Research Guides: Middle East and Islamic Studies Guide: The Modern Middle East

Databases and Electronic Resources

Afghanistan Digital Library This link opens in a new window
The objective of the Afghanistan Digital Library is to retrieve and restore the first sixty years of Afghanistan’s published cultural heritage. The project catalogues and digitizes as many Afghan publications from the period 1871–1930 as possible to identify and locate.
Confidential Print: Middle East, 1839-1969 This link opens in a new window
The Confidential Print series has been issued by the Foreign and Colonial Offices since c. 1820. The series originated out of a need for the Government to preserve all of the most important papers generated by the Foreign and Colonial Offices. The content consists of reports, dispatches, correspondence, political summaries, economical analysis, and description of leading personalities The collection covers a broad sweep of history from c. 1839 to 1969, taking in the countries of the Arabian peninsula, the Levant, Iraq, Turkey and many of the former Ottoman lands in Europe, Iran, Afghanistan, Egypt and Sudan.
Early Arabic Printed Books from the British Library This link opens in a new window
Early Arabic Printed Books from the British Library (1475-1900) is a full-text searchable digital library of early printed books in Arabic script. Covering religious literature, law, science, mathematics, astrology, alchemy, medicine, geography, travel, history, chronicles, and literature, and including European translations of Arabic works and Arabic translations of European books.

Most of the texts are OCR-ed, but the accuracy rate varies considerably.
Images of the Prophet Muhammad in European publications have been redacted. To access these images please email guy.burak@nyu.edu
Foreign Office Files: India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, 1947-1980 This link opens in a new window
This collection consist of the British Government's files on the countries of South Asia from shortly before Indian partition and independence up to 1980. The papers in the files cover such issues as economic and industrial development, trade, migration, visits to South Asia by British politicians and by South Asian politicians to Britain and elsewhere, education, administrative reorganization, conflict over language, aid, political parties, agriculture and irrigation, and television and the press.
Foreign Office Files for the Middle East, 1971-1981 This link opens in a new window
Foreign Office Files for the Middle East, 1971-1981 includes Foreign Office Files for the Middle East Module I; Foreign Office Files for the Middle East Module II; and Foreign Office Files for the Middle East Module III - This collection is an essential resource for understanding the events in the Middle East during the 1970s. It addresses the policies, economies, political relationships and significant events of every major Middle East power. Conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli War, the Lebanese Civil War and the Iranian Revolution are examined in detail, as are the military interventions and peace negotiations carried out by regional and foreign powers like the United States and Russia. Commercial interests are also scrutinized, with in-depth analyses of Middle East nations’ economic stability and reviews of international arm sales policies. The activities of oil producing nations such as Saudi Arabia are closely monitored, with particular reference to the Gulf States and members of OPEC.
Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, Oman and Central Arabia Online This link opens in a new window
The Gazetteer of the Persian Gulf, Oman and Central Arabia is one of the European primary sources for the study of the modern Gulf region from the 17th to the early 20th century. The Gazetteer offers the fullest account of the state of knowledge of the region in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
History of Afghanistan Online (Brill) This link opens in a new window
This is the online version of Robert McChesney and Mehdi Khorrami's translation of the History of Afghanistan (Sirāj al-tawārīkh). The History of Afghanistan was commissioned as an official national history by the Afghan prince, later amir, Habib Allah Khan (reigned 1901-1919). The author, Fayz Muhammad Khan, better known as “Katib” (The Writer), was a scribe at the royal court. For more than twenty years, he had full access to government archives and oral sources and thus presents an unparalleled picture of the country from its founding in 1747 until the end of the nineteenth century.
Kotobarabia Arabic E-Library This link opens in a new window
A collection of electronic books in Arabic. The collection ranges from contemporary novels to national heritage scientific treatises, with over 6500 titles written by Arab authors in various genres.
Kotobarabia Modern Arab Renaissance Collection This link opens in a new window
The Kotobarabia Modern Arab Renaissance Collection is an archive of books published 1820-1914 from Egypt, Syria, and other regions of the Islamic World. The collection is comprised of over 2,500 titles in the humanities and the sciences, including writings from Mahmoud Abdo, Gamal El Din El Afgahany and Rashid Reda. Consisting mostly of historic texts, the books in this collection are full-image, with searchable metadata only.
U.S. Intelligence on the Middle East, 1945-2009 This link opens in a new window
This comprehensive document set sheds light on the U.S. intelligence community’s spying and analytic efforts in the Middle East and North Africa. It covers the time period from the end of World War II to the present day, up until the 2002-2003 Iraqi Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) assessments, the Global War on Terror, the Iraq War, and Iran’s nuclear program.

Digitized Newspapers and Periodicals

Translatio (University of Bonn): Middle Eastern newspapers and periodicals in Turkish, Persian and Arabic.

CRL-Global Press Archives's the Middle Eastern and North African Newspapers collection (open access)

Servet-i Fünun Project (Ottoman Turkish)

Jara'id - Ottoman and Mandatory Arabic Newspapers (National Library of Israel)

al-Arshif (collection of Arabic periodicals)

Arabic and Middle Eastern Electronic Library (AMEEL) (Yale)

al-‘Iraqiyah - an aggregator of Iraqi academic periodicals

Center for Research Libraries

Middle Eastern and Islamic Resources at CRL

To access CRL's online catalog

Cambridge Archive Editions

Search Archive Editions in Bobcat
Archive Editions publications provide thousands of original documents, as well as numerous maps, on the national heritage and political development of many countries. AE material is particularly rich for the study of boundary formation, claims and disputes amd modern political development of the Arabian peninsula and Arab/Persian Gulf.

Published Archival Sources from the Middle East

Dirāsāt Wathāʾiqīyah by Dār al-Kutub wa-al-Wathāʾ'iq al-Qawmīyah (Egypt)

Publications by the Prime Ministry Archive (Turkey)

Published Court Records (Turkey)

Published Ottoman Documents

Thematic Collections of Ottoman Documents

Primary Sources in Translation

Online Bibliographies and Sourcebooks

Images, Maps and Photographs from the Middle East

Abdul Hamid II Collection (Library of Congress) : This monumental collection portrays the Ottoman Empire during the reign of one of its last sultans, Abdul-Hamid II. The 1,819 photographs in 51 large-format albums date from about 1880 to 1893. They highlight the modernization of numerous aspects of the Ottoman Empire, featuring images of educational facilities and students; well-equipped army and navy personnel and facilities; technologically advanced lifesaving and fire fighting brigades; factories; mines; harbors; hospitals; and government buildings. Most of the places depicted are within the boundaries of modern-day Turkey, but buildings and sites in Iraq, Lebanon, Greece and other countries are also included.
The American University of Beirut Jafet Library's Poster Collection
Arab Image F oundation
Archnet is a globally-accessible, intellectual resource focused on architecture, urbanism, environmental and landscape design, visual culture, and conservation issues related to the Muslim world. Archnet’s mission is to provide ready access to unique visual and textual material to facilitate teaching, scholarship, and professional work of high quality. Officially launched in 2002 as a partnership between the Aga Khan Trust for Culture and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Archnet has since evolved into the largest open, online architectural library with a focus on Muslim cultures. Its digital archives form a comprehensive resource on architecture, urban design, landscape, development, and related issues. Archnet provides a bridge for interested persons to learn how to enhance the quality of the built environment, to compensate for lack of resources for students and faculty in academic institutions, and to highlight the culture and traditions of Islam.
The Gertrude Bell Collection comprises books on Arabic and Persian languages and on the histories of Arabia, and the Near and Middle East which were formerly part of Gertrude's working library.
Ibraaz Contemporary Visual Culture in North Africa and the Middle East
Maps of the (Late) Ottoman Empire: especially useful for those interested in 19th-century eastern Anatolia, Greater Syria and Iraq
The Middle East Film Posters Digitization Initiative (Princeton University)
NYPL's The Middle East in Early Prints and Photographs
Travelers in the Middle East (TIMEA) is a digital archive that focuses on Western interactions with the Middle East, particularly travels to Egypt during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.
The University of Chicago Library's Guide to Middle Eastern Posters Collections 1970s-1990s
UNRWA Photo and Film Archive
Yale's The Palestine Poster Project Archives

Online Resources

Al-Bab The Best Arab Blogs [Mostly in English]

Amar Foundation Foundation for Arab Music Archiving & Research

American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions (from Salt Research, Istanbul)

Arab Gulf Digital Archive

Arabic Literature (in English)

Archives of Crete (from Salt Research, Istanbul)

Avalon Project: Documents in Law, History and Diplomacy

Cairo Book Stop

The Digital Collections of BiblioPera Partners (Istanbul)

The Digital Collections of Salt Research (Istanbul)

Directory of Archives and Libraries in Jerusalem

French Press from the Ottoman Empire (from Salt Research, Istanbul)

Iran Human Rights Documentation Center

Istanbul Urban Database

Jadaliyya

The Ottoman Bank (from Salt Research, Istanbul)

Ottoman Diplomats: Letters from the Imperial Legation in Brussels (1849-1914)

The Memory of Modern Egypt [In Arabic] An collection of Egyptian political speeches and images.

The Middle East Research and Information Project (MERIP)

Nashriya: Digital Iranian History

Qatar Digital Library

Servet-i Funun journal

The Svoboda Diaries Projects (University of Washington)

The Turkish National Library's Non-Book Materials (registration required)

Tozsuz Evrak

The Hamidian Collection at Fales and the Library of Congress

The Hamidian collection at LoC

NYU holds a complete set of books in Ottoman Turkish and Arabic gifted by Sultan Abdülhamit II to Abram Hewitt. Hewitt donated the books to NYU. This set has a twin in the Library of Congress (now fully digitized).