I am very excited to announce that I have created a digital archive for historic food resources!

I have called it Historic Cookbooks Digital Collection, a resource companion to A Dollop of History. It includes digitized books, transcribed texts, and manuscripts with recipes, culinary or kitchen guides, menus, or some combination of all of the above.

Technically speaking, this is more of a curated collection of internet resources than a true archive, but its purpose is the same. I use a huge number of primary resources in my research and I link to them in individual recipe posts. But to make things easier for myself and for my fellow food history enthusiasts, you can now browse these books, manuscripts, and websites directly.

I work very hard to ensure that copyright is protected, so anything that has been uploaded directly to the collection is considered Fair Use or in the public domain. Items that are protected by copyright will include links to websites or repositories to ensure they will be attributed properly. The ultimate goal of this project is to make all of these materials more accessible to the public for educational purposes. I gain nothing from it apart from a streamlined research process and general life satisfaction.

This digital archive is currently in its infancy and will continue to grow and expand as I add materials. So be sure to check back often to see what is new!

Browsing Tips

• I have arranged the materials into collections by century. Anything earlier than the 14th-century is considered “Ancient.” Right now, each item can only be assigned to one collection at a time.
• If you want to search by country or language, or some other area of interest, use the Browse Items tab and click “Browse by tag.” I am not a web developer so I am at the mercy of my limitations for the time being.
• When available, certain resources have been embedded directly into the site and can be scrolled in the image viewer. Others are in PDF form, which you can click on to access the files.
• Don’t skip over the URL’s! Those links are there for good reason.

I sincerely hope you enjoy browsing through the historic resources as much as I do! Thank you for your continued support!

Note: The Featured image is an introductory page to the Forme of Cury (1390), from the English MS 7 held by the John Rylands Collection at the University of Manchester.