Oxford researchers now have access to China and the Modern World: Imperial China and the West, Part I: 1815-1881.
This database is an essential primary source archive for researching the internal politics of China and Britain, their relationship, and the relationships between other Western powers keen to benefit from the growing trading ports of the Far East. The sources are all in English.
Digitized in two parts from the FO 17 series of British Foreign Office Files (The National Archives, UK) Part 1 of Imperial China and the West provides General Correspondence relating to China from 1815–1881. The FO 17 series provides a vast and significant resource for researching every aspect of Anglo-Chinese relations during the nineteenth century, ranging from diplomacy and war, to trade, piracy, riots and rebellions within China, international law, treaty ports and informal empire, transnational emigration, and translation and cross-cultural communication.
This archive is comprised of material digitized from collections held by The National Archives (Kew):
- FO 17 Foreign Office: Political and other departments: General correspondence, China
- FO 605 Foreign Office: Registers (Library series) and indexes of general correspondence.
These hand-written documents have been opened up to scholars with the use of Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) technology. The manuscripts are fully searchable and you can see the transcript together with the original manuscript.
While you are here, you might also be interested in…
- Documents on British Policy Overseas (Oxford subscription)
- Cambridge Archive Editions Online (esp. China Political Reports, 1911-1960 and China Political Reports, 1961-1970, which draw together the periodic political reports sent by British officials based in China back to the British Foreign Office) (Oxford subscription)
- Foreign Office Files for China, 1919-1980 (Oxford subscription)
- Chinese Newspapers Collection (1832-1953) (Oxford subscription)
- Late Qing Dynasty Periodical Full-text Database (1833-1911) & Supplement (Oxford subscription)
- Modern Chinese Books (1840-1949) (Oxford subscription)
- Chinese Studies (LibGuide)