What are reference sources?
Answers
Answer:
Reference sources are authoritative works that help you locate information about people, facts, and ideas. These sources can help you find the date of an important event, major achievements of an individual or organization, or a definition of a term or concept.
Reference sources include dictionaries, encyclopedias, almanacs, charts, and other forms of information that can be 'referred' to for research purposes. A reference source is a secondary source. Reference sources are helpful to historians in many ways. They allow researchers to look up detailed information, such as dates, names, and statistics. They are especially helpful to historians who want make sure their interpretation is factually correct. In this way, reference sources can be used for 'confirmation' purposes. As helpful as reference sources are, we should remember they are pretty much useless when it comes to constructing an original history. Original histories are drawn from primary source material.