Region-focused Collections
There is a guide listing general digital libraries and resources for discovering digital collections, arranged by region and country. Only a few examples of particular interest are listed here.
Guide for African digital libraries and resources for finding digital collections on Africa
African Online Digital Library (AODL) (Michigan State Univ) offers photographs, videos, archival documents, maps, interviews and oral histories in numerous African languages.
African Activist Archive (1950s-1990s) includes: pamphlets, newsletters, leaflets, buttons, posters, photographs, and audio/video recordings relating to social justice activism in supporting Africans.
Liberia and the United States: Nation-Building in Africa, 1864-1918 and 1918-1935
Apartheid South Africa 1948-1980
Black Short Fiction and Folklore: From Africa and the African Diaspora
Akkasah Photographic Archive at NYU Abu Dhabi offers over 9000 photographs of hte Middle East and North Africa
OurLagosHistory.com offers pamphlets, newspaper articles amd other material on the history of Lagos.
The Liberated Africans Project contains information on Africans liberated by international efforts, 1808-1896, to abolish the Atlantic slave trade. Includes material in the British National Archives and the Sierra Leone National Archives
Arabic literature of Africa online, edited by J.O.Hunwick, R.S. O'Fahey. Leiden, The Netherlands; Boston, MA : Brill
Black short fiction and folklore from Africa and the African diaspora offers stories, folktales, and short fiction by African, African American, and Caribbean authors.
BrillOnline primary sources. Western travellers in the Islamic world online covers travelogues on the Ottoman Empire, Ethiopia, Central Asia, Afghanistan, North Africa, and Iran.
Full text content in English, German, French, Italian, and Latin.
African blue books of statistics, 1821-1953
Frontier Life: Borderlands, Settlement and Colonial Encounters
Early Experiences in Australasia covers the arrival of the first settlers through Australian Federation.
Frontier Life: Borderlands and Colonial Encounters includes archival documents, maps, and photographs from several archives pertaining to the lives and colonial encounters of people living at the edges of the Anglophone world from 1650-1920. Geographic scope includes North America as well as Southern Africa, Australia and New Zealand.
The International Women's Movement: The Pan Pacific / Southeast Asia Women
China
Translations of the Peking Gazette Online (1793-1912) includes English translations of Qing dynasty official edicts and memorials. Content from several publications, including the Indo-Chinese Gleaner, the Canton Register, the Chinese Repository, and the North China Herald is included creating a comprehensive collection of Peking Gazettes.
Asia and the West: Diplomacy and Cultural Exchange (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Asia and the West, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Asia and the West. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Largely UK and US diplomatic and consular records with some missionary correspondence and publications.
Party and Government Documents in English (PGDiE) includes official documents in English, covering various levels of Chinese government, Communist Party of China (CPC) and National People's Congress (NPC), 1921 onwards.
Propaganda and the Chinese Press : global perspectives, 1946-1996 Contains articles from Xinhua, the official news agency of the People's Republic of China, covering foreign and domestic affairs from 1946-1996, translated into English.
German foreign relations and military activities in China, 1919-1935. Records from Record Group 242: National Archives Collection of Foreign Records Seized, T-1141: Records of the German Foreign Ministry Pertaining to China, 1919-1935.
China: Culture and Society: The Watson Pamphlet Collection, Cornell University
The Minutes of the Shanghai Municipal Council
China, Trade, Politics and Culture, 1793-1980
British Foreign Office Files for China, 1919-1980
China, America and the Pacific: Trade and Cultural Exchange
Japan
Japan at War and Peace, 1930-1949: U.S. State Department Records on the Internal Affairs of Japan
Foreign Office files for Japan, 1919-1952 includes Japan-specific files from the FO 371 and FO 262 series and the Western and American Department papers in FO 371. Section I: Japanese Imperialism and the War in the Pacific, 1931-1945 -- Section II: Occupation of Japan, 1946-1952 -- Section III: Japan and Great Power Status, 1919-1930.
Meiji Japan: The Edward Sylvester Morse Collection
Asia and the West: Diplomacy and Cultural Exchange (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Asia and the West, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Asia and the West. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Largely UK and US diplomatic and consular records with some missionary correspondence and publications.
U.S. intelligence on Asia, 1945-1991 offers declassified documents on U.S. intelligence community. Covers People's Republic of China, North Korea and North Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, and Australia.
Photography: The World through the Lens (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Photography, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Photography. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Includes:
- Japanese Old Photographs in Bakumatsu-Meiji Period
- The Meiji and Taisho Eras in Photographs
- Portraits of Modern Japanese Historical Figures
Korea
Asia and the West: Diplomacy and Cultural Exchange (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Asia and the West, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Asia and the West. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Largely UK and US diplomatic and consular records with some missionary correspondence and publications.
South and Southeast Asian literature: classic and postcolonial writers in English, 1825 to present
Includes writers who were born in or identify themselves culturally with India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Afghanistan, Sri Lanka, the Maldives, Malaysia, Myanmar, Singapore, and Fiji. Includes the work of writers in Africa, the United Kingdom, North America, and the Caribbean. Focuses on literature of the late-colonial and postcolonial eras, but also includes earlier work.
U.S. intelligence on Asia, 1945-1991 offers declassified documents on U.S. intelligence community. Covers People's Republic of China, North Korea and North Vietnam, Japan, Taiwan, Indonesia, Thailand, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore, and Australia.
South Asia
India-Pakistan Conflict: Records of the U.S. State Department, February 1963-1966
Afghanistan and the US, 1945-1963: Records of US State Department Classified Files
Afghanistan in 1919: The Third Anglo-Afghan War. From the India Office records.
Balochistan Archives includes a catalog of holdings of books, maps,and manuscripts, as well as finding aids to archival collections, together with a digital collection of books, manuscripts, maps, and genealogies concerning Balochistan Province, Pakistan.
India from Crown Rule to Republic, 1945-1949: Records of the U.S. State Department
The Indian Army and Colonial Warfare on the Frontiers of India, 1914-1920 concerns the area between India and Afghanistan. Includes over 5,000 images and a wide variety of military records and regimental histories. From the British Library
Foreign Office Files for India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, Section II: South Asian Conflicts and Independence for Bangladesh, 1964-71. Sections on additional subjects will be added in the future.
Foreign Office Files for India, Pakistan, and Afghanistan, Section II (1947-1980) contains the DO 133, DO 134, FO 371 and FCO 37 files from The National Archives, Kew.
East India Company. Module 1, Trade, governance and Empire, 1600-1947 offers documents from the India Office Records at the British Library.
Southeast Asia
Online Burma/Myanmar Library is an index to over 30,000 full texts of individual Burma documents on the Internet. It also houses articles, conference papers, theses, books, reports, archives and directories. Includes the Burma Press Summary archive).
Sukarno and the Army-PKI Rivalry in the Years of Living Dangerously, 1960-1963 includes US Department of State records consisting of memoranda, correspondence, telegrams, memoranda of conversations, reports, and news articles concerning U.S. relations with Indonesia, Indonesian internal affairs, and Indonesia’s foreign relations.
European Colonialism in the Early 20th Century: Colonialism and Nationalism in the Dutch East Indies (1910-1930) offers US State Department documents, including correspondence, studies and reports, cables, maps, etc., related to U.S. consular activities.
Southeast Asia Digital Library
'The International Women's Movement: The Pan Pacific / Southeast Asia Women
Asia and the West: Diplomacy and Cultural Exchange (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Asia and the West, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Asia and the West. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Largely UK and US diplomatic and consular records with some missionary correspondence and publications.
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Batavia, Java, Netherlands East Indies, 1818-1906
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Iloilo, Philippine Islands, 1876-1886
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Manila, Philippine Islands, 1817-1899
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Padang, Sumatra, Netherlands East Indies, 1853-1898
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Saigon, Vietnam, 1889-1906
- Despatches from U.S. Consuls in Singapore, Straits Settlements, 1833-1906
- Despatches from U.S. Ministers to Siam, 1882-1906
- History of the Philippine Insurrection Against the United States, 1899-1903, and Documents Relating to the War Department Project for Publishing of History, 1899-1903
- Notes from the Siamese Legation in the United States to the Department of State, 1876-1906
- Records Relating to the United States Surveying Expedition to the North Pacific Ocean, 1852-1863.
- Selected Records of the U.S. Consulate in Bangkok, Siam, 1856-1912
Guide for European digital libraries and resources for finding digital collections on Europe
Austria
Occupation and Independence: The Austrian Second Republic, 1945-1963
Eastern Europe
Socialism and National Unity in Yugoslavia, 1945-1963: Records of the U.S. State Department
France
Journaux de la Revolution (Newspapers of the French Revolution, 1848)
L'Affaire Dreyfus (The Dreyfus Affair in the Making of Modern France)
Foreign relations and colonial documents on particular regions are listed under the regions concerned.
French Revolutionary Opinions Online presents the entire corpus of public interventions by representatives in the National Convention during the trial of King Louis XVI together with other sources concerning the trial
Révolution et l'Empire includes works by Aulard, Barante, Louis Blanc, Buchez, Jaurès, Lamartine, Michelet, Quinet, Thiers ou Tocqueville and others.
The French Book Trade in Enlightenment Europe (1769-1794) tracks the dissemination of over 400,000 copies of almost 4,000 editions of 3,600 works by Swiss publisher-bookseller, the Société typographique de Neuchâtel (STN).
Digital Correspondence of Voltaire project
Bibliotheque Diplomatique Numerique (Ministère de l'Europe et des Affaires étrangères) offers digitized diplomatic documents
Actes royaux français, 1256-1794
French Revolution Digital Archive (FRDA)
Germany
Foreign relations and colonial documents on particular regions are listed under the regions concerned.
East Germany from Stalinization to the new economic policy, 1950-1963 contains largely instructions to and despatches from U.S. diplomatic, and consular personnel regarding political, military, economic, social, industrial, and other internal conditions and events in East Germany.
Digitization of the microfilm Records of the U.S. Department of State Relating to the Internal Affairs of East Germany
The Economy and War in the Third Reich, 1933-1944
German Folklore and Popular Culture: Das Kloster
Illustrated Magazines of the Weimar Republic
Ireland
The Digital Library of the Caribbean (dLOC) is a cooperative digital library for resources from and about the Caribbean and circum-Caribbean. It is organized into thematic collections (including a science and medicine themed clustering), a full list of which you can find here.'
Caribbean Literature (19th-20th centuries) includes published works, manuscripts, archival and other kinds of materials in various languages.
Cuban culture and cultural relations, 1959- offers ca. 45,000 documents from the Casa de las Américas in Havana, documenting the culture and cultural relations of Revolutionary Cuba and countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Conde de Montemar website provides open access to a collection of letters from the family of Diego José Carrillo de Albornoz y Bravo de Lagunas, V Count of Montemar from Lima, Perú. The collection, housed in Illinois’s RBML, comprises some 280 letters between 1761 and 1799.
Latin American & Caribbean Digital Primary Sources is a link collection of open access resources.
Feminism in Cuba: Nineteenth through Twentieth Century Archival Documents
Brazilian and Portuguese History and Culture
World Scholar: Latin America and the Caribbean
SUR, 1931-1992 (Argentine literary magazine)
Akkasah Photographic Archive at NYU Abu Dhabi offers over 9000 photographs of hte Middle East and North Africa
Jewish Press (1850s-1990s, largely 1900-1950) includes Jewish and Hebrew periodicals in Hebrew, French, Yiddish, English, Judeo-Spanish, Judeo-Arabic, Russian, and Hungarian published in Europe, the Middle East and the United States.
Confidential print. Middle East, 1839-1969. Marlborough, UK : Adam Matthew Digital. Confidential prints were informational documents printed by the British Foreign and Colonial Offices and distributed privately to their officials. Includes Egypt.
BrillOnline primary sources. Western travellers in the Islamic world online covers travelogues on the Ottoman Empire, Ethiopia, Central Asia, Afghanistan, North Africa, and Iran. Full text content in English, German, French, Italian, and Latin.
U.S. and Iraqi Relations: U.S. Technical Aid, 1950-1958
Anarchist periodicals (Russian anarchist periodicals of the early 20th century)
The Russian Civil War and American Expeditionary Forces in Siberia, 1918-20 reproduces letters, reports, memoranda, cablegrams, maps, charts, and other kinds of records.
Alexander III and the policy of "Russification," 1883-1886 offers documents from the British Foreign Office Records of General Correspondence for Russia (F.O. 65).
Cult of Body Online offers primary sources on sports and physical culture in Russia, 1891-1919
Commercial and Trade Relations Between Tsarist Russia, the Soviet Union and the U.S., 1910-1963
World War I and Revolution in Russia, 1914-1918
See also: Guide for UK digital libraries and resources for finding digital collections on the United Kingdom.
Foreign relations and colonial documents on particular regions are listed under the regions concerned.
British and Irish Women's Letters and Diaries, from 1500-1950
British Politics and Society (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within British Politics and Society , open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under British Politics and Society. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection.
British Printed Images to 1700 is a searchable database of prints and book illustration.
The Grand Tour: British Travel on the Continent
John Johnson Collection: an archive of printed ephemera (18th-20th centuries). Collection, housed in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, documents everyday life in Britain. Currently consists of five categories: Nineteenth-Century Entertainment; The Booktrade; Popular prints; Crimes, murders and executions; and Advertising.
London Low Life: Street Culture, Social Reform, and the Victorian Underworld
Mass Observation Online (social research on everyday life in Britain)
Nineteenth Century British Pamphlets
Northern Ireland: A Divided Community, 1921-1972
Old Bailey Online - Proceedings of the Old Bailey
The Papers of Joseph Chamberlain
The Papers of Neville Chamberlain
The Papers of Sir Austen Chamberlain
Photography: The World through the Lens (In: Nineteenth Century Collections Online). To browse the Collections within Photography, open menu in search box on upper left. Click on image under Photography. You can search within a Collection, or in Advanced search you can limit to Collection. Largely British collections with worldwide subjects.
Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975: Rock and Roll, Counterculture, Peace and Protest
State Papers Online: Early Modern Government in Britain and Europe
Victorian Popular Culture: Moving Pictures, Optical Entertainments and the Advent of Cinema offers sources for Victorian and Edwardian optics, magic lantern shows, panoramas, dioramas, early photography, and early motion pictures. Includes objects, ephemera, books and journals. Material is from the collections of the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum, University of Exeter.
This page lists subject-specific digital collections. For general US digital libraries and other lists of digital collections
Foreign relations, State Dept., and intelligence documents on particular regions are listed under the regions concerned.
American History, 1493-1945 (The Gilder Lehrman Collection)
China, America and the Pacific: Trade and Cultural Exchange
Law and Society Since the Civil War: American Legal Manuscripts from the Harvard Law School Library
Frontier Life: Borderlands, Settlement and Colonial Encounters
Overland Journeys: Travels in the West, 1800-1880
This list of eras is rough and intended to loosely group the resources
Colonial America to 1763
Colonial North America at Harvard Library
Colonial America (Correspondence between the British government and the American colonies)
Revolutionary America, 1763-1789
The Documentary History of the Ratification of the Constitution
Early Republic 1789-1836
Tocqueville's Democracy in America: Editions, Translations, Sources, Interpretation
Antebellum 1836-1860
Civil War/Reconstruction, 1860 to 1875
Gilded Age/Progressive, 1876 to 1929
Progressive Era: Reform, Regulation, and Rights (1872-1934) and Voices of Reform (1875-1945)
Depression/WWII, 1929 to 1945
Cold War era, 1946 to 1990
The Nixon Years, 1969-1974: Complete FCO 7 and FCO 82 Files from the National Archives, Kew
Popular Culture in Britain and America, 1950-1975: Rock and Roll, Counterculture, Peace and Protest
The Sixties: Primary Documents and Personal Narratives, 1960 to 1974
Post-Cold War era, 1990- .