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Genealogist often adopt a numbering system to keep everyone straight in their database. Ahnentafel numbering and collateral
numbering systems abound. Dollarhide proposed a system that seems to marry all the strengths of a number of system. His work
and thoughts are documented at the Genealogy Bulletin archive site. I adopted this system with some modifications and love it. If you already know the Dollarhide system, the specific modifications proposed by Cole (me) are listed here. If you just want to understand the modified system from scratch, the examples and explanation below will hopefully suffice.
First, a person is selected as the starting point. All people in the database related in any way to this person can be
numbered using this system. The starting person is person 1.
Using traditional Ahnentafel or ancestry numbering, the starting person's father is person 2, their mother is person
3, paternal grandfather... person 4, paternal grandmother ...person 5, etc. Each person's father is double their own number;
each person's mother is double plus 1. Unlike Ahnentafel numbering, Dollarhide prescribes adding a decimal point and
0 to the number. This is a very important modification as we shall see. All direct ancestors have
a number that ends in ".0". When presented with a list (or items labeled with the numbers), it is very easy to identify direct
ancestors.
Siblings
Dollarhide prescribes that siblings and half-siblings of direct ancestors are numbered using a .1, .2, .3, .4, etc. suffix.
Thus all the (half-)siblings of person 3.0 are labeled 3.1, 3.2, 3.3, 3.4, etc. They are numbered in birth order (or whatever
the genealogists believes is the best order when birth order is not available). A modification I have made is to skip
the .n label corresponding to the direct ancestor. This allows us to see the birth order position of the direct ancestor
at a glance.
The entire set of siblings, including half siblings through each direct ancestor parent, receive numbers that have the
person number of the direct ancestor. This makes it easy to identify these extended families.
It is not uncommon to run out of numbers in the .1, .2, ... .8, .9 series. In this case, we start with letters .A, .B,
.C, .D, etc...
Family of 25.0 with first husband.
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Direct Ancestors 24.0 & 25.0 Family
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Older brother 12.2
Older sister 12.3
Direct Ancestor 12.0
Younger borther 12.5
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Family of 24.0 with second wife.
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Secondary Spouses
You will note in the above example, we did not have numbers for the spouses. Dollarhide prescribes denoting a non-direct
ancestor spouse by a * suffix on the spouses number. If there are more than one marriage, use *1, *2, *3, etc., in order of
the marriage (or whatever order the genealogist things best if this is not available). I have modified this system and
skip the number of marriage corresponding to a marriage of the two direct ancestors. This system applies
to any marriage not of two direct ancestors. Thus we can number spouses of siblings (12.1*) or previous or subsequent
spouses of direct ancestors. We have not yet described descendant numbering (next section) but we also number spouses
of descendants in the same way.
25.0*1 married to 25.0 (divored or widowed)
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24.0 married to 25.0 (divorced or widowed)
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Descendents
Dollarhide prescribed numbering descendent's as well as ancestors. Descendants are numbered by appending a new
number to their already numbered parent. Thus descendent's of the starting person become 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, etc.
Descendants of a sibling of a direct ancestor are 9.1, 9.2, 9.3, etc. This is applied as often as needed, so grandchildren
of the starting person are 1.11, 1.12, 1.13 (children of 1.1) and 1.21, 1.22, 1.23 (children of 1.2). Note that some cousins
have a nice property in that they have similar numbers using their common ancestor. Of course, cousins is a complex issue.
Complications
Changing Direction
Using the above methods, it is possible to number all ancestors and spouses going backward. Additionally it is possible
to begin going forward from any of the direct ancestors. This allows us to number lots of the common people in our databases.
But what of mother's in law? Brothers and sisters of in-laws? Or even their descendants?
Dollarhide conveniently allows us to go backward in the family line (2.0 to 4.0), to go laterally in a family (4.1,
4.2, 4.3) and to start going down the family tree again (4.31, 4.32, 4.33). This change in direction from backward to
forward seems family natural. Dollarhide prescribes that we can change direction in other way, too. When we change
form sibling or descendancy back to ancestry, we use a "/" to show this. If we wish to start going backward from certain
spouse labeled person, 9.2*1, we can talk about their father as 9.2*1/2.0. We treat everything on the left of the "/" as person
1 and move backward. 9.2*1/3.0 is the mother of 9.2*1. The tree can continue backward and indeed forward using descendant
numbering. This change of direction can be applied at any level of descendancy. I think of it is a tree that grows within
the tree.
Sometimes you just don't know the birth or marriage orders. In such cases, I sometimes use a series x, y, z (or other
"late alphabet" letters). This shows that I really don't know and encourages me to research and find out. It allows me to
number some other relatives on the basis of the temporary number. Of course, if this gets out of hand you will find it not
very useful. If it remains a long term assignment, it is probably best to simply number the item with best available guess
and move forward.
Multiple Starting Persons
It is possible to denote more than one starting point. You might want to do this for several different reasons. First,
it might be desired to describe more than one set of people for whom no relationship can be exactly described (because
they are related, or because the relationship cannot yet be described). In the case, we designate then person one but
put a unique prefix to work for each, for example person 1 to your main tree, but person Z1 for a set of related people whom
you eventually intend to find a precise relation as a fruit of research. Or two equally important trees could be described
with designations A1 and B1 for root people. When people are related in some way to both root persons, you must choose between
two possible labels, or you could at that point renumber everyone is one or the other trees (using the common person as the
starting point).
Another reason for multiple roots can be a political issue of naming a set of siblings as root. This can be done by designating
all siblings as 1.x. For example, 1.1, 1.2, and 1.3 for three brothers and sisters who will all be treated as root person.
If the children do not have the same parents, one set is selected for the direct descendant line, and the other parents are
labeled using secondary spouse names. I used this situation for my database, because I wanted my two daughters to be the root
people, 1.1 and 1.2.
Another reason that I have encountered for using multiple roots is to truncate an extremely deep ancestry numbering. PAF
has a limited number of characters. When you reach the limit, you must designate a person as a new root. This shortens the
numbers again so they fit in PAF. Using the on-line and printed research material, it is not uncommon to have Ahnentafel numbers
that go into the 10's and 100's of millions. You must restart the numbering on such trees in PAF when this occurs.
Using the Labels
I assign the number manually in PAF using the custom ID field. I ask PAF to dispaly the custom ID after the names on
the screen.
I actually uses the ids to label reports (e.g. 12.0 Individual Full Name.pdf, 12.0 & 13.0 Family Group Full
Names.pdf, 12.0 Pedigree Full Name.pdf, etc), to label picture files (12.0 Name (date) Place.jpg), and sources (15.0 Birth
Certificate Name Issuer), etc. You cannot use the * character in the file name nor the separator (/) in many operating systems,
so you have to device a substitute. I use o for * and - for / (just for file names).
PAF does not have a long enough unique ID. The Dollarhide system breaks down eventually if you have a line that goes back
to 400AD or so. I have a few (unverified) lines like this. I simply substituted a character code for a 8 digit label and started
all over: 1638947.0 Martin from 800AD -becomes M1/1.0. This is a variation of having multiple starting persons.
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