Sources of History
Senior 1 · History and Citizenship
Sources of History
Lesson 4 of 5
25 min
In February 1876 the explorer Henry Morton Stanley stayed at Kafurro in Karagwe, a kingdom east of Rwanda in what is now Tanzania. There he met Hamed Ibrahim, a rich trader in ivory, cattle and slaves who had lived in Karagwe for twelve years. Stanley wrote down what Hamed told him about Rwanda (which Stanley spells "Ruanda") and published it in 1878. Read the extract carefully.
"The people of that country are not cowards. Mashallah! they have taken Kishakka, Muvari, and have lately conquered Mpororo. The Waganda measured their strength with them, and were obliged to retreat. The Wanya-Ruanda are a great people, but they are covetous, malignant, treacherous, and utterly untrustworthy. They have never yet allowed an Arab to trade in their country, which proves them to be a bad lot."
Henry M. Stanley, Through the Dark Continent, volume 1, chapter 17 (London, 1878). Public domain.
Words to know: "Kishakka" is Gisaka and "Muvari" is Mubari, two kingdoms east of the Rwanda Kingdom; Mpororo lay to the north, in today's Uganda. "Waganda" means the people of Buganda, and "Wanya-Ruanda" means Banyarwanda. "Mashallah" is an Arabic expression of praise.
About two weeks later, Stanley's own boat party tried to land on the Rwandan shore of Lake Ihema. The people there drew their bows and made the strangers turn back. Stanley described them as snarling "like so many spiteful dogs".
Definition
Reliability: how far a source can be trusted to give an accurate account. It depends on who made the source, when, why, and whether other evidence agrees.
Definition
Bias: a one-sided view that favours or opposes a person, group or idea, often because of the author's interests or beliefs. Example: a trader who is refused entry to a country calls its people "a bad lot".
Definition
Hearsay: information a person did not witness but heard from someone else. Stanley's description of Rwanda's conquests is hearsay: he had never been inside Rwanda.
Definition
Corroboration: checking a claim against other, independent sources. If sources made by different people for different reasons agree, the claim is corroborated and more likely to be true.
| Question | Why it matters |
|---|---|
| 1. Who made it? | Was the author a witness, an insider or an outsider? What was their job or position? |
| 2. When was it made? | At the time, or years later? Memories fade and later knowledge creeps in. |
| 3. Why was it made? | To inform, to praise, to persuade, to sell books? The purpose shapes the content. |
| 4. What does it say? | Separate facts that could be checked from opinions and judgements. |
| 5. How did the author know? | Eyewitness, hearsay or guesswork? |
| 6. Does other evidence agree? | Corroboration turns a single claim into a stronger conclusion. |
Worked example: analysing the 1876 extract step by step
Verdict: unreliable as a judgement of Rwandan people, because it comes from a frustrated trader and is full of insults; useful and fairly reliable as evidence that by 1876 Rwanda was a strong, expanding kingdom that controlled who could enter it.
The Rwandan court and Hamed Ibrahim had nothing in common. The court's poets praised their kings; the trader resented them. Their accounts were made by different people, in different languages, for opposite reasons. That is exactly why their agreement is valuable: when sources with different biases report the same fact, the fact is unlikely to be invented. Historians call this corroboration.
The same reasoning works with Stanley's words about the people of Lake Ihema. They tell us nothing true about the character of those people. They do tell us two things: that Rwandans on the frontier defended their shore against armed strangers, and that Stanley himself looked down on Africans. A biased source can still be a useful source; you just have to ask the right question of it.
Important
Useful is not the same as reliable. A source can be unreliable about one thing and very useful about another. Always say what a source is reliable or useful for.
History Skills: "How to evaluate the reliability of historical sources". Watch for the questions the presenter asks about a source's author and purpose, and compare them with the six questions above.
Pair work: Stanley's book was a best-seller in Europe. Many Europeans formed their first picture of Rwanda from books like it, years before they ever met a Rwandan. What problems could that cause? Can you think of a source today (a film, a social media post, a news report) that shapes how people see a place they have never visited?
Practice
Sources and credits
