HISTORY • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of History

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/hˈɪstəri/ /hˈɪstri/ Listen

noun

History n. (pl. histories)

1.

A learning or knowing by inquiry; the knowledge of facts and events, so obtained; hence, a formal statement of such information; a narrative; a description; a written record; as, the history of a patient's case; the history of a legislative bill.

2.

A systematic, written account of events, particularly of those affecting a nation, institution, science, or art, and usually connected with a philosophical explanation of their causes; a true story, as distinguished from a romance; distinguished also from annals, which relate simply the facts and events of each year, in strict chronological order; from biography, which is the record of an individual's life; and from memoir, which is history composed from personal experience, observation, and memory. "Histories are as perfect as the historian is wise, and is gifted with an eye and a soul." "For aught that I could ever read, Could ever hear by tale or history." "What histories of toil could I declare!"

History piece, a representation in painting, drawing, etc., of any real event, including the actors and the action.

Natural history, a description and classification of objects in nature, as minerals, plants, animals, etc., and the phenomena which they exhibit to the senses.

Synonyms: Chronicle; annals; relation; narration. History, Chronicle, Annals. History is a methodical record of important events which concern a community of men, usually so arranged as to show the connection of causes and effects, to give an analysis of motive and action etc. A chronicle is a record of such events, conforming to the order of time as its distinctive feature. Annals are a chronicle divided up into separate years. By poetic license annals is sometimes used for history. "Justly Caesar scorns the poet's lays; It is to history he trusts for praise." "No more yet of this; For 't is a chronicle of day by day, Not a relation for a breakfast." "Many glorious examples in the annals of our religion."

verb

History v. t. To narrate or record. (Obs.)

See images of 'History'

Etymology of 'History'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"History" Quotes from Famous Books

... friend remarked to me on the strangeness of the circumstance that the greatest event in the history of a nation, its conversion to Christianity, largely as it is often recorded in national legends, has never been selected as a theme for poetry. That event may indeed not supply the materials necessary for ...

— Legends of the Saxon Saints • Aubrey de Vere

... a complete history of the dog. Miss O'Hara had brought, also, two photographs of Waffles in pleasing poses, and when she left, Mr. Gubb accompanied her to the late home of Waffles. It was there he gathered the clues over ...

— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler

... de Talleyrand, who is so capable of estimating men, and whose admirable sayings well deserve to occupy a place in history, had long entertained a similar opinion of Sieyes. One day, when he was conversing with the Second Consul concerning Sieyes, Cambaceres said to him. "Sieyes, however, is a very profound man."—"Profound?" said Talleyrand. ...

— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... flowering into crocketed spires. The window above the door is deeply niched; it opens upon a balcony made in the form of a double pulpit, - one of the most charm- ing features of the front. Chenonceaux is not large, as I say, but into its delicate compass is packed a great deal of history, - history which differs from that of Amboise and Blois in being of the private and sen- timental kind. The echoes of the place, faint and far as they are to-day, are not political, but personal. Chenonceaux dates, as a residence, from the year ...

— A Little Tour in France • Henry James

... his lot with the creatures of an age later than his own, people of larger spiritual capacity and assuredly of a larger capacity for melancholy. With this fancy in my mind, by the help of certain notes, which lay in the priest's curious library, upon the history of the works at the cathedral during the period of its finishing, and in repeated examination of the old tapestried designs, the ...

— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Horatio Pater

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