Practice question · Multiple choice
A manuscript claiming to be a fifth-century charter mentions a fortress built in the ninth. What kind of argument has just been made, and what is its limit?
Hints
- The fortress fixes an earliest possible date. Ask what it does not fix.
- Disqualifying a claim and establishing a new one are different jobs. Which has been done?
Show the answer
A. An anachronism argument: decisive for forgery, silent on who
Why
The anachronism sets a terminus post quem and disqualifies the claim, which is the strong move historians actually have, it says what the text cannot be, not what it is. Option 3 names a real complication, and it is why scholars distinguish an interpolated copy from a wholesale forgery.
Practise The Epistemology of History
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More questions on The Epistemology of History
- Sort each practice: does it belong to objectivity as procedure or to the impossible mirror?
- Because every historian selects and interprets, all historical accounts are equally valid.
- Why is incidental detail, a bill of lading listing the price of pepper, such strong evidence?
- Why does the archive tilt toward the wealthy, literate, and metropolitan?
- Complete the account of historical evidence.
- Put the three filters in the order they act on the past.