Discuss what is historiography from all angles

History, also known as historiography, is an integrated social science, which is a kind of spiritual production practice and its products created by the subject of historical research under the guidance of the general laws provided by Marxist philosophy, by using certain ways and means of thinking and understanding, and in the process of interaction with the historical object, through the analysis and study of the historical object in order to understand its special laws and characteristics.

Historical knowledge.

The definition of historiography can be categorized into two types of connotations due to the difference between the broad and narrow meanings.

Broadly speaking, historiography is the unity of two meanings of history, including: (1) the objective existence of human society and its development process, which is completely independent of people's consciousness; (2) the historian's understanding of this objective existence and process and its laws and regulations; and (3) the historian's understanding of the history of the world and the history of the world. (2) the historian's description and exploration of this objective existence and process and its laws, as well as the practice of spiritual production and the products it creates. Historiography in the narrow sense of the term does not include the former, but refers exclusively to the latter. Historiography in the narrow sense of the term is the unity of a spiritual production practice and its creation that belongs to the conceptual form. As far as its nature is concerned, depending on the different perspectives and starting points of historians, there are "activities", "learning" or "scholarship", "knowledge system", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge", "knowledge" and "knowledge". knowledge system", "science", "art" and "half science, half art", "Integration" and so on.

Before the birth of Marxist historiography, people generally define historiography in a broad sense, that is, the definition of historiography and the definition of history is often the same, and few people make a strict conceptual distinction between the two. In English, "historiography" and "history" are the same word: history, and according to the fourth edition of the Oxford Advanced Learner's English-Chinese Dictionary, the first meaning of history is "historiography" - the study of past events. According to the fourth edition of the Oxford Advanced Learner's English-Chinese Dictionary, the first meaning of history is "historiography" - the study of past events; the second meaning is "history" - past events, especially past events recognized in their entirety; and the third meaning is actually from the first meaning: "history". The third term is actually derived from the first - a systematic account of past events. It can be seen that "historiography" and "history" are its original meaning.

The process of recognizing historiography in China and the West was basically the same. In ancient China, the concept of "historiography" also developed from the understanding of "history", or it was initially included in "history". According to Mr. Qu Lindong's research, generally speaking, the meaning of "history" in ancient China has gone through the development process of historians, history books, history events and historiography. The concept of history may have started in 319 A.D. (the second year of Taixing of the Eastern Jin Dynasty), the year when Shi Le of the Later Zhao Dynasty claimed the throne during the period of the Sixteen Kingdoms of the Eastern Jin Dynasty. At that time and for a century and a half thereafter, there was no clear explanation of its connotation. However, the fact that historiography got rid of its dependence on economics and became a completely independent department of the official school, along with the traditional studies of economics and law, is still of great significance in the development of ancient Chinese historiography. Later on, it had the contents of codification and documentation; in the Qianjia period of the Qing Dynasty, people gave historiography the contents of historical narrative skills and methods of historical understanding. To sum up, in ancient China, people's interpretation of the concept of historiography reached the highest level of understanding: historiography is a specialized, technical study on how to recognize, narrate or codify past events. This understanding is similar to the modern Western historian's definition that "historiography is an art". In the history of the development of historiography in ancient China, "history" as the objective existence of human society in the past, and "historiography" as a kind of specialized study of people's activities of understanding and describing it as well as its results, finally achieved a preliminary separation, which was the result of thousands of years of exploration by ancient historians. This is the result of thousands of years of exploration by ancient historians and one of their greatest achievements in the understanding of historiography. It is precisely because "historiography" was born out of the hard shell of "history" that, in the view of contemporary historians, "history" and "historiography" are two connotations and two separate concepts. are two concepts with different connotations and essences, and the answer to the question of what each of them is belongs to different ontological categories, when people define them, they are like a double-sided monster - both are used interchangeably and entangled with each other, - "history" is a concept that has been developed from the hard shell of "history". -History" has always had two meanings because of the multiple meanings of the word, and this situation has persisted in modern times. Therefore, the modern definition of history is not much better than that of the ancients, and often fails to completely separate the two sides of the goddess Cleo. When they define "what is history" or "what is history", they are not actually defining "history" but "historiography". "Sometimes it is a combination of both meanings at the same time. If we analyze them from the perspective of historical ontology, people will inevitably take their definitions as defining the concept of "history" in terms of conceptual forms, and thus conclude that their view of history is essentially an idealistic view of history. If we analyze the actual content of their explanations and the overall context of the text, it is not difficult to see that they defined the connotation of historiography in a narrow sense. For example, Liang Qichao, a modern master of national education and the first advocate of the "new historiography" revolution, wrote at the very beginning of his book The Method of Chinese Historical Research: "What is history? It is a record of the body of the continuing activities of human society, its total achievements, to find its cause and effect relationship, for the modern activities of the general public to learn from." The word "history" here obviously refers to "historiography"; moreover, the content of the book "The Method of Chinese Historical Research" is also a question of how to study history, rather than a question of what history is. Of course, most historians use the traditional method of simultaneous training. For example, Du Wei Yun said, "Generally speaking, the so-called history is nothing more than the events that actually happened in the past (in short, past events), or the record of the events that actually happened in the past (the record of past events)."

Today's definition or interpretation of historiography can be said to be diverse, and there is no consensus.

"Activity" said. Mr. Qu Lindong said in his book "Outline of Chinese Historiography", "The comprehensive activity of knowing, recording and writing about the history of human society, this is historiography." Mr. Qu's definition is appropriate to the content of his book. For historiography, in ancient China, existed mainly in the form of a kind of cultural accumulation activity attached to political activities, as the system of historiographers and historiographers' halls amply attests. Although historiography began to become a specialized discipline in the Eastern Jin Dynasty and the sixteen kingdoms, the development of ancient Chinese historiography, although there is no lack of private historical behavior, but both cultural and political activities and mainly as a manifestation of political activities, "comprehensive activities" characteristics, and did not change.

"Learning". Mr. Wu Ze in his edited "Introduction to History" book "Introduction", to the definition of historiography is: "historiography is the study of the development process of human society and its laws of learning."

"Historiography is half science, half art" said. The origin of this statement is more complicated. Whether historiography is a science or an art, or both, in the history of Western historiography, this debate can be traced back to the ancient Roman Empire in the second century AD. The first to discern the issue was the then rhetorician and writer of satirical prose, the Greek-Roman Loucianos (c. 120-180 or so. One says c. 125-192. (Older translations of Lucian, now also Loucian according to the English translation Lucian). Lucianus wrote about 80 miscellaneous treatises in the traditional dialogical style on propositions of literature and art, philosophy, rhetoric, religion, etc. Among them was a monograph on historical criticism, On Writing History, which "can be positioned as the first monograph on the theory of history in the history of Western historiography." Lukianus puts forward the epistemological and methodological problems of the ontology of historiography in terms of the task or purpose, essence, value, and method of understanding of historiography, the structure of the historian's subjective consciousness, the collection and processing of historical materials, the forms of expression of historical writings, and the general criteria for judging the merits of historical writings, etc. He reveals the truthfulness of the ontology of historiography as compared with that of literature and art (such as odes, poems, and dramas, and other forms of expression). It is believed that, although historiography has a component of appreciation, it also needs to make use of the appropriate techniques of literary art, and that it needs the "beauty of style", "beauty of truth" and "beauty of organization", which are "flashy and realistic".

For Lucianus, "the inability to distinguish between poetry and history is indeed the great trouble of historiography". Lukianus's analysis of the similarities and differences between "poetry and history", "practical history" and "appreciative history", opened the debate between later historians on whether history is a science It opened the door for later historians to debate whether history is a science or an art. In the modern West, whether it is the historians of objectivism who put forward that historiography is an empirical science of "truthfulness and straightforwardness" and that "historiography is a science, no more and no less", or the historians of relativism who put forward that historiography is an art. "Historiography is half science, half art" and so on different forms of historiography ontological understanding, on the principle of history, the understanding of the nature of historiography, as well as the discussion of the subject area, the path of thinking, in fact, did not go beyond the level of understanding reached by Lukianus and the boundaries of the delineation.

In contemporary Chinese historiography theory, historiography theorists have taken over the problem of Lukianus. Historians who insist that historiography is a science, on the one hand, along the cognitive path opened up by Lukianus, identified authenticity as one of the essential characteristics of historiography from the distinction between historiography and literature; on the other hand, along the dialectical, historical and materialistic cognitive path opened up by Marx and Engels, they profoundly expounded the objective reality of the object of study of historiography from the heights of the ontology of history and the ontology of historiography and thus laid a solid foundation for historiography. Some other historians who hold a relativist or even eclectic view of historiography also continue Lukianus's cognitive path, but the difference is that they smuggle the "undoubtedly additional things" that have already been excluded by Lukas into the content of the essential characteristics of historiography, making it something that is embedded in the essence of historiography, and then based on it, they have resurrected what is essentially the "extra". Then, on the basis of this, he repeated the old tune of "half ...... half". Mr. He Zhaowu's history is a "both scientific and non-scientific super-scientific" humanities, can be seen as "half ...... half" said the contemporary Chinese version.

In the late 1980s, Mr. He Zhaowu put forward the famous proposition of "False Problems in Historical Research", arguing that "in order to modernize the science of history", "the historical community should make an assessment of all the specious and false problems of the past". In order to modernize the science of history, "the historical community should re-criticize and clarify all the specious and false issues of the past". This theory had a considerable impact on Chinese historians. The first thing he clarified as a "false question" was the question of the long-term, or stagnant, or long-term stagnation of Chinese feudal society. In the 1990s, his clarification work was soon traced back to the realm of historiography ontology and the scope of historical ontology, and the question "Is historiography a science?" was taken as a quasi "false question". as a quasi "false question" - Mr. He did not directly identify it as a "false question" but only as a manifestation of the "science-only point of view". Mr. He did not directly identify it as a "false issue", but only regarded it as a manifestation of the "science-only view", which is why we call it a quasi "false issue" - to clear it up. From some of his published articles, such as "a number of reflections on historiography", "historiography of the dual nature of the piece", "history of the dual nature of the piece", "historians, historiography and history", as well as he was included in his own "academic and cultural essays" collection of "history and historiography" Preface, and so on, it is not difficult to find that his history as a humanities is "a humanities", "a humanistic discipline", "a humanistic discipline", "a scientific viewpoint", so we use the quasi "false issue" to call it - to clean up. A humanities is a "super-science" that "people's study and understanding of history constitutes historiography."

"Historiography itself consists of two levels, the first level (Historiography I) is the knowledge or identification of historical facts or materials, and the second level (Historiography II) is the understanding or interpretation of the first level (Historiography I)."

"The data given in Historiography I can be for there to be a 'reality', i.e., a view on which everyone agrees (or can agree) ...... Historiography II is essentially a thought-constructing process ......"

"Historiography II also contains two parts, rational thinking and experiential faculties, which, when synthesized, become historical rationality. The rational mind is that which identifies it with science; the experiential faculty is that which identifies it with art, and thus with something distinct from science ...... Thus historiography is both science and, at the same time, not science; it needs to be both scientific and something other than scientific... . that is, a sensitivity to that experience of mind which we need to know history, that sensitivity which is essentially akin to art."

"The key to historiography being historiography is in Historiography II, not in Historiography I. Historiography I is science, Historiography II is philosophy."

"A scientific approach to historiography requires recognizing the non-scientific component of historiography." Otherwise, "historiography can't even talk about the so-called 'scientific' historiography, let alone the 'humanistic' (which is both scientific and non-scientific, and therefore super-scientific, but not anti-scientific) historiography ".

The main points of Mr. He Zhaowu's "Some Reflections on Historiography" on the "Historiography of Duality" are as mentioned above. His "historiography Ⅰ", "historiography Ⅱ" dichotomy put forward, some young historical theorists from the inspiration, and then distinguished the so-called "historiography Ⅲ". It can be seen that the dichotomy has contributed to the "refinement" of historiography: it has opened up a path of structuralism or hierarchical research in the ontological study of historiography. As to whether the concept of history itself is capable of making such a refined and clear-cut hierarchical distinction, no one has yet investigated.

In summary, Mr. He's argument can be summarized as follows: historiography is a humanistic discipline that combines science, philosophy, and art with non-science, non-philosophy, and non-art, and is not empirical, with the history of ideas as the most essential and central part, and is constituted by people's research, knowledge, and experience of history.

This kind of historiography is in fact a new Lukianus, different from Lukes, Mr. He put Lukes's "practical history" and "appreciation of history" with an eclectic mix, so that historiography changes into a Or, in other words, by means of sex change operation, history has become a hermaphrodite. Or rather, through the sex-change operation, history returned from the scientific age of the late 20th century to its simple and unqualified childish age.

According to Mr. He Zhaowu's relevant discussion, this duality of historiography, which is both right and wrong, is rooted in the duality of history. The so-called "history has the argument of its duality, that is, as a natural man, man's history is subject to the laws of nature and necessity, but as a free and self-disciplined man, he is the master of his own history, and it is up to him to determine his own orientation". In this way, the general connotation of the definition of history as it is usually understood - the objective course of human society - has been greatly reduced to the history of man, and not only is the "class" gone, but also the "society" has been reduced to the history of man. The connotation of "society" is also removed. Both the so-called duality of history and the so-called duality of historiography are in fact rooted in the duality of "man" in the sense of individual attributes. In explaining what historiography is, Mr. He over-emphasizes the "freedom and self-discipline" of the "human being", which he has completely individualized, and in discussing the characteristics of historiography, he equates the general characteristics of the humanities with those of historiography. "So this is the reason for the cry of pain!"

"Science" says that in 1902, the British positivist historian and key representative of the Cambridge School of History, John Bagnell Bury (1861-1927. Also known as Bury, Bury), succeeded Sir John Acton (Sir John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton (1834-1902) as Chint Professor of the Chair of Modern History at Cambridge, concluded his inaugural address, "The Science of History," with the following sentence, "Historiography is a science, no more and no less." This is one of the more cited quotes by historians exploring the question of what historiography is. In contemporary Chinese historiography, there are three representative views on "science": general "science"; "specific and empirical science with specificity, synthesis, wholeness and authenticity"; "science of history"; "science of history"; "science of history"; "science of history"; and "science of history". "said;" "integrative science" said.

The general "science" is the most common definition of historiography. For example, the new edition of the Dictionary published in 1999, "historiography" article: "Also known as 'historiography'. A branch of the social sciences. The science that studies and expounds the specific process of human social development and its regularity." Another example is the definition of historiography as defined in the "Preface" of Wu's book "Introduction to Historiography": "Historiography is a reflective science, the science of all kinds of specific historical research and the exploration of its inner laws."

"Specific and empirical science with particularity, synthesis, wholeness, and authenticity". Mr. Li Zhenhong in the book "theory and method of history" in a special chapter, from the "history is the basis of science", "the characteristics and tasks of historical science", as well as the object of study of historical science, etc., to explore the scientific historiography and its fundamental difference with general history. The question of what scientific historiography is and its fundamental difference from general historiography is discussed. According to his discussion, historiography can be distinguished into two kinds: one is the general historiography before the emergence of Marxist historiography, which is not yet a science, but at best a specialized system of knowledge for describing and studying the objective existence of the human society and its processes in the past; and the other is Marxist historiography, which is the only scientific historiography so far. To be precise, scientific historiography is "the analytical study of countless historical phenomena, historical events, and historical figures of the peoples and nations of the world, under the guidance of the general laws provided by the philosophy of Marxism, in order to understand the special laws and characteristics of their historical development", a discipline with such distinctive and important features as specificity, comprehensiveness, wholeness, and authenticity. The science is a specific and empirical science with special, comprehensive, holistic, and authentic features.

Unlike most historians in the past, Mr. Li Zhenhong correctly distinguishes the difference between historical science and philosophy, especially Marxist philosophy of historical materialism, social science in general, literature, and other disciplines from the three aspects of object, task, and characteristics of research, thus defining the object of objective and real special research for the historical science and stipulating the special tasks it should undertake. The definitions of historiography or historical science given by most historians always confuse the objects and tasks of the study of historical science and the philosophy of historical materialism. For example, the entry "Historical Science" in the Dictionary of Historical Theory, which was published after Li's work and reflects the theoretical research results of Chinese historiography in the new period in a more comprehensive and systematic way. The dictionary absorbed the connotation of the concept of historical science in the two chapters of Li's "Historiography is the Basis of Science" and "Characteristics and Tasks of Historical Science". However, at the same time, it still treats the object of study of the philosophy of historical materialism - "the history of the development of human society" - as equivalent to, and the only object of study of, the Marxist science of history. the only object of study. The object and task of the study of historical science in Li's work, - "under the guidance of the general laws provided by Marxist philosophy, through [the] analytical study of countless historical phenomena, historical events and historical figures of the peoples and countries of the world, in order to understand the special laws and characteristics of their historical development ", - after a slight change in the manner of expression, is taken as one of the main tasks of Marxist historical science; the research task which should belong to the philosophy of historical materialism, - " to reveal the universal laws of the historical development of human society from primitive society through various class societies to socialist society", "to indicate the socialist and ****proletarian direction of historical progress, to provide the proletariat with a scientific theoretical and historical basis for understanding the world and transforming it," and so on. -- are also lumped together among the main tasks of Marxist historical science. The content of this article is in fact a "hybrid" based on the content of the "Historical Science" article in the Dictionary, combined with the relevant content of Li's book. While undertaking its own special tasks and conducting research on special categories, the scientific science of history has completely overstepped the bounds of the philosophy of historical materialism by taking over all the tasks and objects of research. How can the science of history bear its burden? "Integrationism". In the discussion of what is historiography in the new period of historiography, one of the most recent and distinctive definitions is determined by Mr. Jiang Dachun. In his article "Contemporary Chinese Historical Trends and the Development of the Marxist Concept of History," Mr. Chiang, in view of the fact that "historiography is usually regarded as historical treatises or, more precisely, as the historical knowledge expressed in these historical treatises," has an intuitive, "but incomplete and profound," understanding of historiography. "From the perspective of "broad understanding", he defines a new, "comprehensive and profound" and clear definition for historiography: "Historiography is the study of the subject of historians through a certain thinking and understanding of history. Historiography is the spiritual production practice of historical research and the products it creates, i.e., historical knowledge, by which the historian as the research subject interacts with the historical object through a certain way of thinking and understanding and means." In this expression, Mr. Jiang did not involve the concept of "historical existence", but from Mr. Jiang's full text, he is from the meaning of "historical existence" to use as a historian into the category of the object of knowledge of the historical existence of the "historical object". Mr. Jiang uses the concept of "historical object" in the sense of "historical existence", which is the historical existence that enters the category of historians' objects of cognition. Therefore, according to the relevant exposition in his article, we can conclude that: "historian" and "historical existence" are the two prerequisite elements constituting the activity of historical research as the practice of spiritual production; "historical thinking way of knowing", "means of historical knowing", "historical object", "practice of spiritual production of historical research" ("historical research activity"). "Historical research activities") and "historical knowledge" are the five basic elements of historiography. Mr. Jiang's definition of historiography is indeed more comprehensive than all existing definitions of historiography. Mr. Jiang called it "neo-Marxist historiography", and based on its integrative nature in the way of historical understanding and its comprehensive character in the field of objects, he defined it as "an integrative science based on scientificity that inherently combines empiricism, abstraction, value, and art" in nature. "

These are the characteristics of a comprehensive study.

The above definitions or explanations of historiography, although most of the documentary history of the recent or modern people to determine, but from the logical sequence, in fact, they are in line with the natural history of the evolution of historiography itself and the process of the history of thought of the people to recognize it is basically consistent. "History has two meanings" and the present-day "activity", "learning" or "academic" and "knowledge system". "System of knowledge", "super-science" or "half science, half art", "science", can be regarded as corresponding to history. The "knowledge system", "super-science" or "half-science, half-art", "science", and "science" can be regarded as the manifestations of historians' thoughts or theories corresponding to the objective facts of the first, second, third, and fourth epochs of the development of historiography, respectively. Among them, the general "scientific" theory and the other two historiographic interpretations reflect the two different periods before and after the fourth era of historiography's development; as for the latter, it is, more precisely, a manifestation of the objective state of existence of contemporary historiographic practice in the form of historians' theories. As for the latter, it is, more precisely, a manifestation of the objective state of existence of contemporary historiographical practice in the form of historian's theory, that is to say, a theoretical result of historiographical theorists' abstract knowledge of contemporary historiographical practice. Today's Chinese historians have different opinions on historiography, but it is a tangible reflection of the increasingly complex and diverse reality of historiography in the minds of historians, and the definition of historiography is largely influenced by the academic background of the definers and the specific content of the object of study.

Among the several definitions of historiography today, the more meaningful ones in terms of the future development of historiography in China are: Mr. He Zhaowu's "super-science", Mr. Li Zhenhong's "specific and empirical science with particularity, comprehensiveness, wholeness, and authenticity", and Mr. Jiang Dachun's "specific and empirical science with particularity, comprehensiveness, wholeness, and authenticity". Mr. He Zhaowu's "super-science", Mr. Li Zhenhong's "concrete and empirical science with specificity, comprehensiveness, wholeness, and authenticity", and Mr. Jiang Dachun's "integration science". Among them, although Li and Jiang said that each from a different angle of analysis and the same point of view and different ways of expression, but in the understanding of the characteristics of historiography, the real is basically the same, so it can be further integration and become a school of thought. As far as the current research situation is concerned, if it is possible to form a theoretical school with Chinese characteristics in the future ontological study of Chinese historiography, they are undoubtedly worth invoking as the theoretical basis for the establishment and development of the school. The definition of historiography in this book will be determined on the basis of Li and Jiang's two statements. For, historiography is not only an activity, not only a specialized study or scholarship, not only a system of knowledge, but it is a special discipline that is scientific in both its object of study and its task. For Chinese Marxist historiography, it is not only a science in the general sense, it is a completed science in the sense of the form of scientific knowledge.

For the individual historian, history can be a technical or skillful means of earning a living, or it can be a way for him to draw the necessary cultural qualities from history, or to recognize mankind itself in history, or as a useful spiritual activity for him to improve his cultural and artistic experience and appreciation; and the individual historian can certainly be a non-Marxist historian, using Marxism as a means of learning to understand the human condition. The individual historian can of course also be a non-Marxist historian and use other historical concepts than the Marxist materialist concept of history to guide his historical research; moreover, not every individual historian, not every specific historiographical practice, has to undertake the task of revealing the special laws of the historical movement of a certain or every nation or country. However, these kinds of special phenomena that arise in the process of historical cognition and historiography in the performance of its functions and roles, that come only from the subjective cognition of the subject of historiography and the particularity of this form of cognition, the particularity of the means of cognition, and the particularity of the way of utilizing historiography, or that happen to the individual subject of historiography, and that come from the characteristics of the process of historiography that are generated at a certain stage in the process of its development, and that do not come from the objects of study and the tasks that are determined by historiography Instead of the object of study and the task of historiography, it is not something that combines the realities of historiography today that can be the basis for denying that historiography is a science.

From the aspect of characteristics, although historiography has some general characteristics of other social sciences and even humanities (such as literature and art) to a greater or lesser extent, it has become an independent science not because of these general characteristics, but because of its roots in its own research objects and tasks, and the characteristics that distinguish itself from other social sciences and humanities, of which the more significant and important ones are: the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, the special characteristics compared to philosophy, and the special characteristics of history. The more significant and important of these are: its special character compared with philosophy, its comprehensive and holistic character compared with social sciences in general, and its authenticity compared with literature. The general characteristics of the humanities, as manifested in history, cannot be the basis for denying that it is a science.

Therefore, any definition or paraphrase of historiography that historiography is not a science cannot be brought in to serve as foundational material for redefining historiography.

Historiography is science. The general basis of its scientific character is twofold: first, the objective reality and authenticity of its object of study. The object of historiography - the historical phenomena, historical events and historical figures of the world's peoples and nations, as well as the facts and processes of the historical movement constituted by them - is objectively real as a historical being, and it does not change by the subjective will of the historical cognizant, but has an objective nature. subjective will, and has objective reality and authenticity. One is the task it undertakes. The task of historiography is to reveal the special laws and characteristics of the historical development of the peoples and nations of the world, and the study of history is a cognitive activity aimed at exploring the special laws of the historical development of human society. On the basis of these two articles alone, historiography possesses the scientific character that science in general possesses. The general basis for judging the scientific nature of a discipline is: (1) "the object of study must be something objectively real, because only something objectively real can have its inherent laws of development"; (2) it "must be a cognitive activity aimed at exploring the laws of development of the object ". Historiography clearly meets these two requirements. However, such a historiography cannot yet be called a true historical science, because it only has the necessary preconditions for becoming a science, but does not yet have the sufficient preconditions for becoming a completed form of scientific knowledge. A discipline to become a completed form of scientific knowledge, but also need to meet the third layer of requirements: "must reveal the laws of things as a prerequisite, and then in accordance with the laws of the thing itself (that is, its intrinsic connection) to explain the causes of things, is a completed form of scientific knowledge."

Such a completed form of scientific knowledge in the sense of a truly scientific historiography, so far, only Marxist historiography. "The emergence of Marxist historiography presupposes the creation of the Marxist materialist view of history. This view of history provides historiography with a kind of scientific theoretical guidance, which makes it display a tenacious character that distinguishes it from other historiographies of the past and shows its distinct scientific nature." The important feature of Marxist historiography in its method of thought is that it knows history only from history itself, not from the clouds in the sky or from people's hearts and minds. In other words, Marxist historiography, first of all, determines the objective nature of the object of historical research and studies all the history of human society as a natural historical process, thus realizing a profound change in the starting point of historical research. "It firmly believes that the truth of history can be truthfully revealed only by starting from tenacious facts." Secondly, "Marxist historiography's practical application of the materialist conception of history has gained a methodological guide to the study of the inevitable connections between historical phenomena, thus making historiography truly an empirical science that studies the regularities of things and describes the true historical process in accordance with its laws." "The most important basis for making historiography a science is the exploration of the laws of the historical movement of human society. However, the history of philosophical development to date shows that up to now only Marxist philosophy (specifically, the materialist conception of history) has really revealed the basic laws of human historical movement. Thus, the problem is simplified to this, that only by using the Marxist materialist view of history as a guide can historiography become a true science." Accordingly, the fundamental basis for the scientific nature of Chinese historiography, apart from the fact that it possesses the general requirements that must be met for the scientific nature of a discipline, lies in the fact that it is a discipline that falls under the category of Marxist historiography. In other words, the scientific nature of Marxist historiography fundamentally determines the scientific nature of Chinese historiography.