Guides: Classical Studies: Find Primary Sources

Primary Sources

Primary sources provide direct evidence or firsthand testimony about the period or subject you’re researching. In the humanities, a primary source is something that was created during the time period being studied, or created later by individuals who participated in the events of that time.

A primary source…

Provides direct evidence about the topic being studied
Was created at or close to the time of an event or topic
Was created by participants in or observers of an event, time period, or other topic
Can be found in archives as manuscripts, published in books, articles, or newspapers, or online.

Examples of primary sources include:

Eyewitness accounts
Autobiographies and memoirs
Diaries, papers, letters or correspondence, speeches
Interviews
Documents such as laws, court decisions, treaties, charters, deeds, certificates
Novels, poems, or plays written at the time of the event
Photographs, architectural drawings, and artifacts

Primary Source Texts in Print

Loeb Classical Library
This monographic series of important Greek and Latin literature includes epic and lyric poetry, tragedy, comedy, history, philosophy, and more in Latin, Greek, and English. Loeb Classical Library books present the original Greek or Latin text on each left-hand page and an English translation on the right.
Tip: When searching the catalog, use the side menu to filter by Author/Creator to narrow your search to relevant people.

Additional classical literature in print can be found by searching the library catalog.

Primary Sources Collections Available Freely Online

Perseus Digital Library
Primary and secondary sources for the study of ancient Greece and Rome.
Open Greek and Latin
An international collaboration committed to creating an open educational resource featuring a corpus of digital texts, deep-reading tools, and open-source software.
Classical Latin Texts
Searchable archive containing virtually all Latin texts written prior to 200 AD. By the Packard Humanities Institute.
Ancient Graffiti Project
A digital resource for locating and studying handwritten inscriptions of the early Roman empire.
Searchable Greek Inscriptions
A selection of inscriptions from the Packard Humanities Institute.

Online Art Collections

Classical Art Research Centre
The Beazley Archive at the University of Oxford's Classical Art Research Centre offers online databases of ancient art, including a large collection of images of ancient figure-decorated pottery.
Gregorian Etruscan Museum
The Gregorian Etruscan Museum at the Vatican Museums displays works of the Etruscan people from the ninth through the first centuries BCE.
Stanford Digital Forma Urbis Romae Project
This website dedicated to the Forma Urbis Romae, or Severan Marble Plan of Rome, features a database of images and 3D models of the surviving fragments of this ancient Roman map, carved between 203 and 211 CE.