Licensing Opportunity - Central Asia, Afghanistan and Persia: from Silk Road to Soviet Rule

The National Archives (TNA) is seeking expressions of interest from potential partners to digitise and to publish online Foreign Office records relating to Central Asia, Afghanistan and Persia. The contract award would include a commercial license to publish online digital images and associated metadata, and a requirement to undertake all the necessary activities to make that possible - including conservation, digital image capture, use of metadata to allow for meaningful searches of the records, and online publication.

TNA expects that the appointed Supplier will deliver the contract at NIL cost to TNA, and will also deliver a royalty return to TNA during the contract period, in consideration for the licence to publish the Collection. For over a century, from 1800 to the 20th century, this region was the subject of a fierce struggle for supremacy between the British and Russian Empires, the outcome of which continues to shape modern geopolitics.

This nineteenth-century 'cold war' was called the Great Game and it offers fascinating insights into the state of the region today. This collection of 351 documents - mainly bound volumes - will be an important resource enabling the study and understanding of a region that has long been contested by Great Powers.

It will include the full set of Foreign Office volumes titled 'Proceedings in Central Asia'. The new 21st century 'silk road', sponsored by China, suggests that interest in this region will continue to increase not only in current affairs but also as an academic field of study.