Historians may find hymns a very useful and interesting source so I am delighted to be able to report Oxford readers now have access to The Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology.

As the successor to the 1892 Dictionary of Hymnology, this is an essential reference resource for scholars of global hymnody, with information on the hymns of many countries and languages, and a strong emphasis on the historical as well as the contemporary. It contains 2 million words, over 4,000 individual entries and more than 300 authors from over 30 countries writing on hymns of the Judaeo-Christian tradition, from the earliest years to those written today. It includes articles on individual hymns, authors from many countries, hymnals, organisations, and themes, as well as information on hymn tunes and their composers.

You can browse by historical period (from pre-1000 to modern), tradition (Anglican to United Reformed), Hymns in different languages, and places (Africa to United States).

Access is (shortly) via SOLO and already via Databases A-Z.