Yeah litigation is no joke. It’s wonderous to see the lengths people go to to get one up over somebody else. I think it has to do with the lack of social security or something.
Uncannyly I have a similar story. When I was in the African country of Benin, I met a Dutch couple, one of which was an architect who studied African architecture.
My home town has a museum on that exact subject, so I asked him if he knew that, he was like ‘of course, we live in that town’
Turned out he lived around the corner of where I lived.
I was thirteen, visiting Ireland with my parents. We were staying in a hostel somewhere in the area of the cliffs of Moher.
My parents went out for a drink in the pub and met another Dutch couple. They were staying at the same hostel. At breakfast they joined our table and my parents introduced me.
Now I do have a very uncommon first name (the only way I’m part of the 1%). This guy says 'i once met a bit by that name before, it was in Croatia, some ten years ago.
Turns out that was me. The guy had helped dive up one of my swimming shoes that had sank to the bottom of the bay, an act of heroism for the very young me.
So we met this bloke twice, in two very different parts of Europe. The bizarre thing though: if I had a slightly more common name we might never even have known.
But as I said it’s a nitpick. Usually us historians keep to when language became involved. The rest would be prehistorical, but the distinction is not that clean cut (is it ever?).