Home University of Edinburgh Library Essentials
December 19, 2025
MBChB students – want to get the best from the Library for Medicine? A key starting point is the Medicine Subject Guide at http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Sheila Fisken.
Spotlight on featured resources for MBChB Medicine :
UP TO DATE
This resource is highly recommended by the Medical School. It gives evidence based answers to clinical questions quickly and easily. On and off campus access@ http://www.uptodate.com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/contents/search
BMJ
We subscribe to a wide range or resources from the BMJ:
ENDNOTE
Register to get an Endnote account to help store and manage your references. Learn how to create reference lists in a variety of styles.
http://www.docs.is.ed.ac.uk/docs/Libraries/PDF/guideEndNoteWebregistering.pdf
Sheila Fisken – Academic Support Librarian, Medicine MBChB
Want to get the best from the Library for subject areas in ECA? A key starting point is the Subject Guides at http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides. Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news for Art, Design, History of Art, Architecture and Music. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Jane Furness (J.Furness@ed.ac.uk).
Spotlight on significant resources for ECA purchased recently:
Music Online Premium Service from Alexander Street Press:
Provides access to 13 music collections,delivering a combined-and constantly growing-total of 860,000+ audio tracks, 1,200+ hours of video, 26,000+ scores, 124,000+ pages of reference material, and 200,000+ playlists to support diverse learning needs.
Pro Quest Art & Architecture Online:
This collection supports scholarship across fine and applied arts through to interior design, industrial design, and landscape gardening. The title list includes: Apollo, Architectural Review, Architects Journal, Art Monthly, British Journal of Photography, Country Life, Eye, Graphis, Ornament and more.
Routledge Performance Archive online:
A resource produced in partnership with Digital Theatre, providing unique access to a wide range of audio-visual material from past and present practitioners of performance.
Jane Furness – Academic Support Librarian, ECA
We have trial access to RIPM (Retrospective Index to Music Periodicals) on the EbscoHost platform until the 11th November.
RIPM offers a unique, searchable collection of complete full-text music journals not found in any library or any other online resource, spanning a period of some two hundred years, from C.P.E. Bach to Berg and Bartok, and from Schubert to Schoenberg and Stravinsky.
Feedback and further info
We are interested to know what you think of this database as your comments influence purchase decisions so please do fill out our feedback form.
A list of all trials currently available to University of Edinburgh staff and students can be found on our trials webpage.
On Thursday 30th October from 10am, Louise and Clair from Lothian Health Services Archive (LHSA) will be on the Library Pop desk on the first floor of the Main Library. LHSA is one of the largest medical archives in the UK, holding everything from institutional records of Edinburgh’s hospitals to small personal collections from those who worked inside them.
Including registers and minutes, plans, photographs, objects, audio-visual media and more, our archive documents the history of healthcare in Edinburgh and the Lothians over more than four hundred years (our earliest holding dates from 1594). Our collections trace the social, political, economic and (of course) medical history of our city and are widely used by the general public, students and academics. Our most popular resources come from our Royal Edinburgh Hospital (REH) collections, a psychiatric hospital (‘asylum’) that has just celebrated its bicentenary. Ranging from admission registers to patient letters, artwork and case books, the good recordkeeping of the hospital has led to a wealth of unique sources for students, academics and family historians exploring patient experiences in the nineteenth century.
Artwork by Royal Edinburgh Hospital patient, John Willis Mason, c. 1890s (GD16).
On Thursday, we’ll be focussing on our image collections. As Clair has been cataloguing LHSA’s considerable collection of photographs, she has put together a slideshow of some of her favourites:
Royal Infirmary of Edinburgh Ward, 1895 (P/PL1)
We’ll also be remembering the centenary of the First World War in our display by bringing along a number of collection items. For example, you will be able to see a rare wartime photo album from the Edenhall Hospital for Limbless Soldiers and Sailors (based near Musselburgh) and a scrapbook from nurse Ethel Miller. Nurse Miller worked in the 2nd Scottish General Hospital Craigleith, where she decided to pass around a book amongst her soldier patients to record their memories, verses and sketches. The scrapbook is a real favourite with LHSA staff, and in autumn last year we produced a replica copy that is used in education work:
Page from the scrapbook of Nurse Ethel Miller, c. 1917 (Acc12/20)
So come and see us on Thursday from 10am and we can let you know how LHSA can help you, from historical research to sources for projects and finding your own Edinburgh family history.
Louise Williams, LHSA Archivist
On Thursday 30th October the Lord Speaker Baroness D’Souza will deliver the Chrystal Macmillan Lecture on the topic of Ladies in the Lords: Women’s Representation in Political Life.
Today there are 189 women in the House but it is only since the 1958 Life Peerages Act that women (as well as those without an inherited title) were allowed to sit in the House of Lords.
We’ve put together just a short reading list of journal articles available online through the University Library that allow you to read about and around this particular topic. So if you are unable to attend the Lecture or just wish to find out a bit more then read on. Access only available to University of Edinburgh students and staff unless otherwise noted. Read More
Want to get the best from the Library for Informatics? A key starting point is the Subject Guide at www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides-informatics Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Angela Nicholson.
Featured Recent Purchases for Informatics in 2014-15 include:
Foundations and Trends in Technology
Provides high quality reviews, surveys, and tutorials of significant research topics written by leading authors in their field. Titles include:
Foundations and Trends in: Computer Graphics and Vision; Databases; Human-Computer Interaction; Information Retrieval; Machine Learning; Programming Languages; Theoretical Computer Science; Web Science
Angela Nicholson, Academic Support Librarian – Informatics
Want to get the best from the Library for Business? A key starting point is the Business Subject Guide at http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Angela Nicholson.
Featured Library Resources for Business in 2014-15 include
Oxford Handbooks Online
Online Handbooks and Reference for Business and Management from key publishers, including Oxford University Press.
Fame
Fame contain detailed financial information of all UK companies updated monthly with up to 10 years of data. FAME allows you to search by a range of criteria including: location, industry, number of employees, balance sheet items and ratios.
Orbis
Orbis contains comprehensive information on companies worldwide, with an emphasis on private company information. Use it to research individual companies, search for companies by profile, analyse companies. Orbis contains information on both listed and unlisted companies.
Angela Nicholson, Academic Support Librarian – Business
Want to get the best from the Library for Literatures, Languages and Cultures? A key starting point are the Subject Guides for Literatures, Languages and Cultures – find your subject at http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Shenxiao Tong.
Spotlight on significant resources for Literatures, Languages and Cultures purchased recently:
International Database of Shakespeare on Film, Television and Radio
This authoritative online database of Shakespeare-related content in film, television, radio and video recordings is international in scope, is regularly updated and currently holds nearly 8,000 records dating from the 1890s to the present day.
Izvestiia Digital Archive
Among the longest-running Russian newspapers, Izvestiia was founded in March 1917 and during the Soviet period was the official organ of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR. Remarkable for its serious and balanced treatment of subject matter, Izvestiia has traditionally been a popular news source within intellectual and academic circles. The database platform offers the option to go to “All Sources” so that you can cross-search the content with the Pravda Digital Archive and other digital resources.
Orlando
Orlando – “Women’s Writing in the British Isles from the Beginnings to the Present” is a dynamic resource for the study of English literature, women’s writing, and cultural history in general. It consists of factual, critical, and interpreted material, with biographical and writing career entries on over 1,000 writers, more than 850 of them British women. It also includes selected non-British or international women writers, and British and international men, as well as more than thirty thousand dated items representing events and processes in a wide range of contexts such as history, science, medicine, economics and law.
Kotobarabia Arab Leaders, Historians and Philosophers Collection
This is an Arabic e-book collection containing approximately 5,000 titles from nearly 1,000 important Arab thinkers, philosophers, historians, politicians, and theologians in the Arab world. Topics cover feminism, modern medicine, political reforms, including the Orabi Revolution, education, arts, religion, and more. The collection includes works by the Four Imams of the Sunni Sect, the Al Azhar Modern Sheikhs; various authors of the Modern Arab Enlightenment, and rare works by the former Egyptian royal family. The database search platform is in English, with printable and downloadable features.
Chinese Periodical Full-text Database (1911-1949)
The database currently consists of eight series, containing the full text of more than 10,000 periodicals published during this important Minguo (i.e. Republic of China) period. it is cross searchable with the Late Qing Dynasty Full-text Periodicals 1833-1911.
Casalini ebooks Collection
The Casalini full text platform (Torrossa) provides access to a selection of 1,867 scholarly e-books from Italian and Spanish academic publishers since 2000 for University of Edinburgh users. The collection consists of 1,188 titles on Italian studies and Italian literature and 679 titles on Spanish studies. The books are in Italian or Spanish and can be either downloaded or viewed online in PDF format. The e-book collection is fully searchable, including by words in the full text.
Oxford Handbooks Online – Literature Module
OHO brings together the world’s leading scholars to discuss research and the latest thinking on a range of major topics. Each Handbook offers thorough introductions to topics and a critical survey of the current state of scholarship in a particular field of study, creating an original conception of the field and setting the agenda for new research. The articles review the key issues and major debates, and provide an original argument for how those debates might evolve.
Oxford Bibliographies Online
Designed to provide authoritative guidance, Oxford Bibliographies is an innovative online reference tool that combines the best features of a high-level encyclopaedia and the best features of a traditional bibliography in a style that responds to the way people do research online.
ARTFL-FRANTEXT
ARTFL-FRANTEXT is the main database of the ARTFL Project (American and French Research on the Treasury of the French Language). It consists of over 3500 transcribed texts ranging from classic works of French literature to various kinds of non-fiction prose and technical writing from the 12th to the 20th century. Genres include novels, poetry, theatre, journalism, essays, correspondence, and treatises. Subjects include literary criticism, biology, history, economics, and philosophy. In most cases standard scholarly editions were used in converting the text into machine-readable form, and the data contain page references to these editions.
Shenxiao Tong, Academic Support Librarian – LLC
Want to get the best from the Library for Economics? A key starting point is the Economics Subject Guide at http://www.ed.ac.uk/is/subject-guides Start here to explore print and electronic collections, library facilities and library news. Any questions? Your Academic Support Librarian is Angela Nicholson.
Featured Library Resources for Economics in 2014-15 include:
Oxford Handbooks Online & SAGE Knowledge
Online Handbooks and Reference for Economics and Finance from key publishers, including Oxford University Press and Sage.
SAGE Research Methods
SAGE Research Methods is a research methods tool created to help and support beginning and advanced researchers in every step of a research project.
Endnote Online
Register to get an Endnote Online account to help store and manage your references. Learn how to create citations and reference lists in a variety of styles. See http://www.docs.is.ed.ac.uk/docs/Libraries/PDF/guideEndNoteWebregistering.pdf
Angela Nicholson, Academic Support Librarian – Economics
Did you know that Edinburgh has been a world leader in genetics for over a century? And that there’s definitely more to cloning than just Dolly the sheep? Come to the Pop-Up Library on the first floor of the Main Library between 10 and 12 tomorrow (28th) to learn about the fascinating animal genetics collections revealed by the Towards Dolly project, and have some fun while you’re at it. Don’t miss the chance to win some fabulous prizes (including ‘Dolly’ Mixtures, naturally). And yes, there will be a sheep drawing contest.
Don’t be a drone, be a clone – see you there!
Clare Button, Project Archivist, ‘Towards Dolly: Edinburgh, Roslin and the Birth of Modern Genetics’
Hill and Adamson Collection: an insight into Edinburgh’s past
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Cataloguing the private papers of Archibald Hunter Campbell: A Journey Through Correspondence
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Cataloguing the private papers of Archibald Hunter Campbell: A Journey Through Correspondence
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Archival Provenance Research Project: Lishan’s Experience
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