1) A clear argument, and you must tell me the argument and how you intend to make that argument in the introduction. Never drift from the argument. Your essay should have nothing that is off-topic.2) A clear structure. There should be an introduction, body and conclusion. The body should be made up of paragraphs and each of those paragraphs should be making a point that supports or builds your argument. Make sure that I understand the point of each paragraph. One way to ensure that your paragraph is making a clear, coherent point is to structure each paragraph with a first sentence introducing the point, further sentences that help you make that point (evidence, scholarly opinions, etc), and a final concluding sentence.3) Use the ancient literary sources as your evidence and reference them. The ancient literary evidence is very important. The degree to which one uses ancient literary sources depends on the topic. For a topic relating to politics or military history, the ancient literary evidence is the most important form of evidence and should be your main source of facts. For a political history or military history essay, use and cite the ancient sources for your facts and use modern scholarship for their interpretations and theories regarding the topic.4) If one is using archaeological evidence, and to varying degrees archaeological evidence is relevant to every topic, but especially art and religion, for example, you will of course be dependent on modern scholarship for that info, since you are not going out into the field yourselves. Use and cite the modern works when dealing with archaeological evidence.5) When not using the modern scholarship for archaeological evidence, use them primarily for their interpretations and theories regarding the topic, as I said in point 3. You can agree or disagree with them. Use their work to frame your own argument.6) Reference a lot. Every piece of evidence needs to be referenced. Every argument by a modern scholar that you use needs to be referenced. If it\’s something well-known/broad like, \’Hannibal beat the Romans at Cannae\’, then such a statement doesn\’t need referencing, but if you want to discuss that battle in detail and various elements of that battle, reference the relevant passage in, in this case, Polybius\’ Histories (or Livy\’s History, but note that Polybius is mostly more reliable – that doesn\’t mean that Livy is unreliable).Use footnotes when citing modern scholarship. For preparing footnotes and bibliographies with regard to modern scholarship, the following link is useful: http://www.mq.edu.au/about_us/faculties_and_departments/faculty_of_arts/mhpir/current_students/writing_essays_in_history/. I expect a surname, a page number and a third element such as the title (usually abbreviated in footnotes) or year of publication. E.g.Hoyos, Hannibal\’s Dynasty, 23 or Hoyos (2003) 23.Note that ancient sources are cited differently to modern scholarship. If I were to cite Appian\’s Iberica (The Wars in Spain) chapter 7, I would write the following: App. Iber. 7. If it were Polybius book 16, chapter 8, part 9, I would cite it like this: Pol. 16.8.9. I have not bothered to include the title of his work, Histories, in the reference, as Polybius is only known for the one work. Likewise, Livy and Diodorus are known for the one work. Note that the names of ancient authors are usually abbreviated.Important thing! use footnotes for modern sources! different to priamary sources!
Last Completed Projects
| topic title | academic level | Writer | delivered |
|---|