Research Guides: HIST 3337: The Bible and Reform in Europe: Find Primary Sources

Librarian

Contact:

936-294-1520
kclaunch@shsu.edu
Library (NGL) Room 223G

Primary Sources in Library Databases

Early English Books Online (EEBO) This link opens in a new window Virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales, and British North America, as well as works in English printed elsewhere, from 1473-1700.

Primary Sources in Print

Often a variety of primary documents are collected together into a book (usually related to a time period, topic, or theme).

Below are just a few broad collections in the Library; each book contains many original documents.

(Note: many of these books will contain both primary and secondary content, so use your judgement or ask a librarian for help in distinguishing the two).

Augsburg During the Reformation Era: An Anthology of Sources by B. Ann Tlusty
Call Number: Read Online
Sixteenth-century Augsburg comes to life in this selection of original documents. Ranging across the whole panoply of social activity from the legislative reformation to work, recreation, and family life, these extracts make plain the subtle system of checks and balances, violence, and self-regulation that brought order and vibrancy to a sophisticated city community.
The German Reformation and the Peasants' War: A brief history with documents
Call Number: DD182 .B23 2012 (4th floor)
The Protestant Reformation, begun with Martin Luther's posting of The Ninety-Five Theses in 1517, rapidly escalated into an evangelical reform movement that transformed European Christianity. Less than a decade later, a massive rebellion of German commoners challenged the social and political order in what would prove to be the greatest popular rebellion in European history until the French Revolution. In this volume, Michael Baylor explores the relationship between these two momentous upheavals and the centuries-long debate over whether and how they might be connected. A collection of period documents -- including letters, sermons, pamphlets and illustrations -- offer firsthand accounts from the reformers, rebels, and the institutions they sought to topple.
Manifestations of Discontent in Germany on the Eve of the Reformation: A collection of documents
Call Number: DD174.S87 (4th floor)
A collection of documents in translation, from The reformation of the Emperor Sigismund (c. 1438) through Sebastian Franck on the incurable folly of hundred chapters and forty statutes (c. 1500).
Convents Confront the Reformation: Catholic and Protestant nuns in Germany
Call Number: Read Online
Four texts by women who resided in convents or similar institutions or who had recently left convents in Germany in the 16th and 17th centuries.
--- Letter of Katherine Rem of the Katherine convent in Augsburg to her brother Bernard (Augsburg, 1523).0
--- Letter of Ursula of Munsterberg to her cousins, Dukes George and Heinrich of Saxony (1528).
--- Selections from a book of meditations, Der treue Seelenfreund Christus Jesus, written by the Lutheran abbess of Quedlinburg, Anna Sophia, (Jena, 1658.
--- Pamphlet written by Martha Elisabeth Zitter (Jena, 1678).
The Short Chronicle: A Poor Clare's account of the reformation of Geneva
Call Number: Read Online
Jeanne de Jussie (1503–61) experienced the Protestant Reformation from within the walls of the Convent of Saint Clare in Geneva. In her impassioned and engaging Short Chronicle, she offers a singular account of the Reformation, reporting not only on the larger clashes between Protestants and Catholics but also on events in her convent. Throughout her tale, Jussie highlights women’s roles on both sides of the conflict, from the Reformed women who came to her convent in an attempt to convert the nuns to the Catholic women who ransacked the shop of a Reformed apothecary. First published in French in 1611, Jussie’s Short Chronicle is translated here for an English-speaking audience, providing a fresh perspective on struggles for religious and political power in sixteenth-century Geneva and a rare glimpse at early modern monastic life.
Luther's Ninety-Five Theses
Call Number: BR332.D6J3 1957 (4th floor)
Religion in Tudor England: An anthology of primary sources
Call Number: Read Online
The sources in this unique anthology, accidentals modernized and accompanied by careful notes and detailed historical, literary, and theological introductions, immerse readers in this world and allow them to explore comprehensively what was lost, what was transformed, and what was preserved in the English Reformation.
An exposition of the Thirty-nine articles of the Church of England
Call Number: Read Online
By Gilbert, bishop of Sarum. With an appendix, containing the Augsburg confession, creed of Pope Pius IV., &c. Revised and corrected, with copious notes, and additional references.
From Icons to Idols: Documents on the Image Debate in Reformation England
Call Number: Read Online
The debate over religious images was fundamental to the development of the Reformation. From Icons to Idols provides primary sources on this critical aspect of the Reformation in England. The documents in this collection track the image debate across the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries, highlighting the complexities and diversity of arguments and positions held by both Protestants and Catholics. Included here are bishops and theologians, printers and inquisitors, cardinals and artists, suggesting that the question of idolatry was no mere academic exercise.
Voices of the Reformation: Contemporary accounts of daily life
Call Number: Read Online
This fascinating collection of primary source documents furnishes the accounts--in their own words--of those who initiated, advanced, or lived through the Reformation. Covers the people and events of the period in Germany, France, Italy, the British Isles, and elsewhere in Europe. Defines unfamiliar terms alongside of the documents that contain them.
The European Reformations Sourcebook
Call Number: BR301 .E87 2014 (4th floor)
This revised and expanded volume brings together a carefully-selected collection of primary sources drawn from medieval and sixteenth-century texts. Include catechetical writings by Luther and Calvin, and increased analysis of their theological writings, as well as coverage of women reformers such as Caritas Pirckheimer, Katharina Sch#65533;tz-Zell, and Olimpia Morata. Includes a broad range of documents spanning major theological writings through to confessions, political grievances, and writings drawn from tracts, poems, and satires.
A Reformation Reader: Primary texts with introductions
Call Number: BR301 .R44 1999 (4th floor)
Includes not only the most frequently cited documents but also personal narratives, letters, sermons, and comments on the social mores of the times.
Documents on the Continental Reformation
Eye-witness accounts, court testimony, diaries and the verbatim records of debates display to the student of the Reformation the leading figures and the ordinary people, the theological ideas and the practical concerns.

What is a Primary Source?

Primary vs. Secondary Sources: A Guide to Understanding

Primary Source Collections Online

Reformation Europe: Internet History Sourcebook
Reformation Europe: Historical Text Archive
Post-Reformation Digital Library
Select database of digital books relating to the development of theology and philosophy during the Reformation and Post-Reformation/Early Modern Era (late 15th-18th c.). Late medieval and patristic works printed and referenced in the early modern era are also included. The PRDL is a project of the Junius Institute for Digital Reformation Research.
Project Wittenberg Lutheran Electronic Archive
Texts by and about Martin Luther and other Lutherans (including Melanchthon, Gerhardt, and others).
Open Access Digital Theological Library
Content in religious studies and related disciplines from publisher websites, institutional repositories, scholarly societies, archives, and stable public domain collections.
Hanover Historical Texts: Early Modern Europe
Includes links to sources from the Reformation in Germany and more.
John Foxe's "Acts and Monuments Online"
The unabridged texts of the four editions of this massive work published in John Foxe’s lifetime (1563, 1570, 1576, 1583). Each edition changed significantly as Foxe sought to incorporate new material, answer his critics, and adjust its polemical force to the needs of the moment. Not in English.
John Foxe's "Book of Martyrs"
Published in 1563, this work by an English Protestant was designed to attack the Catholic Church and the Pope, and to assert the divine right of the English monarchy to rule over the Church of England.
The Protestant Reformation: Texts
This is an older web page, no longer actively maintained, so there are some broken links, as well as good links to primary sources in English translation.
SBB16: Drucke des 16. Jahrhunderts in der Staatsbiblothek Berlin
Here you can search about 360 pamphlets around the Reformation, among other content. Site in German.
Flugschriften aus der Bibliothek Oettingen-Wallenstein, Universitätsbibliothek Augsburg
Some 1,000 17th century pamphlets. Site in German.
Reformation Portal Central Germany
Created through cooperation between numerous institutions at the 500th anniversary of Luther's theses. Most sources in German.

Finding Primary Sources in the Catalog

This video will give a quick demonstration of several tricks to help you locate primary sources in the library catalog.

1. Use the keyword "sources" in the subject row

2. Along with your topic keywords, add the keywords "documents OR documentary"

3. Along with your topic keywords, add keywords for specific kinds of sources (correspondence, diary, manuscripts, etc. - just separate them all with OR)

4. Click on Exact Search, Enter a person's name (backwards), and click subject. Browse for and click on subjects that include words like correspondence, manuscripts, sources, etc.

Finding Primary Source Collections with Google Advanced Search

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