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Different first name recorded in GRO birth record and baptismal record.

Discussion in 'England & Wales BMD registers' started by JimT, Nov 11, 2019.

  1. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    I didn't say their transcriptions were better - I said they're far better at handling discrepancies, which is much more important.
     
  2. Helen7

    Helen7 LostCousins Superstar

    OK, but surely accurate transcriptions are important when you are searching. Bob was referring to inaccurate transcriptions, and discrepancies can follow from them when you are doing your research.
     
  3. Helen7

    Helen7 LostCousins Superstar

    How bizarre! I wonder if the transcriber was Italian?

    Presumably the 'False False' just means Ancestry couldn't find the place in their database?
     
  4. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    Transcribers are not mind readers, and they don't have the time to consider every possible name. As someone who studied Italian, Campiglia seems to me to be as likely as anything else.

    So far as I'm concerned the fault is not that of Ancestry or the transcriber, but the vicar who probably couldn't care less whether his handwriting was legible. To compound it all. not only did he fail to cross his 't', he left out the third 'n' completely.

    But please no more discussions about so-called mistranscriptions - I've noticed over the years that none of the whingers have themselves been transcribers, and that tells me something.
     
  5. Susan

    Susan LostCousins Member

    Back to the subject of different names, a great great aunt's birth was registered in 1854 as Henriette but she was baptised as Nancy. Her name in the 1861 and 1871 censuses was Nancy. She married as Henrietta in 1873, her death was registered as Henrietta in 1929, and this was her name in all the censuses after her marriage.
     
  6. Bob Spiers

    Bob Spiers LostCousins Superstar

    Yes and the reverse is true, your rushing to defend mis-transcriptions (as you have times before) is a clear sign you have done the work and I am sure others who have done the same (and I know of one or two in the Forum who have admitted to same) would sympathise with your view. Of course it is down to trying to interpret careless handwriting, that is a given, and why in related work proof readers are a necessary evil, and early punch card recording had to be verified. So it is a hard, and clearly a thankless job, but this cannot always let the transcriber off the hook when his interpretation is a million miles off the mark, and your reference to it perhaps being an Italian surname does not hold water. Even in the example I quoted it would have taken a moments glance at the record to see a witness had clearly signed as Cunnington. Yes of course it is a whinge, and in my opinion fully deserved. But others may disagree which is the purpose of the Forum surely.
     
  7. PhilGee

    PhilGee LostCousins Member

    But, where does the transcriber get the certainty that the witness has the same surname let alone is a relative? They do not and, therefore, "are not permitted" to make such deductions. With apologies to Peter, I could understand a groom's transcription of "Thunay Cilwnd Baggtt Masw"!

    Phil
     
  8. Bob Spiers

    Bob Spiers LostCousins Superstar

    That may be so as far as the rule book is concerned, but when did that ever stop people using their 'little grey cells' to take something out of the realms of 'guesswork' to one that can be supported by reasonable deduction?
     
  9. Pauline

    Pauline LostCousins Megastar

    Phil is right - making deductions (reasonable or otherwise) when transcribing is not to be recommended.

    It can be OK to look at other names on the page to help with interpreting the handwriting but even that has to be done with care so you don't end seeing what isn't actually there.
     
  10. Bob Spiers

    Bob Spiers LostCousins Superstar

    Thank the Lord I never volunteered as a Transcriber (and there were past times when I considered same). I would most likely have fallen at the first fence. I am reminded of my favourite 'saw' (many have heard it before) ..."Rules were made for the guidance of wise men, and the obedience of fools". Even handwriting comparisons help the deduction process, and the more pointers there are to help interpretation, the better the end result.
     
  11. AdrienneQ

    AdrienneQ Moderator Staff Member

    I wonder if this is because of Mother Julian of Norwich she was anchoress at the Church of St Julian, we dont know her baptised name. She wrote the earliest surviving book in the English language to be written by a woman, Revelations of Divine Love.
     
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  12. Helen7

    Helen7 LostCousins Superstar

    Yes, very likely. I'd come across Julian of Norwich via my circle dancing group (as writer of the song 'Bells of Norwich'). Thanks for posting the links.
     
  13. peter

    peter Administrator Staff Member

    Quite right - transcribers are not paid to transcribe the names of witnesses, so why would they even look at them?
     

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