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For requests for resources; use with caution.

In general H:SE discourages resource requests. We expect that all answers will provide sources, but explicit requests for sources/references tend to pose a couple of problems.

  1. Sources are subjective. A Marxist historian is going to recommend a different source than a Whig historian. This leads to discussion and argument, and makes it very difficult to select an authoritative answer.

  2. Sources are ephemeral. Tomorrow someone may publish a source, possibly based on new methods, that will invalidate all prior sources. History is a science and like all sciences, history progresses by revolutions.

Sometimes there is only one acknowledged best source for a given question (likely due to a dearth of source material). In those cases, H:SE is happy to provide a reference.

For more information, see recurring discussions on meta.history.stackexchange.com.