World History: Primary Source Collections Online

Online archive of historical images from across the Middle East: Currently provides a representative record of Jordan’s archeological and social history spanning from 1955 to the early 2000s. Photos soon-to-be-digitized will feature subjects from the 1970s onwards in Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Palestine, and Iran. From the American Center of Oriental Research (ACOR) in Amman, Jordan.

Photography from the Middle East, North Africa, and the Arab diaspora dating from the mid-nineteenth century

Contains 770 Arabic documents on papyrus and more than 1300 Arabic documents on paper, as well as several pieces on parchment. Many piece date between 700 and 850 CE, including a significant number of documents from the pre-Ottoman period and documenting the political, economic, religious and intellectual life of Egypt during the first two centuries of Islamic rule and the period up to Ottoman domination. (Univ. of Utah)

Geo-referenced versions of historical and modern maps and satellite imagery. (CAMEL Lab, Oriental Institute, Univ. of Chicago)

Arabic agricultural works, mostly 10th-14th centuries. Site includes digitized manuscript facsimiles, along with their Arabic editions where they exist, and provides an online collaborative translation platform to facilitate translation of these into English. (The Golden Web Foundation, a registered educational charity)

Previously published inscriptions (and their English translations) of Israel/Palestine from the Persian period through the Islamic conquest (ca. 500 BCE - 640 CE), written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Latin, by Jews, Christians, Greeks, and Romans. These range from imperial declarations on monumental architecture to notices of donations in synagogues to humble names scratched on ossuaries, and everything in between. Click "Related Sites" for other inscription collections. (Brown Univ.)

Over 2,700 books and tens of thousands of documents discovered in 2003 in the flooded basement of the Iraqi intelligence headquarters by a U.S. Army team, then preserved by the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration and its partners. (National Archives)

A paleoblog is a blog which posts digitized historical materials.

Digital editions of more than 500 manuscripts and 827 paintings from the Islamicate world broadly construed. Together these holdings represent in great breadth the flourishing intellectual and cultural heritage of Muslim lands from 1000 to 1900, covering mathematics, astrology, history, law, literature, as well as the Qur'an and Hadith. The bulk of the collection consists of manuscripts in Arabic and Persian, along with examples of Coptic, Samaritan, Syriac, Turkish, and Berber. (hosted on OPenn; a project of Columbia Univ., the Free Library of Philadelphia, the Univ. of Pennsylvania, Bryn Mawr College, and Haverford College)

Several thousand prints and photographs contained in works from the 17th century to the beginning of the 20th century. (New York Public Library)

Research archive of historical and contemporary photography from the Middle East and Northern Africa. Historical collections range from the 19th century to the late 20th and cover a variety of themes and topics, from early images of the Holy Lands and from the Ottoman Empire, to images from family albums, institutional archives, and more. (NYU Abu Dhabi)

Search or browse papyrus collections from multiple institutions.

Rare Persian language manuscripts, lithographic books and early imprints, as well as printed books. A sizable number of manuscripts and lithographic books originate in India, Central Asia, the Caucasus and regions under Ottoman rule, in addition to the native Persian speaking lands of Iran, Afghanistan and Tajikistan. (Library of Congress)

Early 20th century images with expired copyright from various archives. "According to Israeli copyright law, photographs taken in the territory of the State of Israel prior to the establishment of the State do not contain any kind of copyright - they belong to the public domain." (Wikimedia Israel)

Thousands of photographs of Ottoman Turkey at the turn of the century and into the first years of the Turkish Republic—3,750 digitized images in total. (Getty Research Institute)

"Records from Saddam Hussein’s regime released by the Conflict Records Research Center. The collection contains a wide range of Iraqi government files including transcripts of high-level meetings, speeches by Saddam and senior officials, correspondence between ministries, and records of the Presidential Diwan." (Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars)

Texts, maps, and images documenting travel to the Middle East (primarily Egypt) between the 19th and early 20th centuries. These materials range from travel guides, travel narratives, and museum catalogs to stereocards, advertisements and postcards. (Rice Univ.)

Digital collection of family papers, official documents, and personal belongings that attempts to open avenues of research into the lives and influence of women in Iran during the Qajar era, 1796–1925. (Harvard Univ.)

Arabic manuscripts from Princeton University, Staatsbibliothek, Berlin, and private libraries in Sanaa, Yemen. (Princeton Univ.)