World History by Period: Home

Picasso, Pablo, 1881-1973. 1937. Guernica. (detail: left quarter of canvas) From Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía. www.museoreinasofia.es, January 10, 2021.

The UCSB Library has FIVE library research guides that cover the discipline of history.

Links to the other four history research guides are found here ►
in the Related History Research Guides box.

You may need to consult more than one of these guides to locate the information resources that cover your topic.

This guide provides tips and links to help you with your world history research, when that history falls within a specific period of time.

The tabs across the top of this guide list links (for online resources) and call numbers (for print resources) that you might find useful.

The Library Research Strategies page gives a quick overview on how to do library research.

The broad periods of history covered on this guide are:

▪ Prehistory & ancient history
▪ Medieval history
▪ Early modern history
▪ 19th & 20th centuries

Each period tab has lists of links (for online resources) and call numbers (for print resources) that you may find useful for your research.  There are lists of Background & Reference Information Sources, as well as Primary Source resources, Scholarly Article Sources, and other sources of information that you can access in the UCSB Library and via its online resource links.

While this guide focuses specifically on world history by period, the UCSB Library has related history research guides for: 

• United States History 
• World History (generally)
• World History by Region
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Australia & Oceania
  • British Isles
  • Europe
  • Latin America
  • Middle East
• World History by Topic
  • Commerce, Commodities & Material Culture
  • Empires, Borderlands & their Legacies
  • Gender & Sexualities
  • Public History
  • History of Public Policy
  • Race & Ethnicity
  • Religion, Culture & Society
  • Science & Technology

You may need to consult more than one of these guides to locate the information resources that best cover your topic.