The idea behind the project The Preservation and Restoration of Cieszyn’s Written Heritage came into being in Cieszyn, in response to news of the planned availability of funding awarded to Poland and other new EU members states from the Financial Mechanism of the EEA and Norway Grants, as a consequence of the signing of an agreement extending the EEA on 14 October 2003. On the initiative of deputy mayor, Jan Matuszek, a decision was made in late autumn 2004 to create a project which, applied to the priority sector of the EEA Financial Mechanism entitled The Protection of European Cultural Heritage, was aimed on one hand at the comprehensive safeguarding of Cieszyn’s library and archive collections against destruction, and on the other of making them widely available. The conversations between the Cieszyn commune (in Polish: gmina) and Książnica Cieszyńska, the Cieszyn Branch of the State Archives in Katowice, the Museum of Cieszyn Silesia, the Cieszyn Lutheran Parish and the Order of the Brothers Hospitallers in Cieszyn led to the approval, at the beginning of 2005, of the above initiative. It was decided that the task of coordinating the measures needed to work out the detailed targets of the project and the documentation needed for the application process would be taken on by Książnica Cieszyńska, supported in issues of procedure by the Department of Strategy and Urban Development of Cieszyn Town Council. Simultaneously, the task of drawing up a feasibility study and completing the application form itself was commissioned to Hills, a Częstochowa consulting company. The preparation of application documents lasted until autumn 2005 and was completed on 28 November 2005 with the submission of the application. Książnica submitted an additional application seeking support for the project to the Promesa programme of the Minister of Culture and National Heritage on 10 November 2005. The first decisions were announced in March of the following year, on the basis of which 11 out of the 111 projects which had applied to the Financial Mechanisms concerning the project The Protection of European Cultural Heritage were recommended after the first stage of selection. The project The Preservation and Restoration of Cieszyn’s Written Heritage was included on a reserve list. On 30 March 2006, the Minister of Culture announced that as a result of his proposal for an increase in funds to be made available for the funding of initiatives applied for in the above priority, three further projects would receive funding, including the one submitted by Książnica. This decision opened the next phase of the Cieszyn project’s evaluation, when it was audited by Czech-Cross, a Prague consulting company. Work on the evaluation of the application submitted by Książnica to the Minister of Culture’s Promesa programme was going on in parallel, as a result of which an agreement for the funding of the project from Ministry funds was signed on 21 June 2006. Finally, on 10 November 2006, the Financial Mechanism Committee in Brussels made the decision to fund the Cieszyn project. The project agreement was signed on 21 March 2007, and the project was begun in earnest ten days later, on 1 April 2007.