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Adam Matthew
The following review appeared in the July 2017 issue of CHOICE. The review is for your internal use only. Please review our Permission and Reprints Guidelines or email permissions@ala-choice.org.
Reference
Social & Behavioral Sciences
[Visited Mar '17] This online resource makes available more than 900 volumes of India Office Records held at the British Library in London. Module I contains Indian Office Records documents from classes A (East India Company's charters, statutes, and treaties), B (minutes of the meetings of the Courts of Directors and Proprietors, C (minutes and memoranda of the Council of India), and D (East India Company's minutes and memoranda of the general committees and offices). Also included are the associated "Z-class" indexes. Adam Matthew plans to release two additional modules, Module II: Factory Records for South Asia and South-East Asia (2018), and Module III: Factory Records for China, Japan and the Middle East (2019).
From the founding of the East India Company in 1600, with a royal charter issued by Elizabeth I, through Indian independence in 1947, the resource covers nearly 350 years of history. Given the far-flung influence of the East India Company, this collection provides a wealth of information on a wide range of topics, such as early voyages of exploration, Britain's Opium Wars with China, and the British Crown's assumption of rule in India by the Government of India Act (1858). The well-designed database structure offers a number of options for accessing and working with the primary sources, including 17 document types (e.g., commissions, deeds, indentures, statutes, treaties) that can be used to search for and filter results. The sources are identified with a thumbnail image, document title, date, India Office Records (IOR) reference class, document type, and era. Documents may be browsed by 11 historical eras or the six IOR classes.
An interactive time line—a particularly helpful feature for novice users—not only provides rich historical context but also links to pertinent documents. Under the Documents tab, users can find a Government Structure Chart section presenting British and Indian office holders (Mughal emperors, prime ministers, viceroys, etc.), with brief biographies and links to related documents. The browsing applications include various filtering capabilities such as document type and date. Advanced searching by keyword, document title, document reference, and date is also available. Additional features include links to external resources, four historical essays by prominent scholars, and an interactive data visualization tool that allows users to map and graph 13 commodities across 17 global markets from 1760 to 1834. Finally, My Archive and My Lightbox permit users to save documents and images for later reference. This immensely valuable resource will increase understanding of the British Empire's impact as well as enhance the study of world trade and economic history.
--R. P. Nash, University of Nebraska at Omaha