COURAGE

connecting collections

The archives preserve records about state, local government, enterprises, religious communities, popular organisations, and other non-state institutions and individuals, dating from 1918 until 1990. The division of Sound and Image is the main repository of the audio-visual heritage in Lithuania. It preserves moving pictures made since 1919, photographic negatives and positives since the 1850s, sound recordings made since the 1950s, and videotapes from 1988 to the present day. Written documents make up 2,177 fonds, approximately 3.5 million files, occupying around 33,000 metres of shelf space. There are approximately 9,000 cinematographic documents (1910s to date). Copies of films made by the Lumiere Brothers in 1895, the earliest films ever made, are preserved in the archive. The archive also includes: a collection of Lithuanian newsreels from 1918 to 1940, and work by the first Lithuanian cameramen, K. Lukšys, J.Milius, the brothers Motūza-Beleckas, S. Vainalavičius, S. Uzdonas and J. Miežlaiškis; cinematographic material relating to the period of the Second World War; documentaries made in the Lithuanian Film Studios and Lithuanian Television in 1946–1990; the first Lithuanian feature films ‘The Blue Horizon’ (Žydrasis horizontas), ‘The Bridge’ (Tiltas), ‘Ignotas Returned Home’ (Ignotas grįžo namo), ‘Turkeys’ (Kalakutai), and others.
According to the archivist Vaidas Agurkis, the documents and collections in the archive are chronologicaly limited to the period 1918-1990. The archive does not seek to obtain new collections. There are only a few exceptions when the archive receives new collections. These are related mainly to the Lithuanian diplomatic service abroad, or some private initiatives. Some documents were transferred from the archive to other archives. For example, part of the Glavlit collection was given to the Lithaunian Archive of Literature and Art. Agurkis says that only three employees at the archive look after the handling, managing and describing of new items. Because of this, the creation and formalisation of new acquisitions takes some years after receiving them.

The Lithuanian Communist Party History Institute was established in 1946 as a subdivision of the Institute of Marxism-Leninism in Moscow. The main aim of the Institute was to translate into the Lithuanian language and publish the works of Marx, Lenin and Stalin. The Institute collected documentation on the communist movement in Lithuania, and conducted research on it.

The Lithuanian Institute of History is a state-funded research institution, and the country’s main history research centre, concentrating largely on the history of Lithuania and its historic neighbours. The Institute has seven research departments, a library, a manuscript room and a publishing department. The manuscript room contains a collection of archaeological, ethnographic and historical material, from which it publishes original sources. The library holds more than 154,000 volumes, dating from the 17th century to the present day.