Traditional Historiography Research Articles

The Tradition and Renewal of Islamic Historiography

Since the nineteenth century, the study of history has become an important branch of historiography, and the number of related research discourses has renewed our understanding of the discipline in general. The study and learning of history has been undertaken in order to examine and summarise the lessons of historical research in order to make it better in the future. The Arab Islamic civilization of the Middle East has created a rich tradition of historiography, which has alternated and interpenetrated with various religious, humanistic and natural disciplines, occupying an important place in the history of Islamic culture and making a great contribution to the history of world civilization, while the tradition of Islamic historiography and its renewal in modern times have provided us with valuable lessons for the study of history today.

Alexander I and the Resignation of M. M. Speransky

This article analyses the historiographical traditions of studying the resignation of M. M. Speransky from the position of Secretary of State in March 1812. Also, the author considers the contradictions in various interpretations regarding the role Emperor Alexander I played in the events and demonstrates the connection of these contradictions with the way in which scholars relied on historical sources to substantiate their concepts. As a result, the article shows that many of the contradictions and ‘mysteries’ of the story followed an uncritical use of later sources that carry significant distortions. Additionally, the author demonstrates that some of the distortions were made deliberately, e. g. in the middle of the nineteenth century, J. de Saint-Glin, an active participant in the events, really wanted to influence the formation of versions behind Speransky’s resignation in historiography and in many ways succeeded in it. Firstly, a new analysis of the sources shows how accusations against Speransky accumulated in the hands of Alexander I, including the most serious of them – treason; and, secondly, what role the Ministry of Police and personally Saint-Glin could play in this. The article emphasises that Alexander I’s decision cannot be considered without regarding his emotional state on the eve of a new clash with Napoleon, which was decisive for the country and his personal fate. Letters from the emperor’s inner circle, namely, Professor G. F. Parrot, his friend, prove that. In this state, he could take accusations of treason seriously, and then he maintained a close interest in the investigation to such an extent that he was even ready to “shoot traitors”. After the wars of 1812–1815, Alexander I’s attitude towards the Speransky case changed so much that he recognised his own wrong and demonstrated readiness to return him to St Petersburg gradually. This approach makes some interpretations of historiography redundant, which previously emphasised the ‘duplicity’ of the emperor, his “acting”, and his desire to abandon the course of liberal reforms.

Urban Censuses in Post-Reform Russia: Analytical Traditions and Practices

This article analyses the historiography of using late Imperial Russian city censuses. The past three decades of historical urban studies in Russia have made such an urban census data study necessary. The city census materials are a more reliable source than the official statistics comparable with national census data. The authors analyse publications related to the urban census history and the implied original methodological solutions for using city census data. The article reconstructs the chronology of historiographic trends, highlighting the regional research traditions. The classification of publications according to thematic and methodological characteristics makes it possible to determine the main directions of the development of source studies. The authors argue that the disciplinary focus of specific studies with reference to census results gradually shifted from purely demographic to historical. The research proves that the country’s history conditioned the development of historiography and its research problems. The pre-revolutionary tradition focused on the practical use of census results and the description of the methodological component. Academic generalising historiography was just emerging. Due to the communist ideology that did not encourage local studies during Soviet times, the use of urban censuses decreased, but source studies reached a qualitatively new level of analysis. The main trend of current historiography is the increased attention to censuses of provincial cities. Specific historical work based on city census data, including such unique components as spatial referencing, has become a notable practice. The historiographic tradition of studying city censuses was formed in both capitals and Western Siberia, while the Crimean school is currently forming.

Rogue Revolutionaries: The Fight for Legitimacy in the Greater Caribbean

Rogue Revolutionaries: The Fight for Legitimacy in the Greater Caribbean

Stories of emperors, sultans, and cities: comparing protagonists in the histories of Doukas and Leonardo Bruni

One of the defining features of the Byzantine historiographical tradition is the dominant narrative roles played by emperors and, in the later period, by Ottoman sultans. This article explores this characteristic feature of the tradition through comparative analysis of the structuring roles occupied by such characters in the fifteenth-century History of Doukas and the protagonistic role of the Florentine people in the contemporary History of the Florentine People by Leonardo Bruni. Transhistorical comparison, organized around two case studies, serves to denaturalize the roles played by emperors and sultans in both Byzantine and modern historiography.

A Ciné-Geography of Militant Cinema in the age of Three Worlds. Making Global History Appear in the Long 1960s

This essay questions the historical narrative of liberation struggles in the long 1960s by looking into two documentary films: La Hora de los Hornos, by Fernando Solanas and Octavio Getino (Argentina 1968), and Le Fond de L’Air est Rouge, by Chris Marker (France 1977). A comparative analysis of the two films – two long narratives of neocolonialism and anti-imperialism – will allow us not only to revisit the periodization of the sixties, but also the ability of militant cinema to overcome the shortcomings of traditional historiography to render the global geopolitics of its struggles. More specifically, the deployment of montage in La Hora decentred the political hierarchies of the capitalist world-system from the perspective of the third world, thus opening history to a global approach of the long 1960s; as for Le Fond, the film can be seen as a global archive of images reinforcing the worldwide scope of the period’s struggles while simultaneously giving it a sense of historical closure. The formal experiments in La Hora and Le Fond allow us to reflect on these films’ status as forms of historical mediation. Showing 1960s political struggles through the formal procedures of film, however, challenges traditional history in fundamental ways. Accordingly, the essay concludes with a reflection on the historicity of film narratives. In particular, it will try to point to how film montage and duration may constitute appropriate narrative forms to come to terms with some of the major challenges currently put to historiography: the global circulation in the history of capitalism and the temporality of the end of communism.

Global Origins of Probabilism

In contrast to traditional historiography which, until recently, has generally explained the origin of probabilism based on works written in the European academic context, this article explores pragmatic works written mostly by —and for— experienced actors making practical use of their knowledge in fields such as trade, commerce and sacraments within the new global horizon of the Hispanic Monarchy. I propose a new, more global explanation of the progressive emergence of probabilism as a theological doctrine and method for the resolution of cases. Particular attention is granted to the use of probabilistic arguments in works of American missionary literature and writings of moral theology produced in the changing context of the central decades of the sixteenth century. This analysis allows us to understand their focus on evaluating probable alternatives in unfamiliar contexts and with unforeseen doubts that already existed in Vitoria’s ideas on economy and mission. As I show in this article, this emerging focus is a tendency that later Salamancan disciples such as the novohispano theologians Alonso de la Vera Cruz (1509-1584) and Tomás de Mercado (1523-1575) went on to radicalize by appealing to the need to follow merely probable opinions in a growing range of cases. Both of them adapted European moral and religious norms to a wide range of specifically early modern problems. The evaluation of the family or marriage customs of the indigenous American peoples and of frequent practices in the transatlantic economy such as money exchange and sale on credit were among the most discussed.

Калмыцкая степь Астраханской губернии в конце XIX в. (по новым архивным материалам)

Introduction. The article introduces into scientific circulation newly discovered archival materials and analyzes actual conditions in Kalmyk Steppe of Astrakhan Governorate in the late 19th century. The issue remains topical enough, which results from its poor historiographic tradition: only a few works have been published in the modern period just to outline some fragmentary aspects. In addition, interdisciplinary, civilizational and cultural approaches are urgently needed to address this theme. Goals. The work attempts a complex characterization of Kalmyk uluses and Kalmyk society in the late 19th century. The former shall be instrumental in defining traditional features and identifying the degree of introduction of new phenomena in socioeconomic development of the region. So, the paper provides data on quite a range of aspects inherent to Kalmyk life. The chronological framework of the study (late 19th century) is well justified: the Kalmyks had spent almost 300 years within Russia’s borders, which makes it possible to determine the degree of preservation of traditional essentials and identify the influence of innovations. Materials and methods. The work employs a set of general scientific and special historical research methods. Special attention is paid to the principles of historicism and systemacity helpful in analyzing events from over 100 years ago and considering the latter in connection with other aspects of Kalmyk social life. Interdisciplinary and civilizational approaches make it possible to present objective accounts of complex processes. The mentioned documents are stored at the Russian State Historical Archive and the National Archive of Kalmykia. The former are mainly represented by consolidated annual reports of Astrakhan Governor describing actual conditions in Kalmyk Steppe — a special administrative and territorial unit of Astrakhan Governorate. Results. The paper analyzes the reports for data on territory and population of Kalmyk Steppe, economy and social structure of Kalmyk society, school and medical aid systems. It also stresses accounts of Astrakhan Kalmyks’ moral appearances by Astrakhan officials. Conclusions. The study shows that Astrakhan Kalmyks were still a traditional nomadic society at the turn of the 20th century. Their livelihood was based on extensive nomadic livestock breeding with the same species and breeds as 300 years ago, though some innovations had been perceived (occasional winter forage conservation, construction of permanent buildings in some localities). All needs of Kalmyks were fully satisfied with their own farmsteads. The innovations included attempts to engage in agricultural activities in suitable areas of Maloderbetovsky Ulus next to resettled Russian peasants, and the involvement of Kalmyk communities in market relations.

The success of the Dutch Revolt: an interpretation inspired by Norbert Elias

ABSTRACT This essay argues that the traditional historiography of the Dutch Revolt (1566–1609/1648) falls short in explaining its success, which became manifest by the 1590s. Whereas religious zeal, geographical conditions, and tax protests play an undeniable role in understanding the outbreak and persistence of the rebellion, the tenacity of the northern provinces of the Netherlands should be understood at least in part as a response to a degree of violence on the part of the Spanish-Habsburg authorities that offended early modern sensibilities of this urbanized region, thereby attesting to the continued relevance of various aspects of Norbert Elias’ civilizing process.

Black Futures Not Yet Lost

This essay explores how the resurgence of the Black Lives Matter movement’s public visibility during the summer of 2020 opened critical space to reconsider and critique entrenched narratives of British abolitionism that render the fate of post-emancipation Black futures inconsequential. It highlights some of the contestations within a British historiographical tradition that has co-opted abolitionism as a means to engender and fortify mythologies of a liberal and progressive white nation to the detriment of even conceiving of Black freedom as a requisite to emancipation. Black political thinkers from the period of enslavement to the present have continually spoken back to these abridged and romanticized histories of British abolitionism calling into view the limits of white abolitionist projects. This article outlines some of the intellectual currents that have shaped a history of Black abolitionist praxis in Britain as a political posture rooted in an acknowledgment of abolition’s unfinished work and its import in the present in anticipation of free Black futures yet to come.

From history to politics: Prince and king of rus Danylo Romanovych in narodnyk’s historical imagination

The article is devoted to the study of the history of the image of Prince and King Danylo Romanovych in the Ukrainian cultural memory of the second half of the 19th century. The choice of the suggested segment of memory studies in Ukrainian history was chosen due to the ideological and, to some extent, the political context of the creation and subsequent construction of the image of Danylo Romanovych as «Prince Danylo Halytskyi» was not investigated in historiographical tradition. Also, some of the features of the creation of historical myths and pseudo-scientific names should be discovered around the ruler’s biography in the process of forming a national identity. The image of Danylo, deprived of a real background, has led to the formation of a limited perspective of historical research, which reduces the cultural and spatial influence of his figure to the Western Ukrainian region and does not fully reconstruct the period of transformation of the Galician-Volyn state into the kingdom of Rus.The author substantiates the main methodological principles of work, reviews the state of study of the scientific problem in the literature, and describes the sources used to realize the goal and objectives. Suggested studies about King Danylo Romanovych were hold due to the methodological constructs of the phenomenon of memoria in Western European researchers. An important role is devoted to understanding the basic terms of memory discourse, which became the core of the implementation of the ideas of the author in the work. Among them, we distinguish the concept of memory and its forms, the phenomenon of the nation, collective and cultural identity, social and individual consciousness.The author highlighted the peculiarities of the intellectual history of the representatives of the Ukrainian national movement – M. Dashkevych and M. Kostomarov, who borrowed to their historical narrative the Russophile «Danylo Halytskyi». This researchers tried to use this image to form their conception of Ukrainian history of Rus.

Female Agents at the Royal Palace of Madrid: Political Interests, Favors and Gifts (ca. 1598-1640)

The rise of the New Diplomatic History in the late twentieth century led to a methodological revolution altering the foundations of traditional historiography.2 One of the principal consequences were a new recognition that there were multiple sorts of diplomatic agents that included artists, businessmen, men of the church, travelers, and women. It is this last group to which we devote this essay. In this paper we will analyze several case studies in order to offer a general perspective of the mechanisms used by these female agents so as to establish a pattern of behavior. We will focus on aristocratic women at the Madrid court during the reign of Philip III and Philip IV in order to know how the foreign ambassadors approached these women seeking information. These women get in return gifts and mercedes for them, their families and members of their patronage networks. Finally, we will study the multiple fidelities developed by female agents.

Foucault and Starobinski

In The Birth of the Clinic, Foucault sweeps both bibliographical references and academic deference aside, thumbing his nose at historians of medicine and initiating a bras d’honneur towards traditional historiography. In this article, we will first recall the context of the reception of Foucault’s translation, where we see Anglo-Saxon readers swinging between admiration and repulsion when reading The Birth of the Clinic. An archeology of Medical Perception. We will then demonstrate how Jean Starobinski’s account of it, “Gazing at Death”, differs from those of his English-speaking peers. Finally, we will explain why we read in it the critical relationship, in every sense of the word, that Foucault and Starobinski maintained throughout their lives.

Heresy and Liminality in Shingon Buddhism: Deciphering a 15th Century Treatise on Right and Wrong

Traditional historiography of Japanese Buddhism presents the Muromachi period as an era of triumph for Zen, and of decline for the previous near-hegemony of Esoteric Buddhism. However, for the Shingon school, the period from the late Middle Ages to early Edo period was rather a phase of expansion, especially in the more remote locales of Eastern Japan. Focusing on a text authored during the fifteenth century, this article will analyze how this idea of the outskirts or periphery was integrated with the process of creation of orthodoxy in local Shingon temples. In doing so, it will shed new light not only on the evolution, but also on the epistemological role of discourse relating to heresy, and on their role in the legitimation of monastic lineages.

НОВЕЙШИЕ АРХЕОГРАФИЧЕСКИЕ ИССЛЕДОВАНИЯ СОТРУДНИКОВ ОТДЕЛА ИСТОРИИ И ИСТОРИИ КУЛЬТУРЫ БАШКОРТОСТАНА ИНСТИТУТА ИСТОРИИ, ЯЗЫКА И ЛИТЕРАТУРЫ УФИЦ РАН

The article highlights the results of scientific and archeographic research by employees of the Department of History and Cultural History of Bashkortostan of the Order of the Badge of Honor of the Institute of History, Language and Literature of the Ural Federal Research Center of the Russian Academy of Sciences over the past two decades. The historiographic traditions of archaeographic developments were laid down in pre-revolutionary regional historiography. In the 1930s with the support of the government of the Bashkir ASSR, with the help of Leningrad and Moscow researchers, the collection of «Materials on the History of the Bashkir ASSR» was published, as a result of which a colossal amount of unique primary sources was introduced into scientific circulation. A worthy contribution to the development of the problems of the national-state system was the scientific and archeographic development of B.Kh. Yuldashbaev. The creation in February 1972 on the basis of the IHLL of the South Ural Branch of the Archaeographic Commission of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR led to a significant expansion of archeographic research and publication of documents. In the post-Soviet period, the philosophy, methodology, and research topics of Russian historical science have changed dramatically, which is also reflected in the publication of primary sources. First of all, the scope of archeographic developments expanded - collections of documents appeared on the census of the population of the Ufa province in 1917 and 1920, the Muslim corps of deputies of the State Duma of Russia in 1906-1917, the Sufi sheikh Zaia Rasulev, on the participation of the Bashkir army in the Polish campaign (1771-1773) , about the Bashkir society according to the documents of the Ufa command hut of the end of the 16th-17th centuries. The research project "History of the Bashkir people" gave a great impetus to archeographic work at the Institute of Nuclear Literature - 8 volumes of collections of documents were published, in the preparation of which the employees of the department took an active part. The archaeographic work of the staff of the department continued later - the diary of the Ufa official M.S. Rebelinsky, as well as the second volume of «Materials on the History of Bashkortostan», which was prepared by A.P. Chuloshnikov by 1940, but remained unpublished due to the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. The processes of digitization of archival funds and the possibility of facsimile reproduction of archival originals, taking into account the achievements of the previous historiographic stage of archaeographic research, open up great opportunities for posing a wide range of research problems previously inaccessible to historians.

The Encyclopaedic Meaning of Erythros in Koine Greek Toponyms. A Cognitive Approach to the Definition of the Ancient Colour Cardinal Points System

Summary The cartographic and historiographic traditions interpreting the Greek toponym Erythra Thalassa indicate this expression could designate several water basins in classical historiography, though it is usually rendered univocally as the Red Sea. This research applies cognitive semantics to the history of geography to retrieve the encyclopaedic meaning of the term erythros in relation to its dictionary meaning “red”. Computationally generated lists of frequency from about 50 ancient Greek and Latin oeuvres denote a predominant toponymic use of the term and a fixed collocation in conjunction with thalassa “sea”. Additional statistical data extrapolated from the Septuagint and the Greek New Testament reveal the tendency in the biblical tradition to use exclusively the inflected form erythra in fully fixed collocations with the term thalassa. The paper finds out that the specific shade of red denoted by erythors has been used since the seventh century BCE in a number of other toponyms and ethnonyms to convey the conceptual meaning of “southern”. To comparatively verify this hypothesis, several Greek toponyms incorporating the term leukos – “white” or “western” – are discussed in relation to their relative position in the oikumene. Based on comparative chronologies and diatopic attestations of the phenomenon, the hypothesis that the Turkic colour cardinal points system and the linguistic means to convey it was introduced to Greece during the period of contact with the Scythe people is proposed.

Dalit Resistance during the Bengal Renaissance: Five Anti-Caste Thinkers from Colonial Bengal, India

This article debunks the myth that Bengal is a casteless land or that Bengalis have no understanding of caste, by excavating, from within a Dalit historiographical framework, the rich and heterogeneous anti-caste politico-intellectual tradition launched and carried forward by the Dalits in colonial Bengal. Due to the paucity of space, it focuses only on three among sixty Dalit communities residing in Bengal and demonstrates the radical edge of five diverse anti-caste thinkers, namely, Harichand Thakur, Guruchand Thakur, Mahendranath Karan, Rajendranath Sarkar, and Mahendranath Mallabarman. Through a critical rejection of nationalist, Marxist and subaltern historiographies and interrogation of the Brahmanical appropriation of Bengal’s anti-caste tradition, it foregrounds the independent and self-critical intellectual history of the Dalits of colonial Bengal. It exposes the epistemic violence suffered by Dalit thinkers and reformers in the textbook historical narratives that glorify a Brahmanical Bengal Renaissance and highlights the neglected discourse of Dalit resistance and renaissance that had taken place at the same time in the same province. It shows how these anti-caste organic intellectuals fought the Brahmanical supremacists during the anti-British movement led by the Brahmins and upper castes, and how their agendas of self-respect and redistribution of wealth conflicted with the Swadeshi movement. Finally, the article demonstrates that while in the history of the anti-caste movement, Phule, Ambedkar, and Periyar justifiably occupy much of the discursive space, a significant and unacknowledged intellectual and political contribution was also made by their contemporary Bengali counterparts.

Charitable Activities in the Sixteenth Century: Early Theatine Identity under Carafa

The Theatine order was the first of the new orders of clerics regular founded after the schism provoked by Luther. The dominant historiographical tradition suggests that, immediately following their foundation, the Theatines devoted themselves to charitable work. However, recent studies have revealed that their main founder, Gian Pietro Carafa (later Pope Paul IV), created the Theatines in 1524 because he needed collaborators to promote the sacralization of the Church for his struggle to curb ecclesiastical corruption and then against heretics and heresies. At the same time, however, what emerges is that only after Carafa's death did the second generation of Theatines refocus the order on the “care of the soul,” aligning the order with the latent teachings of co‐founder Gaetano Thiene. This article reinterprets the history of the early Theatines and aims to define their connection with charity work. It investigates the token charitable activities they performed and how even these activities conflicted with the tasks Carafa assigned to them. To better define the order's identity under Carafa, this article also investigates the difficult relationship between the early Theatines and laypeople, in particular, the women who ran various Italian charitable institutions.

“Mujeres ricas y libres”: Mujer y poder; Inés Muñoz y las encomenderas en el Perú (s. XVI)

This study addresses the role of women in shaping Spanish rule and society in Peru during the first decades of colonial dominance. Liliana Pérez Miguel, while focusing on the specific historical character Inés Muñoz, examines the extensive and diverse groups of women who benefited from the encomienda. This institution, transplanted from the Iberian Peninsula to the New World, entrusted to its beneficiaries, known as encomenderos, the Catholic evangelization and protection of specific Indigenous communities. These encomendados in return paid a tribute, in metals and goods, to their encomenderos. This access to tribute and labor force made encomiendas one of the royal rewards most desired by those who participated in the discovery, conquest, and colonization of the New World. This book shows that several women were active participants in early Spanish colonization, an enterprise that according to the traditional historiography was dominated by male actors.Pérez Miguel specifies that her book fits with an increasing production of gender studies on Latin America and colonial Peru specifically. Her work highlights the diverse social and ethnic backgrounds of those women who obtained an encomienda and their challenges and actions in the face of changing legislation and political interests that shaped their tenures. While the book focuses mainly on Inés Muñoz's life and contribution to Peru's colonization and early society, Pérez Miguel constantly draws comparisons with other contemporaneous encomenderas in colonial Peru, which allows her to reveal the wide range of these women's experiences during the convulsive decades of Spain's colonization of Peru. Through various waves of political unrest, many of these encomenderas had to overcome the loss of partners, children, and even the benefits granted them by the crown. Contradicting the passive role that traditional scholarship has asserted for female actors in early modern societies, many of these encomenderas actively assumed the leadership of their households and estates, and they even initiated legal battles to defend their benefits or seek alternative ones. Thus, beyond a clear focus on gender and biography, this work significantly contributes to social and legal history scholarship.The book provides a lively illustration of the early decades of Spanish rule in Peru, exploring the personal and intimate experiences of famous historical characters such as Francisco Pizarro and Hernando Pizarro, along with many other Spanish conquerors. However, Pérez Miguel highlights as protagonists their female companions and offspring, who on various occasions became the beneficiaries of encomiendas. Their access to economic resources, political influence, and local support networks permitted these women to make profound and lasting contributions to early colonial Peru's politics, economy, society, and culture. Muñoz was related to Francisco Pizarro through her marriage to Francisco Martín de Alcántara, half brother of the famous conqueror. Her close relationship with the first governor of Peru led Muñoz to become the caretaker of his mestizo children and brought her political and economic benefits, including multiple encomiendas. However, she was also affected negatively by the political instability of the early colonial period. After the governor and her husband died at the hands of political enemies, Muñoz became vulnerable, facing the loss of some of her political and economic benefits. By recounting the various setbacks suffered by Muñoz and many other women, some of whom had received encomiendas, the book re-creates the changing political environment faced by these women.Pérez Miguel approaches the experiences of encomenderas with a sharp analysis that employs diverse historical methodologies. She offers an extensive historiographical discussion on her use of gender as a category of analysis that brings together scholarship produced in Latin America, Europe, and North America, a historical dialogue that nurtures this book's outstanding contributions. The author's analysis is also grounded on copious archival research, including probanzas, personal correspondence, notarial records, legal proceedings, and many other records. In approaching these materials, she reminds the readers about their potential biases in relation to women's actions. She also recognizes the danger of generalizing from encomenderas' particular experiences, some of which escaped the written registers. Aware of these limitations, Pérez Miguel critically examines these resources, providing elaborate tables and charts to complement her argument. This book is enjoyable reading for both expert and general audiences, with lively stories and exciting data. Overall, Pérez Miguel's work provides a significant contribution to the scholarship on early colonial Peru.

Sufism in Ottoman Egypt Circulation Renewal and Authority in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries (by Rachida Chih)

This book examines Sufism in Ottoman Egypt in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Contrary to the traditional historiography that interpreted these two centuries as a period of stagnation and/or decline for Sufism and Sufi scholars, Rachida Chih argues that these centuries were fruitful, productive, and dynamic for Sufism in Ottoman Egypt. Chih builds her narrative around the mobilization and interaction of ideas, people, and institutions, focusing her thesis on the Khalwatiyya Sufi order.