History itself the second observation is that the

history itself. The second observation is that the necessity to establish these basic facts rests not on any quality in
the facts themselves, but on an a priori decision of the historian.”

© 2020 IJCRT | Volume 8, Issue 10 October 2020 | ISSN: 2320-2882
IJCRT2010108 International Journal of Creative Research Thoughts (IJCRT) 823
The past itself can never change, i.e. history could not be altered, however our understanding of the past is always
changing and evolving. Different historians analyse and interpret the past according to their own techniques,
principles and priorities. They make new theories and conclusions that could change the way of our understanding
of the past. Historiography recognizes and analyses this process of change. To understand historiography, we must
first accept the fact that our understanding of history is never absolute. Understanding of the past is never immune
to challenges and criticisms. We should also understand the difference between historical facts (things shown by
proof and recognized as true) and history (the analysis and interpretation of these things). The past definitely
contains many definite facts. For example, World War 1 broke out in 1914, India got freedom from British rule in
1947, Atomic bombing of Japanese town Hiroshima took place on 6
th
august 1945.These facts could be isolated
and devoid of meaning if taken on their own. The role of a historian is to make sense of these individual facts
through analysis and research. For doing that, they inspect and interpret the facts, make assumptions, prepare
theories and expresses their findings in the form of their writings.
The questions that a historian is generally tends to answers are as follows:

Causes: Why a particular event have taken place or why an idea have originated.

Process: What are the courses of the event.

Result: What are the outcomes of a particular event or idea.

Consequences: What are the far reaching consequences of the particular event or idea.

Contributions: The action and reaction of different people related to the event.

Significance: The importance of the event or idea.

Changes: To capture the changes that have taken place as a result of the event or idea.
HISTORY OF HISTORIOGRAPHY
From the 19
th
century, historiography as an independent branch of history emerged in Europe. It evolved as a result
of the philosophical revival that took place in the era of European enlightenment. Right from that time, numerous
works on historiography has been produced all over the world. The successive stages of development in history
writing from ancient to the present times can be traced through these works. They capture the progress of ideas of
various historians and changing methods in historical writing. History writing, in the method of a collection of
facts, analysing them and providing them a sensible interpretation did not emerge all of a sudden, instead it was a
gradual process that went through the way of folklore and a variety of quasi-historical writings. Every human
cultures tell us stories about the past that includes deeds of our ancestors, heroes or gods. Earliest chronicles written
by the ancient civilizations could not be treated as proper history. Though, their importance could not be ignored
in the progress of historical writings. Quasi-historical practices like the theocratic and myth traditions in history