Signaletic Instructions: Including the Theory and Practice of Anthropometrical Identification (Classic Reprint) - Couverture souple

Alphonse Bertillon

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1332195822 ISBN 13 : 9781332195824

Editeur : Forgotten Books, 2018

Synopsis

Groundbreaking system for personal identification that aims for unbreakable certainty

This edition explains Bertillon’s signaletic method, a threefold approach to describing a person: precise physical measurements, observable bodily form and movement, and distinctive surface marks. It shows how these descriptions can be stored in files and used to recognize someone again, even if they change their name or appearance.

The book traces how the system spread worldwide—from police stations to prisons—and how it can protect the innocent while aiding the punishment of the guilty. It also covers practical instructions for applying the methods, with updates that include new forms and recent additions to signaletic cards used in Paris.

• The three-part signalment: anthropometric measurements, descriptive morphology, and peculiar marks


• How a signalment enables fast, reliable identification across time and place


• Global use by police, military, banks, and other organizations


• Updated materials, including bi-zygomatic measurements and fingerprints in appendices

Ideal for readers of history, criminology, and forensic science who want a clear view of a pivotal identification system.

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur

Excerpt from Signaletic Instructions: Including the Theory and Practice of Anthropometrical Identification

A very considerable portion of the crimes and wrongs which disturb the order of human society result either directly or indirectly from the apparent impossibility of distinguishing in every case and with unerring certainty one individual from another. It is for this reason, especially, that so many of the professional and habitual criminals who abound in every land have hitherto gone "unwhipt of justice."

Men would be unlikely to render themselves liable to the penalties of the law if they knew that, wherever they might flee, their identity could not fail to be discovered. A sure means of identification would not only have the effect of deterring from crime in general, but would evidently nullify all attempts of whatever kind at u substitution of persons. No impersonations of a pensioner, or a missing heir, or a business man could ever hope to be successful.

How much more precious still would such a means of identification be if it could be applied, not only to the living man, but to his dead body, even when crushed, mangled or dismembered beyond the recognition of his nearest friends and relatives! The life insurance companies and associations of mutual benevolence, for example, could not be robbed under cover of the pretended death of the holder of a policy, indicated by the finding of a body resembling his, or unrecognizable by ordinary means on account of mutilation, fire or decay, but dressed in his clothes and furnished with his papers. Then, too, those who fell in battle, no matter how mutilated they might be, would not need to be buried in nameless graves, but could be recognized and taken, when peace returned, to lie among their own kin.

This powerful instrument of social order is already in existence. One of the most remarkable steps in modern progress is the development of a new form of applied science which has for its...

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Forgotten Books
• Date d'édition: 2018
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1332195822
• ISBN 13: 9781332195824
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 449
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