Hobbes was very close to important figures in the history of politics and science as well as philosophy. His long life was marked by the disturbances that England underwent in the middle of the seventeenth century. The temptation is therefore strong to explain away as a mere consequence of the political upheavals of the 1640s his setting aside of the project of a complete philosophical system and his turning to a series of works of political philosophy. The main purpose of this essay will be to emphasize the inner consistency of Hobbes's philosophical and scientific system, to identify the place and function of history in his system, and only then to study his performance as historian.

Instead of a description - that is, a history - of Hobbes's views on history, I will adopt three successive perspectives upon this subject. The first perspective is provided by the taxonomy of sciences in Leviathan and its theory of science. The functions and modes of history as defined in the early preface to the translation of Thucydides and in later historical works is the second perspective, with particular emphasis on the Leviathan-Behemoth diptych. The final part examines Hobbes's performance as a historian in the light of the criteria identified in the first two parts.