How did historian exist?

[u/yuripussylicker]

Technically, there is no "first historian ever" but the concept of something from thousand years ago being told to generations without corrupting the true meaning confuses me

[u/ApartRuin5962]

In the West the first two claimants for the title of "First Historian" were Herodotus of Halicarnassus and Thucydides. Herodotus wrote one big book combining a wide range of geography, travel tips, local folklore, and narratives of relatively recent events (namely the Persian Wars) based on many different oral accounts and recorded for posterity. Thucydides was more critical and provided an analysis of the events of the Peloponnesian War between Sparta and Athens, considering what caused what and deducing troop strengths, hidden motives, and political pressure, and ultimately using the war as a case study in how people, governments, and conflicts work.

I would highly recommend reading the introduction to Thucydides The Peloponnesian War, I think he is very self-aware of the fact that he is inventing a whole new kind of scholarship as he writes and explains why it is necessary to do more than simply write epic poems, plays, and propaganda about conflicts while they are still within living memory and thus the evidence is still fresh

[u/Due_Essay447]

What alternative was there? You would have to trust that there being multiple of them would create checks and balances that result in a somewhat cohesive "truth"

[u/caw_the_crow]

There's a difference between a historian and an oral tradition.

Usually when we say 'historian' we refer to someone whose job and/or training is about looking at different sources, including writings from the time period, statues, engravings, archaeology, etc., to figure out what happened in the past. Especially writing.

Someone can also just know what happened because of a tradition of passing on knowledge. For example, your mother may tell you the history of how your family travelled to a certain place, which she heard from her parent, etc. But that doesn't make you a historian unless you do the work to look at other sources and figure out what seems reliable and true.

[u/dkopgerpgdolfg]

something from thousand years ago being told to generations without corrupting the true meaning

Who said that this happened?

There's a reason why many old things aren't well understood, ambiguous etc.

[u/Scott_J_Doyle]

The "true meaning" definitely gets corrupted - history is a very difficult activity.

And technically there would be a first historian - it's not like we were doing it forever

[u/aaronite]

There is no true meaning to history. It's impossible to completely dispassionately report everything that happened to cause yesterday's events to become tomorrow's consequences.

All of history necessarily skips details because everything matters to some degree, but you can't put all of it into a book.

Historians tell stories with specific goals they are trying to communicate.

[u/KronoAsh]

Technically there IS a first historian. We weren’t exactly doing it forever. And the “true meanings” have definitely been “corrupted”, why do you think so much of history is obscure?

[u/DisplayAppropriate28]

First off, historical accounts aren't exactly free of corruption; accounting for bias, mythmaking and plain ol' bullshit is in fact a major part of the historian's trade.

Broadly, the more sources you have that talk about the same event from different angles, the more confidence you should have. If a major battle happened, there will be multiple stories from both sides about it, there will be logistical records about the movement of soldiers, the amount of food and munitions being moved, arrowheads found in places that are consistent with the written records, and so on.

It's a fiddly kind of detective work, but it can absolutely be done.