This paper is about Fordham's contribution to Jung's studies on the self. It opens with the epistemological dilemmas inherent in the subject, before moving on to an account of Fordham's research into the incompatible ways Jung used the term ‘self’. There is a description of Fordham's model, which covers his concepts of the primary self, deintegration, reintegration, self objects, self representations, and individuation in infancy. There is a section which discusses areas in which Fordham apparently diverged from Jung, including how these were reconciled by Fordham's developmental approach. These areas include the definition of the self as totality or archetype, the mind body relationship, the ‘ultimate’, the origins of the archetypes, and the primary self, the self and the sense of self. It concludes with an extension to Fordham's outline of a resolution to Jung's incompatible definitions. This draws upon the concept of the central archetype of order and how its unfolding is evidenced towards the end of the first year of infancy.