Research Guides: Anthropology: Digital Artifacts & Images

Digital Artifacts and Images for Ethnography and Archaeology

British Museum: Explore/Highlights
Searchable, browsable database of over two million of artifacts in the British Museum, including 674,000 images. Entries includes an enlargeable photo, description, related objects, and bibliographic references.
California Academy of Sciences
Virtual collection of the Department of Anthropology, California Academy of Sciences. Over 16,000 digital ethnographic objects from Western North America and the Pacific Rim.
Fowler Museum of Cultural History, UCLA (UM Image Source)
Images of collections such as japanese baskets, african ceramics, and a display on The Day of the Dead.
Use UM Image Source to search Fowler digital images or browse entire collection
Logan Museum of Anthropology
Beloit College Digital Collections. Includes ethnographic and archaeological artifacts from 480 groups. Includes collections on the Ainu of Japan, the Heath collection of Native American ethnographic artifacts, the Logan-Saharan Expeditions 1925-1930, and the Bartlett collection of objects from Taiwan, Indonesia and the Philippines.
Musee du Quai Branly
Museum of indigenous art from Oceania, Africa, Asia and the Americas. Searchable databases include the image collection and the catalog of objects. Strengths are musical instruments, textiles and historical collections.
OAIster
A catalog of images and texts hidden in websites of over 1,000 archive collections. For images, limit to Resource Type: image and search on subject 'anthropology'. For archaeological artifacts include 'archaeological excavations' or 'antiquities' in search. Entries include items such as photos of Native American artifacts from the Tennessee State Library and Archives, and Egyptian and Chinese artifacts from the University of Minnesota. Authentication required. For University of Michigan affiliates only.
Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology, Harvard University
Peabody's online database of over 300,000 images of its collections. Includes objects, paintings, prints, drawings, and photographs. Links to digital special exhibitions.
Penn Museum
Searchable database of around 665,000 objects in collections of the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
Philippine Photographs Digital Archive
Over 2,000 historical photos from the Special Collections Research Center, University of Michigan. Taken from several notable photo collections, including the Dean C. Worcester Collection (1866-1924).
Pitt Rivers Museum
The anthropology and archaeology museum of Oxford University. Holds massive collections of objects, photographs, manuscripts, field recordings and films.
Smithsonian
Search over 7.7 million records in collections of the Smithsonian Institution, over half a million with images.
UMMA Digital Image Database
Digitized color slides of archaeological work from around the world. Over 29,000 slides of archaeological and ethnigraphic work collected by the University of Michigan Museum of Anthropology.
Also see the Historical Plant Use Database. Developed over 50 years, the database links traditional ethnic groups of the Southwest United States to plants that they used for medicine, food, etc.

Google Images

Google Images

Google Images Search Tips

Search Tips

You can use many of the same tools to narrow your search in Google Images that you're familiar with from Google Web Search:

put words in quotes to find an exact phrase
use OR between words to broaden your search
use the minus sign - to exclude a word from your search

Narrow your Search

Google Images has special ways to narrow your search

search for a particular color
search for line drawings or clip art
search for faces
limit your search by the size of the image

Search by Image

You can also use an image as a starting point

upload an image, or use one already on the web (this works best)
Here's an overview

Advanced Search

Google Images has an Advanced Search page that gives a good overview of the ways to narrow your search

Last Updated: Feb 5, 2025 11:14 AM

Subjects: Social Sciences