Editorial policy

Fact classes and wording

Direct statements from official archive, government and platform coverage pages are treated as sourced facts. Editorial explanations are identified by their practical, conditional language. Historic context is used only when a cited authority supports it. A missing catalogue reference, deanery, transcript series or boundary conclusion is written as “not confirmed” instead of being inferred from a nearby parish.

No synthetic people

The site does not create profiles from coincident names, transcribe entries, publish family trees or present speculative relationships. Examples discuss source types and research decisions without naming people from records. This rule applies to visible copy, structured data, metadata and internal linking.

Corrections and conflicts

A correction should include an official catalogue URL, repository reference or a precise citation that another editor can inspect. If two sources disagree, both observations remain visible until the conflict can be explained. Changes are made at the fact level and the verification date is updated. Promotional claims, unsourced local lore and generated historical detail are not accepted as evidence.

Independence

Links to commercial platforms describe access or cited coverage. They are not endorsements and do not alter the standard of proof. The site currently carries no affiliate tracking, advertising or sponsored ranking.

Publication gate

A parish receives a full guide only when at least five data points pass the confirmation rule, including provenance and a review date. Automated checks reject missing canonicals, duplicate titles or descriptions, invalid structured data, broken internal links, image accessibility failures and short leaf pages. A build cannot pass merely because a template renders.

Updates are made to the structured fact first and then regenerated across the pages that use it. This reduces contradictory wording and makes the verification date visible. Material that resembles a transcription, surname index, person profile or synthetic family tree is outside scope even when it might attract search traffic.