TESTAMENTOS DE MURCIA

The Archivo Histórico Provincial y General de la Región de Murcia (Spain) wants to add to its database the information on wills, codicils, inventories and postmortem partitions that we keep in a collection of typed cards, which can currently only be consulted in some pigeonholes in the research room.

We keep tens of thousands of last wills and testamentary dispositions granted before the notaries public and notaries of the municipality of Murcia by a multitude of people who preceded us. From artisans to ecclesiastics, including soldiers, farmers, housewives or historical figures such as the humanist Francisco Cascales, the sculptor Francisco Salzillo or the Count of Floridablanca.

The challenge consists of indexing, through citizen collaboration and in a reasonable amount of time, all this information which will then be available to everyone on our website. Thanks to a simple form (supported by a tutorial), volunteers can collaborate in its transcription and enrich the documentary descriptions of our web catalogue and facilitate, in the medium term, the digitisation of these very interesting documents.

The forms contain the name of the grantor (or of the grantors, in the case of marriages), the date and type of document (will, codicil, memorandum...), the notary before whom it was granted and various information of interest, such as marital status, residence, kinship, positions and jobs, etc.