One for the history books

Finally received all my books for my next course, "History of Christianity I". This is way more history than I really want to read about. I haven't taken a history class since high school, and it was always one of my worst subjects because I just wan't any good at rote memorization... all the dates, names, etc! I'm hoping things will be different this time...haha

While I was waiting for some of my other books to arrive, I read ahead in Eusebius: The Church History. Eusebius was a pioneer, so to speak, being the first person (in the 4th century) to try to document the early history of Christianity. By today's standards, he wouldn't be considered a very critical/analytical historian. But I think he was just doing his best to gather, organize, and sift out reliable accounts from rumours and traditions. So we see that Eusebius makes a few errors and slip ups, based on what we know now in this age. Every time I come across one of these types of footnotes, it challenges me a little bit. Is what we know about the early history of Christianity reliable? Do extra-Biblical sources align with what we read about regarding Paul's missionary journeys? What about the other apostles' missionary journeys and martyrdom? How much of it is legend and tradition? Well, I guess I have 3 other books and the lectures themselves to help me think through all this.