Chancelleries of Free City of Krakow – Preliminary Research Results

Abstract

The article concerns the office system of the Senate of the Free City of Krakow and other institutions functioning in this country in the years 1815–1846. Due to the lack of in-depth research as well as certain similarities in the structure of the preserved to this day archive groups of the Free City of Krakow and Galician institutions, e.g., magistrates, there is a widespread belief that they belong to the same Austrian model. This is evidenced by the coexistence of subject and chronological-number schemes in the documentation arrangement and, perhaps, a similar physical form of archival units. The influence of the Napoleonic period on the Krakow chancellery is omitted. This article draws attention to the fact that it was the system of offices of the Duchy of Warsaw that could have had a decisive influence on the office system of the Free City of Krakow.