World History Research Guide

Print Resources

Books: General World History

• The American Historical Association's Guide to Historical Literature
• Encyclopedia of World Biography
• Great Books of the Western World - Primary source materials
• The Historian's Handbook: A Descriptive Guide to Reference Works 
• History in Dispute
• The McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia Of World Biography; An International Reference Work 
• Sources of World History: Readings for World Civilization 
• The Timetables of Women's History : A Chronology of the Most Important People and Events in Women's History 
• Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia 
• World History: A Dictionary of Important People, Places, and Events from Ancient Times to the Present 

For more books, see Finding Other World History Resources.

Print Magazines & Journals: General World History

• Current History - from 1967 to the current issue
• The History Teacher - from May 1982 to the current issue 
• History Today - from 1951 to the current issue
• Journal of Modern History - from 1929 to the current issue

Online Databases

General World History

• Chicago Tribune Historical - Full coverage from 1849 to 1986 (see Chicago Tribune database for 1985-present).
• History Study Center - Primary and secondary documents for history research.
• New York Times Historical - Full coverage from 1853 to 2006 (see New York Times database for 1985-present).
• OAIster -Open Archives Initiative open resource to digital archival materials around the world.
• World Almanac - Includes facts, encyclopedia entries, biographies, statistics, and demographics. 1998 – present.

General academic databases also contain articles from History Review, History Today, History, Historical Methods and other historical journals.  Search for a specific journal title here, or try searching one of our encyclopedias or multiple subject databases:

• Academic Search Complete - Academic, news, popular, and trade publications covering all topics.
• ArticleFirst - General subject database with 12,000+ publications covering all topics. 1990 -present.
• Britannica Online - Complete encyclopedia plus Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, the Britannica Book of the Year and Internet directory. 
• Expanded Academic ASAP - Academic, news, popular, and trade publications covering all topics from 1980 - present.
• Funk & Wagnalls New World Encyclopedia - 25,000 encyclopedic entries covering a variety of topics. 
• SIRS Researcher - Contains thousands of full-text articles exploring social, scientific, health, historic, business, economic, political and global issues.

Web Resources

General World History

• Internet History Sourcebooks Project - Thousands of full text documents, articles, and links to Web pages concerning aspects of world and political history from the 12th century to the present day. Includes research resources for ancient, medieval, modern, byzantine, African, Asian, Islamic history and more.
• Voice of the Shuttle History Page - Wide variety of historical information and resources, covering many periods and regions. Also includes links to economic history, military history, historiography and more.
• BUBL Link Catalog of History Internet Resources - Large catalogue of selected Internet resources covering the humanities, including many history resources.
• Best of History Web Sites
• Open Directory Project History (Society) Links
• University of Kentucky WWW Subject Catalog -- History
• The Librarians' Index to the Internet: History Topics
• The Internet Public Library: History

The Ancient World

Books: The Ancient World

• Ancient Egypt 
• Atlas of Classical History 
• The British Museum Book of Ancient Egypt 
• Chronology of the Ancient World, 10,000 B.C. to A.D. 799 
• The Oxford History of the Classical World
• The Roman Empire:  Augustus to Hadrien - Translated documents of Greece and Rome
• For more books, seeFinding Other World History Resources.

Web Sites: The Ancient World

• The Ancient History Sourcebook - A section of the Internet History Sourcebook. Focuses on online texts.
• The Greeks: Crucible of Civilization - Companion site to the PBS series.
• The Perseus Digital Library - From Tufts University.
• ABZU: Guide to Resources for the Study of the Ancient Near East - Links to thousands of sites in history, with indexes organized by author, publication, and topic. Resources include primary and secondary sources.

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The Middle Ages

Books: The Middle Ages

• Chronology of the Medieval World, 800 to 1491
• Dictionary of the Middle Ages

For more books, see Finding Other World History Resources

Web Sites: The Middle Ages

Medieval History Sourcebook - A section of the Internet History Sourcebook.
Mostly Medieval - The majority of the information contained in these pages is the result of research undertaken prior to and continued during the writing of a novel set in 13th century Scotland. Here you will find information on heraldry, myths and legends, religion, medicine, and other aspects of life in Britain during the Middle Ages." (SLS)
Medieval History - Links to Internet resources from the University Libraries of the University of Washington.
The Labyrinth: Resources for Medieval Studies- An enormous network of medieval studies resources on the Internet, sponsored by Georgetown University. Both primary and secondary sources are included. Links are annotated, and users can perform a search within the site by category.

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The Modern World

Books: The Modern World

Chronology of the Expanding World, 1492 to 1762 
Chronology of the Modern World, 1763 to 1992 
Documents in World History, 1945-1967 
An  Encyclopedic  Dictionary of Conflict and Conflict Resolution, 1945-1996 
World War II: Opposing Viewpoints 
The Cold War Reference Guide 
The Cold War: A History in Documents 
The Encyclopedia of Russian History: From the Christianization of Kiev to the Break-Up of the USSR 
Cambridge Encyclopedia of Russia and the Former Soviet Union 
Encyclopedia of the Holocaust

For more books, see Finding Other World History Resources. 

Web Sites: The Modern World

Modern History Sourcebook - A section of the Internet History Sourcebook.

At Cold War's End: U.S. Intelligence on the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, 1989-1991 -  From the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Web site.

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Other World History Resources

Search the Library's catalog by Author

For example, a search for works by Tacitus will find the The Annals and The Histories.

Search the Library's catalog by Title

For example, you can search for the Magna Carta and the The Constitution of the United States.

Search the Library's catalog by Subject Heading

For a broad search, try using such headings as:

History Research 
World History 
Civilization -- History

You can begin to narrow your search by using headings such as:

History Ancient 
History Modern 
Developing Countries 
Civilization, Western 
Europe, History 
Greece, History 
Rome, History 
Historic Sites

Searching by topic can also yield useful results, such as:

Political Violence 
Iraq 
Cold War 
Technology and Civilization 
Espionage

For works about specific events, governments or people, try using the name in a subject heading search. For example, Caesar, Tudors or Ottoman Empire.

Search the Library's catalog by Keywords

This is also called a "Words in Record" search. You can search by a single word, such as Elizabethan. Try combining key search terms, such as Elizabethan AND Naval or Turkey AND History AND War. Search tip: it's important to separate the terms by the word AND.