ions. Such political power meant that this century’s perspective of history has been significantly altered. G.R.Elton said; ‘that which is deliberately preserved by observers is a drop in the bucket compared with what is left behind by action and without thought of selection for preservation purposes.’ Subjective evidence means subjective history.Historical evidence is limited as to the amount of information it can ultimately provide. Such a limitation to a degree forces history to be subjective. Historical descriptions are like the theories of physics, theoretical constructions designed to account for the available evidence. There is a limit to the amount of knowledge one can gain from evidence, as it is impossible to cover and account for everything with historical facts. There are not records detailing every moment of every day, and as history is often based upon evidence history can be little more than a theory. David Irving, in his article ‘Did Six Million Really Die?’ discusses his belief that ‘there were no gas chambers used for mass murder at Auschwitz and Other Camps.’ Irving argues that there is no objective, truthful evidence suggesting that there were gas chambers. He believes that the “gas chamber tragedy” is just an over exaggerated theory, with no factual grounding. Wether or not Irvings’ argument is correct is debatable, but what is evident through his article, is that history is not always completely objective, as it is often only a theory based upon limited evidence. The idea that historical evidence does not prove the truth of all elements of the past seems to be supported by the fact that historians are sometimes unable to agree among themselves over what happened. The restrictions involved with historical evidence inevitably mean that it is subjective, and subjective evidence means subjective history.The subjectivity of science, consequently lends history ...
