# Alternative place name

**URL:** <https://gramps.discourse.group/t/alternative-place-name/9215>\
**Category:** Help\
**Created:** [March 14, 2026, 7:16pm UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/alternative-place-name/9215 "2026-03-14T19:16:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 13

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**Author:** ![StoltHD](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/db5fbb/32.png) [@StoltHD](https://gramps.discourse.group/u/StoltHD)\
**Post date:** [March 15, 2026, 2:20am UTC](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/alternative-place-name/9215/13 "2026-03-15T02:20:39Z")

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> [@DaveSch](#):
>
> If you set a place date ‘after 1941’ it starts from 1 Jan 1941 including the first. If you set the place date ‘after 1 Jan 1941’ it starts on 2 Jan 1941.

**This must be a bug. “After 1941” should mean after 1941‑12‑31 23:59:59 (or 00:00 on the next day), including all days _after_ that point.**

- **From 1941** should mean **from 1941‑01‑01** , including that day.

- **After 1941** should mean **from 1942‑01‑01** , including 1942‑01‑01.

- **After 1941‑January** should mean **from 1942‑02‑01 and later**.

In other words:

- **“From ”** must _include_ the written day.

- **“After ”** must _exclude_ the written day.

- **“From ”** must include the entire month.

- **“After ”** must include every day _after_ that month.

- **“After ”** must exclude _all_ days in that year and include only days after the last day of that year.

This is basic chronological logic.

**‘After 1941’ should therefore mean after 31 Dec 1941.**  
**GEDCOM’s interpretation (‘after 1 Jan 1941’) causes overlap between “1941” and “After 1941”, which is chronologically impossible.**

**LDS temple‑workflow logic ≠ historical chronology.**  
Gramps inherits this theological scheduling convention, which leads to incorrect historical periods.

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**At some point we need to stop treating GEDCOM as if it were a neutral technical standard. It isn’t. It is a theological workflow format that has been adopted as if it were a historical data model — and that blind adoption keeps producing errors like this.**

GEDCOM’s date semantics were designed for a very specific internal process, not for historical chronology. When software follows those semantics uncritically, we end up with results like:

- “After 1941” starting on **1 Jan 1941** ,

- overlapping ranges between “1941” and “After 1941”,

- and interval boundaries that make no chronological sense.

This isn’t a Gramps problem — it’s a **GEDCOM inheritance problem**.  
And as long as genealogy software continues to follow GEDCOM’s conventions without questioning them, historically incorrect periods will continue to propagate.

If we want historically valid timelines, we have to stop treating GEDCOM as a universal truth and start treating it as what it actually is: **a legacy format with built‑in assumptions that do not match historical reality.**

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_ **Note:** The following explanation was first written in Norwegian and then translated into English with assistance from Microsoft Copilot._

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_[View the full topic](https://gramps.discourse.group/t/alternative-place-name/9215)._