Leopold Von Ranke and the Shaping of the Historical Discipline

As a founder of the modern school of history, Leopold von Ranke (1795-1886) championed objective writing based on source material and established the study of history as a major university discipline. This collection of essays places the great German historian in the context of the developing historical discipline, and its international contributors from the United States, England and the continent assess Ranke's influence by exploring aspects of historical research neglected or rejected within the Ranke tradition and by questioning the state of historical research before and during the age of Ranke. The book is divided into three parts - the context of historical thought in the age of Ranke; Leopold von Ranke - historian and teacher; the burden of the Rankean legacy. Part 1 includes an essay on "Ranke the Reactionary" by Peter Burke, Emmanuel College, Cambridge; and in part 3 there is an essay by Doris Goldstein on "History at Oxford and Cambridge - Professionalism and the Influence of Ranke".