The Eighteenth Century Is Now Online

The Libraries have expanded our already impressive access to early modern resources with Eighteenth Century Collections Online. Scholars of early modern literature, history, philosophy, religion, art, music, government, and law have been singing the praises of two of our most popular full-text resources, Early English Books Online (known affectionately as EEBO) and Evans Digital Edition, the digital version of Early American Imprints. Analogous to microform sets that the Libraries have owned for many years, these two resources have made it easier than ever to access a great portion of the printed output for the early modern English-speaking world—materials listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue 1475-1640, Wing's Short-Title Catalogue 1641-1700, the Thomason Tracts 1640-1661 and Early American Imprints (1639-1800). However, there has always been a gap in our access to materials indexed in the English Short Title Catalogue: the massive and enormously expensive microform set known as The Eighteenth Century. The good news is that great rewards sometimes come to those who are patient: materials in The Eighteenth Century collection are now being digitized and the Libraries have purchased the digital collection. In its first phase, the resource has “every page from 150,000 books” printed in English from 1700 to 1800. As with Early English Books Online and Evans Digital Edition, each and every title in Eighteenth Century Collections Online will be listed in and accessible through Blais, the online catalog. If you prefer to search the entire collection, you can also connect directly to Eighteenth Century Collections Online from the list of databases By Title on the Libraries’ web site. As with other e-resources, off-campus users will be prompted to log in before they can access the database.

For more information, please contact Adam Rosenkranz or Gale Burrow (gale.burrow@libraries.claremont.edu).

Adam Rosenkranz
Honnold/Mudd
adam.rosenkranz@libraries.claremont.edu