I have a document that is quite archaic in its use of the English language. I really just need to check for basic spelling mistakes, but because of its age Word is underlining a lot of it in blue. Is there any way to just check the red lines?

You can apply the 'do not check spelling or grammar' attribute to whatever you don't want checked.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

See http://wordribbon.tips.net/T006053_G...nderlines.html

The Word Ribbons article appears to be dated. I'm on Word 2016. The article did give me a clue to figure it out though. I went to File-Options-Proofing and then I unchecked 'Check grammar with spelling'. That did the trick.

Exactly, if you want to only check spelling. It is the same in all Ribbon versions although in Word 2007 you start out with the pizza button instead of the File button.

If, on the other hand, you want certain words or sections to not be checked at all, the method suggested by Paul is the most effective method.

Mastering the Spelling Checker