Ancestry.com has a database they call “U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900.”

I’m not certain what I would call it, but personally I would leave the word “record” out of the title. It brings to mind the question of what is a marriage record and what is a record in general.

Elizabeth Shown Mills in Evidence Explained defines a record as:

an account of an event, circumstance, etc.; a piece of writing created to preserve the memory of certain “facts.” Careful researchers do not apply the term to their own research notes. (3rd edition, 2015, page 829).

While marriage records are discussed in Evidence Explained, a specific reference defining the term “marriage record” was not noted. Interpreting a “marriage record” as a record of a marriage seems reasonable.

This is where I might have written a different definition of record. Might. Mills does indicate that “careful researchers do not apply the term to their own research notes.” I’m going to conclude by logical extension that researchers also do not apply the term to their research conclusions.

That brings me to the little gem in Ancestry.com’s “U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900” for William Ira Sargent and Florence Ellen Butler that was used as an illustration in this post. Ancestry.com does have information on where the information was obtained to create this database. That source information is partially quoted here.

Source Information

Yates Publishing. U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc, 2004.Original data: This unique collection of records was extracted from a variety of sources including family group sheets and electronic databases. Originally, the information was derived from an array of materials including pedigree charts, family history articles, querie[sic].

About U.S. and International Marriage Records, 1560-1900

[in part]

…This database contains marriage record information for approximately 1,400,000 individuals from across all 50 United States and 32 different countries around the world between 1560 and 1900. These records, which include information on over 500 years of marriages, were extracted from family group sheets, electronic databases, biographies, wills, and other sources….

…Source materials for these marriage records include family group sheets, pedigree charts, family history articles, queries, letters, Bible records, wills, and manuscript genealogies…

Marriage records to me mean records of the following types:

• marriage registers (civil records or church records)
• marriage bonds (civil)
• marriage banns (civil or church)
• marriage licenses (civil)
• other contemporary government or church “records” of a marriage
• bible records (if the researcher has reasonable knowledge to believe the entry was relatively contemporary to the event)
• newspaper publication of licenses and recent marriages
• other materials created relatively contemporary to the event

Records do not have to be issued by a government or a church.

Some of these items are evidence of marriage intent and not necessarily irrefutable evidence that the marriage actually took place.

The source materials for these “records” include a variety of other materials. Family group charts, pedigree charts, “electronic databases” (pretty vague to be honest), and other items are included. Bible records and letters (again if contemporary to the event) could be construed to be a record of a marriage. Wills may provide some evidence of a marriage but they don’t seem to meet the definition of a marriage record as the purpose of a will is not to document a marriage–it’s to document how the will’s signer wants their property disbursed after their death.

And…in the case of William Ira Sargent and Florence Ellen Butler I know where the information was obtained. Thirteen pages of pedigree charts I submitted to Yates Publishing thirty years ago. Those pedigree charts certainly don’t, in my opinion, meet the definition of a marriage record.

Of course one has to cite a database using the title assigned to that database by the publisher–assuming that we are using the information contained in the database at all.

I just wish Ancestry.com would not refer to this database as “marriage records” because that’s not what they are.