STATE ARCHIVES IN OPAVA - STATE DISTRICT ARCHIVES ŠUMPERK

We first learn of efforts to establish a district archive inŠumperk from the minutes of the District National Committee in 1947. The intention was realized a year later; the Šumperk District Archive was the only institution of its kind in North Moravia at the time. It was housed in two rooms of Šumperk Castle (formerly Žerotín), where the Šumperk town archives had been located until then. With the enactment of Government Decree No. 29/1954 Coll. the Šumperk District Archives became part of the nationwide network of state archives. Four years later, the archive acquired its own building in KladskáStreet (today's Geschader House).

The future direction of the archive was significantly influenced by the change in territorial organization. With the entry into force of the Act on the Territorial Organization of the State (No. 36/1960 Coll.) in 1960, the area of responsibility of theŠumperk Archives was extended to include the former districtsof Zábřeh andJeseník. The archives dissolved there became its branches.

Despite the constantly growing volume of documents managed, the technical condition of the buildings used by the archive deteriorated. Due to its poor condition, the archive building in Kladská Street was closed in 1984. The archive collection was moved to seven temporary storage facilities outside the town of Šumperk. As early as 1985, the construction of a purpose-built building in Bratří Čapků Street [Čapek Brothers Street] (it was the first purpose-built archive building in Moravia). However, the capacity of the completed building soon proved to be insufficient. Some of the documents stored in the archive had to be moved to other buildings and the study room only had two places for researchers. Therefore, the reconstruction and expansion of the Šumperk State District Archives began in August 1995. The building was completed and put into operation in April 1998. The new building with a storage capacity of 7,500 linear meters and nine researcher places has been used unchanged ever since.

In 1996, the Jeseník district was renewed. In connection with this change, the Jeseník Archives ceased to be a branch of the Šumperk State District Archives and became an independent district archive. The year 2002 was an important milestone for the further operation of the archive in Šumperk. As a result of territorial reforms, which included the abolition of district offices, the Šumperk State District Archives became became an organizational part of the Regional Archives in Opava.

The main task of the Šumperk Regional State Archives is to take care of the archival material stored and to ensure its accessibility for researchers. The archive controls, among other things, the implementation of the archiving service at the organizational units of the state with district or municipal competence, at the bodies of local self-government units and carries out the selection of archival material in the shredding process and outside the shredding process. At present, the Šumperk State District Archive manages 1922 collections with a total volume of 3170 linear meters. The deposits contain documents from the holdings of towns and municipalities, guilds, documents from parish offices and deaneries, associations, cooperatives, schools, district offices and the so-called personal holdings. In addition, the archive manages several collections, such as the cadastral map collection or the historical and documentary collection, which is mainly used for exhibition purposes. The archive also includes a library, which has been built up since 1958 and contains specialized literature on Czech, world and especially regional history, auxiliary historical sciences and archives, as well as a number of periodicals, bound newspapers and dissertations based on the study of documents deposited in the archive; the library also contains a number of edited editions of historical sources. A separate part is the library of the estate of the soldier, folklorist and collector of folk songs Bohuslav Indra with more than a thousand volumes and the libraries of individual municipalities with many rare prints.

Basic features of the holdings on the history of the House of Liechtenstein family
A number of towns and villages, which today fall within the jurisdiction of the Šumperk Regional State Archives, belonged to the Liechtenstein family. We first encounter this noble family at the end of the 16th century, when Karl of Liechtenstein acquired theÚsov manor by marriage to Anna Černohorská of Boskovice after the Boskovice family died out. The further expansion of the family rule is linked to the aforementioned founder of the Princely House, Charles I of Liechtenstein. During the time of the Estates Uprising, he loyally sided with Emperor Ferdinand II, for which he was rewarded with extensive estates, which were seized from the rebellious members of the Estates community. In 1622, he acquired the estates of Bludov [Blauda], Kolštejn[Goldenstein], Zábřež[Sabresch] and Ruda [Eisenberg], to which the estates of Šilperk ([Mährisch Schildberg] today's Štíty), Bohdíkov[Bohemian March Village], Bartoňov[Bartelsdorf] and Temenice[Hermesdorf]. The town of Šumperk suffered the same fate due to its participation in the Estates Uprising and lost the privilege granted by Emperor Ferdinand I in 1562, which declared it a town of the royal chamber, including other privileges and freedoms, and was entrusted to the care of Charles I of Liechtenstein; it remained under the administration of the princely family until 1848. From 1802, the Liechtenstein family also owned Velké Losiny Castle. In 1945, the property was confiscated by Presidential Decree No. 12/45 GB.

The files of the manors owned by the Liechtenstein family can be found today in the Olomouc branch of the State Archives in Opava. The documents stored in the Šumperk District Archives, which are available to researchers, are mainly of an official nature; they are more or less individual items scattered mainly in the holdings of towns and municipalities that fell under Liechtenstein administration. The document of Alois Joseph of Liechtenstein from 1802, in which he confirms the earlier privileges of the village of PustéŽibřidovice with regard to the work, bears witness to this. In addition to the relatively rich documentary material contained in the collections of the StaréMěsto Municipal Archives, the Šumperk Municipal Archives, theZábřeh Municipal Archives and the collections of other municipalities (Branná [Bord formerly Goldenstein], Pusté Žibřidovice, etc.), the State Archives also contain a number of other documents.), the State District Archive of Šumperk contains various correspondence (applications and complaints) addressed to Liechtenstein officials. Also worth mentioning are the numerous plans and sketches of the princely hunting grounds in the Šumperk-I District Office's holdings. There are practically no documents of a personal nature related to the Liechtensteiners in the Šumperk archives. The only exception are the memoirs of the Liechtenstein gardener Franz Slabý, written at the beginning of the 20th century, which record events from 1802; the memoirs are part of the historical documentation collection. Undoubtedly interesting is the record from 1880 of the exhumation and subsequent burial of the Lichtensteins from the archives of the Velké Losiny municipality.

In the collections of the district and provincial committees there are documents containing information about the confiscation of Liechtenstein property in 1945.