Outline of history

The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to history:

History – discovery, collection, organization, and presentation of information about past events. History can also mean the period of time after writing was invented (the beginning of recorded history).

Nature of history

History can be described as all of the following:

Academic discipline – body of knowledge given to – or received by – a disciple (student); a branch or sphere of knowledge, or field of study, that an individual has chosen to specialise in.
- one of the humanities – academic discipline that study the human condition, using methods that are primarily analytical, critical, or speculative, as distinguished from the mainly empirical approaches of the natural sciences.
Field of science – widely recognized category of specialized expertise within science, and typically embodies its own terminology and nomenclature. Such a field will usually be represented by one or more scientific journals, where peer-reviewed research is published. There are many sociology-related scientific journals.
- Social science – field of academic scholarship that explores aspects of human society.

Essence of history

Chronology – science of arranging events in their order of occurrence in time, such as in historical timelines.
Past – totality of events which occurred before a given point in time. The past is contrasted with and defined by the present and the future. The concept of the past is derived from the linear fashion in which human observers experience time, and is accessed through memory and recollection. The past is the domain of history.
Time – measure in which events can be ordered from the past through the present into the future, and also the measure of durations of events and the intervals between them. Time is often referred to as the fourth dimension, along with the three spatial dimensions. History describes what happened where, but also when (in time) those events took place.

Historical disciplines

Archaeology – study of past human cultures through the recovery, documentation and analysis of material remains and environmental data
Archontology – study of historical offices and important positions in state, international, political, religious and other organizations and societies
Art history – study of changes in and social context of art
Chronology – locating events in time
Cultural history – study of culture in the past
Diplomatic history – study of the historical foreign policy and diplomacy of states
History of science – study of the emergence and development of scientific inquiry
Economic history – the study of economics in the past
Environmental history – study of natural history and the human relationship with the natural world
Futurology – study of the future: researches the medium to long-term future of societies and of the physical world
Historiography – both the study of the methodology of historians and development of history as a discipline, and also to a body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians have studied that topic using particular sources, techniques, and theoretical approaches.
History painting – painting of works of art having historical motifs or depicting great events
Intellectual history
Local history – study of history in a geographically local context
Military history – study of warfare and wars in history
Naval history – branch of military history devoted to warfare at sea or in bodies of water
Paleography – study of ancient texts
Philosophy of history – philosophical study of history and its discipline.
Political history – study of past political events, ideas, movements, and leaders
Public history – presentation of history to public audiences and other areas typically outside academia
Psychohistory – study of the psychological motivations of historical events
Social history – study of societies and social trends in the past
Universal history – study of trends and dynamics in world history
Urban history – historical nature of cities and towns, and the process of urbanization
Women's history – study of the roles of women throughout history
World history – study of global or transnational historical patterns

Auxiliary sciences of history

Auxiliary sciences of history – scholarly disciplines which help evaluate and use historical sources and are seen as auxiliary for historical research.^[1] Auxiliary sciences of history include, but are not limited to:

Archeology – study of ancient and historic sites and artifacts
Chronology – study of the sequence of past events
Cliometrics – systematic application of economic theory, econometric techniques, and other formal or mathematical methods to the study of history
Codicology – study of books as physical objects
Diplomatics – study and textual analysis of historical documents
Epigraphy – study of ancient inscriptions
Faleristics – study of military orders, decorations and medals
Genealogy – study of family relationships
Heraldry – study of armorial devices
Numismatics – study of coins
Onomastics – study of proper names
Paleography – study of old handwriting
Philately – study of postage stamps
Philology – study of the language of historical sources
Prosopography – investigation of a historical group of individuals through a collective study of their lives
Radiocarbon dating – assignation of dates to artefacts from the distant past^[2]
Sigillography – study of seals
Statistics – study of the collection, organization, and interpretation of (historical) data
Toponymy – study of place-names

History by period

History by chronology

Ages of history

Prehistoric Ages

Stone Age
- Paleolithic
  - Lower Paleolithic – (Homo, Stone tools, spread of Homo Erectus to Eurasia, control of fire, and later spears, pigments, constructed shelter)
  - Middle Paleolithic – (Recent African origin of modern humans, Homo sapiens, Homo neanderthalensis; clothing, beads, burial, bedding, bone tools)
  - Upper Paleolithic – (behavioral modernity, atlatl, domestication of dogs)
- Mesolithic – (microliths, bow, canoes)
- Neolithic – (domestication, nomadic pastoralism, agriculture, proto-cities)
- Chalcolithic (Copper Age) – (Yamna culture, Corded Ware)
  - Uruk period
  - Europe – (Metallurgy in pre-Columbian Mesoamerica)

Historic Ages

Other Ages

Regional histories

Regional history

History by continent and country

List of histories by country
Timeline of country and capital changes since 1001 CE
Timeline of ancient country changes before 1001 CE

Economic history by region

Military history by region

Eras by region

Era

History by field

History of religions

History of science

History of science

History of social sciences

History of the social sciences

History of technology

History of technology

History of interdisciplinary fields

Methods and tools

Prosopography – a methodological tool for the collection of all known information about individuals within a given period
Historical revisionism – traditionally used in a completely neutral sense to describe the work or ideas of a historian who has revised a previously accepted view of a particular topic
Historiography – study of historical methodology

General concepts

Annals
Big History
Centuries
Chronicle
Chronology
Decades
Family history
Future
Future history
Genealogy
Historian
Historical classification
Historical revisionism – reinterpretation of orthodox views on evidence, motivations, and decision-making processes surrounding a historical event. Though the word revisionism is sometimes used in a negative way, constant revision of history is part of the normal scholarly process of writing history.
Historical thinking – scholastic reasoning skills applied to historical content, including chronological thinking, historical comprehension, historical analysis and interpretation, historical research capabilities, and historical issues analysis and decision making.
History is written by the victors
History of science and technology
- Timeline of historic inventions
- Timeline of electromagnetism and classical optics
- Timeline of mathematics
- Timeline of atomic and subatomic physics
Identity
Landscape history
List of time periods
Marxist historiography
Millennium
Mythology
Narrative
Oral tradition
Oral history
Palaeography
Past
Periodization
Political history
Prehistory
Present
Pseudohistory
Social history
Social change
Virtual history

Historians

Lists

References

^ Drake, Miriam A. (2003). Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science. Dekker Encyclopedias Series. Vol. 3. CRC Press. ISBN 0-8247-2079-2.
^ Weart, Spencer (2004). "Uses of Radiocarbon Dating". American Institute of Physics. Retrieved 21 March 2015.

External links

Internet History Sourcebooks Project See also Internet History Sourcebooks Project. Collections of public domain and copy-permitted historical texts presented cleanly (without advertising or excessive layout) for educational use.
WWW-VL: History Central Catalogue first history on the WWW, located at European University Institute
BBC History Site
History of things provides quality historical information about countries, sports, brands, music and many other facts and stuff.
[1]

[Drake-1] Drake, Miriam A. (2003). Encyclopedia of Library and Information Science. Dekker Encyclopedias Series. Vol. 3. CRC Press. ISBN 0-8247-2079-2.

[2] Weart, Spencer (2004). "Uses of Radiocarbon Dating". American Institute of Physics. Retrieved 21 March 2015.

[1]

[2]

v t e History of Africa
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v t e History of North America
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v t e History of South America
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v t e History of Asia
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Category Asia portal

v t e History of Europe
Prehistory	Paleolithic Europe Neolithic Europe Bronze Age Europe Iron Age Europe
Classical antiquity	Classical Greece Roman Republic Hellenistic period Roman Empire Early Christianity Christianity in late antiquity Crisis of the Third Century Fall of the Western Roman Empire Late antiquity
Middle Ages	Early Middle Ages Migration Period Christianity in the Middle Ages Christianization Francia Anglo-Saxon England Byzantine Empire Papal States Bulgarian Empire First Second Maritime republics Venice Genoa Pisa Amalfi Viking Age Kievan Rus' Crown of Aragon (Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia, Majorca) Holy Roman Empire High Middle Ages Republic of Florence Feudalism Crusades Mongol invasion Serbian Empire Late Middle Ages Black Death Hundred Years' War Kalmar Union
Modern period	Renaissance Early modern Christianity in the modern era Reformation Age of Discovery Baroque Grand Duchy of Tuscany Thirty Years' War Absolute monarchy Ottoman Empire Portuguese Empire Spanish Empire Early modern France Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth Cossack Hetmanate Swedish Empire Dutch Republic British Empire Habsburg monarchy Russian Empire Age of Enlightenment Great Divergence Industrial Revolution French Revolution Napoleonic Wars Nationalism Revolutions of 1848 World War I Russian Revolution Interwar period World War II Cold War European integration European debt crisis COVID-19 pandemic Russian invasion of Ukraine
See also	Art of Europe Bibliography of European history Genetic history of Europe History of Christianity History of the Mediterranean region History of the European Union History of Western civilization Maritime history of Europe Military history of Europe Crusading movement