I don't expect anything. Murphy's Law. I was merely implying that if I couldn't figure it out without the certificate (or at least a reasonable theory), what are the chances that it holds no new information?
However, that is not what you wrote .... You clearly wrote
.......
When I convince myself I need to purchase Michael and Nora's marriage certificate it had better have some details on it! Knowing my luck it will all be "unknown".
The chances are that WITHOUT that marriage certificate you will not ever have certain knowledge provided first hand from the bride and the groom about what information they knew about their own parents.
May I assure you that I do not spend thousands, nor hundreds of dollars on my hobby, family history in any year.
But IF I do consider I need a piece of information (for example details about a person's parents), and if they were married in Victoria, after 1853, then I would certainly purchase their marriage certificate, as it is FIRST HAND information, given by both parties to the marriage usually to a clergyman who conducts the ceremonies (civil and religious, combined as though one ceremony). In that era, giving untruthful information to a clergyman was considered extremely significant, regardless of the denomination. Simply put, "one did not tell fibs to one's local clergyman"... "Hellfire and brimstone" were words associated with outcomes to those who fibbed ... I place greater reliance on information provided on a Victorian marriage certificate from the second half of the 19th century than I would on many a newspaper cutting from the "family notices" section of any newspaper.
Without the information about the parents of the bride and the groom, as provided on that marriage certificate, HOW CAN you have confidence that your research is getting you back to the actual grandparents generation of the bride and the groom... Are you expecting to have a family history tree that you may eventually share with current and/or future family members? To me, the question becomes .... Do you want to be known as the fh buff or the fh buffoon.... Of course, it is your family history, so it is up to you to determine what you want to record, how you want to record it, what you want to research and what you want to do with your findings.
Cheers, JM
