TWO of York's most historically important documents have been preserved for the future - thanks to the work of council archivists.

More than 1,400 pages of parchment from the Freeman's Roll and the York Memorandum Book have been scanned and digitised by City of York Council, so they can be viewed online and preserved for future generations.

One of the documents, the York Memorandum Book, was badly damaged by floods in Victorian times, but will now be safeguarded for eternity.

The book is the earliest of the civic volumes and contains material dating from 1327 to 1547. It calls itself "a book of diverse memoranda concerning the City of York" and contains a list of the Mystery Plays dating from 1415, with the scribe noting down the name of each guild or combination of guilds, together with the detailed title of the play for which they were responsible.

It was hit by flooding in 1892, while being stored in a basement at Guildhall.

The other document, the Freeman's Roll, contains the names of the Freemen of York from 1272 to 1671, along with the oaths and qualifications for city officials and details of civic issues.

Citizens had to be freemen in order to trade and pasture their cattle on the strays, as well as to enjoy voting rights.

Christian Vassie, the council's executive member for leisure and culture, said: "Over time many old documents become too fragile to be handled by the public.

"The digitising of significant documents such as the York Memorandum Book is therefore vital work, ensuring that the history of our city is available to all, both now and in the future.

"Given that the book was damaged in floods over 100 years ago we are very fortunate the book still exists.

"I applaud the work of the archivists in enabling this and the Freeman's Roll to be available online."

The documents can be viewed digitally in the City Archives, and the council hopes to eventually make them available on the internet.