English Short Title Catalogue, 1473-1800

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Introduction

The English Short Title Catalogue supersedes the Eighteenth Century Short Title Catalogue (but retains the acronym ESTC) and has a chronological coverage of c. 1473-1800. The following have been added to the records of the printed output of the eighteenth century:

  • 24,000 of the 36,000 records listed in A.W. Pollard and G.R. Redgrave, A short-title catalogue of books printed in England. Scotland and Ireland: and of English books printed abroad, 1475-1640; 2nd ed. (London: Bibliographical Society, 1976-1991). 3 vols
  • 47,000 of the 105,000 records listed in D.G. Wing, Short-title catalogue of books printed in England, Scotland and Ireland..., and of English books printed in other countries, 1641-1700; 2nd ed. (New York: Modern Language Association of America, 1972-1988). 3 vols

The English Short Title Catalogue provides extensive descriptions and holdings information for materials printed in Great Britain or any of its dependencies, in any language - as well as for materials printed in English anywhere else in the world. The following material is not included: forms, trade and visiting cards, labels, tickets, invitations, bookplates, playbills, theatre programmes, playing cards, games and puzzles. Coverage is from the beginnings of print to 1800 including all recorded English monographs printed between 1475 and 1700. The English Short Title Catalogue is updated daily.

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How to access the ESTC

All databases are accessible via MetaLib. Find MetaLib from the University homepage by following:

  • To find MetaLib from the University homepage follow:
    either Student home | Library | MetaLib gateway (under Quick Links)
    or Staff home | Library | MetaLib gateway (under Quick Links)
or

When you get into MetaLib, choose the Find Database tab. Locate English Short Title Catalogue (ESTC) from the alphabetical list of databases and click on the title link. A new window will display the ESTC front page.

Information about how to gain access to ESTC from off-campus is available from our How to Connect web page

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How to Search

There are two main ways to search the ESTC Simple Search and Advanced Search. If you have any problems using any of the functions please use the Help option, located in the toolbar, in the top right hand side of the screen.

Simple Search

This gives you the option to search for keyword(s), word(s)in a title or author etc.

ESTC simple search

Advanced Search

This allows you to combine search terms using Boolean operators:

Boolean Operators
Operator Usage
AND Both words must appear in the record (e.g. York AND minster)
OR Either word will appear (e.g. organ OR harpsichord)
NOT Records including the second term will be excluded (e.g. York NOT new)
Use with care this may also discard useful results.

It also allows you to search for a range of information, including subject, keyword, place or date of publication, and genres i.e. advertisements, directories or songs etc (genre codes can be found in the Help option).

If you are not sure of the spelling of a word, try adding the truncation symbol "?".
Example - Moral? will find Moral, morals, morality etc.

Advanced Search Screen

ESTC advanced search

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Display results

Searches for authors, titles, imprints and subjects will allow you to Browse a list of, all authors, titles etc within the ESTC (as appropriate). The 3rd line will display the closest match to your search. This is especially useful if you are unsure of a name or spelling.

ESTC results

There are three options for the way in which multi-record results are displayed, the default setting is List, but you may select one of the following:

Display options
Display Usage
ESTC list display
The List displays one line for each record, showing author, title and year
ESTC brief display
The Brief display provides more detail for each record, including complete author, title, date and imprint information
ESTC full display
The Full display provides complete bibliographic information, including subject headings and added authors. Single record results will always display as Full displays

You can set ESTC to display in your preferred manner, by using the preferences screen, (located in the top right hand corner of the screen along side the help option.)

You can also sort your results according to Author, Title or Year, by clicking on the options at the top of the list.

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Locating Items

The Full Search display also provides details for the holdings of items.

ESTC item location

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Access to Full Text

The full text of the items covered by ESTC can be found in one of two places:

Early English Books on-line (EEBO)

This collection contains digitized versions of the books listed in Pollard & Redgrave and D.G. Wing catalogues, the Thomason tracts are currently being added. EEBO covers the period between 1475 and 1700. EEBO can be accessed from the University homepage by clicking on:

Current students | Study resources | Information connections | Databases at York | Early English Books On-line

18th Century Microfilm Collection

This collection provides microfilmed images of the full texts of all the material printed in any language between 1701 and 1800 in Great Britain and its colonies in North America, the Caribbean and India.

The collection is housed in the RBL, reader printers are availble to print copies of any items of interest. It is also worth noting that the Library has an ongoing project to make all the bibliographic records for this collection searchable via the Library catalogue.

For further information please contact Lisa Foggo (e-mail lf523) or Rosemary van Zijl (e-mail rpvz1).

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Print/e-Mail results

  • You may select up to 50 records within a list to e-mail or print
  • Tick the box next to a record to select it, if you do not tick any boxes ESTC will presume that you wish to select all records
  • When you click Print, formatted records will appear in a new window. You may then use your browser to print
  • You may choose to Print/E-mail in any of the display formats
ESTC print/email results

Limit Searching

You can limit your searching in three ways:

  • Click Limit, from a result of 10,000 records or fewer to limit your search by date, language, country of publication, and other (MARC tags)
  • Click Refine from a result of 100 records to add one or two more search terms to narrow your result
  • Click Previous Search at the top of most screens if you've done two or more searches in this database, to combine two or more result sets - this will retrieve only those records matching selected terms

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Help

For further advice please click on the Help button in the top right of the screen.