Historic documents digitalised

The Danish and the Faroese National Archives have joined forces to digitalise old Faroese documents.

A collection of almost 128,000 old Faroese documents is currently being published digitally. The public can access the documents on the website of the Danish National Archives.

The collection includes documents from the Danish Chancery, dating as far back as 1583. It also includes a substantial collection of documents from the Royal monopoly, along with the oldest part of papers from the Danish Ministry of Justice, which administered Faroese matters from 1849 to 1935. Also included are census papers and death certificates from 1871 to 1971 and medical documents from 1817 to 1944.

Work continues throughout the year

The Danish National Archives recently completed a similar digitalisation project in which all known documents relating to the West Indies were published.

This project prompted Magni Arge, a Faroese member of the Danish Parliament, to strike up a digitalisation collaboration between the Faroese and Danish national archives.

Arge says that the digitalisation work will continue for the rest of the year, and once completed, a vast majority of old Faroese documents in the Danish National Archives will be available to the public.

Translated by prosa.fo