Why searching for family bibles by geographic location - may not be the best method for finding a given family bible?
1)
Contrary to a large portion of genealogical records - that are created
and maintained and kept at the State or County level - bible records
just dont nicely and cleanly conform to categories by geographic
location. Trying to categorize bible records along side other records
that are divided into regional based catgeories such as state / county
- often ends up with bible lists/indexes to be misleading and
incomplete.
2) A very large portion of family bibles do NOT record the locations that births/deaths/marriages occurred in.
Thus making them almost impossible to classify them by geographic region (at least when only based by the information in the bible)
3) Family bibles would often be taken by the family as they migrated and travelled from one country or state to another (often multiple times)
The location where the bible ended up - may be quite distant from where the family originated from and where the bible was purchased.
The unclear or unknown information about the travels of the family bible owners - can make it very difficult in correctly categorizing the famly bible according to region.
4) A family bible record collected by a given person/organization in one region - may have actually been a family bible for a family in a totally separate region.
For example - a family bible collected by and included in a family bible collection for a given state/county genealogical society publication - may represent a family record that occured
in a totally different location.
5) Because of the above scenarios - most geographic-based collection of family bible records - only represent a small portion of what they could be if all the missing detals were known for all the bibles being assessed. Surname based indexes of family bibles are much more complete then location based indexes and when you are looking for a specific family bible using a surname index you will be much more effective than using a location based category.
Though large surname indexes can be rather overwhelming and cumbersome due to size - using computerized search queries of names or locations (like using CTRL-F) in such documents can often be used quickly and efficiently to locate a specific bible within a large collection of references to Family Bibles.
2) A very large portion of family bibles do NOT record the locations that births/deaths/marriages occurred in.
Thus making them almost impossible to classify them by geographic region (at least when only based by the information in the bible)
3) Family bibles would often be taken by the family as they migrated and travelled from one country or state to another (often multiple times)
The location where the bible ended up - may be quite distant from where the family originated from and where the bible was purchased.
The unclear or unknown information about the travels of the family bible owners - can make it very difficult in correctly categorizing the famly bible according to region.
4) A family bible record collected by a given person/organization in one region - may have actually been a family bible for a family in a totally separate region.
For example - a family bible collected by and included in a family bible collection for a given state/county genealogical society publication - may represent a family record that occured
in a totally different location.
5) Because of the above scenarios - most geographic-based collection of family bible records - only represent a small portion of what they could be if all the missing detals were known for all the bibles being assessed. Surname based indexes of family bibles are much more complete then location based indexes and when you are looking for a specific family bible using a surname index you will be much more effective than using a location based category.
Though large surname indexes can be rather overwhelming and cumbersome due to size - using computerized search queries of names or locations (like using CTRL-F) in such documents can often be used quickly and efficiently to locate a specific bible within a large collection of references to Family Bibles.