World History: Primary Sources

Primary Sources

According to the Society of American Archivists, a primary source is “material that contains firsthand accounts of events and that was created contemporaneous to those events or later recalled by an eyewitness.”

Common Examples of Primary Sources

• Documents: diaries, letters, birth/death certificates, medical records, constitutions, court records, etc.
• Photographs: visual records
• Oral Histories: a record of an individual's accounts and interpretations of the past in their own spoken words preserved through the use of audio or video recordings.
• Objects: artifacts, something produced or shaped by human workmanship - like a statue.