“No one knows what is in it”: Cataloguing the Linnean Society Domestic Archive

During the first meetings of the Linnean Society of London, the founding Fellows signed their names in a ledger. Over 200 years later, that ledger sits in storage inside the Society’s rooms in Burlington House and a whole collection has grown, branching out from those very first documents. Minute books, correspondence, receipts and building plans all created in the founding and day to day running of the Society. In fact, the Domestic Archive continues to expand as we hold events, publish research, or care for and study our collections. It is a rich source of first-hand information on the history of the Society, giving understanding to key decisions, the lives of staff and the tremendous amount of work that goes on behind the scenes.

Thanks to a generous legacy left to the Society by a Fellow, Gertrude Marsh-Looi, the Collections Team were able to fund an Archivist (me) to finally create a formal catalogue of this material and make the information we have available and searchable.

Creating an archival collection from scratch is a time-consuming and complicated process. The lack of documentation or personal insight explaining the significance or provenance of files, naming important figures, or linking artwork to their publications can leave a catalogue confusingly vague. Luckily early work on the collection had grouped papers relating to Society Meetings or items in the collections together. This not only gave me a good understanding of recordkeeping in the Society, but also the bones of a structure around which to build the catalogue. Once this was finalised I was able to go through each box, file by file, and sort them into sections that reflected their place in the history of the Society’s actions. This included an ‘all out siege’ on Burlington House, scouring cupboards and ransacking desks for letters, plans, and paperwork that helped to complete the picture.

Every file had to be read and weeded for out-of-scope items, such as magazines left in the Librarian’s purchasing files, Christmas cards packed away with details of an upcoming Council Meeting, or an envelope buried in the Collections papers marked ‘Sounds Intriguing!’…that turned out to be disappointingly empty. Every file kept was then numbered and checked for conservation and security issues before being added to the catalogue. In total 4,050 files and items were listed and then stored securely in Burlington House.

Rummaging through the material, you start to build a picture of the Society. Items from different sections of the catalogue start to link together, showing just how intertwined every element of the Society really is, and paramount to all of this is the relationship with the Fellowship.

One thing I found particularly endearing about this archive is its occasional lack of continuity. The gaps of information can be confounding and send you on a quest to a file that may seem totally irrelevant on the surface but actually gives you more leads to follow. While this sadly means that some information is still hidden, or even lost to a shredder of days past, it may also leave us with some wonderful surprises to come.

Above all, what stays with you about this archive are the voices of the people found within it. Whether you’re reading early letters from esteemed Fellows or more modern correspondence of Fellows and staff who are still in living memory, the voices of these people shine through, their jokes, their frustrations, their schemes and, above all, their investment in the Society and its work.

As the Society moves towards making the majority of our collections available, we hope that providing access to our wealth of material will give an unrivalled insight into the work of the Society and the lives of the people who have helped it to thrive and in-so doing to support further research into the natural sciences.