Archive inventory: a basic element of archival heuristics

The article notes the current lack of the agreed set of requirements to the composition of information in the archival practices. The author analyses the researches of the major historians, source-study experts, textual critics, which set forth the views on the composition of elements and the content of archival descriptions, required for various field researchers to implement the qualified work. The paper considers the components of the concept of "reliability" of an archival description and archival inventory and assesses the need to develop a single unified approach to the compilation of the secondary document information.