HISTORY is the past experience of mankind. More exactly, history is the memory of that past experience as it has been preserved, largely in written records. In the usual sense, history is the product of historians’ work in reconstructing the flow of events from the original written traces or “sources” into a narrative account. The existence of written records distinguished the historic era from prehistoric times, known only through the researches of archaeology.

历史是人类的过往经历。更准确地说，历史主要是以书写记录保存下来的过往经历的记忆。在通常的意义上，历史是历史学家从原始的书写痕迹或“来源”转成记叙性描述事件流程的工作产物。存在的书面记录将历史时代与史前时代区别开来，因此只有通过考古学研究才能知晓。

The subject matter of history is the significant past, meaning the institutions and individual actions that affect the experience and development of whole communities. Traditionally, history has focused on the actions of governments, their leaders, and the conflicts among them—in other words, political and diplomatic history. In the last 100 years the scope of historical interest has broadened to include the history of ideas and the patterns and trends in economic and social life that characterize or influence society as a whole.

历史主题是意义重大的过往，意味着影响整个群落经验与发展制度以及个体行为。从传统上说，历史焦点在于政府，其领导人以及他们之间冲突的那些行为—换句话说，是政治和外交的历史。在过去的100年间，历史兴趣的范围已扩展至包括观念与模式的历史，以及塑造或影响社会作为一个整体的经济和社会生活的趋势。

History is ordinarily written and studied from the standpoint of a particular civilization or individual country. “World history,” so called, has been mainly the history of Western or European civilization, beginning with its antecedents in the ancient Near East and continuing through its period of virtual world dominance in modern time. The decline of European power in the mid-20^th century and the rise of new states in Asia and Africa have, however, directed more Western attention to the historical background of other civilizations. Within the framework of the history of civilization or country or local region, historical study is traditionally subdivided by periods—“ancient,” “medieval,” “early modern,” “modern” (with shorter sub-periods)—and by topical categories—political, diplomatic, economic, social, cultural, and intellectual history.

历史通常是从一种特定的文明或单个国家的角度来书写和研究的。所谓的“世界史”主要是西方或欧洲的文明史，从其古代的近东前身开始，并贯穿于其近代虚拟世界的统治时期。然而，20世纪中期欧洲势力的衰落和亚洲和非洲新国家的崛起将欧洲更多的注意力引向了其它文明的历史背景。在文明、国家或地区史的框架内，历史研究在传统上被细分为“古代”、“中世纪”、“现代早期”、“现代”等时期（包括更短的子时期）--以及按专题的分类—政治、外交、经济、社会、文化和思想史。

The study of history has been regarded either as a branch of the humanities or as a social science. Actually, in methods as well as subject matter, history belongs to both of these branches of learning. As a social science, history deals with all the various categories of human experience that are treated separately in political science, sociology, anthropology, and economics. The distinctiveness of history in this respect is threefold: emphasis on the chronological dimension; interrelation of the various aspects of social experience, with emphasis on multifactor explanations; and a special regard for uniqueness and the particular events, individuals, and institutions that have had social significance.

历史研究要么被视为人文学科的一个分支，要么作为一门社会学科。实际上，在方法和主题上，历史属于学问的这两个分支。作为一门社会学科，历史涉及在政治学、社会学、人类学和经济学中被分别对待的所有人类经验的不同类别。在这方面，历史的特殊性有三个层面：强调时间维度；社会经验各方面的相互关系，以强调多因素的解释；以及对独特性和特定事件、个体和具有社会意义制度的特别关注。

History is subject to the standards of social science as an attempt to establish objective truth about man and society; at the same time, the historian’s work of synthesis an interpretation involves an imagination and intuition more akin to the arts. The historical narrative is a form of literature. Furthermore, much of the content of historical study has to do with man’s humanistic experiences in intellectual and cultural pursuits.

作为确立人与社会客观真理的一种的尝试，历史受制于社会学科的标准；同时，历史学家的综合解释工作所涉及的更接近于艺术的想象和直觉。历史叙述是一种文学形式。此外，许多历史研究的内容不得不与人在智力和文化追求中的人文体验有关。

The aims of historical study are various, beginning with the motive of pure curiosity and awareness that underlies any scientific pursuit. History is often searched for the “lessons” that it is supposed to hold, though the application of past experience to the new situations of the present is not a simple matter. Almost universally, history is taught to school children for the purpose of instilling civic virtue and patriotism; under dictatorships this use of history becomes outright propaganda, with liberate misrepresentation of the past to conform to the desires of the government. Attitudes toward history—pride, shame, or grudges—may play major roles in politics within nation or in relations among them. Typically “revisionist” school of historians takes shape after violent events such as wars or revolutions, to try to reassess the event in a more objective light. 

历史研究的目的是各种各样的，以纯粹的好奇心和意识的动机开始，这构成了任何科学追求的基础。虽然把过往的经验应用于当代的新形势中并不是一件简单的事，但历史常常被用来寻找它所包含的“教训”。人们几乎普遍认为，向学童教授历史的目的是逐渐灌输公民美德和爱国主义；在独裁统治下，这种对历史的利用完全变成了宣传，为符合政府的意愿，随意歪曲历史。对历史的各种态度---傲慢、羞耻或怨恨---在国家内部的政治中，或在它们之间的关系中可能发挥着重要作用。有代表性的，在暴力事件诸如战争或革命之后，会形成“修正主义的”历史学家学派，尝试用更客观的观点来重新评价事件。

History is an essential part of the individual’s educational experience for the perspective on the variety of human experience and the nature of civilization and for the training in handling complex problems of inquiry that it gives. For the other social-science disciplines, and for policy makers, history obviously provides a far greater range of data and experience than can be drawn from the present time.

历史，对人类经验的多样性和文明本质的视角，以及它所给予的对处理复杂问题探寻的训练，是个人教育经历中重要的组成部分。对于其它的社会-科学学科，以及对于政策的制定者来说，历史显然提供了比从现代可得出的更大范围的数据和经验。

A common error in the use of history is to regard the future a fully determined by the past according to presumed “laws” of history. History itself shows that human experience is subject to too much accident and choice for the future to be fully predicable. But history can explain the origins of present problems and indicate to policy makers the probable consequences of their choices.

运用历史的一个常见错误是根据假定的历史“规律”，把未来看作是由过往完全决定的。历史本身表明，人类经验受制于太多的意外和对未来的选择，是无法完全预测的。但历史可以解释当下问题的来源，并向政策的制定者指出他们选择的可能后果。

Historical research begins with “primary source” records---documents in archives, eyewitness reports and recollections, diaries and letters, and newspapers or other contemporary publications. From these materials the historian must develop framework of questions and classifications, sift through what is often an enormous mass of material, and construct in his mind a pattern of events and their significance, all as a basis for composing a narrative that makes sense. The product of direct historical research, the “secondary source,” is usually in the form of scholarly articles and monographs or specialized books. Finally, historical information may be reworked for its utility to the reader in “tertiary sources,” taking the form of textbooks, encyclopedia articles, or popularized accounts.

历史研究从“第一手资料”记录开始---档案文件、目击者报告和回忆，日记和信件，以及报纸或其它同时期的出版物。从这些材料中，历史学家必须建立问题和分类框架，筛选出通常是大量的材料，并在他的头脑中构建事件的模式和它们的重要意义，所有一切都是构成一种有意义叙述的基础。直接历史研究的产物，“第二手资料”，通常是以学术文章和专著，或专业书刊的形式。最后，为适应读者，历史信息会在“第三资料”中以教科书、百科全书中的文章，或大众化的描述而改写。

At all stages of his work, the historian must employ his faculties of criticism and objective judgment in order to derive from his sources the nearest approximation to the actual truth about the past. He has to check for bias error, and incompleteness in his sources. At the same time the historian must guard against his own biases of nationality or partisanship. Ultimately it is impossible for the historian to be completely objective, since he cannot ignore his own moral values, and since the questions and assumptions with which he approaches the studies of the past inevitably reflect his own times. Each epoch will find new question and approaches for historical research, and the final history on any topic will therefore never be written.

在工作的各个阶段，为从资料中得出最接近过往的真实情况，历史学家必须使用他批评和客观判断的能力。他必须检查他的偏差，以及其不完整的资料。同时，历史学家必须防范他自己的民族或党派的偏见。最终历史学家不可能做到完全的客观，因为他无法忽视自己的道德价值观，而且由于他对过往的研究提出的问题和假定不可避免地反映了他自己的时代。每个时代都会为历史研究找到新的问题和方法，因此，永远也不会写出任何主题的最终历史。

                      ROBERT V. DANIELS, University of Vermont

                      Author of “Studying History: How and Why”

                      罗伯特·V. 丹尼尔斯，弗蒙特大学

                      “《历史研究：如何与为什么》”的作者

                                      2023年12月15日译

（译者注：该词条部分位列《大美百科全书》1985年版，第14卷，第226页至227页）