A page devoted to various archives and digital sources on the early modern world.
Websites of general literary and intellectual interest
Eidolon: Classics done progressively
Journal of the History of Ideas blog
Early Modernist Projects
Six Degrees of Francis Bacon
Website that uses algorithms to determine social networks in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
The Map of Early Modern London
Where were the playhouses located? Taverns, churches? Find out how social space was organized in early modern London here.
Before Shakespeare
An investigation of theater in early modern London before Shakespeare.
Early Modern Print
Text mining early printed books: search for key terms, build N-grams, etc.
Archives
Primary Sources and Online Editions
Early English Books Online (EEBO) — Library login required.
EEBO, an online archive of most books printed in the early modern period, is essential for any student of early modern literature.
DEEP: Database of Early English Playbooks
“Database of Early English Playbooks allows scholars and students to investigate the publishing, printing, and marketing of English Renaissance drama in ways not possible using any other print or electronic resource.”
CELM: Catalogue of English Literary Manuscripts 1450–1700
Catalogue and descriptions of manuscripts of poems, plays, discourses, translations, notebooks, annotated printed books, corrected proofs, promptbooks, letters, documents and other related manuscript materials, many hitherto unrecorded, found in several hundred public and private collections worldwide
Shakespeare’s First Folio Online
Facsimile of the First Folio, courtesy Oxford’s Bodleian Library
The Acts and Monuments Online
Various editions of John Foxe’s Book of Martyrs, one of the most widely read and reprinted books in early modern England
Early Broadside Ballads Archive
Online archive of early modern songs, printed as broadsides. Great resources for exploring early modern popular culture.
Beaumont and Fletcher Folio Online
An Online Reader for John Cotgrave’s Engish Treasury of Wit and Language
How did early modern readers read early modern drama? Find out here.
Henslowe-Alleyn Digitisation Project
Collection of manuscripts crucial to historians of drama
Margaret Cavendish’s Poems and Fancies (online edition)
Digital Cavendish Project
Devoted to the work of poet, novelist, philosopher, and all-around intellectual Margaret Cavendish.
The Pulter Project
Online edition of the poetry of Hester Pulter.
Open Source Shakespeare
Searchable text to Shakespeare’s plays, and a concordance (a tool through which you can search for particular words and phrases across the Shakespearean corpus).
John Milton Reading Room
Hosted by Dartmouth, offers searchable text of Paradise Lost and other works including the prose tracts, as well as bibliographies and other research tools.
Luminarium: Online Anthology of British Literature
Digital Anthology of Early Modern Drama (Now including the works of Christopher Marlowe)
Complete Works of Shakespeare Online
Internet Shakespeare Editions
World Shakespeare Bibliography
Lexicons of Early Modern English
Use this database to search early modern dictionaries for the historical meaning of words.
Dante Resources
Dante’s Worlds
Commentary on Dante’s Inferno, out of UT-Austin
Digital Dante
Wonderful website with wealth of commentary, video-lectures and so forth, out of Columbia U
Dartmouth Dante Project
Read the text (in Longfellow’s English or Dante’s Italian) alongside commentaries medieval and modern.
Podcasts
My old pal Anthony Oliveira does a great podcast on Paradise Lost, here (patrons only): https://www.patreon.com/meakoopa
Shakespeare Unlimited
The Folger Shakespeare Library’s podcast, hosting various scholars on various topics from modern reception and performance to textual issues.
Shakespeare Anniversary Lecture Series
Folger again, this time a collection of recorded lectures.
Bard Times
Overview of various early modern plays, Shakespeare and non-, done smartly and with charm. Alas, no plans for future episodes.
In Our Time
BBC program and podcast that features topics of historical, philosophical, and literary interest, often covering the premodernity.
Ethan John Guagliardo 