4 ms·

"He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past." [0] -- George Orwell, 1984 "History is written by the victors."

by oso2k 11y ago

"He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past." [0] -- George Orwell, 1984 "History is written by the victors." [1] -- Napolean [0] http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6145-he-who-controls-the-past-controls-the-future-he-who http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/6145-he-who-controls-the-pas... [1] https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/210910.Napol_on_Bonaparte https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/210910.Napol_on_Bona...

dalke 11y ago
Please distrust goodreads as an authoritative source for quotes. If you search you'll also find that "History is written by the victors" is also attributed to Churchill and to Hitler. My experience is that quotes to famous people, without any citation, are almost always misattributed. For what it's worth, the oldest Google Book search for 'history is written by the victors' is from the 1970 "Willard W. Waller on the Family, Education, and War", p148, in a section dated "previous unpublished." A search for 'history is written by the winners' finds this summary of the history of the quote, https://books.google.com/books?id=d6JZryGvfxYC&pg=PA90&dq=%22written+by+the+winners%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CBwQ6AEwAGoVChMIr5Dqz7GsyAIVBXdyCh3eVgk6#v=onepage&q=%22written%20by%20the%20winners%22&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=d6JZryGvfxYC&pg=PA90&dq=%2... and concludes there is no clear origin.
- oso2k 11y ago
  And google books is authoritative? Napoleon was oldest the attribution I could find. I actually believe the quote is far older the 1970, maybe homer or some other writer from antiquity describing Alexander the Great. Maybe Plutarch. Grammatically, it's probably not identical to the modern English version, especially if it were translated from the original Greek or possibly Latin.
  - dang 11y ago
    Dalke didn't claim that Google Books is authoritative. He's right that nearly all attributions of famous quotes to famous people turn out bogus—the real sources are usually obscure and often interesting. They're also often more recent than you'd think. Who knows if that 1970 find is the origin of this one (probably not), but it's exactly the sort of thing that could be. A great resource for these is the Quote Investigator, an anonymous researcher who has slowly been building up an impressive portfolio of all the well-known catchy quotes. Here's a great recent example: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/08/28/fish/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/08/28/fish/. He or she takes requests, so I asked him or her to put "history is written by the victors" on his or her todo list.
    - dalke 11y ago
      As a minor observation, the researcher goes by the pseudonym 'Garson O’Toole' and uses the gendered pronoun 'he' when referring to the pseudonym, as seen at http://quoteinvestigator.com/about/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/about/ : > What is Dr O’Toole’s background? Garson O’Toole has a doctorate from Yale University, and exploring quotations is one of his avocations. (The Yale law librarian Fred R. Shapiro and editor of the Yale Book of Quotations further goes on to say the person is "PhD'86" from Yale http://yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3838 http://yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3838 . However, if Shapiro is part of a Tlön-like conspiracy, then this would be exactly how to create a new Bourbaki.) Also, if https://books.google.com/books?id=QZ0eAQAAMAAJ&q=history+is+written+by+the+winners&dq=history+is+written+by+the+winners&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y https://books.google.com/books?id=QZ0eAQAAMAAJ&q=history+is+... is correct about the date, The New Yorker, Volume 42, Part 4 (1966) leads with the line "Much of the world's history is written by history's winner".
  - dalke 11y ago
    Dang's comment clarified my intent. I want now to address "Napoleon was oldest the attribution I could find." There are two aspects to "oldest attribution"; one is to when the attribution was made, and the other is the era that the attributed person lived. They should not be confused. If I say that Socrates said "a broken clock is right twice a day", then this is a recent attribution to someone who lived a long time ago. If others then follow my lead, then there will be a lot of modern citations to someone who lived thousands of years ago. That doesn't mean it would be correct. This means one can't simply order the list of attributed people and pick the person who lived first. That might be a false attribution. For example, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125169095 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1251690... describes some of the quotes falsely attributed to Lincoln, and http://shannonselin.com/2014/07/10-things-napoleon-never-said/ http://shannonselin.com/2014/07/10-things-napoleon-never-sai... lists quotes attributed to Napoleon, but which he either did not say or did not originate. One way to help identify misattributed quotes is to look in the historical record. Sometimes people 50 years ago quoted unknown person X as the source of a quote, where people now quote older and more famous person Y. Because of the tendency to attach quotes to a more famous person, this would suggest - though surely not prove - that the attribution to Y is incorrect. In the early 1970s you can see many people name diverse sources to the quote, including Haley, author of "Roots". As Napoleon's writing are well-known and studied, the lack of a citation during that to Napoleon is a strong indicator that he did not make the quote in any citeable fashion. (Eg, the shannonselin.com link points out Napoleon may have said 'Not tonight, Josephine'; we just don't have citeable evidence for it.)
    - oso2k 11y ago
      > One way to help identify misattributed quotes is to look in the historical record. Sometimes people 50 years ago quoted unknown person X as the source of a quote, where people now quote older and more famous person Y. > Because of the tendency to attach quotes to a more famous person, this would suggest - though surely not prove - that the attribution to Y is incorrect. dalke, you just agreed with my original point in citing those quotes after getting tangled in the weeds of citation & attribution. History or the historical record is often inaccurate; often (re)written by those who control such things at the time of (re)writing. Though, I must say, your distrust of historical record doesn't seem to lead you to the next, and for me, more important question than accuracy of attribution & citation: Why?

by oso2k 11y ago

dalke 11y ago

Please distrust goodreads as an authoritative source for quotes. If you search you'll also find that "History is written by the victors" is also attributed to Churchill and to Hitler. My experience is that quotes to famous people, without any citation, are almost always misattributed. For what it's worth, the oldest Google Book search for 'history is written by the victors' is from the 1970 "Willard W. Waller on the Family, Education, and War", p148, in a section dated "previous unpublished." A search for 'history is written by the winners' finds this summary of the history of the quote, https://books.google.com/books?id=d6JZryGvfxYC&pg=PA90&dq=%22written+by+the+winners%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CBwQ6AEwAGoVChMIr5Dqz7GsyAIVBXdyCh3eVgk6#v=onepage&q=%22written%20by%20the%20winners%22&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=d6JZryGvfxYC&pg=PA90&dq=%2... and concludes there is no clear origin.

oso2k 11y ago
And google books is authoritative? Napoleon was oldest the attribution I could find. I actually believe the quote is far older the 1970, maybe homer or some other writer from antiquity describing Alexander the Great. Maybe Plutarch. Grammatically, it's probably not identical to the modern English version, especially if it were translated from the original Greek or possibly Latin.
- dang 11y ago
  Dalke didn't claim that Google Books is authoritative. He's right that nearly all attributions of famous quotes to famous people turn out bogus—the real sources are usually obscure and often interesting. They're also often more recent than you'd think. Who knows if that 1970 find is the origin of this one (probably not), but it's exactly the sort of thing that could be. A great resource for these is the Quote Investigator, an anonymous researcher who has slowly been building up an impressive portfolio of all the well-known catchy quotes. Here's a great recent example: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/08/28/fish/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/08/28/fish/. He or she takes requests, so I asked him or her to put "history is written by the victors" on his or her todo list.
  - dalke 11y ago
    As a minor observation, the researcher goes by the pseudonym 'Garson O’Toole' and uses the gendered pronoun 'he' when referring to the pseudonym, as seen at http://quoteinvestigator.com/about/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/about/ : > What is Dr O’Toole’s background? Garson O’Toole has a doctorate from Yale University, and exploring quotations is one of his avocations. (The Yale law librarian Fred R. Shapiro and editor of the Yale Book of Quotations further goes on to say the person is "PhD'86" from Yale http://yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3838 http://yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3838 . However, if Shapiro is part of a Tlön-like conspiracy, then this would be exactly how to create a new Bourbaki.) Also, if https://books.google.com/books?id=QZ0eAQAAMAAJ&q=history+is+written+by+the+winners&dq=history+is+written+by+the+winners&hl=en&sa=X&redir_esc=y https://books.google.com/books?id=QZ0eAQAAMAAJ&q=history+is+... is correct about the date, The New Yorker, Volume 42, Part 4 (1966) leads with the line "Much of the world's history is written by history's winner".
- dalke 11y ago
  Dang's comment clarified my intent. I want now to address "Napoleon was oldest the attribution I could find." There are two aspects to "oldest attribution"; one is to when the attribution was made, and the other is the era that the attributed person lived. They should not be confused. If I say that Socrates said "a broken clock is right twice a day", then this is a recent attribution to someone who lived a long time ago. If others then follow my lead, then there will be a lot of modern citations to someone who lived thousands of years ago. That doesn't mean it would be correct. This means one can't simply order the list of attributed people and pick the person who lived first. That might be a false attribution. For example, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125169095 http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1251690... describes some of the quotes falsely attributed to Lincoln, and http://shannonselin.com/2014/07/10-things-napoleon-never-said/ http://shannonselin.com/2014/07/10-things-napoleon-never-sai... lists quotes attributed to Napoleon, but which he either did not say or did not originate. One way to help identify misattributed quotes is to look in the historical record. Sometimes people 50 years ago quoted unknown person X as the source of a quote, where people now quote older and more famous person Y. Because of the tendency to attach quotes to a more famous person, this would suggest - though surely not prove - that the attribution to Y is incorrect. In the early 1970s you can see many people name diverse sources to the quote, including Haley, author of "Roots". As Napoleon's writing are well-known and studied, the lack of a citation during that to Napoleon is a strong indicator that he did not make the quote in any citeable fashion. (Eg, the shannonselin.com link points out Napoleon may have said 'Not tonight, Josephine'; we just don't have citeable evidence for it.)
  - oso2k 11y ago
    > One way to help identify misattributed quotes is to look in the historical record. Sometimes people 50 years ago quoted unknown person X as the source of a quote, where people now quote older and more famous person Y. > Because of the tendency to attach quotes to a more famous person, this would suggest - though surely not prove - that the attribution to Y is incorrect. dalke, you just agreed with my original point in citing those quotes after getting tangled in the weeds of citation & attribution. History or the historical record is often inaccurate; often (re)written by those who control such things at the time of (re)writing. Though, I must say, your distrust of historical record doesn't seem to lead you to the next, and for me, more important question than accuracy of attribution & citation: Why?