Provisional Specification

This principle in contrast to the French Certificat d'addition

In the case of Great Britain, we do have those relatively few cases in which one specific and separate patent is specifically called an addition to another, in a way at least roughly analogous to the French Certificat d'addition, though, again, the French seem to be unique in treating these, at least semantically, as a document type distinct from that of the brevet.

These are all matters of administrative culture, the international variability therein.

A particularly British phenomenon

We have also not entirely clarified the relation between the British "complete" and "provisional" specifications, particularly as these pertain to numbering and quantification. We don't see absolute consistency.

Cases in which the number of the first Provisional Specification number is also that of the Complete Specification

See Patent GB-1908-17014 and-or Patent GB-1909-26034 and-or Patent GB-1909-27476 and-or Patent GB-1914-2711 and-or Patent GB-1914-15494 for sharp cases of a Provisional Specification, of a certain number, being followed by one or more Provisional Specifications, of different numbers, all embedded within the same document and all contributing to one complete specification which uses the initial number.

Cases in which the number of the first Provisional Specification number is not that designating the Complete Specification

Patent GB-1919-144395 has the variably numbered Provisional Specifications culminating under a Complete Specification, with a new number. This may get into the internationally variable semantics of administrative culture, whether improvements upon an initial conception are treated as relative afterthoughts, as in the case of France, in particular, as opposed to the emphasis being put upon the "Complete", the final, as in the case of Great Britain, in particular.

Patent GB-1917-128262 is a related case, in which the document actually includes two differently numbered Provisional Specifications, No. 9689 of 1917-07-05 and No. 519 of 1918-01-09, along with the Complete Specification.

Patent GB-1918-126496, likewise, has a No. 8590 which was filed May 23, 1918, and a No. 17099 filed Oct. 19, 1918.

Cases in which one number is used throughout the Provisional Specification and Complete Specification processes

Patent GB-1911-4506 only uses that one patent number, in the usual manner of its application year, prominently displayed, serving to differentiate it in the event that the mere four-digit number had been used previously or was to be used later. This patent is a simple case. It only goes through one provisional stage. That is likely why only the one number is used. In the case of British patent material, documents give us less of a "real-time" glimpse. The documents seem to have been printed fairly well along into the administrative process, with hindsight being reflected in the documents.