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Loyola University Chicago Libraries

HIST 318C: London Life and Culture 1550-1715

Robert Bucholz

Step One

Londen Encyclopedia

First, if you don’t know the name of the district covered by your map, try to identify it by looking up its major streets (Bankside, Cheapside, Fleet Street) or landmarks (Globe Theatre, St. Paul’s Cathedral) in the London Encyclopaedia, 3rd ed., ed. B. Weinreb, C. Hibbert, A. Keay and A. Keay (London: Macmillan, 2008) [hereafter, LE], held in the Cudahy Library Reference Collection located on the main level of Cudahy Library.  The call number for the volume is AE 5 .L84 2008.

[Note, if you cannot locate the 3rd edition of LE, use the first edition from 1983 which is on 2 hours Reserve at the Circulation Desk to get started.  The call number is Cudahy Reserve DA 679 .L78 1986.]

Step Two

Look up the district (say, Southwark or Shoreditch) in the LE.   This will not only give you a potted history of the area; it will also give you the names of other important features in the area that might add to your paper.  When you see words in LE that are in ALL CAPS [“THE LIBERTY OF THE CLINK”], you will want to note that those terms have an entry in the LE as well.

Look under the Reference tab to find additional reference sources with neighborhood information.

Step Three

Go to the Bibliographies page on this guide.  Select Bibliography of British and Irish History.  You will need to Enter the Database, then select the icon for Bibliography of British and Irish History.  

Once on the Simple Search screen, look up your district by name and do additional searches on specific landmarks by typing their names in the “search anywhere” box at the top of the screen.  

 To narrow your results, confine your search to the years 1500-1800 using the search options at the bottom of the page.  

These searches will give you an initial list of books and articles. To locate articles, click on the “FIND IT@LOYOLA" button that you will see with the citation.  For books, record the author and title, then search for them in the catalog.  If an article or book does not appear to be available on our collection, request it through interlibrary loan.

Try to think of other relevant terms that you can search that would illuminate the history of your district.  For example, if your area is dockland, search for books on docks, trade, sailors, etc.  If your district has theaters, look up work on the early modern English stage, playwrights, actors and audiences.  Your area might very well appear in the indexes to these works.

If you cannot find an article or book that is cited in the database, consult with one of the services offered on the Need Help? page or contact the history librarian, Jane Currie.  

Step Four

Google Books allows you to search the full text of books held by some of the largest libraries in the world.  Try searching for the name of your district in Google Books.  The text of some books no longer covered by copyright will be available.  For others, search the catalog to locate the book in our collection.  If it is not in the collection, use WorldCat to submit an interlibrary loan request.

Step Five

Look up your district in the three Surveys of London:

Stow's 1598:  John Stow, A Survey of London (1603 printing).

Strype's 1720:  A Survey of the City of London and Westminster.

English Heritage (ongoing):  Survey.

Consider as well, the three printed volumes of map surveys that are in the Cudahy Library Reference Collection.

The A to Z of Elizabethan London - A. Prockter and R. Taylor 
Call Number: Cudahy Reference G 1819 .L7 A34 1979b

The A to Z of Georgian London - J. Rocque 
Call Number: Cudahy Reference G 1819 .L7 R553 1982

The A to Z of Restoration London - J. Ogilby 
Call Number: Cudahy Reference G 1819 .L7 O28 1992

Step Six

Look for your district in some of these primary sources:

T. DeLaune -- The Present State of London (rev. ed. 1690).

H. Mission -- Memoirs and observation in his travels over England with some account of Scotland and Ireland.  Trans. J. Ozell (1719).

C. de Saussure -- A Foreign View of England in the Reign of Geore I and George II (1902).

S. Pepys -- The Diary of Samuel Pepys:  A New and Complete Transcription (11 volumes).  Ed. by R. Latham and W. Matthews.
Print copy available in Cudahy Main Stacks DA 447 .P4 A4 1970

J. Boswell -- Boswell's London Journal 1762-63. (not available online)
Print copy available in Cudahy Main Stacks PR 3325 .P8

Step Seven

You can assess and analyze felonious crime in (and learn a great deal more about) your district by searching the The Proceedings of the Old Bailey, 1674-1913

Custom Search -- offers two location-based fields, plus keyword searching.

 

Step Eight

Browse through the bibliographies provided to you on this guide.  There may be titles specific to your district, or you can explore some of the general histories of London and historical refernece works such as the street name dictionaries.