Category Archives: Public Domain Sources

Prelinger archives

https://archive.org/

https://archive.org/about/

The Prelinger Archives’ “mission is to provide Universal Access to All Knowledge.” To accomplish this mission, the archive contains billions of webpages, over 28 millions books, 14 million audio recordings, millions of videos and images, and over half a million software programs. Their focus is on books, and any book in the archive published before 1926 can be downloaded. Modern books can be checked out as with any lending library. The archive works in collaboration with many institution partners including the American Library Association, the Boston Library Consortium, and the Digital Public Library of America, just to name a few. The contents of the archive are really too vast to summarize.

image of The devils and evil spirits of Babylonia : being Babylonian and Assyrian incantations against the demons, ghouls, vampires, hobgoblins, ghosts, and kindred evil spirits, which attack mankind, tr. from the original Cuneiform texts, with transliterations, vocabulary, notes, etc by Reginald Campbell Thompson, 1876-1941.

The metropolitan museum of art

Metropolitan Museum of Art

https://www.metmuseum.org/about-the-met/policies-and-documents/image-resources

While not all of the images in the Metropolitan Museum of Art are in the Public Domain, in 2017 the museum announced their Open Access policy, which makes images believed to be in the public domain available for unrestricted up by the public under the Creative Commons Zero designation. The images can be searched through 20 thematic sets that include the following topics: Masterpiece paintings, cats, Monsters and Mythological Creature, Post-Impressionism, Vincent van Gogh, Arms and Armor, Tiffany Glass, and Dishes, including a terracotta plate from Ca. 520-510 BCE. Images that fall under their Open Access policy are clearly marked with an “OA” in the lower left-hand corner of the image.

Terracotta plate. Signed by Epiktetos as painter. Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Agricultural research Service: US Dept of Agriculture image gallery

https://www.ars.usda.gov/oc/images/image-gallery/

https://www.ars.usda.gov/oc/images/copyright/

The Image Gallery of the US Department of Agriculture’s Research Service consists of images of all aspects of the agency’s work. Categories include animals, plants, insects, food, field research, people, and crops. All the images are, mostly, copy-right free, public domain images which may be used as long as attribution is given. Some of the more interesting images are made with an electron microscope. If you ever wanted an up-close and personal look at a mite, this is the place to go.

Mite imaged with the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s state-of-the-art scanning electron microscope

J Paul getty museum

https://www.getty.edu/

https://www.getty.edu/about/whatwedo/opencontent.html

The Getty Museum maintains a large collection, about 100,00, images available in the public domain, including ” paintings, drawings, manuscripts, photographs, antiquities, sculpture, decorative arts, artists’ sketchbooks, watercolors, rare prints from the 16th through the 18th century, and 19th-century architectural drawings of cultural landmarks.” The images are from around the world and include Edward S. Curtis photographs of indigenous Americans, European illuminated manuscripts, sculpture from 4th century BCE Japan, and Egyptian coins. Unfortunately, downloading the images from their site proved difficult.