SELECTION CRITERIA

Each register – international, regional or national – is based on criteria for assessing the world significance of documentary heritage, and assessing whether its influence was global, regional or national. The following criteria are framed in terms of the international register, but also apply (with logical variation) to regional and national registers.

Assessment is comparative and relative. There can be no absolute measure of cultural significance. Accordingly, there is no fixed point at which documentary heritage qualifies for inclusion in a register. Selection for inclusion in a register will therefore result from assessing the heritage item on its own merits against the selection criteria, against the general tenor of these Guidelines, and in the context of other items already either included or rejected.

When considering documentary heritage for inclusion in the Register the item will be first assessed against the threshold test of:

Authenticity. Is it what it appears to be? Has its identity and provenance been reliably established? Copies, replicas, forgeries, bogus documents or hoaxes can, with the best intentions, be mistaken for the genuine article.

Second, the IAC must be satisfied that the nominated item is of world significance. That is, it must be:

Unique and irreplaceable something whose disappearance or deterioration would constitute a harmful impoverishment of the heritage of humanity. It must have created great impact over a span of time and/or within a particular cultural area of the world. It may be representative of a type, but must have no direct equal. It must have had great influence -whether positive or negative – on the course of history.

Thirdly, world significance must be demonstrated in meeting one or more of the criteria set out below. Because significance is comparative, these criteria are best illustrated by checking them against items of documentary heritage already inscribed on the Register.

Criterion 1 – Time:
Absolute age, of itself, does not make a document significant: but every document is a creature of its time. Some documents are especially evocative of their time, which may have been one of crisis, or significant social or cultural change. A document may represent new discovery or be the “first of its kind.”

Criterion 2 – Place:
The place of its creation is a key attribute of its importance. It may contain crucial information about a locality important in world history and culture; or the location may itself have been an important influence on the events or phenomena represented by the document. It may be descriptive of physical environments, cities or institutions since vanished.

Criterion 3 – People:
The social and cultural context of its creation may reflect significant aspects of human behaviour, or of social, industrial, artistic or political development. It may capture the essence of great movements, transitions, advances or regression. It may reflect the impact of key individuals or groups.

Criterion 4 – Subject and theme:
The subject matter may represent particular historical or intellectual developments in natural, social and human sciences, politics, ideology, sports and the arts.

Criterion 5 – Form and style:
The item may have outstanding aesthetic, stylistic or linguistic value, be a typical or key exemplar of a type of presentation, custom or medium, or of a disappeared or disappearing carrier or format.

Finally the following matters will also be taken into account:

Rarity: does its content or physical nature make it a rare surviving example of its type or time?

Integrity: within the natural physical limitations of carrier survival, is it complete or partial? Has it been altered or damaged?

Threat: Is its survival in danger? If it is secure, must vigilance be applied to maintain that security?

Management plan: Is there a plan which reflects the significance of the documentary heritage, with appropriate strategies to preserve and provide access to it?

Download the Nomination Form