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Maritime Archives and The Crown Estate


This project has been developed in response to findings from the Securing a Future for Maritime Archaeological Archives Project. on seabed and archive management related to The Crown Estate (TCE) and the effects on archaeological archives. This work has secured funding from The Crown Estate Marine Communities Fund

The project is responding to the current situation whereby few archives from maritime archaeological investigations are being deposited in public museums or repositories. Acknowledged issues related to this situation include a lack of clarity in terms of the management framework for maritime archive material within development control, research or reported through the Receiver of Wreck, which means there are no clear routes for archives to reach publicly available repositories and a lack of facilities and expertise able to accept this material.

As seabed owners TCE have a key role to play in archives from on and within their estate, this project will investigate areas where TCE as managers can contribute to improving the fate of maritime archaeological archives through ensuring they are made publicly available through the application of standards, guidance and best practice.

The project involves desk based research, meetings and analysis in order to assess the following key areas:

  • Roles and responsibilities within the marine development framework;
  • What archive from marine development control is currently being deposited, where and in what format;
  • The fate of artefacts within marine aggregate licences;
  • The fate of archives within ports and harbours; and
  • The Receiver of Wreck system.

More detailed project objectives are:

Objective One: Investigation of roles and responsibilities within the marine development framework to develop clarity and ultimately improve the system to ensure all archaeological archives from projects are deposited in a publicly accessible repository.
Objective Two: Review of archive being deposited to assess where there are problems within the current system and assess possibilities for improvement.
Objective Three: Investigation of artefacts within the marine aggregate licensing process, particularly looking at ownership of historic material and whether this is becoming publicly accessible.
Objective Four: Review of procedures and process in relation to archives within ports and harbours.
Objective Five: Review of the handling of historic material within the RoW system

The project began in June 2010 and is due to run until July 2011. Updates on project progress will be publicised on this webpage.