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Medieval Studies Resources

This is a brief list of useful subject specific research sources available in Wesleyan's libraries and on the Internet. It is intended to provide a starting point for research in Medieval Studies, sufficient for basic research needs. For more extensive research needs, you can ask for a personal research session with a librarian.

From the Library (Paper and online purchases and subscriptions)
Reference:  Call Numbers  Encyclopedias  Dictionaries  Guides/Summaries  Bibliographies  Maps/Atlases  
Books:  Catalogs  
Articles:  Indexes & Databases  

On the Internet (See note about Internet sources)
Web Indexes:  Meta Sites/Guides  Search Engines  
Selected Sites:  Reference Sources  Full Text Online  Organizations  

Reference Sources - For introductions to or summaries of topics

Call Numbers - Call Number locations for Medieval Studies (in Reference and Stacks)
  • D 111-203 - Medieval history
  • DA-DX - History of specific countries and areas
    • Encyclopedias
  • Illustrated encyclopedia of medieval civilization - Ref CB353.G7 - Covers all of world history during the medieval period.
  • Encyclopedia of world history; ancient, medieval, and modern, chronologically arranged - Ref D21.L27 1972 - Chronology of world history with an emphasis on the political, military, and diplomatic. Includes outline maps and genealogical tables. Good source for finding brief historical facts, and for placing events in their proper time sequence.
  • Medieval Archaeology; an Encyclopedia - Ref D125.M42 2001 - This one volume encyclopedia of medieval archaeology is broadly defined. Chronologically it begins with the collapse of the Roman Empire in the West in the fifth century, and it ends circa 1500 A.D. Geographically it encompasses the Latin West, from Poland to Iceland, and from southern Italy to northern Scandinavia. There is also an important article on medieval excavations in Novgorod, Russia. The scope of the work excludes, however, the archaeology of the the Byzantine world and the Balkans. It provides readers with a guide to current research in the field, and it includes country as well as regional surveys for the European region. There are entries on a broad range of topics such as dendrochonology, radiocarbon dating as well as historical articles describing medieval textiles, coins, and jewelry. Each entry is also accompanied by extensive bibliographies for more intense reading on the topic.
  • New Catholic encyclopedia (18 volumes) - Ref BX841.N44 1967 - For students of medieval history the work is useful for many areas of interest, including the history of theological or doctrinal issues of the Church, as well as for biographical information on Church notables of the period.
    • Dictionaries
  • Dictionary of medieval civilization - Ref CB351.D24 1984 - Provides brief definitions for a wide range of names and terms in medieval European history.
  • Dictionary of the Middle Ages (13 volumes) - Ref D114.D5 1982 - 5000 articles dealing with the many aspects and the various disciplines encompassed in medieval scholarship. Covers the Latin West, the Slavic world, Asia Minor, the Middle East and North Africa from 500 to 1500 AD.
  • Dictionary of national biography; from the earliest times to 1900 (23 volumes) - Ref DA28.D4 - Biographical information on noteworthy individuals from the British Isles of all historical periods.
    • Guides/Summaries
  • Chronology of the medieval world: 800 to 1491 - Ref D118.S855 1973b - The left-hand pages outline political events chronologically, while the right-hand pages describe the religious, intellectual, and artistic achievements of the corresponding period. The index is a guide to names, places, subject, and titles of works of art and literature.
  • Daily life in medieval Europe - Ref D119 .S55 1999 - Brief overview of daily life for princes, peasants, priests, and others in Medieval Europe.
    • Bibliographies
  • International medieval bibliography. Semi-annual (1967-date) - Ref Z3013.S314 - Indexes articles in the field of medieval studies.
  • Medieval studies: a bibliographical guide - Ref Z5579.5.C76 1983 - 9000 annotatedbook and monograph entries. Includes major collections of source material, as well as secondary works which are basic to the study of the Middle Ages in Western Europe, Byzantium, and Muslim civilization.
    • Maps/Atlases
  • Atlas of medieval Europe - Ref G1791.M3 1983 - Contains numerous maps dealing with various aspects of medieval history. It is further amplified by lengthy essays on political and cultural topics.
  • Shepherd's historical atlas. 9th edition - Ref G1030.S4 1976 - Historical atlas of the world, with an extensive section medieval history; maps are rendered in color.

    • Books

    Catalogs
  • CTW Online Catalog - For books at Wesleyan, Conn College, or Trinity College.
  • WorldCat - For books not in the CTW Catalog (order by interlibrary loan)

    • Articles

    Indexes & Databases - These indexes and databases are the ones most likely to be relevant to research in Medieval Studies. See Indexes and Databases for a full list of available online databases.
  • ITER (Bibliography of Medieval and Renaissance Studies) - An index of bibliographic records from scholarly journals in the fields of Medieval and Renaissance Studies.
  • Humanities Full Text - An index, with many abstracts and some full text articles, to scholarly sources in the humanities; covers articles published from 1984 to the present. (Paper indexes covering back to 1966 are available in the Olin Reference collection at AI3 .H84 and AI3 .S63)
  • Social Sciences Full Text - An index, with many abstracts and some full text articles, to scholarly sources in the social sciences; covers articles published from 1984 to the present. (Paper indexes covering back to 1966 are available in the Olin Reference collection at Z7161 .S654 and AI3 .S63)
  • Social Sciences Citation Index - Arts and Humanities Citation Index - Interdisciplinary indexes covering the journal literature of the social sciences and humanities. In addition to searching for authors, titles, and subjects of articles, these indexes allow searching for articles which have cited a particular publication, and to search for articles which share one or more cited sources in their bibliographies.
  • PCI Full Text - Periodicals Contents Index lists the tables of contents (with access to some full text articles) from social science and humanities journals from as far back as 1770 to recent issues.
  • ArticleFirst - An index of journal articles from all subject areas. Covers articles published since 1990.
  • Philosopher's Index - Indexes and abstracts from philosophy journals and related interdisciplinary fields.
  • MLA (Modern Language Association) Bibliography - Citations to publications pertaining to languages, literature, linguistics, literary theory. Covers publications from 1963 to the present; also available in paper going back to 1929 at Ref Z7006.M64.
  • Religion Database - Citations to articles, books, essays, book reviews, and other publications on world religions. Covers items published since 1949.
  • Art Full Text - and Art Index Retrospective - Abstracts has citations, with some full text, for articles on all aspects of art published since 1984; Retro offers citations to articles published between 1929 and 1984.

    • WWW Medieval Studies Sources - Note: It is important to keep in mind that anyone can publish information on the Internet. You need to be very careful about evaluating and citing information found on the Web. Another good way of finding Medieval Studies resources is to use a search engine or subject directory.

    Internet Indexes

    Meta Sites/Guides to medieval studies Sites - These sites list, and often evaluate, web sites relevant to research in Medieval Studies. See Indexes and Databases for a full list of available databases.
  • Medieval Europe - section of the WWW Virtual Library's Index of Resources for History
  • NetSERF - "The Internet Connection for Medieval Resources." Index of Web sites on all aspects of Medieval studies.
  • Luminarium - Index of online texts of English literature from 1350 to 1660; also indexes critical articles and essays and other related sources.
    • Search Engines
  • Argos - Limited area search engine covering selected sites with information on the ancient and medieval worlds.

    • Selected Sites

    Reference Sources
  • ORB: The Online Reference Book for Medieval Studies - Online texts, articles, reference works, resources for teaching, and other sources for Medieval studies.
    • Full Text Online
  • The Labyrinth: Resources for Medieval Studies - Sponsored by Georgetown University, the Labyrinth is an innovative approach to locating information ranging from texts and images to pedagogical resources, conference proceedings, online catalogs, and a wide variety of other materials in the field.
  • Internet Medieval Sourcebook - Full text of translations of Medieval writings, from Fordham University's Center for Medieval Studies.
    • Organizations
  • Wesleyan's Medieval Studies Program
  • Medieval Academy of America - An organization supporting research, publication, and teaching of Medieval studies. Anyone interested in the Middle Ages is eligible for membership.

    • Research Tips