What do you think of how history is relayed how do we trust the accuracy of it?

Question

What do you think of how history is relayed how do we trust the accuracy of it?

Answer 1

we can trust as how much they told us and we get taught...

Answer 2

The only way we can now for certain what happened - in the past - is to look at the original documents, and the only thing we can get for certain from them is how people viewed the events at the time.

Answer 3

we can trust the accuracy BUT only to a cetain extent. for written evidence we must take into consideration who wrote it, why it was written, when it was written and who was the intened audience.

take the illiad (the story of the trojan war) for instance.

a man named homer wrote it down on paper and he was a poet. poets back then had to memorise their poems and then retell them by word of mouth. as a result we can safely assume that the accuracy of this epic poem decreases because it was retold for entertainment. it was written several hundred years after the actual war (or when we think the war took place) and as a result the poem may have been added to or taken away from by other poets. similar to chinese whispers.

so basically don't believe all historical references as they may contain bias etc. and may not be entirely accurate.  

Answer 4

I feel that we tend to hear the winning sides story so even though history is suppose to be based off of pure fact it is always a little bias.

Answer 5

Ultimately, history is built on documentary evidence.  If one is examining a particular event, the best history comes from looking at all the documentation surrounding the event, from every possible source. Artifacts often also come into play.  

That being the case, a historian often finds conflicting information, and must contend with the possibility that the creator or author of a particular document might have been lying or simply ignorant.  As a result, the historian must use his or her judgment and weigh the evidence in deciding what the truth is.  He or she also uses their judgment in placing the evidence in context.  The more one understands about the context that the evidence was created in, the more one can be sure that one's conclusions about what the evidence means are accurate.

In the end, historical accuracy is something that varies.  Each historian weighs the evidence according to their own lights.  Most narrative history, written by conscientious historians, will present the judgment of that historian, but will footnote the evidence.  If you really want to judge for yourself what happened, don't read narratives, go look at the evidence for yourself.  But keep in mind that you need to study the context carefully.  

As an example, when talking about the decision to drop the atom bombs, one needs to understand the political and moral pressures on the President.  One needs to understand the experience of the war to date, and one must be careful not to allow what they know about the effects of that decision to color their interpretation of the evidence.  In short, if you're studying the decision to drop the bombs, make sure you understand the experience of the President and his advisors with regards to Japan, Japanese code of conduct, Japanese behavior in relation to the entire Pacific War, and most expecially in relation to Okinawa and Saipan.  See?