An inquiry from Vico's formulation of the general idea of history leads to a reinterpretation of the way Marx deals with the general notion of "history", which is not understood as the linear continuity of different production systems, but as the genesis of some systems' conditions from others' integral elements. It is singled out that Althusser has been the first Marxist who fully understood this complexity and the first who undertook the composite character of Marx's historical time. The article closes on some reflections on the singularity of the "Idea of Time" and its construction.
History; time; Marx; Althusser