Archival Science - Provenance, Original Order and Respect des Fonds

1. Provenance, Original Order
and Respect des Fonds
Prepared by: Roxanne Peña
Dr. Juan C. Buenrostro, Jr.
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2. Provenance
• Origin or source of
something, or as the
person, agency or
office of origin that
created, acquired,
used and retained a
body of records in
the course of their
work or life.
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3. Principle of
Provenance
Do not put
together archival
materials that
have come from
different creators
or origins
Do not reorganize
by subject,
chronology,
geographic
division, etc.
Respect the
individual, family,
or organization
that created or
received the items
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4. Original Order
• Organization
and sequence
of records
established by
the creator of
the records.

5. Principle of Original Order
Maintain
records in the
order in which
those records
were created,
received, filed
or used.
Look for
evidence of a
pre-existing
arrangement,
devised by the
creator.
Preserving
relationships
among the
records and to
respect
context in
which the
records came
to be.
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6. Principle of Original Order
Retaining existing
filing systems and
saving the archivist
from having to
decide upon and
apply a new and
artificial structure.
Researchers who
often tend to think
more about
subjects and dates
than creating
agencies
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7. Respect des Fonds
• Respect for the creator of the archives.
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8. Principle of
Provenance
Principle of
Original
Order
Principle
of
Respect
des Fonds
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9. Protecting the
external
integrity
(Provenance)
Protecting the
internal
integrity
(Original
Order)
Protection of the
content, structure
and context of
archives, serving
as authentic and
reliable
documentary
evidence
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10. Concept of Fonds
• Conceptual
container that holds
the materials of a
particular creator.
• Example: Leonardo
da Vinci fonds,
Albert Einstein fonds
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11. Challenges to the Principles of Respect des
Fonds, Provenance and Original Order
Absence of a whole
Importance of items
Reality of multiple provenances
Overlap between archives and collections
Original order and the last resting place
Focusing on function
Making order out of chaos
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12. Absence of a whole
• It is highly unlikely that
an archival institution
will ever have in its
possession, the ‘whole’
of the documents of any
individual, family or
corporate body.
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13. Importance of items
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• When managing individual items or small
units of materials, the archivist needs to
focus even more attention not just on
provenance, but also on custodial history.
• Some items does not have contextual
information or custodial history.

14. Reality of multiple provenances
• Archival materials passed
down from generation to
generation.
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15. Overlap between archives
and collections
• Artificial collections =
groups of archival
materials brought
together according to
some unifying
characteristic.
• Example: Maureen
Lee’s shoebox full of
old postcards
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16. Original order and
the last resting place
• Location of the archival
material is in the hands of
someone other than its
author and the structure of
the documents with cryptic
references to missing
pages.
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17. Focusing on function
• Functional provenance = The origin of a
group of materials as determined by the
activities that produce the materials (the
function), rather than organizational unit.
• Example: Department of Mines, Energy,
Petroleum and Gas = Department of
Mines, Department of Energy, Department
of Petroleum
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18. Making order out of chaos
• Archives that is
badly disorganized.
• Example: Several
boxes of archival
materials of a
deceased local
author who had no
family or close
friends to help sort
out.
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19. Absence of provenance
and original order
• Archival materials
that come with no
provenance and
so has lost its
archival value.
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20. Assigning Names
Name and categorize archival materials so that
they may be appraised and arranged,
described and made available.
Some archivists may see merit in using the
term fonds to identify archives; others may
prefer terms such as archive, papers or group.
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21. Americans
• Archives => public sector materials
• Manuscripts/Papers => private/personal materials
English
• Archive/Archives => collection, papers, correspondence,
papers and correspondence
Canadians
• Records/Archives/Archives Group => public and
organizational materials
• Manuscripts/Manuscript Group => private and personal
materials
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22. Assigning Names
The challenge is to define those
terms within the particular
context in question and then
use those terms within the
particular context in question
and then use those terms
consistently so that they remain
meaningful and logical.
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23. Reference
• Millar, L. (2010). Archives: Principles and
practices. New York: Neal-Schuman
Publishers.
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