The National Archives of Hungary (Budapest, 2006)

ECCLESIASTICAL ARCHIVES - An Overview of Catholic Ecclesiastical Archives by Andor Lakatos

accurately because documents were issued in this language. The first registers and records also helped to maintain the documents. In 1240 an invoice book, the chartularium was made in Saint Martin monastery of Pannonhalma and contains the most important rights ensuring documents. The volume called Liber ruber (that is red book) because of its colour, can still be found in the Archives of Benedict Abbey, the text of several documents were able to survive. At the beginning of the 14

th century a formulary was made in the Franciscan monastery of Székesfehérvár. The 126 formulas assisted with quickly arranging the affairs that occurred in the Franciscan monastery. At this time the royal council decided upon the fees in the issuance of authentic place documents. It was the ruler later on, who decided about the competence of authentic places, the usage of seals, fees and the penalties for the forging of documents which were exremely severe. These views were contained in the regulations of ecclesiastical organizations e.g. in the statute regulating the work of chapters. Because of the importance of documents ensuring rights, a list of inner and outer rules were necessary so as to direct the issuing of documents, their holding and their registry But unfortunately, though very valuable and though subject to scrupulous care, this not able to protect them from natural disasters e.g. fires because of stroke of lightning or even more from the depradations of Tartars and nor by unscrupolous individuals who tried to swindle ownership of property by forgery. It was already noticed in 1276 there was the robbery by violence committed by Péter Csák who caused serious damage in the archives of Veszprém bishopric- and there are other reports about similar actions in the first half of the 14

th century, too. These events caused the ruler great concern as well. In 1322 e.g. King Róbert Károly asked for a report from the chapter of Nyitra about a fire that caused damage in its archives in which many documents were incinerated. The typical storage place of the archives of authentic places and other ecclesiastical documents, which were often marked as private, individual archives. They were located in the sacristy, and tower of churches during the Middle Ages. After 1526 in the areas under Turkish rule, the traditional ecclesiastical organization and its oldest documents were lost. For the „surviving" documents years of 'wandering' took place. Rescuing the archival material from Turkish confiscation began. In the next few centuries nearly all the archives 'travelled incessantly' and unfortunately, not surprisingly, many were lost and others destroyed. Military events were never favourable fort he preservation of the materials of archives and as a consequence, of transporting materials from one place to another resulted in their loss. Sometimes the archives were lost or abandoned by careless owners. Furthermore materials of different archives held in the same place were often mixed. They were often examples for common storage of county, family, ecclesiastical material