All Guides: History: Images & Primary Sources

Images & Primary Sources

Images can be a great primary source. Whether you're looking for a picture of ancient pottery or renaissance art, we have a wide variety of images to support your studies. Images from library databases are generally licensed for educational use in student assignments. Images available for free on the Internet may be under copyright. Use caution when including images from Google in presentations and other work.

Databases

Browse our Guide to Finding Images for more options.

Archives & Repositories

General Archives:

Internet Archive
A non-profit library of millions of free books, movies, software, music, websites, and more.
Library and Archives Canada (LAC)
Acquires, processes, preserves and provides access to our documentary heritage. Search Government Records, Immigration Records, and more.
Archives of Ontario
The largest provincial archives in Canada, and the premier source of information about the history of the land we now call Ontario and its people. Since 1903, the archives have been collecting, preserving, and making available the documentary heritage of the province.

Subject-Specific Archives

French Revolution Digital Archive (by Stanford Libraries)
Over 5,000 images selected from the BnF collections for this digital archive concentrate solely on the period from 1787 through 1799, from the years immediately preceding the outbreak of the Revolution through the emergence of Napoleon. You can use the Genre filter to start searching.
German History in Documents and Images (by the German Historical Institute in Washington, DC)
The collection includes original historical materials documenting German history from the beginning of the early modern period to the present.
The Art of Travel (by the Moore Institute, National University of Ireland)
A database of European travel advice literature (Ars apodemica) from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries.

History

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Images & Primary Sources

Databases

Archives & Repositories

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