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Transcribe Kurrent Script with Transkribus

The AI model “German Handwriting M1” is used for this tool.

Transkribus reads Kurrent, Sütterlin and modern handwriting for you

Transkribus helps you to translate old letters, documents and chronicles from Kurrent into readable text. The Transkribus software enables you to automatically transcribe Kurrent with the help of AI. 

Access the full power of Transkribus

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How Transkribus helps you to convert Letters, Documents and Chronicles from Kurrent to text

Decipher Kurrent with AI-powered Text Recognition

Automatically recognize your Kurrent documents and turn them into normal text. Transkribus helps you to convert Kurrent, Sütterlin and Fraktur Script from the 17th, 18th, 19th and 20th century. There are a number of publicly available artificial intelligence models you can use. 

Manually transcribe and correct automatic translations

With the transcription editor you can manually transcribe Kurrent Script or you can correct transcription errors from the automatic transcription. The results of the automatic transcription can vary depending on the handwriting and the quality of the material.

Train your own AI text recognition models

You can also train specific text recognition models that are capable of recognising exactly the handwriting of your material

Search your Kurrent documents

With Transkribus you can search your documents for names and keyowords and you have also more advanced search options

Export your Kurrent transcriptions

You can export your transcribed text as text documents or as PDFs. 

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Free Public AI-Models
See Public Models >>

How Transkribus works

Transkribus is a software that uses artificial intelligence to “learn” how to read Kurrent Script. For this, the software first needed to be trained with a number of pages that have been manually transcribed. This so called “Ground Truth” enables Transkribus to understand and read Kurrent Script.

The model “German Kurrent M2” for instance was trained with more than 550.000 words from many different handwritings. You can use this and other pretrained AI models to automatically recognize your Kurrent, Sütterlin or Fraktur documents and convert them into normal text. 

If you are able and willing to transcribe about 50 pages by yourself, you can also train a custom AI model. Your own model is then able recognize excactly the handwriting that you are working with. 

Example transcription of a letter of Goethe

Alphabet of the Kurrent script, around 1865 | Source: Wikipedia

About Kurrent

Kurrent was the dominant script from the 16th century to the beginning of the 20th century in the German-speaking world. Not surprisingly, there are still millions of untapped historical documents written in Kurrent. 

With the help of Transkribus making a large number of Kurrent documents accessible to the general public [or also for private use] is today possible. By using one of the public models or a own model, thousands of Kurrent documents can be automatically converted into text. 

Public AI Models for Kurrent

PyLaia
ID: 57815
Viennese Property Registers 1420-1517
- Handwritten

Viennese Property Registers (ENHG) 15th-16th century

By: Julian Helmchen
German, Latin
German Kurrent, Bastarda, Gothic minuscule
1.5 (CER)
View & Try Model
PyLaia
ID: 32524
Transkribus German Kurrent M2
- Handwritten

Transkribus German Kurrent

By: Transkribus Team
German
German Kurrent, Sütterlin, Fraktur
5.29 (CER)
View & Try Model
PyLaia
ID: 35909
Transkribus German handwriting M1
- Handwritten

Transkribus German handwriting M1

By: Transkribus Team
German
Latin alphabet, German Kurrent, Sütterlin
4.70 (CER)
View & Try Model
PyLaia
ID: 37789
Transkribus Early Kurrent M1
- Handwritten

Transkribus Early Kurrent M1

By: Transkribus Team
German
German Kurrent
6.30 (CER)
View & Try Model
PyLaia
ID: 50870
The German Giant I.
- Handwritten

The German Giant I.

By: Transkribus Community
German
Latin alphabet, German Kurrent
8.3 (CER)
View & Try Model
PyLaia
ID: 42164
Swiss German Kurrent 18th Century
- Handwritten

Swiss German Kurrent 18th Century

By: Staatsarchiv des Kantons Zürich
German
German Kurrent
5.90 (CER)
View & Try Model

Pricing

Training, layout analysis, using Transkribus for manually transcribing, etc. – i.e., everything but text recognition proper is free of charge. Yet, you can also use  the Transkribus text recognition feature for free, as you get 500 free credits (i.e. about 500 pages) upon signup.

Your purchases will enable us to keep Transkribus alive into the future and keep this wonderful community going. Everything you need to know about buying credits you can find here.

FREE

Signing up is completely free
  • 500 Free credits on signup
  • Model Training
  • Layout Analysis
  • Manual Transcription
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PAID SERVICES

Handwritten Text Recognition
  • Process larger amounts
  • On-demand or subscription
  • Credits can be shared
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