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Foreword

by Irina Bokova

Director-General of UNESCO

© UNESCO

UNESCO launched the Memory of the World Programme in 1992 to protect and promote the world’s documentary heritage through preservation and access – access to encourage protection, and preservation to ensure access.

This vision was vindicated a few months later, when on 25 August 1992, 1.5 million books in the Bosnia National and University Library in Sarajevo were destroyed. With this, a chapter of the history of humanity vanished. Too much of our heritage is lost like this in the heat of conflicts and through the twists and turns of history. Too much also lies hidden and inaccessible in libraries, museums and archives. This documentary heritage carries the memory of human experience. It is a vehicle for identity and a wellspring of knowledge and wisdom. For twenty years, UNESCO has worked to capture and to share this wealth for the benefit of all.

The UNESCO Memory of the World Registry contains today 245 documentary items from all parts of the world – from clay tablets, manuscripts and films to photographs, maps and web pages. This Register is our flagship to preserve, raise awareness and promote access to the documentary treasures of humanity. Preserving this heritage is important for maintaining the cultural heritage and identity of all societies. It safeguards our memories as a force shaping us as social beings in a common humanity.

The Memory of the World encourages every country to establish a national register and propose items for the international register. Heritage can be recorded on any of the carriers used to safeguard memories. These range from listings of archives relating to historical figures, such as Nelson Mandela and Alfred Nobel, to major historical events, voyages of exploration that have transformed the world, and the records of scientific discoveries and anthropological recordings. The scope is as vast, indeed, as is human experience.

Anne Frank’s Diaries or the Epigraphic Archives of Wat Pho need little explanation today. However, other items on the Register, such as the Sakubei Yamamoto collection and the 1824-1897 Royal Archives of Madagascar, may be less well-known but are no less emblematic of human ingenuity.

This book reveals this heritage in all of its diversity. For twenty years, the Memory of the World programme has gone from strength to strength. We must now take it ever further – by increasing nominations from all countries and by raising the visibility of preserving sources of knowledge of outstanding significance. Memory of the World is coming of age at a time when preserving our documentary heritage is more important than ever.