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Source Citations
Source citations help us document, organize, and analyze the evidence gathered. They are the hallmark of quality family history.

Ideally, every event on a person's record will have one or more sources. The information about the event came from somewhere (even if it was guessed), and that source should be cited.

Value of Source Citations
As Elizabeth Shown Mills has written, "Source citations have two purposes: to record the specific location of each piece of data; and to record details that affect the use or evaluation of that data."

When to Add Source Citations
Because every event should have a source citation, the best time to enter source citations is at the same time as you enter the event information. Document AS YOU GO! Link each source citation to the event(s) it documents. For example, a marriage license may also divulge birth information and should be cited for both the marriage and the birth. Cite the census source for each member of the family listed.

What to Cite
In theory a good source citation contains five normal, and two optional elements:
 * Normal:
 * Author
 * Title
 * Repository (for publications the place published and publisher; for unpublished material the repository and address)
 * Date
 * Page
 * Optional:
 * Optional library or archive call number
 * Brief preliminary evaluation comment about the source (optional, but especially valuable)

In practice the first five elements are sometimes complicated and may be hard-to-find details. For example, who is the author, what is the title, and what is the date of an untitled parish register kept over many years by several ministers?

Most archives and libraries have already used these elements to describe the source in their catalog. So using the repository catalog helps the researcher cite the elements of the footnote in a way that will help other researchers find the same source at the same repository.

On the other hand, as researchers rely more and more on the Internet, new questions arise about how to cite sources from a “repository” that changes so often.

Source Citation Style Guides
There are several handbooks that can help you improve the style of your source footnotes. They are guides. They differ slightly in their suggestions. Please encourage your fellow researchers to cite sources, and avoid being overly fussy about the minutia of their citations. If you see a citation that needs improvement, encourage the author to consider one or more of these guides:


 * University of ChicagoPress. The Chicago Manual of Style, 14th ed. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1993.


 * Mills, Elizabeth Shown.Evidence Explained: Citing History Sources from Artifacts to Cyberspace. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing, 2007.


 * Mills, Elizabeth Shown.QuickSheet: Citing Online Historical Resources: Evidence! Style*,2nd rev. ed. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing, 2007.


 * Silicon Valley PAF Users Group: Family History Documentation Guidelines, 2nd ed. San Jose, Calif.: SVPUG, 2000-2003.


 * ProGenealogists. “Internet Citation Guide for Genealogists,” in ProGenealogists Internet site.

Citation Examples
Examples of citations that are used in genealogy are available at Citations (Evidence Style).