Lietuvos centrinio valstybės archyvo kūrimasis (1918–1921 metai)

Abstract

Šio straipsnio tikslas – pirminių šaltinių duomenimis papildyti apie CVA kūrimąsi rašiusių autorių pateiktus duomenis, atskleisti, kaip ir kodėl Kaune kūrėsi Lietuvos centrinis valstybės archyvas, kas stovėjo prie nepriklausomos Lietuvos archyvų kūrimo ištakų, kokios aplinkybės įtakojo ir darė poveikį šiam procesui, koks buvo to meto archyvistikos specialistų (jei tokių buvo) ir ką tik atkūrusios savo nepriklausomybę valstybės požiūris į archyvus, archyvinius dokumentus, jų (iš)saugojimą bei panaudojimą.

The main purpose of the article is to reveal the process of the Central State Archives’ establishment emphasizing the main reasons and conditions of this particularly important historical event. The situation for the establishment of Central Archives was extremely unfavorable: authorities of the newly reborn state were first of all concentrated on securing the state survival and existence. This was one of the reasons why the initiative of establishing the State Archives emerged from individual intellectuals who were deeply concerned about the dangers of the national archival records’ destruction. The situation started to improve since May 28, 1919, with the establishment of the State Archeological Commission (SAC), subordinate to the Ministry of Education. The members of the Commission (Volteris, Nagevicius and, especially, Jablonskis) should be considered to be the main persons in the process of the CSA establishment. Due to particular reasons, the state authorities did not play the main role in the process. Concern about the archives and preservation of archival records was not state’s priority at that time. Two factors – the growing conflict between SAC and the owner of the first premises occupied for the Archives at Didzioji totoriu 17 street and intensive recapture of archival documents which had been transported to Russia during the World War I, accelerated the CSA establishment process. It should be also emphasized that the establishment of the Lithuanian Central State Archives was ordered by the Ministry of Education and not by the parliament or government which shows insufficient state authorities’ attitude towards the archives and archival documents in Lithuania at that time. Despite the fact that the establishment of CSA is a comparatively new event, a great variety of dates and names connected with this meaningful historic event is still to be discussed and analyzed by future researchers.