LNAB Vs Current Last name

Question

In my many years of geneological research it has always been standard that a women's LNAB is her name.

Other names she may have used belong to some stranger she married.In some cases there can be several other names she used.

If i know her maiden name and the last names of other people she may have been affiliated with I can search under those names as well as her LNAB.

What is Wikitree policy on this?

Comments

The WikiTree search will provide results for a woman with both her maiden name and her married surname, if they are both on her profile, no matter which you use for the search.  You can enter both in the search screen, apparently, if you use the father's name field for the maiden name.

I think a bigger issue is that when you research a woman, you need to know her name at the time of any particular event in order to find the relevant records.  So if you don't know who a woman married, for example, it can often be quite difficult to find a death record.

Edited to clarify.

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Married name will be returned ONLY if married name is in one of the Last Name fields.

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You mean on the existing profile, not in the search box, right, Linda? I.e, you can search for a woman even if you only know her maiden name, and the results will include the married name if it is on her profile.

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Correct, you stated search can be done with both married and maiden, but searching by married name or both, will not return a profile for a married woman if that married name is not in one of the Name fields on her profile.

Some children birth records have mothers maiden name, others have married name.

Answer 1

The answer is in the Name Fields help page:

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:Name_Fields#Current_Last_Name

The current last name should be the last name the person was using at death. In some cultures, for a married woman it is the name of her last husband. In others, it is not. So you need to look at original records and see what the final occurrence of the person's last name actually was.

The multiple fiels is not a problem for search. The search engine will find people with the name you search both in the LNAB field and in the current name field.

Comments

So I should be putting her husband's last name as current name, I haven't entered husband's last name as current name for any woman.

I have always entered her husband if known, does that add his last name to her profile?

In the case I am thinking of, her maiden name was used as a second name for all her children and subsequent descendants

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Yes, maiden name is frequently in children's maiden name for some children.  Her married name should be put in Current Last Name, if used, so search will work properly.  

If it is not in Current Last Name and a Search is done with her married name, it will not return her in results because that surname is not in her name fields. It is not looking at marriages to find other surnames during a search.  

As an example, Pickering-1054 is married but her husbands last name of Ing is not on her record and a search for 'Susannah Ing' will not show her profile in the results.

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Legally, a married woman WILL be referenced with her husband's last name, whether or not she chose to take it. If Miss Doe marries Mr. Smith she will be called Mrs. Smith by numerous people, regardless of whether she decides herself to be called Miss Doe still, or Mrs. Doe-Smith, Mrs. Smith-Doe, or even Mrs. Smith. So I find it useful to make sure the husband's name shows up somewhere on her record as it's likely that somewhere in her married life, she was referenced that way. There are exceptions, but they're few and far between. And as several have mentioned, unless it's listed somewhere on her profile, she will not be found by her married name in a search.

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http://legisquebec.gouv.qc.ca/fr/showdoc/cs/CCQ-1991/20181213

#5:

Toute personne exerce ses droits civils sous le nom qui lui est attribué et qui est énoncé dans son acte de naissance.

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Scott, Not in every country. Some countries the men use the women's name.

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I suppose since I do mostly U.S. or U.K. genealogy, my expertise falls into those areas. So I stand corrected potentially where it comes to other areas. And perhaps "legally" is a bit strong. Referred to is much more likely. It probably wouldn't hurt to put the married name in the Other Last Names field if there's a potential it was used, even if there's an indication that she kept her maiden name or reverted back at some point. Just saying to hedge bets that a search might be done to find her under her married name, it would be a good move to put it there. Of course, in countries where this is an uncommon practice or does not happen, then it would be better to change the man's Other Last Names so that he can be found properly in a search.