History

A guide to library research for Historical research at the University of Calgary.

Reference Sources & Tools

Reference Sources are tertiary sources, resources, and finding tools to help you find general information and facts about people, organizations, events, or terminology. They are authoritative and can include encyclopedias, dictionaries, biographical dictionaries, yearbooks, atlases/gazetteers, handbooks/manuals, almanacs, factbooks, directories, thesaurus, bibliographies, indexes. This page outlines a variety of reference source types to get you started.

Reference Tools
A link to the Reference Tools Guide at the University of Calgary. This guide will provide links to many databases.
History Reference Collection at the TFDL
This is a list of print reference titles related to History available at the Taylor Family Digital Library.

General Reference Databases

This is a list of general reference source databases with full-text content.

Oxford Reference This link opens in a new window
Oxford Reference is the home of Oxford's quality reference publishing, bringing together over 2 million entries, many of which are illustrated, into a single cross-searchable resource. This resource provides quality, up-to-date reference content. Made up of two main collections (Oxford Quick Reference and Oxford Reference Library) which are both fully integrated and cross-searchable.
- Includes fulltext of the reference sources.
Credo Reference This link opens in a new window
Credo Reference (formerly XreferPlus) is an online reference library comprised of reference books including encyclopedias, dictionaries, thesauri and other reference books. Subjects covered include art, biography, history, literature, music, religion, and science and technology.
Cambridge Histories This link opens in a new window
- Access to volumes published online prior to 2023.
Cambridge Histories spans subject areas across the humanities and social sciences, with a concentration on political and cultural history, literature, philosophy, religious studies, music and the arts.
Gale ebooks This link opens in a new window
Gale ebooks is a database of encyclopedias and specialized reference sources for multidisciplinary research. These reference materials once were accessible only in the library, but are now accessible online from the library or remotely 24/7. Because each library creates its own eBook collection, the content you see may vary if the database is accessed from different libraries (your school, your public library, or your office). Encyclopedias and specialized reference resources in: Arts, Biography, History, Information and Publishing, Law, Literature, Medicine, Multicultural Studies, Nation and World, Religion, Science, Social Science.

Lois Hole Campus Alberta Digital Library
The initiative provides 35 participating post-secondary institutions in Alberta with access to commercially licensed digital resources and newly created collections of unique digitized content.

Indexes

Indexes are important resources to help your research because they work as finding aids to scholarly articles, books, newspaper and magazine articles, primary source materials, and archival fonds. While many of these are print-only materials, many are available through subscription databases or free websites.

Historical Abstracts This link opens in a new window
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Covers the history of the world (excluding the United States and Canada) from 1450 to the present, including world history, military history, women's history, history of education, and more ... Provides indexing of more than 1,700 academic historical journals in over 40 languages back to 1955.
America: History and Life This link opens in a new window
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Index of literature covering the history and culture of the United States and Canada from prehistory to the present. With indexing for over 1,800 journals from 1895 to the present.
Anthropology Plus This link opens in a new window
As a compilation of the Anthropological Index and Anthropological Literature databases, Anthropology Plus is the world's most comprehensive index of bibliographic materials covering the fields of anthropology, archaeology, and related interdisciplinary research. This database offers worldwide indexing of all core periodical and lesser-known journals from the early 19th century to today, providing extensive indexing of journal articles, reports, commentaries, edited works and obituaries in the fields of social, cultural, physical, biological and linguistic anthropology, ethnology, archaeology, folklore, material culture, interdisciplinary studies, etc.

Canadian Periodical Index
print index

Gale OneFile. CPI.Q (Canadian periodicals) This link opens in a new window
Gale OneFile: CPI.Q, the award-winning electronic version of the Canadian Periodical Index, provides the most-requested Canadian reference information available. It includes more than 1,300 Canadian periodicals (more than 700 full text), a multilingual interface, indexing from 1980 forward, and full-text articles from 1983 forward. This vast collection is fully integrated, enabling users to search the entire database with a single query. It yields a variety of relevant periodical articles, biographies, company profiles, historical documents, science and technology essays, and much more. Exclusive features, including Topic Finder, InterLink, and a mobile-optimized interface, support and enhance the search experience.
International medieval bibliography This link opens in a new window
To access database right click title and select 'open link in (in)private or incognito window'
International medieval bibliography is the leading bibliography of the European Middle Ages (c. 400-1500). It offers an unparalleled tool for medievalists to identify the contents of current work published throughout Europe, the Americas and the Asia-Pacific region. The discipline areas to which the IMB is relevant include Classics, English Language and Literature, History and Archaeology, Theology and Philosophy, Medieval European Languages and Literatures, Arabic and Islamic Studies, History of Education, Art History, Music, Theatre and Performance Arts, Rhetoric and Communications Studies. The "International Medieval Institute", based at the University of Leeds, is responsible for producing the bibliography.
Index Islamicus This link opens in a new window
Index to literature on Islam, the Middle East and Muslim areas of Asia and Africa, and Muslim minorities elsewhere. Includes citations to over 3,000 journals, conference proceedings, monographs, and book reviews from 1906 to present.
Scopus (Elsevier) This link opens in a new window
Scopus, an abstract and citation database, includes peer-reviewed titles from international publishers, Open Access journals, conference proceedings, trade publications, quality web sources.
Web of science This link opens in a new window
- If API is needed, see APIs for Scholarly Resources: Web of Science API Lite
Web of Science indexes core journal articles, conference proceedings, data sets, and other resources in the sciences, social sciences, arts, and humanities. Includes:
- BIOSIS Previews (1980-present)
- KCI-Korean Journal Database (1980-present)
- MEDLINE® (1950-present)
- Preprint Citation Index (1991-present)
- SciELO Citation Index (2002-present)
PAIS Index This link opens in a new window
PAIS (Public Affairs Information Service) Index includes PAIS International and PAIS Archive. PAIS International database contains continually updated records for over half a million journal articles, books, government documents, statistical directories, grey literature, research reports, conference papers, web content, and more. PAIS Archive is a retrospective conversion of the PAIS Annual Cumulated Bulletin, and covers monographs, periodical articles, notes and announcements, and analytics.

Encyclopedias

Encyclopedias are excellent starting points for your research. They are used to get a basic understanding of your research topic. Look for short reading lists following entries, the author of the entry (as they have likely written other works on the topic) and pay close attention to the proper nouns related to your topic as using accurate and, possibly, variant spellings is important when searching for books and articles.

You will find a wide variety of print and electronic encyclopedias in our collections. To find encyclopedias specific to your topic, use the Advanced Search from the library search box with the subjects “encyclopedias” AND ”history” AND keywords specific to your research (e.g., encyclopedias AND history AND military).

The best databases to find history-related encyclopedias in the University of Calgary’s collections include:

Gale in context. World history This link opens in a new window
Gale In Context: World History reaches back to the ancient world—and forward to today's headlines—to deliver a chronicle of the people, cultures, events, and societies that have formed the history of the human race. A range of topics such as Aztecs, Industrial Revolution, Silk Road, the Buddha, Space Race, and more provide a wide perspective across the globe.
Cambridge Histories This link opens in a new window
- Access to volumes published online prior to 2023.
Cambridge Histories spans subject areas across the humanities and social sciences, with a concentration on political and cultural history, literature, philosophy, religious studies, music and the arts.
Oxford Reference This link opens in a new window
Oxford Reference is the home of Oxford's quality reference publishing, bringing together over 2 million entries, many of which are illustrated, into a single cross-searchable resource. This resource provides quality, up-to-date reference content. Made up of two main collections (Oxford Quick Reference and Oxford Reference Library) which are both fully integrated and cross-searchable.
- Includes fulltext of the reference sources.

Dictionaries

Dictionaries can take many formats and are intended to provide quick reference information. The most known formats provide definitions for words and phrases or language translations. The largest and best known is the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). Other types of dictionaries are historical dictionaries (often specific to a country, region, or ethnic group), biographical dictionaries, geographical dictionaries, and other subject-specific dictionaries. The databases noted above under General Reference Sources will include many dictionaries.

Oxford English Dictionary (OED) This link opens in a new window
A complete text of the 2nd. ed. of the Oxford English dictionary with quarterly updates, including revisions not available in any other form. Also includes the Historical Thesaurus of the OED, a taxonomic classification of the majority of senses and lemmas in OED Online.

You will find a wide variety of print and electronic dictionaries in our collections. To find historical dictionaries specific to your topic, use the library search box with the subjects "dictionaries" AND "history" in addition to keywords specific to your research (e.g., dictionaries AND history AND military).

Library Search Box
This search box can help you find books, theses, book chapters for electronic books, primary sources, journals, journal articles, microformats titles, and more. from the University of Calgary's collections.

A bibliography is a list of books, articles, and other sources relevant to your research topic. In addition to the bibliographies found at the end of books, theses, journal articles, encyclopedia entries, there will often be separately published bibliographies on your topic.

To find published bibliographies, start with using the library search box with the subjects "bibliography" AND "history" AND a keyword related to your subject (e.g. military).

Historiography is the study of the writing of history. Historiographies can do the same job as a bibliography, so if a bibliography does not exist for your topic try searching for a historiography instead.

Handbooks, manuals, or guides are useful for looking up information in specific areas. They often present information in a practical, step-by-step structure and include facts, formulas or procedures. To find handbooks, manuals, or guides in relation to your topic, search the library search box using "handbook OR manual OR guide" and your topic search terms.

Chicago manual of style online This link opens in a new window
The Chicago Manual of Style Online is completely searchable and easy to use, providing quick answers to your style and editing questions. The Q & A content is fully searchable along with the content of The Chicago Manual of Style. The Chicago Manual of Style Online also provides convenient Tools, such as sample forms, letters, and style sheets.

The History Student’s Handbook: A Short Guide to Writing History Essays
Department of History. 2019 edition.

Chronologies and timelines are also useful guides for placing historical events in context, particularly for countries, regions, or major events. These can be found in handbooks, guides, and manuals or sometimes on their own (e.g., The Routledge Companion to Britain in the Twentieth Century).

Libraries & Cultural Resources

Research Guides