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History vocabulary · Sources and Archives

Source criticism

Meaning in history, with examples

nounCommon term

In history, source criticism means: The careful evaluation of a historical source to judge where it came from, who made it and why, and how reliable and useful it is for a particular question.

In Turkish: kaynak eleştirisi, kaynak tenkidi

How it is used

A core method that developed in nineteenth-century German scholarship. External criticism checks whether a source is authentic and when it was made; internal criticism examines its content, bias and accuracy. In teaching, source analysis and source evaluation are also common.

Example sentences

  1. Good source criticism starts with a simple question: who wrote this, and why?

  2. Source criticism showed that the letter was a later forgery.

Common collocations

  • apply source criticism
  • external criticism
  • internal criticism
  • source analysis
  • primary sourceEvidence created at the time being studied or by people who witnessed it, such as letters, diaries, official records, photographs or objects.
  • biasA one-sided view that makes a source or a writer favour one person, group or explanation, so that the account is not fully balanced or complete.
  • provenanceThe origin of a document or object and the record of who has owned or kept it since it was made, used to judge whether it is genuine and lawfully held.
  • evidenceInformation from sources, objects or data that helps show whether a claim about the past is true, or how likely it is.

More terms: Sources and Archives

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