Clans

This category allows classification of distinct family groups that have more than one surname. Its value includes easy reference for related families without the difficulty of looking through long lists of unrelated people with the same surnames.

Use[]

To use it, simply create a suitably-named category or even a single "article" page (with a fairly distinctive name - the examples below are not all really distinctive), and add that category or article to this category (by adding [[category:clans]] to the page).

If you start with a single article page but then want to tie all its people together in their own category, just:

1. add to that page the proposed "subcategory" name, with a piped link using an asterisk so that that page lists first in the category, eg [[category:Brown in Brownville, PA|*]]
2. add the same, but with the surname replacing the asterisk, to each individual's page
3. add [[category:clans]] to the new category

Order of listing[]

With the diversity of surnames, subcategories of this category may be unnecessarily difficult to use. Probably "piped" category links are desirable so that people are listed in surname order. For a category listing, if the category name is followed by a "pipe", the listing treats the page as if its name was the expression after the pipe instead of the real page name. Example: Virginia Clopton (1813-1876) could have on her page the following link to the Cowan category: [[category:Cowan|Clopton, Virginia]] instead of just [[category:Cowan]], so that she listed under "C" (with other Cloptons and before all the Cowans) instead of "V".

See also[]

• Surname in place

External links[]

• Wikipedia has a nice article on clans.
• You may also be interested to read the Wiktionary article.