Instructions

It is quite possible to draw up the pedigree of your family on your own, without spending a lot of money on paying for the services of professional historians. It is only important to know with and in which direction to move. The first thing to do is to ask in detail all living relatives, especially the older generation, about your family. Pay special attention to names, dates of birth, death and imprisonment. Places of birth and residence, nationality and religious affiliation should also be recorded. Subsequently, this data will greatly help in restoring unknown links of your kind.

Oral information received from relatives is best formalized in the form of detailed stories collected in one notebook or album. Simultaneously with their preparation, it is worth collecting all the family documents at your disposal: photographs, letters, personal diaries and notes, any official evidence or information. Literally everything can come in handy, even extracts from medical records and directions for tests.

In order to organize the available information and visually represent the structure of your kind, it is best to draw up the primary. A pedigree (genealogical) tree is a schematic representation of intergenerational painting, that is, family ties in the form of a conditional tree, at the roots of which there is a common ancestor. The trunk is made up of representatives of the main line of the genus, and the branches are various subsidiary lines. The traditional family tree was always drawn from bottom to top, imitating the shape of real trees, which is not very convenient for subjective perception. Therefore, for the most part, modern pedigree schemes are made inverted - the ancestor-founder is placed at the very top, and his descendants are located further downward.

Today on the Internet there are numerous and computer programs that allow you to create detailed pedigree charts. Family Tree Builder is one of the most convenient and popular. It can be downloaded from the developers website ( www.myheritage.com) absolutely free. The program runs on Windows and provides many options for organizing information about relationships.

The structure of the genus, drawn up in the form of a diagram, will immediately allow you to see what data is still lacking for a complete picture. In most cases, oral interrogations of relatives make it possible to collect information about the composition of the family only up to the 3-4th generation, then memory refuses. If there is a need to learn more about your kind, you will have to turn to archival research. In Russia, basic data on citizens after the 1917 revolution. were recorded in the registry office, and before it in the church registers. Today, all this information can be found in the respective archives. To be admitted to work in the archive, you will need a passport, two photographs (if the archive is regional or central) and a corresponding application. The staff of the archive will familiarize you with the rules for working with documents already on the spot. They will also help you find the right sources.

For collecting information about distant ancestors, in addition to church registers containing information about births, deaths and marriage registrations, Revision Tales may be useful. Before the revolution, they recorded data on people belonging to the taxable estates - artisans, peasants, bourgeois. These documents usually contained information about males, including their last name, first name, patronymic, age, place of birth and residence, marital status, information about the presence of children, nationality and property status. It is advisable to immediately enter all new information into the constructed scheme, and the data itself in the form of texts is best arranged in the form of a separate book or album, which could be inherited by your children.

The story of your family is always interesting. People are often fond of searching for information about their ancestors, make up a family tree - and sometimes learn interesting things! Someone turns out to be a descendant of an ancient noble family, and someone's great-great-grandfather was a rich merchant or a famous scientist. Jewish genealogy turns out to be much more complicated than any other, which is not surprising.

The entire history of the Jewish people, starting with Abraham, is a constant movement from place to place. There was only one relatively long period without migration across all usyuds - from the conquest of the land of Israel by Yehoshua bin Nun to the capture of Jerusalem by Titus and the destruction of the Second Temple. Further - endless migrations, again expulsions and again migrations. And it was Poland and the modern territory of Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova that became the place of residence of Ashkenazi Jews until the beginning of World War II.

Our site was created specifically for those who want to find ancestors or other relatives who lived in these places. We work with many archives and libraries, we have specialists in all directions - from searching records in the registers of old synagogues to finding graves in ancient Jewish cemeteries.

Finding roots

According to the "Regulations on the Jews" of 1804, the function of keeping registers of births in duplicate was imputed to the duties of the rabbis. One of them was kept in the synagogue, the other - in city institutions. Records of acts of civil status in synagogues were conducted according to approximately the same schemes as among Christians (birth, circumcision, marriage, death). However, metric records did not exist for all Jews. Births and deaths of girls were often not recorded. Boys were subject to the obligatory religious rite of circumcision, and in addition, their registration was necessary by virtue of the existing laws on military service and was constantly checked.
Jewish birth books were kept in two languages: on the left page of the spread the text is in Russian, on the right - the same text is duplicated in Hebrew or Yiddish. The years according to the Hebrew chronology in both variants are practically not indicated anywhere, in the Hebrew text the dates according to the Christian calendar are indicated. There were also problems associated with the transmission in Russian of Jewish names and toponyms by Jews who had a poor command of Russian grammar and kept registers of births. Some notes are often lost as a result of careless cutting of sheets after stitching notebooks.

But if you really want to, the past will reveal its secrets, and any person will be able to trace the fate of his kind, even if the information was considered lost.

To search, just contact us and indicate the information about the relative that you have - name, place of birth, etc. We will definitely try to help you.

Anyone who wants to feel like a part of a huge whole. After all, the history of each family is fraught with an incredible amount of secrets and discoveries, troubles and joys, happy and tragic stories that will make you feel that there is an incredible legacy behind you. And it is not at all necessary to be a distant relative of princes and counts to feel like a part of history.

The opportunity to find out who your predecessors were is invaluable wealth that cannot be measured in material units.

Someone wants to understand who their great-grandmother was, someone wants to find a trace of a relative who disappeared decades ago, and someone wants to find out where the remains of their grandfather who died in the Great Patriotic War are buried.

The goals are different, but they have one thing in common - the desire to find answers to exciting questions about the origins of your family in the mists of time. In any case, the research process can turn into a real adventure and be remembered for many years.

Where to start a kind of research

Start by asking the oldest family members about family members living elsewhere. What do they remember about their parents, brothers and sisters, when they were born and what were their names, where did they live and where did they move?

Perhaps someone knows the burial places or the house in which your great-great-grandfather was born is still preserved. Any information will be valuable. Even what songs they sang in the village, when they played a wedding, what clothes they wore and what they ate, how they liked to spend time and what animals were kept in the house. Perhaps this information will not help you find out your ancestry up to the seventh generation, but it will definitely bring distant times closer to us and help us understand people who lived decades ago. Do not forget to record the conversation on a dictaphone so that later you can decipher the recording and transfer it to paper. Plus, the living voice of a loved one will definitely stay with you, and important details will not slip away from your memory.

How to find information about your ancestors in the archives

Before heading to government records, start by taking apart your home shelving.

Pay attention to photographs, documents on marriage or its dissolution, birth and death certificates, documents on graduation. At the same time, look not only at the front, but also at the back of the document or photograph. Important notes may remain on it, which will help in further searches.

This is especially true for photographs: many people signed the names of the people depicted, as well as the date and place where the picture was taken. And in the photo itself, you can see the name of the station or find out in what rank your great-grandfather ended the war.

How to find the history of your ancestors: ways to organize information

When searching with numerous sources and scraps of information, it is very easy to get confused. Therefore, we advise you to write down all incoming data in a notepad or create a folder on your computer.

How to find your kind of ancestors by name and surname: on the Internet and in the archive

It is logical that those who seek to find data about their roots try to find their relatives using a search by last name. On the Internet, you can find many sites dedicated to the research of experts in the field of surname history. Perhaps you, too, will be lucky to find a clue that will lead you to the traces of your ancestors.

There are special reference books and dictionaries where you can find a short history of your surname. Usually, it dates back to ancient times, and is often formed from a nickname, name, profession, nationality, noticeable character traits or appearance, as well as the place of residence of your distant ancestor.

So, the surname Goncharov was built on the principle "the son of a potter - potters". The surnames of representatives of princely families usually came from the name of the lands where the possessions of the family were located. Vyazemsky and Meshchersky are a direct example of this.

Think about how your last name was formed, perhaps it will say a lot about your relatives.

How can you find the roots of your ancestors on the Internet: looking for information about relatives on the Internet

A simple search query on Google with the name and surname of your relative is unlikely to give any significant result. Rather, you should contact specialized search engines:

• Google Books helps you find scans of thousands of books and reference books. Ordinary search engines cannot find hundreds of digitized editions of the pre-Soviet period. And with the help of this site, you can simply drive the surname and first name into the search bar and accidentally stumble upon the mention of relatives.

• MyHeritage.com is an international service that allows you to search through a myriad of archival lists, birth records, revision tales, and burial lists. The site is paid, but there are also options that you do not need to pay for. With its help, you can, as well as find your ancestors, there and model an approximate layout of your own family tree based on data about their pedigree.

• OBD "Memorial". Practically a starting service for those who know very little about their roots and want to understand how to find their family by last name. Memorial is a service that helps to get information about missing, killed or captured soldiers during the Great Patriotic War. The place of birth and year are written for almost all military personnel. This makes the search much easier. If you know that your great-great-grandfather died in the war, but from which village he was and where to look for data about him you do not know, this resource can become a real treasure of information. Often, the lists indicate not only the name of the soldier and his place of birth, but also the names of his family members who were informed about the death of the soldier. This is not only a name, but also a mark about who the person is to the deceased. Thus, you will not only find out the place of birth of your relative, but also the names of his mother, father or wife. This service is also useful for those with rare surnames. Through the search, you can see the distribution area and find out where its carriers were born and lived. Quite often it turns out that almost all of the namesakes lived in the same area or even in one small village.

• An important help in finding information about ancestors on the Internet will be the site of the All-Russian Family Tree. There you can find a whole database, and a great forum of members who share their stories of finding roots, and can also give valuable advice and suggest in which direction to "dig" further.

• You can search more specifically and pointwise. If you want to know about the fate of your relative who died during the First or Second World War, we advise you to turn to the resources "In memory of the heroes of the Great War 1914-1918" and "Memory of the people." If you are looking for information about a relative who could be repressed - pay attention to the sites "Personal file of everyone" and the project "Last address".

• You can view the personal files of relatives who died in the Holocaust on the website of the Yad Vashem Center.

• For those who know that their ancestors in Soviet or pre-revolutionary times lived in Moscow or St. Petersburg, the address directories "All Moscow" and "All Petersburg" will become an invaluable assistant. Here you can find information about your relative's address, and sometimes about his occupation. These reference books can be viewed on the website of the Historical Library.
• Something similar to the previous point - Commemorative books. Such collections were published in the pre-Soviet period every year in almost every province. They wrote about all the people who held any position in the province. Starting from a village doctor or land surveyor to the chairman of the noble assembly. Almost all publications have indexes. You can search for memorable books on the website of the same "Historical Library".

• A somewhat specific, but also extremely useful resource for those who are interested in how to find the biography of their ancestors - the site familysearch.org. It is a collection of documents prepared by American Mormons. You can search digitized documents from all over the world, including Russia and Ukraine. However, non-Mormons cannot view the data. You can get permission if you make an official request to the administration of the resource.

How else can you find information about the biography of your ancestors

To search for living relatives or descendants of those who have already died, write to the website of the program "Wait for me". You can not only send an application to search for a specific person, but also track whether you or your loved ones, relatives and friends who have lost contact are not looking for you.

You can contact the registry offices. Provided that you have your own birth certificate (if not, order it there), you can receive documents of already deceased relatives. Using this method, you can find out where your grandmother was born or where your grandfather got married. However, this only works for documents issued after the October Revolution. Papers of the pre-Soviet period must be looked for elsewhere.

How to find data about your ancestors in the archives

Since the 18th century, population censuses have been carried out in our country. The oldest of them are in the archives and help to restore the genealogy before the time of Peter I. Many centuries ago, the most important documents: birth and death certificates, marriage certificates were issued in two copies, one of which was kept in the church, and the second - in a special storage.

It is better to look for cases related to noble families in the Russian State Historical Archives in St. Petersburg.

Also in the city on the Neva is the Russian State Archives of the Navy - here you can find both information about relatives who lived in pre-Soviet times and those who were born and lived after the revolution.

The Russian State Archive of Ancient Acts is based in the capital - here you can find documents from the Time of Troubles and an earlier period. The Russian State Military Historical Archive is also located in Moscow. Here it is better to look for information on the time before 1918.

In the Moscow region there is the city of Podolsk, which houses the Central Archives of the Ministry of Defense - here it is possible to find information for the period from the beginning of the Second World War to the present.

You can do the research yourself, but be prepared to face painstaking paperwork and hours spent in archives. Those who, for some reason, cannot spend so much time, but still want to get information about their roots, should turn to the help of professionals. "Russian House of Pedigree" will help you conduct research that will show where, how and when your ancestors lived, loved and died. Our specialists have access to closed archives. They will not only help to draw up a search strategy, but also carry out archival and search work, verify the authenticity of the data and organize the information received into a family tree. You can order the design of a genealogy book and a family coat of arms, which will clearly show the rich history of your family.