Courses

The Vatican is famous for holding it biennial palaeography and diplomatic course in Rome. This is notoriously hard to get admitted to and very hard work once there. Your level of Latin and palaeography should be excellent before you even go. They believe in education the old fashioned way and although the course may be ideal if you want to work in an Archivio di Stato, it is not particularly relevant to modern archival practices.

Various universities across Italy offer degree and post graduate courses which will help in the heritage sector. For example, Universita degli Studi di Pavia runs a 3 year course on Operatori dei Beni Culturali which includes modules in History of Art, Languages, Latin, modern record keeping etc. It is unlikely to be feasible for a British person to study there as getting a grant would be nearly impossible and it would take 3 years on top of what you may already have studied in Britain. These courses are aimed at young Italian students thinking of a career in archives or museum work.

There appear to be no courses in Italy for foreigners working in archives although if your Italian is good enough you could probably attend training events run by ANAI.

Last modified 07/09/2004