History is a discipline that attempts to understand human beings, the civilisations, cultures, nations and communities that they make and that make them. History is about time because everything human has its time and time runs out: it is about change, development, coming into being and passing away and about understanding people in different times whose worlds are no longer and are no longer our own. History is also about the stories that human beings tell themselves about time – about who they think they are, where they think they came from, where they think their past is leading them, and so on. It is also about the ways in which these stories themselves change with time and with the purposes of their tellers.