Membership Number
Members of The Augustan Society, Inc., are assigned a unique Membership Number. The purposes of this are tradition, and as a way to quickly determine seniority in the Society.
Membership numbers are logged in the Membership Book to avoid duplication.
Present practice is to assign sequential numbers. This is done automatically by the web site the Society moved to in 2022. Numbering of new members started with #108; consecutive numbers were retroactively assigned to existing members in order of their membership date.
The previous system used numbers with two parts, a letter and several digits. The letter is first letter of the surname. While usually obvious, prefixes such as de or von, and titles such as Füerst or Prinz are not counted. The prefix Van usually has been counted, von has not; it's not entirely clear what the logic is here. The letter is followed by a number, which is assigned in sequential order to the extent possible (but see below). Members who left before 2022 will retain these numbers.
In the above system, members whose last name changes (e.g.: a woman changing name at marriage or divorce) were not issued a new membership number.
An earlier system of sequential numbers exists, and these are being loaded into the Membership Book by prefixing them with "X-" (as no surnames in the second system began with that letter).
Not all members have identifiable numbers, and there will be no effort to assign same.
Some numbers in the previous system have been issued twice. Such duplicates are being remedied as found by adding a suffix letter to distinguish them. Duplicates are not possible in the present system.
At present, the only use for Membership Numbers is to include them on the Certificate of Membership and the Membership Card.
Member numbers have also been assigned to some members of the Order of the Augustan Eagle, Noble Company of the Rose, and Hereditary Order of Armigerous Augustans to represent their memberships in those groups. As best can be reconstructed, these were all serial numbers used to establish seniority, and the practice has been discontinued.
Member numbers may have been assigned to members of some of the Lineage Groups, but a definitive list of these has not been found, and the program may have been discontinued at some point. They are not assigned today.
