Diplomatics
Code: 100328 ECTS Credits: 6| Degree | Type | Year |
|---|---|---|
| History | OT | 4 |
Contact
- Name:
- Josep Antoni Iglesias Fonseca
- Email:
- toni.iglesias@uab.cat
Teaching groups languages
You can view this information at the end of this document.
Prerequisites
Completing Palaeography is not compulsory but it will help to set you up for study success, particularly if this is your first time studying at UAB.
Objectives and Contextualisation
Studying Diplomatic, you learn how to check the authenticity of the charters and diplomas. You learn how to make a Diplomatarium, that is, a charter’s collection, with exercises on the process of dating medieval documents, reducing to our current calendar the chronological compute of the ancient and medieval eras; to elaborate an abstract, summarizing the diploma's content while being capable of its critical edition.
Competences
- Developing critical thinking and reasoning and communicating them effectively both in your own and other languages.
- Mastering the specific methods and techniques of diplomacy.
- Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
- Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
- Students must develop the necessary learning skills in order to undertake further training with a high degree of autonomy.
Learning Outcomes
- Communicating in your mother tongue or other language both in oral and written form by using specific terminology and techniques of Historiography.
- Critically distinguishing an authentic diploma from a false or interpolated one.
- Identifying the main and secondary ideas and expressing them with linguistic correctness.
- Organising and planning the search of historical information.
- Properly using the specific vocabulary of History.
- Reducing to our current calendar the chronological compute of the ancient and medieval eras.
- Solving problems autonomously.
- Submitting works in accordance with both individual and small group demands and personal styles.
- Summarizing the diploma's content while being capable of its critical edition.
- Using the characteristic computing resources of the field of History.
Content
- Diplomatic: definition and main aims.
- Concept of diploma or charter.
- True or false documents, or forgery through interpolation.
- Original documents and copies. Records and cartularies.
- Medieval cronology. Reducing to our current calendar the chronological compute of the ancient and medieval eras.
- Abstracts.
- Diplomatic, Palaeographical, intepretative and critical editions.
- Heuristic apparatus, and, where appropriate, how to elaborate the corresponding critical apparatus.
- How to make a Diplomatarium, that is, a collection of charters.
- Problems related to indexing a Diplomatarium. The problem of the adaptation of old proper names to our current languages.
Activities and Methodology
| Title | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type: Directed | |||
| Diplomatic: concept and main aims | 20 | 0.8 | 7, 2 |
| Medieval chronology | 20 | 0.8 | 6 |
| The adaptation of old proper names to our current languages | 20 | 0.8 | 8, 9 |
| To make a diplomatarium | 20 | 0.8 | 7, 2, 8, 6, 9 |
| Type: Supervised | |||
| Edition of a collection of a few diplomas | 20 | 0.8 | 7, 2, 8, 6, 9 |
| Type: Autonomous | |||
| Written work | 50 | 2 | 7, 2, 8, 6, 9 |
The module aims to develop understanding and practical skills in Diplomatic, based around practical sessions. These will be accompanied by classes that review the theory and will use facsimiles of all the original diplomas. Students will be able to demonstrate skills in initiating and carrying forward an independent programme of practical archivist research, editing a collection of a few diplomas, under supervison of Professor. During the module, students will be encouraged to actively participate in class.
Seminar hours: The module will be taught through a series of weekly lecture workshops and seminars. They will be based on systematic study of primary sources prepared in advance and will involve student-led discussions and presentations. The emphasis throughout is on the acquisition and enhancement of specific skills.
Tutorial hours: tutorials and specific learning exercises (individuals or in a small group). You will be offered guidance about the preparation of the assessed tasks in individual tutorials.
Independent learning: to search archive documents, to be able to read diplomas, to write an essay addressing one of the course themes, self-study.
15 minutes of a class will be set aside, within the calendar established by the center/degree, for students to fill in surveys to evaluate the performance of the teaching staff and to evaluate the subject.
The Biblioteca d'Humanitats offers virtual courses aimed at getting to know documentary collections better, bibliographic reference managers or issues such as plagiarism or copyright. The teacher can include one of these courses as an activity: https://www.uab.cat/web/our-services/training-sessions-1345738247880.html
Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.
Assessment
Continous Assessment Activities
| Title | Weighting | Hours | ECTS | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active participation in class | 10% | 0 | 0 | 7, 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 6, 9, 5, 10 |
| Examination I (1:30 h.) | 25% | 0 | 0 | 7, 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 6, 9, 5, 10 |
| Examination II (1:30 h.) | 25% | 0 | 0 | 7, 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 6, 9, 5, 10 |
| Written work: edition of a collection of a few diplomas | 40% | 0 | 0 | 7, 1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 6, 9, 5, 10 |
The continuous evaluation will be based on the activity in class (10%), the quality of the final work presented, which consists of the preparation of a short diploma (40%), and a two mid-term exams (25% + 25%).
The unique assessment will consist of three activities: the preparation of the regest of three documents of various types, the reduction to the current calculation of five timelines from the medieval and modern era, and a final exam. Students will be able to take part in the single assessment through the Academic Management dates. Single Assessment tests may coincide with dates reserved for continuous assessment. Recovery of the single assessment: the same recovery system as for the continuous assessment will be applied.
At the time of carrying out each assessment activity, the teacher will inform the students (Moodle) of the procedure and the date of review of the qualifications.
The schedule of assessment tests cannot be modified (except in justified exceptional cases), and Erasmus students who request to advance an exam must submit a written document from their home university to the professor justifying their request.
For recovery, students must have previously been assessed in a set of activities whose weight is equivalent to a minimum of 2/3 parts of the total qualification (Continuous Assessment) or deliver all the scheduled tests (Assessment unique). Students will obtain a Not assessed/Not submitted course grade unless they have submitted more than 30% of the assessment items.
In the event of a student committing any irregularity that may lead to a significant variation in the grade awarded to an assessment activity, the student will be given a zero for this activity, regardless of any disciplinary process that may take place. In the event of several irregularities in assessment activities of the same subject, the studentwill be given a zero as the final grade for this subject.
This subject allows the use of AI technologies exclusively for support tasks such as bibliographic or content-based searches, text correction or translations (but not transcripcions). In the case of subjects in a Modern Languages degree, use of translation must be specifically
authorised by the teacher. Other specific situations may be contemplated, as deemed appropriate by the teacher. The student must clearly (i) identify which parts have been generated using AI technology; (ii) specify the tools used; and (iii) include a critical reflection on how these have influenced the process and final outcome of the activity.
Lack of transparency regarding the use of AI in the assessed activity will be considered academic dishonesty; the corresponding grade may be lowered, or the work may even be awarded a zero. In cases of greater infringement, more serious action may be taken.
Bibliography
Alturo, Jesús. Chartae Latinae Antiquiores. Part CXII: Spain I. With the assistance of T. Alaix. Dietikon-Zürich: Urs Graf Verlag, 2017. 128 p. Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Alturo, Jesús. Chartae Latinae Antiquiores. Part CXIII: Spain II. With the assistance of T. Alaix. Dietikon-Zürich: Urs Graf Verlag, 2017. 136 p. Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Bresslau, Harry. Manuale di diplomatica per la Germania e l’Italia. Trad. di Anna Maria Voci-Roth. Rome: Ministero per i beni culturali e ambientali, Ufficio centrale per i beni archivistici, 1998. 1423 p. (Pubblicazioni degli archivi di Stato. Sussidi; 10). Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Cappelli, Adriano. Cronologia, cronografia e calendario perpetuo dal principio dell'èra cristiana ai nostri giorni. 3za ed. Milano: Ulrico Hoepli, 1969. 602 p. (Manuali Hoepli). Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Giry, Arthur. Manuel de Diplomatique: diplômes et chartes: chronologie technique: éléments critiques et parties constitutives de la teneur des chartes: les Chancelleries: les actes privés. Genève: Slatkine Reprints, 1975. 944 p. Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Guyotjeannin, Olivier; Pycke, Jacques; Tock, Benoît-Michel. Diplomatique médiévale. 3e éd. augmentée. Turnhout: Brepols, 1993. 486 p. (L’atelier du médiéviste; 2). Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB. Enllaç al catàleg de la UAB.
Students will also be directed to online resources, in particular digitised diplomas at, eg, Biblioteca de Catalunya, Arxiu Nacional de Catalunya and other Catalan archives which also Seminari de Paleografia, Diplomàtica i Codicologia has an agreement.
How to cite and prepare the bibliography: https://www.uab.cat/web/study-and-research/how-to-cite-and-create-your-bibliography-1345738248581.html
Software
None
Groups and Languages
Please note that this information is provisional until 30 November 2025. You can check it through this link. To consult the language you will need to enter the CODE of the subject.
| Name | Group | Language | Semester | Turn |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (PAUL) Classroom practices | 1 | Catalan | first semester | morning-mixed |
| (TE) Theory | 1 | Catalan | first semester | morning-mixed |