Practice question · Put in order
Order these historiographical landmarks.
- Ibn Khaldun’s Muqaddimah sets out a science of society (1377)
- Herodotus inquires into the Greek–Persian wars (~440 BCE)
- Sima Qian completes the Shiji (~94 BCE)
- Ranke’s archival seminar founds the modern discipline (1820s–30s)
- Thucydides narrows history to contemporary events (~400 BCE)
Hints
- Two Greeks come first, then a Chinese archivist.
- The professionalising German professor comes last.
Show the answer
- Herodotus inquires into the Greek–Persian wars (~440 BCE)
- Thucydides narrows history to contemporary events (~400 BCE)
- Sima Qian completes the Shiji (~94 BCE)
- Ibn Khaldun’s Muqaddimah sets out a science of society (1377)
- Ranke’s archival seminar founds the modern discipline (1820s–30s)
Why
Two Greeks, a Chinese court archivist, a North African theorist, and a Prussian professor. The standard textbook sprints from the second to the fifth, and calls a provincial tradition "the history of history".
Practise From Herodotus to Ranke
The app has 6 more questions on this lesson, and keeps your place in the course. History I is free to start.
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