This collection of essays argues that there is an pre-history, that is, a longer tradition of the transnationalization of historical culture and historical science. It seeks to substantiate the claim that history writing reflected the globality of its time as much as followed the nationalization of the societies in which it was produced.

Authors from all over Europe contribute to an up-to-date analysis of how history can be written when leaving the classical concept of national history

Acknowledgements Note on the Contributors 1. The Various Forms of Transcending the Horizon of National History Writing; M.Middell and L. Roura Aulinas 2. Comparison and Transfer. A Question of Method; M.Espagne 3. The Writing of World History in Europe from the Middle of the Nineteenth Century to the Present: Conceptual Renewal and Challenge to National Histories; M.Middell and K.Naumann 4. Area Studies and the Writing of Non-European History in Europe; A.Eckert 5. Imperial History; A.Friedrichs and M.Mesenhöller 6. Colonisation, Decolonisation, and Imperial Historiography of the Iberian Peninsula; L. Roura Aulinas 7. A la recherché d'histoire imperial. Histories of Russia from the Nineteenth-Century to the Early Twenty-First Century; M.Aust 8. Regional History as a 'Challenge' to National Frameworks of Historiography. The Case of Central, Southeast, and Northern Europe; D.Mishkova, B.Stråth and B.Trencsényi 9. The Canon of European History and the Conceptual Framework of National Historiographies; A.Liakos 10. The French Revolution and its Historiographies; J-C.Martin 11. Historians in the Storm. Emigré Historiography in the 20th Century; E.Tortarolo 12. How Regional, National, and Transnational History have (not) been written in Belgium. Reflections within a European Perspective; G.Warland and M.Van Ginderachter 13. A New Challenge to the Writing of History in Europe at the End of the Twentieth Century?; M.Middell and K.Naumann Bibliography Index of Names