When recent events fade into the past, to recapture and to understand those events and their place as historical record, we need looks to contemporaneous documents to get a clear picture of what has happened.
For France and its diplomatic history, it is possible to do that through the many archives located all over France. Take the example of the diplomatic archives of the Quai d'Orsay (the French ministry for foreign affairs) now located in two locations - in La Courneuve in the suburbs of Paris, and in Nantes.
