Diplomatics facts for kids

Diplomatics is a special study that looks closely at old documents. It helps us understand if these historical papers are real or fake. The word 'diplomatics' comes from 'diploma,' which originally meant a folded paper. A French monk named Jean Mabillon helped make this study famous with his book, De re diplomatica, back in the 1600s. It's important not to confuse it with 'diplomacy,' which is about how countries talk to each other.

At first, diplomatics was used to figure out if old official papers, like royal decrees or church documents, were real or fake. These papers were often made by royal or church offices called chanceries. Later, people realized these same skills could be used for all kinds of documents. This includes legal papers, private letters, and even digital information today.

Diplomatics is one of the important "helper sciences" for history. It's different from palaeography, which is the study of old handwriting. Diplomatics is more like textual criticism, which checks if a text is accurate, or historical criticism, which looks at historical sources.

Images for kids

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  Title page of Jean Mabillon's De re diplomatica (1681)

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  Title page of Volume 4 of Tassin and Toustain's Nouveau traité de diplomatique (1759)

See also

In Spanish: Diplomática (ciencia) para niños