Hunting for Sources: Dreams and Realities of Nineteenth-Century Archival Travel

Some of the most sober travel accounts written in the nineteenth century can be found in the pages of German historical journals. Most of these travel reports, never containing any illustrations, are brief accounts of archival journeys made on behalf of historical associations. They tell us about scholars’ attempts to trace and transcribe historical sources – especially medieval charters – preserved in town halls and archival institutions across Europe. The authors seem to have been eager to avoid the impression that these archival journeys had a touch of tourism, for the reports usually keep entirely silent about hotels in which the travellers stayed, places of interest they saw, and landscapes they witnessed from the train.