Read a family recipe book in Sütterlin
Handwritten German family cookbooks and baking journals from the early twentieth century were penned in Sütterlin. Photograph the recipe page. FamilyLore deciphers the cursive script, translates ingredients into English, and highlights uncertain words.
Your first three pages need no account and no card.
A domestic hand from our shelf, as FamilyLore read it
A dotted underline marks a word FamilyLore was unsure of; [?] is its own note on a doubtful reading.
Leo Meter to his daughter Barbara · Easter 1943
- Im Osten, Ostern 1943[?]
- Liebe kleine Barbara,
- heute ist Ostern und auf allen Feldern und Straßen
- ist alles neu, klein und jung. Die Blümchen,
- die Schäfchen und die Kinder. Vor zwei Wochen sahen die
- Kinder[?] so aus,
Also on the shelf: Johann Kilian’s 1858 letter in 19th-century Kurrent
How well it reads, measured
| Script | Pages | Characters read correctly | Names, dates and numbers right | Misread words it marked | Last run |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kurrent and Sütterlin15 pages · 3 Nov 2026 | 15 | 83%Characters read correctly | 75%Names, dates and numbers right | 85%Misread words it marked | 3 Nov 2026 |
Measured on letters whose holders published a transcription made by hand, read the same way your page is. The figures rest on a few pages so far and move as pages are added. How well FamilyLore reads
Questions
- Can’t ChatGPT do this?
- A general chatbot can read some Sütterlin handwriting, sometimes well, but it usually hands you clean text with no sign of which words it guessed, and its makers publish no figures for this script; FamilyLore marks the words it is unsure of and publishes how often it reads correctly, in the table above.
- What if it reads a word wrong?
- Tap a word to see the other readings FamilyLore weighed, and correct it if you know better. The translation is redone from your correction. Most misread words carry a mark, but not every one, so a name or a date that matters is worth checking against the photo.
- How does FamilyLore handle historical German cooking measurements?
- Traditional recipes often reference archaic measures such as Pfund, Loth, or Prise. FamilyLore transcribes the exact scribal characters so you can convert historical measurements reliably.
- Who sees my pages?
- Only you. A page becomes public only if you share it, and then only to people who have the link. Deleting your account deletes the photos you uploaded.
What FamilyLore doesn’t read well yet
- Cooking oil smudges, flour dust, or ingredient stains that conceal letter ascenders.
- Two-column notebook pages where ingredient lists sit adjacent to preparation instructions.
- Personal family kitchen shorthand and unstandardized abbreviations.
From photo to text in three steps
Take a photo of the page
Lay the sheet flat, in daylight and without flash. A phone photo of the whole page is enough.
Upload it
“German (Kurrent), 1918 to 1945” is already chosen.
Read it
You get the page as it was written, in modern spelling, and in English. Correct a word you know better yourself.
Rather read it yourself?