History databases

17th and 18th Century Burney Collection Newspapers

  • Extensive collection of more than one thousand newspapers and pamphlets from 1600-1800.
  • Based on a collection at the British Library gathered by Reverend Charles Burney.
  • Coverage: Broad coverage of the humanities, science, and medicine.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

19th Century British Library Newspapers

  • Provides access to national, regional, and local 19th century British newspapers.
  • It includes 48 titles which reflect the social and political developments of the time.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

19th Century British Pamphlets Collection

  • A digital collection of more than 26,000 significant pamphlets compiled from seven UK university libraries.
  • Coverage: Key political, social, technological and environmental issues of their day.
  • Included in the main library search.

19th Century UK periodicals, series 1

  • A full text resource that spotlights the birth of modern magazine publishing in Britain.
  • Charts the rise of children’s entertainment and education, and increasing interest in popular sports and hobbies.
  • Also covers the political spectrum of women’s writing.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Arts & Humanities

  • Features hundreds of titles covering Art, Architecture, Design, History, Philosophy, Music, Literature, Theatre, and Cultural Studies.
  • Full-text journals.
  • Included in the main library search.

Avalon Project

  • A Yale-based project to provide documents in law, history and diplomacy back to the 18th century and earlier.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Bess of Hardwick's Letters

  • Letters to and from Bess of Hardwick between the years 1550 and 1607. It includes correspondence, images, and commentaries that provide an overview of her life.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Bibliography of British and Irish History

  • Covering British and Irish history and relations with the empire and Commonwealth, from 55 BC to the present.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Bristol Historical Resource

  • This is the online version of the Bristol Historical Resources CD-ROM, Created in 2000 by the UWE Regional History Centre.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

British Cartoon Archive

  • Contains more than 125,000 cartoons, fully-catalogued, searchable, and available to view online.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

British History Online

  • The digital library of the core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and early modern history of Britain.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

British Humanities Index

  • An international abstracting and indexing tool for research in the humanities and arts.
  • This indexing database provides article citations and abstracts, not full text.

British Periodicals Collections I and II

  • Almost 500 British periodical runs from the 1680s to the 1930s, based on the UMI Microfilm Collection, 'Early British Periodicals'.
  • Included in the main library search.

British Union of Fascists: newspapers and secret files

  • Contains the three principal organs of the British Union of Fascists: Action (1936-1940), Blackshirt (1933-1939) and Fascist week (1933-1934).
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Clergy of the Church of England Database

  • The principal records of clerical careers from over 50 archives in England and Wales.
  • Coverage of as many clerical lives as possible from the Reformation to the mid-nineteenth century.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Corpus Vitrearum Medii Aevi (Medieval Stained Glass Windows in Britain)

  • International research project dedicated to recording medieval stained glass in Great Britain.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Cullen Project

  • A searchable database of the consultation letters of Dr William Cullen (1710-1790) at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Digimap

  • Digimap is a collection of services that deliver maps and map data of Great Britain.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Digital National Security Archive

  • The Digital National Security Archive is a database of primary declassified documents covering US foreign and military policy since 1945.
  • Included in the main library search.

Early English Books Online

  • Digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Early European Books Online

  • A wide-ranging overview of the intellectual life and historical upheavals of early modern Europe.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO)

  • A diverse collection of material for the researcher of the eighteenth century.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

European History Primary Source

  • Primary sources for the history of Europe between the 18th and 20th Century.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Europeana

  • A database of historical artwork, artefacts, books, videos and sounds from across Europe.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Gallica

  • The digital library of the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF).
  • This digital library includes more than 70,000 volumes of digitised texts, 80,000 still images, and 30 hours of sound recordings.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Guardian and Observer (ProQuest Historical Newspapers)

  • Online access to The Guardian (1821-2003) and The Observer (1791-2003) newspapers.
  • Easily searchable first coverage of the politics, society and events of the time.
  • Included in the main library search.

Historical Texts

  • Contain a wide range of online texts from the fifteenth century to present day.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Illustrated London News

  • Covers the reporting period 1842 to 2003, including news of war, disaster, ceremonies, the arts and science.
  • Included in the main library search.

Independent Local Radio

  • Audio files from four archives of Independent Local Radio from 1973 to 1996.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Independent Voices

  • Digital collection of alternative press newspapers, magazines and journals, drawn from the special collections of participating libraries.
  • Produced by feminists, dissident GIs, campus radicals, Native Americans, anti-war activists, Black Power advocates, Hispanics, LGBT activists, the extreme right-wing press and alternative literary magazines during the latter half of the 20th century.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

John Johnson Collection

  • A digitised document collection of more than 65,000 printed items of ephemera from the eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

John Strype's Survey of London Online

  • An electronic version of John Strype's Elizabethan survey of London and Westminster.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

JSTOR

  • UWE Bristol subscribes to the JSTOR multidisciplinary Arts and Sciences Collections I,II,III,V,VII, VIII and XIV.
  • A scholarly archive of over 1,000 full-text electronic journals.

Legacies of British Slave Ownership

  • A database holding the findings of two projects on slave ownership.
  • Topics include areas on the slave owners estates and plantations, maps of the estates.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

London Lives 1690-1800

  • A fully searchable database of 240,000 manuscripts from eight archives and fifteen datasets.
  • Gives access to 3.35 million names on the subjects of crime, poverty and social policy between 1690-1800.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Mass Observation Online

  • The Mass Observation Online archive specialises in material about everyday life in Britain.
  • Included in the main library search.

Migration to New Worlds

  • The emigration of peoples from Great Britain, mainland Europe and Asia to the New World and Australasia in the 19th and 20th centuries.
  • Included in the main library search.

The Old Bailey Online

  • A database of the largest body of texts detailing the lives of non-elite people ever published.
  • Contains 197,745 criminal trials held at London's central criminal court.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland

  • Ultimate reference work on family names of the UK.
  • Covers English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cornish and immigrant surnames.
  • Included in the main library search.

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography

  • An illustrated collection of over 56,000 biographies of people who shaped all aspects of Britain’s past.
  • From the 4th Century to the 21st Century.
  • Included in the main library search.

Periodicals Archive Online

  • Digitised journals published in the arts, humanities, and social sciences, spread over a two hundred year period.
  • Included in the main library search.

Picturing Places

  • Contains the role and history of topographical views, maps and texts.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Project Muse

  • Online access to high quality humanities, arts, and social sciences journals from scholarly publishers.
  • Included in the main library search.

ProQuest Dissertations & Theses: A&I

  • The most comprehensive available record of doctoral theses from the UK and Ireland.

SAGE Research Methods

  • A web-based research methods tool created to help researchers, staff and students with their research projects.
  • SRM focuses on methodology rather than disciplines, so can be used by researchers from the social sciences, health sciences and more.
  • Included in the main library search.

Scopus

  • The largest abstract and citation database of peer-reviewed literature: scientific journals, books and conference proceedings.
  • Fields of research include science, technology, medicine, social sciences, and arts and humanities.
  • Included in the main library search.

The Times Digital Archive

  • Access to back issues of The Times (London) newspaper online.
  • One of the most highly regarded resources for the study of 18th century history and onward.
  • Included in the main library search.

UK Parliamentary Papers

  • Includes over 200,000 House of Commons sessional papers from 1715 to 2005, with supplementary material back to 1688.
  • UKPP delivers page images and searchable full text for each paper, along with detailed indexing.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

Vision of Britain

  • Data on Britain between 1801-2001, including maps, statistical trends and historical descriptions.
  • NOT included in the main library search.

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History

History resources

Specialist advice and websites for history students.