This Will Be An Amazing Resource For Historians

The rest of you may not much care! This came across one of the professional historian email lists, and I am so anxious to see this!

State Papers Online, 1509-1714

Readers of this list should be aware that the archive of State Papers will be released from this coming October (2007).

State Papers Online, 1509-1714 (SPO) will be an essential tool for any historian who studies any aspect of early-modern British history and the relations of the Tudor and Stuart kingdoms with other states and countries in Europe and beyond. It has been produced by Thomson Learning - Gale with the guidance and advice of leading scholars in Britain and the United States.

SPO has as its foundation the State Papers, Domestic and Foreign, in The National Archives at Kew. It puts these alongside other collections that were originally in the state papers kept by the monarch's Principal Secretaries in the sixteenth century: at the British Library (principally the Lansdowne Manuscripts and some of the volumes of the Cotton Manuscripts)and in the Cecil Papers at Hatfield House, as well as the archive of the English Privy Council.

SPO will reproduce in facsimile each of the original manuscripts. Nearly two million digitized pages will be searchable from the modern printed Calendars. By overcoming the difficulty of matching an individual entry in a Calendar to a manuscript, SPO marks a huge advance for historians in all disciplines, whether they use it for their own research or for teaching.

Being able to view images of the manuscripts alongside entries in the Calendars will allow scholars not only to read any comments made by the recipients of documents but also to make their own notes, transcripts and corrections within SPO.

SPO has been designed for research historians, research-based teaching and students. Each phase of SPO will have introductory and explanatory essays, a glossary of terms, lists of abbreviations, and other helpful material. This is a project on an impressive scale. It will be quite the most important resource for historians of early-modern Britain for many years.

Built on the magnificent work of the Victorian archivists, it will bring into the light archives explored by most of us on microfilm in research libraries; from now on there will be few excuses for historians of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries not to go to the original manuscripts of the most important collections of The National Archives and British Library. To have the State Paper archives put back together again, fully viewable and searchable from our own computers, is nothing short of revolutionary.

The first Part will be available in October, with the rest following within two years. The four parts will form one seamless searchable archive.

State Papers Online, 1509-1714

Part One: Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers, Domestic

• The National Archives, London, State Papers 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 15, and Calendars;
• British Library, London, Burghley Papers (Lansdowne Manuscripts and some Cotton Manuscripts) and Catalogues;
• Hatfield House Library, Hertfordshire, Cecil Papers (Calendars and Transcriptions).

Part Two: Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Foreign, Ireland, Scotland, Borders and Acts of Privy Council.

• The National Archives, London, State Papers 49, 50,51, 52, 53, 59, 60, 61, 62, 63, 65, 66, 68, 69, 70, 71, 75, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 88, 89, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106 and 108, and Calendars;
• Acts of the Privy Council

Part Three: James I to Queen Anne, 1603-1714: State Papers, Domestic

• The National Archives, London, State Papers 8, 14, 16, 17, 18, 20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 38, 40, 41, 42, 44 and 46, and Calendars
• British Library, London, Additional Manuscripts 64870-64924, 69868-69935, 69936-69998, and Catalogues.

Part Four: James I to Queen Anne, 1603-1714: State Papers Foreign and Ireland and Acts of Privy Council

• The National Archives, London, State Papers 47, 57, 63, 64, 65, 66, 67, 71, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 82, 84, 85, 86, 87, 88, 89, 90, 91, 92, 93, 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 108 and 112, and Calendars;
• Acts Privy Council