Digital gallery
Here you can view digitised material from the National Library of Scotland's outstanding collections.
Browse these features by subject category | Search within these features | List these features in A-Z order
 | Experiences of the Great War The First World War experiences of four very different people — the General, the Nurse, the Soldier, and the Conscientious Objector. |
| Rolls of honour Scottish listings of casualties and those who died while on active service during the First World War. |
| | British military lists Details of officers who served in the British Army, Navy and Air Force in the First and Second World Wars. |
| First World War official photographs Black-and-white photographs mainly of the Western Front during the First World War. From the papers of Field Marshal (Earl) Haig. |
| | Blighty and Sea Pie Editions of two magazines published for Britain's fighting forces between 1917 and 1919, with pictures, stories, poems and humour. |
| Scottish clubs publications Historical texts from the 12th-19th centuries, edited by Scottish clubs, including manuscripts, church records, diaries, legends and literary texts. |
| | Scottish Post Office directories Find where people lived and traded in Scotland between 1774 and 1911 by searching and browsing over 700 Post Office directories. |
| Map images Further your family, local history or school project using this collection of thousands of zoomable maps of Scotland and beyond. |
| | Scottish Screen Archive Watch films from Scotland's national moving images collection, which preserves over 100 years of Scottish history on film and video. |
| The word on the street Discover early news stories and ballads that informed and entertained Scots between 1650 and 1910 as you browse around 1,800 broadsides. |
| | Scottish Science Hall of Fame A tribute to 10 great Scottish scientists of the past. Read transcripts of letters, papers and published works about or by them. |
| Robert Burns The life, work and legacy of Scotland's Bard, together with fascinating detail about original material in the Library's collections, and short song clips. |
| | Poems, chiefly in the Scottish dialect Read page by page the first published collection of poems by Robert Burns, known as 'The Kilmarnock edition', printed in 1786. |
| The last letter of Mary Queen of Scots Read, in English and French, the last letter by Scotland's 16th-century queen, written only hours before her execution in Fotheringhay Castle. |
| | Robert Louis Stevenson A biography of story-teller and poet Robert Louis Stevenson, along with digitised early editions of 'Kidnapped' and other works. |
| Early Gaelic book collections Several hundred books in Gaelic and other Celtic languages, plus works about the Gaels, their languages, literature, culture and history |
| | The Auchinleck Manuscript Middle English language and literature as Chaucer would have known it, contained in this rare document, with a full transcription. |
| Medical history of British India Search 426 volumes of rare official documents recording disease prevention and public health in India in the 19th and 20th centuries. |
| | Special collections of printed music Volumes from two archives featuring 18th and 19th century Scottish printed music, and from one archive of the works of Verdi. |
| 12 key Scottish plays 1970-2010 Introducing 12 of the major plays and major playwrights of Scotland. See images from theatre productions and related archive material. |
| | Theatre posters 1870-1900 A glimpse of the theatre in 19th-century Edinburgh — posters and photos of shows, pantomime characters, and actors and actresses of the day. |
| Playbills of the Theatre Royal Edinburgh Find out about this important theatre in the 19th century by searching through our selection of playbills. |
| | Pencils of light Delve into photographic history with 300 images taken in the 1840s by the Edinburgh Calotype Club - the world's first photography society. |
| Muriel Spark Using material from her personal archive, we tell the story of the life and career of one of Scotland's greatest novelists, Dame Muriel Spark. |
| | Genealogical collections concerning families in Scotland 1750-1751 Volume one of Walter Macfarlane's collection of genealogies of ancient Scottish families, compiled around 1750. |
| Golf in Scotland 1457-1744 Take a swing through golf's early history. Key documents, including the first 'rules' of the game, show how golf developed in Scotland. |
| | Sporting photos Who are the people in these photos of sporting events in Scotland around the late 19th century? Can you help us find out? |
| Scotland's pages Move along the timeline of key events in Scottish history, and discover along the way some of the 'treasures' held by the Library. |
| | First Scottish books See online, page by page, 'The Chepman and Myllar Prints' — nine of the earliest books printed in Scotland, in or around 1508. |
| The Murthly Hours View each page of this book of prayer dated 1280 — one of the most richly illustrated manuscripts in Scotland during the Middle Ages. |
| | Propaganda — a weapon of war A selection of images of British Government propaganda which was used at home and in Europe during the Second World War. |
| Scots abroad Read and hear six stories of Scots who emigrated to start a new life between the 1770s and the 1930s. |
| | Slezer's Scotland Dozens of zoomable engravings show us Scottish towns, castles and palaces from the 17th-century, as seen by military surveyor John Slezer. |
| Gazetteers of Scotland, 1803-1901 Browse and search 20 volumes of the most popular descriptive gazetteers of 19th-century Scotland, covering towns, counties, parishes, glens and more. |
| | Scotia depicta Castles, abbeys, battle grounds, harbours and landscapes in Scotland are among the subjects in this 19th-century book of engravings and descriptions. |
| Biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen Biographies of famous Scotsmen and some women, mostly of the 16th to the 19th centuries. Over 30 engraved portraits. |
| | Hutton drawings Documents and drawings of Scottish castles, landscapes, churches and other religious buildings, collected by George Henry Hutton. |
| Chalmers' 'Caledonia' Five volumes about the counties of Scotland, published in 1887. Includes parish histories and a dictionary of places. |
| | The photographs of John Thomson Find out about the Scottish photographer and traveller who helped pioneer photojournalism on London's Victorian streets. |
| Scottish history in print Two major Jacobite sources are online as keyword searchable files, together with details of thousands of works published by historical clubs. |
| | The spread of Scottish printing Trace the spread of printing across Scotland from 1508 to 1900. Read an early item produced in each of the first 33 printing towns. |
| Churchill: The evidence The life and times of Winston Churchill, MP for Dundee before he became a wartime Prime Minister. Features schools resources. |
| | Soviet posters Around 70 posters issued in the Soviet Union between 1919 and1930, relating to the Russian Civil War and economic and social issues. |
| The Gutenberg Bible Read our rare copy of the first book to be printed with moveable type. Johannes Gutenberg printed it in Germany around 1455. |
| | Military maps of Scotland Maps and plans made for government troops by the Board of Ordnance during the Jacobite period in the 18th century. |
| The Blaeu Atlas The first Atlas of Scotland, printed in 1654, containing 49 engraved maps, and 154 pages of descriptive text translated from Latin. |
| | The Bartholomew Archive Read about the remarkable record of mapmaking and printing by the world-famous Bartholomew firm in Edinburgh from 1820 to 2002. |
| The Duncan Street Explorer Photos, audio recordings, floor plans and more help tell the story of the famous Bartholomew mapmakers of Edinburgh. |
| | Phoebe Anna Traquair Examine in detail Traquair's exquisite illuminated manuscript of Elizabeth Barrett Browning's 'Sonnets from the Portuguese'. |
| The Aberdeen Breviary See the Latin church service book that was the reason printing was introduced to Scotland. Printed in Edinburgh in 1510. |
| | A guid cause The history of women's suffrage in Scotland, with photographs, newspaper reports, diary entries and other sources. Activities for secondary schools. |
| English ballads Browse over 2,300 broadside ballads, mostly from 19th-century England, with subjects ranging from courtship, occupations and emigration to patriotism and wars. |
| | Jacobite prints and broadsides Portraits of people and illustrations of events relating to the Jacobite Rebellions in Scotland in 1715 and 1745-1746. |
| Scottish bridges Photographs showing the building of the Forth Bridge, taken from 1886-1887, and the Tay Bridge after its collapse in 1879. |
| | Northern lights Explore the spirit of enquiry, debate, and improvement which characterised the Scottish Enlightenment during the 18th century. |
| Getting started with Shakespeare Resources to help primary and secondary school pupils understand some of Shakespeare's works by exploring scenes and characters or writing sonnets. |
| | Shakespeare collected View early editions of William Shakespeare's plays. Create a digital Shakespeare scrapbook and add your own images and text. |
| Out of Africa: The Kirk papers An overview of the personal papers of Sir John Kirk, a British Consul in Africa who explored the Zambesi with David Livingstone. |
| | Scottish decorative bookbinding Distinctive examples of bookbinding created in Scotland, from our pre-eminent collection of decorative bindings, which spans 500 years. |
| Photographs of the south side of Edinburgh Black-and-white photos of tenements and shops around St Leonards, Edinburgh, taken in 1929 by Alfred Henry Rushbrook. |
| | The Moir Rare Book Collection Learn about John William Moir's collection of rare books on all aspects of bees and beekeeping, including how bees 'sing'! |
| The write stuff Modern Scottish writers — among them J K Rowling, Liz Lochhead and George Mackay Brown — through the lens of photographer Gordon Wright. |
| | James VI and the Union of the Crowns A look at the union of the Scottish and English crowns in 1603, and the monarch who wanted to lead a peaceful, united Britain. |
| Morall fabillis of Esope the Phyrgia 'Aesop's Fables' put into Scots by 15th-century poet Robert Henryson, who lived in Dunfermline. This edition printed in 1571 in Edinburgh. |
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