The Birth of The Archive: A History of Knowledge is a book that focuses on the historical context of archives in early modern European history. Its author, Markus Freidrich, aims to address how Europeans used archives and how the physical state of archives influenced the production of knowledge. This is in contrast to what he describes as a traditional or normative approach, which does not consider the place of archives in society and culture. In this review, I intend to clarify what Freidrich’s approach is and if he accomplishes his goal of placing archives in their social and cultural contexts. Before doing that, I need to introduce the author and review the structure of his book.
According to his faculty page at the University of Hamburg, Markus Freidrich is a Professor of Early Modern History. His research interests include religion in early modern Europe, the history of knowledge and information, and archives and archival culture. He earned his PhD in history from the University of Munich and has taught at various universities in the United States and Germany. His accolades include a fellowship from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, the Heinz Maier-Leibnitz Prize, and a fellowship to the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science.
The Birth of The Archive includes eight chapters each with its own theme. Chapter one serves as an introduction, where Professor Freidrich describes his approach to his subject. He introduces readers to the historiography of the history of archives and comments on relevant theoretical points of view.
Regarding his approach, Freidrich distinguishes his view from scholarship in which, as he puts it on page 12, “[a]ctual archives scarcely enter the picture as historical objects.” As examples of that type of scholarship, he uses Michel Foucault’s and Jacques Derrida’s theoretical perspectives. On page 11, he mentions that Foucault views archives metaphorically and describes them as a “past model of reality.” Derrida’s perspective is psychoanalytical and involves the relationship – Freidrich uses the word “dialectical” – between memory and the suppression of fear of cultural loss.
In contrast, Freidrich’s comments about archives are more concrete. He begins chapter one with an incident: a break-in at the Chambre des Comptes in Paris in 1682, which draws attention to the importance of the environment in which archives existed. Unsurprisingly, parchment was expensive, and Freidrich connects the break-in to the illicit used-parchment trade in France at that time. As he puts it on page three, “[e]ven the most venerable archives of the most powerful authorities in the kingdom were at best only thinly separated from the pulsing social life of their immediate surroundings.”
The next two chapters of The Birth of The Archive focus on origins. Chapter two covers developments starting in the 11th century, including an increase in professionals who were literate and new methods used to organize and preserve the increasing volume of texts. Chapter three introduces the relationship between states and the growth of archives. Freidrich discusses the centralization of state and administrative records and the ways states used new archival policies to exercise control over territory. It is important to keep in mind that he does not claim that this early period is the beginning of archival history. As he points out on page 34, this was a period of reinforcement and institutionalization of existing archival institutions.
Chapter four focuses on the way people interpreted and thought about archives in the early modern era. Freidrich brings up early treatises on the subject of archives and discusses developments in jurisprudence and politics. Particularly interesting is the topic of historical memory and myth. On page 67, he mentions the assumption in the early modern period that archives were a way to preserve memory “in a generally credible way.” He also brings up attempts to find the origins of archives in a mythical prehistoric era and the Bible.
In Chapters five and six, Freidrich directs his attention to early the modern archivists themselves and their working conditions. He describes their relationships with the institutions in which they worked and the princes, ministers, and scholars who relied on them. Freidrich also discusses everyday life for archivists, including practical challenges they faced when dealing with old documents, the eternal struggle to bring order to archives, and managing collections of fragile documents that were susceptible to fire.
The last two chapters of The Birth of The Archive broaden the perspective of the book. Chapter seven revisits the theme of power. Freidrich starts the chapter by referring to 17th century writers who argued that archives underpin state power. He refers to modern writers, also, who argue that archives are a bridge between knowledge and power.
Chapter eight discusses the implications early modern archives had on historians. Given that Freidrich’s approach emphasizes the practical details of his subject matter, it is no surprise that he brings up challenges historians faced when dealing with archives. There were political obstacles, such the need to petition the authorities to gain access to a particular archive, which makes sense given the close connections between archives and political power. There were mundane obstacles, as well, such as difficulties with travel, poor conditions in archives, and uncooperative archivists.
In one anecdote, Freidrich mentions the discomfort a historian experienced while visiting archives in the south of France. Even though he was traveling at the behest of the French king and searching for documents with political significance, archivists made his life difficult. They forced him to work in conditions that tested his patience in what he referred to as, on page 182, “very small, very dark, and very uncomfortable places.”
Now that this review has reached the end of its summary of The Birth of The Archive, it is possible to return to the question at the beginning of this review: does Markus Freidrich succeed in placing archives in their social and cultural contexts? Indeed, he does. As the book summary above demonstrates, each chapter discusses a different theme in its historical context. While the author makes theoretical observations throughout the book, he consistently gives readers a sense of the world in which European archives developed.
The last question to ask, given the subject matter of the course for which this review is written, is how does The Birth of The Archive relate to the history of the Scientific Revolution. Early scientists, like Galileo Galilei, Johannes Kepler, and Isaac Newton, do not appear in Markus Freidrich’s book. When Freidrich discusses the context surrounding archives, he focuses on politics, not on science. However, historians of science can learn a great deal from his book about how to approach an abstract or theoretical subject with a concern for its practical and historical context.
In addition, the connections Freidrich makes between power and knowledge are worth applying to early modern science. His book describes how historians and archivists paid attention to the dynamics of power, which was something early scientists did, as well. As much as we associate, for instance, Tycho Brahe’s famous observatory with scientific progress, for example, we should be willing to consider its place in the cultural and social world in which it existed, as Markus Freidrich does with archives in The Birth of The Archive.
