Historical Interpretation and Source Evaluation
What you must understand
Interpretation is argued, not asserted. Know source criticism (origin, purpose, value, limitation), corroboration, contextualisation, historiography (Herodotus, Thucydides, Livy, Tacitus, Plutarch, Polybius and their methods and biases), and modern schools and debates such as structural versus individual explanation, elite versus subaltern perspectives, and the impact of archaeology on textual narratives.
Learn to handle fragmentary sources (e.g. lost historians known through quotations), inscriptions with formulaic language, papyri as administrative and private evidence, and material culture as non-intentional evidence.
Traps examiners set
- Using a source's bias as a reason to discard it entirely; bias is itself evidence of viewpoint.
- Quoting a historian without naming date, genre and audience.
- Confusing reliability (accuracy) with usefulness (what it can tell you) - a propaganda inscription is unreliable for facts and excellent for ideology.
- Overgeneralising from a single find or one passage.
- Presenting a modern interpretation as established fact rather than a position with evidence.
Rule of thumb
Use the OPVL-plus frame: Origin, Purpose, Value, Limitation, plus what it cannot tell you - then state your judgement explicitly and weigh it against another source.
Worked example
"How useful is Thucydides for the Peloponnesian War?" Value: contemporary participant, rigorous about cause, includes speeches showing competing positions. Limitations: speeches are reconstructed, focus on Athens and Sparta, silence on women, slaves and economic life, and his own exile shapes perspective. Corroborate with inscriptions (tribute lists), comedy (Aristophanes) and archaeology. Conclude: highly useful for elite political and military narrative, insufficient alone for social history.