What Are Historical Sources?

Historical sources are, at their most basic level, something that tells us about history. It
may be a document, a picture, a sound recording, a book, a cinema film, a television
program or an object. Any sort of artifact from the period in question that conveys
information can qualify as a source.

There are two main types of historical sources: 1) primary sources and secondary
sources.

A primary source is something that originates from the past. It can be a chronicle, a
piece of pottery, or even a piece of glacial ice that gives us climate data about the levels
of atmospheric carbon one thousand years ago. Historians, to the best of their abilities,
work with primary sources to understand the past on its own terms, not through the
modern-day lenses.

Include documents or artifacts created by a witness to or participant in an event. They

can be firsthand testimony or evidence created during the time period that you are
studying.
Primary sources may include diaries, letters, interviews, oral histories, photographs,
newspaper articles, government documents, poems, novels, plays, and music.

A secondary source is a work that comments on the past. Typically this is a recently
written book that describes past events, often written by a historian or trained scholar
familiar about the time period and civilization in question. A secondary source is a book
about history. Scholars will spend just as much time with secondary sources as they will
with primary sources since they attempt to understand how other scholars interpret
obscure events and may disagree with their analyses. Analyze a scholarly question and
often use primary sources as evidence.

Secondary sources include books and articles about a topic. They may include lists of
sources, i.e. bibliographies, that may lead you to other primary or secondary sources.