So, anyone doing primary research at the moment?

Amtmann

Just wondering if there are any practicing historians here, and, if yes, what are you researching at the moment?

I'm in the midst of transcribing a 25-folio sixteenth-century Franconian manuscript detailing the Peasants' War of 1525. The scribe's hand took a little getting used to, but it's going very well now. I'm quite bleary-eyed at the moment, as I photographed the document in its archive in Germany and am working off the images, zoomed to considerable magnification. It's very enjoyable - plus it's going better than I'd expected!

pjproby

curious to know how you photographed them-any special gear?

Amtmann

A standard Fujifilm Finepix F60 handheld digital camera on 'text' mode, flash suppressed. No special gear. I then moved them to my computer and made DVD backups. The archivists had no problem with me taking pictures - it's the only way to do it really, unless you want to work off photocopies.

pjproby

you are of course, duty bound, to show us at least one page from your research.
seriously though i am fascinated to know how it looks.

Ostrom

Furet wrote: »

A standard Fujifilm Finepix F60 handheld digital camera on 'text' mode, flash suppressed. No special gear. I then moved them to my computer and made DVD backups. The archivists had no problem with me taking pictures - it's the only way to do it really, unless you want to work off photocopies.

The National Library are allowing this now, it has been a huge help (aside from some very silly copyright conditions - newer books are excluded, despite damage to the binding being the main justification for allowing cameras)

What is the manuscript in relation to? I use a lot of maps, district reports from agricultural reform boards, agricultural stats and travel diaries. Thankfully nothing pre-dating widespread typesetting

I'm not a historian though, sociologist mainly doing historical research

Amtmann

pjproby wrote: »

you are of course, duty bound, to show us at least one page from your research.
seriously though i am fascinated to know how it looks.

These are from three different types of document (an excerpt from a Gerechtsbuch, a Urphedebuch and a Rechnung) from two different archives. The script looks complex at first but after your eyes adjust to it - and after a bit of practice - it really is quite legible. For example, look at the blacker text in the second photo. It's actually dated "Acte Mitwoche nach Sebastiani Anno [abr.] viiii" - the eighth Wednesday after Sebastiani (a saint's feast day) [15]19.

Amtmann

efla wrote: »

What is the manuscript in relation to?

Nobody really knows for sure yet. I'm the first person to work on this document. It hasn't been used by historians before. It comes from and relates to a specific town in Franconia and dates from summer 1525. I know that it's about the Peasants' War in this particular town, and it seems to relate to the defeat of the local rebel leaders by Margrave Casimir and the Swabian League.
I'm transcribing first; I'll translate it later. Sixteenth-century Franconian German isn't quite my forté just yet, but I'm getting there!

I use a lot of maps, district reports from agricultural reform boards, agricultural stats and travel diaries. Thankfully nothing pre-dating widespread typesetting

Lucky. Many of my documents are actually filthy with centuries of dust, and many are stained by moulds and water damage. I'm hoping to make use of travel diaries as well.

pjproby

thanks for posting those images- i really appreciate it.
if anyone is seriously interested in making their own (relatively) inexpensive book scanner you might be interested in these links

http://www.diybookscanner.org/forum/index.php?sid=54c6ee1b8a04ce3eb1fd69f492b584cf


http://www.instructables.com/id/DIY-High-Speed-Book-Scanner-from-Trash-and-Cheap-C/

convert

I thought I had it tough with sixteenth to eighteenth century documents (which are in English!) - that looks a lot tougher! But as you said, once you get used to the writing, it begins to be much easier to decipher the more research you do!

Amtmann

convert wrote: »

I thought I had it tough with sixteenth to eighteenth century documents (which are in English!) - that looks a lot tougher! But as you said, once you get used to the writing, it begins to be much easier to decipher the more research you do!

Yes, sometimes I think I unconsciously hate myself

What type of history are you doing (social, economic, military)?

convert

Furet wrote: »

Yes, sometimes I think I unconsciously hate myself

I know that feeling all too well!!

Furet wrote: »

What type of history are you doing (social, economic, military)?

What I'm doing falls between social and legal history - I'm looking at the ways in which families held land, how they leased or purchased it and how it was used for family arrangements, such as marriage settlements, inheritance, payment of debts, etc.

Due to the fact I have to look at so many legal documents, sometimes I really wish I had a law degree along with my history degree!!

Though I really love handling the primary sources and looking at documents from the sixteenth century with the seals still intact, I envy those whose material is typed - makes reading it so much quicker!!

Amtmann

convert wrote: »

What I'm doing falls between social and legal history - I'm looking at the ways in which families held land, how they leased or purchased it and how it was used for family arrangements, such as marriage settlements, inheritance, payment of debts, etc.

Brilliant. I love that type of material. It contextualises the world of the common people, for so long neglected by historians. I'm very interested in the German Peasants' War (Der Bauernkrieg) and the grievances that kick-started it, many of which related to the confiscation of lands formerly held in common, restrictions on hunting and using wood from forests, and the gradual introduction of Roman law in the Empire's lands with regard to how peasants used their traditional plots.

Due to the fact I have to look at so many legal documents, sometimes I really wish I had a law degree along with my history degree!!

That really worried me at the start too - the interdisciplinarity. I felt like, "right: so not only do I have to learn about the history of the period and region through primary research, I have to do it in part through using anthropology and sociology too. What Have I Let Myself In For?" The panic has abated now, thankfully!

Though I really love handling the primary sources and looking at documents from the sixteenth century with the seals still intact, I envy those whose material is typed - makes reading it so much quicker!!

Tell me about it. I've actually reached the stage now where I can usually read the text directly from the document, but in order to translate it I still need to transcribe it first. It's terribly time-consuming. But at least I'm finding that vocabulary was much smaller then. The same words appear again and again. This helps. A bit.
But I get a real kick out of handling the original documents. One of the ones I used caused me to sneeze violently though - it was so dusty. It took ages to photograph that one because obviously whenever I felt the sensation that I was about to sneeze, I had to take several steps back. There were a few modern historians in the archive at the same time, sitting there with their typed documents from 1917 thinking that this was hilarious!

Ostrom

Furet wrote: »

Brilliant. I love that type of material. It contextualises the world of the common people, for so long neglected by historians. I'm very interested in the German Peasants' War (Der Bauernkrieg) and the grievances that kick-started it, many of which related to the confiscation of lands formerly held in common, restrictions on hunting and using wood from forests, and the gradual introduction of Roman law in the Empire's lands with regard to how peasants used their traditional plots

I'm doing something similar in Irish context, enclosure of commonage and the effects of restriction on communal production. I've come across a few studies dealing with the similar forms in Germany and Russia (Mark an Mir).

convert wrote: »

What I'm doing falls between social and legal history - I'm looking at the ways in which families held land, how they leased or purchased it and how it was used for family arrangements, such as marriage settlements, inheritance, payment of debts, etc.

In Ireland?

Amtmann

I think the three of us have found some common ground.

(Horrendous pun, sorry. )

Ostrom

Furet wrote: »

I think the three of us have found some common ground.

(Horrendous pun, sorry. )

Was that an Evans reference?

You all phd's?

convert

efla wrote: »

In Ireland?

Yep, in Ireland

Ostrom

convert wrote: »

What I'm doing falls between social and legal history - I'm looking at the ways in which families held land, how they leased or purchased it and how it was used for family arrangements, such as marriage settlements, inheritance, payment of debts

Are you just working on 16th century? I'm very interested, as I'm doing something similar at the moment

convert

efla wrote: »

Are you just working on 16th century? I'm very interested, as I'm doing something similar at the moment

No, it's the late sixteenth to eighteenth centuries that I'm focusing on. What period are you looking at? It must be relatively recent if the documents are typed?

Ostrom

convert wrote: »

No, it's the late sixteenth to eighteenth centuries that I'm focusing on. What period are you looking at? It must be relatively recent if the documents are typed?

Late 18th-19th & early 20th, I'm mainly interested in cultivation methods amongst collective leaseholders. I'm lucky-ish as there aren't many obscure sources (they were on the same relative level as cottiers), and the main ones (Griffith's, Census, 6 inch O.S are easily available). Their post-famine decline was well documented also. Some estate books and rent rolls, but nothing too difficult.

Any particular location/class for your own work? I'm looking mainly along the West/North West

brianthebard

I was working on The Workers' Republic over the summer for my masters dissertation. It was a newspaper edited by James Connolly in the last year of his life.

Ostrom

brianthebard wrote: »

I was working on The Workers' Republic over the summer for my masters dissertation. It was a newspaper edited by James Connolly in the last year of his life.

What were you doing with it?

brianthebard

Just reading it, trying to see what things looked like before the Rising. I had a number of intentions at the beginning but in the end I focused on literature, the political theories and plans for the Rising, because there was so much information that I couldn't deal with the whole thing.

Judgement Day

And I thought I was having a tough time - I am resetting an early history of the 1798 rebellion (229 pages) that I am republishing - and while I am working from a fairly maggoty, water stained volume at least its in English (sort of)! The 1798 rebellion is an area of Irish history that I have been studying for some years and this first forray into reprinting a history of the period is, hopefully, a forerunner to something original from my own hand. Good luck Furet with your endeavours you're a better man than me.