Historiography

See History

When someone writes history, that person is called a historian. When a historian of fervent curiosity bases the writing of history in particular on critical analysis of historical source material and provides a narrative synthesis that receives the approprobation of critical analysis, that person may be referred to, more technically, and with more distinction, as a historiographer (etymologically, a 'grapher' in words of what one has learned through inquiry). A historiographer's writing of history as is called historiography — i.e., the historiographer's art or occupation. Thus, Herodotus, the Greek historian whose life nearly spanned the 5th century BCE, and whom the Roman scholar, Cicero (106-43 BCE), dubbed 'the father of history', occupied himself with the 'art' of historiography, writing of the wars between the Greeks and Persians — in the process setting a precedent for historiographers to come.

The term historiography may apply, in other senses:

• to the study of the writers of history as it gives insight into their writings, e.g., their potential biases, their philosophy
• to the study of the historical writings themselves for critical analysis by other historiographers
• to the study of the history of historical writing
• to the study of the theoretical bases, methodologies and approaches of historical writings, as in the different approaches to writing the history of science, for example

— all in contrast to the study of the history per se.

The journal Histos ("The Electronic journal of ancient historiography at the university of Durham.") states that its ....focus will be more on the historical texts and media than on the historical problems for which those texts and media are sources, though the emphasis may naturally vary. For example, see the article by Clemence Schultze, entitled "Authority, originality and competence in the Roman Archaeology of Dionysius of Halicarnassus". wherein the opening paragraph states:

Any attempt to understand an ancient historian’s programme, claim to authority, self-definition,[citation] originality and ideas about history and historiography must begin with analysis of his prefatory statements.[citation] Dionysius’ preface (whose literary and intellectual quality has generally been underestimated) reveals how his authority rests at once upon his predecessors and upon himself. At the very outset, in a single long and impressive sentence, he marks his knowledge of, and simultaneously his distance from, those predecessors; he expresses his attitude to his role and his materials; and he asserts the logismoi (‘reasonings’) and empeiria (‘knowledge’) which underpin his work: [Dionysius's sentence follows].

Thus, a historiographer may write history or study how historiographers write history. The article, History, extensively discusses topics relevant to historiography.