What date to record for abandoned children?

FedericoAlbertini

Hi all, I'm new at indexing and after a few easy batches I came across a batch that includes 3 records about abandoned children. The available dates a re usually as follows: registration date (today), date when the child has been found (yesterday, for example), apparent age of the child (a boy of apparent 15 days of age). One of the registrations in the batch is about a boy of the apparent age of 8 months...

I believe the only certain and pertinent date is the second one, the date when the child has been abandoned/found: am I right? is this the date I should use?

The example, in Italian, is in this batch: https://www.familysearch.org/indexing/batch/590b1df1-b184-4eee-80c6-6fe62e6ae0d5

The example in the image, taken from the batch page 3, entry 2, the record # 9, that mentions on the day of the 8th of January [...] a male boy of apparent age of 15 days ...

Thank you for your suggestions/guidance!

Ksalers

Well the general rule is, no birth date = leave <blank>. However, for this specific project they ask you to put the registration date when no birth date is available.

😊

Ksalers

Normally if the birth date isn't recorded, you would leave it <blank>.

However, based on field instructions (purple question mark) located above date it states:

• Tuttavia, se la data di nascita non è indicata, scrivi la data di registrazione.

However, if the date of birth is not indicated, write the registration date.

So this is what google translate told me this means 😆

So in this instance, if you have a registration date, put it down.

FedericoAlbertini

Dear Ksalers,

thank you for your answer: Google translate did a good job but still it seems odd to mark the registration date when they state that the child has an apparent age of 8 months as in one of the cases in my batch.

I'll leave the batch open for a couple of days more just to be sure that there is no other point of view, then I'll proceed with the registration date as in the guidelines. I guess that the researchers will sort it out, given the chance to reach the indexed registry note.

Thank you again,

Federico

Ksalers

@FedericoAlbertini

Are you trying to decide if you should guess a birth date based off the age estimate of appearance noted in the record?

We are never encouraged to make an estimate of a date based off info recorded in the text.

FedericoAlbertini

Yes, yes, I understand. I was just looking for a specific guideline about abandoned babies, if any available.

I'll apply the general rule: no birth date = registration date

Thank you again, Federico