how do we know what happened in the past I mean really how do we know we see the past portrayed in movies TV we see it in video games we read about it in books we learn about it in class but how do historians actually know what happened my name is Christian and I'm a medieval historian and professor in this video we'll discuss the sources which tell us about the past specifically the difference between PR primary and secondary sources think about all the ways we can learn about the past books teachers movies television shows museums video games artifacts old letters or journals old photographs old buildings bones paintings there are practically unlimited numbers of sources which tell us about the past in some way but are they all equal in hist we classify sources into two types primary and secondary a primary source is anything anything at all which was created by humans in the time period we are studying so say you're interested in the time of Shakespeare primary sources could be any of his writings his plays his sonnets or letters but they could also be other sources from that time period as well such as tax records cery surviving buildings and paintings and even if it existed Bill Shakespeare's favorite hat all of these sources were created while Shakespeare was alive everyone tells us a little bit about the world he inhabited primary sources are our evidence our evidence from the past they're the remnants from long dead people in their world they're all we have so what about secondary sources a secondary source is anything which talks about or concerns turns the past but was made afterwards so textbooks about Shakespeare are secondary sources your English teacher is a secondary source movies are secondary sources that weird television show that claimed that Shakespeare was actually an alien from mpace secondary source Wikipedia random internet websites secondary sources and even serious academic research published by phds and peer- rreview journals also secondary sources now needless to say not all secondary sources are created equal some can be downright misleading or crazy or just wrong some however could be really good such as the work published by professional historians and other Scholars and peer-reviewed academic journals nevertheless all of them good and the bad are still classified together as secondary sources if primary sources are evidence about the past then secondary sources are by their nature opinion sometimes good opinion sometimes well-informed and expert opinion but opinion nevertheless when we as historians want to investigate the past we need to go to the evidence to the primary sources first this is not to say that we're not interested in opinion particularly the opinion of other historians but original Research into the past requires primary sources when we investigate the opinions of other historians we are doing historiography a worthwhile task but a different one from primary sour research if you've liked this video please consider subscribing to the channel for new videos about history every week until next time on the medieval historian