Archivio di Stato - Lucca - Tuscany

The establishment of a state archive was proclaimed on August 27, 1804 by the government of the Republic of Lucca. This archive did not include the papers of the "Camera de' libri e delle Scritture", the oldest public archive of the municipality of Lucca (documented since 1308) of a notarial nature, while it did include the archive "di Palazzo", which consisted of political and government documents. It was not until 1860 that the documents of the Chamber and the Palace were reunited.

Important was the leadership of Salvatore Bongi, who first applied the historical method in the reorganization of the documents, in which the original order of the papers had to be absolutely respected, by drawing up inventories in which the structure and organization of the subjects covered they had produced, were thoroughly explained, in the local and general historical-institutional context. The four inventories masterfully compiled by Bongi still serve as models for the application of this method, which, albeit with the necessary corrections and updates, is still used by archive management. In 1927 there were 2 civil servants, instead of the 5 on the staff roster. Despite this, the service to the users was still considered good.
The archives of the State Archives of Lucca cover about 15,000 meters of shelves, with 22,483 parchments (of which 698 "fragmenta codicum", recovered from covers of volumes), 152,432 pieces of paper, 1,199 maps, 116 coins, medals and tokens, 306 seals and cancels, 253 cones and punches, 1207 clichés. These original archives have been supplemented over time: Italian land registry, fascist archives and national liberation committees, prefecture, courts of justice, police stations, hospitals; some already inventoried private archives such as those of Arnolfini, Bottini, Buonvisi, Guinigi, Mansi, Sardini, and others still being published, such as those of Bongi, Cenami, Raffaelli, Sardi, Spada.

Willem Vandenameele