THE FAMILY BIBLE

Taranaki Daily News, 21 December 1935, Page 7

THE FAMILY BIBLE

RECORDS LITTLE KEPT NOW. CONDENSED DIARY OF EVENTS. A family Bible was recently produced to an old age pensions committee in support of an applicant’s claim to have attained the prescribed age. (Rarely is such evidence offered to-day. Legislation is robbing us of this once glorious record of the simple English life, writes Frank Longworth in the Daily Mail. . Compulsory registration of births, marriages, and deaths, now in force for nearly one hundred years, has killed the family Bible. A century ago, even fifty years ago, it was a valued treasury of all important dates and events. It was an honoured custom to enter the birth of a child immediately on return from church after the christening ceremony . . . To have done it earlier was considered profane. Similary the wedding breakfast was not complete until a record of the day had been entered, while in the quiet of the evening the head of the house would copy in a blank age sufficient facts regarding the new member of the family as would make history for future generations to read. Deaths, with the place of burial, were entered immediately after the funeral service. The old family Bible had at least a dozen blank pages in the front of the Book, and a similar number at the end. It was always written up by the senior male member, and on his death handed down to his eldest son or, failing him, to the eldest daughter. It was the most valued of all the heirlooms. Few people of the twentieth century can tell the names of their greatgrandparents, hardly any the names of the generation before that. The family Bible, on the other hand, brought to life in a few pages the whole history over a period of 200 years or more. Yet it was not a mere catalogue of dates; it recorded important outstanding events, such as the sale or purchase of a new . home, and the wars in which father or son had fought, with the honours wort. Frequently painted miniatures were pasted in; photographs were unknown. In truth a very condensed diary, but covering centuries instead of months. What a pity the custom is dying out. Cuttings get lost and photographs fade, but the Old Book lasted for ever.