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HISTORY

to Hong Kong. The office currently manages 10 000 linear metres of official records, about 4 000 photographs dating from the 1860s and an extensive collection of maps, local newspapers and official publications. The map collection has been expanded significantly during the year by the additions of 360 maps and plans of the historic sites of batteries and barracks in Hong Kong.

The Public Records Office provides a records management service to government departments and makes material available for reference and research to both local and overseas scholars, journalists, students, members of the public and staff of other govern- ment departments.

Records of permanent value are held at the head office in Central District and at one of the two sub-offices at Wong Chuk Hang Road, Aberdeen. Non-current records, many of which will eventually be destroyed, are stored in the second sub-office.

The increasing awareness of Hong Kong internationally has resulted in a further growth over the past year in the number of reference enquiries received by the Public Records Office, and in the number of individuals conducting research on source materials held. In addition to the publication of a number of books based on these materials, records have been used in the production of television documentaries, films, exhibitions and articles for various newspapers and periodicals.

Owing to extensive loss and destruction of official records during the Japanese occupa- tion, the bulk of the office's holdings dates from the resumption of British administration in 1945. The loss occasioned by the war has, however, been redeemed to some extent by the acquisition of microfilm copies of certain pre-war British government records relating to Hong Kong. The most significant of these comprises despatches exchanged by the Governors of Hong Kong with London from 1842 to the end of 1952.

Public access to library materials, including the newspaper, map and photograph collections, is unrestricted, but formal approval is requied for access to official records. Photocopying, microfilming and reading room facilties are available.

Archaeological Background

Archaeological studies in Hong Kong, which began in the 1920s, have uncovered ancient artefacts and other evidence of human activity at numerous sites along the winding shoreline, testifying to events which span more than 6 000 years. The interpretation of these events is still a matter of controversy. Archaeologically, Hong Kong is but a tiny part of the far greater cultural sphere of South China, itself as yet imperfectly known. In such a context, scholarly debate over definitive interpretations may be expected to continue for many years to come.

Some writers suggest that Hong Kong's most ancient inhabitants were related to the early horticultural Bacsonian peoples of Southeast Asia, themselves successors of late Pleistocene hunter-gatherers known as the Hoabinhian. They urge an underlying contin- uity of cultural development running throughout the prehistoric periods and perhaps into the historic. More traditional views see in the archaelogical remains evidence of powerful influences entering the region from northern cultures, sch as the neolithic Longshan and the early northern bronze age cultures which gave rise to China's first historic dynasties, the Xia and the Shang. There are, on the other hand, a growing number of scholars who believe that the prehistoric cultures within the South China region had evolved locally, indepen- dent of any major influences from outside the area.

Recent excavations have revealed two main neolithic cultures lying in stratified sequence. At the lower, oldest, levels there is coarse, cord-marked pottery together with a fine, soft