Art history resources
Books on Fine arts can be found in rooms 2.44 and 2.45 at the Maughan Library, with the classmark N.
The following links are to art-focused eresources and image libraries:
- Art and Architecture Archive This link opens in a new window A full-text archive of magazines comprising key research material in the fields of art and architecture, dating from the late-nineteenth century to the twenty-first. Subjects covered include fine art, decorative arts, architecture, interior design, industrial design, and photography. The issues are presented as full-color page images; detailed article-level indexing permits quick, efficient searching and navigation of this material. Senate House membership gives access to: Art & Architecture Archive Collection 1 Art & Architecture Archive Collection 2 Coverage: 1895 - 2015 Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Image Quest This link opens in a new window Britannica® ImageQuest™ – provides access to millions of royalty free images on one site and from 60 of the world’s most respected image libraries. You can access million rights-cleared images from over 50 world-class collections, including: British Library, De Agostini Editore Picture Library, Design Pics and Photo Researchers.Each photo or illustration comes with complete metadata, including the source, the copyright holder, caption and keywords. Because Britannica has done the work of finding the best photos – most of which are not freely available on the web – you can trust the source and be certain that you’re using an accurate photo.
- Artstor (JSTOR) Artstor features millions of high-quality images and media from some of the world’s top photo archives, museums, libraries, scholars, and artists, including rare materials not available anywhere else. Artstor’s collections also include Open Access collections from partner museums freely available to all. All content in Artstor is rights-cleared for education and research — you are free to use it in classroom instruction and handouts, presentations, student assignments, and other noncommercial educational and scholarly activities. With approximately 300 collections composed of over 2 million images* (and growing), scholars can examine wide-ranging material such as Native American art from the Smithsonian, treasures from the Louvre, and panoramic, 360-degree views of the Hagia Sophia in a single, easy-to-use resource.
- Index of Medieval Art This link opens in a new window The Index of Medieval Art online database holdings complement and partly overlap with the print Index at Princeton University, which is currently being integrated into the database. The collections include images and descriptive data related to the iconography of works of art produced between late Antiquity and the sixteenth century. Although the Index of Medieval Art was formerly known as the Index of Christian Art, it now includes secular subjects as well as a growing number of subjects from medieval Jewish and Islamic culture. As of 1 July 2023, the Index is accessible without a subscription.
- VADS This link opens in a new window ADS provides a national collection of over 140,000 images from over 300 art and design collections across the UK, which are freely available for non-commercial use in education. The images cover the broad range of the visual arts including applied arts, architecture, design, fashion, fine art, and media. VADS is a service of the Library at the University for the Creative Arts (UCA).
The Maughan Library
Print books, journals and DVDs for Languages, Literatures and Cultures can be found at the Maughan Library.
Other libraries
If you need further resources, you may want to visit other libraries. Please check for access restrictions before visiting.
Collections Guide for Languages, Literatures and Cultures
Welcome to the Collections Guide for Languages, Literatures and Cultures
This guide provides tailored information on library collections and links to some of our key resources.
Languages, Literatures and Cultures resources
- Cambridge Companions Online (Cambridge Core) This link opens in a new window Cambridge Companions are a series of authoritative guides, written by leading experts, offering lively, accessible introductions to major writers, artists, philosophers, topics, and periods. CCO offers thousands of comprehensive and accessible essays on major authors, periods and genres, written by experts and designed for student readers.King's users have access to the complete collection of Cambridge Companions, which is divided into three subsections: Literature and Classics; Philosophy, Religion and Culture; and Music.
- MLA International Bibliography and Periodicals Directory This link opens in a new window Covers folklore, languages, linguistics and literature. Provides citations for items from journals and series published worldwide from 1926 to date. Indexes books, essay collections, working papers, proceedings, dissertations and bibliographies. Available via EBSCOhost. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Oxford Reference Online This link opens in a new window Oxford Reference Online: The Core Collection brings together 100 well-known and trusted dictionaries, reference books and Encyclopedias, into a single cross-searchable web database. The Premium Collection offers all of these, plus added functionality and more detailed information from titles in the world-renowned Oxford Companions Series, plus the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations. ORO provides integrated, consistent coverage of a broad range of subjects: everything from General Reference, Language and Quotations to Science and Medicine, and from Humanities and Social Sciences to Business and Professional.
- Torrossa This link opens in a new window Torrossa, Casalini Libri's full text platform offers access to over 455,000 articles and chapters, 39,000 ebooks and 1,000 ejournals from over 265 Italian, Spanish, French and Portuguese publishers. Please note: Only select titles are subscribed by Senate House Library. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
Find books for Languages, Literatures and Cultures
Print dictionaries / lexicons can be found in the Round Reading Room at the Maughan Library and also on the shelves with the relevant collection at the following classmarks:
- PC2640 - French
- PC4640 - Spanish
- PC5333 - Portuguese
- PE1625 - English
- PF3640 - German
Key classmarks for Comparative Literature:
- PA5000-5660 - Byzantine and modern Greek literature
- PJ7501-8517 - Arabic literature
- PK2030-2142 - Hindi, Hindustani literatures
- PK2151-2212 - Urdu literature
- PL8009.5-8014 - African literature
- PN45-57 - Theory
- PN80-99 - Criticism
- PN801-820 - Romance Literature
- PN821-840 - Germanic Literature
- PN851-884 - Comparative Literature
- PN1010-1525 - Poetry
- PN1600-3307 - Drama
- PN3311-3503 - Prose
- PQ4001-5999 - Italian literature
- PR1-9680 - English literature
- PS1-3626 - American literature
Key classmarks for the study of the French language and Francophone and associated cultures:
- DC1-947 - French history
- DS531-560.72 - French Indochina history
- DT411-411.9 - French Territory of the Afars and Issas. French Somaliland history
- DT521-555.9 - French West Africa, French Sahara history
- DT546.1-546.49 - French-speaking Equatorial Africa history
- DT551-551.9 - French Sudan history
- JN2301-3007 - French politics
- PC2001-3761 - French language
- PC3801-3976 - Catalan language
- PH5001-5490 - Basque language
- PQ1-3999 - French literature
Key classmarks for the study of the German language and German-speaking and associated cultures:
- DD1-905 - German history
- DT436-449 - German East Africa history
- JN3201-4980 - German politics
- PF3001-5999 - German language
- PN821-840 - Germanic literature
- PT1-4897 - German literature
Key classmarks for the study of the Spanish and Portuguese languages and Spanish-speaking, Lusophone, and associated cultures:
- DP1-402 - Spanish history
- DT330 - Spanish Morocco history
- DT619-620.9 - Spanish West Africa history
- JN8101-8399 - Spanish politics
- PC4001-4977 - Spanish language
- PQ6001-6726 - Spanish literature
- PQ6056 - Moorish-Spanish literature
- PQ7081-8560 - Spanish American literature
- PH5001-5490 - Basque language
- PC3801-3976 - Catalan language
- DP501-900.22 - Portuguese history
- DS498-498.8 - Portuguese in India history
- DT591-615.9 - Portuguese-speaking West Africa history
- JN8423-8661 - Portuguese politics
- PC5001-5498 - Portuguese language
- PQ9000-9326 - Portuguese literature
- PQ9900-9948 - Portuguese African literature
- F1201-3799 - Latin American history
- JL1200-2499 - Latin American politics
- PQ9500-9796 - Brazilian literature
Watch films in a range of languages
A diverse collection of films covering a wide range of genres and multiple languages. Staff and students have access to subscription titles as well as free content.
- BFI Player (British Film Institute) This link opens in a new window BFI Player is a video on demand service from the British Film Institute, streaming acclaimed, landmark and archive films. These are available for rent, for subscription or for free. King's College London has a subscription. The placement and availability of films is dependent on rights agreements with licensors. The focus is on British and European independent films, as well as international releases.Additional information:Access your free BFI Player subscription in 3 easy steps: 1. Go to player.bfi.org.uk/students and create an account OR sign in if you already have one by selecting 'Already have an account? Sign in'2. Select university from the dropdown list 3. Authenticate subscription using your university credentialsFYI:• Once you've set up your subscription, you can simply login on BFI Player for the remainder of this academic year. You don't need to use the subscribe link• BFI Player is unavailable outside the UK• Rentals and festival events are not included in the subscription offer• Make sure you tick the box ‘I’d like to receive the newsletter’ for exclusive competitions, watchlists and other BFI opportunities via email. A reminder that users need to re-subscribe every year e.g. if someone had an account last year, they simply need to visit player.bfi.org.uk/students and select 'Already have an account Sign in'.
A key streaming resource for films. Includes French, Spanish and Asian feature films, plus documentaries and videos on a wide range of subjects.
- Kanopy This link opens in a new window Kanopy is an online video streaming platform with access to a unique collection of films in the world, including documentaries and training films.
Offers a huge collection of films, TV and radio programmes which have aired on UK channels. Useful for titles that are not available via commercial streaming services or on DVD.
- Box of Broadcasts (BoB National) This link opens in a new window BoB (Box of Broadcasts) National is a shared online off-air TV and radio recording service for UK higher and further education institutions. You can choose and record any broadcast programme from 60+ TV and radio channels. The recorded programmes are then kept indefinitely (no expiry) and added to a growing media archive (currently at over 1 million programmes), with all content shared by users across all subscribing institutions.Please note: Individual registration is required and access is only available from the UK.
A film streaming resource specialising in features and documentaries from Spanish-speaking countries. Also includes titles in a number of languages.
- Digitalia Film Library This link opens in a new window Digitalia Film Library is an online film streaming platform providing access to films and documentaries in international languages and includes unique content from Spain and all Spanish speaking countries. With access to more than 1400 titles covering 42 different languages including Spanish, Russian and many other Germanic, Romance and Slavic languages, Digitalia Film Library provides subtitles in English.
A vast multi-disciplinary video collection. Includes a large number of documentaries on its Film Platform and Documentary channel.
- Alexander Street Video (Alexander Street Press) - New platform This link opens in a new window Alexander Street Press is an online video streaming platform with access to more than 34,000 video titles. This database offers a wealth of digitized content across disciplines, but is particularly focused on the fields of counselling, anthropology, history, diversity studies, theatre, film, music, dance, news, current affairs, and the social sciences.King’s has access to a wide range of educational videos, audio and text resources.
Covers a wide range of subjects including feature films and documentaries.
- Academic Video Online This link opens in a new window Academic Video Online provides a vast database of film and video clips from documentary, newsreel, entertainment, and television sources. The thematic range and temporal span make the collection relevant to many disciplines, from anthropology to zoology, various courses and student levels. The collection includes award-winning films, including Academy®, Emmy®, and Peabody® winners, and gives access to the content from PBS, BBC, 60 MINUTES, National Geographic, Annenberg Learner, BroadwayHD™, A+E Networks’ HISTORY® and more sources. Academic Video Online is a part of ProQuest One Academic.
A large collection of Spanish-language films and companion guides.
- Platino Educa This link opens in a new window An educational site, aimed at teachers and lecturers, which provides a large collection of Spanish-language films and companion teaching guides. The website provides information in English and Spanish.
Documentary films, features and newsreels from countries including the USSR, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, China and East Germany.
- Socialism on Film This link opens in a new window Sourced from the British Film Institute (BFI), Socialism on Film documents the communist world, from the Russian Revolution to the end of the Cold War. This unique multimedia collection spans most of the twentieth century and contains documentary films, features and newsreels from countries including the USSR, Vietnam, Korea, Cuba, China and East Germany, and provides a counterpoint to Western perceptions of communist states.
Newspapers
UK and international newspapers are useful sources for a number of subjects. Our collection provides a range of historical titles and current editions.
Factiva and Nexis UK include international and non-Anglophone titles.
French resources
- Cairn ebook collection This link opens in a new window Cairn eBook (Ouvrages) collection offers publications in social sciences and humanities from major French, Belgian and Swiss publishers. King's has access to 11 titles in the area of political science.
- Cairn Journals Collection This link opens in a new window Cairn Journals (Revues) Collection offers a comprehensive online collection of journal content covering Humanities and Social Sciences, French Studies and Economic, Social, and Political Sciences from major French language publishers
German resources
- Bibliographie der deutschen Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft (BDSL) This link opens in a new window German language index of (primarily) German language periodicals, covering all aspects of German language and literature from 1985 to the present. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Monumenta Germaniae Historica (Brepols) This link opens in a new window A corpus of historical works, charters, legal texts, letters, political texts, and literature from the European Middle Ages. It contains about 800 texts and further material is added yearly.The powerful search engine developed by the Centre ‘Traditio Litterarum Occidentalium’ and Brepols Publishers allows unparalleled exploitation of this important body of texts, permitting in-depth searches of the corpus. Moreover, the integration of the eMGH into the Brepolis Latin platform offers the opportunity to carry out searches simultaneously with other collections of texts bringing together a total of 16,000 works (Library of Latin Texts, Aristoteles Latinus Database, Archive of Celtic-Latin Literature), and allows the user to search Latin reference dictionaries (Database of Latin Dictionaries).
Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American resources
- Brazilian and Portuguese History and Culture (Gale Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window Manoel de Oliveira Lima was a Brazilian diplomat, journalist, historian, and book collector whose career spanned Brazil's transition from empire to republic. Born in 1867 in Recife, Pernambuco, and educated from the age of six in Portugal, he dedicated himself to the study of Brazilian and Portuguese culture. Brazilian history and literature was the central focus of his writing and collecting. Oliveira Lima's twenty-three-year diplomatic career included postings in five European capitals—Lisbon, Berlin, London, Brussels, and Stockholm—as well as in Washington, Tokyo, and Caracas. His travels in Europe and the Americas afforded him privileged access to dealers in books, manuscripts, works of art, and other materials for the study of Brazil, Portugal, and the Ibero-American world.
- Confidential Print: Latin America, 1833-1969 (Adam Matthew Primary Sources) This link opens in a new window This full-text collection comprises “the most important papers generated by the Foreign and Colonial Offices” of Great Britain pertaining to Central and South America and the French- and Spanish-speaking Caribbean from 1833-1969. The materials range from single-page letters or telegrams to comprehensive dispatches, investigative reports and texts of treaties. They cover a vast array of topics, and document Latin American history from a British perspective.
- Hispanic American Periodicals Index (HAPI) This link opens in a new window HAPI is your source for authoritative, worldwide information about Central and South America, Mexico, Brazil, the Caribbean basin, the United States-Mexico border region, and Hispanics/Latinos in the United States. HAPI Online contains complete bibliographic citations to articles, book reviews (through 2001), documents, original literary works, and other materials appearing in more than 500 key social science and humanities journals published throughout the world. HAPI Online combines current information about Latin America with in-depth coverage spanning more than thirty years. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Iberoamericana Online This link opens in a new window Iberoamericana Online is a companion collection to the world-leading journal Revista Iberoamericana, now published by Liverpool University Press as part of a new partnership with the Instituto Internacional de Literatura Iberoamericana (IILI), the oldest and most extended academic organization dedicated to the study and promotion of research in Latin American literature at a global level. The collection comprises of 106 volumes including those from IILI’s renowned print series: Serie Nueva América, Serie Nuevo Siglo, Serie ACP (Antonio Cornejo Polar), Serie Premio Revista Iberoamericana a la mejor tesis, Serie Malunga, Serie S (Sexo y Sexualidades), Serie Libros de los Mundos, Serie Críticas, Serie Clásicos de América and Serie Tres Ríos. The majority of the volumes in the collection are Spanish language and largely focus on Latin America and the Caribbean with titles on Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Mexico, Peru, Puerto Rico and Venezuela. An essential digital resource in Latin American literary studies, this collection is rich with an abundance of academic research spanning subject areas including literary criticism and theory, poetry, politics, history, colonialism, indigenous studies, queer studies, gender studies and more. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Latin American Drama This link opens in a new window Latin American Drama is a one-of-a-kind database with plays written by Latin American playwrights in the 19th-21st centuries. Besides serving as a rich resource for literature scholars, the collection also supports the study of American history, ethnic diversity, immigrations issues, and political history. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Latin American Newsletters (LatinNews) This link opens in a new window Latin American Newsletters (LatinNews) was founded in London in 1967 to provide expert political, economic, and security analysis on Latin America and the Caribbean. For nearly 50 years, it has been acknowledged as the foremost authority on the region. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Latinx Thought and Culture: The NPR Archive, 1979-1990 This link opens in a new window Latinx Thought and Culture: The NPR Archive, 1979-1990 showcases two radio programs: the weekly Spanish-language Enfoque Nacional (1979-1988) and the Daily English-language Latin File (1988-1990), available for the first time in a searchable database as digitized audio with transcripts. They focus on Latinx issues related to politics, sociology, human rights, the arts and more with interviews of key figures and news reporting by a new generation of Latino/a journalists at the time. Coverage:Enfoque Nacional, 1979-1988 (Weekly, 500 episodes of 30 minutes each) Latin File, 1988-1990 (Daily, 414 episodes of 15 minutes each) Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Oxford Research Encyclopedias (OREs) This link opens in a new window For the Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Latin American History
- PRISMA (Publicaciones y Revistas Sociales y Humanísticas) This link opens in a new window PRISMA (Publicaciones y Revistas Sociales y Humanísticas) is a comprehensive reference resource providing full-text scholarly journals in the social sciences and humanities for the interdisciplinary academic study of Hispanic and Latin America, and the Caribbean Basin. Offering key titles indexed in the Hispanic American Periodicals Index (HAPI), a highly respected database produced by the Latin American Center of the University of California, Los Angeles, PRISMA features Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
Comparative literature resources
- Dictionary of Literary Biography Dictionary of Literary Biography gives online access to biographical and critical essays on the lives, works and careers of the world's most influential literary figures.Senate House on site access only. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Literary Encyclopedia The Literary Encyclopedia is a constantly evolving and updating repository of authoritative reference work about literary and cultural history. All our articles are solicited by invitation from specialist scholars in higher education institutions all over the world, refereed and approved by subject editors in our Editorial Board. The LE is thus uniquely selective, reliable and authoritative. Its online format allows for rapid publication and frequent updating of articles; its integrated digital resources (author life-chronologies, customisable timelines, thematic or course-oriented bookshelves, related article clusters, critical bibliographies) respond dynamically to teaching and learning demands.Senate House on site access only. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
- Literature Online (LION) This link opens in a new window Literature Online is a fully searchable library of over 330,000 works of English and American poetry, drama, and prose, plus biographies, bibliographies and key secondary sources. Senate House resources require registering for Senate House library membership. See also our library FAQ for more details.
Spanish, Portuguese and Latin American collections
Our collections on the history, literature, and culture of Spain, Portugal and Latin America and of the Portuguese-speaking world are an area of collection strength and are considered to be of national and international importance. They include the library collections of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Canning House. Our holdings are especially strong in Portuguese history and literature, Brazilian history and the history and culture of Portuguese-speaking Africa.
Find Arts & Humanities literature online
The following eresources cover a range of disciplines including your subject area:
- Proquest Arts & Humanities collection This link opens in a new window A collection of ProQuest databases in the Arts & Humanities subject area for King's users. Additional databases may be available via Senate House
- JSTOR ebooks and journals This link opens in a new window JSTOR offers academic journal articles, books, and primary sources in 75 disciplines. Via JSTOR books, King's currently has access to over 54,000 titles from over 42 publishers.King’s subscribes to the following collections within JSTOR: 19th Century British PamphletsArts & Sciences I-XV CollectionBusiness I CollectionBusiness II CollectionIreland CollectionJewish StudiesLanguage & Literature CollectionLife Sciences CollectionMusic CollectionPolitical ScienceFilm StudiesLanguage and LiteraturePhilosophyReligionSociologyBusiness and Economics
- Periodicals Archive Online (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window PAO – formerly PCI Full Text - is a major online periodical archive that contains hundreds of journal backfiles in the humanities and social sciences. The date range is 1770-2000. A hive of hundreds of digitised journals published in the arts, humanities and social sciences. It provides researchers with access to more than 200 years of scholarship, spread across a wide variety of subject areas. Please note King's College London users have access to Collections 1 to 10 and JISC special collections 1 and 2.
- Project MUSE This link opens in a new window Project MUSE is a leading provider of digital humanities and social sciences content; since 1995, its electronic journal collections have supported a wide array of research needs at academic, public, special, and school libraries worldwide. MUSE books and journals, from leading university presses and scholarly societies, are fully integrated for search and discovery. King's only subscribes to selected journals.
- EBook Central (Proquest) - King's This link opens in a new window Ebook Central is an ebook platform. King’s have purchased over 21,200 titles covering a range of subjects and provides further access to over 176,350 titles.
- Humanities Index (1962-) (ProQuest) This link opens in a new window Formerly known as BHI: British Humanities Index.An international abstracting and indexing tool for research in the humanities, HI indexes over 400 internationally respected humanities journals and weekly magazines published in the UK and other English speaking countries, as well as quality newspapers published in the UK. It covers current affairs, political science, religion, law, history, archaeology, education, economics, environment and gender studies.Updated monthly with approximately 1,500 records added; it also has the capability to link to electronic full text of many journal articles
Senate House Library
Senate House Library is a large humanities research library in Bloomsbury. 
King’s staff and students are entitled to free membership which provides
borrowing rights to print books and remote access to most eresources.
See Membership for information on signing up.