Marc Bloch

"The sources tell us what was preserved; historical imagination must help us understand what was lost."

"Every generation must write its own history because every generation has different questions to ask."

"The historian who does not change his mind in light of new evidence is not doing history; he is doing ideology."

"Medieval society was held together by webs of obligation and reciprocity that modern contracts have not entirely replaced."

"To study history is to study the multiple ways humans have organized their social life."

"The past does not speak to us directly; it must be interpreted, and interpretation is always an act of imagination."

"History teaches humility because it shows us how often those who were certain they understood have been proven wrong."

"The historian must resist the temptation to see the past as merely a series of steps leading to the present."

"Medieval feudalism was not a step on the road to modernity but a complete system in its own right."

"Documents are fragments, and the historian's task is to understand not only what they say but what they hide."

"To understand a historical period, we must study its margins and exceptions as much as its center."

"The study of history is an education in the contingency and fragility of all human institutions."

"The historian who claims to have captured the 'spirit of an age' is likely imposing a false coherence on irreducible complexity."

"Every historical interpretation is provisional, pending the discovery of new evidence or the asking of new questions."

"Medieval people understood their world differently than we understand ours, but not less deeply."

"The past cannot be changed, but our understanding of the past can always be changed."

"To study history well is to learn to read carefully, to question persistently, and to imagine sympathetically."

"The historian's task is not to explain the past but to make it intelligible."

"History shows us that human nature is constant but human possibilities are infinitely variable."

"The study of history is ultimately an act of self-understanding, for we are creatures of history."