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HIST 150: History Through Objects: The Atlantic World

What is a Primary Source?

A Primary Source are first hand accounts & materials from the period under examination. These may include:

  • diaries
  • journals
  • newspapers
  • contemporary publications
  • autobiographies
  • music/songs
  • recordings or images
  • play bills
  • performance Reviews 
  • interviews
  • recordings
  • diaries
  • journals
  • newspapers
  • contemporary publications
  • autobiographies
  • music/songs
  • images
  • Broadsides / Posters
  • Legal documents
  • Films

When is a source primary?

A secondary source is a descriptive work written about a topic, event, or person after it happened, usually well after it happened.

When secondary sources are written close to the period under examination, it become harder to distinguish between primary and secondary.
Example: is a 2025 book about the 2024 election a secondary source because it's after the fact or primary because it's roughly contemporary? 

Another example

I am interested in Librarianship in the mid 18th century. I find a book from 1736 giving the histories of Britain's oldest libraries back to William I (1066) to Elizabeth I (1603):

 

Is it a primary source?