The Stadtarchiv München is the archive for the accumulating material from all municipal offices, businesses and companies of

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

; In addition, private holdings are also archived there. The Stadtarchiv is located in the

Schwabing Schwabing is a borough in the northern part of Munich, the Capital (political), capital of the Germany, German state of Bavaria. It is part of the city borough 4 (Schwabing-West) and the city borough 12 (Schwabing-Freimann). The population of Sc ...

-West district. The older part of the building used to serve as a municipal military office.

History

Since the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, documents from the city life have been archived in Munich. As a rule, the

city treasurer The municipal treasurer is a position of responsibility for a municipality according to the locally prevailing laws. The treasurer of a public agency is electedregistrar was appointed, who, starting in 1845, was responsible for keeping records of events that were important from every day. Since 1893 there is a separate municipal office. It was initially located in a building designed by Hans Grässel on

Marienplatz Marienplatz (English language, English: Mary's Square, i.e. St. Mary, Blessed Virgin Mary, Our Lady's Square) is a town square, central square in the city centre of Munich, Germany. It has been the city's main square since 1158. History During ...

; and in 1920 it moved to its current location.

Building and location

The Stadtarchiv is located in the former municipal military office; the building was built in 1912–1914, also by Hans Grässel; it is an historically listed building. A large extension through plans by

Hans-Busso von Busse Hans-Busso (Arthur Rudolf) von Busse (7 May 1930, Oppeln, Upper Silesia – 7 November 2009, Munich) was a German architect and academic. He designed, among others, the in Erding and a restaurant at the Evangelische Akademie Tutzing. Selected ...

, was built in 1990. Today, the Stadtarchiv occupy the entire block between Winzerer, Elisabeth, Schleißheimer and Hohenzollernstraße. The golden

medallion A medal or medallion is a small portable artistic object, a thin disc, normally of metal, carrying a design, usually on both sides. They typically have a commemorative purpose of some kind, and many are presented as awards. They may be in ...

above the entrance on Schleißheimer Straße and the silver pillar in front of it are part of the ensemble Oculus historiae, oculus memoriae, oculus oblivionis from Anne and Patrick Poirier.

Many documents concerning the city of Munich can be found in the ''

Staatsarchiv München Staatsarchiv München is located in Maxvorstadt, Munich, Bavaria, Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to t ...

'' (Munich State Archives); this is due to the various competences from city and state, which were distributed differently in earlier times, for example in the area of police. Most of the documents in the Stadtarchiv originate naturally from the 19th and 20th centuries, the time after the onset of Munich's strongest growth. The oldest document dates back to 1265. From the period before 1500, the Stadtarchiv has 2381 documents, and from the following three centuries a further 6922. A large portion of these documents are council minutes, tax books and chamber bills. The contents of the Stadtarchiv are made up of the following parts: ''Bestand Bürgermeister und Rat'' (mayor and council) holdings contain documents from the highest city administration on all municipal tasks. The Gewerbeamt inventory contains documents from the field of business and industry, including the archive of the ''Spaten-Brauerei'' (Spaten Brewery). In the contents of the ''Lokalbaukommission'' (local construction committee), construction-historical material is collected, among other things building permit files and construction plans of private buildings; concerning Urban buildings, their contents are found in the construction office. Documents on municipal and private schools can be found in the inventory of the school office, such as urban cultural policy and development in the inventory of the cultural office – including files of the city museum and the ''Münchner Philharmoniker'' (

Munich Philharmonic The Munich Philharmonic () is a German symphony orchestra located in the city of Munich. It is one of Munich's four principal orchestras, along with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Radio Orchestra and the Bavarian State Orche ...

). These records include registration documents from the first third of the 19th century, the Munich city chronicle dating back to 1818, numerous legacies and a photo collection, which also contains compilations by

Karl Valentin Karl Valentin (, born Valentin Ludwig Fey; 4 June 1882 – 9 February 1948) was a Bavarian comedian. He had significant influence on German Weimar culture. Valentin starred in many silent films in the 1920s, and was sometimes called the "Cha ...

. Since September 2009, the Stadtarchiv store all Munich

birth Birth is the act or process of bearing or bringing forth offspring, also referred to in technical contexts as parturition. In mammals, the process is initiated by hormones which cause the muscular walls of the uterus to contract, expelling the f ...

marriage Marriage, also called matrimony or wedlock, is a culturally and often legally recognised union between people called spouses. It establishes rights and obligations between them, as well as between them and their children (if any), and b ...

, and

death certificate A death certificate is either a legal document issued by a medical practitioner which states when a person died, or a document issued by a government civil registration office, that declares the date, location and cause of a person's death, a ...

s for which the statutory retention period has expired under the Civil Status Reform Act; before then it was the lone responsibility of the

registry office A register office, commonly referred to unofficially as a registry office or registrar's office is an office in the United Kingdom, Republic of Ireland and some Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth countries responsible for the civil registration ...

. Since 2016, the Stadtarchiv offers an

online search Online search is the process of interactively searching for and retrieving requested information via a computer from databases that are online. Interactive searches became possible in the 1980s with the advent of faster databases and smart terminal ...

facility, which allows a requirement-free as well as time and location-independent search of all holdings.

Particularities

The city of Munich has received from the estate of Shalom Ben-Chorin, the entire contents of the deceased in 1999

religious philosophers Religion is a range of social system, social-cultural systems, including designated religious behaviour, behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, religious text, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics in religion, ethics, or ...

home office; Furniture, books and other objects were brought from

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

to Munich and they reconstructed the home office in 2009 in the Stadtarchiv with the original furnishings. The literary estate, Manuscripts and letters, were given to the literature archive Marbach. Ben-Chorin was born in Munich at

Zweibrückenstraße 8 The house Zweibrückenstraße 8, in the district of Ludwigsvorstadt-Isarvorstadt in Munich, was built in 1903. The residential and commercial building is a historically protected architectural building (file number D-1-62-000-7788 in the list of ...

in 1913.

Directors

* Pius Dirr (1917–) * Reinhold Schaffer (−1958) * Michael Schattenhofer (1958–1990) * Richard Bauer (1980–2008) * Michael Stephan (since 2008)

References

External links