Herbert Levi Osgood was an American historian of colonial American history. As a professor at Columbia University he directed numerous dissertations of scholars who became major historians. Osgood was a leader of the "Imperial historians" who studied, and often praised, the inner workings of the British Empire in the 18th century.

The historiography of the British Empire refers to the studies, sources, critical methods and interpretations used by scholars to develop a history of the British Empire. Historians and their ideas are the main focus here; specific lands and historical dates and episodes are covered in the article on the British Empire. Scholars have long studied the Empire, looking at the causes for its formation, its relations to the French and other empires, and the kinds of people who became imperialists or anti-imperialists, together with their mindsets. The history of the breakdown of the Empire has attracted scholars of the histories of the United States, the British Raj, and the African colonies. John Darwin (2013) identifies four imperial goals: colonising, civilising, converting, and commerce.