Archivi paradossali: i fondi documentari delle comunità religiose di donne tra medioevo e prima età moderna

This contribution examines archives from female religious communities, linking the history of these institutions to the history of archiving practices (preservation and classification). It argues that enclosure and religious women’s distinct legal status shaped these collections in specific ways. It first shows how classification by “producing subjects” can flatten communities’ long histories by imposing a single, perennial origin. It then describes a dual archival logic: records of external relations alongside documents sustaining internal cohesion and memory. Finally, it considers these collections as paradigmatic of broader phenomena resulting from the contradiction between archiving practices generally oriented toward preserving large administrative and governmental collections and the original structure of fonds not intended to be made public.