James Baldwin 24. An account, mostly false, of events mostly unimportant, which are brought about by rulers mostly knaves, and soldiers, mostly fools. Ambrose Bierce 25. Historians relate not so much what is done, as what they would have believed. Benjamin Franklin 26.
History is a distillation of rumor.
The history of the world is but the biography of great men. History a distillation of rumor. Thomas Carlyle 29. Dionysius of Halicarnassus 30. It is impossible to write ancient history because we lack source materials, and impossible to write modern history because we have far too many.