Hi Trencrom,
Yes, it is 'possible' that the date may have come from St Just BT's but I cannot confirm that possibility as I am not sure just what BT's for that Parish have survived.
And, whilst BT's are a useful source (particularly when PR's have not survived) there can still be problems.
BT's (I am pretty sure) were a periodical requisite of the Bishop and so were most probably compiled 'periodically'.
This means that a door for error has been opened as an inherent part of the recording process.
The original PR entries may not necessarily have been written 'immediately' and may have been left as the 'duties of the clerk' which means there are times when even these may not be completely accurate.
From documents I have seen I am sure that the BT was not written alongside the PR entry but would have been 'copied' at a date sometime before it was required.
Therefore, there is the obvious possibility of transcription errors we see even today in more modern documents.
I have an example (seen and have copies of) where I thought I had found the burial of a Francis Trewheela at Ludgvan in 1743.
The PR showed one thing and the BT showed another - turned it it was the daughter (Elizabeth) of Francis who was buried.
Have since found out that Francis, in 1763, was transported to America for 7 years for a 'misdemeanor'.
IGI and how they deal with things is a touchy subject with me.
I do not wish to malign the Organisation itself as they have been doing wonderful work in providing all this information for us through some very long and arduous work.
I have, many years ago, spoken with someone about my main concern and was told it was 'being addressed' basically.
That concern was exactly that mentioned in your note regarding the 'copying' of dates prior to the Julian/Gregorian Calendar change.
My understanding has been that the information we have seen since its inception is the work of Church Members who supply their transcribed work for input to the 'database'.
In other words - 'I' might be a member of the LDS and visit the Cornwall Record Office (e.g.) and copy entries of interest to myself from a number of PR's.
Many of those entires might fall into the 1st January-24th March period prior to the change of Calendar.
With these being the last three months of the year in the Julian Calendar and now becoming the first three months in the Gregorian Calendar 'I' decide to make things 'normal?' by changing the year upwards by one for those three months.
This has created enormous problems and I have seen it compounded by the way Genealogical Programs handle these types of dates.
A date in 1741 could, as information is passed on via programs, suddenly become 1748 for example.
My ABSOLUTE preference is that all data recorded from an original document (such as PR's and BT's) should be recorded 'as written' with the dates intact - regardless of the change of Calendar.
Another point you make about recording dates as (e.g.) 1722/23 can be part of this problem because you need to be sure that the earlier date is definately from the original source.
This is part of the 'compounding' point I was trying to make above which I do hope makes some sense.
The other problem with many IGI recorded dates is that some are certainly recorded in 'original format' whilst, it seems, the majority are already 'converted'.
St Ives is a good example of this where, in IGI, there are at least two Batch numbers dealing with the period in question.
I have noticed on more than one occasion that the baptism for the exact same person is recorded differently under each Batch Number film.
The very best way around this is a comparison with the Original PR.
On a final note for this - IGI Deaths have been becoming available for a few years now.
But here is the next problem - when they say Death, is it Burial?
In most cases the date you find will be a Burial date but I have seen a few cases where it is actually the Death date.
If you log into 'familysearch.org' and navigate your way to the 'IGI search' you will find that 'death/burial' is among the options.
Time to move on to other areas now.
