Asterisks in Ancestry Trees?

[Phoenix]

I have noticed several trees, invariably American, where asterisks are added to surnames.

Is this a convention with a particular meaning?

[Katarzyna]

I noticed that too and wonder if some are using that method to show their DNA matches perhaps.

[kiterunner]

Here is an old ancestry thread about it:
https://www.ancestry.co.uk/boards/thread.aspx?mv=flat&m=13355&p=topics.ancestry.ancsite

[Phoenix]

Thanks, Kite!

So asterisks probably mean no independent research done. (Or, I lifted it, without questioning what asterisks meant)

[JBee]

I use brackets around the married surname if I don't know the maiden name.

[Kit]

I was using asterisks on my own tree for one particular line. I stopped working on it and when I returned I forgot what I had been doing so had to delete them all.

I've been reading comments on the FTM users group and they say that if a name is unknown to use 5 _ to denote the name. For some reason ancestry can deal with that but will search for other names as they are written and therefore wont find them.

[marquette]

My sister-in-law used asterisks in her tree to indicate her direct ancestors.