Research Guides: Modern History & Political Identities in The Horn of Africa: Home

General Reference: Biography, Encyclopedias, Handbooks, & Historical Dictionaries

Abbink, J. A bibliography of Ethiopian-Eritrean studies in society and history, 1995-2010. (Leiden : African Studies Centre, 2010)

Africa : an encyclopedia of culture and society. 3 vols. Edited by Toyin Falola and Daniel Jean-Jacques. (Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, an imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC, 2016)

--See also: E-book

Africa contemporary record. Annual. (London: Africana Publishing, 1968/69-2002)

Africa south of the Sahara. Annual. (London: Europa, 1971-) Print version

See also: Europa world plus Online

An African biographical dictionary. 2nd ed. Compiled by Norbert C. Brockman. (New York: Grey House Pub., c2006) (667 p.)
--See also: E-book

African folklore: an encyclopedia. Edited by Philip M. Peek and Kwesi Yankah. New York : Routledge, 2004. (593 p.)
--See also: E-book

African kingdoms : an encyclopedia of empires and civilizations. Edited by Saheed Aderinto. (Santa Barbara, California : ABC-CLIO, an imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC, [2017])

Arabic literature of Africa. Edited by John O. Hunwick and R.S. O'Fahey. (Leiden; New York: E.J. Brill, 1994-) --See especially:

Vol. 1. The writings of eastern Sudanic Africa to c. 1900. Compiled by R.S. O’Fahey, with the assistance of Muhammad Ibrahim Abu Salim [and others].
Vol. 3A. The writings of the Muslim peoples of northeastern Africa. Compiled by R.S. O'Fahey
--See also: Volumes 1-4 online

Area Handbook series [historical]. Prepared by the Library of Congress and sponsored by the US Dept. of the Army. (Washington)

For the handbook of a country, search in CLIO: use country name and "area handbook".
For available online handbooks on Africa, see section on US Dept. of the Army in "US Organizations on Africa," compiled by Columbia University Libraries.
See also: The Library of Congress: Country Profiles, 2004-2008

Collins, Robert O. The waters of the Nile : an annotated bibliography. (London ; Hans Zell Publishers, 1991)

A companion to the anthropology of Africa. E-book. Edited by Roy Richard Grinker, Stephen C. Lubkemann, Christopher B. Steiner, and Euclides Gonalves. Hoboken, NJ : Wiley-Blackwell, [2019]

Dictionary of African biography. 6 vols. Emmanuel K. Akyeampong and Henry Louis Gates, Jr., editors in chief. (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, c2012)

Diriye Abdullahi, Mohamed. Culture and customs of Somalia. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2001.

Encyclopaedia Aethiopica. 5 vols. Edited by Siegbert Uhlig ; editorial board: Baye Yimam [and others]. (Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz, 2003-2014)

Encyclopedia of Africa. 2 vols. Edited by Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2010)

Encyclopedia of African history. 3 v. Ed. by Kevin Shillington. (New York : Fitzroy Dearborn, 2005)
--See also: E-book

Encyclopedia of Islam. Leiden, The Netherlands: E. J. Brill, 2004- Requires a special font.

Essien, Kwame and Toyin Falola. Culture and customs of Sudan. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2008.

Ethiopia : history, culture and challenges. Edited by Siegbert Uhlig, David Appleyard, Alessandro Bausi, Wolfgang Hahn, and Steven Kaplan. Münster : LIT Verlag ; East Lansing, MI : Michigan State University Press, [2017]

Falola, Toyin. Key events in African history : a reference guide. Westport, Conn. : Greenwood Press, 2002.
--See also: E-Book

Getahun, Solomon Addis and Wudu Tafete Kassu. Culture and customs of Ethiopia. Santa Barbara, California : Greenwood, an imprint of ABC-CLIO, LLC, [2014]

The handbook of civil society in Africa. Edited by Ebenezer Obadare. New York : Springer, [2014]
--See also: E-Book

Historical Dictionary series. Scarecrow Press (Metuchen, NJ ; Lanham, MD)

---For a dictionary of one country, search in CLIO, with "All fields" in "Advanced Search", and use [current name of country] and "historical dictionary".

Historical dictionary of civil wars in Africa. 2nd ed. (2008)
Historical dictionary of Djibouti (2000)
Historical dictionary of Kenya. 3rd ed. (2014) E-book.
Historical dictionary of Eritrea. 3rd ed. (2019) E-book.
Historical dictionary of Ethiopia. 2nd ed. (2013)
--See also: E-book
Historical dictionary of Somalia. New ed. (2003)
--See also: E-book
Historical dictionary of the Sudan. 4th ed. (2013)
--See also: E-book

Islam in Africa (1974-2019). Compiled by Paul Schrijver and updated by ASCL Library. (Leiden, The Netherlands: Afrikastudiecentrum = African Studies Centre, University of Leiden, 2018) --via AfricaBib.Org

The Kenana handbook of Sudan. Edited by Peter Gwynvay Hopkins. (London ; New York : Kegan Paul ; Abingdon, OX, U.K. : Distributed in the UK by Marston Book Services ; New York : Distributed in the USA by Columbia University Press, 2007)
--See also: E-book

Milkias, Paulos. Ethiopia. (Santa Barbara, Calif. : ABC-CLIO, c2011)

Morin, Didier. Dictionnaire historique afar, 1288-1982. Paris : Éditions Karthala, [2015]

New encyclopedia of Africa, 5 v. Editor in chief, John Middleton; editor, Joseph C. Miller. Detroit: Thomson/Gale, c2008.
--See also: E-book

Oxford Bibliographies Online (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press)

--Select "African Studies" and see especially:
Djibouti. By Kenneth Menkhaus and Claire Metelits.
Eritrea. By Dan Connell.
Ethiopia. By David Shinn.
Indian Ocean and Middle Eastern Slave Trades. By George M. La Rue.
Italian colonial rule. By Mia Fuller.
Kenya. By Thomas Spear and Godfrey Muriuki.
Northeastern African states, c 1000 BCE--1800 CE. By Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst.
Oromo. By Marianne Bechhaus-Gerst.
Somalia. By Mohamed Diriye Abdullahi.
Sudan and South Sudan. By Jay Spaulding.

The Oxford encyclopedia of African historiography : methods and sources. Thomas Spear, editor in chief. (New York : Oxford University Press, 2019)
--See also: E-book

The Oxford handbook of the Ethiopian economy. Edited by Fantu Cheru, Christopher Cramer, and Arkebe Oqubay. (Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2019)
--See also: E-book

The Oxford handbook of modern African history. Edited by John Parker and Richard Reid. New York : Oxford University Press, 2013.
--See also: E-Book

Oxford research encyclopedias--African history Online. (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press)

Scholarly essays, with extensive bibliographic references, on a wide variety of topics in the field...such as:
Africans in the Indian Ocean world. By Richard B. Allen.
Archaeology and heritage of slavery in Eastern Africa. By Lydia Wilson Marshall.
Digital sources for the history of the Horn of Africa. By Massimo Zacaria.
Education in colonial Sudan, 1900-1957. By Iris Seri-Hersch.
Egyptian-Sudanese trade in the Ottoman period to 1882. By Terence Walz.
Encounters between Ethiopia and Europe, 1400-1660. By Matteo Salvadore.
Ethiopia in the nineteenth century. By Teshale Tibebu.
Ethiopian Red Terror. By Jacob Wiebel.
Farming and herding in Eastern Africa: archaeological and historical perspectives. By Freda Nkirote M'Mbogori.
Haile Selassie. By Eshete Tibebe.
Heritage and the use of the past in East Africa. By John Giblin.
History of agriculture in Ethiopia. By James C. McCann.
The history of Islam in East Africa. By Felicitas Becker.
History of Sudanese nationalism. By Yoshiko Kurita.
Mahdist Omdurman. By Robert S. Kramer.
The Nile Waters issue. By Terje Tvedt.
The 1924 Revolution in Sudan. By Elena Vezzadini.
Slavery and post-slavery in the Indian Ocean world. By Alessandro Stanziani.
Sudanese Communist Movement. By Yoshiko Kurita.
Urbanization in East Africa, circa 900-2010 CE. By Andrew Burton.
Urban society in colonial Sudan. By Ahmad Alawad Sikainga.
Water management in East Africa. By Matthew V. Bender.
Women, gender, and sexuality in East Africa. By Miroslava Prazak.
Women in Ethiopia. By Meron Zeleke Eresso.
Women in Somalia. By Safia Aidid.
Women in South Sudan. By Christopher Tounsel.

Prijac, Lukian, compiler. Contribution à l'histoire de la Corne de l'Afrique et du golfe d'Aden : inventaire des sources. Paris : L'Harmattan, [2019]
--See also: Offsite copy

Rake, Alan. African leaders: guiding the new millennium. (Lanham, Md.: Scarecrow Press, 2001)

Routledge handbook of Islam in Africa. E-book. Edited by Terje Østebø. Abingdon, Oxon ; New York, NY : Routledge, 2022.

Tesfagiorgis G., Mussie. Eritrea. (Santa Barbara, Calif. : ABC-CLIO, 2010)

Tvedt, Terje. The Nile : an annotated bibliography. London : I.B. Tauris, 2004.

World Bibliographical Series. Published by Clio Press in Oxford, England and Santa Barbara, CA: 1979-1999.

For a country bibliography, search in CLIO and use [name of country] and "world bibliographical".

World biographical information system--African Biographical Archive [Online] ([Munich] : K. G. Saur, 2004-2010)

Yakan, Mohamad Z. Almanac of African peoples & nations. (New Brunswick, NJ : Transaction, c1999)
--See also: E-book

Library Catalogs

CLIO
(All CU libraries EXCEPT Law Library & Teachers College)

Pegasus (Law Library)

Educat (Teachers College)

Borrow Direct

Interlibrary Loan

WorldCat (Interlibrary Loan tool)

Indexes: Articles, Book Chapters, Books

Africa-Wide Information via EBSCO (Baltimore, Maryland: National Information Services Corporation, 1997--

African Women Bibliographic Database (AfricaBib.Org, Davis Bullwinkle, University of Arkansas, Little Rock)

AnthropologyPlus. (Dublin, Ohio: OCLC).

Historical Abstracts. Monthly. (Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO, 1982--)

MLA Bibliography. 10 times per year. (New York : Modern Language Association of America, 1963-)

PAIS International. Monthly. (New York: Public Access Information Service, 1972-)

Atlases and Maps

Africa's lakes: atlas of our changing environment.. (Nairobi, Kenya: United Nations Environment Progam--UNEP, 2006). via Internet Archive

Africa mountains atlas. (Nairobi, Kenya: UNEP, 2014).

Atlas of the Ethiopian rural economy = YaʾItyop̣yā yagaṭar ʾikonomi ʾatlās. Addis Ababa, Ethiopia : Central Statistical Agency : Ethiopian Development Research Institute ; Washington, DC USA : International Food Policy Research Institute, c2006.

Atlas of the Juba and Shabelle Rivers in Somalia = Buugga xog-khariidadeedka wabiyada Juba iyo Shabeelle. Somalia : FAO Somalia Water and Land Information Mangement project, 2010.

Atlas of Somali water and land resources = Buug naqshado khayraad biyo iyo dhul ee Soomaaliya. Nairobi, Kenya : FAO : SWALIM, 2009.

Columbia University Libraries: Geospatial Data Catalog (Research Data Services)

Eastern Africa atlas of coastal resources. Vol. 1. Kenya. (Nairobi, Kenya : United Nations Environment Programme ; [Brussels] : Belgian Administration for Development Cooperation, c1998).

Environmental Systems Research Institute.
The Sub-Saharan Africa map book. (Redlands, California : Esri Press, [2014])

Ethiopia's war on Eritrea. Asmara, Eritrea : Research and Documentation Center of Eritrea, [1999]

Freeman-Grenville, G.S.P. The new atlas of African history. (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1991).

Greater Horn of Africa climate risk and food security atlas. (Nairobi : UNON Publishing Services Section, 2018)

Griffiths, I.L. An atlas of African affairs. 2nd ed. (New York: Routledge, 1994)
See also: Lehman Reference copy.

Historical atlas of Africa. Ed. by J.F. Ade Ajayi et al. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1985).
See also: Butler Reference copy

Kenya : atlas of our changing environment. Nairobi ; Sioux Falls, S.D. : United Nations Environment Programme, 2009.

Khartoum road atlas. Small edition. Khartoum, Sudan : Daleelteq Co., [2011]

Kwamena-Poh, Michael et al. African history in maps. (London; New York: Longman, 1982).

Maps of Africa on the Internet. (Columbia University Libraries)

National atlas of Ethiopia. 3rd ed. Addis Abeba : Ethiopian Mapping Agency, 2015.

National atlas of Kenya. Printed and published by Survey of Kenya. 5th ed. Nairobi : Survey of Kenya, Kenya Government, 2003.

Perry Castañeda Library, University of Texas at Austin: Maps of Africa (Austin, Texas)

Regional atlas of Oromiya. Council of the Regional State of Oromiya, Planning & Economic Development Bureau. Rev. ed. Finfinne : Statistics and Information Department, 2008.

ReliefWeb Maps and Infographics (Geneva, Switzerland: UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs)

Socio-economic atlas of Kenya : depicting the national population census by county and sub-location. Nanyuki, Kenya : Kenya National Bureau of Statistics ; Bern, Switzerland : Centre for Development and Environment, 2014.

Sub-regional atlas of Southeast Oromiya. Council of The National Regional State of Oromiya, Bureau of Finance and Economic Development. Finfinne, [Ethiopia] : Statistics and Information Dept., 2007.

Sub-regional atlas of West Oromiya. The National Regional State of Oromiya, Bureau of Finance and Economic Development. Finfinne, [Ethiopia] : Physical Planning and Regional Statistical Information Dept., 2004.