John Stoner's WWW Sources for Scottish History

Introduction

This is a sampler of World Wide Web resources for the study of Scottish history. It is a "sampler" because no claim to comprehensiveness is being made here. This page is part of the larger Web site devoted to Web resources for the study of the history of the Celtic fringe--Ireland, Scotland, and Wales--as an integral part of British history. This page contains annotated links to relevant Web resources organized into seven major categories (see the Table of Contents).

A good brief overview of World Wide Web resources on Scotland is available on City.net's Scotland Page. City.Net, a service of Excite, provides information on travel, entertainment, local business, government and community services for cities and countries world-wide. The service's Scotland page provides a good summary listing of current information sources on the Web related to Scotland. As the Scotland page is considered a "sub-Page" of City.net's United Kingdom page, see especially the United Kingdom entry from the CIA's 1995 World Factbook for more information on Scotland.

Table of Contents

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General Sites (Meta-Sites)

The Alba--Scotland Page
This site is part of The Gaelic Homepage, which is maintained at SunSITE at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. The larger site is devoted to the language and culture of the Gaels, those people that speak or did speak any of the three Gaelic languages. See especially Celtic Background, Politics, Scottish Kings, and Scottish URLs.

Gateway to Scotland
This Web site is part of the WWW server of the Geography Department at the University of Edinburgh. The site contains information on Scottish geography, politics, and history, as well as links to other Web resources regarding Scotland. See especially Notable Dates in Scottish History, Scotland - Famous People, and Principal Scottish WWW Servers.

All Things Scottish
This Web site was created and is maintained by Mary-Gwen and David Alston of Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada. A brief listing of Scottish related Web resources, the emphasis here is on music and Celtic culture. However, there are some relevant links to Web resources on Scottish history.

ALMAC's Electric Scotland
This Web site is part of the larger ALMAC site (ALMAC is an Internet provider in Scotland) and aims to be a comprehensive source of Scottish Culture, poetry, history, folklore and Clan information. See especially the following:
Historic Scotland
Provides access information regarding Scottish monuments and historic buildings
Scottish Clans and Families
Includes a search engine
Dalriada Celtic Heritage Trust
History page contains links to detailed treatments of the kingdom of Dalriada, lordship of the Isles, the Picts, Clan genealogy and Scotland's early history.
History of Scotland
Includes very detailed histories of the Battle of Culloden, the Battle of Falkirk, and the Highlands.
Celtic Net
This site was designed to bring culture of the Celtic people to the world via the Internet. It is part of the Taisbean Multimedia Productions site. As of last visit, the main links that are active are those having to do with Scotland--see History of the Kilt in Scotland and Directory of Scottish Clans.

The Gathering of the Clans
This Web site, created and maintained by Scott Agnew, is devoted to "all things Scottish." The Gathering was started in March of 1994. It provides information on Scottish folklore, history, culture, and Scottish heraldry. The Gaelic Cultural Centre page of this site provides links to Web resources on Scottish religion and mythology, history, politics, geography, and Scottish universities--see especially The Scottish Wars of Independence. The Great Hall of the Clans page is a repository of Scottish heraldry and Clan information on the Internet--each Clan has its own page with information on its history, traditions, motto, tartan, etc. This page also provides links to genealogical resources. The Scottish Clan and Family Organizations page provides contact information for Scottish clan and family organizations.

National Library of Scotland
This Web site provides access to the resources of the National Library of Scotland, Scotland's premier library, which serves both as a general research library and as the world's leading repository for the printed and manuscript record of Scotland's history and culture. See especially the following: Collections, NLS Catalogs, Scottish Online Resources, and Selected Resources on the World Wide Web. This is an essential Web resource for the student of Scottish history.

Ron MacKinnon's Scottish Links
This Web site provides briefly annotated links to Web resources about Scotland in the areas of tartans, Scottish sites in the United States and Canada, music, commercial sites, the Clan Mckinnon, and general sites. While there is no specific section on history, the general set of sites contain some useful links for the student of Scottish history.

Scottish History
This Web site is part of the larger U.S./Scotland Links Page Web site (a frames version is also available). This site, maintained by J.M. Leffler, provides a brief list of Web resources related to Scottish history.

Scottish Language and Culture
This Web site is part of Michael O'Callaghan's Texas Celtic Page. It is a brief annotated list of links to Web resources regarding, as the name indicates, Scottish language and culture. However, some of the links also include resources on Scottish history.

Scottish Links
This Web site, created and maintained by Melanie provides an extensive annotated list of Web sources related to Scotland. The sites are listed in alphabetical order by site name; an eclectic list, this site contains some relevant links for Scottish history.

ScotWeb's Things Scottish
This Web page provides a brief listing of links to cultural and historical resources. This page is part of the of the larger ScotWeb site, by Scotweb Internet Services Ltd., a member of Aberdeen Chamber of Commerce which aims to provide users with information links relating to the North East of Scotland. The Things Scottish page provides links to pages on Sir William Wallace, Historic Scotland information on sites of interest, Robert the Bruce and genealogy

The Tartan Pages: Scotland on the Internet
This Web site, created and maintained by Gordon Dick, is designed to be the most comprehensive site of information and links to Scottish information on the Internet--a kind of "Yellow Pages" for Scotland on the Internet. It's breadth of coverage makes it an important site for the student of Scottish history. See especially the following:
Scottish History & Heritage
Scottish Stories and Legends
Politics
Tartans, Clans and Genealogy
Scottish Newspapers and Magazines
Books, Bookshops and Publishers
Scottish Education

Temporal Nexus--Scottish Information
This Web site, created and maintained by Gavin Greig at the University of Dundee, Scotland, provides a short listing of Web resources on Scotland in the areas of newspapers and magazines, newsgroups, general introductory (or meta-) sites, and special interest sites. Some of the links are briefly annotated. The site contains some useful links in the area of Scottish history, although the emphasis is primarily on Celtic culture.

Yahoo's Scotland--History
By following Yahoo's subject hierarchy along the following path: Regional:Countries:United Kingdom:Scotland:History, the searcher comes up with links to web sites relating to Scottish history. While certainly not comprehensive, this Yahoo site provides a quick and easy introduction to Web sites on Scottish history. A good starting place.

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Historical Case Studies and Specialized Sites

The HAMISH Project
This is the Web site for the HAMISH Project--Hypertext and Multimedia in Scottish History. The project is dedicated to the development of Computer-Aided Learning tools for the subject of Scottish History. Having received funding from the Scottish Library and Information Council, the project is developing a multimedia collection of historical sources (both primary and secondary) in hypermedia form. Secondly, the project aims to develop customization tools to provide specific exercises for particular curricula and to enable teachers to create their own exercises. The site provides links to some examples of the project's resources.

The Newstead Research Project
This Web site provides access to information resources on the Newstead Research Project. The Project is investigating the region surrounding the Roman fort of Trimontium near Newstead, on the River Tweed in the Borders region of southern Scotland. The Web site was created by Dr. Rick Jones, project director, and Paul N. Cheetham. The project is run from the Department of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford, United Kingdom. The site provides an introduction and preliminary report (1993) on the project.

Falkirk--Local History
This Web page provides a brief history of the town of Falkirk. This page is part of the Graeme High School Web Page which resides on the server of ALMAC, an Internet provider for Scotland.

Notable Dates in Scottish History
This Web page is linked to Professor Susan Parman's Web Page in the Anthropology Department at California State University Fullerton. Dr. Parman has done research on Scotland, the European Community, Japan, Central Asia, Mexican-Americans, and the American South; on the history of anthropology, ethnographic field methods, symbolic anthropology, psychological anthropology, sociolinguistics, cartography, the anthropology of islands, and the neurophysiology and cultural interpretations of dreams.

Roman Scotland: Outpost of an Empire
This Web site provides access to an exhibition at Hunterian Museum and Art Gallery at the University of Glasgow. The exhibition documents the Roman presence in Scotland in the first and second centuries A.D., with emphasis on the Antonine Wall frontier and the life lived by the soldiers based in forts along its line

Scotland's Lost History - Is it Deliberate?
This Web page addresses the issue of what the author, Hamish Mitchell , considers to be the failure of the history of Scotland to be taught in Scottish schools. He suggests that this is due to the fact that so many of the events of Scottish history are seen by the British state as being touchstones of nationalism and anti-establishment thought, and therefore a threat. The site provides a list of neglected topics, some of which have hypertext documents. This site is part of the larger Why Scotland Needs Independence Web site (also created and maintained by Mitchell), which presents the case for Scottish independence. This latter page contains links to resources, both contemporary and historical, devoted to Scottish nationalism.

Scottish Institute of Maritime Studies
The Web site of the Scottish Institute of Maritime Studies established within the University of St. Andrews. The aim of the Institute is to further interdisciplinary teaching and research into the archaeology, ethnology, and history of human interaction with the sea. A brief set of links to related resources is provided.

The Scottish Wars of Independence
This site was created and maintained by Bill Cooper as one of the links from his History page. Cooper indicates that his site on the Wars of Independence was originally created in response to a question about the actual history behind the movie Braveheart. Cooper is in the process of continuing the history at least through the final recognition of Scotland's independence and the death of Robert Bruce. The site does not cite any sources for the narrative history it provides.

Stones of Scotland
A Web site devoted to providing access to textual, visual, and cartographic resources on megalithic structures in Scotland. It is part of the larger Stone Pages site, devoted to megalithic structures in Europe.

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Genealogical Resources

GENUKI: The UK & Ireland Genealogical Information Service
GENUKI attempts to serve as a "virtual reference library" of genealogical information that is of particular relevance to the UK and Ireland. It is a non-commercial service provided by volunteers in cooperation with the Federation of Family History Societies and a number of its member societies. From the UK and Ireland page, follow the link to Scotland Web page. This is probably the best meta-site for Scottish genealogical research.

Glasgow & West of Scotland Family History Society Home Page
This site provides Web links to information on the purposes, publications, projects, and services of the Glasgow and West of Scotland Family History Society. The Society was founded in 1977 "to promote the study of family history in the Glasgow & West of Scotland."

Library of Congress Entries for Scottish Genealogy
This web document, which is connected to the Library of Congress Holdings section of the Researching From Abroad web page of the GENUKI site is a list of 215 entries from the Library of Congress's online catalog, found in the "PREM" (pre-1968) and "LOCI" (post-1968) files which were retrieved by searching under the Library of Congress subject heading "Scotland--genealogy".

Scotland Genealogical & Historical Societies
This list of genealogical and historical societies of Scotland is part of TFC's Genealogical On-Ramp Web site. The list provides addresses as well as links to lists for genealogical societies in other parts of the world. Only one of the genealogical societies listed here has a WWW site. See also the Scotland section of the Foreign Publications & Periodicals page at this site.

Scotland Information
This Web site, created by Christine Gaunt and John Fuller and maintained by Christine Gaunt, provides a brief but useful listing of Web resources on Scotland in the areas of genealogy, general information, university resources, and graphics. It is part of a larger Web site on Genealogy Resources on the Internet which provides links to genealogy resources available through Mailing Lists, USENET newsgroups, anonymous File Transfer Protocol (FTP), Gopher, World Wide Web, Telnet, and E-Mail. This larger site and its various sub-pages is one of the major meta sites for genealogical resources on the Internet.

Scottish Genealogical Society
This Web site is maintained by the Scottish Genealogy Society, which was founded in Edinburgh in 1953 by a group of historians and genealogists. The Society aims to promote research into Scottish family history and to undertake the collection, exchange and publication of material relating to genealogy. The Society is academic and consultative and does not provide record searching. The site provides information regarding membership, holdings, contacts, and a Publications List.

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Primary Sources (Archives and Online Documents)

The Declaration of Arbroath
This Web page presents the Declaration of Arbroath of 1320, the Scottish "declaration of independence" in both its original Latin and in its English translation. This is one of the documents that is part of the History of the United Kingdom--Primary Documents Web site, which provides links to transcribed primary documents on British history which are available on the Web. That site is in turn part of the larger Eurodocs site. This latter site, which is maintained by Richard Hacken at the Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, provides links to Western European (mainly primary) historical documents that are transcribed, reproduced in facsimile, or translated.

Edinburgh University Library Special Collections
This Web site is part of a project to create an online index to the manuscripts of the Edinburgh University Library (EUL). The EUL Manuscript Collection includes valuable source material on a large range of subjects, including medieval to modern literature, Scottish history, and African missions.

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Bibliographic Information

Books from Scotland
This Web site provides access to the titles sold by Books From Scotland, an international mail order book vendor for new Scottish interest books, which sells exclusively by mail order direct from Scotland. See especially the following:
Culture & Tradition
Genealogy & Emigration
Scottish History
Reference

History
A list of printed sources on Scottish history provided by University of Edinburgh's Information Service.

National Museums of Scotland
The National Museums of Scotland aim to provide Scotland with a national museum service of which preserves and enhances the collections in its care and promotes research on them. See especially:
National Museums of Scotland Publishing
A brief listing of some of the titles published by the Publishing Department which produces popular and academic titles on Scottish history and literature, Scottish and international art, archaeology, natural history and history of science.
National Museums of Scotland Library
The Library holds over 250,000 volumes of books, periodicals and special collections.
The Scottish Ethnological Archive
Founded in 1959 with the aim of preserving documentary and illustrative material, and in particular the details of social and economic life.

Peter Bell, Rare Books
These book dealers, with a shop in Edinburgh, specialize in antiquarian and scholarly books on the humanities, especially English history, literature, biography and Scottish history, literature and philosophy, with a special interest in books by and about the Victorian period. This Web site provides contact information and selected information on titles the dealers handle.

Unicorn Limited's Book Section
This Web page is part of the larger Unicorn Limited, Inc. Web site. Unicorn Limited is a bookstore specializing in books on Celtic, Viking, and Scottish life, history, folklore, customs, weaponry, genealogy, militaria, literature, music, cooking and costume. From the Book Section page, see the Family History Listings, the Booklets, and the Scots-Irish Catalogue Web pages.

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Online Publications

Highlander Web Magazine
An electronic magazine devoted to the Highlands of Scotland. The Library page contains the following links relevant to Scottish history:
Bloody Culloden
Selections from the book Bloody Culloden, compiled and edited by John Macdonald (first published in 1995 by the Inverness Courier) which is available for purchase through the magazine.
The History Section
Contains a number of links to pages covering a wide range of topics in Scottish history--the Highland clearances, Scottish monarchs, history of the Clans. Broad if not always detailed coverage.
William Wallace - The Truth
This page and its varied links claim to be "the ULTIMATE William Wallace site anywhere on the Web." Based largely on William Wallace: Brave Heart by James Mackay, which is available for purchase through the magazine.

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Online Catalogs and Databases

List of Scottish WWW Sites
This site lists Web sites in Scotland, organized under the following subjects: General/Tourist Infomation, Town/Regional Guides, Commercial/Business Services, Recreational Information, Art/Exhibitions/Festivals, Educational Information, Newspapers and Electronic Magazines, Cyber Cafe's, and Other Public Internet Access Points, Government/Societies. In addition to relevant links found under these headings, the site provides a search engine for Scottish WWW sites.

St. Andrews University Library
This Web site provides access to the University of Saint Andrews Library main catalogs and manuscript database via telnet, as well as links to other Library resources in the United Kingdom.

Scottish Economic History Database, 1550-1780
This Web site provides access to an online database that was produced to further the dissemination of data collected during a project on Scottish wages and prices, 1550 -1780, funded by the British Economic and Social Research Council. The database was created by Alex Gibson, Department of Geography, Exeter University, United Kingdom, who maintains the Web site. The database can be searched by data categories as well as by geographic terms. In addition, the site provides access to User's Notes that describe the project and the database in detail.

Social Science Information Gateway
The Social Science Information Gateway (SOSIG) at the University of Bristol provides access to information sources in the social sciences over the Web. All of the resources that appear on the Gateway have been described, classified and entered into a keyword searchable database. See UK Resources on SOSIG.

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LIS 190: The Web as a Research Tool Celtic Fringe Home Page WWW Sources for British History WWW Sources for Irish History WWW Sources for Scottish History WWW Sources for Welsh History

author: John W. Stoner - stonerjw@ocf.berkeley.edu
Last updated: September 6, 1997.