Imperial and Colonial History Datasets

  • This material is held at
  • Reference
      GB 1956 Imperial and Colonial History
  • Dates of Creation
      1980-2002
  • Name of Creator
  • Language of Material
      English.
  • Physical Description
      [databases]

Scope and Content

Study Number 801: Nations in Conflict : Data on National Growth and International Violence for Six Major European Powers, 1870-1914: The annual aggregate data compiled for the period 1870 - 1914 on Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Russia and Austria-Hungary are in 8 categories: national size, colonial size, economic and productivity profile, commercial activity, government budget, alliances, violence, and conflicts of interest. The first 6 are aggregate data compiled from yearbooks and other historical sources. One of the alliance measures - adversary relationship - is a dummy variable coded 1 if nation was not aligned, 0 if aligned. Variables in the last two categories are derived from subjective scaling procedures.

Study Number 1384: Slave Trade Movement between Africa and the Americas, 1817-1843: Data includes: ship's port of arrival, date of arrival, type of vessel, tonnage, master's name, number of guns, number of crew, national flag, number of slaves, port of departure, number of days of voyage, mortality.

Study Number 1385: English Slave Trade, 1791-1799: House of Lords Survey: Data includes: ship's name, tonnage, home port of ship, departure date, African port of arrival, date of African arrival, slaves taken on board (total number), slave mortality, slaves relanded before African port departure, number of slaves shipped, date of African departure, American port of arrival, date of arrival in New World, number of slaves landed, date ship left America.

Study Number 2923: Liverpool Trade and Shipping, 1744 to 1786: Liverpool overseas trade and shipping; trans-atlantic voyage patterns; slave trade; Liverpool shipowners and merchants; war and its impact on trade and shipping.

Study Number 2992: British Economic Imperialism, 1869 to 1914: Variables include raw values, nine-year moving averages, deviations from the average, and deviations from the linear trend for such quantities as British investment abroad, British gross domestic fixed capital, British exports and imports to the British Empire and to other parts of the world, and the number of British alliances. Data were collected from the most recent available studies in economic history, econometrics, and political science.

Study Number 2994: Wealth, Household Expenditure and Consumer Goods in Preindustrial England and America, 1550 to 1800: The probate inventories (Parts 1-11) include information about personal wealth, household production, and the possession of consumer durables and semi-durables. The household survey for England circa 1790 (Part 12) contains dietary information as well as information about other household expenditures. The wills from England and America (Part 13) are a source for learning about the kinds of goods people obtained from their families through inheritance. Finally, information pertaining to the distribution network in eighteenth century England is contained in the aggregate county-level data on the shop and peddlers' tax (Part 14).

Study Number 3219: European State Finance Database - Revenues and Expenditure in Spanish America c. 1570 to c. 1816: Each record is the income or expenditure of an individual tax for a given year and treasury. Data includes: archival source; starting month; starting year; ending month; ending year; caja id; tax code number; type (debit or credit); pesos de ocho; pesos de ensayados; pesos de oro; tax name.

Study Number 3882: Liverpool Community, 1649 - 1750: Data includes:

  • Councillors and town officers, 1649-1749
  • Freemen admissions, 1650-1708
  • Hearth taxes 1663, 1664, 1666, 1673
  • Overseas Port Book, 1665
  • Vestry officials, 1681-1750
  • Apprentices indentured, 1707-50
  • Rate assessment for 1708
  • Overseas Port Book, 1709
  • Rate assessment, 1743
  • Plantation ship owners, 1743-48

Study Number 4077: Jeremy Bentham, 1748 to 1832 - transcripts of original manuscripts: The data represent a full transcription of a small proportion of the 60,000 manuscripts of Bentham's writing held in University College London Library and includes:

  • Securities Against Misrule
  • Constitutional Code
  • Official Aptitude Maximized: Expense Minimized
  • Book of Fallacies
  • 'Emancipation Spanish' and 'Rid Yourselves of Ultramaria'
  • 'Codification Proposal'
  • 'Writings on Medicine and Poor Relief'
  • Full transcriptions of manuscripts relating to the following subjects: Evidence; Logic; France.
  • Full transcriptions of the following fragments: Colonization Society; Clony an Navy; Definitions of Pain and Pleasure; Auto-icon; Civil Code.

Study Number 4544: Political Regimes and Regime Transitions in Africa, 1910 to 1994: This data collection focuses on political regimes and regime transitions in 47 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The first part of the dataset contains information on the characteristics of post-colonial political regimes from independence to December 31, 1989. Economic variables include GNP per capita, inflation, structural adjustment programs, overseas development assistance, and external debt, while social indicators concern ethnic and religious fragmentation. Political variables provide a listing of every national election in Africa from independence to 1989, for totals of 106 presidential and 185 parliamentary contests, the number of political parties, association groups, and media outlets in each country in 1975 and 1989, and type of political regime, including the duration of each regime in years and the total number and mode of previous regime transitions up to 1989.

Administrative / Biographical History

Study Number 801: Nations in Conflict : Data on National Growth and International Violence for Six Major European Powers, 1870-1914: The data were compiled as part of the investigators' study dealing with the dynamics of conflict and warfare and the role of national growth and expansion in that process.

Study Number 1384: Slave Trade Movement between Africa and the Americas, 1817-1843: To conduct a quantitative analysis of the slave trade from Africa to the Americas during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

Study Number 1385: English Slave Trade, 1791-1799: House of Lords Survey: To examine the growth of slave trade to the America's, the internal dynamics of its volume, and how it compared with other trades within the British Empire and with other leading slave trade routes of other European powers.

Study Number 2923: Liverpool Trade and Shipping, 1744 to 1786: The aim of these data is to produce a machine-readable edition of the Liverpool Plantation Registers 1744-84, and of the known voyages, masters, shipowners and life histories of the vessels listed therein through to 1786.

Study Number 2992: British Economic Imperialism, 1869 to 1914: These data are a time series of forty-six cases, 1869-1914, consisting of one hundred and thirty-four variables recording information on various aspects of the British economy.

Study Number 2994: Wealth, Household Expenditure and Consumer Goods in Preindustrial England and America, 1550 to 1800: These data explore changes in English and American consumption between 1550 and 1800.

Study Number 3219: European State Finance Database - Revenues and Expenditure in Spanish America c. 1570 to c. 1816: The European State Finance Database (ESFD) is an international collaborative research project for the collection of data in European fiscal history. There are no geographical or chronological boundaries to the collection, although version one has concentrated on data within the period c.1200 to c.1815. The purpose of the ESFD is to establish a significant database of European financial and fiscal records. The data are drawn from the main extant sources of a number of European countries, as the evidence and the state of scholarship permit. The aim is to collect the data made available by scholars, whether drawing upon their published or unpublished archival research, or from other published material. The database will be updated from time to time as more data are made available. Scholars who wish to deposit data are encouraged to do so and are advised to contact Professor Richard Bonney at Leicester University. This study is one of 38 studies in the series.

Study Number 3882: Liverpool Community, 1649 - 1750: The purpose of the project was to investigate the character of Liverpool society during the first century of its rapid commercial expansion, and in particular to address the question whether its social characteristics help to explain the dynamic nature of its economic growth. The particular questions addressed include the origins of in-migrants to Liverpool, occupational structure and change, family and business networks, and the character of the governing elite and their use of power. The method was to input major sources for the history of Liverpool into computer files, to link names and compile information about Liverpool inhabitants. This allowed information to be built up about geographical origins, occupations, wealth, residential location, family and business or political networks and inter-generational continuity in the town.

Study Number 4077: Jeremy Bentham, 1748 to 1832 - transcripts of original manuscripts: The aim of the Bentham Project is to produce a new scholarly edition of the works and correspondence of Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), the influential jurist, philosopher and social scientist, whom A.J.P. Taylor described as 'the most formidable reasoner who ever applied his gifts to the practical questions of administration and politics'.

Study Number 4544: Political Regimes and Regime Transitions in Africa, 1910 to 1994: This project was intended to provide a comparative analysis of recent political developments in Africa by presenting a set of quantitative data on political regimes and regime transitions. The data set contains information for 47 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. An inclusive method of case selection was used, covering all countries on the subcontinent. In other words, cases were not chosen according to values on a dependent variable (say, whether they had held a multiparty election), but included every country regardless of its experience with regime transition.

Arrangement

Study Number 801: Nations in Conflict : Data on National Growth and International Violence for Six Major European Powers, 1870-1914: Contains two tab delimited text files.

Study Number 1384: Slave Trade Movement between Africa and the Americas, 1817-1843: Contains one PDF file and two tab delimited text files.

Study Number 1385: English Slave Trade, 1791-1799: House of Lords Survey: Contains one tab delimited text file.

Study Number 2923: Liverpool Trade and Shipping, 1744 to 1786: Contains nine tab delimited text files.

Study Number 2992: British Economic Imperialism, 1869 to 1914: Files are supplied direct from the ICPSR.

Study Number 2994: Wealth, Household Expenditure and Consumer Goods in Preindustrial England and America, 1550 to 1800: Contains fourteen tab delimited text files.

Study Number 3219: European State Finance Database - Revenues and Expenditure in Spanish America c. 1570 to c. 1816: Contains one PDF file.

Study Number 3882: Liverpool Community, 1649 - 1750: Contains seventeen tab delimited text files.

Study Number 4077: Jeremy Bentham, 1748 to 1832 - transcripts of original manuscripts: Contains one thousand one hundred and thirty-two (1132) text files.

Study Number 4544: Political Regimes and Regime Transitions in Africa, 1910 to 1994: Contains data for forty-seven African countries. Files are supplied direct from the ICPSR.

Access Information

By written application to the History Data Service. A letter of introduction may be required and prospective users will be obliged to sign an undertaking outlining the terms and conditions of access to the research materials.

Acquisition Information

Study Number 801: Nations in Conflict : Data on National Growth and International Violence for Six Major European Powers, 1870-1914: ICPSR; Choucri, N.; North, R.

Study Number 1384: Slave Trade Movement between Africa and the Americas, 1817-1843: Robbin, A., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Data and Program Library Service; Curtin, P.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of History. Sponsored by: Carnegie Corporation (New York); University of Wisconsin-Madison Columbia University (New York).

Study Number 1385: English Slave Trade, 1791-1799: House of Lords Survey: Robbin, A., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Data and Program Library Service; Curtin, P.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Department of History. Sponsored by: Carnegie Corporation (New York); University of Wisconsin-Madison Columbia University (New York).

Study Number 2923: Liverpool Trade and Shipping, 1744 to 1786: Richardson, D., University of Hull, Department of Economic and Social History; Beedham, K., University of Hull, Department of Economic and Social History; Schofield, M.M., University of Liverpool, Department of Economic and Social History. Sponsored by: Economic and Social Research Council. Grant Number: B00230039 and RB00232194.

Study Number 2992: British Economic Imperialism, 1869 to 1914: ICPSR; McGowan, P., Arizona State University.

Study Number 2994: Wealth, Household Expenditure and Consumer Goods in Preindustrial England and America, 1550 to 1800: ICPSR; Shammas, C., University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, Department of History.

Study Number 3219: European State Finance Database - Revenues and Expenditure in Spanish America c. 1570 to c. 1816: Bonney, R.J., University of Leicester, Department of History; Smith, J.G.; Sponsored by: British Academy and Economic and Social Research Council.

Study Number 3882: Liverpool Community, 1649 - 1750: Power, M., University of Liverpool, Department of Economic and Social History; Lewis, F., University of Liverpool, Department of Economic and Social History; Ascott, D., University of Liverpool, Department of Economic and Social History. Sponsored by: Leverhulme Trust.

Study Number 4077: Jeremy Bentham, 1748 to 1832 - transcripts of original manuscripts: Nicoll, I., University College London, Bentham Project; Rosen, F., University College London, Bentham Project; Schofield, P., University College London, Bentham Project. Sponsored by: Economic and Social Research Council; British Academy; Leverhulme Trust; Wellcome Trust. Grand Number: R000237011.

Study Number 4544: Political Regimes and Regime Transitions in Africa, 1910 to 1994: CPSR; Bratton, M., Michigan State University, Dpartment of Political Science; Walle, N. van de, Michigan State University. Department of Political Science. Sponsored by: National Science Foundation (U.S.). Grant Number: SBR 9309215.

Note

This record was compiled by David Borg-Muscat, UK Data Archive.

Record entered by Nadeem Ahmad of Qualidata, UK Data Archive, University of Essex.

Other Finding Aids

A collection level record for all materials in the Imperial and Colonial History collection is available via the History Data Service's online Browse Collections web page.

Conditions Governing Use

No part of the History Data Service material may be reproduced, published, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the HDS.

Custodial History

At various dates depositors placed their material with the History Data Service, UK Data Archive.

Additional Information

History Data Service, UK Data Archive, University of Essex.