[This topic originated in the General-->Masterfully Comprehensive Plan thread.]
Salve, amice Curio, et Salvete omnes...
Slightly off-topic, but I do feel the need to answer a question where it was asked:
The contemplated Archives would contain historical material relating to the Societas. There would not be a lot about Nova Roma, just enough to give the reader a sense of the context out of which we were formed. Other articles I've earmarked for it are prior versions of the Regula, Magistrates' edicts and decreta, and what documentation and commentary I have on various topics that have come up...say, the Decretum de Nominibus, the Collegia reform, and the site outage earlier this year.
A lot of this (old Regulae, edicts, lists of Magistrates) would come from the current Regula pages, which need to be completely rewritten in light of the Concilium reforms. I don't want to just scrap the older stuff; it's part of our history, so needs to be preserved in some form...hence, an Archive section.
The SVR Annales would be an important part of the Archives, but not the whole thing. For them, I think the best I could realistically do would be to write the history of the Societas as I have experienced it, and then, as for other articles in the Archives, invite other sodales to do the same.
I think I'd like the Annales to end up being rather like an oral history, in which, say, one of us would describe some event from his or her point of view, and then the rest of us (anyone who cared to) could chip in with ours. We'd get a collection of such stories; rather like the RP thread, it would be a work-in-progress, and hopefully a collaboration of the entire Societas.
It has been suggested that, if I write up Annales for the Societas, the document should be put up for a vote before going up on the site. This strikes me as odd, not to mention unnecessary: does any other contribution have to be voted on before it is published? I think this suggestion was made in the belief that I was going to write the thing all by myself. But our history is a function of community memory; it ought to be a community concern and a community effort. Nothing on (any) God's green earth is preventing anyone else who cares to from entering a chronicle written from their own perspective. Mehercule, I'd welcome such a thing from Tiberius Coruncanius...or Silvanius Florus...or any number of others who've seen fit to leave us. There are lessons to be learned from our malcontents.
Again, the intent is not to write a history of Nova Roma. Certainly, for those parts of it that touch us, the stories of those who remember them would be a good thing to have...but to go all the way back to the Great Big Religious Fuss of '98, or the "Crisis" of '99, would be a bit much for visitors curious about the Societas and not the "Roman Republic Reborn". A statement of the things that brought us here, maybe some examples of NR-ishness mentioned in passing, should be sufficient attention paid to organizations besides our own.
In fide,