My passion for paleography started very early in life, while still at college in Brazil. It was part of the classes I had to get in order to receive my bachelor's degree. The different hand letterings from different records I had in my hands was, and still is, fascinating to me. Later in life, doing my own genealogy, I discover that the love for paleography was in my own DNA!
Francisco Ferreira Drummond, my 3rd. great-grandfather, and a historian from Terceira Island, Azores, was also a Paleographer. Through his history books about the Azores he not only brought to life many historical facts from medieval documents, but he also translated many of those manuscripts from Latin into the Portuguese language.
Last week I received the American Translators Association (ATA https://www.atanet.org/) magazine, July/August 2017, as part of my membership. I was surprised with an article about the translation of old manuscripts and genealogy. Not that the fact of doing genealogical translation is uncommon, but to see an article on a magazine discussing genealogical paleography, explaining to the public how it affects the outcome of a research, and find other languages genealogists working hard on the same as I do, was just great! It was like an endorsement of my passion and work.
I have been doing historical transcripts and translations of Portuguese records into English for about five years - https://myportuguesegen.blogspot.com/p/books-and-documents-are-important.html. Through these years, I build up a customer portfolio of very happy returning clients. I am so proud of the work I do for each of them. I give the best of my knowledge and skill set in paleography, the Portuguese language, its socio-history and the peculiarities of each century.
If you are a translator of old records like myself, or if you are just reading this blog as someone curious about this unusual vocation, you can learn more about it reading the complete article online.
If you want to learn paleography, here is a good start for the English language. This book is designed to teach you how to read and understand the handwriting found in documents commonly used in genealogical research.
