Thursday 3 May 2012

English ballads in the National Library of Scotland

The National Library of Scotland has catalogued and digitised 2,300 English ballads, mostly 19th century. There are 23 topics. with Wars further subdivided: Courtship and marriage (383), Crime and punishment (94), Disasters (26), Elegies and laments (92), Emigration and farewells (56), Fashion (20), 'Foreigners' (23), Ireland (190), Literature and theatre (65), Misc (23), Occupations (107), Old age and death (26), Patriotism (73), Politics and government (321), Religion and morality (102), Royalty (136), Scotland (24), Slavery (10), Soldiers and sailors (177), Sons and daughters (57), Sports and entertainments (99), Temperance and various vices (50), Wars: Spanish Succession (13), Wars: Seven Year's War (7), Wars: French Revolutionary (12),  Wars: Napoleonic (62), Wars: Crimean (61), Wars: Indian (14), Wars: Other (28).

As with Word on the Street (Scottish broadsides - see blog post 30.11.11), you can browse and search. As the screen shot shows, expandable menus on the left allow you to subdivide your results by Form, Place, Subject (including further subject subdivisions), Place, People and Century. There are also transcriptions of the text. An excellent resource.

(C) National Library of Scotland

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