02 Questioning the Sources

H ow do we know what we know That might sound like a philosophers question rather than a historians, but it lies at the heart of what historians do. Before we can form any conclusions about the past, we need to understand and evaluate the sources were using. And thats especially true for the Persian Empire. To study the Persians, we must be detectives, questioning and analyzing our witnessesour sourcescarefully. In this lecture, well meet these witnesses, including the Greek narrative sources, some books of the Hebrew Bible, the inscription at Bisitun, archaeological evidence, and ancient letters from Egypt.