Who Were the Sea Peoples?

"If we are to get further, we need at this present no essays of the causes of the Civil War, but studies of the political behaviour of all sorts of men in all sorts of institutions, unaffected by the historian's foreknowledge of the later event. In that way we may ultimately perhaps arrive at an explanation of the mid-seventeenth century breakdown, but it will be less well-tailored, less readily reduced to a list of preconditions, precipitants and triggers, less satisfactory to theorists of revolution. On the other hand, it might be real." -- Elton, quoted in J.C.D. Clark, Revolution and Rebellion: State and society in England in the seventh and eighteenth centuries , p. 35

If I say we do not need theory to interpret history , how can it be that I also contend that Lincoln's diaries are not a simple statement of the"facts," but require interpretation? Interpretation based on what , if not a theory? Well, first of all, let us note that the term "theory" is overloaded. In one sense, we can use theory for something such as, "Well, I have a theory that Lincoln actually wanted to be martyred, which is why he went to the theater." Certainly historians must have "theories" like this, although I would prefer "hypothesis" here: they need to think about history, after all! What I mean by saying historians do not need "theory" (and what I believe Mises meant when he claimed they did ) is that they do not need what Aristotle would call theoria : abstract, general systems of timeless laws. For instance, Arnold Toynbee, in his A Study of History , develops a theory of how a civilization in decline wil...