Archive contents

Collecting and registering

Collecting and registering all documentation relevant to the Rock Art of Alta is a significant and ambitious task which takes time. It often takes more time than we would prefer. Most of the rock art in Alta was discovered in the 1970s, except for the rock paintings in Transfarelv which had already been known for some time before this. The total amount of rock art documentation, management documents, scientific publications, media coverage and other documents that has been produced since then by management officials and other parties is still not completely identified.

Furthermore, additional materials which is relevant to the Alta Rock Art Archive is produced every year. Thus, the Alta Rock Art Archive is a living archive where new material are continuously being added. As of February 2023 the archive consisted of more than 22 000 registered files. Photographs will always dominate the digital archive contents, being the main function of the archive.

Restrictions

Large amounts of the Alta Rock Art Archive contents is publicly available online, but not all. There are several reasons why some documents cannot be made publicly available, for example copyright-protected materials created by others, or personal information.

If you are interested in accessing more material or information than what is already available online, you can send such requests to Alta Museum.

Organizing the archive contents

The contents of the Alta Rock Art Archive is organized according to several themes. The most central themes are available as keyword-menus in the archive-application for searching. Every theme is not necessarily relevant for all registered files.

The rock art panels menu serves as reference to which rock art locations in Alta that the registered files are connected with. The rock
art panels in Alta generally also belong to larger rock art sites and geographic areas.

The document menu contains keyword-categories for the many types of documentation that is available in the archive. For example, there are several sub-categories for different types of photos in the archive.

The figures menu pertains to the many pictures of the rock art in the archive. The keyword-categories in the menu is used for sorting the rock art documentation according to what type of figures that appear in the pictures. The most detailed categories are first of all applied to close-ups of figures.