Vienna City and State Archives

Vienna City and State Archives (MA 8)
Head	Brigitte Rigele
Business group	Culture and science
founding	13th or 14th century
	www.wien.gv.at/kultur/archiv

The Vienna City and State Archives ( Municipal Department 8 or MA 8, previously MA 67), located in the easternmost of the four Vienna Gasometers, is the archive of the Austrian capital and the federal state of Vienna . It preserves the archivable documents of Vienna as a (city) municipality and since 1920 in its function as one of the nine federal states of Austria, makes them accessible and makes them accessible to the public. The Vienna Archives Act 2000 forms the basis for the current work of the Vienna City and State Archives. The archive is part of the Culture and Science business group of the City Council .

history

According to Felix Czeike , the archive already existed in the 14th century. (The oldest kept document dates from 1208.) From the 15th century it was housed in what is now the Old Town Hall. In 1863, on the initiative of Karl Weiß, the archive was set up as part of the municipal collections, which also included the city library and the historical museum that emerged from the weapons collection in 1887 . Historical registries were also kept decentrally in individual municipal offices.

In 1883 the municipal collections moved to specially furnished rooms in the New Town Hall (which was completed in the same year) (as it was called until around 1960). By resolution of the municipal council on June 25, 1889, the archive was separated from the other municipal collections and directly subordinated to the mayor as an independent department. In 1904 it was incorporated into the magistrate with subordination to the magistrate director.

On October 1, 1920, Vienna was defined as a separate federal state in the new federal constitution , valid from November 10, 1920; On November 18, the new city constitution passed on November 10 came into force, which also constitutes Vienna as a state. Since then, the archive has also acted as a state archive, but retained the name Archive of the City of Vienna for decades . The separation of Vienna from the state of Lower Austria in terms of ownership was concluded at the end of 1921 with the so-called Separation Act .

After the National Socialists came to power , the Vienna urban area was expanded to include large areas on October 15, 1938 ( Greater Vienna ). Numerous holdings from previously Lower Austrian municipalities were incorporated into the inventory - and subsequently returned from 1954, when 80 of the 97 local municipalities incorporated in 1938 returned to Lower Austria .

Under the Nazi regime, the archive tried to acquire holdings from institutions that had been dissolved by the state. Among other things, it received archives from the Viennese guilds . An essential task during this time was to participate in the implementation of the National Socialist race laws . During the Second World War, around 70% of the archive holdings were taken to various salvage camps in Lower Austria; the war losses could thus be kept low.

In 1950 the archive came under the responsibility of the Culture Business Group. From 1969 onwards it was called the Archives of the City and State of Vienna , in 1973 the name Vienna City and State Archives was determined.

The space problems of the archive in the town hall were resolved for decades by the last ten branches in various official buildings and were only resolved for a long time with the move to Gasometer D in Simmering in 2001/2002. The building has been accessible via the Gasometer underground station since 2000 . When the new location opened in autumn 2001, it was announced that 35 km of documents would have to be stored and that the move would be completed by summer 2002.

scientist

At the Vienna City and State Archives, important scholars worked on urban history research, including:

Karl Uhlirz (director 1889–1903)
Karl Hango (director 1903–1923)
Hanns Jäger-Sunstenau (genealogist and heraldist, at the archive 1946–1973)
Felix Czeike (Director 1976–1989)
Ferdinand Opll (Director 1989-2010)
Peter Csendes (Deputy Director 1978-2004)

Structure of the holdings

In line with the structure of the Austrian archives, the growth of the holdings of the Vienna City and State Archives is based on the principle of origin or provenance . According to this principle, the acquired holdings are left in their original state of order.

In accordance with Vienna's function as a city, documents from the city offices, the historical registries, the municipal departments and district offices, the leading offices and authorities, the representative bodies and the city institutions, funds and companies are kept.

According to the function of Vienna as a federal state, documents from the state administration, state courts, institutions and companies, the police , denominational offices, patrimonial authorities, guilds and trade committees belong to the inventory; State records only insofar as they are not kept by the Austrian State Archives .

The archives of official origin are supplemented by collections and documentation of various kinds on the history of the city, such as a biographical, a topographical and a cartographical collection, a photo collection and a manuscript collection.

The holdings of the Vienna City and State Archives can be viewed online in the Vienna Archive Information System (WAIS).

The state parliament and municipal council documentation kept by the archive is used for the scientific development of the public sessions of the Vienna regional parliament and municipal council and the collection of data on Viennese politicians. The information database of the Vienna State Parliament and Municipal Council (INFODAT Vienna) makes all political events visible and transparent; you can search for search terms, keywords, individual processes or people. Over 70,000 cases (zoning, subsidies, draft laws, debates, etc.) including links to the materials are currently available online.

From 1977 to 2011 the archive worked in cooperation with the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Urban History Research on the publication of historical city atlases and thus took part in a Europe-wide research project.

In an archive library comprising 120,000 volumes, subject-specific publications are collected, which can be viewed in the archive's reading room. Material from all political currents in Vienna is recorded in a political documentation.

Use

The archive is generally used by viewing archive material in the archive's reading room. The legal protection periods must be observed. The reading room is equipped with 42 workstations, two computers with Internet access, WLAN and microfilm and microfiche readers. A consultant is available for advice in a separate consultation room. The consultation can also be conducted in English.

The main focus of interest in the archive holdings are in the area of scientific research and science-related issues as well as in local history or genealogical research, in the pursuit of personal legal matters, including pension, property and inheritance matters, and in internal use by local politics and city administration. Holdings can be researched and ordered online via the Vienna Archive Information System (WAIS).

The archive answers written inquiries about the holdings and their usability. For a fee, brief, clearly defined inquiries about the content of archived material and the history of the city can also be provided, provided the inquiries do not require extensive research. Copies and digital copies can be ordered in writing.

public relation

The Vienna City and State Archives repeatedly provide an insight into its holdings through the main topics in the Vienna History Wiki . Originals are also exhibited in the reading room foyer. Workshops, lectures and conferences are also held in cooperation with other research institutions. The lecture hall can be divided into two smaller halls.

On September 11, 2014, the Vienna History Wiki project, supported by the Vienna City and State Archives and the Vienna Library in the City Hall , was presented. It contains almost 34,000 entries on the history of Vienna, important personalities and places and buildings. The "Vienna History Wiki" is constantly being expanded and is intended to provide quick and transparent access to the history of the city of Vienna.

Cooperations

As part of its commitment to scientific research, the Vienna City and State Archives work together with a number of research institutions, including the Association for the History of the City of Vienna and the Association for the History of the Labor Movement.

literature

Peter Csendes : The Vienna City and State Archives. A leader . Vienna 1991, OCLC 38667859 .

Ferdinand Opll : History of the Vienna City and State Archives . Vienna 1994

Ferdinand Opll: Activity report of the Vienna City and State Archives 2001–2005 . Vienna 2006.

Brigitte Rigele: The Vienna City and State Archives in the years 1938–1945. In: Sabine Bohmann and others: Austria's archives under the swastika. (Communications from the Austrian State Archives, 54). Studienverlag, Innsbruck 2010, ISBN 978-3-7065-4941-7 , pp. 387-424.