Selection Criteria
East India Company covers over 300 years of global history, allowing users to explore the operations of the English East India Company – which at its peak controlled over a quarter of the world’s trade and ruled over millions of people – and European colonial expansion and trading activities in Asia more generally between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries.
The material included in East India Company has been selected in close collaboration with academic subject experts, collections specialists at the British Library, and under the guidance of the Editorial Board. It brings together in one portal key primary sources from the India Office Records (IOR) held at the British Library in London, UK.
The India Office Records occupy 14 km of shelving at the British Library, comprising both official and personal papers dating from the sixteenth to twentieth centuries. From this vast trove of primary source materials, key archival series from the India Office Records have been digitally reproduced in East India Company.
This resource comprises archival volumes from a range of file classes, including IOR/A, IOR/B, IOR/C, IOR/D and IOR/E in their entirety, and associated index volumes from file classes IOR/H and IOR/Z.
Three of these archival series - IOR/A, IOR/B, and IOR/D - comprise the foundational charters of the Company and the minutes and memoranda of its main administrative organs, while IOR/C contains the minutes of the Council of India, the main post-1858 administrative body of British India.
The 'Factory Records', the majority of which are included in IOR/G, contain records relating to individual trading posts across the Global South including locations in Africa, South, East and South East Asia.
IOR/E comprises extensive general correspondence to and from the Company between 1600 and 1858, including correspondence with the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India from 1784 to 1858.
IOR/F comprises the Records of the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India and contains comprehensive material, including minutes, correspondence, draft despatches and papers, documenting the Board’s oversight of the Company’s operations between 1784 and 1858. This series also includes the Board’s commentary on, and revisions to, the Company’s outgoing despatches found in IOR/E.
A Note on Exclusions
Where exclusions have been made, this has largely been due to:
- Fragile condition of material.
- Duplicated material within collections.
East India Company covers over 300 years of global history, allowing users to explore the operations of the English East India Company – which at its peak controlled over a quarter of the world’s trade and ruled over millions of people – and European colonial expansion and trading activities in Asia more generally between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries.
The material included in East India Company has been selected in close collaboration with academic subject experts, collections specialists at the British Library, and under the guidance of the Editorial Board. It brings together in one portal key primary sources from the India Office Records (IOR) held at the British Library in London, UK.
The India Office Records occupy 14 km of shelving at the British Library, comprising both official and personal papers dating from the sixteenth to twentieth centuries. From this vast trove of primary source materials, key archival series from the India Office Records have been digitally reproduced in East India Company.
This resource comprises archival volumes from a range of file classes, including IOR/A, IOR/B, IOR/C, IOR/D and IOR/E in their entirety, and associated index volumes from file classes IOR/H and IOR/Z.
Three of these archival series - IOR/A, IOR/B, and IOR/D - comprise the foundational charters of the Company and the minutes and memoranda of its main administrative organs, while IOR/C contains the minutes of the Council of India, the main post-1858 administrative body of British India.
The 'Factory Records', the majority of which are included in IOR/G, contain records relating to individual trading posts across the Global South including locations in Africa, South, East and South East Asia.
IOR/E comprises extensive general correspondence to and from the Company between 1600 and 1858, including correspondence with the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India from 1784 to 1858.
IOR/F comprises the Records of the Board of Commissioners for the Affairs of India and contains comprehensive material, including minutes, correspondence, draft despatches and papers, documenting the Board’s oversight of the Company’s operations between 1784 and 1858. This series also includes the Board’s commentary on, and revisions to, the Company’s outgoing despatches found in IOR/E.
A Note on Exclusions
Where exclusions have been made, this has largely been due to:
- Fragile condition of material.
- Duplicated material within collections.