Go to the Product Home Page View and pick from a list of all authors in the database Find sources by specific criteria Find authors by specific criteria Find encounters between groups of people by specific criteria Search the texts for words, phrases and more Search texts of letters only for words, phrases and more Search multiple fields to examine the texts for words, phrases and more Click here for comprehensive help Search the database and external web sites for maps, prints and illustrations
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Table of Contents

6. RESULTS


1. GUIDED TOUR

A basic 10 minute guided tour that shows the major features of the database is available. Please CLICK here for more.

2. INTRODUCTION

2.1 INTRODUCTION

Early Encounters in North America provides sophisticated searching across large numbers of primary documents, as well as table of contents access to a wide array of primary sources. It also provides databases of encounters and images.

For novices who wish to get quick access to key documents, we recommend using the Tables of Contents and the Simple Search tools.

For scholars who wish to conduct in-depth searches we recommend using the Advanced Search and Find Sections Search. The search value of some of the fields in the database will not become apparent until more documents are added.

2.2 DATABASE FUNCTIONALITY

There are three basic ways to use the database.

  • Tables of Contents -- Use these to see what's contained in the database. This is the best way to check whether an author, a source, a date is included. It's also the best way to see what fauna, flora, peoples and encouters are in the database. To use this tool, simply click on the appropriate table of contents button on the navigation bar.
  • Find Tools -- The "FIND" tools let you search for specific authors or specific works in the database. Find Authors returns a list of all authors that match your specific criteria. Find Sources returns a list of all sources (works and manuscripts) in the database. The difference between the "FIND" tools and the "SEARCH" tools (explained next) is in the results they give. The "FIND" tools do not return documents, but rather lists of sources and authors. Note the difference between a source (a collection of documents) and the documents themselves (items within a source).
  • Search Tools -- The "SEARCH" tools let you analyze words and documents that meet your search criteria. The "SEARCH" tools return documents or bibliographic citations or both. In this database the search tool searches an entire volume.

2.3 DATABASE STRUCTURE - SECTIONS AND SOURCES

There are three types of documents in the database

  • Sources -- These are rekeyed volumes of primary works, some of which consist of works by different authors.  The rekeyed sources replicate the original paper works, and can be browsed using the original tables of contents.
  • Sections within Sources -- Letters, diary entries, speeches, testimony, chapters and other sections within a source been separated so that they can be retrieved independently of each other.  Using Find Sections within Sources you can retrieve sections by particular authors, that have particular subjects and much more.  Sections are the basic indexing unit of the database.  Each section has been marked up by as many as 25 different fields.
  • Images -- Images can be viewed within texts and independently of texts.  You can browse images by author in the Author Table-of-Contents or search for them by various fields in the Find Images

Viewing Details: For Authors, Sources, Images, Encounters and Sections within sources you may view the full bibliographic details whenever you see links to 'details'.  In the Author TOC simply click on the '1' to see the details associated with an author.

2.4 SEARCH NAVIGATION BAR

The Search Navigation Bar lets you move around the database retrieval tools, including the Search tools. It is the same as the Tables of Contents tool bar, except that the Search tools are expanded, and the Tables of Contents tools are reduced. You can toggle between the two by clicking Tables of Contents in the red section indicated above. (The graphic above is just an illustration; it does not have live links.)

The Search tools are divided into three separate categories, all of which search the texts in the database and return documents:

  • Simple Search - for novice users or those wishing to do a quick search. It provides basic searching
  • Advanced Search - all fields, except specific letter fields
The yellow color indicates which Search tool you are currently using. As you move from tool to tool, the yellow moves to indicate which tool you've selected. You may click on the red parts of the Navigation Bar to move to the appropriate tool.

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2.5 TABLE OF CONTENTS NAVIGATION BAR

The Tables of Contents Navigation Bar lets you move around the Tables of Contents tools. It works in the same way as the Search Tool bar. When using these tools, the Tables of Contents are expanded and the Full Text Searches are collapsed. You can toggle between the two by clicking Tables of Contents or Search.

The Tables of Contents are divided into eleven separate categories, all of which provide quick access to specific documents within the database.

The yellow indicates which table of contents you are using. The yellow moves as you move from tool to tool. You may click on the maroon parts of the Navigation bar to move to the appropriate tool. (The graphic above is just an illustration; it does not have live links.)

2.6 NOTES ON MARK-UP CONVENTIONS

Materials in the database have been transcribed using original spellings and grammar. In some documents spelling is inconsistent, even within a sentence.

For more information on mark-up conventions, contact the Editor.

2.7 ABOUT THE SEARCH SOFTWARE

PhiloLogic, a suite of software developed by the ARTFL Project at the University of Chicago in collaboration with The University of Chicago Library's electronic text services, provides sophisticated searching of large encoded databases on the World Wide Web. It is an easy to use yet powerful full-text search, retrieval, and reporting system for large multimedia databases (texts, images, sound) with the ability to handle complex text structures with extensive indexed metadata. PhiloLogic in its simplest form serves as a document retrieval or look up mechanism whereby users can search relational databases retrieve given documents and, in some implementations, portions of texts such as acts, scenes, articles, or head-words. This same document retrieval       mechanism serves as the basis for defining a corpus in a full-text search.  One can, for example, either retrieve all documents in a database written       by women from 1935 through 1945 or one can search for words or phrases within database which fit those criteria. The typical PhiloLogic search is       broken down into five distinct stages: 1) defining a corpus (i.e. limiting a search), 2) word expansion, 3) word index searching, 4) text extraction, and 5) link resolution and formatting (e.g., SGML to HTML conversion). In other words, after defining a corpus (or one may search an entire database), one can execute a single term, phrase or proximity search. By looking up indices of the word(s) in a relational database, PhiloLogic extracts blocks of text containing the search term(s) with links to larger blocks of text. These extracts are formatted to display on a Web browser and sometimes include links to images, sound recordings, other texts, or even other databases.    In addition to simple word and phrase searches, users can perform more  sophisticated searches by using extended UNIX-style regular expressions for complex wildcard searching and, in some implementations, morphological and orthographic expansion. All of these mechanisms to expand words can be combined using Boolean operators such as OR (the vertical bar "|") and AND (a space) within a variety of searching contexts.

Its functions were originally designed for scholarly research in databases of literary, religious, philosophical, and historical collections of texts as well as important historical encyclopedias and dictionaries. PhiloLogic handles notes so as not to interfere with phrase searching. Users can easily search words with diacritics (either by specifying accents or ignoring them by typing in uppercase) and non-Romanized scripts. At present there are some fifty databases on the Web under PhiloLogic containing languages such as ancient Greek, Latin, Hindi, and Urdu as well as nearly all Western European languages. PhiloLogic can also be set up to recognize or ignore manuscript notations such as different brackets, which can indicate spurious text or editorial emendations. Because the software recognizes typical text structures as real data objects, it understands units, such as words, sentences, paragraphs, sections, and pages, permitting very flexible searching and retrieval of these textual objects. Other full-text engines on the market search for strings of characters. Rather than searching for two words within the same sentence or paragraph (intellectual units), other engines must search for two words within a certain number of characters regardless of sentence or paragraph. With PhiloLogic scholars always know where they are in a given text since pagination can be displayed along side other objects. Such a high degree of indexing can lead to decreases in speed, PhiloLogic indexing has been maximized such that it is still incredibly fast on the Web.

For more information on PhiloLogic, contact Catherine Mardikes, ETS Coordinator, The University of Chicago Library.

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3. FINDING TOOLS

3.1 FIND SOURCES

The Find Sources tool lets you find all the original works in the database that match your specific criteria. For example, you can find out all the sources published by the Pennsylvania Historical Society or see whether a particular edition is included.

Practical Example:
Find all sources that have slavery as a subject.

Note: For a detailed discussion of the fields in Find Sources see the section on Fields and their Descriptions below.

3.2 FIND AUTHORS

The Find Authors tool lets you find authors in the database that match your specific criteria. For example, you can find all the authors in the database that were born between 1620 and 1630.

Practical Example:
Find all Naturalists in the database.

Note: For a detailed discussion of the fields in Find Authors see the section on Fields and their Descriptions below.

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3.3 FIND ENCOUNTERS

The Find Encounters tool lets you find encounters in the database that match your specific criteria. For example, you can find all encounters between Father Paul le Jeune and the Huron.

Practical Example:
Find all encounters that were trade encounters. 

Note: For a detailed discussion of the fields in Find Encounters see the section on Fields and their Descriptions below.

3.4 FIND IMAGES

The Find Images tool lets you find images in the database that match your specific criteria. For example, you can find all images created by Theodor de Bry.

Practical Example:
Find all images created by John White.

Note: For a detailed discussion of the fields in Find Images see the section on Fields and their Descriptions below.

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4. SEARCHING

4.1 SEARCH OVERVIEW

There are two basic kinds of searching in the database.

The conventions used in each kind of searching are slightly different as shown below.

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4.2 FULL-TEXT SEARCHING

4.2.1 Full-Text Searching

Full-Text Searching is when you search for specific words or phrases that occur in the texts themselves.

PhiloLogic supports wildcard characters and Boolean (logical) operators, which are modeled on UNIX regular expressions to perform "pattern matching" in full-text searching. Pattern matching allows identification of a large number of words corresponding to a defined pattern. Wildcard characters can be useful, for example, in identifying cognates made obscure by affixes and vowel weakening, inconsistencies due to irregular orthography, and variations on account of word inflection as well as for discovering potential emendations for uncertain readings. The most commonly used regular expression operators (wildcard and Boolean) are listed below.

4.2.2 Wildcard Characters in Full-Text Searching

. (period):
matches any single character (e.g., gentlem.n will retrieve gentleman and gentlemen).
* (asterisk):
matches any string of characters, anchoring the match at the beginning of a word (e.g., cigar* will match cigar, cigars, cigarette, etc.).
* (asterisk):
matches any string of characters, anchoring the match at the end of a word (e.g., *habit will retrieve habit, cohabit, and inhabit), or in the middle (e.g., c.*eers matches compeers, cheers, and careers).
.? (period question mark):
matches the characters entered or the characters entered plus one more character in place of the question mark (e.g., hono.?r matches both honor and honour and cat.? matches cat and cats, but not cathedral, Catherine, etc.).
[a-z] (brackets):
matches a single character found in the specified range (e.g., [c-f]at will match cat, dat, eat, and fat) or any letters within the brackets (e.g., civili[zs]e will match both civilize and civilise).
# (hash mark):
matches capitalized words only (e.g., #bacon will retrieve Bacon, but not bacon). Otherwise word searches are case insensitive. Please note that this operator does not work properly in conjunction with the vertical bar (e.g., searching #hamlet|#bacon will not retrieve accurate results).
E (capital letter):
matches all accented and non-accented forms (e.g., to search naïveté regardless of accents type naIvetE).

Note: If you are using wildcard characters and would like to see a full list of the words matching your search-term, then run your search as a Frequency by Author search. The results page of a Frequency by Author search lists all the terms found in a database that match your search-term.

4.2.3 Wildcards and Boolean Operators in Full-Text Searching

  • Space: serves as the AND operator in sentence and paragraph Proximity Searching (e.g., church state retrieve all cases where church and state appear in the same specified context; this is not the case in phrase searching).

  • These expressions can be combined for more sophisticated searches; for example, searching
    old|aged|ancient m.n|fellow*
    finds any of the three adjectives together with the nouns man or fellow in the singular or plural.

4.2.4 Punctuation and Full-Text Searching

4.2.5 Selecting a Search Option

PhiloLogic at this time offers two kinds of searches: "Single Term and Phrase Search," which is set up as the default, and "Proximity Searching in the Same Sentence or Paragraph." One may select and deselect a search option by clicking on the "radio" buttons.

For a fuller discussion see the PhiloLogic User Manual

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4.3 FIELD SEARCHING

4.3.1 Searching in Specific Fields

When entering search terms in bibliographic fields, as opposed to the full text search box, use the following Boolean operators: uppercase AND, OR, and NOT. One can use a NOT operator by itself (e.g., in the Type field enter: NOT editorial). It must be the first term in the box with no spaces preceding and it cannot be used with other Boolean operators

4.3.2 Advanced Field Searching with Regular Expression Operators

As in full text searching, one can use regular expression operators for more specialized searching. The caret sign (^) at the beginning of a word anchors the match at the beginning of the entry (e.g., ^child will find the personal event "Childbirth," but not "Adoption of Child). One can also use the vertical line (|) as a Boolean operator OR. With this operator one can exclude two terms from one's search (e.g., NOT adams|burr).

4.3.3 Punctuation and Spacing in Fielded Searching

When entering terms, punctuation and spacing must match exactly that in the fields. The following marks of punctuation produce a "Nothing found" message: ampersand (&), parentheses, question mark, and double quotes (""). If necessary for searching, replace the mark of punctuation with a period, which stand for any single character.

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5. FIELDS AND THEIR DESCRIPTIONS

5.1 LIST OF ALL FIELDS THAT CAN BE SEARCHED

Here is a summary table of all fields in the database, showing which tool they can be found on. Detailed descriptions can be found below.

    Search Texts Find Tools
    Simple Search Advanced Search Letters Only Find Author Find Sources Find Encounters Find Images
1 Age at Death       x      
2 Artist             x
3 Author Name x x x x x    
4 Author of Source Work             x
5 Author's Gender x x x x      
6 Cultural Affiliation   x x x      
7 Cultural Events   x          
8 Cultural Groups   x       x  
9 Description [of Encounter]           x  
10 Document Type x x     x    
11 Editor or Translator         x    
12 Encounter Code           x  
13 Encounter Name x x x     x  
14 Encounter Type           x  
15 Estimated Number of People           x  
16 Expedition   x x     x  
17 Fatalities During Encounter           x  
18 Fauna   x          
19 Flora   x          
20 Geophysical Features   x          
21 Image Color             x
22 Image ID             x
23 Image Medium             x
24 Image Source             x
25 Image Subjects             x
26 Image Title             x
27 Image Type              
28 Keyword in Caption             x
29 Keyword in Content Note             x
30 Keyword in Descriptive Note             x
31 Keyword in Titles         x    
32 Language of Edition         x    
33 Location           x  
34 Month Written   x x        
35 Nationality x x x x      
36 Natural Phenomena   x          
37 Note       x      
38 Occupation   x   x      
39 Original Language         x    
40 Participants   x       x  
41 Personal Events   x          
42 Place of Birth       x      
43 Place of Death       x      
44 Place of Publication         x   x
45 Places Discussed   x x        
46 Previously Unpublished         x    
47 Publication Year         x    
48 Publisher         x    
49 Race x x x x      
50 Recipient   x x        
51 Record Number   x          
52 Religion x x x x      
53 Search Texts x x x        
54 Societal Role   x   x      
55 Start Day           x  
56 Start Month           x  
57 Start Year           x  
58 Subject Headings x x x   x x x
59 Title of Source Work             x
60 Where Sent (Geographical)   x x        
61 Where Written (Geographical)   x x        
62 Where Written (Setting)   x x        
63 Year of Birth       x      
64 Year of Death       x      
65 Year Written x x x        

 

 

5.2 FIELD DESCRIPTIONS WITH SAMPLE SEARCHES

5.2.1 Age at Death

Description: This is the age when the author died and is calculated from birth and death dates where they are available. It is optional. This field can be searched using Advanced Search and Find Authors only.

How to use this field: Key in the number of days or range of days in the box Age at Death. For example, 25 or 40-50.

Practical Example:

Find authors who were aged 50-100 before they died.
Click on the navigation bar to Search Texts

Note: To search for occurrences where we have been unable to determine a value, key in 9999 in the field box.

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5.2.2 Artist

Description: This is the name of the artist who created an artistic work. This will include all variant forms of the artists name including pseudonyms, pennames, nicknames or aliases. The same official form of the name is used regardless of the form used by the artist at the time of creation. It is required. 

How to use this field: Enter the name of the artist in the Artist field. This field can be searched using Find Images only.

Practical Example: See Author.

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5.2.3 Author Name

Description: This is the name of the author who wrote the text. The name will include all variant forms of the author's name, including pseudonyms, pennames, nicknames, and aliases. The same official form of the name is used regardless of the form used by the author at the time of writing.

How to use this field: Use this field to analyze word usage by a particular author, or find works written by a particular author. This field can be searched in Simple Search, Advanced Search, Letters Only Search, Find Authors, and Find Sources.

Practical Example: Find all text written by John Hariot.

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5.2.4 Author of Source Work

Description: See Author
 

5.2.5 Author's Gender

Description: This field indicates gender of the author.

How to use this field: Use this field to restrict your search to authors of one or the other gender. This option is available in Find Authors, Simple Search, Advanced Search, and Letters Only. Gender is indicated by an M or an F.

Practical Example:Find all letters written by women authors.

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5.2.6 Cultural Affiliation

Description: This field is used to capture an author's cultural affiliation (i.e. English, American Indian).

How to use this field: Use this field to find works by author's of a particular cultural affiliation. This can be searched in Simple Search, Advanced Search, Letters Only, and Find Authors.

Practical Example: Find all texts by American Indian authors.

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5.2.7 Cultural Events

Description: This field indicates that a cultural event is being discussed in the document.

How to use this field: Use this field to find information about specific cultural events, such as feasts or gift-giving. Cultural events can be found through the Advanced Search.

Practical Example:
You are looking for documents that are about weddings.

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5.2.8 Cultural Groups

Description: This field contains the names of the cultural groups discussed in the documents.

How to use this field: Use this field to find documents about specific cultural groups. This field is available in Advanced Search and Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find all documents about encounters with the Huron.

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5.2.9 Description [of Encounter]

Description: This field contains descriptions of the encounters found in the database.

How to use this field: Use this field to search descriptions of the encounters found in the database. This field is only available in Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find all encounters that concern kidnappings.

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5.2.10 Document Type

Description: This field enables you to restrict the kinds of documents you search and retrieve.

How to use this field: Use this field to find specific types (i.e. letters, diaries, narrative, etc.) of documents. This is available in Advanced Search and Find Sources.

Practical Example:  Find all speeches by American Indians.

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5.2.11 Editor or Translator

Description: This field enables you to find sources or documents edited or translated by a particular person.

How to use this field: Use this field to find all sources edited or translated by a specific person. This search is available in Find Sources and Find Images.

Practical Example: Find all sources edited by Reuben Gold Thwaites.

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5.2.12 Encounter Code

Description: Enables you to search for encounters by a numeric code.

How to use this field: Use this field to find a specific encounter. This is only available in Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find a specific encounter between the Spanish and American Indians.

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5.2.13 Encounter Name

Description: This field enables you to search encounters by a specific name.

How to use this field: Use this search to find a specific encounter. This is only available in Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find me all encounters involving the Spanish.

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5.2.14 Encounter Type

Description: This field contains the type of encounter described in the text.

How to use this field: Use this field to find specific kinds of encounters between cultural groups (i.e. kidnap, battle, trade, etc.). This field is only available in the Find Encounters Field.

Practical Example: Find me all encounters that centered around trade.

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5.2.15 Estimated Number of People

Description: This field provides an estimated number of people that may have been involved in an encounter.

How to use this field: This field can be used to search for encounters in which a certain number of people were involved. This field is only available in Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find all encounters in the database in which between 10 and 25 people were involved

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5.2.16 Expedition

Description: This field contains names of recognized expeditions. Expeditions are named based on The Atlas of North American Exploration: From the Norse Voyages to the Race to the Pole by William H. Goetzman and Glyndwr Williams.

How to use this field:Use this field to find documents about specific expeditions.

Practical Example: Find all documents about the the Hernando de Soto expedition to Florida.

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5.2.17 Fatalities during Encounter

Description: This is a Yes/No field that indicates whether or not there were fatalities during the encounter.

How to use this field: Use this field for searches for all encounters in the database that did or did not have fatalities. This field is only available in Find Encounters.

Practical Example: Find all fatal encounters where the Huron were involved.

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5.2.18 Fauna

Description: This field contains subject headings related to animal life in North America.

How to use this field: Use this field to find documents discussing animal life. This field can only be searched from the Advanced Search screen.

Practical Example: Find all documents that talk about beavers.

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5.2.19 Flora

Description: This field holds subject topics which describe plant life in North America.

How to use this field: Use this field to find all documents in the database that discuss a specific plant. This field is available only in Advanced Search.

Practical Example: Find all documents in the database that are about tobacco.

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5.2.20 Geophysical Features

Description: This field holds subject topics which describe North American geophysical feature, such as mountains, rivers, etc. 

How to use this field: Use this field to find documents that describe geophysical features found in North America. This field is only available in Advanced Search

Practical Example: Find all documents in the database that describe mountains.

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5.2.21 Image Color

Description: This field allows you to restrict to images with color, or that are black and white. This field does not search all images in the database. It is restricted to images that have value outside of the texts in which they were originally found.

How to use this field: Select the option  you want from the pick list. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Find black and white images in the database.

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5.2.22 Image ID

Description: This field is intended for quick access to a particular image.

How to use this field: Key in the exact Image ID number in the box. Image IDs always take the format Sxxxx-Ixx, where Sxxxx is the source from which the image came and Ixx is the image number within that source. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Find image S2995-I03.

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5.2.23 Image Medium

Description: This field lets you restrict to woodcuts, drawings and other media.

How to use this field: Key in the medium you are looking for into the Image Medium box. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Restrict your search to Woodcuts.

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5.2.24 Image Source

Description: This field lets you identify all images from a particular archive, or museum.   This field is not mandatory and is  populated only for manuscript material.

How to use this field: Key in the source you are looking for into the Image Source box. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Find all images from the University of California.

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5.2.25 Image Subject

Description: This field lets you find images of particular topical subjects.

How to use this field: Key in the subject you are looking for into the Image Subject box. To find out what subjects are available, click the terms button to the right of the Image Subject box. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Find all images of farming.

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5.2.26 Image Title

Description: This field searches the titles of images in the database.

How to use this field: Key in the title you are looking for into the Image Title box. To find out what titles are available, click the terms button to the right of the Image Title box. This field is only available in Find Images

Practical Example: Find all images with Indian in the title.

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5.2.27 Image Type (Not currently implemented)

Description: This field describes the kinds of images available in the database (paintings, woodcuts, etc.).

How to use this field: Use this field to limit searches of images to one specific kind of image. This field is not currently implemented.

Practical Example: Find all woodcuts indexed in the database.

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5.2.28 Keyword in Caption

Description: This field contains captions taken directly from the originals. In cases where the images are referred to within texts, the referring text is included.

How to use this field: Use this field to search for keywords in captions. This field is only available in the Find Images.

Practical Example: Find all captions that contain the word dance.

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5.2.29 Keyword in Content Note or Keyword in Descriptive Note

Description: Content Notes are created by our editors to describe the contents of images. Descriptive Notes are created by our editors for information about the image itself - for example, questions of provenance, earlier versions etc...

How to use this field: Use these fields to search for keywords in content notes or descriptive notes. This field is only available in the Find Images.

Practical Example: Find all content notes that contain the word Indian.

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5.2.30 Keyword in Source Note

Description: This field is to allow you to search bibliographic notes about the source described.

How to use this field: Use this field to search through notes on provenance, original editions and other miscellaneous information . This field is only available in Find Sources.

Practical Example: Find all notes that mention the word 'reprint'.