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HIST17370GD: Early Modern Europe

Historical Images & Primary Sources

Historical images are increasingly made public online through the Internet. Museums, libraries, and archives can all be great places to find public domain historical images and primary sources. In addition, some sites, like Flickr and Internet Archive, compile images from multiple institutions. See the Finding Images guide for a comprehensive overview of general sources, copyright considerations, and citing practices.

Search Tips

Locating relevant images can be tricky, depending on the extent of descriptive metadata that has been provided for the image. Every institution has their own standards and terminology preferences. Sometimes browsing images (instead of keyword searching) within smaller collections through the use of filters can have great advantages. However, when keyword searching try using just one or two keywords related to:

  • names of individuals - example: ("Louis XIV" OR "Sun King" OR "Louis the Great")
  • geographic region - example: (France OR Paris)
  • era - example: renaissance
  • event - example: "French revolution"

Try to think of the labels or tags someone might put on an image related to your topic. Consider synonyms as well as broader and narrower terms.

Databases & Sites

For images in the public domain, see:

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