Metadata: Documents of Congregations
Collection
- Country:
- Hungary
- Holding institution:
- National Archives of Hungary, Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg County Archives, Nyíregyháza
- Holding institution (official language):
- Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Szabolcs-Szatmár-Bereg Megyei Levéltára, Nyíregyháza
- Postal address:
- Széchenyi str. 4. 4400 Nyíregyháza
- Phone number:
- (36) 42 414 313
- Web address:
- http://www.szabarchiv.hu/drupal/elerhetosegunk
- Email:
- szszbml@mnl.gov.hu
- Reference number:
- IV.A.501.b
- Title:
- Documents of Congregations
- Title (official language):
- Közgyűlési iratok
- Creator/accumulator:
- Szatmár county
- Date(s):
- 1517/1838
- Language:
- Latin
- Hungarian
- Extent:
- 0.3 linear metres (3 boxes)
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The 'Documents of Congregations' collection comprises the documents of congregations for Szatmár County in 1517-1838. The collection is part of the 'Documents of the congregation of nobilities in Szatmár County'.
The collection is rather small as the documents were distributed in the wake of World War I and only the files related to the history of Hungary remained in Nyíregyháza. There are three boxes of papers and all of them are fragmentary. Theoretically, the documents deal with issues of public administration; in fact, besides the Actorum publico-politicorum they also comprise Actorum juridicorum-type materials. In terms of their content, the sources include the assessment of taxes, documents about providing supplies for the army and fragmentary financial accounts.
The collection does not separate the Jewish-related documents. Even this fragmentary material covers Jewish-related sources. The three boxes include fragmentary documents under 10 headings, which date mostly to the early 19th century. Jewish-related documents tend to describe censuses or files registering the lack of censuses, or individual business relationships.
The part of the collection discussing public administration issues should be supplemented with the collection of Actorum publicum politica available in the Cluj (Kolozsvár) archives and the ‘Publicly-owned assets of the Government collection’ dating from 1831, which offer a more comprehensive picture of the territory of historical Hungarian regarding both the history of Szatmár county and the Jews.
- Archival history:
-
The document collection of Szatmár County is based on documents preserved by county officials as no archives had been established before the 16th century. Therefore, initially mostly congregation records were collected in Szatmár County. The categorisation of the collected materials started under the rule of Maria Theresa. The documents were also classified into subject groups at that time. The archives were established in Nagykároly and the documents collected previously were also held there. The emergence of the new borders after World War I resulted in the division of the archived documents and also the relocation of the archives. Part of the material remained in Hungary, whereas the other part was taken to Romania. Documents of the congregation of nobilities were also divided regardless of their timespan. Due to air raids, the materials owned by Hungary were moved to Zajta in 1944 and then to Mátészalka during World War II. Finally, in 1950, they were placed in the newly established archives in Nyíregyháza.
It is possible that Ferenc Schemberger was the person who started to catalogue the archives in Szatmár County in the 18th century. He had already proved his worth by systematising the documents of Szabolcs County earlier. He established the systematisation framework in the archives of Szatmár County in 1781-1783. He classified the Acta publico-politica ‘Publicly owned assets of the Government collection’ into fascicules (packs) and separated the court and legal documents from them. The reforms implemented by Joseph II transformed the previously established system. However, Schemberger‘s successors followed in his footsteps in categorising the documents after 1790.
- Access points: locations:
- Nagykároly
- Subject terms:
- Census
- Financial matters
- Financial matters--Debt
- Taxation
- Trade and commerce
- System of arrangement:
- Schemberger developed 58 packs (fasciculi) for documents from the period of 1724-1781, i.e. each year was given numbers in ascending order. The reforms implemented by Joseph II. broke with this method of classification as documents of public administration were catalogued subsequently. Thus the year of 1786 refers to the first fasciculus and year-by-year reverse numbering was started until 1789. In 1790 archivists returned to Schemberger’s practice, and continued the categorisation with fasciculus 59.
- Finding aids:
-
Some of the handbooks for the material are available in the Archives of Nyíregyháza, Hungary: Elenchus cronologicus publico-politicorum actorum (Volume 259) (1610-1677); Elenchus nominalis seu statisticus I-II. 1724-1781 (Volume 267-268); Index elenchus Francisci Schemberger publico- politicorum (Volume 269). Additional handbooks can be found in the Archives of Cluj (Kolozsvár).
Some periods can only be investigated by examining the documents themselves. All the handbooks are paper-based. When the handbooks are used, it must be ensured that the headings actually reveal the collections of two archives. If merely the headings are used, they may not provide clear information in which files the materials are held. Due to the small size of the collection in Nyíregyháza, it is advisable to consult the documents themselves.
- Yerusha Network member:
- University of Szeged
- Author of the description:
- Dr. Tibor Almási, Dr. Erzsébet Mislovics, University of Szeged, 2019
