Chirograph (Cyrograph)
The Chirograph was a legal document held between two parties and authenticated. Written on a piece of vellum or parchment, a chirograph would be used for various medieval, papal or notarial document which was then irregularly cut apart and divided among the parties.
Contents
History and Use
“The chirograph supposedly had its origins in Anglo-Saxon England, where the practice of using notaries to ratify legal documents was not continued generally after the Roman era.”
Authentication
The text on the chirograph was copied twice on the same sheet of vellum or parchment and written between the two sections was the word “cirographum.” The copies were then cut through this lettering, usually in a wavy or irregular manner in order to avoid forged copies. When the two copies were brought together, it would prove the document authentic and free for ratification between the two parties. It would be hard to fake these documents, as the lettering itself was unique as well: "Written in round court-hand, with heavy main-strokes; the strokes below the line drawn out into a point or a hair-line; those above, looped or turned over to the right. In line 2 a transposition of words is indicated by double oblique strokes" (Bond).
Multiple Meanings
The roots of chirography “really only means a hand-written document – from the Greek, xeiro=hand, and graphos-writing” (Stoller).
Various Uses
Medieval Documents
Papal Documents
Notarial documents
Taking Care of Business
Works Cited
- Bond, Edward Agustus, Edward Maunde Thompson, and George Frederic Warner, THE PALÆORAPHICAL SOCIETY. Facsimiles of Manuscripts and Inscriptions. Second Series, Volume II, (London : William Clowes and Sons, Limited, 1884-1894).
- [[ ]], Anglo-Saxon Manuscripts and their Heritage"