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PART A - ESSENTIAL INFORMATION
PART
A - ESSENTIAL INFORMATION
1.1 Name of documentary heritage: The Tibetan Archives
1.2 Country: The People's Republic of China
1.3 State, province or region: The Tibetan Autonomous Region
1.4 Address: Western Suburbs, LHASA, Tibet, China
1.5 Name of organization or institution:
The Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives
2.1 Owner: The Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives
2.2 Custodian (name and contact details): The Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives
2.3 Legal status
(a) category of ownership: public
(b) details of legal and administrative provisions for the preservation of the documentary heritage: Archives holdings are within the legal jurisdiction of the Archives Law of the P.R. of China
(c) accessibility: Archives holdings are open to the public
(d) copyright status: There is copyright limit
2.4 Responsible administration
The Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives
is administratively under the leadership of the Tibetan Autonomous Regional
Government, while receiving the professional supervision and guidance of
the State Archives Bureau of China.
3.1 Description and inventory: There are catalogues and inventories.
3.2 Bibliographic/Registration details: The inventory provides item by item description (partly).
3.3 Visual documentation, if appropriate: There are photos and paintings.
3.4 History: The oldest holdings could go back to the XIIIth century.
3.5 Bibliography: Most of the archival holdings relate to the Tibetan religion and the Indian religion, which reflect the Sub-Asian Continent culture.
3.6 Names, qualifications and contact details of independent people or organizations with expert knowledge about the values and provenance of the documentary heritage
Mrs Zhuo Ga, Director of the Tibetan
Autonomous Regional Archives. She is a native Tibetan and has been working
in archival management for more than 15 years.
The archival holdings reflect the political, economic, religious and cultural life of the Tibetan people, as well as the transferring and removal of Indian religion to Tibet. All processed archival holdings are open to the public, except those relating to the State security or to the privacy. Anyone with an identity card is entitled access to the Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives for research purposes. The preservation budget is about US$ 50,000 per year.
The Archives were able to follow
up the standards set up by the State Archives Bureau of China, i.e. the
temperature of the repository is kept at 18-22° centigrade and the
humidity at 5055%. Its repository is newly equipped with some compact shelving
and records containers. There are three staff specialized in the maintenance
of records.
5. Assessment against the Selection Criteria
5.1 Assessment of the documentary heritage against each criterion described in Annex 2.
Criterion 1 - Influence: The Tibetan archives are of world significance as they are a reflection of political and religious life of India, Nepal, Sikkim and Buthan.
Secondary Criterion 2 - Rarity: The Tibetan Archives are of great significance as they are rare and complete. Their contents are unique in the world.
5.2 Contextual assessment: - not communicated
5.3 an evaluation of the authenticity: - not communicated
5.4 an assessment of rarity (if
appropriate): - not communicated
6.1 Details of consultation about the nomination with the
(a) Owner: The Tibetan Autonomous Regional Government
(b) Custodian: Mrs Zhuo Ga, Director of the Archives
(c) relevant Regional or National Memory of the World Committee
There is a "Memory of the World"
National Committee, which consists of five members with the Deputy Director-General
of the State Archives Bureau of China (Mr Shen Zhengle) as the Chairman
of the Committee.
7.1 Name : The Tibetan Archives
7.2 Relationship to documentary heritage : Important part of the documentary heritage of China
7.3 Contact person: Mrs Zhuo Ga, Director of the Tibetan Autonomous Regional Archives
7.4 Contact details : Western
Suburbs, LHASA, Tibet, China
PART
B - SUBSIDIARY INFORMATION
The holdings are mostly in Tibetan
and the priority is to translate them into Chinese. Most of the holdings
should be described after their translation into Chinese. Some of the paper
records are deteriorated and should be salvaged with paper restoration
and digitization. The annual budget for the records preservation is meagre.
. Present physical state
A new archival repository was established at the western suburbs of Lhasa in 1989 with a funding of US$ one million appropriated by the Tibetan Autonomous Regional Government.
. History of preservation
One set of advanced microfilming equipment was purchased from the USA, UK and Japan in 1990 with a financial support from the Ministry of Finance of China (US$ 450,000) in order to microfilm endangered records.
. Current preservation policy in relation to proposed nominated documentary heritage
The Archives plan to train some 25 young staff in Tibetan language so that the translation work from Tibetan into Chinese could be accelerated.
. Person or organization responsible for preservation: - not communicated