On the role of finite, hereditarily normal spaces and maps in the genesis of compact Hausdorff spaces

We consider how properties of the bonding maps of the inverse spectrum determine properties of the inverse limit. Specifically, we study the limits of inverse spectra of finite T0-spaces with bonding maps which are either chaining or normalizing. We will show that if the bonding maps are normalizing, then the inverse limit is a normal T0-space, and therefore, its Hausdorff reflection is its subset of specialization minimal elements. If the maps are chaining, then the inverse limit is a completely normal spectral space; such spaces have been studied since they include the real spectra of commutative rings [C.N. Delzell, J.J. Madden, J. Algebra 169 (1994) 71], and the prime spectrum of a ring of functions, Spec(C(X)). The existence and importance of this class of non-Hausdorff, normal topological spaces was extremely surprising to us. Further, each of these results is reversible; if the inverse limit is normal, then each space in the spectrum is preceded by one whose bonding map to it is normalizing. By way of contrast, the inverse limit of finite T0-spaces with separating bonding maps need not be a normal topological space (Example 3.8(a)) and furthermore, if the spaces of the inverse spectrum are normal, then the Hausdorff reflection of the limit must be zero-dimensional (Theorem 3.15).