Property Box

Names & Titles Dialog

The Names & Titles Dialog is a floating window and satellite of the Property Box.  That is to say, it stays in sync with the current record in the Property Box and closes when the Property Box closes, or if the Property Box displays a record which is not an Individual record.  

To open the Names & Titles dialog, click on the 'more...' link to the right of the Name field, in the Main tab of the Property Box, when viewing an Individual record.

The Names & Titles Dialog allows additional names and titles to be entered for an Individual. Each name can be associated with a name prefix, suffix, nickname and/or "Given Name Used".  Don't confuse a title with a name prefix. "Dr" would count in this context as a name prefix. "Lord Beaconsfield" would count as a title.

You can't add names in the Facts tab of the Property Box, but you can add (or edit or delete) titles there. If you add a title here in the Names & Titles Dialog, it will show up in the Facts tab, and vice versa. If you want to associate a title with dates and/or other details, such as a note, you can only do this in the Facts tab.

Names and Surnames

When you enter a person's name that consists of more than one word, Family Historian will always assume that the last name is the surname, unless you explicitly indicate otherwise by using slash characters to mark the surname. Suppose, for example, that Elizabeth Powell Smith's surname is 'Powell Smith'. If you entered her name simply as "Elizabeth Powell Smith", Family Historian would assume that 'Smith' was the surname. To mark her surname correctly you would need to put slashes round 'Powell Smith' like this: "Elizabeth /Powell Smith/". If the name had been hyphenated however (as 'Powell-Smith') there would have been no need for slashes as Family Historian would have treated the hyphenated name 'Powell-Smith' as the last name, and hence the surname.

In some languages, the surname may not necessarily appear at the end of the name. For example, "Mao Tse-Tung" should be entered as "/Mao/ Tse-Tung" because 'Mao' is the surname. If you only enter only one word as the name (e.g. 'Jane') Family Historian will, by default, assume that it is not the surname and will automatically add two slash characters on the end of the name to reflect this ("Jane //"). If actually 'Jane' was the surname, and that's the only name you had, you would need to enter it as "/Jane/" to make this clear.  Of course, the alternative is to use a question mark or something similar, to mark the unknown name part - for example, "Jane ?" or "? Jane".

Why does Family Historian need to know which part of the name is the surname? It needs to know this so that it can provide a number of different services, such as automatic capitalization of surnames, surname-first ordering, search-by-surname, and more.

When viewing names in Name fields, for editing purposes, Family Historian can, if you wish, always put slashes round the surname, to make it clear which part of the name is the surname.  However, for aesthetic reasons, users may prefer it if Family Historian keeps the use of slashes to a minimum, and only puts slashes round the surname when this is needed for clarity - that is, if the surname is not the last name, or if there is only one word in the name.  See the Show Surnames Between Slashes option in Preferences: Property Box tab for options relating to this.

Source Citations

You can add, edit or delete source citations for names and titles, in the Property Box Citation List Pane, just as you would for any field displayed in the Property Box.  If the Citation List Pane is open, it will always display source citations for the current name or title field in the Names & Titles Dialog.

Fields

The fields in the Names & Titles Dialog are:

Primary Name	Your preferred name for the person. Put slashes round the surname - as in "John /Smith/". If you don't know the surname, put slashes at the end - as in "John //". If you only know the surname, put slashes round that - as in "/Smith/".
Name Prefix	e.g. 'Dr'
Name Suffix	e.g. 'Jr."
Nickname	The person's nickname.
Given Name Used	The Given Name Used field is for cases where the name a person was known by was one of their names, but not the first. For example, even before she was baptised, her parents may always have intended that Jean Clare Smith should be called “Clare” say - or perhaps even “Jean Clare”. In the first case you would enter "Clare" as the given name used. In the second, you would enter "Jean Clare". If she was always known as "Jean" there is no need to enter this in the Given Name Used field, and we recommend that you don't. If no name is specified as the given name used, Family Historian will assume that it is the first given name.
Add	Add an alternate name or a title.
Edit	Edit the name or title.
Delete	Delete an alternate name or title. You can blank the contents of the Primary Name, but you can't delete it.
Move Up/Down	You can change the order of names with respect to other names. You can also change the order of titles with respect to other titles. But you cannot change the order of names with respect to titles, or vice versa.
Make Primary	This command can only be used with names. Makes the name the primary name. The existing primary name is not deleted. It is merely demoted to the status of alternate name.