Research Guides: 18th-Century Sources (Tri-Co): Primary Sources

Online Collections: Primary Sources

18thConnect
A web portal and research environment devoted to digital projects concerning the 18th century. Many primary texts and images are accessible by subject, author, and other categories. Use the Advanced Search to refine by format, discipline, genre, and so on.
- Only some content will be available full text.. Please contact a subject librarian to find full-text copies of sources not available in 18thConnect.
American Broadsides & Ephemera: Series I
Offers fully searchable facsimile images of approximately 15,000 broadsides (1820-1900) and 15,000 pieces of ephemera (1760 -1900) from the American Antiquarian Society collection. Subjects range from contemporary accounts of the Civil War, unusual occurrences and natural disasters to official government proclamations, tax bills and town meeting reports. Material types include clipper ship sailing cards, early trade cards, bill heads, theater and music programs, stock certificates, menus and invitations documenting civic, political and private celebrations.
American Periodicals Series Online
Search through 1,800 magazines and journals published in the United States between 1740-1940. Includes early scientific publications, trade journals, popular magazines such as Ladies' Home Journal, and journals such as Puck, The Dial, and McClure's.
Burney Collection Newspapers Archive, 17th & 18th Century
Provides full text to the newspapers and news pamphlets gathered by the Reverend Charles Burney (1757-1817), representing the largest single collection of 17th and 18th century English news media. The 700 or so bound volumes of newspapers and news pamphlets were published mostly in London, however there are also some English provincial, Irish and Scottish papers, and a few examples from the American colonies, Europe and India. Cross-search all Cengage subscribed newspaper collections via NewsVault.
Early American Imprints: Series I, Evans (1639-1800)
Covers American history and literature from the colonial period to the eighteenth century. Provides full-text digitization of the Early American Imprints microform set, Series I (1639-1800).
Early American Imprints: Series II, Shaw-Shoemaker (1801-1819)
Covers American history and literature from the colonial period to the eighteenth century. Provides full-text digitization of the Early American Imprints microform set, Series II (1801-1819). Covering every aspect of American life during the early decades of the United States.
Early English Books Online (EEBO)
Contains digital images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed elsewhere from 1473-1700. This collection contains about 100,000 of over 125,000 titles listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue (1475-1640) and Wing's Short-Title Catalogue (1641-1700) and their revised editions, as well as the Thomason Tracts (1640-1661) collection and the Early English Books Tract Supplement. Includes books, pamphlets, manuscripts and newspapers.
Early English Books Online Text Creation Partnership
Offers text editions for a significant portion of the Short Title Catalog of Early English books published between 1473 and 1700. Currently contains digital images for 125,000 works, distributed under the title Early English Books Online. Upon completion this resource will contain 25,000 searchable and readable editions that link to a corresponding image file. Covers 15th to the 18th century.
Eighteenth Century Collections Online
Offers full-text access to English-language titles and editions published between 1701 and 1800 including books, pamphlets, almanacs, Bibles and treatises. Subjects covered include history, geography, fine arts, medicine, science, literature, language, religion, philosophy and law. Significant collections of women writers, collections on the French Revolution, and numerous eighteenth-century editions of the works of Shakespeare are also included.
Electronic Enlightenment
Searchable and browseable database offering extensive access to the web of correspondence between the greatest thinkers and writers of the long eighteenth century and their families and friends, bankers and booksellers, patrons and publishers. Coverage includes letters and documents, document sources such as manuscripts and early printed editions, scholarly annotations, and links to biographies, dictionaries, encyclopedias, newspapers, and other online resources.

Jonathan Swift Archive
"Digitized texts of Jonathan Swift’s prose works, transcribed from a great variety of early printed editions."

Nineteenth Century Collections Online
Full-text access to a range of English-language titles and editions, including books, newspapers, pamphlets, manuscripts, ephemera, maps, statistics, and more—with many titles from the 18th, as well as the 19th century. Subjects covered include history, geography, fine arts, medicine, science, literature, language, religion, philosophy, diplomacy, theater, politics, law. etc.
Reading Experience Database (RED), 1450–1945
An open-access database and research project with more than 30,000 records of reading experiences of British subjects, both at home and abroad, and of visitors to the British Isles, between 1450 and 1945.
Women Writers Online
Offers a full-text collection of works in English by pre-victorian women writers. Covers 1400-1850.

Search Tripod

List of 18th-Century Books in Tripod

List of Anglophone texts from the long eighteenth century (1660–1830) in Tripod:

Sorted by title. You can alternatively sort by author, call number, date, and relevance. You can also change the time span using the slider on the right-hand side of the results page [e.g., 1700–1800]. Further refine your results by adding keywords and checking the box next to "Retain my current filters.")

Selected Books in Tripod

Collected Writings of Charles Brockden Brown by Philip Barnard, Elizabeth Hewitt, Mark L. Kamrath (eds.)
ISBN: 9781611484441
Publication Date: 2013-05-16
Charles Brockden Brown (1771-1810) is a key writer of the revolutionary era and U.S. early republic, known for his landmark novels and other writings in a variety of genres. The Collected Writings of Charles Brockden Brown presents all of Brown's non-novelistic writings, letters, political pamphlets, fiction, periodical writings, historical writings, and poetry in a seven-volume scholarly edition.
The Idea of Being Free by Mary Hays
ISBN: 155111559X
Publication Date: 2006-01-01
Mary Hays (1759-1843) is often best remembered for her early revolutionary novels The Memoirs of Emma Courtney and The Victim of Prejudice. In this collection, however, Gina Luria Walker reveals the extraordinary range of Hays's oeuvre. The selections are mainly from Hays's non-fiction writings, including letters, life-writing, political commentary, and essays. This Broadview edition includes a critical introduction and full annotation.
The Collected Works of Phillis Wheatley by Phillis Wheatley; John Shields (Editor)
ISBN: 0195052412
Publication Date: 1988-04-14
"Questions of race, gender, and literary form intersect in the poetry the Schomburg Library presents. Phyllis Wheatley's poems are read freshly in the light of what John C. Shields calls her 'poetics of liberation.'"--Jean Fagan Yellin, The Washington Post Book World
Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe
ISBN: 9780141439822
Publication Date: 2003-04-29
Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe, regarded by many to be first novel in English, is also the original tale of a castaway struggling to survive on a remote desert island. Edited with an introduction and notes by John Richetti, this edition contains a full chronology of Defoe's life and times, explanatory notes, glossary and a critical introduction discussing Robinson Crusoe as a pioneering work of modern psychological realism.