Introduction: Records, tools and archives in Europe to 1700
Archival history: Literature and outlook
PART I: The Work of Records (1200- )
Probative objects and Scholastic tools in the High Middle Ages
A late medieval chancellery and its books: Lisbon, 1460-1560
Keeping and organizing information from the Middle Ages to the 16th Century
Information management in early modern Innsbruck, 1490-1530
Part II: The Challenges of Accumulation (1400- )
The accumulation of records and the evolution of inventories
Early modern inventories: Habsburg Austria and Würzburg
Classification: The architecture of knowledge and the placement of records
The formal logic of classification: Topography and taxonomy in Swiss urban records, 1500-1700
Part III: Comprehensive visions and differentiating practices (1550- )
Evolving expectations about archives, 1540-1650
Registries: Tracking the business of governance
Part IV: Rethinking records and state archives (1550- )
Understanding records: New perspectives and new readings after 1550
New disciplines of authenticity and authority: Mabillon's diplomatics and the ius archivi
Conclusion: The era of chancellery books and beyond.