firstmentioned

First mentioned is a term used in historical scholarship to denote the earliest known written reference to a person, place, organization, or object in surviving sources. It reflects when a subject first enters the documentary record, not necessarily when it came into existence. Consequently, the first mention is a data point in a larger chronology rather than a definitive founding date.

Sources for the first mention include charters, chronicles, legal deeds, lists, inscriptions, maps, and literary texts. Dating is achieved through paleography (the study of handwriting), linguistic analysis of spellings, and cross-checking with related documents. Because many documents have perished or were copied over time, researchers treat a first mention as provisional and open to revision.

Limitations include uneven survival of records, scribal errors, and name changes. A subject may be older than its first mention, or may be mentioned under a different name in earlier sources. The absence of an earlier mention has limited reliability as evidence of nonexistence, especially for regions with few literate records.

Applications include establishing a chronological framework for history and archaeology, disambiguating places with similar names, tracing the growth of towns or institutions, and guiding genealogical or toponymic research. In many cases, scholars publish a "first mention" or "earliest attestation" date alongside the modern name.

Example: a town named X is first documented in a charter dated 1130. A noble family is first attested in a chronicle from 1250. A medieval church is first mentioned in an inscription dating to 1289.