Databases

215 databases found HistoryX

A dictionary of Sinitic characters and compounds related to East Asian cultural, political, and intellectual history.

Colonial Caribbean covers the history of the various territories under British colonial governance from 1624 to 1870. This extensive resource includes administrative documentation, trade and shipping records, minutes of council meetings, as well as details of plantation life, colonial settlement, imperial rivalries across the region, and the growing concern of absentee landlords.

Content Warning: 
Colonial Caribbean covers topics which are inextricably linked to stories of oppression and abuse. Please be aware that distressing content can be found throughout the documents and contextual essays in this resource, including graphic descriptions and first-hand accounts of physical or sexual abuse.

New
Coverage: 1624 to 1870

Stretching from Jamaica and the Bahamas to Trinidad and Tobago, Colonial Caribbean makes available materials from 27 Colonial Office file classes from The National Archives, UK. Covering the history of the various territories under British colonial governance from 1624 to 1870, this extensive resource includes administrative documentation, trade and shipping records, minutes of council meetings, and details of plantation life, colonial settlement, imperial rivalries across the region, and the growing concern of absentee landlords. 

New

Colonial Legacies: Empire and Commonwealth Periodicals is a digital archive comprising over 30 periodicals concerning the 20th-century history of the British Empire, decolonization, and the history and culture of former colonies. The archive offers a mixture of British publications about the empire and titles published in Commonwealth countries (including Australia, New Zealand, India, Canada, South Africa, and Papua New Guinea).

Coverage spans over 150 years, ranging from the late-19th century to the 21st – these publications encompass the empire’s later phase and its post-independence legacies. It will support research in key events in colonial history, including the latter stages of the Scramble for Africa, the world wars, independence movements, the creation of the Commonwealth and more. While official publications contain valuable information about colonial administration and ideology, more popular titles, covering the arts, society, and general interests, provide insights into many facets of Commonwealth countries’ history and society before and after independence.

This primary sources collection consists of historical documents from the British National Archives that offer perspectives on politics, diplomacy and everyday life in the German-occupied countries. Includes detailed information indexed by year and section, from the occupied states of Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway and the Vatican, and the neutral countries--Portugal, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland--along with a day-by-day chronology of the war, photographs and posters from The National Archives, film footage of Special Operations Executive (SOE) agents in France from the Imperial War Museum, links to related resources and three newly commissioned essays by leading experts in addition to a comprehensive introduction by Dr. Michael Stenton.

Coverage: 1834 to 1966

This primary source database provides online access to the United Kingdom's Colonial, Dominion and Foreign Offices' confidential correspondence relating to Africa between 1834 and 1966.  Includes official documents and maps covering almost the entire period of European conquest and colonization of Africa (with the exception of Egypt).

Contents range from single-page letters or telegrams to comprehensive dispatches, investigative reports and texts of treaties.  From coastal trading in the early nineteenth century, through the Conference of Berlin of 1884 and the subsequent Scramble for Africa, to the abuses of the Congo Free State, fights against tropical disease, Italy's defeat by the Abyssinians, apartheid in South Africa and colonial moves towards independence, the documents in Confidential Print: Africa provide insight into the modern period of European colonization of the continent. 

New
Coverage: 1959 to 1964

This collection of Foreign Office Files provides a comprehensive history of key events across Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos during a period of political upheaval, civil unrest and escalating conflict. Published in two sections, Conflict in Indochina explores the rising tension across Indochina after 1959:

  • Crisis and Upheaval, 1959-1964
  • Escalation, Reunification and Withdrawal, 1965-1979 (Coming Soon)

Comprising correspondence, maps, photographs and memoranda, this collection examines how the conflict crossed international borders and impacted the wider region. Administrative reports offer insight into the internal politics of Laos, Vietnam and Cambodia, covering key themes such as trade, economic development and increasing political instability. Documents reveal the growing intervention from foreign powers, as China and the Soviet Union sought to expand their influence over communist parties in the region.

Coverage: 1936-1945

Digitized from originals held by the Library's Research Collections.  The collection contains items originating from prisoners held in German concentration camps, internment and transit camps, Gestapo prisons, and POW camps, during and just prior to World War II. Most of the collection consists of letters written or received by prisoners, but also includes receipts for parcels, money orders and personal effects; paper currency; and realia, including Star of David badges that Jews were forced to wear.

Curio.ca provides streaming access to selected educational content from CBC and Radio-Canada, with documentaries from television and radio, news reports, and archival material.  Both English and French language content is included.  Programs are pulled from the Doc Zone, The Nature of Things, The Fifth Estate, Marketplace, The Passionate Eye, and more.

Note:  McMaster's subscription does not include the BBC or National Geographic channel.

This collection brings together material from within former British colonies and Commonwealth nations, alongside some from former French and Portuguese territories, to provide valuable primary source material created for local audiences by local actors during a period of enormous global change. After the Second World War decolonization movements around the world gathered pace, and the development of party politics, trade unions and other local and national movements in former colonies and Commonwealth nations across Africa, Asia, the Caribbean, Australasia and the Americas took many different forms.

This archive allows insight into the variety of systems and modes of national and international political thought that became prominent in the twentieth century, including socialism and communism, anti-imperialism, regional independence movements, trade unionism, student activism, Pan-Africanism and many modes of constitutional democracy. The three sub-collections included are: Marjorie Nicholson Papers from the Trades Union Congress Library, Papers of African Trade Unions, and Political Pamphlets from the Institute of Commonwealth Studies. 

Brings together approximately 50,000 images of original manuscript and printed material, including a strong core of documents from the Bodleian Library, Oxford. Ephemeral material such as ballads, cartoons and pamphlets is featured alongside diaries, advice literature, medical journals, conduct books and periodicals. The database is structured into five thematic sections:

  • Conduct and Politeness
  • Domesticity and the Family 
  • Consumption and Leisure
  • Education and Sensibility
  • The Body

A dictionary of biographical entries for individuals who have contributed to the history of Canada. 

Coverage: 1945 to the present

From the nongovernmental National Security Archive, this database consists of curated and indexed, declassified government documents covering U.S. policy toward critical world events – including their military, intelligence, diplomatic and human rights dimensions – from 1945 to the present. Each collection is assembled by foreign policy experts and features chronologies, glossaries, bibliographies, and scholarly overviews that provide insight into significant international issues.

Includes primary sources, supporting materials, and archives, along with video. The content is not only  useful for teaching and research in disability studies, but also in history, media, the arts, political science, education, and other areas where the contributions of the disability community are often overlooked.

Coverage: 1898 to 1990

A fully searchable collection of primary source documents from Britain's Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), shedding light on diplomatic history throughout the 20th century. It is based on three print series which form a record of British peacetime diplomacy since the end of the 19th century: British Documents on the Origins of the War 1898-1914Documents on British Foreign Policy 1918-1939 and Documents on British Policy Overseas.  Documents are selected and edited by the official historians of the FCO, with many documents specifically declassified for inclusion. 

Streaming video collection of independent, social-issue and environmental films from renowned leaders in documentary film distribution, including titles from Bullfrog Films, Collective Eye, GOOD DOCS, Women Make Movies, and many others.

Coverage: 1534 to 1850

Contains nearly 100,000 pages of letters, diaries, memoirs and accounts of early encounters among peoples in North America from 1534 to 1850. Collection focuses on personal accounts and provides unique perspectives from all of the protagonists, including traders, slaves, missionaries, explorers, soldiers, native peoples, and officials, both men and women. 

EEBO contains page images of almost every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1470-1700.  From the first book printed in English through to the ages of Spenser, Shakespeare and of the English Civil War, EEBO's content draws on authoritative and respected short-title catalogues of the period and features a substantial number of text transcriptions. 

The Text Creation Partnership, which provides highly searchable versions of the texts, made the first 25,000 works freely available in 2015.  This interface, at the University of Michigan, allows proximity and boolean searching within the available works, but does not search the full EEBO database.  

Coverage: 1500 to 1700

Over 200 complete works in fictional prose from the period 1500-1700.

Coverage: 1450 to 1700

Provides access to works printed in Europe before 1701, bringing together a diverse array of printed sources, regardless of language, as well as works published further afield. Full-color, high-resolution facsimile images of some of the world's most significant collections of early printed books in Europe are included. McMaster has access to Collection 3, 5, 6, 10 and 12 of Early European Books.

Coverage: 1600 to 1947

Includes primary source documents that trace the history of the East India Company which, at its peak, controlled over a quarter of the world's trade. Containing royal charters, correspondence, trading diaries, minutes of council meetings and reports of expeditions, among other document types, this collection charts the history of British trade and rule in the Indian subcontinent and beyond from 1599 to 1947.

Topics covered include:

  • Administrative and ecclesiastical appointments
  • Agriculture
  • Charters and the Company’s relationship to the English/British Crown
  • Courts and legal affairs, including legislation
  • Diplomacy, treaties and ambassadorial expeditions
  • Finance and debt
  • The machinery of government
  • Pay and pensions for Company servants and their families
  • Railways
  • Trade
  • Early voyages to Japan and the Spice Islands (Indonesia)
  • Warfare and military matters

This collection is a key resource for scholarship of British imperial history, maritime trade, global commerce, and the history of the first great multinational corporation.

Coverage: varies by database

Cross-search over 30 indexing, abstracting, and fulltext databases in a range of subjects.

Coverage: 1843 to 2020

For over 170 years, The Economist has published timely reporting, concise commentary and comprehensive analysis of global news every week. It covers the world's political, business, scientific, technological and cultural developments and the connections between them. Included in the archive are full-colour images, covers, advertisements, multiple search indexes, and the facility to browse each and every issue from 1843 to 2020.

The most current issues of The Economist are available in print and online via several databases. 

Provides original German documents from the London School of Economics and Political Science collection, including:

  • Statistics of the Third Reich analysed, 1933-1944
  • Monatliche Nachweise über den auswärtigen Handel Deutschlands (January 1933-June 1939)
  • Der Aussenhandel Deutschlands Monatliche Nachweise (July 1939); and
  • Sondernachweis der Aussenhandel Deutschlands (August 1939-1944).

These publications illustrate a number of major topics, including: the importance of German trade with Eastern Europe; effect of new trade treaties with Southeastern European states concluded in 1934 and 1935; Germany's economic offensive beginning in1934; growth of a "command economy" and the requirements of the Rearmament Program; balance of payments problem; and the defeat of "the traditionalists" with the dismissal of Schacht and Neurath and the appointment of Ribbentrop. Sondernachweis der Aussenhandel Deutschlands is particularly important as it provides a thorough breakdown of German foreign trade by commodity, volume and value on a monthly basis. The December issue of each year gives a final listing of annual figures.

Coverage: 1701 to 1800

ECCO provides online access to every significant English-language and foreign-language title printed in the United Kingdom between 1701 and 1800, along with thousands of important works from the Americas. Content consists of books, pamphlets, broadsides, ephemera, and more.

McMaster has purchased both ECCO and the update, ECCO II, giving us access to over 180,000 titles (200,000 volumes).  Subject coverage includes history, literature, religion, law, fine arts, and science.

Coverage: 1680 to 1816

Brings together rare journals printed between c1680 and 1816, illuminating all aspects of eighteenth-century social, political and literary life. Many are ephemeral, lasting only for a handful of issues, others run for several years. Topics covered are extremely wide-ranging and include: the writings of Sir Isaac Newton; the French Revolution; reviews of literature and fashion throughout Europe; political debates; and coffee house gossip and discussion.

Coverage: 1492 to the present

This primary sources database provides images of original documents related to the British Empire. The content is structured around five thematic sections: Cultural Contacts; Literature; The Visual Empire; Religion; and Race, Class, Colonialism and Imperialism.

Coverage: 1473 to 1800

Lists over 480,000 items published between 1473 and 1800 mainly in Britain and North America mainly, but not exclusively, in English from the collections of the British Library and over 2,000 other libraries.  Also see Early English Books Online (EEBO) and Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) for full-text.

Coverage: 1900s to the present

Brings together multimedia materials (text, archival primary sources, video and audio) around key environmental challenges, including climate change, water/air pollution, biodiversity, conservation, agriculture, deforestation and more. The database is curated around specific environmental issues and events from the 20th and 21st centuries. Provides an understanding of the relationship between people and the environment through social, cultural, economic, political, historical and ecological perspectives. 

This collection from Wiley Digital Archives focuses on critical aspects of anthropogenic change, with unique and rare archival collections from the Environmental Society of America (ESA), Royal Botanic Gardens (Kew Gardens), the National Archives (UK), the Commonwealth Forestry Institute, CABI (Centre for Agriculture and Bioscience International) and more. The collection will build to approximately one million pages or images of primary sources featuring data-heavy collections on Deforestation, Agriculture, Livestock, and Fisheries (Food Production); Ecology, Botany, Biodiversity, and Extinction; Water Sources, Irrigation, Wetlands, and Hydrology, with an expected competion date of December 2023.