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Ryskamp, George R., Peggy Ryskamp, and H. Leandro Sori. Mastering Spanish Handwriting and Documents: 1520–1820. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2023. Paperback, xxii, 308 pp. $60.00 US. ISBN: 9780806321196
The early modern Spanish world was connected by paper housed in royal, government, and ecclesiastical archives. Parish priests, notaries, and imperial bureaucrats penned a wide range of records that shaped imperial policies and local customs from the cradle to the grave. Reading these documents, however, presents numerous challenges for the novice researcher and the seasoned scholar alike. In Mastering Spanish Handwriting and Documents: 1520–1820, George R. Ryskamp, Peggy Ryskamp, and H. Leandro Sori provide a practical “handwriting study” of early modern cursive writing – both humanistic (itálica) and secretarial (cortesana) styles – from both Spain and Spanish America (primarily Mexico). Their guide offers useful research tips and crucial background information for both genealogists and historians at all levels interested in archival research.
Mastering Spanish Handwriting is divided into two general sections. The first four chapters offer an overview of the history of Spanish handwriting together with definitions of important terms related to paleography and transcription. Readers learn about variations in numbers and letters, abbreviations, provenance, writing strokes, and the basic characteristics of the humanistic style. They also receive an explanation of the difference between extracts, abstracts, transcriptions, and translations and the skills needed to execute these types of research outputs. Of particular importance in this section is the rules for both literal and modern transcriptions, foundational for modern critical editions and the proper citation of archival materials. In the second section, the authors transcribe, translate, and explain documents like baptismal records, parish registries, marriage contracts, notarial records, and testaments, to name a few. While it is beneficial to read the first section before proceeding to the rest of the book, each chapter in the second section can be read on its own. The authors chart possible reading strategies for the book based upon whether one’s knowledge of Spanish handwriting is at a beginner, intermediate, or advanced level.
One of the major strengths of this book is its practicality. Each chapter includes facsimiles of early modern Spanish records together with line-by-line transcriptions, corresponding translations, and commentaries on things like orthography, contractions, and the specific form of an author’s hand. Even if several of the reproductions are extremely poor, making it difficult to decipher all the words of each text, the reader still gets a feel for what the document looks like and the style of handwriting on display. The book also includes – although not in one organized and navigable appendix – several helpful charts on things like conventionalisms, individual letters of the alphabet, measurements, common types of notarial documents, terminology used in death registers, and where records on the sacraments were stored. Readers will especially appreciate the helpful advice on deciphering unfamiliar and difficult handwriting styles. The authors seek to ease the stress and frustration of transcription by telling researchers to avoid spending too much time on seemingly indecipherable words and phrases. They also remind their readers that “you are learning a new skill, one that even at the time of Cervantes required effort” (275). This human touch offers a level of kindness that is often missing from this genre of writing.
Another strong point of this book is that the authors situate handwriting in its historical context. They argue that there are four areas of knowledge one needs to effectively use original documents: (1) the style of handwriting in use, (2) the legal formats of the day, (3) the procedures in place, and (4) the larger historical context. While the authors do offer some information on historical trends in the Spanish empire, they clearly state that their focus is on the first three areas. For example, to prepare readers to interpret testaments, the authors describe who testamentary beneficiaries are, Castilian law concerning estates, and some of the social functions of inheritance systems in the Spanish world before explaining the ten different components of these legal wills. This is the type of contextual information they provide before their transcriptions and commentaries of ecclesiastical and notarial records in all chapters of the second section of the book.
While the authors claim that the documents they seek to illuminate were used and created by “ordinary people in everyday life” (xv), this statement merits some clarification. They fully recognize the plurilingual nature of the Spanish empire but disclose that their focus is on handwriting in Castilian and not other Iberian and Indigenous languages. The ordinary people they are referring to, then, are primarily Spaniards and Creoles and not the original inhabitants of the Americas, who made up most of the population. Having said this, the authors speak to the many limitations of early modern archival records. When discussing marriage, they explain that even though the Spanish crown and local priests encouraged marriage, most imperial subjects never tied the knot because they simply could not afford the costs involved. In their chapters on dying the good death, they highlight the fact that most people in the early modern Spanish world entered their graves without wills. So even if the authors do not devote space to “reading against the grain” or archival silences, they warn their readers of the real dangers of capturing only elite perspectives in Spanish archives.
There are a few elements missing from Mastering Spanish Handwriting that would have made it a more useful guide, especially for researchers in the “beginner” category the authors outline in their introduction. While there is a robust index to guide readers thematically throughout the book, there is no glossary of terms, both for those related to paleography and others more specific to textual production in the early modern Spanish world. A more organized way of sharing references would have also been a welcomed addition. The authors dutifully provide footnotes and image credits, but they only have bibliographies at the end of two chapters in the introductory section. A brief annotated bibliography or at least a reference list with sections of suggestions for further reading at the end of the book would have increased its useability. Readers would also benefit from a brief discussion of archival practices in the early modern Spanish world together with some tips on locating archives in Spain and Spanish America today, both those with extensive digitized collections available online and hundreds of parish archives that are still only accessible by approaching local priests.
Some of the possible additions I have outlined can be found on Brigham Young University’s website “Script Tutorial: Making Sense of Old Handwriting” (https://script.byu.edu/), which the authors frequently cite and helped to design. The website includes a brief introduction to paleography and bilingual tutorials for Spanish and several other European languages that are accompanied by notes on the alphabet, explanations of different record types, and interactive exercises. One can also find lists of geographical dictionaries, pdf files of the Spanish Records Extraction Guide, and a bibliography of useful works on paleography. The authors explain that while their website and book refer to each other, they are ultimately separate entities. Even still, including some of the bibliographical and glossarial information available on the website in the book would have made reference work much easier for the reader. For instance, when discussing the diversity of socioracial categories – like indio, mestizo, español, and so forth – in baptismal records in Spanish America, the authors tell readers to go to the definitions provided on “Script Tutorial” without proper instructions. They fail to state that these terms appear listed in the “Techniques & Tools” section of “The Spanish Tutorial,” not to mention the fact that what they call a “Spanish Tutorial glossary” (53) in the book is entitled “Genealogical Glossary” on the website.
Mastering Spanish Handwriting will be an important reference tool for archives and special collections that contain a substantive level of early modern Spanish documents. Graduate students will find this book useful in the early stages of their doctoral research, especially if their program or school does not offer classes in paleography. Any instructor who teaches Spanish handwriting for Spain or Spanish America will be thankful for such a hands-on resource for developing research skills that are fading in our increasingly digital world.
- Jason Dyck, University of Western Ontario