Book excerpt: Puzzle Pieces of the Past: Spanish Abbreviations 1500-1700 is a contextual presentation of hundreds of abbreviations found in the handwritten documents of the Spanish colonial period. Abbreviation examples include but are not limited to abreviaturas eclesiasticas, nexos, por signos convenciales, superposicion, por enclace, por apocope, sincopa y por sigla. All the abbreviations and phrases were scanned from photocopies of extant Spanish documents written between 1500 and 1700 and are presented in the original handwriting. Each abbreviation is presented with a phrase showing context and source reference. Together with each abbreviation and phrase is a printed display of the letters represented, the full spelling of the word or words in early modern Spanish, and the current Spanish spelling. This book contains four indices. A-D are related to this book. Index E is a selected Bibliography to assist with the study of Spanish, colonial paleography. Index F is a forty-five page dictionary of over one thousand abbreviations including the editorial expansions, and modern spellings. The format of Puzzle Pieces was planned to assist a variety of users, among them serious Spanish paleographers and historians, graduate students doing research for dissertations, and genealogists. It will also serve as an adjunct text for university-level courses in the history of the Spanish language, Spanish historical linguistics, and Spanish paleography."