Multimedia Collections
- Empire Online (1492-1962) This link opens in a new windowFull text primary source documents, including original manuscripts and printed material covering colonial history, politics, culture and society from 1492 to 1962.
- EuroDocs: Online Sources for European HistoryRich website linking to primary sources for all periods of European history. Organized first by country, and then loosely chronologically. Includes transcriptions, facsimiles, and, sometimes, translations. Maintained at Brigham Young University.
- European History Primary SourcesThis portal provides access to the digital repositories of European libraries. Searching is provided by country, century, subject, and languages. Hosted by the European University Institute.
- Heilbrunn Timeline of Art HistoryThis multifaceted tool places art works from the Metropolitan Museum's collection within geographical and chronological context. It has excellent thematic essays (background information) that cover the historical eras and cultures that produced the works of art (the primary sources), along with maps and key events from each place and time period.
- EuropeanaA digitized multimedia library of the European cultural heritage: digitized books, manuscripts, photos, paintings, maps, audio and film material, newspapers, etc.
- NapoleonicaDigital collections related to the Napoleonic era, including correspondence, images, and administrative documents.
- Voyages: The Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade Database This link opens in a new windowRecords from more than 35,000 individual slaving expeditions between 1514 and 1866 from archives and libraries throughout the Atlantic world, providing information about vessels, enslaved peoples, slave traders and owners, and trading routes.
Books
- Google Books Advanced SearchGoogle has digitized thousands of books and magazines and made them searchable. Use this advanced search interface for precise searching. You may be able to access the full text of books that are out of copyright. If an item is only available in "snippet view" or "limited preview," you may be able to obtain that item from our own collection or via Interlibrary Loan.
- Nineteenth Century Collections Online This link opens in a new windowMonographs, newspapers, pamphlets, manuscripts, ephemera, maps, statistics, and more from the 19th century.
Images
- British PathéA growing digital archive of newsreels created by the British Pathé company from the 1890s through the 1970s. These videos include areas such as historical events and documentaries as well as travelogues and contemporary coverage of culture.
- ARTstor This link opens in a new windowDigital image library offering searchable collections of images and descriptive information including architecture, painting, sculpture, photography, and more, encompassing many time periods and world cultures.
Note: First time, off-campus users accessing via OpenAthens will be required to create a personal account
- Old Maps OnlineAccess to maps from research libraries around the world. You may search a place and a time period to find high-resolution maps.
- Library of Congress MapsAccess to digitized maps from the Library of Congress.
Indexes to Primary Sources
Use these tools to help locate primary sources. You may need to use Interlibrary Loan to acquire the actual primary sources.
- C19: The Nineteenth Century Index This link opens in a new windowAll-inclusive bibliographic tool for 19th-century research.
- British Newspaper ArchiveSearch the contents of millions of newspaper pages published in 19th and 20th century Britain. Only indexing is available. Full text articles must either be purchased by the user or requested through Interlibrary Loan.
Newspapers & Magazines
- ICON: International Coalition on NewspapersThis website links to historic newspaper digitization projects from around the world. Projects are listed by country or by state. Most newspapers are freely available, but the fee-based projects are noted as such.
- Gallica: National Library of FranceDigitized copies of French newspapers from the 19th and early 20th centuries, including Le Figaro (1826-1942), Le Temps (1861-1937), among others.
- Illustrated London News Historical Archive, 1842-2003 This link opens in a new windowDigitized full run of the world's most iconic illustrated newspaper from 1842-2003.
- Gale Primary Sources This link opens in a new windowCross-search Gale's primary sources Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO), Nineteenth Century Collections Online (NCCO) and NewsVault.
- Times Digital Archive This link opens in a new windowFull text PDF facsimiles of specific articles as well as complete pages, including photos and advertisements, from every issue of the London Times.
Personal Accounts
To find personal accounts in the JMU Library Catalog, search for the phrase "personal narratives" with keywords.
- JMU Library Catalog This link opens in a new windowFind journals, books, ebooks, films, sound recordings, and government documents available to JMU users.