The book is an investigation of the evidence for King Arthur based on the earliest written sources rather than later myths and legends. The evidence is laid out in a chronological order starting from Roman Britain and shows how the legend evolved and at what point concepts such as Camelot, excalibur and Merlin were added. It covers the historical records from the end of Roman Britain using contemporary sources such as they are, from 400-800, including Gallic Chronicles, Gildas and Bede. It details the first written reference to Arthur in the Historia Brittonum c800 and the later Annales Cambriae in the tenth century showing the evolution of the legend in in later Welsh and French stories. The work differs from other books on the subject in not starting from or aiming at a specific person. It compares the possibility of Arthur being purely fictional with an historical figure alongside a list of possible suspects. The evidence is presented and the reader is invited to make up their own mind before a discussion of the Author's own assessment.

Here is the final volume of Norman O. Brown's trilogy on civilization and its discontents, on humanity's long struggle to master its instincts and the perils that attend that denial of human nature. Following on his famous books "Life Against Death" and "Love's Body", this collection of eleven essays brings Brown's thinking up to 1990 and the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe. Brown writes that 'the prophetic tradition is an attempt to give direction to the social structure precipitated by the urban revolution; to resolve its inherent contradictions; to put an end to its injustice, inequality, anomie, the state of war ...that has been its history from start to finish'. Affiliating himself with prophets from Muhammad to Blake and Emerson, Brown offers further meditations on what's wrong with Western civilization and what we might do about it. Thus the duality in his title: crisis and the hope for change. In pieces both poetic and philosophical, Brown's attention ranges over Greek mythology, Islam, Spinoza, and Finnegan's Wake. The collection includes an autobiographical essay musing on Brown's own intellectual development. The final piece, "Dionysus in 1990," draws on Freud and the work of Georges Bataille to link the recent changes in the world's economies with mankind's primordial drive to accumulation, waste, and death.

This is a book for anyone interested in history, what it is and where it comes from. Engaging and challenging, it confronts us with the many 'histories' that exist and have existed around the world, from the Zulu kingdoms to Communist China. The Use and Abuse of History takes as its starting point the way history is taught to children. The different narratives that constitute the histories of countries as diverse as India, Iran, Trinidad and the United States make for fascinating reading in their own right. What makes this book so valuable, though, is what these narratives tell us about the societies which created them - how much is history distorted in order to condition the minds of those who are taught it? A pioneer in its field that has become a key text of contemporary historiography, this is a book that poses fundamental and disturbing questions about the use and abuse of history.

Introduction to Public History: Interpreting the Past, Engaging Audiences is a brief foundational textbook for public history. It is organized around the questions and ethical dilemmas that drive public history in a variety of settings, from local community-based projects to international case studies. This book is designed for use in undergraduate and graduate classrooms with future public historians, teachers, and consumers of history in mind. The authors are practicing public historians who teach history and public history to a mix of undergraduate and graduate students at universities across the United States and in international contexts. This book is based on original research and the authors' first-hand experiences, offering a fresh perspective on the dynamic field of public history based on a decade of consultation with public history educators about what they needed in an introductory textbook. Each chapter introduces a concept or common practice to students, highlighting key terms for student review and for instructor assessment of student learning. The body of each chapter introduces theories, and basic conceptual building blocks intermixed with case studies to illustrate these points. Footnotes credit sources but also serve as breadcrumbs for instructors who might like to assign more in-depth reading for more advanced students or for the purposes of lecture development. Each chapter ends with suggestions for activities that the authors have tried with their own students and suggested readings, books, and websites that can deepen student exposure to the topic.

Historians know about the past because they examine the evidence. But what exactly is "evidence," how do historians know what it means--and how can we trust them to get it right? Historian David Henige tackles such questions of historical reliability head-on in his skeptical, unsparing, and acerbically witty "Historical Evidence and Argument." "Systematic doubt" is his watchword, and he practices what he preaches through a variety of insightful assessments of historical controversies--for example, over the dating of artifacts and the textual analysis of translated documents. Skepticism, Henige contends, forces us to recognize the limits of our knowledge, but is also a positive force that stimulates new scholarship to counter it.

In this lucid and probing study, Robert C. Miner argues that Giambattista Vico (1668-1744) was the architect of a subversive, genealogical approach to modernity. Miner documents the genesis of Vico's stance toward modernity in the first phase of his thought. Through close examination of his early writings, centering on Vico's critique of Descartes and his elaboration of the 'verum-factum' principle, Vico, Genealogist of Modernity reveals that Vico strives to acknowledge the technical advances of modernity while unmasking its origins in human pride.

Miner's careful analysis of the often neglected Universal Law shows how Vico uses Augustine to articulate a new conception of natural law that mediates between the idealism of Plato and Aristotle and the realism of Tacitus and Machiavelli. Vico emerges as a penetrating reader of traditional philosophy and philology, as well as a radical pioneer of modern historical consciousness.

Miner also traces important connections between Vico's magnum opus, the New Science, and his earlier writings, arguing that the New Science is not merely a work of scientific history. Miner contends that this work is more fundamentally a genealogy that enacts Nietzsche's desire to treat etymology and language as signposts for understanding the development of moral concepts. Miner shows how Vico's genealogy attempts to disclose hidden continuities between the culture of secular modernity and the pagan institutions of idolatry, divination, and sacrifice.

Throughout this engaging work, Miner portrays Vico's genealogy as expressly Augustinian and Catholic, yet sufficiently complex to resist assimilation to reactionary anti-modernism. According to Miner, the goal ofVico's genealogy is to encompass the best of ancient and medieval traditions within an "encyclopedic" fusion of history and philosophy that is both modern and Christian. Although Vico sees the "age of man" as moving toward the "barbarism of reflection, " his trust in divine providence saves him from nihilistic despair. Miner concludes that Vico's thought not only anticipates later efforts to infuse philosophy with historical consciousness, but also contains the seeds of a coherent alternative to the program of postmodern genealogy.

Believe it or not, the 1990s are history. As historians turn to study this period and beyond, they will encounter a historical record that is radically different from what has ever existed before. Old websites, social media, blogs, photographs, and videos are all part of the massive quantities of digital information that technologists, librarians, archivists, and organizations such as the Internet Archive have been collecting for the past three decades. In History in the Age of Abundance? Ian Milligan argues that web-based historical sources and their archives present extraordinary opportunities as well as daunting technical and ethical challenges for historians. Through case studies, he outlines the approaches, methods, tools, and search functions that can help a historian turn web documents into historical sources. He also considers the implications of the size and scale of digital sources, which amount to more information than historians have ever had at their fingertips, and many of which are by and about people who have traditionally been absent from the historical record. Scrutinizing the concept of the web and the mechanics of its archives, Milligan explains how these new media challenge, reshape, and enrich both the historical profession and the historical record. A wake-up call for historians of the twenty-first century, History in the Age of Abundance? is an essential introduction to the way web archives work, what possibilities they open up, what risks they entail, and what the shift to digital information means for historians, their professional training and organization, and society as a whole.

"Developing a dialogue between historians and economists is a crucially important task if we are to improve our understanding of the past. Economists have the tools to be able to provide in-depth analysis, the historians have the meat and substance which is necessary, and a blending of the two is terribly important. "Economics and the Historian is a valuable resource for this interchange."--Nobel Laureate Douglass C. North, author of "Institutions, Institutional Change, and Economic Performance

"This is a superlative collection of essays for historians who would like to learn about economic history but lack much formal training in mathematics and economic theory. The essays present fundamental concepts of economic analysis in a clear and concise manner, and they show how these concepts can be applied to a variety of historical problems."--Ted W. Margadant, author of "Urban Rivalries in the French Revolution

"This book is must reading for historians who want to know what there is in economics that might be useful for their fields."--Nobel Laureate Robert W. Fogel, author of "Time on the Cross

"Introduces historians and history students to the concepts, models, and logic of economic theory and shows how economic analysis can be applied to solving historical puzzles and problems. Each of the essays illuminates a different subfield of economics with numerous examples drawn from a quarter century of cliometrics. This book will make basic tools of economic historical analysis accessible and at times even entertaining to students (and colleagues) who have little or no background in economics. And it is guaranteed to enliven any course or seminar, as it did mine."--John H. Coatsworth,author of "Central America and the United States

In these pathbreaking essays, Roy Rosenzweig charts the impact of new media on teaching, researching, preserving, presenting, and understanding history. Negotiating between the "cyberenthusiasts" who champion technological breakthroughs and the "digital skeptics" who fear the end of traditional humanistic scholarship, Rosenzweig re-envisions the practices and professional rites of academic historians while analyzing and advocating for the achievements of amateur historians.

While he addresses the perils of "doing history" online, Rosenzweig eloquently identifies the promises of digital work, detailing innovative strategies for powerful searches in primary and secondary sources, the increased opportunities for dialogue and debate, and, most of all, the unprecedented access afforded by the Internet. Rosenzweig draws attention to the opening up of the historical record to new voices, the availability of documents and narratives to new audiences, and the attractions of digital technologies for new and diverse practitioners. Though he celebrates digital history's democratizing influences, Rosenzweig also argues that the future of the past in this digital age can only be ensured through the active resistance to efforts by corporations to control access and profit from the Web.

The book analyses the ideological and philosophical basis of Zionism, i.e. how Zionism solved the most important problems of Jews in the last decades of the 19th century: the problem of assimilation, the philosophical principles of national identity, the idea of self-liberation and the conception of the Jewish state. Another problem discussed in this book is how the religious idea of "Return to Zion" became both philosophical and political goals. All considerations are based on the analysis of the source texts of the protagonists and founders of Zionism (Hess, Pinsker, Herzl and Nordau). Zionism is also shown in the perspective of its strength and weakness, as well as its importance for Jewishness in general.

The essays assembled here represent forty years of reflection about the European cultural past by an eminent historian. The volume concentrates on the Renaissance and Reformation, while providing a lens through which to view problems of perennial interest. "A Usable Past" is a book of unusual scope, touching on such topics as political thought and historiography, metaphysical and practical conceptions of order, the relevance of Renaissance humanism to Protestant thought, the secularization of European culture, the contributions of particular professional groups to European civilization, and the teaching of history.The essays in "A Usable Past" are unified by a set of common concerns. William Bouwsma has always resisted the pretensions to science that have shaped much recent historical scholarship and made the work of historians increasingly specialized and inaccessible to lay readers. Following Friedrich Nietzsche, he argues that since history is a kind of public utility, historical research should contribute to the self-understanding of society.

The surge of evolutionary and neurological analyses of art and its effects raises questions of how art, culture, and the biological sciences influence one another, and what we gain in applying scientific methods to the interpretation of artwork. In this insightful book, Matthew Rampley addresses these questions by exploring key areas where Darwinism, neuroscience, and art history intersect. Taking a scientific approach to understanding art has led to novel and provocative ideas about its origins, the basis of aesthetic experience, and the nature of research into art and the humanities. Rampley’s inquiry examines models of artistic development, the theories and development of aesthetic response, and ideas about brain processes underlying creative work. He considers the validity of the arguments put forward by advocates of evolutionary and neuroscientific analysis, as well as its value as a way of understanding art and culture. With the goal of bridging the divide between science and culture, Rampley advocates for wider recognition of the human motivations that drive inquiry of all types, and he argues that our engagement with art can never be encapsulated in a single notion of scientific knowledge. Engaging and compelling, The Seductions of Darwin is a rewarding look at the identity and development of art history and its complicated ties to the world of scientific thought.

Natural Symbols is one of the most important works of modern anthropology. First published over thirty years ago, the work presaged many of the most controversial areas of intellectual debate, from the social significance of the body to religious cosmology.
Written against the backdrop of the student uprisings of the late 1960s, the book took seriously the revolutionary fervour of the times, but instead of seeking to destroy the rituals and symbols that can govern and oppress, Mary Douglas saw instead that if transformation were needed, it could only be made possible through better understanding. Expressed with clarity and dynamism, the passionate analysis which follows remains one of the most insightful and rewarding studies of human behaviour ever written.

Revolutionary critic of the philosophy of progress, nostalgic of the past yet dreaming of the future, romantic partisan of materialism - Walter Benjamin is in every sense of the word an "unclassifiable" philosopher. His essay "On the Concept of History" was written in a state of urgency, as he attempted to escape the Gestapo in 1940, before finally committing suicide. In this scrupulous, clear and fascinating examination of this essay, Michael Löwy argues that it remains one of the most important philosophical and political writings of the twentieth century. Looking in detail at Benjamin's celebrated but often mysterious text, and restoring the philosophical, theological and political context, Löwy highlights the complex relationship between redemption and revolution in Benjamin's philosophy of history.

Why we learn the wrong things from narrative history, and how our love for stories is hard-wired. To understand something, you need to know its history. Right? Wrong, says Alex Rosenberg in How History Gets Things Wrong. Feeling especially well-informed after reading a book of popular history on the best-seller list? Don't. Narrative history is always, always wrong. It's not just incomplete or inaccurate but deeply wrong, as wrong as Ptolemaic astronomy. We no longer believe that the earth is the center of the universe. Why do we still believe in historical narrative? Our attachment to history as a vehicle for understanding has a long Darwinian pedigree and a genetic basis. Our love of stories is hard-wired. Neuroscience reveals that human evolution shaped a tool useful for survival into a defective theory of human nature. Stories historians tell, Rosenberg continues, are not only wrong but harmful. Israel and Palestine, for example, have dueling narratives of dispossession that prevent one side from compromising with the other. Henry Kissinger applied lessons drawn from the Congress of Vienna to American foreign policy with disastrous results. Human evolution improved primate mind reading-the ability to anticipate the behavior of others, whether predators, prey, or cooperators-to get us to the top of the African food chain. Now, however, this hard-wired capacity makes us think we can understand history-what the Kaiser was thinking in 1914, why Hitler declared war on the United States-by uncovering the narratives of what happened and why. In fact, Rosenberg argues, we will only understand history if we don't make it into a story.

Skepticism: From Antiquity to the Present is an authoritative and up-to-date survey of the entire history of skepticism. Divided chronologically into ancient, medieval, renaissance, modern, and contemporary periods, and featuring 50 specially-commissioned chapters from leading philosophers, this comprehensive volume is the first of its kind. By exploring each of the distinct traditions and providing expert insights, this extensive reference work: - Covers major thinkers such as Sextus Empiricus, Cicero, Descartes, Hume, Spinoza, and Wittgenstein. - Acknowledges the influence of ancient skeptical traditions on later philosophy and explains why it is still a fertile topic of inquiry among today's philosophers and historians of philosophy. - Analyzes various forms of skepticism including Pyrrhonian, Academic, religious, moral, and neo-Pyrrhonian. - Addresses issues in contemporary epistemology and indicates new directions of study. Skepticism, a driving force in the history of philosophy, remains at the center of debates in ethics, philosophy of religion, epistemology, and the philosophy of mind. Skepticism: From Antiquity to the Present is an essential point of reference for any student, researcher, or practitioner of philosophy, presenting a systematic and historical survey of this core philosophical topic.

Barack Obama's politics are deeply informed by his profound knowledge and understanding of his country's history. His articles, books, and speeches are replete with references to America's past and how that relates to the present he sees and the future he envisions. Exploring Obama's own words, Steven Sarson examines his interpretation of American history from colonial times to the present, showing how Obama sees American history as beginning with the "common creed" of equality and liberty proclaimed in the Declaration of Independence and the "more perfect union" created by the Constitution. He analyses Obama's understanding of the colonies, revolution, and early nation, slavery and the civil war, segregation and civil rights, economy and society, Native Americans and foreign policy. An epilogue explores how Obama personifies the American dream through the stories of individuals, including his own. A unique and fascinating take on the past and how we interpret it, this book will appeal to all students and scholars of American history, as well as anyone interested in Obama's presidency.

Performing History: How to Research, Write, Act, and Coach Historical Performance addresses those areas that are of greatest challenge to novice historical performers. Historical performers must approach the process that is their work with a respect for both subject matter (the people who made the decisions that lead to what we call history) and for audiences, whatever the knowledge level they bring to the subject. That respect requires careful, on going research (to wear the mantle of authority), while also recognizing that none of us will ever know everything there is to know (the mantle is lined with humility). It requires the crafting of stories that will interest targeted audiences, and the skill to tell those stories in a compelling manner. Performing History is crafted for people who want to develop a first person narrative, those who have created a first person narrative but want to make it better, and those who want to help others develop first person narratives--museum and historic site volunteer coordinators, program and education curators, and, of course, those who wear many hats in small staffs. It is also for teachers, parents, and partners who are providing support for historical performers.

This book is available as open access through the Bloomsbury Open Access programme and is available on www.bloomsburycollections.com. This collection of short essays on texts in the history of democracy shows the diversity of ideas that contributed to the making of our present democratic moment. The selection of texts goes beyond the standard, Western-centric canonical history of democracy, with its beginnings in ancient Athens and its climax in the French and American revolutions, recovering some of the significant body of democratic and anti-democratic thought in Latin America, Asia, and elsewhere. It includes discussions of well-known philosophers like Plato and Aristotle, but also of a variety of thinkers much less well known in English as writers on democracy: Al Farabi, Bolivar, Gandhi, Radishchev, Lenin, Sun Yat-sen, and many others. The essays thus de-center our understanding of the moments where the idea of democracy was articulated, rejected, and appropriated. Spanning antiquity to the present and global in scope, with contributions by key scholars of democracy from around the world, Democratic Moments is the ideal text for all students wishing to expand their understanding of the ways in which this contested concept has been understood.

Thanks to digitisation, newspapers from the seventeenth to the twenty-first century have become an indispensable and accessible source for researchers. Through their pages, historians with a passion for a person or a place or a time or a topic can rediscover forgotten details and gain new insights into the society and values of bygone ages.Historical Research Using British Newspapers provides plenty of practical advice for anyone intending to use old newspapers by: * outlining the strengths of newspapers as source material * revealing the drawbacks of newspapers as sources and giving ways to guard against them * tracing the development of the British newspaper industry * showing the type of information that can be found in newspapers and how it can be used * identifying the best newspapers to start with when researching a particular topic * suggesting methods to locate the most relevant articles available * demonstrating techniques for collating, analysing and interpreting information * showing how to place newspaper reports in their wider context In addition nine case studies are included, showing how researchers have already made productive use of newspapers to gain insights that were not available from elsewhere.

Why did men and women in one of the best educated countries in the Western world set out to get rid of Jews? In this book, Judith M. Hughes focuses on how historians' efforts to grapple anew with matters of actors' meanings, intentions, and purposes have prompted a return to psychoanalytically informed ways of thinking. Hughes makes her case with fine-grained analyses of books by Hugh Trevor-Roper, Ian Kershaw, Daniel Goldhagen, Saul Friedlander, Christopher Browning, Jan Gross, Hannah Arendt and Gitta Sereny. All of the authors pose psychological questions; the more astute among them shed fresh light on the Holocaust - without making the past any less disturbing.