Do I index unlabeled dates in the margin?

Megan Lingmann

https://www.familysearch.org/indexing/batch/9a3133d9-1cb6-41b5-84d5-c4573de59a15

I am reviewing this baptismal record. There are numbers written in the margin that are most likely the birth dates of the children, and that is how they were indexed. Personally, I would not have indexed these numbers and marked the birth dates blank since these numbers are not specifically labeled as birthdays, and we are not supposed to assume other information such as surnames, genders, years, locations, etc., so I would apply that here as well and not assume they are birthdays if they are not labeled as such. I have seen dates written in the margin that are labeled as birth dates, and I do index those.

Is my assumption to not assume correct? Should these numbers in the margins be indexed as birthdays, or do we leave that for researchers to decide?

Mirevo

Hello Megan,

Good judgement, correct we are not to assume dates, or ages.

You may also consider the example image on the Field help for birth day, month and year, they shows image similar to yours with the difference that these images contain the words When born above the dates on the left margin.

Again, in the Project instructions on What to index, there is another example image on: How to Index a Baptism Registers it shows that theses dates should be indexed on the birth day, month and year entries.

Thank you for indexing these records.

Megan Lingmann

Wonderful! Thank you for your help and for bringing those examples to my attention.