Formatting - emilyhboyer/Signed-Sealed-Delivered GitHub Wiki
This page explores some of the more complex formatting standards of the Signed, Sealed, and Delivered project.
The schema for this project is included in the template.xml document, which can be found under probates, found here. To see how individual lines are encoded, see lb on the Attributes page.
Tracking Documentation
On the home page, there is a file titled "Boyer Probate Tracking." This document is used to record what probate records have been completed, who the probate record pertains to, the date of the document, who encoded the article, and when. Each file and subsequent .xml file is labeled using the below format:
MD_CC_PRO_startpage_year_surname
| Abbreviations | Description |
|---|---|
| MD | = state/colony name (Maryland) |
| CC | County name; Charles County |
| PRO | = probate; type of record |
| startpage | Denotes the page number that the probate records starts on in the FamilySearch repository; this number does not change. This number corresponds to the page as indicated by FamilySearch, not the primary source. This is because some scans are repeated, damaged, and possibly out of order, and scans from FamilySearch offer a baseline for viewers to navigate |
| year | Year that the probate record was created; states within the record, not always in order |
| surname | Surname of the individual (author) of probate record |
Dashes
As seen throughout these probate records, some records contain a multitude of dashes that can appear at the end of sentences. This can be seen in David Towell's Will, as pictured below:
I have chosen not to encode these dashes, as they do not add any value to the transcription or encoding. Meaning, if one were to look at the primary source, it is clear that that symbol or marking is a dash, and thus including an attribute/element for said dash is not necessary; it's purpose is clear without need for explanation.
Sides
The last thing included on most probate records is a number and the word sides, as see here:
The number (x) and "sides" do not have a unique attribute; they appear in a standard attribute. They do, however, appear before a signature. For example:
Signatures (if included) should be the last item encoded in a probate transcription.
Signatures
At the end of the majority of probate records included in this repository, signatures of the author and of witnesses appear. An example of this appears below:
An important reminder is that the probate records transcribed in Signed, Sealed, and Delivered are the prerogative court copies; the signatures and seals included in this copies are not the originals, and have been added by the original transcriber (individual who made copied the original probate records in the 17th century for the prerogative court). Because these signatures are not the originals, I have not assigned them a special element. Rather, I have chosen to state the individuals name within the persName attribute, unless this name has already been repeated elsewhere. This is because if one was to look at the primary source, they can see that it is a signature because of its placement on the document and because of the handwriting. My assumption is that viewers of these records are more ultimately interested in the name that appears on the probate record.