Re: Genealogy For The Beginner

In our last episode, <47b851c4.5237220@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, the
lovely
and talented J. Hugh Sullivan broadcast on soc.genealogy.computing:

> My problem, and that of so many, is: (1) fire, flood and war destroyed
> many essential records (2) poor dirt farmers didn't leave much of a
> trail.

> I have every Sullivan in the 1790 census in NC. I have eliminated all
> but 5 as possibly being the father of my gg grand. In theory I should
> be able to choose one of the 5. But what if his father was not even
> included in the 1790 census - and I know several Sullivans that were
> not.

> From this thread I gather several people would have no problem
> selecting the father that looked best - whether he was right or wrong
> does not matter. That's certainly one way to do it.

I do not believe I have read a post in which anyone suggested any such
thing.

The issue was whether genealogy should proceed as if pedigreeing a prize
sow.  There was, of course, no ability to do such a thing with any degree
of
confidence until late in the 20th century, while genealogy --- by that
name
--- has proceeded in other ways in at least the six centuries that went
before.

You pose a false choice: it is not genetics or fraud.  Historic, social,
and
legal facts are facts, so much as DNA is.  Lands, title, surname, caste
and
class, trades and tools, and much else has passed for centuries without
anyone doing a cheek swab or knowing what to do with one if they had.
That was not fraud or whim.

We know the presumption of Western common law, that the husband of the
mother is the father of the child does not, in many cases, coincide with
genetics --- now that genetic facts can be tried.  Rarely is maternity an
issue, but --- so it is written --- even Solomon tried such a case. For
most
common folk, for most of human history, the facts were never tried in
courts
--- and it is hard to say what evidence courts might have admitted, since
many times even the mother was not sure of the biologic truth, even if she
alone did know whether there were any grounds for doubt.  Yet children
were
born.  They took the names of the men they called father.  They learned
his
trade or rejected it.  They took their place in order of inheritance for
his
lands, titles, tools, and chattels.  That is history, and it is the
history
with which genealogy has been concerned from the time the word genealogy
entered the English language until just the last couple of decades.

Now it is true that genetic information has some medical application.  But
for most of human history there was neither remedy or prophylaxis for
genetic diseases.  Information on genetic parentage would have been
medically useless to our ancestors if they had it.  The questions they
could
answer were such as "Who shall have Jack's bellows and anvil now that he
is
dead?"  And they did not need DNA to find those answers.  Is it really up
to
us to determine whether they decided rightly or wrongly because our DNA
test
now shows that Jack's boy was not Jack's?

Of course when you are entertaining picking one of five men with a given
surname to celebrate as your ancestor, just because they are the ones that
show up on the census, you are not doing pedigree.  But you are not doing
historical genealogy either.  You don't get pick your history any more
than
you get to pick your pedigree.

Social facts and legal facts are facts as much a genetic facts.  From now
forward, we have a chance to make them all coincide if we desire to do so.

But we cannot work that choice, if we make it, in reverse:  we cannot
change
the award of Jack's legacy no matter how well DNA proves that the boy who
got his hammer was not his biological son.  We can also choose to ignore
the
biological facts, except in the very few cases and limited cir***stances
in
which they are relevant to some medical issue.  That is we can choose to
proceed as people did when they had no choice: to make place for bastards
and orphans and yard children.  You may call it a fraud all you want, but
it
is a truth that long served humanity well:  there is more of being a
father
in hearts and minds than there is in testicles.

-- 
Lars Eighner <http://larseighner.com/>
usenet@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
                         Countdown: 337 days to go.