Diplomatics

The diplomatics ( diplomatics, from Ancient Greek diploma " Folded " from diplóos "double" ) is one of the basic disciplines of auxiliary historical sciences. It deals with the classification, the features of the exhibition ( of people, and business activities of the firms, tools such as formularies ), according to tradition, the authenticity and the historical value of legal documents. Research priorities of German researchers were initially predominantly European documents of the Middle Ages and the early modern period. Meanwhile, there is also an extensive research on Tibetan Mongolian records and documents. The scientists who deal with this area of ​​research are called Diploma sufferers.

Origin of the term

The term diplomacy is probably the treatise De re diplomatica (Latin About the documents, Paris, 1681) by the Benedictine monk Dom Jean Mabillon ( 1632-1707 ) back. He had been commissioned by his order, to create a defense that should defend the historically based claims of ownership against attacks of the Jesuit Order. In particular, they should provide an answer to the doubts of the Belgian Jesuit Daniel Papebroek which he had expressed about the authenticity of the oldest Merovingian charters of the abbey of Saint- Denis. Mabillon developed scientific, ie verifiable methods for the determination of authenticity and falsification of records in question, and thus created the basis of modern diplomatics.

The proof of the authenticity of documents was initially the main purpose of diplomatics (Latin veri ac falsi discrimen distinguish the truth from falsehood ). The whole forgery or alteration of documents, the latter by overwriting (for example, palimpsest ), erasing or adding (negative or positive interpolation), served mainly in the Middle Ages to justify non-existing rights or rights that were not previously documented by certificates, to secure. The assignment to the auxiliary historical sciences was only in the 19th century, as the center of diplomacy thus initially focused on the fight against counterfeiting and she was more likely to be seen as a part of the law.

In the investigation of their deeds paläografischen, language and content features, as well as their tradition and typology are evaluated.

Founder of the scientific study of the documents are the Austrian Benedictine monks Bernhard Pez and Hieronymus Pez, the Bavarian Benedictine Karl Meichelbeck, the Schwabe Magnoald Ziegelbauer, and Johann Heumann of Teutsch Brunn in Germany. During the 19th century, the diplomacy has been pursued intensively in Germany, which is why some German technical terms also have international significance.

Core of Spezialdiplomatik how she founded in the mid-19th century, Theodor von Sickel, is the question of the Kanzleimäßigkeit a single certificate. The certificate researcher tries to rediscover the inner and outer features of the document in other contemporary documents in order to deduce the practice of group of people that created for a Prince, clergy or institution records ( "Law Firm "). At the center of this investigation are the one who designed the certificate text ( dictator ), and the one who has the document actually written on the parchment ( Mundant ).

With the diplomacy associated sub-areas which are sphragistics or Sigillografie ( Sigillography ), the chronology (study of the time) and the Heraldry ( heraldry ).

Document review as part of discipline

The document review is the most important sub-discipline of diplomatics. Their function is to determine the source of known quality union a certificate. The aim is to establish the meaningfulness of a certificate. Basic method is the comparison, with authenticity, Kanzleimäßigkeit and other features of a document are determined by examination of external and internal features that may be relevant to the historical interpretation of concern.

As part of the document review external and internal characteristics are investigated. Exterior features include: writing material, format, document font / font seal characters on the document (eg monogram, Rekognitionszeichen, Rota, Chrismon ), folding or sealing and external maintenance.

Interior features include: certificate form ( the formulaic elements of a deed), dictation ( the individual formulations of the certificate), legal and factual contents of the certificate. For the design of dictation include the analysis of rhythmic sentence statements ( cursus ), which have been used in particular in the Pope firm as a method to prevent counterfeiting.

Using the document review were many documents, in particular documents of the Middle Ages and the early modern period, now identified as the falsification of documents, such as the famous Donation of Constantine.