Henry Thomas Buckle

Born in Kent in 1821, Henry Thomas Buckle was an English historian and essayist who became famous for trying to make history more scientific. Rather than focusing mainly on kings, battles, or individual heroes, he argued that large social forces and regular patterns shaped human progress.

His major work, History of Civilization in England, was widely read and debated in the 1850s. Buckle believed that careful study of facts, especially social and statistical facts, could reveal laws of history much as science reveals laws of nature. That bold approach made him an important figure in Victorian intellectual life, even for readers who disagreed with him.

Buckle never finished the grand history he planned. He died in 1862 while traveling in the Middle East, still young, but his reputation endured because of the scale of his ambition and the force of his ideas. He is also remembered as a strong amateur chess player, adding an unexpected side note to the life of a writer drawn to pattern, logic, and strategy.