I have already written that archives in Germany typically remain with organizations and are not transferred to municipal, regional, or federal archives as long as the organization exists. For example, church registers are kept in churches for centuries, while bishops’ offices maintain their own archives, often with small reading rooms for researchers (research is fee-based and charged hourly).

There are also large family archives. I needed access to one such archive, stored in the castle of the Counts von Wieser. Interestingly, these family archives are officially registered with the state. In the Main State Archive of Baden-Württemberg in Karlsruhe, there is a detailed inventory of the von Wieser archive and other significant family archives containing documents from the 16th to 18th centuries. Access to the archive’s documents is possible only by arrangement with its owner and under their terms.

In the photo: the castle of the Barons von Wieser, where their family archive is located.