Analysis and Evaluation of Ancient Sources
What you must understand
You must evaluate sources systematically: authorship, date, genre, audience, purpose, bias, reliability, corroboration and limitations. Distinguish primary from secondary sources and literary from documentary and material evidence. Know that ancient historians wrote rhetoric-laden narrative, that speeches in historiography are usually composed, that inscriptions and coins offer non-elite or official perspectives, and that archaeology can confirm or complicate texts. Concepts include source criticism, corroboration, silences, and the difference between reliability and usefulness - a biased source is still useful evidence for the author's attitudes.
Traps in questions
Do not dismiss a source as 'biased' and stop there; explain what the bias reveals and how to use it. Avoid treating one source as definitive. Do not conflate reliability with truthfulness or usefulness. Beware questions that ask about 'the ancient view' when sources disagree. Do not overstate what fragmentary evidence can prove.
Rule of thumb
Run the OCCAM check: Origin, Context, Content, Audience, Motive - then state explicitly what the source can and cannot support.
Worked example
Comparing an imperial coin with a literary panegyric, note that both are official and interested; the coin's wide circulation makes it evidence for intended public messaging, while the text gives fuller ideological articulation. Neither proves popular belief.