ABSTRACT
Archival documentation is the term used to refer to those documents that record the activities of an archival program. As the term archives has come to mean different things in different contexts, the term archival program has come into common use to represent that wide range of tasks and roles undertaken by people when endeavoring to ensure that information is preserved as evidence. This entry does not attempt to prescribe the specific forms of records that archival documentation should create, as circumstances will vary widely from jurisdiction to jurisdiction and from country to country. Rather, the entry outlines the fundamental issues and purpose of archival documentation in order to help the reader judge the adequacy of existing systems and plan for improved forms of documentation. The guiding principle of archival documentation is that it helps tell the story of the materials managed by an archival program.
