Record type

Archive catalogues and finding aids — where to find them free

Descriptions of what an archive holds, so you know what to request before you travel or write.

Public archives Provara searches for archive catalogues and finding aids

not yet connected  Digital Public Library of America
DPLA · US

Metadata for photographs, letters, diaries, yearbooks, local records from 4,000+ US institutions

Licence: Metadata open; items per holding institution · terms read 2026-09-06
live  Riksarkivet (Sweden) — registers & archives
Swedish National Archives · SE

Indexed birth, marriage and death register entries (parish, date, parents), plus archive volumes and AI-transcribed text

Licence: Metadata CC0 1.0; images Public Domain Mark · terms read 2026-09-06
live  DigitalNZ / Papers Past (New Zealand)
National Library of New Zealand · NZ

Papers Past newspapers 1839–1980s (full text), plus NZ library, museum and archive collections

Licence: Developer terms permit commercial use of metadata with link-back; per-record usage flags honoured · terms read 2026-09-06
not yet connected  Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek / Archivportal-D (Germany)
Deutsche Digitale Bibliothek · DE

Finding aids and digitised objects from ~270 German archives, libraries and museums (emigration files, church-book finding aids, address books)

Licence: Metadata CC0; objects per-item rights statement · terms read 2026-09-06

How to ask

In Provara, ask Provara what an archive holds on a family or a place. With web search on, it searches all 2 live archives above in one call, reads the best hits, and proposes only what the record it read supports — with the record beside the claim.

Start free
No card needed. Build and source your tree free; search these archives free; the assistant's research runs on tokens.

Every licence on these pages was read from the archive's own terms on the date shown. Provara proposes only what a record it has read supports, shows the record beside the claim, and marks anything unsourced as a hypothesis. Nothing on this page states a fact about any person.