Dr. Péter Balázs: Guide to the archives of Hungary (Budapest, 1976)

Somogy Megyei Levéltár (Somogy County Archives)

SOMOGY MEGYEI LEVÉLTÁR (SOMOGY COUNTY ARCHIVES) 7400 KAPOSVÁR, Rippl-Rónai tér 1. (Pf. 91.) Tel. 12-563 Director: Dr. József KANYAR candidate of historical sciences Coming under Turkish rule at the end of the sixteenth century, Somogy county has lost its independence, as Art. 41 of 1596 (decree VII) and Art. 22 of 1608 (decree I), confirming the former, united it with Zala county. Art. 86 of 1715 has restored the self-standing county. The archives was founded by Art. 73 of 1723 which obliged the county to erect a county residence for its assemblies and courts of law, also for the preservation of its most valuable treasure, the records in an archives. From 1724 to 1735 the archives was found in the county residence of the age, in Tapsony. Here it was that János TALLIÁN, chief notary began to copy into volumes the decaying records, stored in a wet place. They were transferred to Kaposvár in 1750 only. The first works for arrangement and description were executed in the Archives in the reign of Maria Theresa. Now the registering of records, the copying of the journals fair and their indexing was begun. Also the management of county acts was first regulated in this period. The county took serious steps to get back further archival matetial from Zala county, the resistance of the latter, however, caused them to fail. In the second phase of arrangement, during the reign of Joseph II, arrangement and description were continued; the administrative and judicial records were separated at this time. The third phase of arrangement lasted from 1790 to 1848. In this period Sámuel EPERJESSY (1792-1799), Dániel SZOKOLAY (1804-1813), Pál J3EZERÉDY (1828-1846) and József KÖRMENDY (1846-1849) acted as archivists, among others. Of them the work of Sámuel EPERJESSY (registering and indexing) and Pál BEZERÉDY (registering and copying of journals) deserves to be praised. After 1848/49 the Archives were left without specialists for years, entrusted to the care of officials of the law court and the county administration; instead of alleviating the disorder in the stack-rooms, they turned it into a chaos, lacking the necessary knowledge. Only the restoration of county self-government (1860) brought experts to the direction of the archives again.