Beyond political events

thematic diversity and historical distance in the appendices of David Hume's History of England

Abstract

The History of England from the Invasion of Julius Caesar to the Revolution of 1688 is the most comprehensive historical work in David Hume's vast and multi-thematic oeuvre. First published between 1754 and 1762, the History has usually been printed in six volumes since 1778. They comprise seventy-one chapters and four appendices, accompanied by paratexts, illustrations, footnotes, and endnotes. Despite the scope and grandeur of the History, this article will turn attention only to the appendices of the work, arguing that these sections contain the most representative passages of the narrative innovations proposed by Hume in his historiographical practice. These innovations, such as his use of digression and essayistic style, serve as moments of suspension of the main narrative, proposing a reconciliation between neoclassical and philosophical forms of historiography, the two dominant genres of historical writing in the English-speaking world around 1750. In addition, due to their digressive and essayistic nature, these segments allow Hume to issue judgments and opinions about the past he opted to thematize, displaying a typically eighteenth-century notion of historiographical impartiality. In constructing the analysis, this article divides itself into two sections: an introductory segment and the other that describes and examines the appendices of the History, and brings concluding remarks.