 384
Bradley, F. H., 134, 148, 150 Chardin, 266
Bradley, R. D., 189, 274 Charlemagne, 238, 259, 439. 447
Brandt, A., von, 44 Charon of Lampsakos, 50
Braudel, F., 163, 591, 677 Chatelet, E., 62, 66, 76
Breysig, K., 123, 153, 166 Cheyney, E. P., 149, 165
Brodbeck, M., 191, 358, 582 Childe, V. G., 632, 659
Brown, R., 156 Chladenius, J. M., 86
Browning, R., 202 Chopin, F., 440
Bruck, R., 162 Choulguin, A., 147, 164
Brunfitt, J. H., 94 Chwistek, L., 171,408,416
Bruni, 50 Cicero, 1, 63, 64
Bruno, G., 538 Clapham, J. H., 669
Brutus, 312 Cochran, Th. C., 189
Brzostowski, P., 573 Cohen, M. R., 191, 359, 477, 478
Bucher, K., 119, 123 Coleman, J. S., 529
Buchez, P. J. B., 111 Collingwood, R. G., 52, 56, 66, 90,
Buckle, H. T., 65, 110, 115-117, ISO, 93, 95, 121, 134, 148-150, 164, 165,
266 183, 538, 541
Budzyk, K., 237 Columbus, 616
680 INDEX OF NAMES
Comparez, H., 182 Defourny, M., 122

Comte, A., 98, 110, 113, 115-118, 122, Dembiflski, B., 154
123, 176, 265 Demolins, E., 162
Condillac, E. B., de, 306 De Morgan, see Morgan, L. H.
Condorcet, A. N., 64, 91, 92, 94, 95, Deopik, D. V., 535
108, 176, 185, 265 Dervan (prince), 473
Constantine the Great, 71, 75 Descartes, R., 83, 91, 262
Coontz, S. H., 534 Destler, M. A., 165
Cordolani, A., 238 Diaz, F., 94
Cornforth, M., 215 Dilthey, W., 103, 121, 122, 128, 129,
Coste, A., 162 131, 135, 136, 138, 154, 158, 159,
Costes, W. H., 600 540
Cournot, A. A., 143 Dionysius, the Short, 72
Croce, B., 95, 128-131, 134, 136, 143, Disraeli, B., 558
148, 150, 156, 158, 164, 183, 332, Diwald, H., 159
409,609 Dlugosz, J., 48, 74, 75, 450, 462
Crompton, S., 616 Dobias, J., 55, 56, 66, 67, 76
Cromwell, 0., 256, 259, 261 Dobrov, G. M., 535
Crubellier, M., 214 Dobrovsky, 435
Cunow, H., 208, 215 Dobrowolski, K., 93
Czarniecki, S., 662 Dollar, C. M., 534
Czarnowski, S., 225, 237, 673, 677 Donagan, A., 184, 190, 580
Czartoryski, A., 154 Dopscb, A., 439
Czekanowski, J., 531, 534 Dray, W. H., 184, 189-191, 214, 543,
Czerwiflski, Z., 477, 478 550, 556, 580, 583-586
Cze:iowski, T., 479 Drems, H., 384
Droysen, G., 121
Droysen, H., 121
Da Gama, V., 616 Droysen, J. G., 112, 122, 151, 152,
D'Alembert, J. L., 108 389, 390, 392, 393, 399
Danielou, J., 161 Du Bas, 266
Daniels, R., von, 188 Dubrovs.ky, S. M., 216
Danta, A. C., 32, 184, 187, 188, 190, Duby, G., 145
311-313, 324, 356, 357, 560, 585, Du Cange, 56, 82, 83
609,623 Duhem, P., 138
Danton, G. J., 655 Durkheim, E., 112, 143, 145, 163,
D'Arcy, M. C., 159,189 224
Darwin, Ch., 114, 188, 202, 265 Dutkiewicz, J., 237, 384, 624
Daszynska-Goliflska, Z., 485, 530 Dworzaczek, W., 480
Daunou, P. C. F., 111, 389, 395 Dyoniziak, R., 189
D'Avenel, G., 484
Dl!browski, J., 74, 77, 655
Dl!mbska, I., 162, 479 Eden, F., 106
Decier, 266 Eichhorn, K. F., 103
INDEX OF NAMES 681
Einhard, 48, 447 Fritz, K., 66

Eliade, M., 601 Fritzhand, M., 189, 659
Ellwood, C., 595 Furtak, T., 473
Elsass, M. J., 486 FUter, E., 119
Engel-Janosi, P., 128
Engels, F., 52, 56, 106, 154, 159, 197,
198,203,205,207-209,214,215,236, Gadamer, H. G., 540
255, 256, 267, 269, 272, 278, 282, 285, Galbraith, V. H., 52
301, 344, 355, 358, 409, 417, 637, Galleati, A., 121
657,671 Gallie, W. B., 184, 190, 580, 586
Engerman, S. L., 376, 384 Gallus Anonymus, 367,435,451
Ephorus, 46 Gal~ski, B., 300
Eratosthenes of Cyrene, 69 Gardin, J. C., 535
Euclid, 170 Gardiner, P., 32, 95, 123, 184, 190,
Eusebius of Caesarea, 72 550, 557, 560, 584, 677
Garelli, M. P., 535
Gaskell, P., 106
Faber, K. G., 166 Gatterer, J. C., 86, 87, 101
Fabri, J. E., 101 Geiger, T., 299
Fanfani, A., 44, 673 Gellner, F. A., 184, 190
Febvre, L., 52, 76, 145, 146, 162, 163, Georgisch, P., 86
273,673 Geyl, P., 119-121,213
Feder, A., 166, 390, 399 Geymonat, L., 4, 7, 18, 29, 59, 65
Feigl, H., 191, 358 Gibbon, E., 63, 88, 89, 94
Ferguson, W. K., 3, 87, 93 Gibson, Q., 355
Feuerbach, L., 203, 283 Giedymin, J., 6, 20, 21, 27-29, 43,
Feuter, E., 44 122, 174, 186, 191, 356, 358, 364,
Fichte, J. B., 107,213 367, 378, 383, 384-387, 390, 399,
Fierich, J., 499, 532 400,416,420,421,427,443-445,462,
Finch, H. A., 160 476,479,482,577,620,623,624,629,
Finley, M. J., 61, 66, 190, 631 630,676
Fiore, J., de, 71 Gieysztor, A., 356, 465, 480
Fishlow, A., 376 Gilbert, F., 384
Floud, R., 534 Gobineau, J. A., de, 141
Fogel, R. W., 376, 384 GOdel, 2
Fontenelle, B., 266 Goethe, J. W., 132
Fourrier, C., 205 Goldmann, L., 209, 214, 216
Foustel de Cou1anges, 587 Goldstein, L., 187
France, A., 2 Gooch, G. P., 44, 119
Frazer, J. G., 122 Gordon, M., 188, 477
Freeman, E. A., 112 Garlitz, W., 166
Frege, G., 15 Gothein, E., 153
Fresney, N. L., de, 85, 86, 93 Gottschalk, L., 184, 185, 188, 190,
Freud, S., 271 585, 641
682 INDEX OF NAMES
G6rka, 0., 659 Hegel, G. W. F., 32, 54, 64, 106-108,

G6rnicki, L., 49 121, 128, 185, 197-203,205,207,213,
G6rski, K., 162, 167 255, 256, 269, 274
Grabaud, S. R., 384 Heidegger, M., 159
Gracchi, the, 538 Heisenberg, W., 248,667
Gramsci, A., 207, 208, 216, 256, 358, Heitzman, M., 148, 164, 165
657 Hekataios of Miletus, 50, 69, 71
Graunt, J., 503 Hellianicos of Mytilene, 68, 70
Gregory of Tours, 48 Helmer, 0., 560
Gregary XIII (pope), 81 Helvetius, C. A., 267
Grekov, B., 642 Hempel, C. G., 183, 184, 190, 421,
Greniewski, H., 272, 297, 301 427, 543, 544, 550, 552, 553, 556-
Grey, W. W., 535 564, 568, 570, 583, 585, 624, 674
Grodecki, R., 586 Henry VII, 612, 613
Grossman, H., 501, 532 Henry VIII, 613
Grotius, H., 84 Herbart, J. F., 154
Grushin, B. A., 215 Herbst, S., 41, 44, 93
Grynwasser, A., 659 Herburt, S., 48
Grzybowski, K., 93, 120 Hoerder, J. G., 64, 90, 106, 197, 267
Guicciardini, F., 80 Herodotus, 46,50,61,62,66-68,70
Guilford, J. P., 492, 507, 531, 533 Heussi, K., 152, 166
Guizot, F., 104, 105, 107, 255 Hexter, J. H., 535
Gumplowicz, L., 122, 154, 167, 177 Hilbert, D., 2, 15, 170
Gurvitsch, G., 163 Hildebrand, B., 117
Hinrichs, C., 119
Hintze, 0., 153
Halkin, L. E., 78, 147, 164, 199 Hippocrates, 76, 264
Halphen, L., 32, 119, 147, 164
Hitler, A., 621
Hamer, S., 76
Hobbes, T., 84
Hamilton, J., 486
Hochfeld, J., 216, 283, 295, 300, 301
Handelsman, M., 31, 32, 42, 45, 154-
Hockett, H. C., 359
156, 167, 199, 356, 386, 387, 389,
390, 393, 395, 399, 479 Holbach, P. H. D., 251, U7
Hanell, K., 76 Homer, 46, 61
Hanka, V., 435, 440, 444 Hook, S., 189
Hansen, G., 106 Hoselitz, B. F., 123
Harrah, D., 28, 383 Hoszowski, S., 486, 499, 508, 532,
Harrington, J., 84 652, 660
Harris, E. E., 164 Hughes, E. C., 673, 677
Harsin, D., 164 Huizinga, J., 52, 56, 165
Hauser, H., 486 Hume, D., 85, 89, 90, 94, 172, 267,
Hayek, F. A., 179, 187, 188 306, 313, 324, 325
Heckscher, E. P., 530 Huntington, E., 273, 595, 601
Heeren, A. H. L., 88, 90, 94 Husa, V., 44
INDEX OF NAMES 683
HusserI, E., 126, 127, 137, 146, 147, Kautsky, K., 208, 215, 256
158, 164 Kayser, E., 390
Hutton, J., 114 Kelles-Krauz, K., 208, 216, 595
Kemeny, J. G., 28
Kennedy, 1. F., 382
Igelstrom, J., 581 Kepler, M., 635
Iggers, G. G., 94, 120, 158, 163, 165, Kersten, A., 601
188 Keuck, K., 55
Imbert, G., 533 Keynes, J. M., 345, 347, 358, 586
Inama-Stemegg, K. T., 485,530 Khaldun, Ibn, 3, 61, 72, 75, 77, 81,
Inglot, S., 653 87, 197,264, 265, 595, 610
Isidorus of Sevilla, 48 Khinchin, A. I., 28
Ivan the Terrible, 554 Kieniewicz, S., 576, 586
Kirkor-Kiedroniowa, Z., 501, 532
Kim, P., 166
Jablonowski, A., 484, 493, 532 Klaus, G., 18, 160, 298
Jacoby, F., 56 Klein, M., 190
James, W., 134 Klempt, A., 93
Janko of Czamk6w, 74 Klimek, S., 534
Janowski, L., 120 Kluback, W., 159
Jasiilski, A., 300 Kluckhohn, C., 95
Jaspers, K., 52, 161 Kluk, K., 660
Jensen, R. J., 534 Kloskowska, A., 167
Jevons, W. S., 308, 355, 456, 457, Kmita, J., 27-29, 167, 191, 192, 383,
479,677 400, 535, 583, 623, 624, 659
Jewsiewicki, B., 535 Knies, K., 117, 118
Jezierski, A., 513, 533 Kochanowski, J., 28
John the Baptist, 71 Kochanowski, J. K., 154
Jolivet, R., 56 Kocka, W., 531
J ordanes, 48 Kon, I. S., 121, 128, 131, 158, 161
Joynt, C. B., 677 Konarski, S., 648
Julius Sextus Africanus, 71 Koneczny, F., 154, 214
Konopczynski, W., 648, 659
Konstantinov, K. Y., 216
Kaegi, W., 40, 44 Korzon, T., 122, 655
Kahk, J. J., 535 Koscialkowski, S., 356, 386, 387, 389,
Kahler, E., 188 395, 399
Kamieniecki, W., 481 Kosciuszko, T., 627,648,655
Kamienski, H., 654 Kotarbiilska, J., 175, 188
Kant, I., 91, 99, 114, 173 Kotarbiilski, T., 28, 171
Karamzin, N. M., 104, 105 Kova1chenko, I. D., see Kovalchenko,
Kareyev, N. T., 112 Y.D.
Kaufmann, F., 158, 160, 213, 332, Kova1chenko, Y. D., 523, 535
357, 358 Kovalevsky, M. M., 154, 162, 167
684 INDEX OF NAMES
Kowalski, S., 160 Lazari-Pawtowska, I., 624, 630

Kozanecki, T., 6 Lazarsfeld, P., 520, 522
Kraft, V., 357 Leach, E., 168
Krajewski, W., 215, 272 Lee, D. E., 189
Krandievsky, S. I., 94, 167 Lefebvre, F., 673
Krasuski, l., 165, ·166 Le Goff, l., 238
Kroeber, A. L., 95, 122, 167 Legowicz, l., 121, 157
Kromer, M., 49 Leibniz, G. W., 86, 196, 231
Kronski, T., 213 Lekh (prince), 473
KryiJ.ski, H., 533 Lelewel, l., 32, 41, 45, 56, 93, 99, 101,
Krzywicki, L., 208, 216, 288, 673 102, 104, 105, 109, 119-121, 389,
Kuczynski, S., 385, 499 390, 395, 397, 399, 483, 530, 590
Kudrna, l., 213 Lenin, V., 103, 119, 207, 208, 212, 215,
Kuhn, T. S., 40, 248 236, 257, 259, 261, 272, 291, 294,
Kula, W., 39, 40, 44, 120, 123, 163, 233, 300,355, 358,485,611,638,642
237, 238, 319, 320, 356-358, 384, Le Play, F., 105
410, 417, 490, 493, 508, 522, 530- Lerner, D., 190, 533, 600
534, 552, 583, 584, 591, 594, 600, Le Roy Ladurie, E., 269, 273, 477
654-656, 660 Leszczynski, S., 527
Ktlrbis, B., 77 LeSniewski, S., 29, 170
Kurowski, S., 520, 534, 595, 601 Lemodorski, B., 601, 623
Kuznetz, S., 530 Levi-Strauss, C., 157, 167, 271, 375
Levy-BrIihl. L., 122
Labriola, A., 141, 162, 207, 208, 215, Lewicki, A., 676
273 Lewis, H. D., 311, 358
Labrousse, E., 486, 673 Lindey, G., 584
Labuda, G., 6, 237, 386, 387, 389, 391, Lipset, S. M., 300
399, 439, 473, 481 Litwin, l., 273, 274
Lacombe, P., 112, 122, 595 Locke, l., 12, 27, 84, 91, 172, 306
Ladenberger, T., 532 Louis XIV, 14
Ladislaus the Short, 650 LOwith, K., 188, 189
Lamarck, l. B., de, 114 Luce, R. D., 28, 383, 548, 584
Lampedusa, G. T., 480 Lukacs, G., 208, 216, 657
Lamprecht, K., 143, 152-155, 167, 199 Lumumba, P., 538
Lange, 0., 29, 216, 227, 228, 237, 241, Lilnig, l. Ch., 86
272, 279, 281, 295, 297-299, 301, 533, Luschei, E. C., 29
534,586 Luther, M., 427
Langlois, C. V., 7, 32, 112, 356, 386, Lutman, R., 356
387, 399, 431 Luty6.ski, l., 122
Laplace, P. S., de, 114 Lycurgus, 79
Lasswell, H. D., 533
Latte, K., 76
Launuy, l., de, 535 t.adog6rski, T., 497, SOl, 532
Law, l., 242, 554 Lo~, l., 359
INDEX OF NAMES 685
Lowmianski, H., 381, 384, 385, 460, 358, 375, 560, 587, 616, 619, 624,
468, 479, 481, 638, 642 637, 657, 671
Luczak, C., 480 Maurer, G. L., 106
Lukasiewicz, J., 171 Maus, H., 122
Mayenowa, M. R., 535
Mayo, B., 659
Mabillon, J., 81, 83, 93, 389 Mazzini, G., 538
Mably, G. B., de, 86 Mc Lennan, J. F., 122
Macaulay, T., 100, 104 Mecnikov, L. I., 162
Ma.cchiavelli, N., 3, 80 Mehlberg, H., 629
Mac Iver, R. M., 178 Meinecke, F., 119, 122, 151, 152, 158
Macpherson, D., 106, 446 Meister, A., 166
Madurowicz-Urbanska, H., 613, 623 Mejbawn, W., 186
Majewski, J., 642 Menckes, J. B., 86
Malestroit, M., 372 Merton, R. K., 156, 673
Malewski, A., 6, 121, 160, 161, 191, Metzger, W. P., 190
216, 272, 286, 299, 300, 417, 429, Meuvret, J., 531
479-482, 576, 577, 584, 585, 628- Meyer, E., 153, 166, 251
630,636,641,642,659,662,668,676, Meyerhoff, H., 190, 191
677 Michelet, J., 100, 104, 650
Malinowski, B., 156, 157 Mickiewicz, A., 104, 538, 539
Malthus, T. R., 202 Mieszko I, 355
Mandelbawn, M., 128, 130, 131, 158, Mignet, F. A., 255
159, 161, 166, 182-184, 187, 190, Milidukh (prince), 473
191, 297, 358 Mill, J., 115, 306
Mannheim, K., 152, 158, 166, 178, 179, Mill, J. S., 110, 115, 116, 118, 122,
299, 327, 357 123, 198, 450, 456, 478, 479, 630
Mansi, J., 85 Mises, R., von, 346, 359
Manteuffel, T., 45, 600 Miskiewicz, B., 40, 42, 43
Mankowski, Z., 480 Moharruned, 262, 627
Marczewski, J., 375, 530 Mols, R., 531
Maritain, J., 161, 252 Morrunsen, T., 481
Marrou, H. J., 55, 70, 76, 146, 147, Monod, G., 93, 112
154, 163-165, 199, 214, 328, 356, Montaigne, M. E., 266
540, 593 Montefiore, A., 190, 585, 586, 659
Martin of Opava (Martin the Pole), Monteil, A. A., 106
73 Monter, 0., 216
Martin, R. M., 28 Montesquieu, C. L., 64, 88, 89, 94, 266,
Marx, K., 52, 56, 61, 106, 119, 120, 267
128, 133, 159, 164, 171, 176, 178, Montfaucon, B., de, 85
179, 181, 185, 197, 198, 203, 205- Moore, G. E., 171
212, 214-216, 255, 256, 259, 260, Morare, C., 39, 44
267, 269, 272-274, 278, 279, 281, Morgan, L. H., 122, 478
282,285,289,294,296,298,301,337, Morris, C., 12, 18, 27, 28
686 INDEX OF NAMES
Moszczeilska, W., 43, 164 Otto (the archbishop of Mainz), 466

Moszyilski, K., 467, 481 Otto of Friesingen, 73
Muhsin Mahdi, 77 Owen, R., 205
Miiller, F., 46, 47, 55, 88
Miiller, J., von, 94
Muratori, L. A., 86 PalackY, F., 104, 105
Murphy, G. S., 189 Palli, H. E., 535
Myrdal, G., 191, 299, 357 Palmer, R. R., 190
Papebroche, 389
Paprocki, B., 449
Nagel, E., 66, 188, 191, 272, 550, 580, Pareto, V., 177
584, 620, 624, 634, 667, 676, 677 Parsons, T., 157
Napierski, Kostka, 648 Pasenkiewicz, K., 29, 416
Napoleon I, 27, 28, 132, 225, 256, 259, Passmore, J. A., 191, 358
425, 426, 622, 625 Paul, St., 535
Napoleon III, 215, 273, 587 Pavlov, I., 551
Naruszewicz, A., 49, 87, 93 PawIDski, A., 121, 484, 495, 532
Nasse, E., 120 Pawlowski, T., 619, 624
Neurath, 0., 172 Peano, G., 170
Newmacher, W., 106 Pearl, R., 520
Newton, I., 15, 231 Peel, R., 558
Neyman, J., 505 Peguy, C., 161
Nichols, R. F., 190 Peirce, C. S., 134
Nicod, J., 347 Pele, J., 576, 623, 629, 630
Niebuhr, B. G., 63, 103 Pepin, 439
Niedermann, J., 95 Perrault, C., 265
Nietzsche, F., 137, 153, 166 Perrin, C. E., 163
Nigg, W., 76 Persowski, F., 474, 482
Nowak, L., 6, 191, 276, 300, 375, 384, Peset, J. M., 477
568, 585, 624 Petavius, D., 81
Nowak, S., 6, 29, 319, 442, 464, 534, Petty, W., 503
541, 565, 583, 585, 586, 629, 631, Pelug, G., 94
633, 641 Philip II, 591
Nowak, T., 659 Piatier, A., 530
Piccolomini, E. S., 74
Oakeshott, M. B., 148, 150, 183 Piganiol, A., 165
Oman, c., 149, 165 Pitz, E., 160
Oppenheim, P., 624 Plato, 76, 240, 262, 264
Orlik, F., 527 Plekhanov, G., see Plekhanov, Y.
Orosius, 48, 73 Plekhanov, G. V., see Plekhanov, Y.
Ortega, J., y Gasset, 150, 159, 161, 214 Plekhanov, Y., 120, 141, 162, 166, 207,
Ossowska, M., 643, 659, 660 208, 215, 256, 257, 273
Ossowski, S., 161, 300, 355, 523, 534, Pliny, 47
543, 583, 593,600, 601, 630, 641 Poincare, H., 138, 170
INDEX OF NAMES 687
Pokrovsky, M., 212, 216 Rickert, H., 128, 131-133, 135, 138,
Po1ybius, 62, 67, 68, 70 143, 155, 158, 159, 161, 3~2, 662,
Pomeau, R., 94 663, 676
Poniatowski, J., 655 Ricoeur, P., 164, 540
Poniatowski, S. A., 312, 527 Ritter, K., 44
Popeliniere, H. L. V., de la, 54, 78, Robert (the archbishop of Mainz), 466
79, 81, 92 Robespierre, M., 261, 312
Popes, L., 673, 677 Robinson, J. H., 149, 150, 165
Popper, K., 158, 159, 161, 173, 174, Rockwood, R., 94
176, 179-181, 183, 186-189,456, 559, Rogers, J. T., 141, 484
585, 629, 630, 642, 677 Rogowski, L. S., 200, 213
Por~bski, M., 28 Rokeache, M., 523
Porter, G. R., 106 Romein, J. M., 148, 164
Poseidonius, 70 Romilly, J., de, 76
PotkaiJ.ski, K., 121, 475, 482, 659 Roscher, W., 117
Potocka, D., 440 Rossi, P., 128
Potocki, T., 527 Rostworowski, E., 526, 527, 535, 573,
Potter, D. M., 190 585
Poully, Levesque de, 85 Rotenstreich, N., 164, 184, 623
Poussin, N., 590 Rottman, T., 523
Pribin (prince), 473 Roy, E., Ie, 138
Pribram, A. E., 486 Rudner, R., 358
Prinsterer, G. V., 104 Riihs, C. F., 101
Pr6chnik, A., 655, 660 Runciman, W. G., 160
Purs, J., 522, 534 Rusmski, W., 579, 586
Russell, B., 160, 170, 171, 175, 200,
312, 313, 345, 34~ 356
Raiffa, H., 28, 383, 548, 584 Rutkowski, J., 156, 167, 373, 471, 481,
Ranke, L., 61, 63, 64, 100, 103-105, 486, 491, 498, 501, 531, 532, 564,
107, 109, 117, 119, 120, 127, 136, 569, 570, 572, 575, 579, 585, 586,
151, 152, 165, 166, 609, 650 591-593, 600, 638, 639, 641, 642
Ratzel, F., 141, 268, 269 Rychlikowa, 1., 534
Ratzenhofer, G., 177 Ryle, A. L., 184
Read, C., 151, 165 Ryle, G., 556, 560, 584, 585
Reclus, E., 162 Rymer, T., 86
Redfield, R., 601
Reichenbach, H., 189, 234, 237, 359,
456, 479, 541 Sabine, G. A., 95
Reizov, B. G., 119 Saint-Simon, C. H., 122, 205, 595
Renan, E., 11 0 Salustius, 62
Renier, G. J., 149, 165 Sarno, 473
Resher, N., 560, 677 Santayana, G., 158
Reynier, L., 106 Sartre, J. P., 159, 215
Ricardo, D., 117 Sauvy, A., 534
688 INDEX OF NAMES
Savigny, K. F., 103, 117 Smolenski, W., 121

Scalinger, J., 81 Smolka, S., 121
Scheler, M., 137, 158, 161 Soboul, A., 484, 486, 530, 624, 673
Schelle, G., 94 Sobieski, W., 154
Schelling, F. W. J., 107, 108 Solla Price, Derek J. de, 44
Schilfert, G., 120 Solon, 79
Schiller, F., 107 Solovyev, S. M., 117
Schlick, M., 171, 172, 185, 186 Sorokin, P. A., 154, 167, 177, 188,
Schlozer, A. L., 86, 87, 96 213
Schmeidler, B., 393 Spencer, H., 114, 126, 158, 176, 177,
Schmidt, N., 77 179, 265
Schmoller, G., 118 Spengler, 0., 133, 138, 160, 161, 177,
Schneider, J., 535 201, 202, 214, 595
Scholz, H., 186 Spinoza, B., 255
Schonemann, K. T. G., 101 Spranger, E., 160
Schopenhauer, A., 137 Srbik, H., 44
Schulze, H., 160 Staff, L., 28
Scott, W., 617 Stalin, J., 212, 295, 298
Scriven, M., 559-561 Stark, W., 299, 327, 357
See, H., 162, 600 Starr, C. G., 190
Seignobos, C., 7, 32, 112, 143, 356, Staszic, S., 404
386, 387, 399, 431 Stein, L., von, 107
Semkowicz, W., 41, 42, 45, 469, 471, Stephen, J. F., 123
481 Stem, A., 56, 66, 76, 165, 166, 189,
Serejski, M. H., 6, 40, 44, 66, 93, 94, 191, 328, 357, 358
120, 121, 167, 600, 660 Steward, J. H., 122
Shannon, C. E., 28 Stonert, H., 27, 28, 43
Shils, E. A., 160 Strabo, 264, 273
Shorter, E., 534
Strauss, L., 165
Shotwell, J. T., 44
Strout, C., 165
Sickel, T., 45
Suchodolski, B., 77, 95
Sieveking, F., 76
Sigismundus Augustus, 298 Suszko, R., 28
Simiand, F., 486, 530 Suter, F. F., 122
Simmel, G., 128, 130, 131, 136, 138, Svechnikov, G. A., 248
150, 154, 158-161, 623 Svetopelk, 473
Sismondi, J. C. Simonde de, 103, 107, Swierenga, R. P., 384
120 Sybel, H., 152
Skalkowski, A. M., 648, 655, 659 Szczepanski, J., 297, 299, 300, 601
Skarga, P., 49 Szczotka, S., 653
Slupecki, J., 29 Szczurkiewicz, T., 162
Smedtal, c., de, 112 Szujski, J., 121, 590
Smith, A., 117 Szulc, S., 530, 533
Smith-Russner, F., 66, 93 Szumilewicz, I., 234, 237, 238
INDEX OF NAMES 689
Tacitus, 47, 48, 62, 70, 76, 381 Tylor, E. B., 122, 265
Taine, H., 110, 114, 141, 268 Tymieniecki, K., 600
Tamerlane, 627
Tarski, A., 27, 28, 171
Tassin, 86 Usher, A. P., 531
Tatarkiewicz, W., 157, 213 Ustinov, V. A., 524, 525, 535
Tawney, R. H., 427, 613, 623, 639,
641, 642, 673
Tazbir, J., 571, 585 Valery, P., 133, 328
Teggart, F. J., 66, 76, 93, 94, 121, 122, Valla, L., 61, 63, 75, 77
149, 150, 162, 165, 202, 214, 266, Van der Wee, H., 384
Vandryes, P., 162
273
Temin, P., 376 Verlinden, C., 39, 44
Thierry, A., 99, 100, 104, 105, 107, Verworn, M., 272
255, 650 Vetulani, J., 659
Thomas Aquinas, 252, 262 Vico, G. B., 91, 95, 108, 266, 595
Vidal de la Blache, P., 269
Thomas, W. I., 670
Vielrose, E., 528, 530
Thompson, J. W., 44, 119
Vilar, P., 530, 673
Thorndike, E. L., 551
Villanis, 80
Thucydides, I., 62, 67, 70, 76, 149 Villerme, L. R., 108
Timaios of Taormina, 62, 69 Victoria (queen), 24, 53
Toch, H., 523 Vineyard, P., 106
Tocqueville, C., 107 Violette, P., 120
Tokarz, W., 581, 586 Voise, W., 92
Took, T., 106 Voltaire, 3, 32, 61, 64, 85, 88, 94, 587,
Topitsch, E., 189 590
Topolski, J., 93, 119, 121, 160, 161, Voss, G. J., 82, 85
163, 167, 168, 191, 216, 273, 384, Vrein-Lucas, 440
427, 477, 479, 480, 481, 531, 533,
577, 585, 601, 623, 628, 641, 642,
659, 676, 677 Wach, J., 159
Toustain, 86 Wachowski, M., 167
Wachsmuth, E. W. G., 101
Towianski, A., 539
Wagner, F., 166
Toynbee, A., 177, 179, 197, 201-203,
Walker, L., 214
213, 214, 639, 642
Walsh, W. H., 188; 189, 213, 556, 609,
Treitschke, H., 152
610,623
Trevelyan, G. M., 164, 320, 623
Watkins, J. W. N., 184, 187, 190, 237
Trevor-Roper, H., 214 Wat Tyler, 606
Troeltsch, E., 152, 158, 166, 600 Watt, J., 616
Tuchett, D., 106 Weber, A., 142, 160
Turgot, A. R. J., 64, 89, 94, 176, 267 Weber, M., 128, 132, 133, 138, 142,
Turner, F. J., 117 146, 160, 161, 188, 357, 375, 619,
Twardowski, K., 28 624, 673
690 INDEX OF NAMES
Wegele, F., 119 Woodward, P. R., 28

Weintraub, K., 94 Wright, A. F., 190
Weitz, G., 122 Wyclif, 612
Wellington, A., 28, 614 Wyczanska, K., 535
Wesendonck, R., 93 Wyczanski, A., 530
Wesolowski, W., 300
Weyand, K., 95
Weyl, R., 234 Xenopol, A. D., 143, 144, 162
White, M., 158, 184, 187, 190
Whyte, W. F., 673, 677
Wiatr, J. J., 216, 273, 293, 295, 297, Yaglom, A. M., 28
299, 301 Yaglom, Y. M., 28
Wichman, 465 Yule, 527
Widajewicz, J., 465, 480
Widgery, A. G., 163
Widukind, 48, 465 Zachorowski, S., 575, 586
Wiener, N., 29 Zawadzki, T. 6, 470
Wikarjak, J., 55 Zawirski, Z., 237
Wilhelm (the archbishop of Mainz) , Ziembmski, Z., 477
466 Zientara, B., 579, 586
William the Conqueror, 449 Ziomek, 1., 28
Windelband, W., 135, 136, 160, 662 Znamierowski, C., 677
Wirth, L., 357 Znaniecki, F., 178, 237, 673
Wisniewski, J., 513, 533 Zyndram of Maszkowice, 380, 462, 466
Wit Stwosz, 598
Wittgenstein, L., 171, 175
Wlodarski, B., 45 Zytkowicz, L., 510, 511, 533
Wojciechowski, T., 121, 464-467, 480 Zywczyilski, M., 600

Methodology of History

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Methodology of History

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METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY

LOGIC, METHODOLOGY, PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE,

SOCIOLOGY OF SCIENCE AND OF KNOWLEDGE,

AND ON THE MATHEMATICAL METHODS OF

SOCIAL AND BEHAVIORAL SCIENCES

J AAKKO HINTIKKA, Academy of Finland and Stanford University

ROBERT S. COHEN, Boston University

DONALD DAVIDSON, Rockefeller University and Princeton University

GABRIEL NUCHELMANS, University of Leyden

WESLEY C. SALMON, University of Arizona

Translated from the Polish by

D. REIDEL PUBLISHIN G COMPANY

PWN - POLISH SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHERS

(Synthese library; v. 88)

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METHODOLOGY AND HISTORY

I. THE SUBJECT MA'ITER OF 1lffi MErnODOLOGY OF SCIENCES 11

ll. THE SUBJECT MA'ITER OF 1lffi MErnODOLOGY OF HISTORY . 30

IT!. THE SCOPE OF 1lffi SUBJECT MA'ITER (DoMAIN) OF HISTORICAL

GROUNDS FOR CLASSIFICATION • 59

IV. PRAGMATIC REFLECTION 67

1. The development of the critical pattern of research and early

VI. ERUDITE AND GENETIC REFLECTION 96

VII. STRUCTURAL REFLECTION • 124

VIII. LooICAL REFLECTION 169

IX. DIALECTICAL REFLECTION • 193

TIlE OBJECflVE METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY

X. HISTORICAL FACTS • 219

XI. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (CAUSALITY AND DETERMINISM) 239

XII. THE PROCESS OF HISTORY (HISTORICAL REGULARITIES) 275

THE PRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF HISTORY. THEORY OF

XIII. THE NATIJRE OF HISTORICAL COGNITION • 305

XIV. QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS. A GENERAL RECONSTRUCTION OF

1. The problem of decisions . •..... 360

XV. THEORY OF SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE. 386

XVI. THEORY OF NON-SOURCE-BASED KNOWLEDGE • 401

XVII. THE FUNCTIONS OF SOURCE-BASED AND NON-SOURCE-BASED

XVllI. THE AunrnNTICI'IY OF SOURCES AND TIJE RELIABILI'IY OF

XIX. METIIODS OF ESTABLISHING HISlORICAL FACTS. 454

xx. QUANTITATIVE METIIODS IN HISlORICAL RESEARCH • 483

XXI. THE PROCEDURE OF EXPLANATION IN HISTORICAL RESEARCH • 536

XXII. CoNSTRUCTION AND SYN1HESIS • 587

3. The problem of synthesis in historical research . 590

THE APRAGMATIC METHODOLOGY OF mSTORY

XXIll. THE NATURE AND INSTRUMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATION. 605

XXIV. COMPONENTS OF NARRATIVES: HISTORICAL STATEMENTS AND

xxv. ELEMENTS OF HISTORICAL NARRATIVES: EVALUATIONS . 643

XXVI. THE ME1HODOLOGICAL STRUCTURE OF HISTORICAL RESEARCH. 661

INDEX OF NAMES . 678

the controversy about history as a discipline? He can neither ignore it

two principal elements indispensable in explaining the enigma of

type of theoretical knowledge which is at his disposal. Much will de-

theory of historical sources, the study of their reliability and authen-

METHODOLOGY AND HISTORY

1. The main branches and aspects of the methodology of sciences

The subject matter of the general methodology of sciences, which

2. The methodology of sciences and semiotics

When we reflect on the subject matter of the methodology of sciences,

all those processes in which something functions as a sign. Semiotics

Object of .ILanguage ofl Language user