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Historical Archives Part 2:

The Historians Perspective

Adam Chapman


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Aims and Objectives

How are archives and their content

created?

How do the contents of archives end upthere? Who decides?

What sort of material might be expected?

Approaches to documents Applications in archaeology


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The whys of archives

Institutional memory in this sense, a

medieval cartulary and the minute book of a

nineteenth century shipyard perform exactly

the same function though what they can tell

us about urban landscapes may be rather

different.

Legal or financial expediency or, it might be

useful one day.


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Audit do not underestimate this: a vastamount of the surviving documents ofcentral and local government survive

because someone, somewhere thoughtthat others would come and check up onhow something was done or how moneywas spent.

Recording an event or sequence of eventsanything from a medieval court roll to afootball match report.


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And finally:

Conscious safeguarding of items of historicalsignificance preservation and conservation.

This has been happening for longer than you

might think.


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Approaches to Documents

Texts dealing strictly with the content, the way inwhich language is deployed the assumptions behind itand the processes which shape authorial choice.

The Document as Object Material Culture. Thisapproach considers documents within their physicalcontext. How does it appear? Is care taken in itspreparation and display? What function does thedocument perform? How does it signify ownership?

Omission what does a document notdo and why?


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Types of Archive:

Public

Private and Personal correspondence, clubs

and societies, family, legal or financial

Corporate Trade and Industry or even

University

Governmental (National and Local)

Church

Community


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Archival Material: Medieval

Very process-driven and probably in Latin

Dominated by Church and State but this

covers an enormous amount of ground

Of particular use, from an archaeological

perspective, are building accounts, rentals and

inventories note these refer primarily to

buildings and plots

Limited survival of private documents


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Archival Material : Modern

(i.e. post 1500)

Stands a good chance of being in English.

More varied in origin, content and purpose.

Greater survival of private documents.

More pictorial and mapping evidence.

The closer to the present you get, the more

there is a positive and a negative Not necessarily historic the HER and similar

datasets can be regarded as archives


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Following that reference:

What does TNA E 101/18/1 actually mean? How

can this help?

TNA = The National Archives (formerly the

Public Record Office) E = Records of the Exchequer

E 101 = King's Remembrancer: Accounts

Various (sub-series: records of the army andnavy)

18/1 = The specific document


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Recording, Transcriptionand

Note-taking


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Recording and Note-keeping

Photography

Pros Quick, cost-effective and you

can enlarge it when you get home. Cons copyright, institutional

policies, keeping track of data,

limitations. It does not save taking notes. Sorry.

IF IN DOUBT ASK


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General points

What information do you want

from the document?

Do you need to transcribe it all?

Is this a good use of your time?


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Record what isthere and not what

you thinkis there note alternative

spellings for example: Is Dinfor the same as Dinefwr or

Dynafor?

Beware different languages in thesame document


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Research Archives

Often available online having been assembled

as part of research projects

Synthesise archival sources in more accessible

forms (potentially, this does not always work)

May well include items not easily or accessibly

documented to a lay audience this is

especially true of medieval documents


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Footbridge over railway line from Waterloo to the old

Terminus Station and Docks, connecting Marsh Lane (W

side) with Chantry Road (E side), City of Southampton.


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Historic Mapping: John Speed

Southampton 1611 the earliest extant

street plan of the city


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Reconstructive mapping based on archives

and archaeology: Medieval Southampton

So thampton c 1454 (3D render based


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Southampton c. 1454 (3D render based

on 1454 Terrier and archaeological

data)

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