THE MANUSCRIPTS

The first folklore material received by ALF was already collected before its foundation — the collection of children songs collected by means of a questionnaire given to schoolchildren (42,358 items), the collection of Barons Society (33,416 items), as well as the substantial collections contributed by profesors Pēteris Šmits and Jānis Alberts Jansons, teachers Arvīds Aizsils and Jānis Greste, Rīga Secondary School No. 2, gymnasiums of Cesvaine and Ludza, Teacher Training Institutes of Rīga, Jelgava, Daugavpils and Rēzekne, and, of course, the University of Latvia.

Collection did not cease even during the WWII, when ALF organised field-work expeditions to different parts of Latvia. Similarly during the soviet years, when the folklorists were faced with an ideological demand to collect the so-called soviet folklore, the ALF archives also received valuable material. The main method of folklore collection in this period was the field work expedition. In the period since 1947 there have been 52 such folklore collection expeditions.

Nearly every employee of ALF, beginning with the person behind the founding of ALF - Anna Bērzkalne, has one’s own collection in the holdings of ALF. The archives hold collections of well-known culture people like — Āronu Matīss, Mārtiņš Celmiņš, Jānis Misiņš, Augusts Bīlenšteins, Ozoliņu Dāvis, Voldemārs Vankins, Jānis Endzelīns, Juris Plāķis, Pēteris Smelters, Fēlikss Laizāns, Jēkabs Ķīburis, Ludis Bērziņš, Kārlis Straubergs, Pēteris Birkerts, Ivans Fridrihs, Sergejs Saharovs, Jānis Leimanis, archaeologists Vladislavs and Juris Urtāns, Krišjānis and Valdemārs Ancītis, local historians Kārlis Bukums, Jānis Kučers, Sigurds Rusmanis and many others. ALF also keeps the largest collections of folk music transcriptions in the collections of Jurjānu Andrejs, Emilis Melngailis, Arturs Salaks, Lidija Galeniece, Voldemārs Stelbergs, Andrejs Krūmiņš as well as those created during the post-war expeditions.

Last time modified: 12.09.2016 13:25:08