Original Order

According to the DACS Statement of Principles, original order is an instance of archival context to be documented, but should not be exclusively situated as the central guiding principle of archival arrangement decisions.1 Throughout the lifespan of an archival collection, the creator may have changed the arrangement many times to suit their activities and needs, which is one of a myriad of reasons that the concept of original order becomes complicated. The way a creator initially used or maintained their records may not correspond to the order in which a collection was received.2 While archivists should avoid altering the received order of a collection prior to processing, they should also not assume that the order in which a collection was received aligns with the manner in which the records were used or kept by the creator.3

Some collections arrive without any obvious signs of order, let alone the original order. A collection may arrive in disarray for any number of reasons, and may require the archivist to impose an order to create context for the researcher. The received order may differ due to the collection having been partially processed by another archivist or altered by a third party. For example, if a seller physically rearranged the collection while in their possession, it may be difficult for an archivist to decipher what the original order was. The archivist should avoid altering the received order prior to conducting a thorough survey of the collection and obtaining context of the materials.

In archival theory, the principles of provenance and original order are often described collectively as respect des fonds, a concept dating back to the 19th century, which literally means respecting the fonds or records of a single creator by not mixing them with the records of others,4 while also maintaining the existing arrangement and structure.5 These concepts have endured, but also continue to be reexamined since the guidance was initially intended for the paper records of government agencies. Born-Digital records further complicate these long-standing definitions, as the order, ownership, and origin of digital materials can be more ambiguous.6

  1. “Original Order and Arrangement as Archival Context” from “DACS Statement of Principles,” Society of American Archivists’ Technical Subcommittee on Describing Archives: A Content Standard, Version 2021.0.0.2, https://saa-ts-dacs.github.io/dacs/04_statement_of_principles.html#original-order-and-arrangement-as-archival-context. ↩

  2. Jennifer Meehan writes that we must consider “the ways in which records are created, used, and maintained initially and over time by the creator (personal recordkeeping); the ways in which records are used, maintained, and transmitted by subsequent custodians (custodial history); and the ways in which records are treated once in archival custody, even before being formally processed (archival interven-tion).”Jennifer Meehan, “Rethinking Original Order and Personal Records,” Archivaria, no. 70 (October 20, 2010): 32., https://archivaria.ca/index.php/archivaria/article/view/13294. ↩

  3. Dorothy Berry reminds us that “Valuing the collection organizer over the collection’s human subjects makes sense in many contexts, but as powerful institutions desire more and more to collect material histories beyond the ruling class, we begin recreating systems of bodily ownership that have now been translated into memory.” Dorothy Berry, “The House Archives Built,” Up//Root, July 23, 2021, https://www.uproot.space/features/the-house-archives-built. ↩

  4. Shelley Sweeney, “The Ambiguous Origins of the Archival Principle of ‘Provenance,’” Libraries & the Cultural Record 43, no. 2 (2008): 193–213. https://www.jstor.org/stable/25549475. ↩

  5. Terry Cook, “The Concept of the Archival Fonds in the Post-Custodial Era: Theory, Problems and Solutions,” Archivaria, no. 35 (1992), https://archivaria.ca/index.php/archivaria/article/view/11882. ↩

  6. Jefferson Bailey, “Disrespect Des Fonds: Rethinking Arrangement and Description in Born-Digital Archives,” Archive Journal, June 2013, http://www.archivejournal.net/essays/disrespect-des-fonds-rethinking-arrangement-and-description-in-born-digital-archives/. ↩