For many more primary source collections, see our primary source guides for History and Literature. I'm happy to help you find primary sources relevant to your topic.
Primary sources documenting the period of rapid colonial expansion by European imperialist regimes across the African continent in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. Includes diaries and journals, letters, maps, photographs, film footage, and official documents.
Dates: 1870-1914 CE
Primary sources on the history of South Africa's apartheid regime from South Africa, Britain, the United States, and other powers, including letters, telegrams, reports, trial papers, news clippings, activists' biographies, and first-hand accounts of events.
Dates: 1948-1980 CE
British government documents from the modern period of European colonization of the African continent through independence movements.
Dates: 1834-1966 CE
Primary sources tracking forms of colonialism, empire, and imperialism, from the explorations of Columbus to recent decolonization, with an emphasis on the 19th and 20th Centuries.
Dates: 1482-2003 CE
Primary sources documenting slavery and abolition, including court records, slavery testimonies, pamphlets, books, maps, and more. Areas of focus include the African coast, the Middle Passage, slavery and the Islamic world, spiritualism and religion, resistance and the Underground Railroad, free Black settlements.
Dates: 1490-2007 CE
Full text of more than 60 newspapers from across Africa, in English and other languages.
Dates: 1800-1922 CE
Thousands of articles by scholars focused on the lives and events that have shaped African American and African history and culture, along with primary source documents, encyclopedias, and biographies.