authenticity

Archaeologists tracing the evolution of British legal practices discovered one area where innovation was discouraged: the parchments for documents. From the 13 th to the 20 th century AD, British lawyers were scrupulously consistent in their use of sheepskin parchment for legal documents, choosing to write on this type of paper almost exclusively. A team of researchers from the Universities of York, Exeter, and Cambridge recently completed an exhaustive study of the parchment-using habits of British solicitors and barristers, going all the way back to the medieval era. Before beginning the study, they expected to find examples of lawyers using other types of commonly manufactured parchment, including goatskin and calfskin, as an alternative to sheepskin. But it seems old-time legal