  The historian begins not with the past itself but with survivals from the past that need to be authenticated and interpreted before they can be used as evidence. A historical fact is not simply given. It is a conclusion: not “what really happened” but “what the evidence obliges us to believe” (EM 112). We identify as historical facts the conclusions that our investigations best support. The task of historical inquiry is to establish historical knowledge, according to the canons of the historian’s craft, from evidence that is always scattered, unreliable, and open to interpretation.