Problemáticas históricas e arquivísticas actuais para o estudo dos arquivos de família portugueses (Épocas Medieval e Moderna)

Abstract

Family archives are sources of remarkable interest for both history and archivistics. The study methods of this aequis under these two disciplines are described herein, either in terms of the objective data, or of the structure of the information. This paper places itself at the crossroad of historiographic and archivistic knowledge, the latter being viewed from the perspective of the renewed epistemological paradigm of information science. The first part introduces fields of theoretical innovation that foster a fruitful dialogue between the two subjects. Then it discusses the enhancement of the value of family archives, in Portugal, France, Spain and Italy. Finally, the paper proposes aprimary approach to an important acquis deposited at the Torre do Tombo national archive, the description of which was recently published on line: the Archive of the Viscounts of Vila Nova de Cerveira.