Steve Lancaster wrote: > I agree with Anne. The system used to record birth dates is written assuming > the child was born a month or two before baptism. Only if the child is older > than that is the date expanded to remove ambiguity. For those baptized on > 21st March 1802 the dates refer to the previous few months, except for Maria > who was born in 1799. So, Harriot was born Feb 21st 1802 Hallo I'm sorry but that cannot be assumed at all. A child was often expected to be baptised the first Sunday after birth. This was not a law or a requirement. It did not happen with every birth. A date of birth or age was not required either. It may be that in London or Westminster this was an encouraged item but it was not something that had to be done with every baptism in every register in every parish in every county in the whole of England and Wales. If you have a look at Maria's baptism, you will see her younger brother was baptised the same day as her. He was born in February 16 1801. His baptism is listed before Maria's. Harriot was born November 21 1799. The person who asked the question originally will be able to find out in the censuses whether she was given as 35 or 40 in the 1841 census or 48/9 or 50 in the 1851 census.

Very sorry, maybe I should have expressed it differently, when I said 'the system used to record birth dates' I was referring purely to the register in question, I quite agree that there was no universal system in place and everyone had their own 'system', if at all. Looking at just this register it is clear that the pattern used for birth dates is to assume the child was born recently, but naturally the dates jump around and there are exceptions. So for baptisms on 21st March 1802 we have: Sarah b. Feb 5th 1802 Thomas b. Feb 16th 1802 Maria b. Nov 6th 1799 Harriot b. Feb 21st 1802 George b. Feb 28th 1802 The order of these children in the transcript is just the order in which they were baptized, there is no significance to Maria's brother Thomas being listed before her. Steve -----Original Message----- From: Connie Sent: Tuesday, September 18, 2012 12:17 PM To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [MDX] Help with Date on Image Steve Lancaster wrote: > I agree with Anne. The system used to record birth dates is written > assuming > the child was born a month or two before baptism. Only if the child is > older > than that is the date expanded to remove ambiguity. For those baptized on > 21st March 1802 the dates refer to the previous few months, except for > Maria > who was born in 1799. So, Harriot was born Feb 21st 1802 Hallo I'm sorry but that cannot be assumed at all. A child was often expected to be baptised the first Sunday after birth. This was not a law or a requirement. It did not happen with every birth. A date of birth or age was not required either. It may be that in London or Westminster this was an encouraged item but it was not something that had to be done with every baptism in every register in every parish in every county in the whole of England and Wales. If you have a look at Maria's baptism, you will see her younger brother was baptised the same day as her. He was born in February 16 1801. His baptism is listed before Maria's. Harriot was born November 21 1799. The person who asked the question originally will be able to find out in the censuses whether she was given as 35 or 40 in the 1841 census or 48/9 or 50 in the 1851 census. ************************************** Send your List messages using **PLAIN TEXT** and always **TRIM AWAY** superfluous old messages in replies. **MEANINGFUL Subject Lines - who, what, where, when, with SURNAMES in CAPITAL letters** List Admin can be contacted at: [email protected] ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message