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ArcheoBiblioBase: Archives in Russia: B-2Last update of repository: 6 September 2020Rossiiskii gosudarstvennyi arkhiv drevnikh aktov (RGADA)Previous names
RGADA is in effect an amalgamation of five major prerevolutionary Russian historical archives: (1) the Moscow Archive of the Ministry of Justice (MAMIu) was founded in 1852 as an amalgamation in its turn of several earlier Moscow historical and agency archives: the Razriad-Senate Archive (Razriadno-senatskii arkhiv, founded in 1763), the Archive of Former Landowners Affairs (Arkhiv prezhnikh votchinnykh del, founded in 1768), the State Archive of Old Acts (Gosudarstvennyi arkhiv starykh del, founded in 1782), and the Archive of the Moscow Departments of the Senate, as well as a number of regional archives of state institutions throughout the Russian Empire that were abolished during the reforms of the 1860s; (2) the Moscow Main Archive of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MGAMID)—from 1724 till 1832, the Moscow Archive of the Collegium of Foreign Affairs (MAKID), to which in 1882 was joined the State Repository of Antiquities for Charters and Manuscripts (Gosudarstvennoe drevlekhranilishche khartii i rukopisei), which, since 1834, had been a subdivision within the system of Court archival institutions; (3) the State Archive of the Russian Empire, which shared the building with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in St. Petersburg, having been detached from the Petersburg Archive of the Collegium of Foreign Affairs in 1834, it remained in St. Petersburg until 1917; (4) the Moscow Division of the General Archive of the Ministry of the Imperial Court (Moskovskoe otdelenie Obshchego arkhiva Ministerstva Imperatorskogo dvora), founded in 1869 as the Moscow Court Archive, which brought together the Archive of the Armory Palace (Arkhiv Oruzheinoi palaty) and the Archive of the Moscow Office of the Court (Arkhiv Moskovskoi dvortsovoi kontory), and was renamed in 1888; (5) the Land-Survey Chancellery Archive (Arkhiv Mezhevoi kantseliarii), founded in 1768, and continued as the Central Land-Survey Archive from 1919 until 1939. In 1918 the holdings of all these archives were reorganized as the Juridical and Historico-Cultural Section of the Consolidated State Archival Fond. In 1925 (with the exception of the Central Land-Survey Archive) those early archives were transformed into the Repository of Antiquities (Drevlekhranilishche) of the Moscow Division of the Central Historical Archive of the RSFSR, which also encompassed the nationalized archives of the Moscow agencies of the Synod, churches and monasteries, and many personal and family archives. In 1931 the Repository of Antiquities was reorganized into the State Archive of the Feudal-Serfdom Epoch (GAFKE), to which was joined the holdings of the Central Land-Survey Archive in 1938–1939. In 1941 GAFKE was renamed the Central State Archive of Early Acts (TsGADA; 1985–1991—TsGADA SSSR). The archive received its present name (RGADA) in 1992. (See the chart in the new RGADA guide, b–60, vol. 1). In 1993, RGADA was named to the federal register of the most valuable monuments of the cultural heritage of the peoples of the Russian Federation. |