fingerprint

• Types of Patterns

  • ARCH
  • LOOP
  • WHORL
• Fingerprints may be resolved into three large general groups of patterns

  • Each group bearing the same general characteristics or family resemblance
  • Patterns may be further divided into sub-groups by means of the smaller differences existing between the patterns in the same general group
• Division of Patterns

  • I. ARCH
  • II. LOOP
  • III. WHORL
• LOOP

  • Radial loop
  • Ulnar loop
• Pattern area

  The only part of the finger impression with which we are concerned in regards to interpretation and classification
• The pattern area is present in all patterns, but in many arches and tented arched it is impossible to define</b>
• Type lines

  The two innermost ridges which start parallel, diverge, and surround or tend to surround the pattern area
• Type lines are not always two continuous ridges, they are more often found to be broken</b>
• When there is a definite break in a type line, the ridge immediately outside of it is considered as its continuation</b>
• Bifurcation

  The forking or dividing of one line into two or more branches
• A single ridge may bifurcate, but it may not be said to diverge</b>
• Finger prints have been used for over two thousand years, but the present practical system of classifying and filing them for quick reference was perfected a comparatively few years ago
• Studying finger print identification means allying yourself with one of the most rapidly progressing of the modern sciences
• Tattooing

  • Can be changed, duplicated, and disfigures
  • Used by barbarians and savages for identification
• Scarification


  • Involves cutting various parts of the body so that scars form on healing, often in the form of elaborate designs
  • Can be changed and disfigures
  • Used in the past and to some extent still employed for identification
• Personal description


  • Unreliable, as all the features by which we can "recognize" one whom we know are subject to change, either deliberate or accidental
  • There are numerous "doubles" among human beings who are unrelated, not to mention related doubles like twins
  • Recognition is not identification
• Photographs


  • Unreliable for identification, as the angle at which the photograph is taken, changes due to age, condition of health, accident, mutilation, the existence of "doubles", the lack of dimension, the lack of color (of eyes, hair, etc.) all render photography a poor, unreliable method of identification
• Anthropometry


  • Involved the measurements of certain bony parts of the human body
  • An improvement over all previous methods and resulted in numerous successful identifications
  • Had several disadvantages: It took a long time to learn the system, it was expensive in application, it could be used for adults only, it could not be applied to children, it was subject to errors and duplications, and it was extremely slow
• There are no two finger prints in the world that are exactly alike
• Nature never duplicates anything in all its details, and while it does provide similar things, it does not provide identical things
• Even the finger prints of Siamese twins, joined since birth, are different
• Finger prints can be changed or obliterated by the use of corrosive acids or plastic surgery, but if the papillary ridges come back at all, they will be exactly as before
• Finger prints were used in China before the birth of Christianity
• The present system of giving names to the various patterns, and of placing them in files where they can be quickly found, is comparatively new
• Over 2000 years ago, finger prints were used symbolically and as "sign manuals" by the Chinese
• The oldest written material on finger prints, other than the ancient Chinese records, is the 17th century writings of Dr. Nehemiah Grew, who in 1684 published a report before the Royal Society (London) describing the ridges and pores of the fingers, hands, toes and feet
• This was followed by the book of G. Bidloo, in 1685, an anatomical treatise in which he described the sweat pores and the ridges
• Similar researches were the writings of Hintze in 1751 and Albinus in 1764, both of Germany, and then Mayer in 1788 who specifically stated that the arrangement of skin ridges is never duplicated in two individuals, the first definite statement along these lines
• In 1856 Herman Welcker took the print of his right palm, and years later in 1897 he printed the palm again, and in the following year he published these prints, proving that finger prints do not change
• In 1823, at Breslau, Poland, Prof. Johannes E. Purkinje published a thesis in Latin in which he classified finger prints, giving them names, describing them, and laying down rules for classification, which forms the basis of modern finger printing
• Purkinje did not, however, mention that finger prints might be used to identify individuals
• In 1858, William Herschel, the Administrator in the Hooghly District of Bengal, India, started the practice of recording the hand prints of the natives on contracts to prevent impersonation and refutation of signature
• By 1893 the British Government was sufficiently interested in finger prints to investigate the subject, and a committee was named by the Home Office at London, which indicated in their report dated February 12, 1894 that finger prints became officially adopted for the time being, by the English, as a supplementary system
• Herschel's successor at the post in India, Sir Edward Richard Henry, had become interested in finger prints, and studying the earlier works of Herschel and Galton, started on a classification system of his own, which he detailed in a paper read in 1899 at Dover before the British Association for the Advancement of Science
• Dactylography

  The science of fingerprint for the purpose of identification
• Pattern Area

  That part which lies within the area surrounded by the type lines
• Type Lines

  The basic boundaries of most finger print
• Core


  The inner terminus, which serves as characteristics point in ridge counting to determine the number of ridges intervening between the core and the delta
• Crease


  Usually run longitudinally along the length of the finger. Crease become more prominent and more numerous with age
• Plantar


  Pertaining to the sole of the foot