SUMMARY

It's impossible to do genealogy without encountering problems deciphering ancient documents at some time or other. Regular, repeated and, above all, progressive reading of Ancien Régime documents can, of course, contribute to individual learning of palaeography. But this may seem time-consuming to the impatient researcher or the person working on digitised online archives, which are a little less easy to read. As for those who are moving on from parish registers to immerse themselves in notarial documents, they encounter new difficulties linked to professional abbreviations, and feel the need for a tool to help them. The aim of this book of modern palaeography (16th-18th centuries) is to help you learn to read faster and better than if you were left to face the texts alone. It is a useful addition to the book already published by the same publisher, Déchiffrer les écrits de nos ancêtres, which mainly covers texts from the first half of the 19th century. What's more, if an act is difficult to decipher in form, the substance is sometimes just as hard to understand. What is the meaning of the profusion of masses requested in the will of a particular ancestor? Why baptise a child "at home" and then state that "the ceremony took place in the parish church"? This guide places the documents studied in their historical context, providing the reader with all the necessary historical and demographic references. The texts proposed for transcription recreate three fictitious lives to cover the full range of documents that genealogists may come across: from acts in the parish registers to marriage contracts or promises of marriage, disclaimers, different forms of will (nuncupative, solemn or with inventory, etc.). Lastly, these texts correspond to three levels of reading difficulty, for more effective progressive learning.

AUTHOR

Béatrice Beaucourt-Vicidomini has a master's degree in modern history, is a professional genealogist and palaeographer and a member of the Chambre Syndicale des Généalogistes et héraldistes de France. She gives numerous individual and group courses in palaeography, and here she provides information that she believes will be useful to anyone working on their family history.