ENCYCLOPEDIA
BRITANNICA:
Early
anatomists described the ridges of the fingers, but interest in modern
fingerprint identification dates from 1880, when the British scientific journal
Nature published letters by the Englishmen Henry Faulds and William
James Herschel describing the uniqueness and permanence of fingerprints. Their
observations were experimentally verified by the English scientist Sir Francis
Galton, who suggested the first elementary system for classifying fingerprints
based on grouping the patterns into arches, loops, and whorls. Galton’s system
served as the basis for the fingerprints classification systems developed by
Sir Edward R. Henry, who later became chief commissioner of the London
metropolitan police.
Fingerprints
afford an infallible means of personal identification, because the ridge
arrangement on every finger of every human being is unique and does not alter
with growth or age. Fingerprints serve to reveal an individual’s true identity
despite personal denial, assumed names, or changes in personal appearance
resulting from age, disease, plastic surgery or accident.