Bronze Age World

Reading ancient testimony

Ask who produced the document, for whom, and for what purpose. Distinguish its ancient creation from its modern edition or translation. Survival and excavation shape what can be read today.

Use the linked edition and reliability notes for the author, audience, transmission and limits of this particular source. Missing information is not an assurance of neutrality.

Document and modern access

Type: ancient literary text in modern edition
Publication: Not specified

Open DOI or stable record (opens in a new tab)

Records informed by this source

date assertion Cassiterides tin-islands tradition — date assertion
informs · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Records Herodotus’s uncertainty about the islands and tin source.
relationship Cassiterides tin-islands tradition — later interpreted as referring to — Northwest Iberian tin landscapes
Evidence confidence: low
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Records uncertainty.
entity Cassiterides tin-islands tradition
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Records Herodotus’s uncertainty about the islands and tin source.
myth interpretation Cassiterides as uncertain Classical geographic compression of western tin knowledge
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Provides the ancient uncertainty.
relationship Research record — associated with
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Provides the ancient uncertainty.
relationship Research record — proposed memory of
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Provides the ancient uncertainty.
relationship Research record — proposed memory of
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Provides the ancient uncertainty.
relationship Research record — proposed memory of
Evidence confidence: moderate
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Provides the ancient uncertainty.
property Literary tradition, not an excavated event date
Evidence confidence: high
supports · provides primary evidence · Histories 3.115
Shows explicit ancient uncertainty in a later tin geography tradition.
claim The Cassiterides tradition cannot be converted into a fixed Bronze Age tin-source polygon.
Evidence confidence: near certain
supports · supports · Histories 3.115
Provides the explicit ancient uncertainty.
property assignment Cassiterides tin-islands tradition — has evidence property — Literary tradition, not an excavated event date
Evidence confidence: near certain
supports · supports assignment and caveat · Histories 3.115
Herodotus is evidence for Classical uncertainty, not a Bronze Age route map.