Dictionary of national biography online
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The Online Books Page
presents
edited by Leslie Stephen and Sidney Lee
The Dictionary of National Biography (or DNB) is a biographical reference for deceased persons notable in British history. The current edition of this work has been published online by Oxford University Press since The current electronic edition is not free, but is available through individual or library subscription. There is also a recent print edition.
Some earlier editions of this work are freely available online, and remain of historic interest. Below we link to free online volumes of the first and second editions, and some of their supplementary volumes.
First edition
The first edition was published in 63 volumes from through in London by Smith, Elder, and Co. (In the US, Macmillan also published many of the volumes in conjunction with Smith, Elder. These copies are noted in the list below with an "(M)" notation.) Various supplements, errata volumes, and indexes were published in the years to fo•
The ODNB was first published in , in 60 print volumes and online. Since a continuation project has extended and developed the ODNB’s online edition.
Updates are published monthly. Our January update is composed of biographies of people who have died in the very recent past (all people in the ODNB are deceased). Our other monthly updates are gathered around themes of related lives and also extend the Dictionary’s coverage across earlier periods in the light of recent scholarship and publications. Updates also revise existing biographies in response to new research. Since we have added around biographies and thematic essays.
Dictionary editors also run a programme of public engagement with other national institutions (museums, galleries, the National Trust, English Heritage, and national biographies worldwide), as well as with British public libraries and university research projects in the UK and the United States. The Dictionary's popular podcast series is available on itunes and
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Dictionary of National Biography
Reference on notable British figures
The Dictionary of National Biography (DNB) is a standard work of reference on notable figures from British history, published since The updated Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB) was published on 23 September in 60 volumes and online, with 50, biographical articles covering 54, lives.
First series
[edit]Hoping to emulate national biographical collections published elsewhere in europe, such as the Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (), in the publisher George Smith (–), of Smith, Elder & Co., planned a universal dictionary that would include biographical entries on individuals from world history. He approached Leslie Stephen, then editor of the Cornhill Magazine, owned bygd Smith, to become the editor. Stephen persuaded Smith that the work should focus only on subjects from the United Kingdom and its present and former colonies. An early working title was the Biographia Bri