Notes Regarding the Historical Perspectives of Bogdan Petriceicu Haşdeu
Notes Regarding the Historical Perspectives of Bogdan Petriceicu Haşdeu

Summary/Abstract: The views of Bogdan Petriceicu Haşdeu on the methodology and philosophy of history were shaped under the influence of the advanced ideas of the European culture and philosophy. As he himself stated, he was “interested by rules, standards, totality”. In the field of historical methodology, B.P. Haşdeu opted for a “thorough scientific method”. The successive stages that the historian must follow - data collection, partial interpretation (that is, grouping and comparing them) and building the edifice (that is, drawing the conclusions). B. P. Haşdeu’s conception blends together the old, preponderantly providentially, explanation with the scientific, positivist one. Haşdeu admitted the objective existence of historical factors: natural or social, but considered that their action is limited by the intervention of the Providence. In spite of these, Haşdeu considered that man played an important part in history, emphasising that “neither the divinity, nor nature can annihilate… man’s free will”. B. P. Haşdeu considered that the influence of land on a people was very important, and therefore he formulated a unique historical law - the law of posthumous territorial influence, stating that a territory can influence a people even long after it leaves that particular territory. B. P. Haşdeu concludes that a nation is formed by the interaction between a land and a people (race).

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