Blog
Guides and insights on Sütterlin, Kurrent and reading old handwriting – for everyone who wants to decipher grandma's letters and diaries.
Decipher Gothic script: a guide for beginners
Learn to decipher Gothic script: the alphabet, common pitfalls and practical exercises. How to read old letters, diaries and parish registers from before 1875.
Genealogy for beginners: getting off to a good start
Genealogy for beginners: find your ancestors in parish registers and censuses on Arkivalieronline - and decipher the Gothic script that blocks your way.
Old Danish spelling: Aa, Å and capitalised nouns
Understand old Danish spelling: why it says »Aa« instead of »Å«, and why nouns were capitalised before the 1948 reform.
Reading parish registers and censuses: a practical guide
How to find and read parish registers and censuses on Arkivalieronline - and decipher the Gothic script that keeps your ancestors hidden.
Emigrant letters: the story of those who sailed to America
More than 300,000 Danes emigrated to America. Their letters home are priceless - but written in Gothic script. Learn the history and have the letters deciphered.
Translate old letters: from Gothic script to readable text
How to make old letters in Gothic script readable and translated - into modern Danish or into English for family abroad.
Southern Jutland: family history from 1864 to the Reunification of 1920
The history of Southern Jutland families from the defeat of 1864 to the Reunification of 1920 - told in letters and diaries written in Gothic script. Here is how to decipher them.
Old measures and abbreviations in handwritten recipes and documents
Pound, lod, pægl and kvint: understand the old Danish measures and abbreviations you encounter in grandmother's cookbook and in old documents.
Free Danish genealogy: the best sources online
Danish genealogy for free: the archives, databases and tools that cost nothing – what they cover, where they stop, and what to do when the handwriting defeats you.