Mid-April 2016 marks the 500th anniversary of the settling of the dispute between the Mekinje convent and the town of Kamnik in regard to the cutting down of trees in the territory of the Kamniška Bistica valley. The verdict was issued by the Carniolan governor and the lord of Schonberg Hans Auersperg (Janns von Auersperg), and by the Carniolan Vicedom Erasem Braunbart (Erasmen Braunwart). The charter was written in two identical copies and authenticated with two pendant seals of both issuers. The charter presented here is kept in our Collection of charters and is one of the 220 charters in the series Charters of the Convent of the Order of the Poor Clares in Mekinje.

In addition to generating the much needed electrical energy, the construction of the Hydroelectric Power Station in Medvode had an impact on the general appearance of the region by building a dam across the river Sava and creating Zbilje Lake. This month's archivalia is dedicated to documents that bear witness to the construction of this power station in Medvode between 1947 and 1953.

The first lists of telephone subscribers appeared directly at the beginning of the operation of telephone networks. 140 years after Bell's invention of the electromagnetic telephone we present Directory of Telephone Subscribers and Telephone Offices for Slovenia, which initially also gives general instructions on how to use the phone at all, the review of telephone subscribers in a series of highlights from the life of 99 Slovenian towns in 1922.

Draft of the speech delivered by Edvard Kocbek at the Meeting with the Representatives of the Leadership of the Communist Party of Slovenia in October 1946 (later titled Edvard Kocbek's Interpellation on Treating Christian Socialist and Christians Presented at the Meeting with the Communist Party Leadership) is a revealing critical assessment of the first post-war year, reflecting clearly the characteristics of that time. It also bears witness to Kocbek's separation from the leadership of the Slovenian Communist Party.

This month’s archivalia takes us back to a dramatic revolutionary time a century ago. Presented here is a contract, signed on November 27, 1918 in Maribor by Rudolf Maister, commander of the Styrian Border Command of the SHS, and Colonel Rudolf Passy, the representative of the German-Austrian Committee for Public Welfare and the colonel of the Graz Military Command. The contract was to be a starting-point for determining a demarcation line between the two conflicting sides in Styria and Carinthia and was to ensure a much needed peace. However, official political spheres of the opposing states did not approve of the actions of their military commanders.

On December 23, exactly 200 years ago, the Austrian Emperor Franz I signed the Land Tax Act (Grundsteuerpatent) and ordered the compilation of the Franciscean cadastre. Records created at that time and for that particular purpose are, of course, regarded as archives and as a European cultural monument, since they were the first of this kind in the whole of Europe.

Documents kept by the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia as a private fonds of Ivan Mohorič partly apply to his work at the Chamber of Commerce, Craft and Industry and to his work at different pre-war Yugoslav ministries. Most of the documents were created during his research of the history of Slovenian economy, also preserved is some of his correspondence. The records reveal the often hidden side of Ivan Mohorič, lawyer and economist, namely his artistic flair. All sessions and meetings were not always constructive and Mohorič probably found them long and boring.

December 2015 marks the 25th anniversary of a milestone in the history of Slovenia - plebiscite for independent and sovereign Slovenia. When acquiring archival documents on the plebiscite in 2013, the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia also ingested the digital database "Plebiscit 1990", which was one of the first ingests of archival records in a digital form.

For the most part of the second half of the 16th century, Ljubljana was witnessing strong friction between Catholics and Lutherans. Prominent roles on the Catholic side were played out by the territorial prince, the Ljubljana bishop and members of Cathedral Chapter as well as by the members of the (catholic) religious orders, especially Franciscans. Since the conditions in the Ljubljana Franciscan house were apparently serious (it only had two friars), territorial prince, his officials in Carniola and the Ljubljana Bishop Konrad Glušič became concerned. The archive of Vicedomfor Carniola includes several documents that bear witness to their concern.

June 2012 marks the 49th anniversary of the first charter flight across the Atlantic in the history of the Yugoslav civil aviation. An Adria Aviopromet plane, the predecessor of today's Adria Airways, flew across the puddle, setting a Yugoslav record in the length and uninterrupted duration of the flight.

After the departure of the French, who included Carniola in their Illyrian Provinces and dissolved the Carniolan provincial estates, a careful restoration of the Austrian authority ensued. In August 1818, the "estates' constitution" was restored as well by means of an imperial patent. The patent as a print in German is kept in our collection of deeds, but more common was the bilingual, German-Slovene version of the text. The patent was a legal act with no real substance. Carniolan estates had basically no real power of decision-making, they were mere shadows of their former self, a “living corpse” as referred to by Sergij Vilfan.

Preserved in the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia is the legacy of the Slovenian filmmaker Dušan Povh, which among other things includes his correspondence, film related literature, contracts, personal documents, as well as original shooting books for Bojan the Bear series of animated films. Slovenian Film Archives at the Archives of RS keeps all 37 of the animated films on the cute children's character, who in his unique way uses colours and drawings to create various, often imaginary, situtions.

The grain warehouse for the needs of the Idrija mercury mine was built in the 1760s. When a century later the railway to Trieste was completed which put a stop to traffic on the river of Ljubljanica, the warehouse lost its meaning and was sold by the state. Preserved among the archival records of the Provincial Building Directorate in Ljubljana are a number of interesting plans of which two are presented here as this month's archivalia.

Presented here as this month's archivalia are the minutes of the first meeting of the famous Litostroj strike committee of December 1987. Included on the agenda was a discussion about the decisions and demands made by the Litostroj workers at the protest before the then Slovenian assembly and later in Cankarjev dom. The minutes are a part of the private fonds of France Tomšič. The fonds was transferred to the Archives of the RS in 2014 and contains documents that deal mostly with Tomšič's role in the process of Slovenia's democratization and its path towards an independent state.

Keeping partisan hospitals well hidden and their operations secret was essential, and not many people knew about their existence or location. Hospitals were ideally constructed on sparsely populated Karst terrain, in naturally formed ditches, the forest needed to be coniferous and overgrown, and any tracks needed to be carefully covered. Camouflaging entrances into such hospitals was of utmost importance. The unwritten rule of partisan hospitals was that there can never be too much secrecy.

This archivalia is a speech delivered by Rudi Šeligo at the Boršnik Meeting in Maribor in October 1996. The document is kept among Šeligo's private archival records that were transferred to the Archives of RS in 2005. If we pay close attention to the text we can see that not much has changed in Slovenian culture within the last almost 25 years. The same speech could easily be delivered today; sadly, it would still be equally relevant.

Archival records of the late director Milan Ljubić, which were transferred into the Archives of the Republic of Slovenia in 2018, contains a lot of material that refers to the realisation of the so-called “Chronicles". These are archival film shootings of individual Slovenian workers, important for their role in cultural and public life of that time. Also preserved are separate notes of Milan Ljubić, who was the organizing producer of Chronicles between 1969 and 1975.

Demarcation line and later state (Rapallo) border between Italy and the new Yugoslav state cut through areas, municipalities and villages that once belonged to the same state. Many people who lived near the border found themselves separated from their forests, meadows or fields which remained on the other side of the border. Special passes were needed for people who owned real estates in both of the neighbouring states, as well as for those who made daily trips to help out on the farms. Massive daily crossing of the border led to thriving trade of smuggling and contraband. Although officially there is no distinction between the two terms, they were, however, perceived differently by the people.

This month’s archivalia is a letter sent by the Czechoslovakian Ministry of Justice Dr. Alois Neuman to the Federal Secretary of Justice of SFRJ Milorad Zorič on August 6, 1966. The letter makes it evident that the Czechoslovakian minister had been monitoring the situation of the two men convicted at the eight Dachau trials for quite some time. He expressed his deep disappointment over the fact that the two men were merely pardoned and released from prison, and not fully rehabilitated.

The request made by the Inner Austrian Court Chamber on behalf of the territorial prince Ferdinand II in 1609 and sent to the Ljubljana bishop Tomaž Hren and to the Carniolan Vicedom Jožef Panitzol, is a small, but valuable piece in the mosaic of diverse archival notes on this provincial-princely institution. It is a source that confirms the fact that the authorities in Graz (and later in Vienna) cared about the financial conditions of the court hospital – which, apart from the town hospital, was the only long-lasting health care institution in Ljubljana during the early Modern Times.