Historical Method

History as Reconstruction
● The historian is many times removed from the events under investigation
● Historians rely on surviving records
● “Only a part of what was observed in the past was remembered by those who observe it; only
a part of what was remembered was recorded; only a part of what was recorded has survived;
only a part of what has survived has come to the historian’s attention.”
● “Only a part of what is credible has been grasped, and only a part of what has been grasped
can be expounded or narrated by the historian,”
● Historian
❖ Fallible ( capable of error…capable of making mistakes )
❖ Biases – personal, political, religious, personal idiosyncrasies
❖ Each has his own frame of preference – a set of interlocking values, loyalties,
assumptions, interests and principles of actions
History is not Fiction
● Historical accounts must be based on all available relevant evidence
● A version of the past that cannot be supported by evidence is worthless
● The reconstruction of the total past of mankind, although it is the goal of historians, thus
becomes the goal they know full well is UNATTAINABLE.
Historical Method
● Agreed ground rules for researching and writing academic research or professional history
● Core protocols historians use for handling sources
● Historians have to base their accounts on source materials
● Historians need to be able to locate and organize the relevant sources on which they will base
their account
● Historians have to verify sources, to date them, locate their place of origin and identify their
intended functions
● The process of critically examining and analyzing the records and survivals of the past
● Involves:
❖ Selection of Subject
❖ Collection of Sources
❖ Examination of Genuineness
❖ Extraction from Sources
Historical Sources
● Source – an object from the past or testimony concerning the past on which historians depend
in order to create their own depiction of that past. (Howell and Prevenier, From Reliable
Sources an Introduction to Historical Method )
● Tangible remains of the past (Anthony Brundage, Going to Sources)
● Written Sources
❖ Published materials
➢ Books, magazines, journals
➢ Travelogue transcription of speech
❖ Manuscript [any handwritten or typed record that has not been printed]
➢ Archival materials
 ➢ Memoirs, diary
● Non-written Sources
❖ Oral history
❖ Artifact
❖ Ruins
❖ Fossils
❖ Art works
❖ Video recordings
❖ Audio Recordings
● Primary Sources
❖ Testimony of an eyewitness
❖ A primary source must have been produced by a contemporary of the event it narrates
❖ A primary source is a document or physical object which was written or created during
the time under study.
❖ These sources were present during an experience of time period and offer an inside
view of a particular event.
❖ Primary sources provide first-hand testimony or direct evidence concerning a topic
under investigation. They are created by witnesses or recorders who experienced the
events or conditions being documented
❖ These sources are created at the time when the events or conditions are occurring, it
can also include autobiographies, memoirs, and oral histories recorded later.
❖ Primary sources are characterized by their content, regardless of whether they are
available in original format, in microfilm/microfiche, in digital format, or in published
format
❖ Four Main Categories of Primary Sources
1.Written sources
2. Images
3. Artifacts
4. Oral testimony
● Secondary Sources
❖ A secondary source interprets and analyzes primary sources. These sources are one or
more steps removed from the event.
❖ Secondary sources may have pictures, quotes or graphics of primary sources in them
❖ Examples: History textbook Printed materials (serials, periodicals which interprets
previous research)
Historical Criticism
● In order for a source to be used as evidence in history, basic matters about its form and
content must be settled.
1. External Criticism
2. Internal Criticism
❖ External Criticism
➢ The problem of authenticity
➢ To spot fabricated, forged, faked documents
➢ To distinguish a hoax or misrepresentation
➢ Test of Authenticity
 1. Determine the date of the document to see whether are anachronistic e.g.
pencils did not exist before the 16th Century
2. Determine the author e.g. handwriting, signature,
3. Anachronistic style e.g. idiom, orthography, punctuation
4. Anachronistic reference to events e.g. too early, too late, too remote
5. Provenance or custody e.g. determines its genuineness 6. Semantics –
determining the meaning of a text or word
7. Hermeneutics – determining ambiguities
❖ Internal Criticism
➢ The Problem of Credibility
➢ Relevant particulars in the document – is it credible?
➢ Verisimilar – as close as what really happened from a critical examination of vast
available sources (Louis Gottschalk, Understanding History )
➢ Test of Credibility
1. Identification of the author e.g. to determine his reliability; mental processes,
personal attitudes
2. Determination of the approximate date e.g. handwriting, signature
3. Ability to tell the truth e.g. nearness to the event, competence of witness,
degree of attention
4. Willingness to tell the truth e.g. to determine if the author consciously or
unconsciously tells falsehoods
5. Corroboration i.e historical facts – particulars which rest upon the independent
testimony of two or more reliable witnesses
● Three Major Components of Effective Historical Thinking
1. Sensitive to Multiple Causation
2. Sensitive to Context
3. Awareness of the interplay of continuity and change in human affairs
❖ Sensitivity to Multiple Causation
➢ Every event or situation is the product of multiple causes or factors, short-term or
long-term
➢ Inquiry into all relevant condition and circumstances that determine the direction
of human affairs
❖ Sensitivity to Context
➢ consciousness about how other times and places differ from our own
➢ Bridging the cultural and temporal gap
➢ Interpreting the past using values and beliefs of the past (historical mindedness)
❖ Continuity and Change
➢ There can be “history” only when there is change
Summary
In studying the past, there must be evidences to reconstruct the past. For historians, these evidences
are classified into two: primary sources and secondary sources. A primary source is defined " as a
piece of evidence written or created during the period under investigation". It is a record left by a
person who witnessed the event one is studying. In other words, a primary source can be an
eyewitness account or a first hand account of a particular event. A primary source can come in the
form of written sources such as documents, archival materials, letters, government records,
newspapers, parish records, court transcripts, and business ledgers.

Primary sources can also be non-written. They can come in the form of artifacts such as the
Manunggal jar, edifices like colonial churches, clothes, jewelry, farming implements and paintings. An
individual's first hand account of a particular event such as the memoirs of the Japanese occupation
in the Philippines can be a primary source. Of recent date, photographs, films and recordings (both
audio and video) are also considered primary sources.

On the other hand, Secondary Sources in history are works produced after the event has taken
place. Secondary sources are usually an assessment or a commentary of events, people, or
institutions of the past. Secondary sources may also come in many forms.They come in the form of
books which can be popular or scholarly. Secondary sources come in the form of monographs.
Monographs are specialized works which are narrow in scope, but are based on primary sources.
Essays or chapters in a book based on primary or secondary sources are considered Secondary
Sources. Article published in scholarly journals are likewise considered secondary sources.
Dissertations and papers read in conferences are considered secondary sources.

Primary sources, in whatever form, have to be subjected to what is called the Historical Method.
There are two components in the historical method. The first is called External Criticism which aims at
checking the authenticity of the primary source. It aims to check whether the source is real or fake.
For example, validating the authenticity of a document requires checking if the paper and ink of the
document belong to the period being studied.

Once the source is considered authentic, then primary sources goes through Internal Criticism which
checks on the reliability of the source.