The Social History of the Archive: Record-Keeping in Early Modern Europe

Archives are the factories and laboratories of the historian. Along with private studies and public libraries, they are the loci of our apprenticeship as scholars and the warehouses from which we acquire the materials to build the history we write. Until recently, however, scholars of the early modern period (as of other eras) rarely paused to consider how and why these repositories came into being, despite the fact that these processes have fundamentally shaped and coloured our knowledge of the past. Too often we mine the documentary sources they house without scrutinizing the decisions about selection, arrangement, preservation and retention taken by those responsible for the care of their contents over successive generations. We still fall into the trap of approaching them as if they provide a transparent window through which we can view societies remote from us in time. The tendency to regard archives as neutral and unproblematic reservoirs of historical fact is a legacy of the historiographical developments of the nineteenth century. It reflects the style of ‘scientific history’ synonymous with the endeavours of the Prussian scholar Leopold von Ranke, who, by elevating the empirical analysis of primary sources onto a pedestal, established the core methodological principles of History as a discipline. The fetischization of the archive of which we are heirs was a by-product of the pervasive positivism of an era in which the ideal of objectivity emerged as the philosophical hallmark of professional academic practice. It reflected the presupposition that the conscientious scholar could reconstruct what really happened with precision and accuracy.1 The same epistemological moment gave rise to the notion of the archivist as a passive and impartial guardian of the surviving traces of the past. This ethos of invisible custodianship underpinned the official repositories that grew up as an arm of the modern bureaucratic state and gave birth to a new class of civil servants. According to the pioneering Dutch handbook on archival method published in 1898 and Hilary Jenkinson’s influential A Manual of Archive Administration (1922), the archivist was simply the obedient and silent handmaiden of the historian. According to the dependent relationship delineated in these texts, his responsibility was to preserve records rather than to encroach on the domain of the specially trained historical researcher and participate in the task of interpreting them. For Jenkinson the archivist who approached his work ‘without prejudice or afterthought’ thereby became ‘the most selfless devotee of the Truth the modern world produces’.2 These assumptions have exerted ongoing influence and contrived to obscure the extent to which the ‘keepers’ of records themselves have played a critical part in establishing the parameters and boundaries of historical understanding. As Terry Cook has commented in an important article, they have contributed to erecting an enduring and unhealthy divide between historians and archivists and to effacing the ways in which the two operate as ‘co-creators’ of meaning. They have served for too long to occlude the subjectivity of the archive itself.3 Arising from a conference held at the British Academy in April 2014, this Past and Present Supplement builds on the burgeoning body of current work that is approaching the archive not merely as the object but also the subject of enquiry. Whereas once such questions were the terrain of a small band of technical they are into the the two and archival have to in the from the contents of archives to their a of scholars are in the of they than They are not of but in which a of and have and and of the and of the records that these has this is a of the that has the as a the and It from about the of the to the of that us from the and to as an from the in which is It is a of the scholars have to ‘the of the It is also a of the that in The of and The of Archive an on the to records as a the of and of the a to critical enquiry. the archive as a for the that and the of our these scholars have played a part in as a for They have of how the archive a as as a as a and the of they have us to of the of History as a from the that archival are and this the of in the early modern period the of the and developments that served as to the of the of the rise of new of and other in the of and the of a and state civil and the and and and the of and It on the the in public and private that the between and and the processes by which and records were and the It the of early modern archival and in to provide a and a to the of onto that of the archive that are of the of the era in which was in modern as a methodological this Supplement and scholars to with a of that what the Dutch archival has ‘the history of the It the and bureaucratic which the of archival has and how became into the of It not simply on the professional that to the and state but also a of were by the of this the The also the early modern in the of ‘the of and that them the the and the of to the archive at a for the of and are them and the repositories in which they to that can and at the of a on our they us of the of the The of this a of that are themselves for to the historiographical which the in this the from which they their and to which in they how the their task and of the that from their are records and archival between the two are to and by or as of or archives were of the enduring of the they have archives are for and for the of than those who them. the of these the of the of the nineteenth and early has in by the of It is to the early modern in the relationship between these two was and these and they the they in ways that the and boundaries the archival between the and often the to a and those to a or a were a or such as a or an in early modern such as published in and and of this reflected are in a the of the and of a or a and official and to for as and of and to of were also in a they were with other of and in which knowledge and were and and the of and that in the of the Archives and the by the and in in the of the and the British the between an archive and a between for to and those to and not the and of between the and early modern those of that was not or in and which was in the of of private and for the of the for analysis and by and generations. for was to scholars and and that to the state and was from also served as an of with which to the The by the of the official archive of were and into of the new by the of an this the that archival from to the and of a and can a in the and this was part of a historical and archives not merely as but also as and that to the of historical and of an to preserve the for the They on a and with other of repositories with which they and of the of archive as a to the and and that also as a for the that and their these was the and as and have was how they of a of is the Archive or and which about with in or The is to ‘the Archive of the and of without which and is (as they to in a archive an for the and of It was a for and of the of in the archive of the of are and in a on part of the published in the that was for the have in the an of that Archive and of that in from a at the of of the of the as ‘the in a about the of The of to the in which the were the ‘the Archive by his for was also a for the of The by to to the most the of the archive of and the and of the and in a to to the of a and this too was to up the and in can a the in his to and as a for an of the the as ‘the of and Archive of and were by early modern as and they to and they also the of and and the of that and were not by them into or The of the in the from and records to and them in a and It is also that in the and the in the and It to the in which and knowledge became in the with this of rather than and of and It the to to a of repositories and in as as to that on the and were in and The is a which not merely and but also and and traces of and the boundaries between and and the to this are as in as in They the and in which and from the of archival to as a practice. the archive as an and a they how shaped and was shaped by between and and by the of the divide between the and official and the and they to the which to the of records and the public and private repositories in which they were the ways in which and became in This Past and Present Supplement in the of a of important 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