Introduction

This page outlines basic concepts in archival description.

Terminology

Staff working on archival description projects should understand the following terms:

• Access point

• Archival appraisal

• Archival arrangement

• Archival authority record

• Arrangement

• Chief source of information

• Collection ID

• Description

• Level of arrangement

• Finding aid

• Office ID

• Office of Primary Responsibility

• Office of Secondary Responsibility

• Original order

• Producer

• Provenance

• Reference code

Basic concepts

• Archival description is a core archival function guided by a set of guiding principles.

• Archival description involves the publication of online finding aids that describe archival fonds and collections, and archival authority records that describe the creators of archival material.

• Information provided in each archival description should come from the appropriate chief source of information for the archival material.

• Archival descriptions should align with our metadata guidelines for archival descriptions.

• Archival descriptions should align with our writing style guidelines for archival descriptions.