eadings in

Philippine History
Chapter 1
The Meaning of History
 History – Greek word historia means
learning by inquiry.
 History is the systematic accounting of a
set of natural phenomena, that is, taking
into
consideration the chronological arrangement
of the account. This explained that
knowledge is derived through conducting a
process of scientific investigation of past
events (Aristotle).
The Meaning of History
 History is referred usually
for accounts of phenomena,
especially human affairs in
chronological order.
 Theories in investigating
history:
Factual History
Speculative History
Theories in Investigating
History
Factual History Speculative History

 Factual History -  Speculative History - goes

presents readers the plain beyond facts because it is
and basic informationvis-the concerned about the
à-vis events that place reasons for which
took event happened (why),
(what), the time and date and the way they
which the events happened happened (how).
(when), the place with  It tries to speculate on the
which the events took place, cause and effect of an event
and the people that were (Cantal, et al. 2014).
involved (who).
 History deals with the study of the past.
 Historians seek to understand the present by
examining what went before. They undertake
arduous historical research to come up with a
meaningful and organized rebuilding of the past.
 Historiography is the practice of historical writing,
the traditional method in doing historical research
that focus on gathering of documents from different
libraries and archives to form a pool of evidence
needed in making a descriptive or analytical
narrative.
 The modern historical writing include examination
of documents and the use of research methods from
related areas of study such as archaeology and
geography.
The Limitation of Historical
Knowledge
 The incompleteness of records has
limited man’s knowledge of history.
Most human affairs happen without
leaving any evidence or records in
any
kind, no artifacts, or if there are, no
further evidence of human setting
in which to place surviving artifacts.
The Limitation of Historical
Knowledge
The whole history of the past (HISTORY-AS-
ACTUALITY) can be known to a historian only
through the surviving records (HISTORY-AS-
RECORD).
Historians study the records or evidences that
survived the time. They tell history from what
they understood as a credible part of the record.
Their claims may remain variable... This explains
the “incompleteness” of the “object” that
historians study.
History as the Subjective Process of
e-Creation
From the incomplete evidence,
historians strive to restore the total past
of
mankind.
History becomes only that part of the
human past which can be meaningfully
reconstructed from the available
records
History as the Subjective Process of
e-Creation
Historian’s aim is verisimilitude (the
truth, authenticity, plausibility) about a
past.
The study of history is a subjective
process as documents and relics
are
scattered and do not together
comprise the total object that the
Historical Method and
Historiography
Historical Method – the process of
critically examining and analyzing
the records and survivals of the
past.
Historiography – the imaginative
reconstruction of the past from
the
Historical Method and
Historiography
 Historical Analysis
a) Select the subject to investigate;
b) Collect probable sources of information
on the subject;
c) Examine the sources of genuineness, in
part of in whole;
d) Extract credible “particulars”
from the
sources (or parts of sources).
Sources of Historical
DataData
Historical
 They are sourced from artifacts that have
been left by the past.
 The artifacts can be either relics or
remains, or the testimonies of witnesses to
the past.
Historical Sources
 They are those materials from which
the materials construct meaning.
Sources of Historical
Data
Relics or “remains” – offer researchers a
clue about the past.
Artifacts can be found where relics of
human happenings can be found, e.g. coin,
manuscript, book, strand of hair, or other
archaelogical or anthropological remains.
Whether artifacts or documents, they are
materials out of which history may be
written (Howell & Prevenier, 2001).
Sources of Historical
Data
Relics or “remains / Artifacts

Laguna Copper Plate Manunggul

Inscription Jar
Sources of Historical
Data
 Testimonies of Witnesses
– whether oral or written, may have
been created to serve as record or they
might
have been created for some other
purposes. All these describe an event,
such as the record of a property
exchange, speeches, and commentaries.
Written
Sources
of
History
1. Narrative or Literature
2. Diplomatic or Juridical
3. Social Documents
Written Sources of
History
1. Narrative or Literature
Are chronicles or tracts presented in
narrative form, written to impart a
message whose motives for their
composition vary
widely.
 A scientific tract, a newspaper article
(ego document or personal narrative), a
novel or film, a biography (panegyric,
hagiography)
Written Sources of
History
2. Diplomatic Sources
 Those document /record an
existing legal situation or create a
new one.
It is these kinds of sources that
professional historians once treated
as
the purest, the “best” source.
Written Sources of
History 3. Social Documents
 Are information pertaining to
economic, social, political, or judicial
significance.
 They are records kept by
bureaucracies.
 Examples: government reports such as
municipal accounts, research
findings,
documents like parliamentary
Non-Written Sources of
History
1.Material Evidence or
Archaeological
Evidence
2. Oral Evidence
Non-Written Sources of
1. Material Evidence
History
 Also known as archaeological evidence
 One of the most important unwritten
evidences
 Include artistic creations such as pottery,
jewelry, graves, churches, roads, and others that
tell a story
about the past.
 These artifacts can tell a great deal about the
ways of life of people in the past, and their
culture.
 These artifacts can reveal a great deal about
the socio-cultural interconnections of the
Burial Cloth Mysterious
(The Astrolabe of
“Death San Diego
Blanket”)
Non-Written Sources of
History 2. Oral Evidence
Is an important source of
information for
historians.
 Tales or sagas, folk songs or
popular rituals, interviews
Non-Written Sources of
History
Non-Written Sources of
History
Primary Versus Secondary
Sources
Primary Secondary
Sources Sources
 are materials made by
 Are original, first-hand people long after the events
being described had taken
account of an event or
place to provide valuable
period that are usually interpretations of historical
written or made events.
during or close to the  Analyze and interpret
event or period. primary sources.
 Their key function is  An interpretation of
to provide facts. second-hand account of a
historical event.
Primary Versus Secondary
Sources Sources Secondary
Primary
 Diaries, journals, letters, Sources
newspaper and magazine
articles (factual accounts),  Biographies, histories,
government records or
transcribed speeches literary criticism, books
 Interviews with written by a third
participants or witnesses, party about a
interviews with people historical event, art
who lived during a certain
time, songs, plays, novels,
and theatre reviews,
stories, paintings, newspaper or journal
drawings, sculptures. articles that interpret.
Historical
Criticism
Historical
Criticism
Historical
Criticism
It examines the origins of earliest text to


appreciate the underlying circumstances

upon which the text came (Soulen & Soulen,
2001).
 Goals:
 To discover the original meaning of the text in its
primitive or historical context and its literal
sense or sensus literalis historicus.
 To establish a reconstruction of the historical
situation of the author and recipients of the text.
Historical
Criticism
It has its roots in the 17 century and gained
th

popular recognition in the 19 and 20

th th

centuries.
The absence of historical investigation paved
the way for historical criticism to rest on
philosophical and theological interpretation.
Various methodologies: source criticism,
form criticism, redaction criticism,
tradition criticism, canonical criticism
Historical
 Various methodologies
 Criticism
Source criticism – analyzes and studies the
sources used by biblical authors.
:

 Form criticism – seeks to determine a unit’s

original
form and historical context of the literary
tradition.
 Redaction criticism – regards the author of the text
as editor of the source materials.
 Tradition criticism – attempts to trace the
developmental stages of the oral tradition from
its historical emergence to its literary
presentation.
 Canonical criticism – focuses its interpretation of the
Source criticism – analyzes and studies the
sources used by biblical authors.

Source criticism (or information evaluation) is the

process of evaluating an information source, i.e.
a document, a person, a speech, a fingerprint, a
photo, an observation, or anything used in order
to obtain knowledge. In relation to a given
purpose, a given information source may be
more or less valid, reliable or relevant. Broadly,
"source criticism" is the interdisciplinary study
of how information sources are evaluated for
given tasks.
Form criticism – seeks to determine a unit’s
original form and historical context of
the literary tradition.
Form criticism as a method of biblical
criticism classifies units of scripture by
literary pattern and then attempts to trace
each type to its period of oral transmission.
Form criticism seeks to determine a unit's
original form and the historical context of
the literary tradition
• Redaction criticism – regards the author of the text
as editor of the source materials.
• Redaction criticism is a critical method for the study
of biblical texts. Redaction criticism regards the
author of the text as editor (redactor) of the source
materials. Unlike its parent discipline, form criticism,
redaction criticism does not look at the various parts
of a narrative to discover the original genre. Instead,
it focuses on how the redactor shaped and moulded
the narrative to express theological and ideological
goals.
Tradition criticism – attempts to trace the
developmental stages of the oral tradition from its
historical emergence to its literary presentation.

Tradition history or tradition criticism is a methodology

of biblical criticism that situates a text within a
stream of a specific tradition in history and attempts
to describe the development of the tradition over the
course of time. Tradition history seeks to
analyze biblical literature in terms of the process by
which biblical traditions passed from stage to stage
into their final form, especially how they passed
from oral tradition to written form.
• Canonical criticism – focuses its interpretation of the
bible on the text of biblical canon.
• Canonical criticism, sometimes called canon
criticism or the canonical approach, is a
way
of interpreting the Bible that focuses on the
text of
the biblical canon itself as a finished product.
Brevard Childs (1923-2007) popularised this
approach, though he personally rejected the term.
Whereas other types of biblical criticism focus on the
origins, structure and history of texts, canonical
criticism looks at the meaning which the overall text
-in its final form - has for the community which uses
it.
Historical
Criticism
 First part – to determine the authenticity of
the material (provenance of a source).
 The critic should determine the origin of
the material, its author, and the
sources of information used [external
criticism].
 Second part – to weigh the testimony to the truth.
 The critic must examine the trustworthiness
of the testimonies as well as determine the
probability of the statements to be true
[internal (higher) criticism].
Historical
Criticism
Historical
Criticism
External criticism – determines the
authenticity of the source.
 The authenticity of the material may be tested in two
ways, by paleographical (the deciphering and
dating of historical manuscripts) and diplomatic
criticism (critical analysis of historical document to
understand how the document came to be, the
information transmitted, and the relationship
between the facts purported in the document and
the reality).
Historical
Criticism
 External criticism – determines the authenticity
of the source.
 The authenticity of the material may be tested in two
ways, by paleographical and diplomatic
criticism.

 Paleography – the study of old or ancient forms

of writing.
 Diplomatics – the science of authenticating,
dating, and interpreting old official documents.
Historical
Criticism
Historical
Criticism
Internal criticism – determines the historicity
of the facts contained in the document.
 It is not necessary to prove the authenticity of the
material or document. However, the facts
contained in the document must first be tested
before any conclusion pertaining to it can be
admitted.
 In determining the value of the facts, the character
of the sources, the knowledge of the author, and
the influences prevalent at the time of writing must
be carefully investigated.
Historical
Criticism
Test of
Authenticity
 Making
document,
of
the best guess
the historian
the date of the
examines the
materials see they not
anachronistic:
to paper was rare
whether are in
before 15 th century,
Europe typewriting was not
invented until 19 th century, Indian paper
came only at the end of that century.
The historian also examines the inks for signs
of age or anachronistic chemical
composition.
Test of
Authenticity
Making the best guess of the possible author of
the document, the historian sees if he/she can
identify the handwriting, signature, seal,
letterhead, or watermark.
 Isographies – the dictionaries of biography
giving examples of handwriting.
 Paleography – the study of old or ancient forms
of writing.
 Diplomatics – the science of authenticating,
dating, and interpreting old official documents.
Test of
were Authenticity
The disciplines of paleography and diplomatics
founded in the 17 century by Dom Jean
th

Mabillon.
Anachronistic styles – idiom, orthography,
punctuation
Anachronistic references to events – too early
or too late or too remote; or the dating of a
document at a time when the alleged writer
could not possibly have been at the place
designated (the alibi) uncovers fraud.
Test of
Authenticity
Usually if the
document is where it
ought to be (e.g., in
a
family’s archives, in
the governmental
bureau’s record) its
provenance (custody,
as the lawyers refer to
it), creates a
presumption of its
genuineness.
Carmina Cantabrigiensia, Manuscript
C, folio 436v, 11th century
Folio from Papyrus 46, containing 2
Corinthians 11:33–12:9
Thank you! :)
God bless!