Family History Club

Palaeography for family historians

Tips and Sources of Information

Family History ClubPalaeography session• Study of handwriting• Genealogists may need to read a number

of different types of document while researching their family tree:– Wills– Inventories– Census records– Land agreements – indentures– Diaries, letters, notes etc

A few tips:

• Write down your transcription as you go along – start a new line where the scribe does – it will be easier to read again and compare later

• If you are really stuck on a word have a look at the words around it for use of the same letters

• Look at alphabet guides for the period of the document you are looking at – they really help!

• If you are stuck it’s often useful to go away and come back to it in a while – or get someone else to have a look.

A few common problems

• Shortened words – if you notice a word has a line above it, it may have been shortened by the scribe e.g:

• Lower case “c”’s and “r”’s can be indistinguishable and “i”’s, “n”’s “m”s, “u”s” and “w”’s often just appear as single lines

Web sites • The National Archives palaeography guide• http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/palaeography/

• Deciphering Old Handwriting - From a genealogy course taught by Sabina J. Murray• http://www.amberskyline.com/treasuremaps/oldhand

• Early English Handwriting• http://www.btinternet.com/~tylcoat/handwrit.htm

• An introduction to palaeography• http://paleo.anglo-norman.org/

• Palaeography – Reading early writing• http://www.jaydax.co.uk/genlinks/palaeography.html

• Some notes on Medieval English Genealogy• (Scroll down to: Links and bibliography for handwriting and language)• http://www.medievalgenealogy.org.uk/guide/hand.shtml

• Glossary of Latin words• http://comp.uark.edu/~mreynold/recint1.htm

• Scottish handwriting.com• http://www.scottishhandwriting.com/content/

• Historical auxiliary sciences – palaeography• http://www.vl-ghw.lmu.de/palaeographie_en.html

• Medieval handwriting• http://www.medievalwriting.50megs.com/

• 1891 London census transcription – handwriting analysis• http://www.census1891.com/hand.htm