Who has never, during a boring lecture, meeting, conference or telephone call, relieved the tedium by doodling – scribbling various pictorial or geometric shapes in the margins of the paper intended for taking notes? The more boring the topic one is listening to, the more imaginative and extensive the doodles.

Doodling was – and still is – resorted to by scribes, people assigned to make a written record of legal documents, such as wills, contracts and trade agreements, and to take down the minutes during important meetings. Evidence of this is plentiful at the Notarial Archives in St Christopher Street, Valletta, where notarial and other related documents from the 15th century to date are housed.

The notaries themselves and their scribes often scribbled meaningless marginal doodles. They also produced more elaborate decorative imagery that enhanced the appearance of otherwise drab documentation.

The late Sir Ernest Gombrich (1909-2001) is one of the few art historians who has seriously discussed doodles on official documents of the 17th and 18th centuries. In a paper aptly entitled ‘The pleasures of boredom’ he suggested that doodles such as those found in the historical archives of the Banco di Napoli “reflected scribal ennui – while the text was necessary and serious business, the superfluous images were but playful expressions”. Widening the scope of his observations beyond the Neapolitan bank’s doodles, he further concluded that “scribbling pictures in official (textual) records everywhere is a sign of tedium on the job”.

Caroline Dean also wrote about doodling on official documents in a work entitled ‘Beyond prescription: notarial doodles and other marks’ in which she focused on what she termed “non-prescribed markings” in the notarial records of the city of Cuzco in Peru. Dean wrote that these non-prescribed markings “invite us to step momentarily into the notary’s office” and to virtually envisage the work that went into the production of the various documents.

Nearer home, Giovanni Bonello came up with his own definition of doodles. In his essay ‘Doodles: Breaking the Bullarum Code’ (Histories of Malta, Vol IX – Confessions and Transgressions), he defined doodles as “stream-of-consciousness images, in which the hand carries away the mind to create a figurative scribble of no particular rational import (though very eloquent and revealing of the working of the subconscious)”.

While going through the Libri Bullarum, Bonello was struck by the hundreds of small drawings that decorated the margins of these heavy tomes, in which the Order of St John’s official documents and edicts were recorded. He discovered, however, that most of the doodles in these records did not fit his own definition since they had a particular rational import as they were related to the subject of the bulla whose margins they decorated – portraits, visual witticisms, symbolic metaphors and satirical observations.

The notaries and their scribes often scribbled meaningless marginal doodles. They also produced more elaborate decorative imagery that enhanced the appearance of otherwise drab documentation

During my work as a volunteer at the Notarial Archives in Valletta, I too was struck by the numerous doodles and other decorative imagery found in the bastardelli of Maltese notaries. The bastardello is a bound volume containing the first rough drafts of a particular notary’s contracts, deeds, wills and other documents.

Two fair copies of the bastardello draft, known as the original and the register copy respectively, were later prepared – the former for the official Notarial Archives and the latter for the notary’s use. The rough drafts and the register copies often contain more information than the original copies as they contain many additions, deletions and marginal notations, most of which were not permitted on the original version. Among these additions are the doodles and other more elaborate drawings that adorn many of the pages of the bastardelli.

The doodles and other non-prescribed markings at the Notarial Archives fall into a number of categories. One of these is that of abstract marginal scribbles. These are to be found in the bastardelli of several notaries, and were especially popular in those of the late 17th and 18th centuries. There is little doubt that these doodles, which are mostly of little artistic value, were produced almost unconsciously by the scribes or copyists during their labours.

Other marginal images are not completely abstract, but have some form of pictorial significance. Among these we find a large number and variety of ‘cruciform imagery’, where the cross is the basic element. These marginal doodles are believed to be the equivalent of what we now call ‘bullets’.

In these cruciform doodles, and in other more elaborate imagery involving the symbol of Christianity, the eight-pointed cross of the Order of St John rarely features. Could this be a subconscious sign of resentment of the Order’s rule?

Another category of notarial doodles comprises pictorial images. The most common of these are faces, ships and animals. Occasionally one also comes across more elaborate graphics, such as one featuring the half-length figure of a man wearing a cloche-type hat in the 1587-1588 bastardello of Notary Ciappara.

A contemporary painting by Corneille de Lyons dated 1550 shows the Consul de Lyons wearing very similar headgear. Such doodles, together with others showing clothing and footwear, serve to give us an insight into the sartorial fashions of the day.

Doodling was not restricted to the bastardelli. In one fragment of what must have been what we now refer to as rough paper, the various mathematical calculations and other scribbling are embellished by several doodles of faces, ships and boots. There is also a short poem in Italian entitled La Lontananza, suggesting that the scribbler was far from his native land and feeling homesick.

The visual adornment of initial letters, referred to as ‘calligraphic initials’, forms another group of non-prescribed markings which are clearly of a higher artistic standard than doodles. These bring to mind the elaborate and colourful ‘illumination’ of initial letters, often enhanced with the use of goldleaf, in mediaeval manuscripts.

The more modest embellishment in local notarial documents varies from simple adornment of the letters with curlicues and similar appendages to more pictorial images. The initial letters ‘I’ of In nomine, ‘D’ of Die and ‘R’ of Registro are the most frequently embellished letters.

Some of the ‘R’ adornments encountered are quite imaginative. One shows, for example, a man holding on to a leash attached to a pair of birds which are perched on top of the letter. Another depicts a dog about to leap at a bird which is also perched on top of the ‘R’.

The bastardelli, some dating back to the 15th century, are a written record of the social, economic, commercial, religious and political history of these islands

Sometimes there is no script version of the letter, which is made up by parts of the image itself. Examples include an ‘R’ that features a man climbing a ladder to reach a flag of the Order on top of a tower. The best example, however, is that of the letter ‘R’ formed by a shotgun-wielding hunter with his two dogs.

Very frequent pictorial adornments are those related to religious symbolism. Judging by their bastardelli, local notaries were all very religious; almost invariably, the bastardello starts with a short prayer in Latin or Italian calling for the protection of the Holy Trinity or of Jesus Christ. The monogram of the name of Jesus Christ – IHS – forms the basis of several pictorial adornments, while several depictions of the Holy Cross are also encountered.

Notarial insignia, which are pictorial signatures adopted by some notaries, often had an elaborate design incorporating the IHS monogram and a cross motif, such as that of Notary Salvatore Ciantar, who was active in the first half of the 17th century.

As already mentioned, the bastardelli and other documents housed at the Notarial Archives are replete with doodles and other decorative imagery: in order to select the illustrations for this article I sifted through a database of hundreds of scanned images meticulously maintained by Isabelle Camilleri. Interesting as they are, these give but a slight indication of the importance of these documents.

The bastardelli in particular, some dating back to the 15th century, are a written record of the social, economic, commercial, religious and political history of these islands. They therefore provide a running commentary of the daily lives and activities of the inhabitants of these islands spanning a period of six centuries.

Unfortunately, this rich paper heritage, a veritable national treasure, has been the victim of neglect in the past. Much harm has been caused through improper storage, defective restoration, hostile environmental conditions, insect activity, mould and even wartime damage.

Now, thanks to the Notarial Archives Research Council (NARC), founded by the indefatigable Joan Abela, this important collection is being preserved and protected in a professional, efficient and accessible manner for future generations of researchers. Restoration is in the capable hands of paper conservator Theresa Zammit Lupi.

The NARC is a non-governmental organisation bringing together researchers, academics and other interested citizens in order to support the Chief Notary to Government and Keeper of the Notarial Archives, and all the staff, in their efforts to preserve for posterity the rich paper heritage housed in the Notarial Archives. The staff at the archives, together with a team of dedicated volunteers, are doing their utmost to achieve these aims.

Sponsorships by leading firms, associations and individuals are contributing in no small way to the eventual transformation of the Notarial Archives into an important focal point for Maltese historical study that will be fully accessible to both the local as well as the international research community.

Acknowledgements
Thanks to the staff at the Notarial Archives and to my fellow volunteers. Special thanks to Joan Abela and Theresa Zammit Lupi for their encouragement and valuable suggestions and to Isabelle Camilleri for giving me access to the images database.