The man who saved the Catalan archives

Barcelona"Agustí Duran Sanpere (Cervera, 1887 - Barcelona, ​​1975) was a man of action and courage," says Pilar Cuerva, director of the National Archives of Catalonia (ANC) and co-curator, with Enric Terradellas, of the exhibition dedicated to the multifaceted archivist, which runs until June 13. He was methodical, devised and organized an archival system that still endures, and stood up for what was necessary. He rescued in extremis The archive of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem, which a scrap metal dealer almost turned into pulp. He confronted violent groups who wanted to burn Church property during the Civil War. And he waited, with all the risks that entailed, for Franco's troops to arrive to guarantee the safeguarding of Catalan heritage.

Duran promoted his own model of cultural management that has endured to this day. "At the beginning of the 20th century, he was very knowledgeable about the most modern trends in archival science that were spreading in Europe, and he created a new organization for archives," Cuerva points out. He was an archivist with an international vision and, at the same time, knew the country like the back of his hand. He was also a man of his time, "a man of the Noucentisme movement." "For him, archives were dissemination services; they were knowledge and culture, which contributed to creating a better society," the curator adds.

Duran was appointed head of the Archives Section of the Generalitat and president of the Heritage Service Commission on June 2, 1936. His dream of implementing the new territorial organization of the archives was about to become a reality, but war broke out. Duran, who was in Zurich recovering from a car accident, returned to Catalonia to serve the Generalitat. From that moment on, he was responsible for organizing the rescue of the country's heritage archives. "He was the leading authority on archives and applied the same methodology he had used to organize the documentation. He was a very enthusiastic person; this is evident in his letters to his wife and colleagues. He was passionate about everything related to heritage," says the director of the ANC. During the war, he kept a diary in which he recorded all the actions taken to save Catalan heritage, and He took an inventory to keep everything under control.

Orders not to abandon the workplace

In August 1938, five months before the Francoist army entered Barcelona, ​​he compiled a table with data on the saved archives and a list of collection locations, the linear meters of preserved documents, and the repository where they were being stored at that time. "These actions made it possible to save all the heritage and return it to its rightful owners. It made it possible for us to access it today," Terradellas explains. "The Fiveller family archive is a prime example," Cuerva states. It is a noble family archive that Martí de Riquer inventoried and transferred to the General Archive of Catalonia in September 1936. in the Pedralbes monastery And in 1939, Duran returned it to its rightful owners. In 2019, the family deposited it in the National Archives of Catalonia. Some of the restored furniture from this archive can be seen in the exhibition. When the Republicans lost the war, Duran asked his collaborators not to leave their posts to ensure the safeguarding of heritage. Duran was a staunch Catalan nationalist and an active defender of the Catalan language. He was purged and court-martialed, but he retained his position as director of the City's Historical Archives until his retirement in 1957. He was accused of being left-wing, of having gone on official trips, and of having collaborated with the Generalitat government and maintained close contact with its leaders. He provided extensive documentation demonstrating all his safeguarding work, and he had many witnesses in his favor. The dictatorship did not stop him either. He promoted the radio bulletins disseminating Barcelona's history, broadcast from April 21, 1944. Part of his legacy also includes the three volumes of "Barcelona and its History." Among the previously unpublished information that can be seen at the ANC is the report he prepared in 1916 in Cervera, where he outlines his vision of how archives should be organized. Another document being exhibited for the first time is the summary proceedings and excerpts from the sentence that acquitted him. "We are also exhibiting excerpts from his diary and have taken the first steps to have it declared a national cultural asset," says Cuerva.