Personal mentions in historical documents

Open Archives makes searching the data of archive institutions and historical associations in the Netherlands, Belgium, Suriname and France very easy.

Some of the data concerns historical personal records - around 350 million - that can be searched by name. The historical documents with the personal entries are provided with contextual information about the date (historical weather) and place (census, maps). Related documents are also automatically searched for and shown as suggestions.

Another part of the material you can search and browse on Open Archives are transcripts - around 9 million of them.

Transcriptions

Archive institutions are putting a lot of effort into digitizing parts of their archive access. This makes it possible to view more and more online, including on Open Archives.

As an example, below is a scan from the archives of the Old West India Company (National Archives 1.05.01.01), specifically from folio 53 from inventory 42 "Commissions, instructions, conditions for Colloniers. Acts [...] of and aen Zoutschips" :

For those who cannot read this type of old handwriting, automatic handwriting recognition offers a solution. Several archive institutions are working on models to improve automatic handwriting recognition by offering the scans and human-made transcriptions to computers to learn from.

The current models recognize a multitude of handwriting and can therefore convert the above scan into the following text:

Compareerde voor Bewinthebberen der westjndisen
Comp.e de onderschreven persoonen, Soo voor hem
selven als sijne mede reeders, versouckende als opt andr
met
bladt ende rechter zijde Acte van Concessie om het
Schip genaemt den volphijn schipper Adriaen sends
te mogen varen onder de linuten vande westjndische
en hout
Comp.e omme aldaer sout, te becomen, De welcke hen
midts desen werden versunt, onder de conditien ende
borchtochten aen dander zijde gementioneert
Actum den 24 Novemb 1621 tot Middelburch
Cornelis Ccunelaer
Puthorno vernis

More experienced researchers and historians will be able to interpret this text. Old Dutch will be a challenge for many.

But the computer can help here too! Based on a Large Language Model, a summary in contemporary English can be made of the above transcription:

Before the directors of the West India Company, the undersigned individuals appeared, both for themselves and their fellow ship owners. They requested a document granting permission to sail the ship named "Den Volphijn," captained by Adriaen Sends, under the authority of the West India Company to obtain salt there. This permission was granted to them on the 24th of November 1621 in Middelburg. The individuals mentioned in the transcription are Cornelis Cunelaer and Puthorno Vernis.

Open Archives offers all Plus subscribers the opportunity to create an automatic summary of the transcripts available on Open Archives!

Side note about artificial intelligence (AI)

The transcriptions are made by computer (by archive institutions) via automatic handwriting recognition. The summary is made by computer (by Open Archives) from these transcriptions based on a language model. Both artificial intelligence tasks are not perfect, but often more than sufficient so that the historical document becomes understandable.