Geography of “Archival continents” of Russian Diaspora: history of formation

The article analyzes the process of the establishment of archival continents of the Russian diaspora and the causes of the emergence of foreign archival Rossica. The article reveals the influence of migrations on this process. Authors show the diversity of archival materials on the Russian history which are kept outside Russia and often scattered in different archival collections, private and public archives and libraries. The emergence of communities of the Russian diaspora in several countries of the world led to the formation of extensive archival heritage. The study of this heritage is one the most urgent contemporary problems. The activities related to the discovery, restitution to Russia and use of this heritage have significantly increased in the last decades which is connected with the change of the political situation, researchers’ gaining access to the archival collections of the Russian diaspora. The relevance of this fundamental research problem is enhanced by the necessity of eliminating the existing information gap at the current stage of the Russian history development - to reveal the information concerning foreign archival Rossica, the documents of the Russian diaspora and their locations in foreign archives and compile them in the unified information data base. The identification of the location of different documents of this group is aimed at the reconstruction of the integrity of the scattered archival collections by means of both restitution, exchange or copying of the documents and by means of virtual unification, for example, in the form of digital archive. These activities will also contribute to solving the problems related to the restitution of the archival heritage.