Subject Guides

African History

Guide Contents

Ethiopia

Ethiopian Manuscript Imaging Project. This database makes available digital images of over 750 Ethiopian religious codices and magic scrolls from the 16th to 20th centuries.

Kenya

Kenya National Assembly Official Records. This online repository includes the official and published summaries of the Kenya National Assembly proceedings from 1911 to the present. All records in English.

Liberia

American Colonization Society Maps of Liberia. The Library of Congress digital archives includes 20 maps from the Society dated between 1830-1870.
Indiana University Liberian Collection. This online archive includes several collections of photographs relating to life in Liberia.
Liberian Letters Collection at University of Virginia. This small collection includes letters from two formers slaves who settled in Liberia in the mid-nineteenth century.
Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia. Features video, audio, and transcripts from the 2005 Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Liberia.

Mali

Islamic Manuscripts from Mali. This Library of Congress digital collection includes 32 Arabic manuscripts from the ancient library at Timbuktu.
Slavery and Manumission Manuscripts of Timbuktu.This online repository features 19th century Arabic manuscripts from Timbuktu relating to slavery in Islamic Africa.

Nigeria

G. I. Jones Archive of Southeastern Nigerian Art and Culture. This collection of photographs, taken by a British colonial administrator in Nigeria, documents the art and culture of various people groups in Nigeria.
Onitsha Market Literature Collection. This digital collection from the University of Kansas features images of Nigerian stories, plays, and advice pamphlets sole in the Onitsha Marketplace in the 1960s.

Rwanda

Genocide Archive Rwanda. Features videos, maps, trial transcripts, and rememberance ceremonies of the 1994 genocide.
Rwanda Documents Project. From the personal collection of an attorney for the International Criminal Tribunal, this archive includes thousands of documents relating to the UN and US government's involvement in Rwanda and the trials following the 1994 genocide.
Voices from the Rwanda Tribunal. The International Criminal Tribunal's online collection includes 49 interviews with legal professionals involved in the 1994 genocide trials.

South Africa

Digital Innovation South Africa (DISA). Online collection includes oral histories, correspondance, maps, music, pamplets, and other resources relating to South Africa's freedom struggle.
Nelson Mandela Digital Archive Project. Online exhibits and documents relating to Nelson Mandela.
South African History Archive (SAHA). Small digital archive includes documents, posters, and photographs relating to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the anti-apartheid movement.
South African History Online (SAHO). Features speeches, newspaper articles, audio, and video from the history of South Africa's freedom struggle.
South African Voices. University of Wisconsin's collection includes oral interviews and transcripts of South African folklore, mythologies, songs, poems, and histories.
Traces of Truth. This digital archive contains records used by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission and affiliated organizations.
University of Cape Town Digital Collections. Small online repository includes photographs, music, oral histories, and documents relating to the history of the University and South Africa.
University of the Witwatersrand Historical Papers Online. Online documents, transcripts, photographs, and manuscripts relating to apartheid, the Anglican Church and charitable organization in South Africa, and history of the country.

Sudan

Indiana University Neur Field Notes. This collection features the linguistic field notes of Eleano Vandevort, a missionary in South Sudan in the early twentieth century.
Sudan Open Archives. This digital archive features historial books and documents relating to the history of Sudan, environmental and peace issues, ethnographic studies, and Islam in Sudan.

Uganda

Yale University Uganda Christian University Archives. Features records of the Anglican Church of Uganda and the Missionary Society of the Church of England dating back to 1877.

Multi-National

African Online Digital Library. Includes oral interviews, photographs, manuscripts, and video relating to colonialism, activism, and African religions.
African Origins. Online database of the vital data of over 91,000 slaves liberated by International Courts of Mixed Commission and the British Admiralty Courts.
Africana and Black History Collection. Includes rare images, photographs and documents relating to African history and the African diaspora, from the New York City Public Library.
Afriterra. Online collection of over 2,000 historic maps of Africa.
Gallica: Voyages en Afrique. Site in French only. Includes over 900 volumes and images on French colonialism in Africa.
Goethe Universitat Africa South of the Sahara Image Collection. Largest online archive of the African Collection of the German Colonial Society, includes more than 50,000 photographs dating from the 1880s.
Images of Colonialism. Harvard University's collection includes late 19th century images from European newspapers relating to the colonial experience.
International Mission Photography Archive. Features historical images from missionaries in Africa from the mid 19th to early 20th centuries.
Internet African History Sourcebook. Includes transcripts of documents relating to African history from ancient to present day.
Livingstone Online. Includes online editions of medical and scientific correspondance of David Livingstone on his 19th-century travels in Africa.
Mundus. Web guide to over 400 collections of missionary papers in the UK, some links lead user to digital collections.
Northwestern University Winterton Collection. Features over 7,000 photographs taken in East Africa from 1860-1960.
Northwestern University Maps of Africa. Online collection includes 113 maps and text from the 16th to early 20th centuries.
The British Library Endangered Archives. Features documents and manuscripts from endangered archives in Africa.
The British Library Maps of African Online. Includes hundreds of maps of Africa from the 19th to the 20th century.
The National Archives: Africa Through a Lens. British National Archives collection includes images of African in the 1860s from the Foreign Office.
University of Oregon Political Ephemera and Realia Project. Includes African pamphlets, t-shirts, cloths, posters, and other items relating to Sub-Saharan political culture.
University of Texas Perry Castaneda Library Historical Maps of Africa. Includes over 20 historical maps of Africa, dating to 1808.
University of Wisconsin American Geographical Society Digital Archive. Includes over 1,000 aerial photographs of Africa from the early 20th century.
Women in World History. Features letters from women who lived, travelled, and worked abroad during the colonial period. Includes letters from some of the earliest European women in Africa.
Woodrow Wilson Center, Horn of Africa Crisis. Online collection includes primary documents relating to 1970s conflict between Ethiopia and Somalia.
World Digital Library: Africa. Features over 2,000 artifacts, documents, and images relating to history of Africa and colonialism, dating to 8000 BCE.