Did Herodotus’ Histories pave the way for historical narratives that moved away from myth and legend and toward the search for objective truth?

Herodotus’ Histories pioneered a way of writing history that moved away from a mythological worldview and toward the search for objective truth, which led to the recognition that past events could be used to predict the future and learn lessons. History has since evolved into a discipline that emphasizes accuracy and objectivity, and has become an important medium for understanding society and culture.

 

In the 5th century BC, Herodotus wrote a book about the Persian Wars and titled it Historiai. The root of the title, histor, was originally a legal term meaning “eyewitness” or “witness”. Etymologically, “history” originally meant “eyewitness testimony,” but after the appearance of Herodotus’ Histories, it came to mean “the search for truth” or “the story of the results of the search.
Before Herodotus, knowledge of the past was passed down through myths, legends, or religion, a mixture of fact and fiction. In particular, the ancient Greeks’ main source of knowledge about the past was the Iliad. “The Iliad is an epic poem written by the 9th-century BC poet Homer about the Trojan War that has been passed down from generation to generation. In this epic, the will of the gods, especially Zeus, is fulfilled through war. Herodotus sought to create a new narrative form that was distinct from epics based on this mythological worldview. In other words, Herodotus recognized the importance of events in the near past and pioneered a new field of history by directly identifying, exploring, and describing them in a causal form.
“After the Histories appeared, people came to recognize that the utility of historical narrative was to predict the future by using the past to teach lessons to future generations. This perception is based on the idea of recurrence, the idea that what has happened once will happen again and again, like the seasons. Thus, for a long time, history was perceived as a “school of life” that teaches people to be right and wise. In order to be instructive, accounts of the past had to be accurate and objective.
The realization that historical narratives can be more than just a record of past events, but also a guide to the future, has had a profound impact on modern historiography. This led to the realization that history is not just a record of the past, but an important tool for understanding the present and future. By analyzing and understanding the background, causes, and consequences of historical events, we can gain the wisdom to solve current problems and prepare for the future.
Of course, not all historians have prioritized accuracy and objectivity as the overriding principles of historical narrative. Rather, many historians of the Hellenistic and Roman periods engaged in rhetorical narratives that aimed to move their readers, a trend that continued to some extent into the Middle Ages. They considered it more important to write a moving and persuasive narrative than to record facts objectively. In this sense, they placed history within the confines of rhetoric.
However, there were still historians during this period who believed that the main purpose of history was to convey the important events of the past without sensationalizing them, and they were sharply criticized. Moreover, from the 15th century onward, rhetorical historical narratives were relegated to the margins of historical narrative, and the consciousness of accurately exploring the past and the objective description of past facts were once again emphasized as the measure of history. This change was driven by the humanists of the Renaissance, who sought to rediscover classical texts and redefine the methodology of historical writing.
From this development, we can see that historical narrative is not just a record of facts, but an important medium for understanding society and culture. Historiography is a discipline that explains the changes and development of human society based on the facts of the past, and it expands our understanding through various perspectives and methodologies. In this sense, we realize that history is not just an academic study, but an important field that is directly related to our lives.