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Primary Sources

  1. General Guides for Finding & Understanding Primary Sources
  2. Guides for Researching Medieval Manuscripts
  3. Databases (*Only for affiliated students, faculty & staff)
  4. Manuscript Collections
  5. Online Libraries

 

 

 

 

Guides for Finding & Using Primary Sources

 

Finding Primary Sources

Duke
http://www.lib.duke.edu/libguide/fi_primary.htm

 

 

Finding Primary sources

UC Berkley
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/TeachingLib/Guides/PrimarySources.html

 

 

How to Distinguish Between Primary and Secondary Sources

  UC Santa Cruz
   http://library.ucsc.edu/ref/howto/primarysecondary.html

 

 

Using Primary Sources on the Web

RUSA
http://www.lib.washington.edu/subject/History/RUSA/

 

 

What is a Primary Source

UF
http://www.uflib.ufl.edu/UFDC/?b=UF00076095

 

 

 

Subject specific guides for Researching Medieval Manuscripts

 

In Search of Medieval Manuscripts

 Cornell University Library
 http://www.library.cornell.edu/olinuris/ref/manuscripts.html

 

This site is under construction, but promises to be an outstanding site.   The site is a well organized 'how to' guide teaching students how to find manuscripts.   Lots of paper resources are listed and a few electronic resources are linked so far.

 

Manuscripts

Stanford University Library
http://library.stanford.edu/depts/ssrg/medieval/mss/mangen.html

 

 

 

Databases

 

Early English Books Online (EEBO)

Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in English from England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, British North America and elsewhere from 1473-1700. EEBO covers the following subjects: education, exploration, history, linguistics, literature (poetry, prose & drama), mathematics, music, philosophy, politics, religion, and science. Examples of the types of material contained in EEBO include almanacs, calendars, music, novels, prayer books, pamphlets, proclamations, and many other primary sources. Works by such famous people as Malory, Bacon, More, Erasmus, Boyle, Newton , and Galileo are contained within EEBO.

 

Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO)

The Eighteenth Century Collections Online can be used to access the digital images of 150,000 English language books published during the 18th Century (1701-1800). ECCO was created using the holdings of the British Museum and 1,500 public & private universities worldwide. This online collection is divided into seven subject areas: history and geography; social science and fine arts; medicine, science and technology; literature and language; religion and philosophy; law; and reference.

 

LexisNexis: Primary Sources in U.S. History

This database allow access to Primary Sources in African American History; American Women's History; U.S. Presidential History; and Guides to Microforms.

 

North American Women's Letters and Diaries

North American Women's Letters and Diaries is the largest collection of women's diaries and correspondence ever assembled. Spanning more than 300 years, it brings the personal experiences of some 1,325 women to researchers, students, and general readers. The collection includes some 150,000 pages of published letters and diaries from individuals writing from Colonial times to 1950. Represented are all age groups and life stages, all ethnicities, many geographical regions, the famous and the not so famous. It also includes 300 biographies to assist the user. *See also a similar database called In the First Person.

 

ProQuest Historical Newspapers

This database offers full page and article images from four famous newspapers. The newspapers Included are the New York Times (1851-2001); Wall Street Journal (1889-1986); Washington Post (1877-1988); and Christian Science Monitor (1908-1991). The collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue, cover to cover, in downloadable PDF files. *See also an online resource called Harpweek.

 

WorldCat

WorldCat is a giant online catalog that contains more than 57 million records. Beside the usual secondary resources, one can also find archival material & manuscripts. Worldcat will tell you which libraries own a particular item and its coverage is global (giving a state by state and country by country break down).

 

 

 

Manuscript Collections

 

* Aberdeen Bestiary

   University of Aberdeen (United Kingdom)

   The new & improved 2002 site: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/bestiary/bestiary.hti    Old site (pilot project) still available: http://www.clues.abdn.ac.uk:8080/besttest/firstpag.html

 

 

 

* Bibliotheque Nationale de France (BNF)

   National Library of France

   BNF Homepage (English Version): http://www.bnf.fr/site_bnf_eng/index.html    Direct Link to Manuscript Collection: http://www.bnf.fr/site_bnf_eng/collectionsgb/indexgb.htm

 

If you happen to enter their homepage in French at www.bnf.fr/ then click on the link in the top left that says 'English Version'.   This site contains 1,000 illuminated manuscripts Online.   The manuscripts can be found by searching the name of the manuscript.   One can use this link to browse even if you don't know what the manuscripts are about.   Each manuscript usually contains many different images within it.   Simply click on the images to enlarge the picture and examine its details.   Unfortunately, the National Library does not give manuscript details or explanations of individual images (like the images on the British Library Website).

  Another method of searching is using the following themes:

  • History
  • Religion
  • Science & Technology
  • Sports & Entertainment
  • Miscellaneous

The section entitled 'Introductory Text' gives a short explanation (~one page long) regarding important events (100 Years War), personages (Charles V) or other aspects of medieval culture.   Students may want to read the section entitled 'Illumination in the Middle Ages' as it gives a good introduction to how manuscripts were created.

Also of interest on the BNF site is an Online search engine and digital collection called Gallica 2000.   It contains about 70,000 multi-media documents available for public use (some appear to be available full-text).   Time periods covered are from the Middle Ages to the 20 th century.

 

 

 

* Bodleian Library

   University of Oxford    http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/dept/scwmss/wmss/medieval/browse.htm

 

The Bodleian Library has digitized and made about 1,000 manuscripts publicly available.   These manuscripts are arranged by century and country of origin.   The bulk of the collection spans from the 11 th to the 17 th century.

 

 

 

* British Library

   Direct link to Manuscript Collection: http://www.bl.uk/collections/toppage.html

 

The British Library has made some of its greatest manuscripts available Online.   Visitor's can utilize their "Turn the Pages" feature while viewing the manuscripts (requires Macromedia Shockwave version 8.5 which can be downloaded free).   Some of the manuscripts of interest include:

  • Beowulf
  • Caxton's Chaucer
  • Da Vinci's Notebook
  • Gutenberg Bible
  • Lindisfarne Gospels
  • Magna Carta

Also of interest is an image library full of medieval manuscripts that are available for purchase.   Use by individuals and schools (for non-profit purposes) of low-resolution images is free, but please read the section regarding their use and copyright.

Direct Link to their Online Images: http://ibs001.colo.firstnet.net.uk/britishlibrary/controller/searchtips

This image collection covers all time periods; including the medieval.   One can search for images by using their title list (a large, alphabetical listing of everything they have), subject index (a listing of popular topics--but not organized by time periods), or by using the search box.   If you don't know the exact name of the image or manuscript you want, using the search box would probably be your best bet.   Putting in keywords such as knight, Chaucer, or medieval will bring back relevant results.   There is an advanced search to help you refine your search.

Each image contains the following useful information:

  • Title of Image
  • Description of the people/events depicted
  • Title of the work
  • Author
  • Illustrator
  • When it was produced
  • Language
  • Record Number
  • Shelfmark
  • Page Folio Number

You can also click on the image to enlarge it and examine it more closely.   Some of the manuscripts contain brilliant colors and detail.

 

Compass

http://www.thebritishmuseum.ac.uk/compass/ixbin/hixclient.exe?_IXDB_=compass&search-form=graphical/main.html&submit-button=search

An Online database that contains about 5,000 objects in the British Museum collection.   The site offers images, links, background information, and maps.   It is designed mostly for a general audience.

 

 

 

Burnet Psalter

   University of Aberdeen Historic Collections (United Kingdom)
   http://www.abdn.ac.uk/diss/historic/collects/bps/index.html

 

 

 

Cary Collection

   Graphic Arts Library & Digital Image Database
   Rochester, NY: Rochester Institute of Technology

   http://wally.rit.edu/cary/cc_db/manuscripts/index.html

 

Fifty one leaves of medieval manuscripts from Western Europe. Dates range from the 12th to the 16th Century.

 

 

 

Codices Electronici Sangallenses (CESG) - Virtual Library

    Digital Abbey Library of St. Gallen

    http://www.cesg.unifr.ch/en/index.htm

 

 

 

 

Compass--see the entry for the British Library

 

 

 

DScriptorium

   Provo, UT.:Brigham Young University    http://www.byu.edu/~hurlbut/dscriptorium/dscriptorium.html

 

DScriptorium (the D is for digital) , hosted by Brigham Young University, is devoted to collecting, storing and distributing digital images of Medieval manuscripts.   All materials on this website may be freely distributed for the personal use of students, scholars and the public.   It is not a particularly large collection, but a nice one.   There are also links to other manuscript collections on the Web.

 

 

* Digital Scriptorium

   Berkley, CA: University of California    http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/Scriptorium/

 

Digital Scriptorium is hosted by U.C. Berkley, but is a product of a consortium of universities and libraries around the country (including the University of Texas, New York Public Library, Columbia University, and others).   The project was started by funding from the Andrew Mellon foundation and is continuing from a grant through the National Endowment for the Humanities.   The database houses 1000 images of archival materials and now has 8,500 color images from the joined holdings of the Berkeley and Columbia affiliated libraries!   The images are intended for personal use and teaching purposes.   Scholars and students will enjoy this site.

 

 

 

Early Manuscripts at Oxford University

   Oxford, U.K.: Oxford University    http://image.ox.ac.uk/

 

This site is maintained by Oxford University.   It offers high-resolution, digital facsimiles of complete manuscripts scanned directly from the originals. Many of the oldest manuscripts held by the University's Libraries are available here .   This site provides access to over 80 early manuscripts.   These manuscripts are available from the following collections:

  • Balliol College
  • Bodleian Library
  • Corpus Christi College
  • Jesus College
  • Magdalen College
  • Merton College
  • St. Johns College

Please note that this is an ongoing project and not everything has been entered into the digital collection.

 

 

 

Electronic Beowulf

   University of Kentucky: Kevin Kiernan & Paul Szarmach Ed.    http://www.uky.edu/~kiernan/eBeowulf/guide.htm

 

The University of Kentucky hosts the American audience whom wish to access this site. Professor Kiernan and Paul Szarmach of the Medieval Institute, Western Michigan University are the current editors. Many scholars will recognize Kevin Kiernan as an expert in the field of Medieval literature. The British Library is the sister site for the U.K. and is allowing its manuscripts to be used for this project . This site is essentially an Online help guide to those who have purchased the CD-ROM which contains images of the Beowulf manuscript.

 

 

 

EuroDocs: Online Sources for European History

Brigham Young University
http://eudocs.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Main_Page

 

 

 

Hill Monastic Manuscript Library

   http://www.hmml.org/

 

 

 

Illuminated Middle Ages (English Version)

   http://www.moyenageenlumiere.com/

 

 

 

* Koninklijke Bibliotheek (KB)

   National Library of the Netherlands

   Homepage: http://www.kb.nl/kb/manuscripts/

 

Patrons can perform basic or advanced searches.   One can also browse using any of the following categories:

  • Religion & Magic
  • Nature
  • Human Being, Man in General
  • Society, Civilization, Culture
  • Abstract Ideas & Concepts
  • History
  • Bible
  • Literature
  • Classical Mythology & Ancient History

When you find a manuscript that you like, you can click on the picture to examine it.   Or, if notice that there is a sort of tassle hanging down from the top frame, you can use your mouse to drag it down.   Hidden off screen is the picture and the commands to manipulate the manuscript (enlarge it, etc.).   This feature is this site unique way to present the manuscript to you.

Another related site has more links to KB's manuscript collections:

A Hundred Highlights from the Koninklijke Bibliotheek

http://www.kb.nl/kb/100hoogte/hh-en.html

Click on the Hundred Highlights link and you will find tons of links to different topics to explore or types of works (manuscripts, woodblocks, engravings, drawings, etc.).

 

 

 

New York Carver

   Stone Carving, Architecture, & Art in the Middle Ages    http://www.newyorkcarver.com/scriptoria.htm

 

 

 

Repositories of Primary Sources

University of Idaho
http://www.uidaho.edu/special-collections/Other.Repositories.html

 

A listing of over 5000 websites describing holdings of manuscripts, archives, rare books, historical photographs, and other primary sources for the research scholar.

 

 

 

TRES RICHES HEURES DU DUC DE BERRY

   Medieval Book of Hours    http://humanities.uchicago.edu/images/heures/heures.html

 

A nice site that begins with explanations about what the Tres Riches Heures is about and who painted it.   If you scroll down, there are details describing what the various months of the calendar represent.

 

 

 

Vatican Library Collection

   http://www.vedo.com/store/index.asp?DEPARTMENT_ID=5

 

Go to the top

 

 

 

Online Libraries

 

Note: The following Web resources can be consulted to obtain full-text versions of medieval works.

 

 

Christian Classics Ethereal Library

   http://www.ccel.org/

 

The Ethereal Library offers full-text coverage for works of the church fathers (e.g. St. Augustine's City of God--see 'Chuch Fathers' link on left hand side of the page).    The 'Encyclopedia of Christianity' offers links to full-text topics in a massive, A-Z listing.   This format can aid in finding personalities and is also browseable.   Many of the entries are linked into the Catholic Encyclopedia on the New Advent Website (see above entry).

 

 

DScriptorium & Digital Scriptorium --see the 'Manuscripts' section for these Websites

 

 

* Electronic Text Center

   University of Virginia (UVa)

   Main page: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/    Direct link to resources: http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/eng-on.html

The Electronic Text Center offers publicly accessible versions of some 65 titles from their Middle English Collection.   Here are some of the more well known works available:

  • The York & Towneley Plays
  • Pearl
  • Everyman
  • Sir Gawain & the Green Knight
  • Troilus & Criseyde
  • Canterbury Tales
  • Confessio Amantis
  • Piers Plowman

The Old English Corpus collection (Univ. of Toronto) is also linked, but is only available to those affiliated with UVa.

One really nice feature of this site is that one can search for words or phrases either in individual texts or throughout all texts.   There are opportunities to limit searches by author, title, or date ranges.   The Compound (advanced) Search allows one to conduct proximity searching (allowing one to find one word near another) in texts.

 

 

Humanities Text Initiative

   University of Michigan    http://www.hti.umich.edu/index-all.html

The Humanities Text Initiative (HTI) offers a few resources of interest to those studying medieval and early modern studies:

Benson's Glossarial DataBase of Middle English (see my write up on the Literature Websites [Link it] page)

Bible : King James Version, Martin Luther Translation, New Testament, Revised Standard Version.   Each version can be browsed (by individual books) and searched (using Boolean operators, proximity, or a simple search).

Blake's Songs of Innocence and Experience : A database that is searchable by bibliographic information (identifying works by author and title), word index (allows one to browse through lists of all unique words in the text), Boolean operators, and proximity.

Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse

The Medieval Review (Online journal)

Many of the resources offered through HTI are databases that are particularly useful to scholars who are researching (the above mentioned) literary texts.

Note : In order to access the full text of the following works (see below), go into the database and select the 'browse' feature.

Bible (all versions)

* Corpus of Middle English Prose and Verse

   Some of the works available include:

  • Canterbury Tales
  • Confessio Amantis
  • Everyman
  • Le Morte de Arthur
  • Mystery Plays (York, Towneley, etc.)
  • Owl & the Nightengale
  • Pearl
  • Sir Gawain & the Green Knight
  • Troilus & Creseyde
  • Vision of the Pier's Plowman

 

 

*Internet Medieval Sourcebook (IMS)

Prof. Halsall, Fordham University
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/sbook1.html  

 

An impressive collection of translated primary sources. Ideal for students.

 

 

Internet Classics Archive

   Hosted by MIT    http://classics.mit.edu/

 

Many of the mainstream classics authors will be found here (primarily ancient Greek & Roman: Aristotle, Plato, Caesar, Augustus, etc.).   This site offers students full-text, English translations of these classic works.   Various authors have done the translations (W.D. Ross has done Aristotle's Metaphysics & Nicomachean Ethics).

Note : the search, comment, and trivia features of this site do not work.

 

 

* Luminarium : Anthology of Middle English Literature (1350-1485)

   Anniina Jokinen    http://www.luminarium.org/medlit/

 

A word of advice : Once an author or work is selected, the user may be startled by the music that will automatically start playing.   Find and click on the small grey pause button in the top right-hand side of the screen to stop it.

This site offers links to full texts in Middle & modern English from quality Web sources (i.e. University of Michigan, University of Virginia, etc.).   Authors or works included in this collection are the following:

  • Geoffrey Chaucer
  • John Gower
  • Sir Gawain
  • William Langland
  • Julian of Norwich
  • Margery Kempe
  • Sir Thomas Malory
  • Everyman
  • Medieval Plays
  • Medieval Lyrics

Resources for students also include links to notes, essays, and study guides on that particular author or topic.   Be sure to click on the "additional sources" link located at the bottom of the main page.   You will find a rather large list of links for Online resources dealing with medieval England.   There are many different topics:   art, architecture, general history, plague, chivalry, women, medieval life, manuscripts, medieval science, etc.   Some broken links here, but most are in working order.

 

 

New Advent Catholic Website

   http://www.newadvent.org/

 

The strength of this site rests in the massive amount of information available on medieval philosophers.   The 'Church Fathers' link gives a massive alphabetically list of many great writers from antiquity and the Middle Ages.   Major authors like Augustine and Aquinas have vast amounts of their works full-text.   The home page also includes a link directly to Aquinas' Summa Theologica.   Also of interest on the main page is full-text access of the Catholic Encyclopedia.   Drawbacks of the site include links that are slow or fail to load.   Finally, one has to take the paid advertisements in the side-bars with a grain of salt.

 

 

Old English Pages

   Georgetown University    http://www.georgetown.edu/cball/oe/old_english.html

 

This is a separate site maintained by Georgetown University.   It contains tons of links to electronic editions of Old English texts, translations, and images of Anglo-Saxon manuscripts available on the World Wide Web.   There is also a section arranged by historical topics with many hypertext links within the information.   There is an entire section that talks about how to search old English using traditional search engines.   Examples of searches and tips on how to conduct the search are included.   The student of old English will find it particularly useful.

 

 

* Online Medieval and Classical Library 

   University of CA, Berkley: Douglas Killings Ed.    http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/OMACL/

 

The Berkley site is probably the best known and maintained Online library on the Web.   It has a huge archive (too many to even attempt to list here) organized by author, title, genre, and language.   Much of it is full-text access for use by students and scholars.

 

 

Online Reference Book for Medieval Studies (ORB)

College of Staten Island, City University of New York
http://www.the-orb.net/libindex.html

 

A small collection containing transcriptions/translations of medieval texts.

 

 

Project Gutenburg

   Michael Hart    http://gutenberg.net/

Project Gutenburg makes over 10,000 Ebooks freely available to the general public.   Many of the works found at this site are older literary works that have fallen out of copyright.   All of the works in the collection may be read or downloaded for non-commercial purposes.   Many of the Ebooks are simply in straight text format.   However, there are some that are also audio books.   Use the author and title boxes at the top of the page to search for books you wish to find.   Also note that after clicking on a particular Ebook record, you can use the subject headings and Library of Congress Classification (where available) to find books related to your topic.

 

 

Project Wittenberg

    Gary Bogart of Cornell University & the Reverend Bob Smith, Walther Library at Concordia Theological Seminary.       http://www.projectwittenberg.org/

This site contains works by and about Martin Luther and other Lutherans.

 

 

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