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Primary Sources at Yale
What is a Primary Source?
Strategies for locating primary source materials at Yale
Locating Resources Beyond Yale
For information about finding manuscript and archival materials
beyond Yale's collections, see Locating
materials at Yale and beyond: Archival Collections.
What is a Primary Source?
A primary source is firsthand testimony or direct evidence
concerning a topic under investigation. The nature and value of a
source cannot be determined without reference to the topic and
questions it is meant to answer. The same document, or other piece
of evidence, may be a primary source in one investigation and
secondary in another. The search for primary sources does not,
therefore, automatically include or exclude any category of records
or documents.
The Formats of Primary Sources
The categories that follow are neither rigorously exclusive nor
hierarchical. A single primary source may overlap one or more of
these categories; for instance, a map may be an item in an archival
collection, or a manuscript may have been printed and published at
some point as a book. Nonetheless, these categories have proven to
be practical concepts for organizing and describing the kinds of
sources that document history, and secondary sources, such as
bibliographies, often focus on materials in one of these formats or
categories.
- Printed or published texts
- Books and monographs
- A book is technically "a collection of leaves of paper,
parchment, or other material, in some way affixed to one another,
whether printed, written, or blank..." (ALA glossary of library
and information science (Chicago: American Library
Association, 1983), p.27). A monograph is "a systematic and
complete treatise on a particular subject" (ALA glossary,
p.48), in one or many volumes, complete at the time of publication
or published with the intention of being completed at some future
date.
Books
and monographs as primary sources
- Serials (newspapers, periodicals,
magazines, scholarly journals)
- A serial is a publication that begins at a point in
time, and continues publication, usually at regular, established
intervals, with the intention of continuing publication
indefinitely. A periodical is a serial that's published
three or more times a year. Magazines and newspapers
are general terms for types of periodicals, both describing
publications of interest to general readers. Newspapers are often
published more frequently than magazines and usually in a tabloid
format. Scholarly journals are publications that report the
research of scholars and are often quite
discipline-specific.
Serials
as primary sources
- Government documents
- "Important reference material may be found in publications
issued by national, state, and municipal governments and by
international governmental organizations. Government publications
(often called government documents) chronicle the workings of
governmental units, both currently and historically; provide
information on many other subjects as well, including economics,
history, education, health, labor, agriculture, and the arts; and
contain large collections of national statistics." ( Guide to
Reference Books / Eleventh edition (Chicago: American Library
Association, 1996), p.244)
Government
documents as primary sources
- Manuscripts and Archives
- Unique documents, either hand-written or typed, varying in
length from a single note or letter to a full-length book, and
small groups of the same. Manuscripts
& Archives may be either personal papers or institutional
archives.
During this century the definition of
manuscript, which originally referred to handwritten items, has
evolved; it refers now to "... a body of records or personal
papers or an artificial collection with historical value held by
an institution or individual other than the creator." (Trudy
Huskamp Peterson, "Using the finding aids to archive and
manuscript collections," IN Teaching bibliographic skill
in history: a sourcebook for historians and librarians , ed.
Charles A. D'Aniello (New York: Greenwood Press, 1993),
p.267).
"In archives, [the term] manuscripts is used
to distinguish nonarchival from archival material; it includes
groups of personal papers and artificial collections." ( ALA
glossary of library and information science (Chicago: American
Library Association, 1983), p.139.
See YUL
Research Tutorial: Manuscript and Archival Materials
- Maps
- "A map is a representation on a flat surface (usually of
paper) of the features of a part of the earth's surface or of the
skies, drawn at a specific scale" (Small, John. A modern
dictionary of geography (London: Edwin Arnold, 1989), p.140)
Bibliographic
tools for map research
- Dissertations
- Dissertations are book-length studies based on original
research and written in partial fulfillment of requirements for
the doctoral degree.
Dissertations
as primary sources
- Visual materials
- Visual materials are generally comprised of the following
types of images: original art (single paintings, drawings,
watercolors, sculpture, architectural drawings and plans,
monoprints); films ; prints (works reproduced in
multiple copies, including graphic art, etchings, engravings,
lithographs, woodcuts, mezzotints, posters, trade cards, artists'
prints, and computer-generated graphics; and photographs
(images taken with a camera and reproducible from a
photographic negative, and also those negatives)
Visual
materials as primary sources
- Music
- Music, according to the Oxford English dictionary , is
"... that one of the fine arts which is concerned with the
combination of sounds with a view to beauty of form and the
expression of emotion". It consists of "... sounds in melodic or
harmonic combination, whether produced by voice or instruments",
particularly as devised by a composer.
Music as
a primary source
- Machine readable data files
- Machine-readable data files are collections of numeric data
stored in a form that can only be read by a computer.
Data
files as primary sources
Tools
for identifying machine-readable datafiles
- Realia or artifacts
- Realia can best be described as "... objects which may
be used as teaching aids but were not made for the purpose." (
Oxford English dictionary (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1930),
v.13, p.274). Realia include such items as objects, specimens,
samples, relics, artifacts, souvenirs, and even models and
dioramas. Artifacts are "... anything made by human art and
workmanship." ( Oxford English dictionary , v.1, p.660)
Realia
as primary sources
The union catalogs and databases:
- Orbis
(the OPAC)
- Yale
Finding Aid Database
- Other
catalogs
Orbis
- Orbis contains records for over 10 million items located in 22
libraries on the Yale campus and at the Library Shelving Facility.
(See Libraries
& Collections A - Z for a complete list of Yale libraries
and collections.) The catalog provides information about the
University's current holdings as well as library materials that
are no longer held and material on order or in process. Included
are records for:
- books
- serials (journals, magazines, newspapers)
- electronic resources
- government documents
- maps
- microform collections
- printed music
- sound recordings
- visual materials
- working papers
- government documents (U.S., Canadian, European Union, United
Nations)
- manuscripts and archival materials
- rare books
- See the Orbis Help
Guide for more information about Orbis.
Tips on finding Primary Sources in
Orbis:
- Records in Orbis:
- Records appear in Orbis for many of Yale's
manuscript and archival collections - as well as for rare books,
newspapers, pamphlet materials, and microforms.
For manuscript and archival collections, the Orbis record is a
"collection level" record. It provides a brief summary of the
content and extent of the collection; be sure to select the "Long
View" in Orbis to see all the relevant information. The Orbis
record also will direct you to a "finding
aid", a document that provides more detailed information about
the collection, if one is available.
Many of the finding aids for manuscript and archival
collections at Yale are now available in fulltext on the web,
through the Yale
University Library Finding Aid Database; other finding aids
are available only in paper format at the repository.
- Unique characteristics of primary source records in
Orbis:
- Because of cataloging conventions, Orbis records for primary
source materials often have indicators of the physical format and
genre of the material. These indicators make it possible to search
specifically for
- manuscript and archival collections
- microform collections of manuscript material
- manuscript diaries
- etc.
-
-
- Useful keyword searching techniques:
- Searching by format:
- Format searches can be done using Advanced Search or
More Limits by highlighting one or more options from the
dropdown menus for Medium and Item Type.
-
- More Limits, for a new search, or Refine Search,
for a search in progress, offers Language, Collection, Date,
Medium and Item Type search limits from dropdown menus. By
highlighting one or more options from the dropdown menus for
Medium and Item Type limit can be set for type of
format.
More Limits set to Item Type Archives &
Manuscripts
- Keyword Search: [topic] This search locates ALL of
these collections with records in Orbis.
More
Limits set to Medium Microform
- Keyword Search: [topic] This search locates ALL
microforms with records in Orbis
More Limits
set to Item Type Archives & Manuscripts and
Medium Microform
- Keyword Search: [topic] This search locates all
manuscript and archival collections which are in a microformat.
Advanced Search offers three separate Search For
fields for entering words or phrases with the options of choosing
AND OR NOT operators, and Search In dropdown
menus for limiting by Keyword Anywhere (the default), Title,
Publisher/Place/Date, Author, Subject, Local Subject, ISBN/ISSN,
or Notes fields in an Orbis record.
-
- This type of search is most effective when combined with other
searching terms, especially subject terms, to locate manuscript
and archival materials dealing with a specific
subject.
More Limits set to Item Type
Archives & Manuscripts
- Advanced Search: Search For Indiana Search
In: Subject
AND
Search
For history Search In: Keyword Anywhere
OR
Search
For legends Search In: Keyword
Anywhere: locates manuscript and archival collections
related to Indiana
- More Limits set to Item Type Archives &
Manuscripts
- Advanced Search: Search For france Search In:
Subject
AND
Search
For history Search In: Subject AND:
locates manuscript and archival materials dealing with any period
of French history
Locating Published Collections
Of Primary Sources in Orbis:
Published collections generally carry the word "sources" as part
of the subject(s) assigned to the record:
- EXAMPLES OF SUBJECTS:
- France--History--Philip III, 1270-1285--Sources
- Italy--History--Sources
- United States--History--19th century--Sources
- United States--History--Civil War, 1861-1865--Sources
- So you can use the term "sources" as part of your keyword
search:
- EXAMPLES OF HOW TO SEARCH FOR "SOURCES" IN
ORBIS:
- Use Advanced Search with Source in the
Search For field and Subject selected from the drop
down list in the Search in field. This locates all
records for books which are collections of primary
sources.
- Use Advanced Search filling in the top row of fields
with Source in the Search For field and
Subject selected from the drop down list in the Search
in field; click the AND radio button with
"world war" in the second box with Keyword Anywhere
selected from the drop down menu; click the AND radio
button with "1939" in the lower box with Keyword
Anywhere selected from the drop down menu: This locates all
records for books which are collections of primary sources dealing
with World War II.
- TO LOCATE SPECIFIC GENRES OF MATERIALS IN ORBIS
- Keyword searching can help identify certain types, or genres,
of manuscript or printed materials.
[If you click on
More Limits and highlight Archives &
Manuscripts (to select both options, hold down the
Ctrl key while highlighting your choices), you will
retrieve only manuscript diaries and eliminate the published
diaries from your search results.]
- Keyword Search: diaries : This locates records for
diaries, whether manuscript or an edited, printed edition; it's
important to note that including the designation "diaries" in
records for material which is indeed a diary hasn't been uniformly
applied over time, so this search will not locate ALL Orbis
records for diaries, let alone records for ALL diaries at
Yale)
- Connect
to a list of form and genre terms used in Yale catalog records
- Connect
to a list of subject subdivisions helpful in identifying primary
sources in Orbis
- More
information on limiting searches in Orbis
- More
information on keyword searching in Orbis
The Yale University Library Finding Aid Database
The Yale
University Library Finding Aid Database provides access to
archival finding aids in a platform-independent electronic format.
The database now includes most Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript
Library finding aids, most Divinity Library finding aids, and a
small number finding aids from Sterling's Manuscript and Archives
department and the Music Library.
The Finding Aid Database can be searched using keyword/Boolean
operators. It is possible to search using up to three search terms
or phrases. After you submit a search to the Finding Aid Database, a
results screen will provide a list of finding aids that contain your
search term(s). You then have the option of viewing the finding aids
either using your regular web browser, or using an SGML browser.
The Finding Aid Database offers you the opportunity to search
through many Yale finding aids at one time. Just remember that not
all Yale finding aids are represented in the database.
Other catalogs and Web sites
The Sterling card catalog
The union catalog in Sterling Memorial Library contains cards
for material in most, but not all, formats held by most, but not
all, libraries in the Yale University Library system represented on
a combination of handwritten, half-height cards; typewritten cards;
and computer-produced cards. Some types of materials, such as United
States government documents, maps, scores, and recordings are not
presented in the catalog at all and must be sought out in other
catalogs on campus.
More about
the Sterling card catalog
See the Special
Library Catalogs list.
BIBLIOGRAPHIC TOOLS FOR RESEARCH IN
HISTORY
- This section is designed to provide a selected list of basic
printed and electronic resources to help in the identification of
primary sources in the several specific
national histories included below. These sources include:
- Bibliographies
A bibliography is "A list of
works..., usually with some relationship between them, e.g. by a
given author, on a given subject, or published in a given place,
and differing from a catalog in that its contents are not
restricted to the holdings of a single collection, library, or
group of libraries." ( The ALA glossary of library and
information science (Chicago: American Library Association,
1983), p.22). There are several types of bibliographies:
- An annotated bibliography has entries which
include " ... note[s] ... intended to describe, explain, or
evaluate the publication referred to." ( ALA glossary ,
p.8)
- EXAMPLE: Historical abstracts. v.1- 1955- .
[Santa Barbara, Calif., Clio Press]
- A current bibliography records currently or
recently published documents, with the intent of reporting the
recent literature as it appears.
- EXAMPLE: America: history and life. v.0- 1972- .
[Santa Barbara, Calif., Clio Press]
- A national bibliography is "A bibliography of
documents published in a particular country and, ... documents ...
written in the language of the country." ( ALA glossary ,
p.151).
- EXAMPLE: British national bibliography. v.1-
1950- . London : Council of the British National Bibliography.
- A period bibliography lists works about a given
time period.
- EXAMPLE: Bibliotheque des Fontaines. Catalogue du
fonds revolutionnaire / Bibliotheque des Fontaines. Chantilly
: La Bibliotheque, 1989. 2 v.
- A retrospective bibliography "... lists
documents or parts of documents, such as articles, published in
previous years, as distinct from a current bibliography ... .
Retrospective bibliographies are frequently divided into two types
... [one of which is] research-oriented, [and] are intended as
jumping-off points for those doing research in the topic covered
... ." ( ALA glossary , p.194)
- EXAMPLE: Diaz Sanchez, Pilar. Las mujeres en la
historia de Espasna, siglos XVIII-XX : bibliografia comentada
/ Pilar Diaz Sanchez, Pilar Dominguez Prats. Madrid :
Ministerio de Cultura, Instituto de la Mujer, 1988.
- A serial bibliography appears at fixed intervals
of time, e.g. weekly, monthly, quarterly, annually, and has as its
mission the reporting of titles, often both book titles and
article titles (as well as dissertations, book reviews, pamphlets,
and other types of material) as they appear.
- EXAMPLE: Historical abstracts . v.1- 1955- .
[Santa Barbara, Calif., etc. American Bibliographical Center-Clio
Press]
- A subject bibliography lists works about a given
subject.
- EXAMPLE: Bass, Dorothy C. Women in American
religious history : an annotated bibliography and guide to
sources / Dorothy C. Bass, Sandra Hughes Boyd. Boston, Mass. :
G.K. Hall, c1986.
- Guides to the literature
Narrative introductions to
doing research in a given subject area, with suggestions for
research approaches and introductions to the research literature
and sources of the field.
- EXAMPLE: The American Historical Association's guide
to historical literature / general editor, Mary Beth Norton ;
associate editor, Pamela Gerardi. 3rd ed. New York : Oxford
University Press, 1995. 2 v.
- Indexes
Indexes generally provide access to the
contents of individual periodicals or newspapers, or to the
contents of multiple periodicals and newspapers whose subject
focus is similar. They differ from bibliographies in that fact
that they contain citations to only one type of publication --
articles, book reviews, and editorials in periodicals -- rather
than to a range of materials, e.g. books, articles, and
maps.
- EXAMPLE: The New York times index . v.1- 1851- .
New York, New York Times Co.
- EXAMPLE: Air University Library index to military
periodicals . v.1- 1963- . Maxwell Air Force Base, Ala. : Air
University Library.
- Library catalogs
Many research libraries, or
specialized collections within those libraries, have produced
multi-volume printed book catalogs to the contents of these
collections through a specific date, e.g. all works cataloged
before 1970. Because of the subject focus and inclusiveness of
many of these collections, these catalogs of specific collections
can used as bibliographies on the subject focus of the collection.
- EXAMPLE American Antiquarian Society. Catalogue of
the manuscript collections of the American Antiquarian
Society. Boston : G. K. Hall, 1979. 4 v.
- EXAMPLE Great Britain. Colonial Office. Library.
Catalogue of the Colonial Office Library, London. Boston:
G. K. Hall, 1964. 15v. plus supplement.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHIC TOOLS FOR RESEARCH
BY COUNTRY
American history
Before 1900
After
1900
United
States government documents
European history
France
Great
Britain
Germany
Italy
Spain
European
government publications and official statistics
Tools
for identifying machine-readable datafiles
Back
to Researching a Topic in Four Easy Steps
© 2005
Yale University Library
This file last modified 11/22/04
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