Archival documents are mainly of administrative nature, such as birth record, paycheck, printing record, lawsuits, enrollment, etc. They are different from diaries and letters, which belong to historical documents, because the recorder of archival records did not necessarily participate in the activities. Archival documents can yield to information that musical manuscripts and printed source cannot provide. The accurate, detailed archival documents can be relevant to biography, history of a pace or an institution, chronology, and performing practice.
Archives have many forms; they can be any repositories with documents of administrative activity and transactions of affairs, and the documents are usually preserved in the original chronological order. Therefore the organization of archives is different from libraries and museums, which normally categorize collections by their criteria. In the late eighteenth century the idea of documents preserved by the States started to appear, and there appeared the French Archives Nationales in 1789 and Archives Départementales in 1796. Many other European countries also established their own public archives to preserve documents. In the United States, there are two levels of archives: federal and national. In short, archives are self-contextuaizing; they have their own idiomatic way of management and it is essential to understand how an archive works, how the documents are selected and organized, and how the records were produced for any researcher to have successful uses of archival documents.
Archives were first used for historians in the nineteenth century, when history writing became not only a kind of literature but also a science of finding accurate information. Before long, archives started to be appreciated as the sources for historical information. For musicology, archival documents can help the research on biography, performing practice, chronology of musical works, anonymous works, and the history of a musical society or festival. For example, from employment and pay records of a church, we might be able to figure out how many players were hired to play each part. From a publisher’s administrative records, we could also find out how many copies of a certain work were sold and how much the composer was paid, which could lead to our understanding of the composer’s popularity at that time.
Archival documents can also help the production of catalogues and complete editions as the foundation for future research. The first generation who took advantage of archival documents had been mostly amateurs, and the following generation included musicologists and organ specialists. François Lesure provided guidelines for various archives, especially those in France, and important skills for archival research. Jan LaRue was especially a significant scholar for archival research; he collected materials from libraries and archives through the Cold War and established a huge database for Classical composers, in particular Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven. He also provided new sources for works of major composers, corrected formerly misattributed works, and found the composers for some anonymous works. His work in the 50s and 60s made significant contribution to the study of watermark and he also promoted the use of computer for musicological research and editing.
Various skills are required for successful archival research. Palaeography is the study of deciphering handwriting, and diplomatic is the study of the forms of documents. Knowing proper names (onomatics) and place names (toponymy) are also important skills. Moreover, the historical context requires researchers to have knowledge about economics and calendars. To use archival documents correctly and efficiently, the researcher’s capability of abstracting is crucial. Oftentimes researchers also have to consult experts in other fields to understand extramusical information. In other words, the researcher has to be equipped to evaluate and interpret archival documents to extract meaningful relationships among documents and construct history in an accurate way.
