Barbara MorrisService Co-ordinator

Statistical Accounts of Scotland Online(1791-99 and 1834-45)

Collaboration between academic and public sectors

Email: edina@ed.ac.uk

Collaborative Working

Joint Board for the Statistical Accounts of Scotland

Scottish Library and Information Council

Scottish Confederation of University and Research Libraries

Map of ScotlandNew Statistical Account (1845)

What are the Statistical Accounts?

• First (Old) Statistical account 1791-99, a contemporary “Domesday Book” for Scotland (in 21 volumes)

• Second (New) Statistical Account 1834-45 (15 volumes)

• detailed descriptions of 938 parishes compiled by clergy

• statistical tables, maps, and diagrams

• important source material in the critical 40-50 years during the Agricultural and Industrial Revolutions topography • climate • botany • population • disease • agriculture • wages • architecture • roads • schools • fishing • minerals • remarkable occurrences • morals

Service Preparation

• 29,000 pages scanned a SCURL initiative funded by the JISC

• 29,000 scanned page images typed to permit keyword/phrase searchingfunded by the National Archives of Scotland

• interface developed by EDINA

• tested in public and academic institutions

• FREE service launched January 2001

The ‘Old’ Statistical Account of the Parish of Ceres, Fife

Fiars in Berwick

(price of grain)

1689-1792

Census data, 1785-93

Future developments

• Guided by an Editor and the Joint Board for the Statistical Accounts of Scotland

• New features from October 2001 -

• Access to re-typed text for “cut-and-paste” (FREE)

• Advanced searching e.g. statistical tables (SUBSCRIPTION)

• New features from 2002 - Links via graphic front-end to historic maps, place-name gazetteers, (SUBSCRIPTION)

To use this FREE service, log into the Statistical Accounts on the Web at:

http://edina.ac.uk/

To find out about future developments, email:

edina@ed.ac.uk