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The archival tradition, based on provenance principle’s respect of holdings and on medievalists’ erudition, reached its full development with the publication of the Dutch textbook of Muller, Feith et Fruin and the introduction to the historical studies of Langlois et Seignobos in 1898. The reexamination was guided by the principle that archival materials must be treated with methods and techniques that are subject to international standards of validity. Roughly 40 years ago, the emergence of information technology, the changes in administrative setting, and in the utilization of archives, brought about a paradigm shift. The new paradigm could concentrate on the function of memory that is the archive-institution’s objective.