Common Genealogical Myths

The beginning genealogist must be wary that some slightly more knowledgeable (or apparently so) family “historians” may place traps in his or her way by espousing theories that just aren’t so. Whether from trying to cover ignorance or misunderstanding, they will vigorously advocate one or more of these common myths:

1. Surname sharing means relationship. Everyone with the same surname is related; they all descend from a common ancestor, if only that patriarch could be found.
2. People with different spellings of similar surnames can not be related; they must be different families.
3. We can trace our ancestors to the very beginnings of the family.
4. Published genealogies are factual and may be relied on.
5. Where information comes from (its source) is less important than what is says (its content).

All of these lie in wait to lead us down false trails as we try to track our roots back to their origins in the dim and distant past. Like most myths, there may be just enough truth and emotional appeal in them to seduce us into belief and uncomprehending acceptance. Let us examine each myth more closely.

Myth 1: Surname sharing means relationship.

This myth ignores the reality of how and when surnames came to be for most people, especially, the common people who make up the great bulk of our ancestors. The short version of the real story is that European surnames came into existence over a short and relatively recent (compared to human existence) period of time and many unrelated families adopted the same or similar surnames.

In Europe, surnames became common in the mid-14th century, roughly 1350-1400 AD; until then, few had surnames of any kind. The impetus for this radical and rapid cultural change appears to have been social upheaval & turmoil associated with the Black Plagues of the time; as much as 40% of the population died. Many areas experienced extreme shortages of labor; many peasants and serfs found themselves suddenly free from deceased masters. People moved around the countryside to fill the vacuums and were unknown in their new surroundings. Surnames were mandated to help the government keep track. If you’re of European descent, you will find few ancestors with surnames before 1350.

European surnames come, for the most part, from these categories:

1. Occupation – What the family head’s occupation was at the time they took or were given the name.
2. Location – Where they lived at that time.
3. Physical characteristics – The appearance of the initial name-bearer.
4. Color – Whether this category is related to the above or simply a favorite or political color is unknown.
5. Patronymic – The name is probably of patronymic origin if contains “son”, “mac” or “fitz”.

China has a longer history of family names, from no later than 2852 BC. (As most know, Chinese custom is to place the family name first in order, rather than last.) The family name is taken from 438 words in a sacred poem. Next comes a generation name, composed from characters in a poem adopted by the family. Finally, is the given name for the individual. Today, there are about 3100 family names for the billions of Chinese.

Bottom line: A person with the same surname as you might or might not be related in any relevant sense.

Myth 2: People with different spellings of similar surnames can not be related.

This myth ignores the history of spelling. Today’s standardized spelling of names (or other words) did not arise until fairly modern times, roughly after 1840. A pre-condition for standardized spelling is that most of the population be literate; this didn’t happen until the growth of the public education movement, mostly in the 19th century.

When one examines 17th and 16th century documents, one finds many instances of idiosyncratic spelling. One of my ancestors, for example, had his name spelled different ways in the same document. He, being unable to read or write, would not have known the difference.

Bottom line: A person with a different spelling but a similar pronunciation of the surname may very well be related within fairly recent times.

Myth 3: We can trace our ancestors to the very beginnings of the family.

This myth ignores the reality of the genealogical process – mostly searches for written records naming our ancestors and giving places and dates. The short version is that if records do not exist now – or never existed – we can not find them.

After the fall of Rome, Europe entered the Dark Ages in which much knowledge was lost. Writing was kept alive by a few monks in isolated monasteries and in the service of kings. They concentrated on religious works and exploits of the rich and famous; they did not bother much with recording everyday lives of ordinary people. Even the Domesday Book of 1087 was essentially a tax list. Those with property to be taxed were listed; those with no property (most of the population) were not.

Above, we saw how surnames were unneeded before 1350 because most folks didn’t have their names written down. About 1500, parish priests began recording christenings, marriages and funerals; many of these early records, moldered away or were lost and destroyed by fire, war or other calamities.

The written record is an essential requirement of genealogy. With it, deduction and inference may lead to conclusions. Without it, we have merely idle speculation.

Bottom line: As one goes back in time, records of our ancestors become fewer and fewer. All genealogists ultimately reach “brick walls” which they can not break through or get around.

Myth 4: Published genealogies are factual and may be relied on.

The short version is “Trust no statement that you have not independently verified.” This myth is closely related to the one below; we separate it because the written word is sometimes considered more legitimate.

Authors of genealogies often feel a need to seem more authoritative than the limitations of the documented facts. What they are reluctant to admit is that documentation is often sketchy. It is often necessary to connect.

Often, published genealogies contain "facts" that are extremely unlikely or can not possibly be true. Most couples do not marry before age 15. A woman can not bear children either before she's born or after she dies.

Bottom line: Independently evaluate published works; verify their sources and use the test of common sense.

Myth 5: The source of information is less important than its content.

It is tempting to be seduced by the authoritative-sounding statement. Yet, we should retain that element of doubt and “consider the source”. We should evaluate the evidence which supports the statement.

Sources come in two flavors and with an additional two flavors of evidence. Sources may be either:

• Primary – an eyewitness account, close in time to the event, or
• Secondary – an account by a person who was not present or removed in time from the event.

Sources may be primary for certain kinds of information and secondary for others. For example, a death certificate is a primary source for a person’s death, but is usually secondary for the person’s birth.

The types of evidence contained in the sources may be categorized as either

• Direct – The evidence speaks directly to the question at hand. (A birth certificate is direct evidence of a person’s date and place of birth.) Or,
• Indirect – The evidence only implies or infers an answer to the question at hand. (A christening record is indirect evidence of a person’s date and place of birth.)

Frequently, genealogists must evaluate secondary sources of indirect evidence and draw conclusions as to meaning. This makes the assessment and reasoning going into the conclusion process an essential part of the conclusion. Good genealogy makes it clear how the conclusion was reached; bad genealogy obscures the evaluation & reasoning.

Bottom line: Source is as valuable as content.

Global Warming

Global warming, climate change or (as the scientists call it) "temperature anomalies") is a complicated business. Imagine trying to measure the near-surface air temperatures and ocean water temperatures all over the world and average them out to account for night vs. day and summer vs. winter. Even in my home town of Denver, Colorado, the apparent average temperatures dropped 3-5 degrees when they moved the official weather station from the old airport to the new one.


By the time you're through compiling all this stuff, you have a set of numbers that almost no one can understand. On top of that, they usually report, not an actual temperature, but the difference from an abitrarily-chosen index -- the average of the 1951-1980 period.


As a "numbers guy", I can guess why they do it. There's so much variability from place to place and season to season, that the variation disguises trends. But, the average person is left asking, "What does it really mean?" Let's try to get to the bottom of that.


Now, some dispute that it's even true that the earth is warming up (We got all that snow this winter!) or that the cause is mostly human (Maybe, the sun is getting hotter). Or, they distrust the data because some of the scientists acted in petty ways, trying to squelch critics. (Any college logic student would label that an "ad hominen" argument.) Gosh, there are even some who maintain that the earth is only thousands -- rather than billions -- of years old.


I'm not in those camps; I look , for example, at the shrinking of mountain glaciers & polar ice caps and conclude something's going on that we need to work on. Unfortunately, I also conclude it may already be too late to prevent severe damage. Global political urgency to take uncomfortable actions doesn't match the problem.

Has the world been warmer in the distant past? Yes, of course. Do we want to go back to those times? Almost certainly not.

If you thnk the East Anglia crowd might have been fudging the data, what is your opinion of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies? (You know NASA, the agency that figured out how to put men on the moon and weather satellites in space. ) Well, they're the source for the original data, which you can see for yourself at http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/ . Simply look at the graphs (or the tabular data) and you'll notice a few things:

• Yes, climate runs in cycles -- of about 7 to 11 years per cycle -- but
• There is a steadily increasing temperature trend; since 1910, each minimum of a cycle is higher than the one before;
• A big jump occurred between about 1910 and 1943, roughly consistent with use of internal combustion engines;
• The temperature was fairly stable between 1951 and 1980 (Thus, its choice for the index.) and
• An even bigger jump has happened after 1978 -- perhaps related to global industrializtion.

We've only been able to measure carbo dioxide (a greenhouse gas) in the atmosphere since about 1959. The place chosen for measuring is Mauna Loa, an extinct volcano standing high in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. That graph, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth's_atmosphere, shows a logarithmic increasing trend of CO2 in the air. This pattern, too, is consistent with the temprature increases.

Put it all together and it looks beyond a reasonable doubt that the world's climate is getting warmer and that much of this situation is human-caused.

But, global warming may now be a freight train running out of control with the throttle down. It also seems certain that -- even if we could reduce greenhouse gases going into the air today -- they would linger and cause more warming in coming decades. As the Arctic permafrost thaws, it releases methane, another greenhouse gas. The polar bears, I fear, are doomed.

Should we give up then and resign ourselves to our fate? Absolutely not! Serious problems need serious action. We may yet save ourselves from the worst of the crisis.

Character vs. Disease

This musing is sparked by George Will; he recently wrote a piece for the Washngton Post titled, "Cure for Character?", taking off on the soon-to-be-published revision of the DSM (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders) -- the catalogue that standardizes psychiatric diagnoses.

Mr. Will doesn't like the DSM having categories such as "antisocial personality disorder", "temper dysregulation disorder" and "histrionic personality disorder". He fears that by making these things diseases, a person is absolved of the responsibility to behave in socially-appropriate ways. Of course, Mr, Will, a political conservative, would object; these go straight to the heart of what William F. Buckley once defined as the difference between liberals & conserviatives: "Liberals believe in the perfectability of humankind; conservatives don't."

It's not that I totally disagree with his central point: If we are merely products of bio-chemical processes in our heads, where is the place for free will? If acting like a jerk is a disability, do the rest of us have to put up with jerks?

But what a psychiatrist means by these diagnoses is something more than "people-abuser", "short fuse" or "drama queen". We all know those personality types (and avoid them if we can). A pyshchiatrist encounters them when the phenomena described have become severe; either the person seeks treatment or is brought invountarily to it. Even the seeking of treatment is often less voluntarily than the seeker wishes; it's often a last resort -- after what AA calls "hitting bottom".

Not all in the world of psychiatry are comfortable with the DSM; some worry "whether the disorders it defines are actually real conditions in people in the real world, that can be consistently identified by its criteria." (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diagnostic_and_Statistical_Manual_of_Mental_Disorders) On that score, I'll vouch for the reality of these disorders. And, we shouldn't confuse the signs and symptoms in the DSM with underlying causes; DSM focuses on the former by design, admitting that we have a very limited unsderstanding of the pathologies involved.

We can probably agree that some people characteristically behave in antisocial ways, that it's an aspect of their personalities, and that some carry it to extremes. Similarly with short tempers and histrionics. If the shrinks have noticed too & catalogued it, we should be grateful that their world matches ours. Now, we can say not only "He's crazy." but just how he's crazy.

Why blog?

For years I’ve resisted the blogging fad. It seemed so, well, narcissistic and the world doesn't need much more of that. Why should anyone else want to read my rants?

But, lately, I’ve come to believe that a thoughtful & intelligent person, such as myself, might have insights or perspectives that were worth recording. Perhaps, setting down some of these musings and coming back to them later would help in developing a longer-term and sounder philosophy. If others chose to glance at them, that is all right too.

So, I (and you too, dear reader) set out on this journey. Where it will take us no one knows. Let’s hope it’s someplace good.

We're bound to make many stops along the way -- life, politics, sailing, genealogy, etc., etc. Road trip, Yay!
-rt_/)