Reading sources
Read like a historian
The five questions
Who made this?
A king, a monk, a soldier, a farmer? Whoever writes or makes something looks from their own place in the world.
When?
During the event, shortly after or centuries later? The greater the distance, the more memory can shift.
For whom?
A report for the ruler, a sermon for believers, a letter to a mother? The audience shapes what someone tells and what not.
Why?
To inform, to persuade, to justify, to commemorate? Every source has a purpose, even when it is not said out loud.
What does the source leave out?
Who does not get to speak? Often women, children, the poor, the enslaved or the colonised. What is missing is information too.
Eight skills of a historian
Each skill with an explanation, an example on a real source, the pitfalls and exercises at three levels.
- What is a source?Everything people from the past left behind is a trace: a letter, an axe, a photo, a building. You learn to tell primary and secondary sources apart.
- Who, when, why?No source speaks for itself. With five questions you read a source like a historian: who made it, when, for whom, why, and what does it leave out?
- Counting timeCenturies, BC and AD, and how many years lie between two dates. There is no year zero, and that changes more than you think.
- What came first? With Kaft PlusPutting events in the right order, knowing what happened at the same time, and understanding that periods are conventions.
- Fact or opinion? With Kaft PlusA fact can be checked in sources. An opinion is a judgement. You learn to tell them apart, even when they are mixed in one sentence.
- Through other eyes With Kaft PlusThe same event looked different to a king and a farmer, to a winner and a loser. You learn to ask: who says this, and who is silent?
- Cause and effect With Kaft PlusWhy did something happen, and what followed from it? You learn that events usually have several causes, short-term and long-term.
- Reading images and maps With Kaft PlusA painting, a photo or a map was also made by someone, for someone, with a purpose. You learn to ask what an image shows and what it leaves out.
Exercise
Caesar on the Belgae
In the 50s BC Julius Caesar waged war in Gaul. He wrote his own account of it, De bello Gallico. Almost every Belgian pupil knows one sentence from it. Read the opening and ask the five questions.
Horum omnium fortissimi sunt Belgae, propterea quod a cultu atque humanitate provinciae longissime absunt, minimeque ad eos mercatores saepe commeant atque ea quae ad effeminandos animos pertinent important, proximique sunt Germanis, qui trans Rhenum incolunt, quibuscum continenter bellum gerunt.Of all these [peoples] the Belgae are the bravest, because they are furthest from the civilisation and refinement of the Province, merchants visit them least often and bring in the things that weaken the spirit, and they live closest to the Germans, who dwell across the Rhine and with whom they are continually at war.
Who made this?Show a possible answer
Caesar himself: the Roman general who attacked and defeated the Belgae. He is not a neutral observer but a main actor.
When?Show a possible answer
Shortly after the events, while he was still fighting in Gaul or just after. Close, but in the middle of his own campaign.
For whom?Show a possible answer
For readers in Rome: the senate and the citizens who decided on his power and his future.
Why?Show a possible answer
To justify his wars and make his victories look great. The braver the enemy, the greater the win. His explanation (no luxury, close to the Germans) also fits a Roman picture of 'rough' but strong peoples.
What does the source leave out?Show a possible answer
The Belgae themselves. There is not a single written source from their side. What we know of them comes from their opponent and from archaeology.
What does this teach?
The sentence 'the Belgae are the bravest' became a proud piece of Belgian identity in the 19th century, on school posters and in speeches. But it comes from the man who defeated them, wrote for Rome and wanted to shine. That does not make the source worthless: it tells a lot, above all about how Rome looked at the north.
Read the moment: Caesar and the Belgae