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Ancient Source - How do you use them?
#1
I am writing a paper on the Battle of Cannae right now. The minimum requirement for sources is 3 primary and 6 secondary sources. I am at a bit of a loss here. I can easily gather the required sources, hell I can hit double the requirement with my personal library.

But here is my dilemma.

What am I supposed to use the primary sources for in my paper? My professor has already told me that my "opinion" means nothing unless I can back it up with a scholared source. Unfortunately, as far as I understand them you cannot take primary sources at face value. Polybius and Livy give wildly contradictory information at times and as I uderstand it primary sources are used as a starting ground from which you make interpretations. I am not allowed to make interpretations. Do I write a paper where I quote a primary source, then quote a secondary source that interprets that primary source for me? Gee, sounds like a rather mind-numbing dont learn how to think or interpret on your own kind of paper. Or I could use the primary sources and pull out the most basic of information from them that everyone accepts as accurate. But then what does that accomplish?

Since I cannot think on my own in my paper there is nothing from Polybius or Livy that I can pull out that I could not more easily find in Goldsworthy or Bagnall since both wrote books on the Punic Wars and their primary sources were the two I just mentioned. In effect I am going to write a paper with 12 to 14 sources when in fact I could pick 2 or 3 of those sources and find everything in them. If I wanted to be efficient everything I pull from Polybius, Livy, Bagnall, Matyszak, and a few other books could easily come Goldsworthy.

Seems to me like my paper will have useless primary sources and a bloated secondary source list because of the requirements for the paper. Has anyone else hit this problem when writing and how do you solve it to your own satisfaction?
Timothy Hanna
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#2
I find that going through the ancient sources is generally useful, even if there are lots of modern analyses which quote the most important parts. Sometimes isolated quotes get pulled out and argued over by modern scholars, and it helps to see them in context. Or things become part of 'common knowledge' which aren't actually in the sources. And checking the original words used often tells you something, even if you know small Latin and less Greek like I do.

How long will this paper be?
Nullis in verba

I have not checked this forum frequently since 2013, but I hope that these old posts have some value. I now have a blog on books, swords, and the curious things humans do with them.
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#3
Quote:Do I write a paper where I quote a primary source, then quote a secondary source that interprets that primary source for me? Gee, sounds like a rather mind-numbing dont learn how to think or interpret on your own kind of paper.

Well, if your professor said that your opinion needs to be backed up by a source here is your opportunity. You could cite something from a primary source and argue your point backed by secondary sources, for instance.

I wouldn't call it "mind-numbing." I really enjoy looking up primary sources I read about in secondary works. I think it really helps to understand a topic and it is interesting how scholars view an ancient statement in different ways.
David J. Cord
www.davidcord.com
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#4
Quote:Do I write a paper where I quote a primary source, then quote a secondary source that interprets that primary source for me? Gee, sounds like a rather mind-numbing dont learn how to think or interpret on your own kind of paper.

It seems a bit odd, maybe, but would doing exactly this be a good educational thing. What you can learn by doing this is HOW to interpret an ancient source. I didn't write much papers, but I learned how to handle ancient sources by checking how professionals handled those. By just reading the ancient source you wouldn't be learning anything. By just reading the secondary source you wouldn't learn anything, either. So I don't agree with you it's mind-numbing and a waste of time.
________________________________________
Jvrjenivs Peregrinvs Magnvs / FEBRVARIVS
A.K.A. Jurjen Draaisma
CORBVLO and Fectio
ALA I BATAVORUM
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#5
Jurjen is spot on. To become a historian you need to learn how to interpret, value and use the sources. One way to do so, is to read the source material and check that with what modern academics have said about them. The most likely reason why your professor wants you to back your interpretation up with a modern source is that there is a science behind that. It's important to know who wrote your source, what bias may he have (or not), when did he live (what issues from his age might color his perspective?), what issues was he interested in (so what does he skip, what does he emphasize), etc, etc? Then there's a host of problems - often forgotten but sometimes extremely relevant - regarding the actual survival of the sources. It's usually obvious which parts are missing (we think something's important because it survived in our sources, but what world-shaking events did not?), but what came from what manuscript (when there are multiple surviving manuscript [=Medieval copies] they often differ in places)? Which paragraphs only survived as quotes in other, later sources?
Make it into a detective exercise and find how many modern authors read their primary sources very selectively...
Greets!

Jasper Oorthuys
Webmaster & Editor, Ancient Warfare magazine
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#6
This may help. It´s a good summary:
[url:2vei12gy]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higher_criticism[/url]
Christian K.

No reconstruendum => No reconstruction.

Ut desint vires, tamen est laudanda voluntas.
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