Martin KUNA
(Institute of Archaeology ASCR, Praha, Czech Republic)
Outline: Presentation of the digital archives programme which has started in 2002 and is currently being finalized.
The Institute of Archaeology ASCR in Prague keeps the largest archaeological library in the Czech Republic and collects documentary information on all archaeological field activities on the territory of Bohemia. In August 2002 the historic city of Prague suffered from a catastrophic flood which, among numerous other things, destroyed the library of the Institute almost completely and heavily damaged its archives. Two months later, the Institute has been invited to the Vienna workshop to give an information on this event. Consequently, international aid to restore the library and archives was organized. One of the decisions made in the Institute at that time was to digitize the whole archives as a way to save the damaged documents, to preserve the archives against any other potential damage in the future and to facilitate information exchange in Czech archaeology. This year the digitalization project is going to be finalized, covering in total about 60,000 excavation reports, 200,000 negatives and slides and 10,000 plans. Because of the reasons mentioned above the Vienna workshop may be considered as the most appropriate occasion to refer about the results of the project.
Keywords: digital archives, content management system