Parish Marriage Records

[Avondale16]

I'm trying to identify if a marriage for one of my ancestors was witnessed by his brother. Does anyone know what the rule for completing the marriage licence was prior to 1837 - would the parish clerk enter the witnesses names or would each witness sign their own name or could it be either option? Help please.....as an actual signature could confirm that I have the correct record.
 

[andrewalston]

The people concerned would, as now, sign the church register (or make their mark). I have come across several cases where the person getting married has used a different spelling of their name than the one higher up the entry.

Often, the parish clerk was one of the witnesses. After all, they had to be present to get the register out of the parish chest, and were literate. In lots of cases, you can tell that the register was filled in mostly in their handwriting, with the clergyman just adding a signature.

Bishops' Transcripts were normally copied later by the parish clerk, so no chance of a signature for comparison.

[Avondale16]

Thanks Andrew
I'm attaching the entry in question - would agree that the witness signature for Joseph Stephens appears to be in a different hand to the rest of the entry?

[macwil]

IMHO   ALL the signatures are in a different hand to that which filled in the main details.

[goldie61]

IMHO   ALL the signatures are in a different hand to that which filled in the main details.

I'd agree with that.

More often than not, if these had not been their signatures, (and written by the curate etc), you would see a 'mark', and whoever was filling in the register would have written 'the mark of ...........'.
That doesn't happen here.

[andrewalston]

Joseph was probably John's brother.

The similarity in their signatures indicates that they were taught to write by the same person.