Events

The State Archive organises or participates in events on historical or archival topics from time to time. Since 2004 it has participated in the annual Museum Night in March.

After the Museum Night 2020 did not take place due to the Corona pandemic and the Museum Night 2021 was postponed to the fall, the Museum Night 2022 could again be held in spring as usual. The State Archives offered an exhibition, advertising short films and guided tours to the numerous public on March 18, 2022 under the title «Alles Reklame!»

The Bern Museum Night took place on 22 March 2019. Visitors to the State Archive could find out about criminal cases in Bern and listen to readings from detective stories set in Bern, along with many other things.

16 October 2018 saw the opening of an exhibition in Bern’s Rathaus (City Hall) organised by the State Archive in cooperation with the Historischer Verein (Historical Society) on Charlotte Gutscher-Schmid’s work «Exclusive Bilderwelt». Das Berner Udelbuch von 1466, published by the Historischer Verein des Kantons Bern, Baden 2018. [StAB C 2596]

In this colourfully illustrated publication, art historian Charlotte Gutscher-Schmid analyses the magnificent Udelbuch manuscript with its hand-illuminated initials. The Udelbuch records house ownership by non-resident citizens (the so-called Udel) and thus their Bernese citizenship.

The varied history of Bern in the 20th century presented in thousands of pictures: The photographic collections of press photographers Carl Jost, Walter Nydegger and Hans Schlegel as well as the Berner Zeitung archives provide an insight into the development of Bernese press photography from around 1920 up to 2000. The Canton of Bern State Archive has processed the extensive collections and published them in the online inventory www.be.ch/inventar. Many of the digitalised photographs can be accessed directly.

Am 13 January 2017 a discussion organised by Dr Regula Schmid (University of Bern) and Dr Barbara Studer Immenhauser (State Archive of the Canton of Bern) took place at the University of Bern on the dating of the municipal law of Bern.

The results are presented in the following publication: Regula Schmid (Ed.): Die Berner Handfeste. Neue Forschungen zur Geschichte Berns im 13. Jahrhundert, Baden 2019 (Historical Society of the Canton of Bern Archive, Bd. 93). [StAB A 7295]

Using historical and scientific methods, the so-called «Goldene Handfeste» can be dated to around a decade after 1255. It is thus a successful forgery, which only appears to have been issued by the chancellery of King Frederick II on 15 April 1218.