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Whenever you frame a question with reference to how things have changed over time, you commit yourself to doing historical research. All of us do this all the time, but not everyone thinks very carefully about the best ways of finding information about the past and how it relates to the present.

British History Online is the digital library containing some of the core printed primary and secondary sources for the medieval and modern history of the British Isles. Created by the Institute of Historical Research and the History of Parliament Trust, we aim to support academic and personal users around the world in their learning, teaching and research.

"The crusades were arguably the greatest migration event that took place in medieval Europe. In the 12th and 13th centuries, hundreds of thousands of Europeans travelled to the eastern Mediterranean on military campaigns, pilgrimage and to trade. "The crusades are often blamed for the spread of disease during the medieval period," explained Mitchell, whose work was funded by the British Academy. "But only limited research has investigated which diseases might have been spread, in which direction, eastwards or westwards, and what impact this may have had upon the endemic patterns of disease.""

A Swiss-led team of scientists has used tree rings to detail 2,500 years of European summers, identifying the link between climate and major historical changes.

Springing from the Classical Atlas Project and the Barrington Atlas of the Greek and Roman World, Pleiades is a historical gazetteer and more. It associates names and locations in time and provides structured information about the quality and provenance of these entities. There is also a graph in Pleiades: names and locations are collected within places and these collections are associated with other geographically connected places. Pleiades also serves as a vocabulary for talking about the geography of the ancient world within Linked Data sets and is referenced by research projects such as Google Ancient Places and PELAGIOS.

"This free interactive cultural and learning app will be of interest to anyone interested in Tudor history, cultural research, e-learning, art history, or the town of Thetford. It was created by a joint team from the University of Leicester, Norfolk Museums and Archaeology Service, English Heritage, Oxford University and Yale Center for British Art. It stems from a 3-year project applying space science technology to art historical monuments."

"The CHSSP is proud to introduce our third Blueprint unit: Sites of Encounter in the Medieval World, funded through the generous support of the Social Science Research Council and the British Council.  Drawing on new historical scholarship about the Mediterranean world, maritime technology transfers, travel narratives and multicultural trade cities, the unit is framed around the investigation question:  How did sites of encounter change the medieval world?"

Digital Medievalist (DM) is our on-line, refereed Journal. DM accepts work of original research and scholarship, notes on technological topics (markup and stylesheets, tools and software, etc.), commentary pieces discussing developments in the field, bibliographic and review articles, and project reports. All contributions are reviewed by authorities in humanities computing prior to publication.

Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index covers journal articles, book reviews, and essays in books about women, sexuality, and gender during the Middle Ages. Because of the explosion of research in Women's Studies during the past two decades, scholars and students interested in women during the Middle Ages find an ever-growing flood of publications.

Course | History of the World to 1500 CE This course presents and at the same time critiques a narrative world history from prehistoric times to 1500. The purpose of the course is to convey an understanding of how this rapidly growing field of history is being approached at three different levels: the narrative textbook level, the theoretical-conceptual level, and through discussion sections, the research level.

1. Between Magna Carta and the Parliamentary State: The fine rolls of King Henry III 1216-1272 and the project A fine in the reign of King Henry III (1216-1272) was an agreement to pay the king a sum of money for a specified concession. The rolls on which the fines were recorded provide the earliest systematic evidence of what people and institutions across society wanted from the king and he was prepared to give. They open a large window onto the politics, government, economy and society of England in the hinge period between the establishment of Magna Carta at the start of Henry's reign and the parliamentary state which was emerging at its end. This Project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, makes the rolls freely available to a wide audience while at the same time, in the Fine of the Month feature, providing regular comment on their historical interest. Users of the website are also invited to follow and contribute to the Fine Rolls blog.

The Black Death that decimated populations in Europe and elsewhere during the middle of the 14th century may not have been a blindly indiscriminate killer as previously believed. An analysis of 490 skeletons from a London cemetery for Black Death victims shows the infection did not affect everyone equally, researchers say.

"Evidence from skulls in east London shows plague had to have been airborne to spread so quickly"

"Research that suggests the battle of Hastings took place on the site of what is now a mini roundabout on the A2100 is "no more than informed guesswork"."

"The idea that Medieval people drank beer or wine to avoid drinking bad water is so established that even some very serious scholars see no reason to document or defend it; they simply repeat it as a settled truth. In fact, if no one ever documents the idea, it is for a very simple reason: it's not true."

"The Year 1200: A Centennial Exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art" catalogue to read online or download the pdf

"Resources in Medieval History"

The Internet connection for Medieval Resources

"Resources for Medieval Studies Sponsored by Georgetown University"

primary sources grouped by period