RECENT PORTUGUESE PUBLICATIONS
BULLETIN 52
July
2006
PART
VIII:
Paleography
58.
OLIVEIRA MARQUES, A.H. de, João José Alves Dias and Teresa
F. Rodrigues. Album de
paleografia. Lisbon:
Estampa, 1987. Folio, orig. wrps. with d.j. xiii, 305, (1)
pp., including 158 photographs. Some soiling and minor
staining to dust jacket, front cover, and upper blank
margins of first few leaves. ISBN: none. $200.00
A
manual for university students and scholars learning to
read early documents in Portuguese. The authors concentrate
on scripts of the more difficult periods, so that while
there are only 8 examples from the thirteenth century and
18 from the fourteenth, there are 30 from the fifteenth
century, 49 from the sixteenth, and 43 from the
seventeenth. The remaining 10 are from the eighteenth
century. The documents were chosen with regard to the
interest of their content as well as their script. Each is
reproduced in a good photograph, with the transcription on
the facing page (preceded by the date and place, a brief
summary of the content, and its current location). This
book is an invaluable aid for those who want to learn not
only how to tell whether a document in horrible cursive
script is right side up, but how to read it once it is
pointing in the right direction.
Oliveira
Marques is one of the most respected historians and
medievalists in Portugal. His introduction explains the
symbols and methods used in the transcriptions, and the
rationale behind them. Alves Dias is also a leading and
highly respected historian.
This
essential reference tool and teaching manual has been
out-of-print for a number of years. We have one copy in
stock.