Recently, The First Historical Archives of China opened its exhibition and archival search and retrieval services to the public for the first time.
The operating hours for The First Historical Archives of China are as follows: Monday to Friday from 8:30 to 16:30 (admission stops at 16:00), Saturday from 9:00 to 17:00 (admission stops at 16:30), and it is closed on Sundays and statutory holidays. Special notices will be provided for any exceptional circumstances. Currently, visitors can make reservations either online through the website and applet seven days in advance or on-site for exhibition visits and archival search and retrieval services.
The predecessor of The First Historical Archives of China was the Department of Documents established within the Palace Museum on October 10, 1925. It stands as the first archival management institution in China with modern significance, serving as the central national archives specifically responsible for preserving the central government and imperial archives of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Since its establishment in 1925, it has witnessed nearly a century of development. The archives collection comprises over 10 million documents and volumes, with more than 3,000 items from the Ming Dynasty and the majority from the Qing Dynasty. Among the archives, approximately 80% are in Chinese, 20% in Manchu, and there are over 50,000 items (volumes) in Mongolian, along with a small number of records in other ethnic languages and archives in foreign languages such as English, French, German, Russian, and Japanese. The Ming and Qing archival collection consists of 77 archives, and as of now, nearly 4.8 million documents from 44 archives, including the Cabinet, Legal Revision Institute, Ministry of Punishments and Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Civil Affairs, Ministry of War and Ministry of the Army have been opened to the public. There are seven full-text searchable databases for Chinese documents and 11 for Manchu documents. Additionally, the official website provides access to 4.22 million catalogue entries available for users free of charge.
Recently, the archived documents have been successfully moved from within the West Prosperity Gate of the Forbidden City to the new facility. This marks a significant milestone as the tens of millions of historical archives from the Ming and Qing dynasties have completely stepped out of the imperial compound, entering the public domain, and entering a new era. The current exhibitions include displays such as "Keeping History – An Exhibition of Containers of Imperial Archives of the Ming and Qing Dynasties".
Translator: TANG Yuxin
Reviewer: BAI Jing
