Antedating Quote "history is written by the victor" (1919)

[Jonathan Lighter]

What's interesting to me is that many/ most of the early exx. seem primarily
descriptive or simply ad hoc. Some may even mean "written" in the
metaphorical sense of "made."

Apparently not till the late '70s did the phrase gain its aphoristic, even
moralistic, force -- a "bitter truth." That was a time, paradoxically, when
historical inquiry (at least in the West) in the West was freer and
more nuanced than ever before.

JL
On Wed, Dec 16, 2009 at 12:38 AM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Poster:       Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Antedating Quote "history is written by the victor"
> (1919)
>
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>
> On Tue, Dec 15, 2009 at 5:36 AM, Stephen Goranson <goranson at duke.edu>
> wrote:
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> > Poster: Â  Â  Â  Stephen Goranson <goranson at DUKE.EDU>
> > Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: Antedating Quote "history is written by the victor"
> (1919)
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Related (unconfirmed) uses:
> >
> > Historic fancies‎ - Page 307
> > George Sydney Smythe  1844
> > Vanquished — his history written by the victors — Robespierre has
> left a
> > memory
> >
> > The conspiracy of Gianluigi Fieschi: or, Genoa in the sixteenth
> century‎ -
> > Page xxiii
> > Emanuele Celesia, David H. Wheeler - Â 1866 -
> > ... falsehoods so misrepresented events as to render history nearly
> > impossible.
> > ... courtly and salaried historians — history written by the victors.
> > ...accursed."
> >
> > Medical history from the earliest times: a popular history of the healing
> art‎
> > - Page 133
> > Edward Theodore Withington  1894 -
> > The history of the struggle has been written by the victors, who declare
> that
> > the iconoclast emperors delighted in destroying monasteries and burning
> ...
> >
> > A standard history of Kansas and Kansans‎ - Page 355
> > William Elsey Connelley -1918 -
> > In Kansas the South lost, and the history of the Territory and the State
> has
> > been written by the victors — those founding a Free State through much
> ..
> >
> > Bonnie Scotland: and what we owe her‎ - Page 61
> > William Elliot Griffis - Â 1916
> > ... when success is won ! With the multitude, the end ever justifies
> > the means.
> > The accepted history of almost all wars is that written by the victors.
> ...
> >
> > Stephen Goranson
> > http://www.duke.edu/~goranson
> >
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> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
> Wonderful collection of citations! Thanks Stephen.
>
> Sometimes when searching for an earlier instance of a proverb or quote
> I am uncertain if a particular citation fully captures the meaning of
> a phrase. As reference books move online perhaps there will be more
> space to trace the evolution of quotations and proverbs by listing
> additional intermediate forms and precursors.
>
> I think this will be possible. But the economics of online resource
> provision must somehow support it, and editors are already heavily
> burdened I think.
>
> Garson
>
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