the distinction between 'history' and 'archaeology' in the "definition" of history here is idiosyncratic. Professional historians work with all kinds of materials, including the archaeological materials distinguished in this 'definition.' |
the distinction between 'history' and 'archaeology' in the "definition" of history here is idiosyncratic. Professional historians work with all kinds of materials, including the archaeological materials distinguished in this 'definition.' True, historians use archaeology, but history is limited to the period of human written records, archaeology is not. |
The tightening of the 1st para is a nicely worked revision. sjc |
The tightening of the 1st para is a nicely worked revision. sjc |
When I started the page I made a couple of time slices, but except for the very early ones (neolithic, bronze age, maybe iron age) they really don't work too well except in localized areas. That's why the geographic overviews are at the top. But histories of disciplines wouldn't hurt to add. -- Josh Grosse
Some typical ways to divide up history that I recall include: by geographical region; by nation-state or empire; by time period (or a region in a time period such as history of medieval Europe); by sector or function within society (history of the church, history of the state which is what much history is thought to be, intellectual history, social history, military history, history of exploration, etc.). See http://dmoz.org/Society/History/ and http://dir.yahoo.com/Arts/Humanities/History/. I'm not suggesting we replicate their category schemes (which wouldn't make sense for an encyclopedia), but just use that for ideas about how to expand ours. I'd lend a direct hand but I haven't studied history in a long time. --LMS
True, historians use archaeology, but history is limited to the period of human written records, archaeology is not.
I'm not so sure about that biography link -- we have links to individuals, but Biography is no often NOT history 9or so often written as panegyric, or somewhat fictionalized, or, like that recent bio of Reagan, the author creates a fictional "fly-on-the-wall" character, that I'm not sure why there's a separate link. Anybody else think this is redundant? J Hofmann Kemp
Redundant because the 9 "historical figures" already have the field covered? :-)
Perhaps it's "fictionalized biography" that deserves an index of its own, outside the main biography index.
More imporatintly, I think we need to change the title system for individuals. Right now, we act as if we're doing dictionary entries. For example, Henry VII is 1) one person, and 2) another person. Would it be possible to either make the entry, e.g., Henry VII of England? Putting the first names in their proper language might be another solution, I suppose, so we'd have Henry, Heinrich, Henri.... At any rate, I don't think what we have is going to work well in the long run -- it will be very cumbersome very quickly. J Hofmann Kemp
My 2 groats worth: This is definitely a problem. Henry I could be any one of perm one to fifteen. But hell, every time I want to reference Henry I, if we qualify by nationality, I have to do: {{Henry I of Lemuria|Henry I}} (where { = [ ). This can be a real pain in the neck where you might be referencing ten or twelve monarchs in an article, but highly necessary. The rule of thumb from my point of view is simple: if they're English, they don't need a national qualifier. If they aren't e.g. they're Scots, French, Martian, even Cornish (and we do have the names of some of our kings...) then they need to be qualified. sjc