Major Research Tools

Encyclopedia of the Enlightenment

Full-Text, Reference

Scholarly encyclopedia covering the Enlightenment "from the rise of Descartes' disciples in 1670 to the restoration of the Bourbon monarchy in 1815."


Historical Abstracts

Index
Time period covered: 1450 to present; Publication coverage: 1955 to present

Indexes journal articles, book reviews, and dissertations on the history of the world, except the United States and Canada. Subjects include diplomatic history, economics, international relations, and political science.


Other Suggested Research Tools

Burney Collection of Newspapers

Full-Text

Digital collection of early English news media from the 17th and 18th centuries. Includes pamphlets, broadsides, periodicals, and an extensive collection of London newspapers.


Eighteenth Century Collections Online I and II

Full-Text

Digital collection of 180,000 English language books, pamphlets, essays, and broadsides published from 1701 to 1800. Titles cover history, fine arts, medicine, science, literature, law, philosophy, and religion.


Eighteenth Century Journals

Full-Text
Coverage: 1685-1835

Full-text of magazines and newspapers providing a broad representation of print journalism in the eighteenth century. Most titles are British, but the collection also includes titles from from Canada, the Caribbean, India, and France. Minimal overlap with materials in other collections such as Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO), The Burney Collection, etc.


Empire Online

Full-Text

Primary sources charting the rise and fall of empires, from the explorations of Columbus, Captain Cook, and others to decolonization in the second half of the twentieth century. Includes perspectives from colonizers as well as indigenous peoples from Africa, India and North America.


Gale Primary Sources

Full-Text

Coverage: 1604-2008

Research environment for finding primary sources mainly from Great Britain and the United States covering the 17th to 20th centuries.


History Research Tools - Europe (General)

Gateway

Skillman library's links to major indexes and full-text collections covering multiple periods of European history.


London Times Digital Archive

Full-Text
Coverage: 1785- 2019

Electronic edition of The Times of London.


Slavery and Anti-Slavery: A Transnational Archive

Full-Text
Coverage: 17th C. - late 19th C.

Major collection of primary source material covering the global history of the slave trade, slavery, and anti-slavery movements. Presented in 4 collections: Debates over Slavery and Abolition; Slave Trade in the Atlantic World; The Institution of Slavery; and Age of Emancipation.


State Papers Online, 18th Century 1714-1782

Full-Text

Coverage: 1714-1782

Collection of digitized British government records from the National Archives of the UK. These full-color manuscript scans cover the reigns of George I and George II, and part of the reign of George III. The content details the inner workings of the government during such major events as the Jacobite rebellions of 1715 and 1745, the Seven Years' War, and the majority of the American Revolutionary War.


Victorian Web

Full-Text

Information on the politics, culture, and society of the Victorian era (1837-1901). Originating from materials from English literature courses at Brown University; additional contributions from scholars, graduate students, and undergraduates from institutions around the world.


Specialized Collections

Age of Exploration

Full-Text

Primary sources, including audio-visual materials, relating to key events in the history of European maritime exploration from c.1420-1920.


Church Missionary Society Periodicals

Full-Text
Coverage: 1804-2009

Publications from the Church Missionary Society (CMS), the South American Missionary Society and the Church of England Zenana Missionary Society (CEZMS). CMS was founded in 1799 with aims including social reform in England and world evangelization. CMS was one of the most influential Protestant mission agencies and its work spread from Africa to the Mediterranean, the Middle East, Asia, Oceania and the Americas.


Compact Memory: Internet Archive of Jewish Periodicals

Full-Text

Digital archive of German-language Jewish newspapers and periodicals,  ca. 1768 - 1938, in Germany, Austria, and elsewhere in Central Europe.  Covers religious, political, social, cultural, and academic aspects of Jewish life.


Defining Gender

Full-Text
Coverage: 1410-1917

Primary source material from British archives focusing on gender, leisure, and consumer culture. Thematic areas within the collection are Conduct and Politeness, Domesticity and the Family, Consumption and Leisure, Education and Sensibility, and The Body.


East India Company

Full-Text
Coverage: 1599-1947

Collection of India Office Records from the British Library charting the history of British trade and rule in the Indian subcontinent and beyond.


European Views of the Americas: 1493-1750

Full-Text
Index of works about the Americas written in Europe before 1750. "Covers the history of European exploration as well as portrayals of Indigenous peoples." Note that the full text of English language titles may be found in Early English Books Online or Eighteenth Century Collections Online; for the full text of French titles, check Gallica.

Global Commodities

Data, Full-Text

Primary sources such as manuscripts/diaries, rare books, maps, paintings, advertisements, company records, etc., covering the global history of 15 major commodities: chocolate, coffee, cotton, fur, energy, opium, porcelain, silver & gold, spices, sugar, tea, timber, tobacco, wheat, wine & spirits. Also includes data on energy production, consumption, and reserves by country from 1965 to the present.


Grand Tour

Full-Text
Coverage: c1550-1850

Primary source accounts of English young men and women travelling abroad. Good source of information on daily life in the 18th century and urban centers, particularly Paris, Rome, Florence, and Geneva.


Hemeroteca Digital

Full-Text

Digitized Spanish-language periodicals from the 19th century through the 1930s. Most titles are from Spain, but some are from other Spanish speaking countries. From the National Library of Spain.


Histpop - The Online Historical Population Reports Website

Data

Detailed population data for the British Isles from 1801 to 1937. Includes data on births, marriages, and deaths, plus supplementary essays.


Liberty, Equality, Fraternity: Exploring the French Revolution

Full-Text

Collection of primary sources in translation related to the French Revolution. The site includes images and text documents taken from personal memoirs, official reports, newspaper articles, treatises, and eyewitness accounts. The edited documents are brief, but include full citations to aid in further research. For primary sources on the French Revolution in French, see the French Revolution Digital Archive.


London Lives 1690-1800: Crime, Poverty and Social Policy in the Metropolis

Full-Text

A variety of documents that can be used to reconstruct everyday life in 18th-century London. Incorporates the proceedings of the Old Bailey, London's central criminal court, and provides extensive background essays on London.


Migration to New Worlds

Full-Text
Coverage: c. 1800-c. 1980

Major collection of oral histories, personal accounts, correspondence, shipping records, and many other primary sources covering the experience of migration from Europe and Asia to the United States, Canada, Caribbean, Australia and New Zealand.


Nichols Collection of Newspapers

Full-Text
Coverage: 1672-1737

Digital collection of early English news media from the 17th and 18th centuries. Includes an extensive collection of English newspapers as well as pamphlets, broadsides, and periodicals.


Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (NCSE)

Full-Text

Full text of six nineteenth-century British periodicals and newspapers.


Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland

Reference
Coverage: Middle Ages-Present

Comprehensive listing of over 45,000 English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cornish, and immigrant surnames including variant spellings, origins/etymology, geographical distribution, and associated notes.


Pamphlets and Periodicals of the French Revolution of 1848

Full-Text

Over 100 pamphlets and periodicals presenting opinions and hourly news on the developments of the provisional government that emerged from the 1848 revolution.


Slave Voyages

Data, Visual Resource

Detailed data on slaving voyages from the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database and the Intra-American Slave Trade Database. Also includes the African Names Database, which provides details of Africans taken from captured slave ships or from African trading sites, and a database of images relating to the slave trade.


Victorian Popular Culture

Full-Text
Coverage: 1779 - 1930

Collection of images, posters, playbills, books, objects, and ephemera (e.g. pamphlets, handbills) documenting popular entertainment in the Victorian era. Divided into 4 modules: spiritualism/magic; circuses; theater/music halls; and cinema.