Our collections

Explore domestic life, leisure and material culture of nineteenth- and twentieth-century America. This resource presents a wealth of highly illustrated primary source documents that highlight commercial tastes and consumer trends, and provide a valuable visual record for a breadth of interdisciplinary study.

With documents encompassing events from the earliest English embassy to the birth and early years of the People’s Republic, this resource collects sources from nine archives to give an incredible insight into the changes in China during the period of 1793-1980.

Explore life in early modern London through the lens of livery companies.

Covering the 18th and 19th centuries, China, America and the Pacific provides primary source materials for the study of the history of North American trade and cultural exchange with China. This collection also provides coverage of China’s and the United States' economic dealings with the whole of East Asia and the Pacific.

Explore five centuries of journeys across the globe, scientific discoveries, the expansion of European colonialism, conflict over territories and trade routes and decades-long search and rescue attempts in this multi-archive collection dedicated to the history of exploration.

The digital archive of the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, which holds one of the outstanding collections on American History. It is full of spectacular individual items, but it also has rich veins of manuscript research material. This makes it ideal for teaching survey courses on American History, but equally valuable as a platform for undergraduate essay work and postgraduate research.

The complete CO 5 files from the National Archives, UK, 1606-1822, Colonial America is a 'game changing' development for historians and researchers of early America, the Atlantic world, the Caribbean and the nascent British Empire. Colonial America enables online access to the vast archive of circa 70,000 documents of manuscript materials that tell the story of British involvement in North America.

The definitive collection of primary source documentation to explore life under British colonial rule.

Spanning five centuries and charting the rise and fall of empires around the world, Empire Online is a digital archive enabling research of colonial history, politics, culture and society. There is a focus on the British Empire, but documents also give information on other European empires and the experience of colonised people.

Through a large array of unique documents, this multi-archive collection captures the lives, experiences and colonial encounters of people living at the edges of the Anglophone world from 1650-1920. It ranges across the various colonial frontiers of North America before touching on the settlers of Southern Africa, Australia and New Zealand.

Discover the histories of fifteen key commodities that changed the world through a wide range of manuscript sources, rare books, maps, advertising memorabilia, paintings, photographs and ephemera. Explore themes of exploration and discovery; imperialism and attempts at monopoly, trade Wars, translocation and economic geography, slavery, mass production, luxury, taste and the evolution of global branding.

The National Library of Scotland has wonderful collections documenting this history from the foundation of the East India Company in 1615 to the granting of independence for India and Pakistan in 1947. They are made available online through this collection.

Material is sourced from the American Jewish Historical Society, New York. It contains primary sources on the history of Jewish immigration to the United States, life and culture among the Jewish population there, and records of business and trade from Jewish-owned companies.

The digital version of the Stationers' Company Archives, London. Explore the history of printing, publishing and bookselling dating from 1554 to the 20th century. Includes a complete run of the Stationers' Register, an essential resource for book history and a record publications prior to 1927.

Only five major letter collections exist from fifteenth century England and they are all available online for the first time in this digital resource.

An extensive collection of manuscript materials for the study of medieval travel writing in fact and in fantasy.

Explore the medicine chests and bookshelves of the everyday nineteenth-century American through a colourful array of advertisements, popular texts and much more. This resource offers access to an outstanding collection of highly visual primary source material, together with supplementary features designed to aid research and teaching.

This resource brings together documents and collections from libraries and archives across the Atlantic world covering an extensive time period from 1490. Close attention has been given to the varieties of slavery, the legacy of slavery, the social justice perspective and the continued existence of slavery today.

Material covers the founding and economic development of Virginia as seen through the papers of the Virginia Company of London, 1606-1624. It is also a crucial source for London's economic history in the Early Modern era and will be of interest to social and religious historians.

Exploring the social and cultural history of shopping, the retail industry, and daily and working life.