During our latest ICARUS Convention, we had the pleasure of hosting Mons. Dr. Federico Gallo, director of the Ambrosiana Library in Milan, who gave us some insights into his book “Diplomatics: The Science of Reading Medieval Documents” – the first accessible and up-to-date English-language handbook on the study of medieval documents.

The idea for the handbook originates from the Diplomatics course Mons. Gallo taught in 2017 at the University of Notre Dame’s Medieval Institute. Frequently invited to lecture at Notre Dame, Gallo noticed that the discipline of Diplomatics – founded in seventeenth-century France and developed mainly in continental Europe – had not taken root in Britain or North America. This motivated him to teach it in English for the first time. He based his course on Paulius Rabikauskas S.J.’s Latin “Diplomatica Generalis” for its clarity, completeness, and linguistic neutrality, while adding modern perspectives and his own professional insights.

The concise 98-page guide covers internal and external features of documents, scribal practices, seals, forgery detection, chronology, and papal documentation.

A major highlight is its rich selection of high-quality manuscript images from Milan’s Biblioteca Ambrosiana, which illustrate real examples of medieval writing, layout, and validation techniques. Developed from Gallo’s university teaching, the handbook is designed for students, archivists, and historians seeking a practical introduction to diplomatic method.

Published under a Creative Commons license, the book is freely available online – making a traditionally specialist European discipline more widely accessible than ever.