When inputting locations, should I use the historically relevant town or the modern town?
For instance, I am editing many persons born in modern day "Santo Stefano Quisquina, Agrigento, Sicily, Italy", which existed from 1861 to present.
From 1817-1861, it was known as "Santo Stefano Quisquina, Girgenti, Two Sicilies"
Prior to 1817, Family Search does not list any other previous towns
For persons born between 1817 and 1861, should I use the "Two Sicilies" location?
And for persons born before 1817, do I use the modern day location?
Answers
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IMO you should show the historical location when possible
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Here's an example: https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/9V25-X9D
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In my opinion, as well, use the historical location whenever possible. If you participate in the Beta Profile Quality Score project, you'll see that a conflict will be called out if the place name is not valid for the date.
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Genealogists have been arguing since forever about which placename to use: the name at the time of the event or the current name.
Like Áine and Chas, I'm strongly on the side of "name at the time of the event". That's an unchanging historical fact, and in many cases, that's the label you need to know in order to find documents about the event's participants. It's also the more generally-accepted professional standard, because of its durability.
However, genealogy software and websites often either encourage or require the use of current placenames, especially if there is any mapping involved, because this greatly reduces the size of the associated database of placenames. The drawbacks include the possibility of going stale, if the locality's administration changes in any way, and the difficulties it introduces in identifying relevant documents. (Good luck finding "Bratislava" on a pre-1920 map, for example.)
FamilySearch allows either approach, and follows both practices in different places — or sometimes, neither one. For example, the indexed records database and the Catalog often use the names and jurisdictions that applied at the time when the records were microfilmed, which can result in labels that are anachronistic for the event and outdated for current maps (such as "Czechoslovakia").
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Assuming the place is fully entered in FamilySearch's Places database, if you use the historical name, which I am also in favor of, anyone who wants to know what it is called now and where it is can just click on the Timeline tab and look on that map. Going the opposite direction is much harder and you should not make everyone else that comes to the profile repeat the work you have done to figure out the historical name.
For person's born before 1817, if you know what the name should be, you can request that the name and time period be added by going to the Places database here: and finding that place name (it's here: ) and clicking on the link to improve the place then entering the request. Depending on the country it can take a fair amount of time for it to be added.
You can try entering the name in Family Tree as it was in 1817 then editing it to be correct for prior to 1817 but the previously very useful programming routine that used to easily allow that seems to be having some unfortunate problems recently.
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