I'm using biblatex
and \textcite
, and most citations are appearing correctly with author initials appearing only when needed for disambiguation. But for just a few authors, the initials are always appearing even though the author names are unique. I checked that all my bibtex files cite these troublesome authors in exactly the same way. The surnames are unusual and I am sure they are unique in my bibtex files. What could cause this?
I have found that it only happens to entries which have a shorthand prefixed to them in the bibliography. E.g. the name Mawer triggers the problem in this entry:
PN Sx 1 = Mawer, Allen, F. M. Stenton, and with J. E. B. Gover (1929), The place-names of Sussex, part 1, vol. VI, The rapes of Chichester, Arundel and Bramber, Cambridge: English Place-Name Society
The shorthand prefix is created with this code:
\renewcommand*{\postnotedelim}{\addcolon\space}
\AtEveryBibitem{%
\iffieldundef{shorthand}{}
{\printfield{shorthand}\printtext{ = }}}
Here is an example:
\documentclass{book}
\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{csquotes}
\usepackage[english]{babel}
\usepackage[style=authoryear-comp,sorting=nyt,backref=true,useprefix=true,hyperref,backend=biber]{biblatex}
\renewcommand*{\postnotedelim}{\addcolon\space}
\AtEveryBibitem{%
\iffieldundef{shorthand}{}
{\printfield{shorthand}\printtext{ = }}}
\bibliography{%
bibtex/misc_place_names,%
bibtex/EPNS,%
}
\begin{document}
See \textcite{mawer-nth} and \textcite{epns-Bk}.
\printbibliography
\end{document}
It gives this output when the two entries are in different bibtex files, as in the code above:
See A. Mawer (1920) and Mawer and Stenton (PN Bk).
However, if I put the problem entries in a single bibtex file, the problem goes away.
These are the .bbl entries:
\refsection{0}
\sortlist{entry}{nyt}
\entry{mawer-nth}{book}{}
\name{labelname}{1}{}{%
{{uniquename=1,hash=20531a50f8126d9de20c019a74363211}{Mawer}{M\bibinitperiod}{Allen}{A\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}}%
}
\name{author}{1}{}{%
{{uniquename=1,hash=20531a50f8126d9de20c019a74363211}{Mawer}{M\bibinitperiod}{Allen}{A\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}}%
}
\list{location}{1}{%
{Cambridge}%
}
\list{publisher}{1}{%
{CUP}%
}
\strng{namehash}{20531a50f8126d9de20c019a74363211}
\strng{fullhash}{20531a50f8126d9de20c019a74363211}
\field{sortinit}{M}
\field{labelyear}{1920}
\field{labeltitle}{{The place-names of Northumberland and Durham}}
\field{title}{{The place-names of Northumberland and Durham}}
\field{year}{1920}
\endentry
\entry{epns-Bk}{book}{}
\name{labelname}{2}{}{%
{{uniquename=0,hash=4d6093b4a0c2460e6f2882adf13392d7}{Mawer}{M\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}{}{}}%
{{uniquename=0,hash=21ae7cedb02db0fa4466cce84219d21e}{Stenton}{S\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}{}{}}%
}
\name{author}{2}{}{%
{{hash=20531a50f8126d9de20c019a74363211}{Mawer}{M\bibinitperiod}{Allen}{A\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}}%
{{hash=7e3d1c286187382e0f79c1973fb3b5ea}{Stenton}{S\bibinitperiod}{F.\bibnamedelimi M.}{F\bibinitperiod\bibinitdelim M\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}}%
}
\name{shortauthor}{2}{}{%
{{uniquename=0,hash=4d6093b4a0c2460e6f2882adf13392d7}{Mawer}{M\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}{}{}}%
{{uniquename=0,hash=21ae7cedb02db0fa4466cce84219d21e}{Stenton}{S\bibinitperiod}{}{}{}{}{}{}}%
}
\list{location}{1}{%
{Cambridge}%
}
\list{publisher}{1}{%
{English Place-Name Society}%
}
\strng{namehash}{3d5595324379f60156ee89ea3274856c}
\strng{fullhash}{52adbb96b7969c24919cfbabcc553da5}
\field{sortinit}{P}
\field{labelyear}{1925}
\field{labeltitle}{The place-names of Buckinghamshire}
\field{shorthand}{PN Bk}
\field{title}{The place-names of Buckinghamshire}
\field{volume}{II}
\field{year}{1925}
\keyw{place-names,England,Buckinghamshire}
\endentry
\endsortlist
\endrefsection
Thanks to everyone who commented - it does seem to be the shortauthor field which causing the problem. If this is my bibtex file:
@book{epns-Bk, title= "The place-names of Buckinghamshire", author= "Allen Mawer and F. M. Stenton", volume= {II}, year= {1925}, shorthand={PN Bk}, shortauthor="Mawer and Stenton", publisher={English Place-Name Society}, }
@book{mawer-nth, title= "The place-names of Northumberland and Durham", author= "Allen Mawer", year= "1920", publisher="CUP", shortauthor="Mawer", address= "Cambridge", }
with shortauthor in both cases, then there is no problem. But if shortauthor appears in only one entry, the problem of unwanted initials reappears. So I'm not sure how I can use shortauthor consistently.
biblatex
Donald Knuth
andDonald E. Knuth
are two different people and they get disambiguated.