Suggestions does not recognise Colony of Victoria?

Question

Something new in my "Suggestions" list.

Colony of Victoria in a birth, marriage or death "location country not recognised."

Before 1900, there was no "Australia"

Between 1851 and 1900 "Colony of Victoria"

Before that, 1788 to 1851, what was to become Victoria was part of "New South Wales".

What is the right thing to enter?

Comments

Australia was used officially as early as April 1817, by Lachlan Macquarie.  In 1824 the Admiralty agreed that  the name would be used for the continent.  The first official published use of the name was in 1830.

I would use Colony of Victoria, Australia from July 1851 to the end of 1900 - and mark any errors false.

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Hi Alan, there have recently been some new location suggestions added and from what you say, Colony of Victoria must have been included as an incorrect location. I wonder if anyone else is having problems with any of the other colonies.

Colony of Victoria isn't currently an official location on WikiTree. Melanie's solution to mark it as a false suggestion is the best idea for the moment. I'll see if we can get that location excluded from the suggestions list so it isn't a problem. Thanks for letting us know.

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Here are the Colonial Australia Location Guidelines - still a works in progress https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Australia%2C_Project_Guidelines_-_Colonial_Australia_1788-1900%2C_Locations

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I'm seeing "Province of South Australia" too.

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Province of South Australia (1832–1842)
is a valid place name. The settlers were proud that it was a Province and not a Colony.

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Alan, if you add the tags "data_doctors" and "ales" it will get seen by the Data doctors project. It's not a categorization issue.

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Done. Thanks.

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@ Leslie -- the Province versus Colony for Sth Aus has been discussed previously.

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From memory, the outcome would be either colony or province, but only one sticker {{Australia Born in Colony|colony=Colony of South Australia}}

Answer 1

I added a few Australian colonial location to the location table as requested by project. Here is a list of recognisable endings for Australia.

https://wikitree.sdms.si/function/WTShowTable/Table.htm?table=Countries&filter=AUS

The added locations will be in the release (today or tomorrow).

If you see any other commonly used location endings, let me know. I want to recognize as many locations as possible. If it is official or prefered and timeframe of when it is valid is a question for the future. I already include the dates in the table so when/if the time comes, I will have them.

Comments

Australasia?

"Australasia is a region which comprises Australia, New Zealand, and some neighbouring islands. The term is used in a number of different contexts including geopolitically, physiogeographically, and ecologically where the term covers several slightly different but related regions."

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Australasia is like saying the West Indies.

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Alan, where did you see "Australasia"?

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Australasia is a commonly used term to denote a geographic area as Alan describes.

Australasia - Wikipedia

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I thought he was saying it was on Ales's table, I couldn't see it on the list.

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I think he may wish it added to the list of acceptable locations.

Answer 2

Victoria without Australia works.

Comments

Victoria without Australia could be Victoria, Canada or Victoria, Texas, USA.

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No it wouldn't, because if Victoria is part of the nation of Canada, it should be Victoria, Canada. The source should also make it clear that Victoria is not in Canada or Texas.

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In a perfect Wikitree, all Canadians and Texans, and wherever else in the world there are duplicate placenames, would always use the correct designations for their placenames, just like Australians do. And every profile would be sourced.

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Where Canadians and Texans are imperfect, it doesn't justify Australians adding the name of a country that didn't exist yet.

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The use of Colony of .... makes the location exact.

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There has been no decision yet by the project on what locations should be used. The colonies aren't even in the location pick list.

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The drop down list is just a guide

Answer 3

My understanding is that the location errors are linked somehow to the locations on Family Search.

The Australia Project wanted to do a review of Colonial locations and called for someone to lead the work in May 2020 - but still no takers!  

We said that people could use Colonial names, like Colony  of Victoria etc in the interim, if they preferred.  We probably need to see if we can get something developed to stop these 'suggestions' appearing in the interim, given these are historically correct.  

I had hoped we would have found someone to help lead this work by now.  Thanks for the reminder Alan!

If there's anyone out there who would like to take a lead role in the location review please let me know,

Answer 4

That has also appeared in my suggestions list. I will ignore it because there are way too many to waste my time on marking them as a false suggestion.

Comments

I've written to Ales, let's hope he can weave his magic and make them disappear from the suggestions list!

Answer 5

Surely if using "Colony of Victoria" made sense it would make equal sense to use "State of Victoria" or "Commonwealth of Australia" which are both equally technically correct.

I can't see it does anything more than give an old timey feel to a profile, while making database queries slightly less straightforward.

It's clearly a pretty popular usage though and I certainly don't propose cleaning them all up but I would be disappointed if it became defined as the preferred usage.

Comments

People don't say I was born in the country of Australia, but they did refer to themselves as being born in the Colony of Victoria or living in the Colony of New South Wales.

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I thought I my comment might start something here!

As long as a nothing gets proscribed I'm happy. There's room for a range of personal preferences and styles on wikitree, or there certainly should be.

For the record I'm totally on board with Australia on pre-1901 profiles. I think the slight advantage in querying and place name clarity to an international audience outweighs any anachronisms. Doesn't  mean I would seek to impose that standard on others.

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We're supposed to be using their conventions not ours, and the place names in use at the time. Personally I haven't used Colony of Victoria because the Australia Project has not made a decision on the place names to be used. If someone else has used Colony of Victoria, I don't change it.

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Actually, I DO say I was born in Australia.  I have never in my life used the full, formal, term -- and don't know anyone who does.

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@Mark

Well yes, if you thought you might start something here.
 
I concur

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In the interests of not just guessing what "their conventions" were, I searched for some different text strings on Australian newspapers from the 1880s.

"Born in Australia" - 510 results

"Born in Victoria" - 300 results

"Born in the Colony of Victoria" - 1 result

"Born in the colony" - 806 results (noting this would cover all jurisdictions and is similar to a modern usage of "Born in the State")

"Came to Victoria" - 2,000 results

"Came to the Colony of Victoria" - 16 results

There are bound to be other ways to investigate "their conventions" but this quick look supports the view that 19th Century people did what we do today, which is shorten the official name.

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I searched trove for

"born in the Colony" and got 3,938 total results

"married in the Colony" and got 502 total results

"died in the Colony" and got 1,959 total results.
 

Like today, most would not mention which colony because it was assumed by context, eg born in Melbourne, died in Sydney etc

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Thanks Leslie

searching trove is useful,

'born in province of South Australia' gave 72,000 results

including  THE GROWING PROSPERITY OF THE PROVINCE OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA. (1 December 1845)

@Mark, I like your comment that "clarity.... outweighs anachronisms". 

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The London Gazette, an official government publication, refers to both the Province of South Australia and the Colony of South Australia. All that looking on Trove proves is that a wide variety of terms were used to describe the locations within what is now Australia. There's a lot of "born in Australia" appearing in Trove before 1901 too.

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Most of the ones I checked prior to 1901 that have born in Australia are either to Australia as a continent (like born in Europe), and are talking of groups of people. Even discoveries in Australia came up with that search.

Answer 6

I'm firmly in the "life is too short to get worked up about this" camp. There are a lot of permutations that could be covered (just for Australia), which would in turn generate huge numbers of errors & suggestions for improvement on profiles. Make-work for maintenance teams & profile managers. Even looking briefly at the information Ales has provided I can see several permutations that aren't covered & many profiles that use modern locations for older births/deaths etc. Do I know what they mean? Absolutely. Do I care that it isn't absolutely correct? Not much.

Answer 7

The original New South Wales included New Zealand, I read somewhere.  Until 1851, Victoria was the "Port Phillip District" of NSW.  BDMs went on the NSW listing, so did the shipping indexes.  Courts were held in Melbourne by circuit judges from NSW.

I approach this question in the same way that Wikitree deals with Ireland: use the official designation at the time of the event.  "Northern Ireland" is not just a geographical description; it is the recognized, official  name for Ulster, between certain dates.

P.S. and BTW:  The border between Victoria and NSW is the high-water mark on the Victorian side of the Murray River.  So held by the High Court in a case where it mattered.  If the land below the high-water mark is exposed, that land is in NSW. To go boating or fishing in the Murray, Victorians need NSW licences.  The usual legal rule, showing in some maps of the American Great Lakes, is that the borderline is half-way between the banks.