text:
Mass versus weight
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In common usage, the mass of an object is often referred to as its weight, though these are in fact different concepts and quantities. In scientific contexts, mass refers loosely to the amount of "matter" in an object (though "matter" may be difficult to define), whereas weight refers to the force exerted on an object by gravity.[1] In other words, an object with a mass of 1.0 kilogram will weigh approximately 9.81 newtons on the surface of the Earth (its mass multiplied by the gravitational field strength), since the newton is a unit of force, while the kilogram is a unit of mass. The object's weight will be less on Mars (where gravity is weaker), more on Saturn, and negligible in space when far from any significant source of gravity, but it will always have the same mass.
Objects on the surface of the Earth have weight, although sometimes this weight is difficult to measure. An example is a small object floating in water, which does not appear to have weight since it is buoyed by the water; but it is found to have its usual weight when it is added to water in a container which is entirely supported by and weighed on a scale. Thus, the "weightless object" floating in water actually transfers its weight to the bottom of the container (where the pressure increases). Similarly, a balloon has mass but may appear to have no weight or even negative weight, due to buoyancy in air. However the weight of the balloon and the gas inside it has merely been transferred to a large area of the Earth's surface, making the weight difficult to measure. The weight of a flying airplane is similarly distributed to the ground, but does not disappear. If the airplane is in level flight, the same weight-force is distributed to the surface of the Earth as when the plane was on the runway, but spread over a larger area.
A better scientific definition of mass is its description as being composed of inertia, which is the resistance of an object being accelerated when acted on by an external force. Gravitational "weight" is the force created when a mass is acted upon by a gravitational field and the object is not allowed to free-fall, but is supported or retarded by a mechanical force, such as the surface of a planet. Such a force constitutes weight.[2] This force can be added to by any other kind of force.
While the weight of an object varies in proportion to the strength of the gravitational field, its mass is constant (ignoring relativistic effects) as long as no energy or matter is added to the object.[3] Accordingly, for an astronaut on a spacewalk in orbit (a free-fall), no effort is required to hold a communications satellite in front of him; it is "weightless". However, since objects in orbit retain their mass and inertia, an astronaut must exert ten times as much force to accelerate a 10‑ton satellite at the same rate as one with a mass of only 1 ton.
On Earth, a swing seat can demonstrate this relationship between force, mass, and acceleration. If one were to stand behind a large adult sitting stationary on a swing and give him a strong push, the adult would temporarily accelerate to a quite low speed, and then swing only a short distance before beginning to swing in the opposite direction. Applying the same impetus to a small child would produce a much greater speed.
Contents
[hide]
1 Overview
2 Converting units of mass to equivalent forces on Earth
3 Buoyancy and weight
4 Buoyancy effects of air on measurement
5 Types of scales and what they measure
6 Use in commerce
7 See also
8 Notes
Overview[edit]
Matter's mass strongly influences many familiar kinetic properties.
Mass is (among other properties) an inertial property; that is, the tendency of an object to remain at constant velocity unless acted upon by an outside force. Under Sir Isaac Newton's 330-year-old laws of motion and an important formula that sprang from his work, F = ma, an object with a mass, m, of one kilogram will accelerate, a, at one meter per second per second (about one-tenth the acceleration due to earth’s gravity)[4] when acted upon by a force, F, of one newton.
Inertia is seen when a bowling ball is pushed horizontally on a level, smooth surface, and continues in horizontal motion. This is quite distinct from its weight, which is the downwards gravitational force of the bowling ball one must counter when holding it off the floor. The weight of the bowling ball on the Moon would be one-sixth of that on the Earth, although its mass remains unchanged. Consequently, whenever the physics of recoil kinetics (mass, velocity, inertia, inelastic and elastic collisions) dominate and the influence of gravity is a negligible factor, the behavior of objects remains consistent even where gravity is relatively weak. For instance, billiard balls on a billiard table would scatter and recoil with the same speeds and energies after a break shot on the Moon as on Earth; they would, however, drop into the pockets much more slowly.
In the physical sciences, the terms "mass" and "weight" are rigidly defined as separate measures, as they are different physical properties. In everyday use, as all everyday objects have both mass and weight and one is almost exactly proportional to the other, "weight" often serves to describe both properties, its meaning being dependent upon context. For example, in retail commerce, the "net weight" of products actually refers to mass, and is expressed in mass units such as grams or ounces (see also Pound: Use in commerce). Conversely, the load index rating on automobile tires, which specifies the maximum structural load for a tire in kilograms, refers to weight; that is, the force due to gravity. Before the late 20th century, the distinction between the two was not strictly applied in technical writing, so that expressions such as "molecular weight" (for molecular mass) are still seen.
Because mass and weight are separate quantities, they have different units of measure. In the International System of Units (SI), the kilogram is the basic unit of mass, and the newton is the basic unit of force. The non-SI kilogram-force is also a unit of force typically used in the measure of weight. Similarly, the avoirdupois pound, used in both the Imperial system and U.S. customary units, is a unit of mass, and its related unit of force is the pound-force.
Converting units of mass to equivalent forces on Earth[edit]
Gravity anomalies covering the Southern Ocean are shown here in false-color relief. This image has been normalized to remove variation due to differences in latitude.
When an object's weight (its gravitational force) is expressed in "kilograms", this actually refers to the kilogram-force (kgf or kg-f), also known as the kilopond (kp), which is a non-SI unit of force. All objects on the Earth's surface are subject to a gravitational acceleration of approximately 9.8 m/s2. The General Conference on Weights and Measures fixed the value of standard gravity at precisely 9.80665 m/s2 so that disciplines such as metrology would have a standard value for converting units of defined mass into defined forces and pressures. Thus the kilogram-force is defined as precisely 9.80665 newtons. In reality, gravitational acceleration (symbol: g) varies slightly with latitude, elevation and subsurface density; these variations are typically only a few tenths of a percent. See also Gravimetry.
Engineers and scientists understand the distinctions between mass, force, and weight. Engineers in disciplines involving weight loading (force on a structure due to gravity), such as structural engineering, convert the mass of objects like concrete and automobiles (expressed in kilograms) to a force in newtons (by multiplying by some factor around 9.8; 2 significant figures is usually sufficient for such calculations) to derive the load of the object. Material properties like elastic modulus are measured and published in terms of the newton and pascal (a unit of pressure related to the newton).
Buoyancy and weight[edit]
Regardless of the fluid in which an object is immersed (gas or liquid), the buoyant force on an object is equal to the weight of the fluid it displaces.
A hot air balloon when it has neutral buoyancy has no weight for the men to support but still retains its great mass and inertia.
Usually, the relationship between mass and weight on Earth is highly proportional; objects that are a hundred times more massive than a one-liter bottle of soda almost always weigh a hundred times more—approximately 1,000 newtons, which is the weight one would expect on Earth from an object with a mass slightly greater than 100 kilograms. Yet, this is not always the case and there are familiar objects that violate this mass / weight proportionality.
A common helium-filled toy balloon is something familiar to many. When such a balloon is fully filled with helium, it has buoyancy—a force that opposes gravity. When a toy balloon becomes partially deflated, it will often become neutrally buoyant and can float about the house a meter or two off the floor. In such a state, there are moments when the balloon is neither rising nor falling and—in the sense that a scale placed under it will have no force applied to it—is, in a sense perfectly weightless (actually as noted below, weight has merely been redistributed along the Earth's surface so it cannot be measured). Though the rubber comprising the balloon has a mass of only a few grams, which might be almost unnoticeable, the rubber still retains all its mass when inflated.
Again, unlike the effect that low-gravity environments have on weight, buoyancy does not make a portion of an object’s weight vanish; the missing weight is instead being borne by the ground, which leaves less force (weight) being applied to any scale theoretically placed underneath the object in question (though one may perhaps have some trouble with the practical aspects of accurately weighing something individually in that condition). If one were however to weigh a small wading pool that someone then entered and began floating in, they would find that the full weight of the person was being borne by the pool and, ultimately, the scale underneath the pool. Whereas a buoyant object (on a properly working scale for weighing buoyant objects) would weigh less, the object/fluid system becomes heavier by the value of object's full mass once the object is added. Since air is a fluid, this principle applies to object/air systems as well; large volumes of air—and ultimately the ground—supports the weight a body loses through mid-air buoyancy.
The effects of buoyancy don’t just affect balloons; both liquids and gases are fluids in the physical sciences, and when all macro‑size objects larger than dust particles are immersed in fluids on Earth, they have some degree of buoyancy.[5] In the case of either a swimmer floating in a pool or a balloon floating in air, buoyancy can fully counter the gravitational weight of the object being weighed, for a weighing device in the pool. However, as noted, an object supported by a fluid is fundamentally no different from an object supported by a sling or cable—the weight has merely been transferred to another location, not made to disappear.
The mass of "weightless" (neutrally buoyant) balloons can be better appreciated with much larger hot air balloons. Although no effort is required to counter their weight when they are hovering over the ground (when they can often be within one hundred newtons of zero weight), the inertia associated with their appreciable mass of several hundred kilograms or more can knock fully grown men off their feet when the balloon’s basket is moving horizontally over the ground.
Buoyancy and the resultant reduction in the downward force of objects being weighed underlies Archimedes' principle, which states that the buoyancy force is equal to the weight of the fluid that the object displaces. If this fluid is air, the force may be small.
Buoyancy effects of air on measurement[edit]
Normally, the effect of air buoyancy on objects of normal density is too small to be of any consequence in day-to-day activities. For instance, buoyancy’s diminishing effect upon one’s body weight (a relatively low-density object) is 1⁄860 that of gravity (for pure water it is about 1⁄770 that of gravity). Furthermore, variations in barometric pressure will rarely affect one’s weight more than ±1 part in 30,000.[6] However, in metrology (the science of measurement), the precision mass standards for calibrating laboratory scales and balances are manufactured with such accuracy that air density is accounted for to compensate for buoyancy effects. Given the extremely high cost of platinum-iridium mass standards like the International Prototype Kilogram (the mass standard in France that defines the magnitude of the kilogram), high-quality "working" standards are made of special stainless steel alloys[7] with densities of about 8,000 kg/m3, which occupy greater volume than those made of platinum-iridium, which have a density of about 21,550 kg/m3. For convenience, a standard value of buoyancy relative to stainless steel was developed for metrology work and this results in the term "conventional mass".[8] Conventional mass is defined as follows: "For a mass at 20 °C, ‘conventional mass’ is the mass of a reference standard of density 8,000 kg/m3 which it balances in air with a density of 1.2 kg/m3." The effect is a small one, 150 ppm for stainless steel mass standards, but the appropriate corrections are made during the manufacture of all precision mass standards so they have the true labeled mass.
Whenever a high-precision scale (or balance) in routine laboratory use is calibrated using stainless steel standards, the scale is actually being calibrated to conventional mass; that is, true mass minus 150 ppm of buoyancy. Since objects with precisely the same mass but with different densities displace different volumes and therefore have different buoyancies and weights, any object measured on this scale (compared to a stainless steel mass standard) has its conventional mass measured; that is, its true mass minus an unknown degree of buoyancy. In high-accuracy work, the volume of the article can be measured to mathematically null the effect of buoyancy.
Types of scales and what they measure[edit]
A balance-type weighing scale: Unaffected by the strength of gravity.
Load-cell based bathroom scale: Affected by the strength of gravity.
When one stands on a balance-beam-type scale at a doctor’s office, they are having their mass measured directly. This is because balances ("dual-pan" mass comparators) compare the gravitational force exerted on the person on the platform with that on the sliding counterweights on the beams; gravity is the force-generating mechanism that allows the needle to diverge from the "balanced" (null) point. These balances could be moved from Earth's equator to the poles and give exactly the same measurement, i.e. they would not spuriously indicate that the doctor's patient became 0.3% heavier; they are immune to the gravity-countering centrifugal force due to Earth's rotation about its axis. But if you step onto spring-based or digital load cell-based scales (single-pan devices), you are having your weight (gravitational force) measured; and variations in the strength of the gravitational field affect the reading. In practice, when such scales are used in commerce or hospitals, they are often calibrated on-site and certified on that basis, so that the mass they measure, expressed in pounds or kilograms, is at the desired level of accuracy.[9]
Use in commerce[edit]
In the United States of America the United States Department of Commerce, the Technology Administration, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have defined the use of mass and weight in the exchange of goods under the Uniform Laws and Regulations in the areas of legal metrology and engine fuel quality in NIST Handbook 130.
NIST Handbook 130 states:
V. "Mass" and "Weight." [NOTE 1, See page 6]
The mass of an object is a measure of the object’s inertial property, or the amount of matter it contains. The weight of an object is a measure of the force exerted on the object by gravity, or the force needed to support it. The pull of gravity on the earth gives an object a downward acceleration of about 9.8 m/s2. In trade and commerce and everyday use, the term "weight" is often used as a synonym for "mass." The "net mass" or "net weight" declared on a label indicates that the package contains a specific amount of commodity exclusive of wrapping materials. The use of the term "mass" is predominant throughout the world, and is becoming increasingly common in the United States. (Added 1993)
W. Use of the Terms "Mass" and "Weight." [NOTE 1, See page 6]
When used in this handbook, the term "weight" means "mass". The term "weight" appears when inch-pound units are cited, or when both inch-pound and SI units are included in a requirement. The terms "mass" or "masses" are used when only SI units are cited in a requirement. The following note appears where the term "weight" is first used in a law or regulation.
NOTE 1: When used in this law (or regulation), the term "weight" means "mass." (See paragraph V. and W. in Section I., Introduction, of NIST Handbook 130 for an explanation of these terms.) (Added 1993) 6"
U.S. federal law, which supersedes this handbook, also defines weight, particularly Net Weight, in terms of the avoirdupois pound or mass pound. From 21CFR101 Part 101.105 – Declaration of net quantity of contents when exempt:
(a) The principal display panel of a food in package form shall bear a declaration of the net quantity of contents. This shall be expressed in the terms of weight, measure, numerical count, or a combination of numerical count and weight or measure. The statement shall be in terms of fluid measure if the food is liquid, or in terms of weight if the food is solid, semisolid, or viscous, or a mixture of solid and liquid; except that such statement may be in terms of dry measure if the food is a fresh fruit, fresh vegetable, or other dry commodity that is customarily sold by dry measure. If there is a firmly established general consumer usage and trade custom of declaring the contents of a liquid by weight, or a solid, semisolid, or viscous product by fluid measure, it may be used. Whenever the Commissioner determines that an existing practice of declaring net quantity of contents by weight, measure, numerical count, or a combination in the case of a specific packaged food does not facilitate value comparisons by consumers and offers opportunity for consumer confusion, he will by regulation designate the appropriate term or terms to be used for such commodity.
(b)(1) Statements of weight shall be in terms of avoirdupois pound and ounce.
See also 21CFR201 Part 201.51 – "Declaration of net quantity of contents" for general labeling and prescription labeling requirements.
See also[edit]
Apparent weight
Gravimeter
Pound (force)
Notes[edit]
Jump up ^ de Silva, G.M.S. (2002), Basic Metrology for ISO 9000 Certification, Butterworth-Heinemann
Jump up ^ National Physical Laboratory: What are the differences between mass, weight, force and load? (FAQ - Mass & Density)
Jump up ^ See Mass in special relativity for a discussion of mass in this context. An object or particle does not have to be traveling very close to the speed of light, c, for its relativistic mass, M (or γm) to vary measurably from its rest mass m0. Per the Lorentz transformations and Einstein’s 1905 paper, The Special Theory of Relativity, relativistic mass is 0.5% greater than m0 at only 9.96% c, thus affecting measurements performed with a precision of 1%. Whereas 10% of the speed of light is exceedingly fast in most contexts, it is not "close to the speed of light".
Jump up ^ In professional metrology (the science of measurement), the acceleration of Earth’s gravity is taken as standard gravity (symbol: gn), which is defined as precisely 7000980665000000000♠9.80665 meters per square second (m/s2). The expression "1 m/s2 " means that for every second that elapses, velocity changes an additional 1 meter per second. An acceleration of 1 m/s2 is the same rate of change in velocity as 3.6 km/h per second (≈2.2 mph per second).
Jump up ^ Objects the size of small dust particles, or smaller, are so strongly influenced by Brownian motion that they are no longer influenced by buoyancy.
Jump up ^ Assumptions: An air density of 1160 g/m3, an average density of a human body (with collapsed lungs) equal to that of water, and variations in barometric pressure rarely exceeding ±22 torrs (2.9 kPa). Assumptions primary variables: An altitude of 194 meters above mean sea level (the worldwide median altitude of human habitation), an indoor temperature of 23 °C, a dewpoint of 9 °C, and 760 mmHg (101 kPa) sea level–corrected barometric pressure.
Jump up ^ For example, for the recalibration of the US National Prototype Kilogram in 1985, two austenitic stainless steel artifacts were used for comparison. One, named D2, is similar to 18-8 (type 304) stainless (ie 18% Chromium, 8% Nickel); the other, named CH-1, is a more complex alloy that could be roughly designated as CrNiMo30-25-2 (chemical composition is 29.9% Cr, 25.1% Ni, 2.2% Mo, 1.45% Mn, 0.53 Si, 0.2% Cu, 0.07% C, 0.0019% P). Davis, R. N. (1985). "Recalibration of the US National Prototype Kilogram" (PDF). Journal of Research of the National Bureau of Standards. Washington: US Government Printing Office. 90 (4): 267. doi:10.6028/jres.090.015. Retrieved 2 May 2011.
Jump up ^ International Recommendation OIML R33, International Organization of Legal Metrology.
Jump up ^ National General Conference on Weights and Measures, Specifications, Tolerances, and Other Technical Requirements for Weighing and Measuring Devices, NIST Handbook 44
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Recorded history
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Not to be confused with History of the world, World history, or History of Earth.
Human history
↑ Prehistory
Recorded history
Ancient
Earliest records
Africa
Americas
East Asia
South Asia
Southeast Asia
West Asia
Mediterranean
Postclassical
Africa
Americas
Central Asia
East Asia
South Asia
Southeast Asia
West Asia
Europe
Modern
Early modern
Late modern
See also
Contemporary
Modernity
Futurology
↓ Future
v
t
e
Linear A etched on tablets found in Akrotiri, Santorini.
Palenque Glyphs that has a total of 92 glyphs on the tablet.
Recorded history or written history is a historical narrative based on a written record or other documented communication. It contrasts with other narratives of the past, such as mythological, oral or archeological traditions. For broader world history, recorded history begins with the accounts of the ancient world around the 4th millennium BC, and coincides with the invention of writing. For some geographic regions or cultures, written history is limited to a relatively recent period in human history because of the limited use of written records. Moreover, human cultures do not always record all of the information relevant to later historians, such as the full impact of natural disasters or the names of individuals; thus, recorded history for particular types of information is limited based on the types of records kept. Because of this, recorded history in different contexts may refer to different periods of time depending on the topic.
The interpretation of recorded history often relies on historical method, or the set of techniques and guidelines by which historians use primary sources and other evidence to research and then to write accounts of the past. The question of the nature, and even the possibility, of an effective method for interpreting recorded history is raised in the philosophy of history as a question of epistemology. The study of different historical methods is known as historiography, which focuses on examining how different interpreters of recorded history create different interpretations of historical evidence.
Contents
[hide]
1 Prehistory
2 Historical accounts
2.1 East Asia
2.2 Europe
2.3 South Asia
2.4 Middle East
3 Methods of recording history
3.1 Historical method
4 See also
5 References
5.1 Works cited
6 Further reading
Prehistory[edit]
Further information: History of writing
Prehistory traditionally refers to the span of time before recorded history, ending with the invention of writing systems.[1] Prehistory refers to the past in an area where no written records exist, or where the writing of a culture is not understood. Since the 20th century, the study of prehistory is considered essential to implicit exclusion of certain preliterate civilizations, such as those of Sub-Saharan Africa, pre-Columbian America, Australian Aboriginals and New Zealand Māori.[further explanation needed]
Protohistory refers to the transition period between prehistory and history, after the advent of literacy in a society but before the writings of the first historians. Protohistory may also refer to the period during which a culture or civilization has not yet developed writing, but other cultures have noted its existence in their own writings.
More complete writing systems were preceded by proto-writing. Early examples are the Jiahu symbols (c. 6600 BCE), Vinča signs (c. 5300 BCE), early Indus script (c. 3500 BCE) and Nsibidi script (c. before 500 CE). There is disagreement concerning exactly when prehistory becomes history, and when proto-writing became "true writing"[2] However, invention of the first writing systems is roughly contemporary with the beginning of the Bronze Age in the late Neolithic of the late 4th millennium BCE. The Sumerian archaic cuneiform script and the Egyptian hieroglyphs are generally considered the earliest writing systems, both emerging out of their ancestral proto-literate symbol systems from 3400–3200 BCE with earliest coherent texts from about 2600 BCE.
Historical accounts[edit]
Main article: Historiography – The history of written history
Oracle bone of the Shang dynasty, ancient China
The earliest chronologies date back to the earliest civilizations of Early Dynastic Period Egypt, Mesopotamia & Sumerians [3] which emerged independently of each other from roughly 3500 B.C.[4] Earliest recorded history, which varies greatly in quality and reliability, deals with Pharaohs and their reigns, made by ancient Egyptians.[5] Much of the earliest recorded history was re-discovered relatively recently due to archaeological dig sites findings.[6] A number of different traditions have developed in different parts of the world as to how to interpret these ancient accounts.
East Asia[edit]
In China, the earliest history was recorded in oracle bone script which was deciphered and may date back to around late 2nd millennium B.C..[7] The Zuo Zhuan, attributed to Zuo Qiuming in the 5th century B.C. , is the earliest written of narrative history in the world and covers the period from 722 to 468 B.C. . The Classic of History is one of the Five Classics of Chinese classic texts and one of the earliest narratives of China. The Spring and Autumn Annals, the official chronicle of the State of Lu covering the period from 722 to 481 B.C. , is among the earliest surviving historical texts to be arranged on annalistic principles in the world. It is traditionally attributed to Confucius (551–479 B.C. ). Zhan Guo Ce was a renowned ancient Chinese historical compilation of sporadic materials on the Warring States period compiled between the 3rd and 1st centuries B.C. .
Sima Qian (around 100 B.C. ) was the first in China to lay the groundwork for professional historical writing. His written work was the Shiji (Records of the Grand Historian), a monumental lifelong achievement in literature. Its scope extends as far back as the 16th century B.C. , and it includes many treatises on specific subjects and individual biographies of prominent people, and also explores the lives and deeds of commoners, both contemporary and those of previous eras. His work influenced every subsequent author of history in China, including the prestigious Ban family of the Eastern Han Dynasty era.
Europe[edit]
Herodotus of Halicarnassus (484 B.C. – c. 425 B.C. )[8] has generally been acclaimed as the "father of history" composing his The Histories written from 450s to the 420s B.C. . However, his contemporary Thucydides (c. 460 B.C. – c. 400 B.C.) is credited with having first approached history with a well-developed historical method in his work the History of the Peloponnesian War. Thucydides, unlike Herodotus, regarded history as being the product of the choices and actions of human beings, and looked at cause and effect, rather than as the result of divine intervention.[8]
Saint Augustine was influential in Christian and Western thought at the beginning of the medieval period. Through the Medieval and Renaissance periods, history was often studied through a sacred or religious perspective. Around 1800, German philosopher and historian Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel brought philosophy and a more secular approach in historical study.[9]
Sumerian inscription in monumental archaic style, c. 26th century B.C.
According to John Tosh, "From the High Middle Ages (c.1000–1300) onwards, the written word survives in greater abundance than any other source for Western history."[10] Western historians developed methods comparable to modern historiographic research in the 17th and 18th centuries, especially in France and Germany, where they began investigating these source materials to write histories of their past. Many of these histories had strong ideological and political ties to their historical narratives. In the 20th century, academic historians began focusing less on epic nationalistic narratives, which often tended to glorify the nation or great men, to more objective and complex analyses of social and intellectual forces. A major trend of historical methodology in the 20th century was a tendency to treat history more as a social science rather than as an art, which traditionally had been the case. French historians associated with the Annales School introduced quantitative history, using raw data to track the lives of typical individuals, and were prominent in the establishment of cultural history.
South Asia[edit]
In Sri Lanka, the oldest historical text is the Mahavamsa. Buddhist monks of the Anuradhapura Maha Viharaya maintained chronicles of Sri Lankan history starting from the third century BCE. These annals were combined and compiled into a single document in the 5th century by the Mahanama of Anuradhapura while Dhatusena of Anuradhapura was ruling the Anuradhapura Kingdom. It was written based on prior ancient compilations known as the Atthakatha, which were commentaries written in Sinhala.[11][page needed] An earlier document known as the Dipavamsa(4th century CE) "Island Chronicles" is much simpler and contains less information than the Mahavamsa and was probably compiled using the Atthakatha on the Mahavamsa as well.
A companion volume, the Culavamsa "Lesser Chronicle", compiled by Sinhala monks, covers the period from the 4th century to the British takeover of Sri Lanka in 1815. The Culavamsa was compiled by a number of authors of different time periods.
The combined work, sometimes referred to collectively as the Mahavamsa, provides a continuous historical record of over two millennia, and is considered one of the world's longest unbroken historical accounts.[12] It is one of the few documents containing material relating to the Nāga and Yakkha peoples, indigenous inhabitants of Lanka prior to the legendary arrival of Prince Vijaya from Singha Pura of Kalinga.
Middle East[edit]
In the preface to his book, the Muqaddimah (1377), the Arab historian and early sociologist, Ibn Khaldun, warned of seven mistakes that he thought that historians regularly committed. In this criticism, he approached the past as strange and in need of interpretation. Ibn Khaldun often criticized "idle superstition and uncritical acceptance of historical data." As a result, he introduced a scientific method to the study of history, and he often referred to it as his "new science".[13] His historical method also laid the groundwork for the observation of the role of state, communication, propaganda and systematic bias in history,[14] and he is thus considered to be the "father of historiography"[15][16] or the "father of the philosophy of history".[17]
Methods of recording history[edit]
While recorded history begins with the invention of writing, over time new ways of recording history have come along with the advancement of technology. History can now be recorded through photography, audio recordings, and video recordings. More recently, Internet archives have been saving copies of webpages, documenting the history of the Internet. Other methods of collecting historical information have also accompanied the change in technologies; for example, since at least the 20th century, attempts have been made to preserve oral history by recording it. Until the 1990s this was done using analogue recording methods such as cassettes and reel-to-reel tapes. With the onset of new technologies, there are now digital recordings, which may be recorded to CDs.[18] Nevertheless, historical record and interpretation often relies heavily on written records, partially because it dominates the extant historical materials, and partially because historians are used to communicating and researching in that medium.[19]
Historical method[edit]
The historical method comprises the techniques and guidelines by which historians use primary sources and other evidence to research and then to write history. Primary sources are first-hand evidence of history (usually written, but sometimes captured in other mediums) made at the time of an event by a present person. Historians think of those sources as the closest to the origin of the information or idea under study.[20][21] These types of sources can provide researchers with, as Dalton and Charnigo put it, "direct, un-mediated information about the object of study."[22]
Historians use other types of sources to understand history as well. Secondary sources are written accounts of history based upon the evidence from primary sources. These are sources which, usually, are accounts, works, or research that analyse, assimilate, evaluate, interpret, and/or synthesize primary sources. Tertiary sources are compilations based upon primary and secondary sources and often tell a more generalized account built on the more specific research found in the first two types of sources.[20][23][24]
See also[edit]
History portal
Big History
Source text
References[edit]
Jump up ^ Shotwell, James Thomson. An Introduction to the History of History. Records of civilization, sources and studies. New York: Columbia University Press, 1922.
Jump up ^ Smail, Daniel Lord. On Deep History and the Brain. An Ahmanson foundation book in the humanities. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2008.
Jump up ^ "The Cuneiform Writing System in Ancient Mesopotamia: Emergence and Evolution". EDSITEment. Retrieved 16 December 2013.
Jump up ^ Kott, Ruth E. "The origins of writing". The University of Chicago Magazine. Retrieved 16 December 2013.
Jump up ^ Adès, Harry (2007). A Traveller's History of Egypt. Interlink Publishing. p. 28. ISBN 978-1566566544.
Jump up ^ Greer, Thomas H. (2004). A Brief History of the Western World. Cengage Learning. p. 16. ISBN 978-0534642365.
Jump up ^ "综述", 中国考古学报第5册(Acta Archaeologica Sinica) (in Chinese). 《考古学报》编辑部. 1951.
^ Jump up to: a b Lamberg-Karlovsky, C. C. & Jeremy A. Sabloff (1979). Ancient Civilizations: The Near East and Mesoamerica. Benjamin-Cummings Publishing. p. 5. ISBN 0-88133-834-6.
Jump up ^ Graham, Gordon (1997). "Chapter 1". The Shape of the Past. Oxford University.
Jump up ^ Tosh, The Pursuit of History, 90.
Jump up ^ Oldenberg 1879.
Jump up ^ Tripāṭhī, Śrīdhara, ed. (2008). Encyclopaedia of Pali Literature: The Pali canon. 1. Anmol. p. 117. ISBN 9788126135608.
Jump up ^ Ibn Khaldun, Franz Rosenthal, N. J. Dawood (1967), The Muqaddimah: An Introduction to History, p. x, Princeton University Press, ISBN 0-691-01754-9.
Jump up ^ H. Mowlana (2001). "Information in the Arab World", Cooperation South Journal 1.
Jump up ^ Salahuddin Ahmed (1999). A Dictionary of Muslim Names. C. Hurst & Co. Publishers. ISBN 1-85065-356-9.
Jump up ^ Enan, Muhammed Abdullah (2007). Ibn Khaldun: His Life and Works. The Other Press. p. v. ISBN 983-9541-53-6.
Jump up ^ Dr. S. W. Akhtar (1997). "The Islamic Concept of Knowledge", Al-Tawhid: A Quarterly Journal of Islamic Thought & Culture 12 (3).
Jump up ^ Colin Webb; Kevin Bradley (1997). "Preserving Oral History Recordings". National Library of Australia. Archived from the original on 20 June 2008. Retrieved 16 December 2013.
Jump up ^ Tosh, The Pursuit of History 58-59
^ Jump up to: a b User Education Services. "Primary, Secondary and Tertiary Sources". University of Maryland Libraries. Retrieved 10 July 2013.
Jump up ^ "Library Guides: Primary, secondary and tertiary sources" Archived 12 February 2005 at the Wayback Machine.
Jump up ^ Dalton, Margaret Steig; Charnigo, Laurie (September 2004). "Historians and Their Information Sources" (PDF). College & Research Libraries: 400–25, at 416 n.3. [dead link], citing U.S. Dept. of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (2003), Occupational Outlook Handbook; Lorenz, Chris (2001). "History: Theories and Methods". In Neil J. Smelser; Paul B. Bates. International Encyclopedia of Social and Behavioral Sciences. 10. Amsterdam: Elsevier. p. 6871.
Jump up ^ "Glossary, Using Information Resources". ("Tertiary Source" is defined as "reference material that synthesizes work already reported in primary or secondary sources")
Jump up ^ "Library Guides: Primary, secondary and tertiary sources". Archived from the original on 12 February 2005.
Works cited[edit]
Oldenberg, Hermann (1879). Dipavamsa. Asian Educational Services. ISBN 978-81-206-0217-5.
Tosh, John (2006). The Pursuit of History (4th ed.). Pearson Longamn. ISBN 9781405823517.
Further reading[edit]
Russo, Stan (2005). The 50 Most Significant Individuals in Recorded History. Inklings Press. ISBN 0975912992.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Recorded_history&oldid=815896160"
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The Life That I Have
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The Life That I Have (sometimes referred to as Yours) is a short poem written by Leo Marks and used as a poem code in the Second World War.
In the war, famous poems were used to encrypt messages. This was, however, found to be insecure because enemy cryptanalysts were able to locate the original from published sources. Marks countered this by using his own written creations. The Life That I Have was an original poem composed on Christmas Eve 1943 and was originally written by Marks in memory of his girlfriend Ruth, who had just died in a plane crash in Canada.[1] On 24 March 1944, the poem was issued by Marks to Violette Szabo, a French agent of Special Operations Executive who was eventually captured, tortured and killed by the Nazis.
It was made famous by its inclusion in the 1958 movie about Szabo, Carve Her Name with Pride, where the poem was said to be the creation of Violette's husband Etienne. (Marks allowed it to be used under the condition that its author not be identified.)
The text of the poem:[1]
The life that I have
Is all that I have
And the life that I have
Is yours.
The love that I have
Of the life that I have
Is yours and yours and yours.
A sleep I shall have
A rest I shall have
Yet death will be but a pause.
For the peace of my years
In the long green grass
Will be yours and yours and yours.
Bibliography[edit]
Leo Marks (1998). Between Silk and Cyanide. London: HarperCollins. ISBN 0-00-255944-7. Marks relates his briefing of Violette Szabo prior to her first mission, and his giving the poem to her in Chapter 65 of this book.
Leo Marks (1999). The Life That I Have. illus. by Elena Gaussen Marks. London: Souvenir. ISBN 0-285-63532-8. A small 34 page book with the text of the poem, illustrated by his wife.
References[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b Marks, Leo (1998). Between Silk and Cyanide. New York: The Free Press (Simon and Schuster). p. 454. ISBN 0-684-86422-3.
External links[edit]
Carve Her Name with Pride on IMDb
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