BobRingReflections

This blog topic came from Pat and I talking about my last blog article on the history of personal identification - a natural fallout, I guess.  I quickly determined that there was a lot to learn here too.   After a short introduction, I will discuss the history of personal names in the following sections:   ancient times (before writing), early civilizations (after writing), Europe in the Middle Ages, and America (from the 16 th century to the present).   I will finish with some suggestions for tracing the origin of your name. To make this all manageable, from the Middle Ages on, I will focus on Europe and America.   (There is a wealth of material available on personal naming in other cultures.)   And I will focus on family names versus first names. As usual, I will list my principal sources at the end.   Introduction A  personal name is the set of names by which a person is known.    In many cultures, the term ...

Once again, I have Pat to thank for suggesting this topic as a blog article: personal identification.   After a little research, I was confident that I could learn a lot; the only question was how to approach it with an article of reasonable length. Well, let me start; we’ll see how it goes.   After a short introduction, I will discuss the evolution of personal identification in three pieces: Early History (Antiquity to 18 th Century), Standardized Modern Physical IDs (19 th Century to Present), and Digitization (Late 20 th Century to Present).   I will finish with a look at Future Trends in Personal Identification. I focus on personal identification history in Europe and the United States. As usual, I will list my principal sources at the end.   Introduction Personal Identification (ID) refers to data that identifies an individual, ranging from official documents like a driver's license or passport to specific codes like a Personal Ident...