Dear visitors!

Due to the current lockdown in Germany, I can only work a few hours a day, while spending the rest of the time with my little son.

Generally, I have been receiving more requests than I can work on for months, so it may happen that I won’t reply to your email or only with some delay. Sorry!

My name is Rita Dachner. I’d like to offer to translate your old, handwritten German documents into modern script and summarize them for you in English. Until the first part of the 20th century, a handwriting was used in Germany that looks very different from today’s cursive. This Kurrent script, and later the Sütterlin script, was used for hundreds of years in everyday life, so we can find it on all kinds of old documents – on birth certificates, post cards, love letters, last wills, official letters…

Family research

Perhaps you are interested in your family’s history and now wonder what these hundred-year-old letters you found on your grandparent’s attic are about. Or you even looked in official archives and found birth certificates or similar documents.

Academical research

Or you are writing an academic paper in music or art history. During your research, you came across an artist’s interesting manuscripts in old German script. Unfortunately you can’t read them.

Legal research

Possibly you were asked to clarify the history of ownership of a building. But you are at a loss when looking at an age-old German land register entry.

In any of these cases, I can help you. I made my passion for old scripts into a profession and specialized on deciphering Sütterlin and Kurrent script. Gladly I will enable you to discover the secrets of your old German documents.