More archives saved within the framework of the latest edition of the competition “Supporting archival activities”. We start with summaries therefore.
At the beginning, Discovery in the Foundation for Culture and Heritage of Polish Armenians.
– Such an entry appeared on the website of the State Archives
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In the archives of the Foundation for the Culture and Heritage of Polish Armenians the oldest Armenian record books from the Armenian church in Stanislawów have undergone full conservation; the book of baptisms 1703-1783 and the book of deaths 1715-1829. They have been disinfected and fully preserved. During the conservation work the extraordinary discovery was made. In the leather bindings of the books 54 cards from the 18th century were found. The find was extracted from its covers, separated and cleaned. The procedures carried out thus allow not only for safe research on the contents of the books, but also on those hitherto unknown manuscripts, which may turn out to be valuable material for historians. Thanks to conservation the process of destruction of the oldest Armenian record books kept in the Archives of the Foundation for Culture and Heritage of Polish Armenians has been stopped. The books have been secured and they can be safely used without exposing the material to destruction and health of users to the action of microorganisms.
One of the preserved books can be seen in the permanent exhibition at the Foundation’s headquarters (Warsaw, 12 Świętojerska str.)
As the conservator Hanna Machaj says – an important stage of the conservation work was the separation of the covers containing valuable manuscript cards from the leather binding and the full conservation of these cards. The surface of the covers and the leather were covered with a thick layer of dirt. Due to the great weakness and fragility of the paper base of the manuscripts and its susceptibility to mechanical damage the separation and cleaning of the manuscripts was very difficult. We successfully cleaned the cards of mold, dust and other dirt. We numbered them with a pencil and separated them one by one from the rest.
The procedures carried out allow for safe research on these hitherto unknown manuscripts, which may turn out to be valuable material for historians. We presume that among them there are several pages of the Kipchak-Armenian glossary, another part of which had already been discovered in another book from the archives and compiled.
Elaboration of the Legacy
In addition, as part of the Foundation’s work, the legacy of Leon Ter-Oganjan, an important activist of the Armenian community in Warsaw was developed, recorded and packaged. The list of units can be found in the “Search in the Archives”(“Szukaj w Archiwach”) service. They are also available on the Foundation’s website in the Virtual Archive of Polish Armenians.
