Keeping the records straight
As someone that has spent too much time perusing the records left by those who have come before us, I have found a quote that summarizes the effort completely: “Fractured Latin is the worst”.
My high school Latin teacher used to take subtle digs in my direction, with the warning that “free translation” wasn’t exactly what the course required. I didn’t understand, exactly; my supposing that the meaning I teased out of a given sentence was worth every letter didn’t meet the standards of classical scholarship. I had failed to catch the underlying precept of studying a “dead language”. There was no “other” way to translate the phrase.
So, back to genealogy and the recording of BMS (birth, marriage, sepulture) records. Inventing names and places was edgy, but getting the date wrong was against the whole idea. We wanted to be able to follow the comings and goings of a community, in one way. When the recording official had a less than solid foundation in the language (Latin, it was always Latin), errors were inescapable, and obvious to others with better skills.
I now rely upon the interpretations of such things, done by others, but if I ever get into a mindset that every record should be included upon use (I am far from there, right now), being able to read cursive notations, in an exacting manner, will be a requirement. And for the record, I have come across civil data written in other languages. Not often, but enough that I keep a dictionary at hand. After all, mustn’t mix my French with my Latin.
