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Thank you. May I ask what in particular is seen as wrong (factually?) with Gibbon's view of Rome by today's historians? Did new information come to light since

by omonra 11y ago

Thank you. May I ask what in particular is seen as wrong (factually?) with Gibbon's view of Rome by today's historians? Did new information come to light since he wrote his books that makes him unsuitable for a serious historian to cite?

nemo 11y ago
Gibbon wrote at a time where literary sources were the main material that was used. He actually was something of a pioneer in the 1700s in trying to tie his arguments to cited texts, which is admirable, but given how much ancient historians inherently carried a load of bias and often were offering third-hand accounts at best, they were deeply unreliable. Often histories were laden with propaganda and politics. Modern historians still do look to those historians, but are much more critical about vetting their reliability on topics, have more texts to work with (largely in thanks to the Oxyrhynchus discoveries - Oxyrhynchus was basically an ancient garbage dump in Egypt which thanks to the arid climate preserved a huge trove of texts.) Historians also have a lot of other material to work with - archaeology, epigraphy, numismatics that either weren't available or weren't really considered in Gibbon's time. Many of these offer more objective data about the goings on of the empire and can tell us a lot about things happening all over the empire and show how unreliable the texts discussing events can be. Modern historiography tries to approach history from as objective and critical a stance as can be managed, rather than seeing history as a kind of tapestry to weave a preconceived narrative from. Gibbon's historiographical approach was to weave a history from the documents that while for the most part was roughly accurate in many details, was all about building a grand narrative of how the Late Empire fell due to Christianity effectively ruining everything it touched, miring the empire in "superstition," and "enthusiasms." Today historians recognize that we are better off focusing on building as reliable an account as we can while a historian should (at least attempt to) leave the moralizing and grand narratives out.
- HSO 11y ago
  I usually just upvote but this is a very good comment. Thank you!

by omonra 11y ago

nemo 11y ago

Gibbon wrote at a time where literary sources were the main material that was used. He actually was something of a pioneer in the 1700s in trying to tie his arguments to cited texts, which is admirable, but given how much ancient historians inherently carried a load of bias and often were offering third-hand accounts at best, they were deeply unreliable. Often histories were laden with propaganda and politics. Modern historians still do look to those historians, but are much more critical about vetting their reliability on topics, have more texts to work with (largely in thanks to the Oxyrhynchus discoveries - Oxyrhynchus was basically an ancient garbage dump in Egypt which thanks to the arid climate preserved a huge trove of texts.) Historians also have a lot of other material to work with - archaeology, epigraphy, numismatics that either weren't available or weren't really considered in Gibbon's time. Many of these offer more objective data about the goings on of the empire and can tell us a lot about things happening all over the empire and show how unreliable the texts discussing events can be. Modern historiography tries to approach history from as objective and critical a stance as can be managed, rather than seeing history as a kind of tapestry to weave a preconceived narrative from. Gibbon's historiographical approach was to weave a history from the documents that while for the most part was roughly accurate in many details, was all about building a grand narrative of how the Late Empire fell due to Christianity effectively ruining everything it touched, miring the empire in "superstition," and "enthusiasms." Today historians recognize that we are better off focusing on building as reliable an account as we can while a historian should (at least attempt to) leave the moralizing and grand narratives out.

HSO 11y ago
I usually just upvote but this is a very good comment. Thank you!