What are primary sources?
A primary source is a document or object that was written or created at the time under investigation. It provides a first hand account or personal viewpoint of an event or time period.
Examples of a primary source are an:
Artworks, photographs, music, music scores, poems, government records and artefacts can also be primary sources.
Secondary sources describe, analyse or evaluate these primary sources.
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All images taken from the flickr pages of DCPL Commons, The British Library, Royal Australian Historical Association, Fylkesarkivet i Sogn og Fjordane, Internet Archive Book Images, The British Library, New York Public Library, Jalal gerald Aro, OSUCommons and cropped.; excluding; Fac-simile des monumens colories de L'Egypte: d'apres le tableau de C.L.F. Panckoucke (1825). Retrieved from World Digital Library. and Imperialism is War! 1966.Briskin, V. (1966 - ? )Retrieved from Bridgeman Education database.
| Subject | Primary Source | Secondary Source |
| Art |
original artwork |
document describing the artwork |
|
History |
indigenous artefact letter from an eyewitness |
book describing indigenous artefacts book or article that references the letter |
| Literature | A Shakespeare sonnet | Book on Shakespeare that references sonnets |
| Archaeology | Egyptian mummy | book or article about the process of mumification |
| Social Sciences | original research study | review of several studies on the same topic |
| Theatre | videotape of a performance | biography of a playwright |