The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography is the national record of men and women who’ve shaped British life from the Romans to the 21st century. Naturally, it includes all of the greatest figures from the past. But it also contains many hundreds of men and women—with close ties to particular counties, towns, and villages—whose regional importance means they now appear in the national biography.

• Getting started: our selection
• Finding people near you
• Scotland and Wales
• Gangs, gatherings, and groups

1. Getting started: our selection

Try these interactive maps which highlight people in the ODNB remembered for their contribution to, or links with, the history of a particular place.

From left to right, these maps chart ‘local heroes’, famous gardeners, and brewers of Britain—Mousehole to Orkney, Dover to Enniskillen.

A selection of ODNB biographies are also available as audio recordings. The map on the left includes local heroes—including Friar Tuck, Morecambe and Wise, and Amy Johnson—who’ve featured in our twice-monthly podcast which now offers 100 free episodes. And on the right we remember individuals who lived and worked on or off the coast of this island nation.

2. Finding people near you

The Oxford DNB includes the life stories of more than 57,000 men and women. Online you can search for where they were born, baptized, lived, died or were buried, searching by county, town, village, church, and street.

	Here are some tips for how to find people near you—be they one-time residents of Princes Street, Edinburgh (45), sons and daughters of Whitby (24), or those buried in Exeter (112)—and how this can be used for school projects or family history.
	Text searching across the ODNB’s 63 million words, you can also make links between people and places: for example, we’ve 92 references to Clapham Common, 23 to the River Trent, and 40 to Snowdonia.

3. Scotland and Wales

For readers interested in Scottish and Welsh history, there’s more on regional searching of the ODNB via these two special guides (searches on these pages require subscriber access, available via UK public libraries).

4. Gangs, gatherings, and groups

As well as 57,000 people, the ODNB includes essays on well-known historical clubs and networks in which individuals came together to act collaboratively. There are now 275 groups essays in ODNB Themes (requires subscriber access), with more to follow. Many groups also have strong regional ties, including:

Birmingham’s Lunar Society the Dymock poets Hackney Phalanx Oxford’s Inklings the Putney debaters and the Spalding Gentleman’s Society Full list of groups in Themes (access required)

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> More about the Oxford DNB