Principles to Apply in Choosing (or Creating) Acceptable Place-Names for German Villages

Stephen Kent Ehat

Now outdated, the old "Records Submission Manual (4th Ed., 1973)," stated, on pages 52 and 53, the following for devising place designations for German places:

"When the place is recorded on an input form and sent to the Genealogical Society, use the correct name of the town and the political subdivision of the country as it existed from 1871 to 1918. Record the town and county in the German spelling and the state or country in the English spelling. The German spelling of these areas is included in parentheses for your convenience since gazetteers list them as in Germany."

Of course, over the years, we have seen changes. Presently we see the following at https://www.familysearch.org/en/help/helpcenter/article/how-do-i-enter-dates-and-places-into-family-tree, where it says:

“If possible, enter the place-name as it existed when the event happened.”

I suppose entering the "place-name" as it was rendered at the time the event happened is one thing; entering the string of jurisdictions to which the place belonged is another.

I am presently preparing to submit to FamilySearch Family Tree some ancestral names from the following little villages and towns (for events that happened in representative years shown in parentheses): 

Erbach (* 1603)

Haisterbach (* 1715, * 1749)

Michelstadt († 1629, † 1703)

Momart (*~ 1706, † 1707)

Weiten-Gesäß († 1786)

Zell im Odenwald († 1707, *~ 1710, † 1715)

Looking at one of those places (Zell), we can see from https://second.wiki/wiki/zell_im_odenwald that in the first two decades of the 1700s it belonged to the "Lordship of Brueberg." (See also https://second.wiki/wiki/herrschaft_breuberg; and see https://www.lagis-hessen.de/de/subjects/gsrec/current/3/sn/ol?q=Zell, including links to "References" at the bottom of the page.)

"Lordship of Brueberg," of course, is NOT what I am going to use as part of the jurisdictional breakdown for the place I will designate as "Zell." Today, the FamilySearch accepted standardized place name for Zell has been accepted as "Zell, Erbach, Hesse, Germany." (See https://www.familysearch.org/research/places/?searchTypeaheadInputText=Zell&text=Zell&focusedId=8168991.) From among the numerous places named "Zell" in the list of accepted place-name designations, that one is the right one and that is probably what I am going to use.

But here's the problem I face. If I look at what has been accepted for Momart (also in my list above), I see that FamilySearch has accepted six entries, ALL SIX OF WHICH pertain to the very same place. (See https://www.familysearch.org/research/places/?searchTypeaheadInputText=Momart&text=Momart&focusedId=8165271.)

In light of the FamilySearch suggestion quoted above (“If possible, enter the place-name as it existed when the event happened”), what principles would you use in the case of Momart to choose one from among the six that have been approved (or even to suggest a seventh one!)?

Stephen

Cheryl Viering

This is a complicated problem. A lot of places changed jurisdictions every few years, so listing each event for one person using the time-correct name will give you several place names for the same person, even though the person never moved.

Using the same jurisdiction tree for every event in a person's life is not really correct, but looks better. But their children might have a different name for the same place. And it won't be obvious that all these places are really the same place.

And then there is the question of what place names to use for searching, no matter which system is used.

There was a recent attempt at standardizing place names. It was a total disaster. Place names were suddenly moved to the other side of the world.

Places are just messy. You can sometimes get a type of standardization for one little section of the planet. But that system can't/shouldn't be used for the rest of the planet.

Stephen Kent Ehat

Thank you for your helpful perspective.