2019-07-05 Married, Divorced, Married Again

One or two FAM records?

GEDCOM Question and Answer

What to do if a couple marries, divorces and then marries again, perhaps even divorces again, maybe even repeats this a few times? Should you create a single FAM record that contains all the MARR and DIV subrecords, or should you create a new FAM record for each new marriage?

The answer to that question is quite straightforward; you should not be creating GEDCOM files manually.
You should use your genealogy application to document their relationships. Your genealogy application should create a GEDCOM file that correctly reflects how you recorded these relationships, so that when it imports that GEDCOM file, you get back what you put in. The GEDCOM import and export function of a genealogy application must preserve your choices, not try to correct them.

how to record

The real question is how to record multiple marriages between the same persons. Should you add multiple marriage and divorce events to a single relationship, or shoul you create a new relationship (for the same couple) for each new marriage?

consistency

The answer is that you should create a new relationship, because it is a new relationship. Every new marriage, including between people who have been married to each other before, should be documented as its own separate relationship, because that is the simple and consistent thing to do.

avoid misinterpretation

Multiple marriages should be kept separate from each other, to avoid misinterpretation (by humans). The general meaning of recording multiple events where only one is expected is that these are alternative dates or places. Having separate relationships for separate marriages avoids that misinterpretation.

avoid confusion

Multiple marriages should be kept separate from each other, to avoid confusion. That there sometimes are multiple records to be found for the same marriage is confusing enough already.

Marriage and divorce events should be recorded and presented in chronological order. A consistency check will try to confirm that all events are in logical order. A consistency check may get confused by a second marriage following a first divorce, but even if it understands that situation correctly, what message should it produce when it finds a bunch of these events out of order?

A consistency checker cannot detect that something is missing when you entered only enter the first marriage and second divorce on the same relationship, but will notice information missing when they are recorded as separate relationships.

Multiple marriages should be recorded as multiple relationships to allow other relationships in between.

relationships in between

Multiple marriages should be recorded as multiple relationships to allow other relationships in between. When multiple marriages between the same partners are recorded as multiple relationships, you can easily record other relationship for either partner in between those marriages. If you were to add the second marriage to the same relationship, you can longer put another relationship in between, because there is no in between any more. If you were to add an relationship that actually happened in between the two marriages before or after the two marriages, any consistency checker worthy of the name will quite right complain.

Even if neither partner has another relationship in between the two marriages, the two marriages should still be recorded as two marriages, to correctly and clearly reflect that they were single in between the two marriages.

same name individuals

What you may think of as another marriages between the same two individuals, may actually be a marriage of one partner with a third individual that happens to have the same name as the second individual. It is rare, but it happens.
Always keeping separate marriages as separate relationships does not prevent you from making that mistake, but does make it easier to fix your database when you discover it.

apparent information loss

Multiple marriages between the same persons should be recorded as multiple relationships, to avoid losing information on reports.
Reports may present just one of two marriages recorded as a single relationship, simply because it does not expect multiple marriages on a single relationship.

actual information loss

Multiple marriages should be kept separate from each other, to avoid losing information. It is possible to have multiple MARR and DIV subrecords on a single FAM record, but it may not be expected by a GEDCOM importer, so some applications may loose data when importing such a FAM record.

That may sound like a theoretical consideration, but it is a very practical one, supported by GEDCOM export & import tests.
Back in 2013, Louis Kessler considered the same topic, and performed some tests to see what happened in actual practice.
His blog post Multiple Events and Unions in GEDCOM does not only tell you what goes wrong in PAF 5.1.7.0, RootsMagic 4.0.9.7, Legacy 7.5 and Family Tree Maker 2007, but also provides his GEDCOM test file, so you can try the same test yourself with any other genealogy application or version.

many reasons

So, there are many good reasons to record multiple marriages as multiple relationships, even in the rare case of a marriages between two people who married before.

I can think of only one reason to try and present multiple marriages as a single relationship, and that is because you can - but that you can does not mean you should.

standards

A standard should offer exactly one way to record something, to make sure that everyone does it the same way. If there are, for some reason, multiple ways to record the same information, there should be a normalisation form, to allow easy comparison of data files created by different applications.

GEDCOM

The GEDCOM specification should offer only one way to record a second marriage between two persons, but offers two ways. This seems an acciddent, something that happened because the GEDCOM creators did not think things trough. They apparently never considered the possibility of two people divorcing and then marrying again.
The GEDCOM specification allows multiple events on a single couple relationship (FAM record), because it has to, but does not put any restrictions on that. There should not be too many restrictions on it, genealogist should be able to record any odd combination of events that occurs, but the relationship record should be restricted to events for a single relationship.

genealogy applications

Genealogy applications could assist users by providing some helpful messages and warnings - and many do. But most don't get it quite right. In fact, some major applications get it wrong.

Personal Ancestral File 5

Personal Ancestral File (PAF) 5.2.18.0 does a good job. PAF issues a warning if you try to create a second marriage for the same two persons. That message, X is already in marriage with Y. Do you want to create another marriage for them anyway?, seems aimed at preventing you from accidentally recording the same marriage twice. When you choose Yes, PAF creates a new relationship for the second marriage.

The messagebox is a bit annoying, but the fact that PAF, a genealogy application that has not received updates since 2002, does what it must do, makes it hard to understand just how bad some current genealogy applications respond to an attempt to add a second marriage.

RootsMagic 7

RootsMagic 7.5.9.0 gets it wrong. When you try a second marriage between the same two people, it pops up a messagebox with the text These two people are already linked as a couple. If they were married twice to each other you can add a second marriage fact.. Yes you can, but you shouldn't add a second marriage to the first marriage, you should record the second marriage as a new relationship. When you press the OK button on that messagebox, nothing happens... RootsMagic gets its very wrong, RootsMagic actually refuses to let you record the second marriage as a second marriage! RootsMagic does not let you choose between the two different ways of recording the second marriage, but forces you to use the wrong way, thus thwarting its own consistency checker...

Family Tree Maker 2017

Family Tree Maker 2017 (23.1.0.1480) is even worse. First of all, how to ad an existing person as a spouse is not obvious at all. It isn't hard once you know, but the user interface could be more obvious.
The real problem is that Family Tree Maker refuses to let you enter that second marriage at all! When you try to attach the existing spouse, Family Tree Maker refuses to do so with the messagebox These people cannot be attached because one of them is already in a direct relationship of the other.. Never mind that the messagebox should say with the other, and never mind that if one is a direct relationship with the other, they actually are in a direct relation with each other. The real issue is that this messagebox should not exist all.
Family Tree Maker has to allow you to record the genealogical facts, it may not refuse to record a second marriage.

If you continue to explore the user interface, you will discover that Family Tree Maker does allow to add a second marriage event to the already existing marriage. Thus, the bottom line is that Family Tree Maker, like RootsMagic, thwarts its own consistency checker, by forcing you to record a second marriage the wrong way.

Family Tree Builder 8 refuses second marriage

MyHeritage Family Tree Builder 8.0

Family Tree Builder 8.0.0.8350 annoys by having the wrong default dialog for a new, empty project; it should be Add Person, but it is Add Family (which should really be renamed to Add Couple). Like Family Tree Maker, Family Tree Builder has different menu items for adding a new spouse and attaching an existing spouse. When you to attach the existing spouse again, Family Tree Builder displays a messagebox with the text X is already a spouse of Y, and then does nothing. Family Tree Builder refuses to add the second marriage!

Family Tree Builder 8 does not seem to offer any way of adding a second marriage between the same two persons.
Family Builder 8 does not seem even support divorce.
The MyHeritage Help Centre item How do I add a Divorce in my Tree in Family Tree Builder? does not tell you how to add a divorce event (with a date and place), as it should, instead it tells you how to set the marriage status to divorced.
Thus, this misleading help item strongly suggests that Family Tree Builder 8 does not support the divorce event.
Fact is, MyHeritage Family Tree Builder 8 does support the divorce event, it just isn't obvious how to add it. Yout must, in a less than obivous way, bring up the Edit Family (a misnomer for Edit Couple) dialog box for a couple, in which you can choose to add the divorce event.

Legacy 9

When you try to create a second marriage between the same two persons in Legacy 9.0.0.295, it puts up dialog box with the text X is already his wife. Do you want to link her in again?. When you choose Yes, Legacy creates the second marriage as it should.

Family Historian 6.2

Family Historian 6.2.7 does it best. Adding an existing individual as a spouse is just as easy as adding a new individual as a spouse. When you select the existing partner, Family Historian does not bother you with any error or warning, but simply accepts your input and adds the second marriage as a second relationship. Family Historian simply does what you tell it to do, and does it the right way, without questioning you.

Family Historian 6.2 second marriage

no workaround

Right now, RootsMagic 7, Family Tree Maker 2017 and Family Tree Builder 8 all refuse to create a second marriage as they should. You might think that you could work around this serious limitation by creating a marriage to a new temporary individual, and then merge that temporary individual.
Sadly, that workaround does not work in either RootsMagic or Family Tree Maker 2017. because when you try this, the two separate relationship are merged into a single one without even telling you.
This workaround does not work for Family Tree Builder 8 either, for an even more basic reason; Family Tree Builder 8 lacks the ability to merge profiles.

children

Children of a couple that remarried should be attached to the correct marriage. Any child that couple has together between two marriages is a child of yet another relationship, their unmarried relationship in between.
Vendors can compete on smart display of children from multiple relationships.

Best Practice

user

create separate relationships for second marriages
Attach any children of these marriages to the correct marriage
complain to vendors of products that do not allow you to do so

vendor

Allow multiple relationships between the same two people
Record multiple marriages between the same two people as multiple relationships
Do not automatically combine multiple relationships into a single relationship
Smartly display children from multiple relationships (of same couple) as a competitive feature
Issue warnings when users add multiple marriage or divorce events to the same relationship
Make that same warning part of the consistency and reasonability checks
Allow users to merge profiles, do include appropriate checks

GEDCOM import

Import relationships as they are. Do not modify.
Do not pop up any errors or warnings during import
Include a warning about multiple marriage and divorce events on a single relationship in the import log

GEDCOM export

Export relationships as they are. Do not modify.
Do not pop up any errors or warnings during export
Include a warning about multiple marriage and divorce events on a single relationship in the export log

Standards (GEDCOM)

The couple relationship record should be restricted to events for a single relationship.
Developers should consider one relationship per relationship record the normalised form, and actively avoid having multiple relationships in a single relationship record.

updates

2019-07-06 Family Tree Builder divorce

Contrary to what the MyHeritage Help Centre item for adding a divorce suggests, by sending you off with a non-answer, Family Tree Builder does support divorce events. The text has updated to that reflect that.