Discovery help

The Discovery service has been designed as a replacement for our Catalogue, which no longer meets the needs of our users and growing collections. There are three main ways to discover records in our collection: search, browse and tags.

Should I search or browse?

When you are looking for records, it can be difficult to know whether to 'search' or 'browse'. It is always useful to start with a keyword search and see what results you get, as the record you are looking for may be described in detail in the Catalogue.

If your search does not yield the results you want or expect, browse through the list of our records by government department. Browsing is a useful tool because many of the records in our collection can't be found using a keyword search due to the limited amount of detail in the description field.

Unfortunately, only a small proportion of our records can be searched for by name, place or subject, so you will probably need to use the browse function as well as the search tool to get the best out of your research.

Search help

Use OR to bring more results: Leeds OR Bradford
Use NEAR to find two words close to each other: Shakespeare NEAR war
Use "quote marks" to find exact phrases.
Use brackets for complex searches: Inn AND (Southwark OR Lambeth)
Use NOT to exclude results: Austen NOT Jane
Use a * to pick up variant spellings: Rob*n* will find Robins, Robbins, Robyns and Robinson

Few or no results

There could be a number of reasons why a search may not return the results you'd expect. The record you want may have a poor description and therefore won’t be found by a simple keyword search.

Here are a few suggestions for improving your results:

Check your spelling
Try different keywords
Try more general keywords

For help finding the records relevant to your research, see our research signposts on looking for a place, person or subject

'Refine results' options

The 'Refine results' feature is an easy way to narrow your search results.

When you have conducted a search, the Refine results feature is displayed on the left of the search results page. This offers three categories by which to filter your search results: Subjects, Date and Collection. The items within the categories are generated based on your current search results.

You can narrow your search by selecting the relevant item and clicking the 'Refine' button below each category. Multiple items can be selected, but must be chosen one by one. You can undo any of the refinement by clicking the 'Remove' button in the ‘Your refinements’ area or un-checking the item and selecting the ‘refine’ button.

Explanation of the categories:

Subject: Lists the subjects that the records have been tagged by, for example, railway, education, battles and conflicts.
Date : Lists all the date ranges found in the records. Some records have very broad date ranges and will span across multiple years.
Collection: Lists the government departments that created the records. These are listed by their abbreviated references, for example HO for Home Office; ADM for Admiralty, Naval Forces, Royal Marines, Coastguard, and related bodies, etc.

Advanced search help

Advanced search helps you search for records that match specific criteria. You can use as many of the search filters as you wish.

If you select a search filter such as Sports, under Subjects, only records that are in this category will be returned in your search results. If you don’t specify a subject, the search will return results that match your search terms from all subjects.

Please remember that the more limitations you have in your search, the fewer results will be returned.

Search options

Show results with...

all of these words: Searches for results that match all of the words you have entered into the search box. This is the same as inserting "AND" between the words. This search field is mandatory.
the exact wording or phrase: Searches for results that match all the words in exactly the order you have entered them into the search box. This is same as putting quotes (" ") around a set of words.
any of these words: Searches for results that match either one or more of the words you have entered into the search box. This is the same as inserting "OR" between the words.

But not results with…

any of these unwanted words: Any words you enter into these fields will be excluded from your search. This is same as inserting "NOT" between the words.

Date range

‘Date range’ searches covering dates within the description of the record. Some records have very broad date ranges and will span across multiple years.

Subjects

Searches for results that match the subject(s) you have selected. If no subjects have been selected, the search will return results from all subjects that match your search terms.

Browsing help

Browsing enables you to find records if your searches are unsuccessful. It can also help you find records held near those records you have successfully searched for. You can browse up or down the hierarchy between department and item.

There are up to seven levels of description in the Catalogue:

Department: the highest level, which relates to a department, agency or body that creates the records
Division: an administrative section of the department
Series: the main grouping of records with a common function or subject
Sub-series: a smaller grouping of records with a common function or subject
Sub sub-series: a smaller grouping of records with a common function or subject
Piece: usually the lowest level of unit that can be ordered, comprising a box, file or volume
Item: part of a piece and not usually orderable. It can be a page, a folder, a bundle or sub-file in a box. Note that few records have been described to this level.

Only department, series, piece and item have references. Only pieces and items can be ordered, viewed or copied.

There are two ways to browse up and down the hierarchy between department and item:

From the Discovery homepage, go to 'Browse by government department'. You will see a list of departments and covering dates organised by government department reference.
- Click on the department title to see the divisions for that department
- Click on the division title to see series relating to a particular division
- Click on 'Show content' to a summary of the records it contains
- Repeat this to browse down to piece level, and to item level where such descriptions exist
Click on 'View full details' to show the full catalogue description for that department.
From a search you can see the details of each record in your results list by clicking on the title link.
- From the record description, click on 'Browse from this record'. This provides the hierarchy for that record headed by the department, then division, series, sub-series, piece etc., giving you the administrative context of the record.
- Click on a folder or title to show a list of siblings for the record. For example, if your record is a piece, clicking on the series folder will open up the list of sub-series and pieces in that series.

Tagging help

Tags are intended to improve current record descriptions and help users find information.

You can add as many tags as you like
Tags must be in English
Tags can be single words or phrases between 2 and 50 characters in length
Tags must be appropriate and relevant to the entry tagged
If you tag a record using an abbreviation, such as WWII, we recommend that you submit another tag that spells out the abbreviation
Do not post tags that are offensive, inflammatory or provocative (this includes swearing and obscene or vulgar comments)
Do not post tags that include personal information – addresses, phone numbers, email addresses or other online contact details – relating either to you or other individuals

We reserve the right to remove tags that do not adhere to these standards If you find any tags which you believe are incorrect or inappropriate, please click on the 'flag as inappropriate' link to alert an administrator.