The Lectures on the History of Philosophy: Editions and Sources

Hegel, who offered courses on the history of philosophy more regularly than on any other subject from 1805 until his death, never published a “history of philosophy.”

As Michelet reports, Hegel wrote two notebooks on the history of philosophy for use in his university courses. The first, written in Jena and used in the winter semester of 1805/6, Hegel would always use in his later courses, as a basis to integrate or supplement or for oral improvisation. At times he would add more extensive explanations, for example, by writing notes in the margins; other times he would change the very substance of his exposition according to changes in his judgments about philosophers he happened to have in the meantime studied more deeply (as happened in the cases of Jacobi, Descartes, and Hume). After the Jena notebook Hegel wrote a general sketch on the introduction to the history of philosophy for his first course on the topic given in Heidelberg (winter semester 1816/17), to which he would append in the years that followed additional pages. Dissatisfied with the Jena introduction, he would constantly reelaborate this second notebook at the beginning of his courses in Heidelberg and Berlin.