1492: An Ongoing Voyage
exhibit looking at ‘the rich mixture of societies’ in five areas just before the arrival of Europeans, and at the subsequent contacts between them and the new arrivals from 1492-1600. Divided into six sections, including the life and myths of Columbus, ‘inventing America’, ‘Europe claims America’ (Library of Congress)

H-Atlantic
online discussion list for Atlantic World History from 1500 to 1800, aimed at those interested in the interdisciplinary study of colonial North America and the United States, Europe, West Africa, the Caribbean, and South America in a transatlantic context. Book reviews, links to course syllabi, bibliographies, resources (H-Net)

History of the Atlantic World 1500-1800
website for an international seminar at Harvard University (directed by Bernard Bailyn): seminar topics have included ‘the movement of peoples’ and ‘cultural encounters’, with abstracts of papers online, an Atlantic History discussion list and online newsletter

Atlantic World Roundtable
roundtable discussion (January 2000); summary of the panel; abstracts; links to course syllabi (AHA)

Beginning Eastward From London: a study in the domestic establishment of the British East India Company (1599-1660)
Essay on early years and development of the Company (Chris Godat)

The British Presence in India in the 18th Century
Essay about the East India Company at the BBC website (Peter Marshall)

The Canadian Iroquois and the Seven Years’ War
papers and articles by the site author (D Peter McLeod)

Cultural Readings: Colonization and Print in the Americas
online exhibition exploring Europeans’ attempts ‘to “read” native cultures of the Americas’ (and vice versa); six thematic sections, including ‘promotion and possession’, ‘viewers and the viewed’, ‘colonial fictions, colonial histories’ (University of Pennsylvania Library)

Columbus and the Age of Discovery
searchable database of articles etc relating to ‘encounter’ themes, as well as links to other sites (Millersville, Pennsylvania)

Anthology of the Discovery of Australia
from the first European contacts, the Dutch in the seventeenth century, extracts from their accounts of what they found (Rainer Radok)

Trading Places:The East India Company and Asia 1600-1834
‘virtual’ version of an exhibition of 2002, focusing on trading contacts between European and Asian countries from 1600 (British Library)

Trading Places: The East India Company and Asia
Online seminar to accompany the exhibition of the same name; covers the development and activities of the Company (Anthony Farrington)

Emigrants and Settlers
extracts from selected primary and literary sources (Norton Topics Online)

Encounters: the meeting of Asia and Europe 1500-1800
website for an outstanding 2004 exhibition; beautiful, includes images of some of the key exhibits, resources for educators, quizzes and other activities, bibliography and links (Victoria and Albert Museum)

Hudson’s Bay Company Collection
a digital collection of the donated museum collections of the Hudson’s Bay company; images of artefacts covering several thousand years, indigenous and Euro-Canadian (Manitoba Museum)

Inuit and Englishmen: the Nunavut Voyages of Martin Frobisher
website on the Inuit before the arrival of the English, on Frobisher’s voyages, Inuit responses to the newcomers, Inuit travellers to England and English settlers in Nunavut, and much more (Canadian Museum of Civilization)

La Salle Shipwreck Project
fascinating web site for the project to excavate the Belle, the wrecked ship of Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle (1643-87). As well as the many photos chronicling the excavation work, there are materials relating to La Salle’s ill-fated attempt to establish a French colony in Texas (Texas Historical Commission)

Mahomet and Mustapha: George I’s Turkish servants as surrogate targets
NB: link to download MS Word document
article by Khaled Aljenfawi, discussing the cultural impact of George I’s Turkish servants’ arrival in Britain in 1714 (Brunel University)
From EnterText, 5.3 (2005-6)

Parrots, poets and philosophers: language and empire in the eighteenth century (PDF)
article by John Gilmore, examining references to parrots in eighteenth-century poetry, as exotic ornaments that confer status on their owners, in a process of ‘imitation, translation and cultural transfer’ (Brunel University)
From EnterText, 2.2 (2003)

Renaissance Exploration, Travel, and the World outside Europe
extracts from selected primary and literary sources (Norton Topics Online)

Renaissance Humanism and Christian Hebraism
An online exhibit, with examples of early printed texts in Hebrew: ‘Nowhere was the contact between Jewish and Christian learning more evident than in the art of printing in the 16th century’ (National Library of Canada)

Some representations of America and their diffusion in Elizabethan England
article by Catherine Armstrong, arguing against the view that ‘the relationship between Elizabethans and the New World was characterised by fear’; examines texts that presented America and Americans in a positive way, to encourage English exploration and settlement
From Eras, 2 (2001)

Ruling the world: the cartographic gaze in Elizabethan accounts of the New World
article by Mark Koch, discussing the significance for empire-building of the ‘commanding view’ of maps
from Early Modern Literary Studies, 4:2 (1998)

Texts of Imagination and Empire: the founding of Jamestown in its Atlantic context
Website from a NEH Summer Institute, includes useful commentaries on various topics and a bibliography. But unfortunately it has been designed to work properly only with certain browsers. (Folger Institute)

The First Asians in Britain
Online seminar exploring Asian migrants to Britain and their experiences and attitudes towards them, particularly in the eighteenth century (Rozina Visram)

Transformation from a pre-colonial to a colonial order: the case of India
Essay tracing the development of colonial trading patterns (Om Prakash)