Herodotus knew where Leonidas made his final stand against the Persian invasion of Greece because of a lion monument erected on a hill at Thermopylae. He bragged about memorizing the names of the 300 Spartans who fought alongside Leonidas, which historians today believe he learned from a monument erected upon the king’s grave in Sparta. Other monuments at Thermopylae told him the number of other Greeks that fought and died alongside Leonidas that day. Herodotus’s account of the Battle of Thermopylae (480 BC) has been propagated and retold by other historians such as Plutarch for the past 2,500 years. And most know of the story from the 300 graphic novel and film.

Yet, with the original monuments lost, we had stories of what happened, but we struggled with where it happened. The terrain at Thermopylae has changed dramatically due to earthquakes, sediment deposits, and a receding shoreline. The ground is 65 ft higher than it was in 480 BC. Today, the only reason we’re confident that Leonidas died fighting on Kolonos Hill, was because an archeologist discovered more than 100 arrowheads and spearheads there in 1939. Prior to that, historians had guessed it happened on a completely different spot.

Leonidas was a slaveowner by the way--all Spartans were. They subjugated other Greeks in the Peloponnese, owning entire families that provided labor and food. This enabled the Spartans to focus on their martial lifestyle. They continued this legacy, challenging and eventually defeating the Athenian Empire in the Peloponnesian War and then filling the power vacuum with a short-lived, but powerful hegemony over much of Greece.

Spartan supremacy didn’t last though. Their high watermark came at Leuctra where a Boeotian coalition led by Epaminondas and the Thebans defeated them in battle, killing a Spartan king (371 BC). Epaminondas then marched into the Peloponnese, liberating whole cities, after which he helped them build massive walls to keep the Spartans at bay. I’ve stood among the remnants of these ancient structures and even after 2,300 years, they are impressive. Sparta would never again be dominant and by the time Alexander rose to power, he was content to leave them defiant, yet isolated during his conquests.

Leuctra is arguably one of the most important battles in Greek history. Not only did it mark the beginning of the end of Spartan supremacy, but accounts by Xenophon and other ancient historians provide a wealth of military theory. Thus, locating the battlefield would be something worthwhile. Again, we had stories of what happened, but we didn't know exactly where until 1839 when archeologists discovered not weapons, but instead a monument built by the Thebans to celebrate their victory. Although the monument had been lost, we knew it existed, as even Cicero complained about how gaudy it was.

Cicero’s explicit complaint of the massive stone structure topped with a bronze soldier (sound familiar?) was that war trophies were meant to be remembered “for the present” and “not remain forever.” This was the custom of the Greeks, but even they broke their rules for events such as Thermopylae and Leuctra. Whether others stayed true to the concept or not, there are many battlefield locations that have received only our best guess.

For example, only since the 1980s have historians settled on where they think Caesar defeated Pompey in Thessaly. Prior to then, there were 8 different proposed locations, each with scholarly articles arguing for and against. Elsewhere, we are still clueless as to where Edward Longshanks defeated William Wallace at Falkirk, and the proposed locations are based on what sort of matches vague medieval descriptions of the terrain, all written by people not present for the battle.

Without archeological evidence—weapons or even monuments—we are just guessing with these ancient and medieval battles. As such, I am grateful the Thebans chose to buck tradition and offend Cicero’s sensibilities so we could find remnants of it 2,200 years later.

Of course, some battlefields don’t need post-battle structures for identification. No one could walk a monument-less Verdun, Somme, or Vicksburg without recognizing that parts of the terrain resemble craters of the moon covered in foliage. Other battlefields are not so obvious. Agincourt would simply be a farmland without the Renaissance Faire-like experience. Even Gettysburg would look like little more than hills and farms without the massive amount of stone and bronze structures.

Regardless, it’s difficult to envision a world without monuments. When I want to tell people about John F. Reynolds at Gettysburg, it’s very easy to get their attention in front of his massive 1884 equestrian statue in front Philadelphia City Hall. This Pennsylvania native played a crucial role at Gettysburg, delaying the Confederate advance toward the town and taking a bullet to the neck in the process. It’s an easy story to tell with the statue standing prominently in the middle of the city.

While this seems to support the idea of maintaining monuments, it doesn’t mean that a statue somehow ensures memory. For example, on a work-sponsored bus tour of Philadelphia a few years ago, the tour guide pointed out just about everything related to the American Revolution. Yet, when we passed City Hall, I asked him to tell folks about the John F. Reynolds statue. He brushed me off by pointing in its direction, “There’s John F. Reynolds.” I hated that tour guide.

Outside of the anecdotal, I dragged more than 4 dozen friends and coworkers to Gettysburg for unlicensed tours throughout the Civil War Sesquicentennial (2011-2015). Most of these folks had never visited the battlefield before. Consider that. Nearly 50 people, most of whom grew up in Pennsylvania, never visited the largest battle in the Western Hemisphere, the bloodiest in American history. How is that possible? Gettysburg has 1,300+ monuments, memorials, and markers, leading the Gettysburg Foundation to proclaim it "one of the largest collections of outdoor sculpture in the world."

Yet, with all that going for Gettysburg, I easily mustered up dozens of friends and coworkers who had never visited.

In addition, everyone told me how enriching the Gettysburg experience was with a tour guide spending the day with them, telling them the story. Some said they’d never go again without me or another guide (I recommend Phillip Muskett. He's licensed!). Others stated explicitly how without a guide, it was “just a bunch of statues.” Imagine that. Granted, I put in a lot of work into these tours. I cater it to the person, bringing along maps, photos, and eyewitness accounts, as we spend all day driving and trekking. It’s exhausting and rewarding.

Similarly, I’ve found leading tours of Revolutionary War and Civil War battlefields starkly different. Many prominent Civil War battlefields are national parks with visitor centers and loads of monuments. Compared to Gettysburg, it requires a lot more work to trek a place like Brandywine, the largest battle of the Revolutionary War. The sole park is run by volunteers and sits upon ground where virtually none of the fighting occurred. To get to the action, you have to do a lot of driving and trekking through farms where private landowners have graciously mowed paths for battlefield junkies. I typically walk several miles with friends and family across the line where Cornwallis’s men flanked Washington’s army, playing "The British Grenadiers" on my iPhone while reading excerpts from eyewitnesses I dug up in old, dusty books and archives. Again, exhausting, yet rewarding. But that’s the task of a historian.

The common theme here is that the memory of these historical events and people—Thermopylae, Leuctra, Gettysburg, Brandywine, John F. Reynolds—benefit from historians, not statues. We know the story of Leonidas fighting to the death at Thermopylae because of a historian—Herodotus. We know that the Thebans defeated the Spartans at Leuctra because of Xenophon, not because of monuments. Locating ancient and medieval battlefields has been difficult, but nowadays we’re not handicapped by this massive, uncharted world, covered by only vague descriptions in dusty manuscripts in Greek and Latin. Instead, we have satellite imagery and GPS waypoints. Thus, I have visited obscure battlefields all over the world without monuments or even markers.

The difficulty with the Confederate monument debate is sifting through the strawmen, jokes, and memes. One local Philly talk show host started a Twitter campaign to remove all monuments, everywhere, which he eventually published on CBS Philly, demanding that we tear down William Penn, Rocky, and Vince Lombardi. Victor Davis Hanson theorizes that next will come the rewriting of folk songs and re-editing of Ken Burns’s Civil War documentary, which was frankly sympathetic to the South.

Among this, people joke about how you shouldn’t give trophies to losers. The counterargument is that tearing down these monuments will somehow whitewash our history (no pun intended), meaning we should remember the good with the bad. There was a somewhat similar concept among the Romans in that they kept statues of their vanquished foes such as Hannibal and Pyrrhus. The richest families maintained rooms full of busts of figures from history, which would include famous Romans, enemies, and ancestors. The idea was to continually remind the viewer of the greatness of the past and inspire them to strive for similar greatness. The enemies were glorified because it made their defeat appear much more impressive. Consider that everything we know about Hannibal comes from the Romans. But we’re not Romans. We do not need images of King George III, Santa Anna, the Kaiser, Hitler, Mussolini, Hirohito, or Saddam Hussein to remind ourselves of our military prowess. And although Reynolds remains obscure in Philadelphia even with his statue at City Hall, most know about Robert E. Lee who doesn’t need a statue there.

As much admiration as I have for John F. Reynolds, I would welcome a debate over whether he deserves a 133-year-old statue in the middle of Philly. Why? Because we could talk in detail about his life and deeds at Gettysburg. We could talk about how when Lincoln struggled to find a new commander for the Army of the Potomac, Reynolds lost the opportunity through his insistence the he maintain control without interference from the government. The press would be superb and people would talk about history. If we decided to keep him standing, then more people would know about him because of the debate. More people might make the trek out to Gettysburg as well.

If we are to believe as Cicero did, then war trophies should have a temporary nature to them. As the Thebans learned, even the permanent structures of stone and bronze can be lost. There’s no reason we shouldn’t have to defend the existence of every monument and statue. Confederate general Nathan Bedford Forrest was a terrible person by any measure in any period. The “he was just a product of his times” argument doesn’t hold up, as his men slaughtered unarmed black soldiers because they were black and they had defeated his men prior. He also started the KKK. Great tactician in war? Sure. Worthy of a statue? Not even a figurine! If you really want to remember Nathan Bedford Forrest, then you should be forced to ask a historian or buy a book.

This isn’t a call to tear down all Confederate monuments, but it is a call for people to understand that historians, not monuments, are responsible for ensuring that we remember history. We should encourage inquiry into every monument. When someone questions why we have a statue, we should have an answer. But the answer shouldn't involve ensuring memory or battlefield locations, especially when most of these monuments were constructed away from battlefields, well after the events, and for ulterior motives during the Jim Crow and Civil Rights eras.

It’s also worth pointing out that some of these monuments are just ridiculous. The first thing visitors will encounter at the Manassas battlefield is a massive equestrian statue of Stonewall Jackson portrayed as a roided out superhero. He’s only missing the cape. It's historical value is questionable, as it was erected in 1940. But how will we remember where Jackson stood like a "stonewall"? Again, historians will get the job done.

There have been calls (whispers, hints, and strawmen) to tear down seemingly unreproachable monuments of Abraham Lincoln, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, and Ulysses S. Grant, which are in return used as ammo to dismiss all calls for tearing down anything. These extreme positions are obscuring the reality that we should debate all monuments and likely tear down a lot of the Confederate ones. As we dig deeper into the history behind the funding, construction, and dedications of many of these Confederate monuments, it becomes obvious that many of them were not about remembering history at all. Are these the sort of symbols we want standing in the middle of our parks? Again, if you disagree, then defend it and don’t be offended by being forced to defend it. If we really care about history, then we will welcome the inquiry.

These are healthy debates and if you can’t make the case and convince people, then it’s probably time to tear down the monument or move it to a museum. More importantly, if most historians remain silent on this topic (you know who you are), then the “tear ‘em all down” and the “not-one-inch” crowds will dominate the conversation until the jokesters take it over entirely with memes. Also, splitting hairs over the difference between monuments, statues, and memorials will lose, bore, or even insult the public. For most there’s no difference, and as the Germans have proven with World War II, it is possible to create memorials without any offensive, nationalistic symbols. Some of these structures have history in and of themselves, which may warrant their preservation, but historians should make these cases and convince people.

Monuments have their place, but their historical significance is always debatable. As the Greeks and even Cicero believed, war trophies are temporary, even those made of stone and bronze. As such, it’s up to historians to keep these stories alive and fresh for everyone. We should welcome the debates as opportunities to discuss history with the public.

Notes