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I've traced several lines back to the early 1700s and a few to the late 1600s. I suppose I'm lucky to find this much.
Has anyone else gone any further? Many of my searches end overseas. A few have been baffling, as in, "Mother unknown", or no records outside of census data. What a fun project!
I've seen some trees that go back to the 1200's (and one of my white "high confidence" cousin matches on Ancestry.com has a tree that dates back to the 1500's). Still, past a certain point, I become much more skeptical about the accuracy of what I'm reading. Note, for my black ancestors in the US, I've managed to get back to the mid-1800's.
It's pretty hard to get back to around the 1500s because there were often no records kept and people didn't even have surnames.
I have only one line that goes waaaaay back. I found it because a "cousin" in England who was helping me had a friend who turned out to be from that line and ended up living in the same village. The friend had traced one of his interesting lines really far back and wrote a little book about it. The two of them must have been discussing it and I turned out to be in that distant lineage. It has also been researched by one other person who found almost exactly the same results and now there's a huge website about this family. Probably my ONE family that was rich and important--that's why they kept records so diligently. Oh--and the name is turning up over and over on my 23&Me results too.
But most of us are stuck somewhere in the 1700s with a few in the 1600s. That's what I have read on various genealogy groups.
I've traced several lines back to the early 1700s and a few to the late 1600s. I suppose I'm lucky to find this much.
Has anyone else gone any further? Many of my searches end overseas. A few have been baffling, as in, "Mother unknown", or no records outside of census data. What a fun project!
I would say, with American and Western European research, generally speaking, yes tracing lines back to before about the 17th century is unusual for a number of reasons, but namely the lack of extant records. The farther you go back in time, the dimmer the picture tends to be. Even getting back to the 1600s is quite an accomplishment in itself for many---consider it lucky if you can go back before the Revolutionary War---in my experience that seems to be about when many people start to run into real brick walls. Record keeping was not as thorough as in later times and also, the loss of various records will make it more difficult, if not impossible sometimes.
One major problem people have is they trace an ancestor here in the US back to say 1780 and then they can not determine exactly when they came over here...or even from where (other than the country). Ship passenger manifests are very hit or miss before the mid-1800s, so that tends to make things all the more difficult to find.
Pretty much anybody that can successfully (and accurately) trace a line back to the 13th century is just lucky--and that luck comes in the form of either past nobility, wealth (property ownership) or political involvement. Before about the early 1500s, churches in western Europe tended to not even keep a permanent record of all baptisms/marriages/deaths other than for notable members. Marked graves were also for the wealthy. Only the wealthy got to vote or would show consistently in land records, probate, etc....the average people really left very ;little behind from those times, so that makes it virtually impossible to go back before about the Tudor era in England anyway...and the same couold be said, generally, for much of Europe, if not a bit later.
Three hundred years is a good limit for me. Heck, I'd be content to get that far! I can only trace one of my main four lines to a home country, and I've been stuck for quite a while in those mid- to late-1700s in America.
Because I'm at a standstill, I wonder what else to look for -- I've gathered as many death certificates, newspaper notices, photographs of people and gravestones, stories, etc. as I can, but I don't know what else to "fill in" except to try to keep finding maiden names (but most of these are not direct ancestors and thus not as important to me). Any ideas to kind of flesh out the research, learn more about how these people lived? I've read a lot of online info (google books and other academic and verifiable sources) about what life was like in certain counties/states, etc.
I have about 2,500 entries and am thinking of unsubscribing to Ancestry. I have many supposed matches, but most of them don't connect, so I have a feeling there was an illegitimacy (or more) in the past 150 or so years -- either that, or many, many "cousins" have never been tested.
I also can't find many matches on FamilyTreeDNA. In addition, I have no HVR1 OR HVR2 matches at all, but I have three "Genetic Distance -3" (whatever that means); two are in the US, and two are in England, but all are in the <0.1% range or lower.
I haven't tested with 23andMe but might do so, though I really don't want to know my health risks.
Three hundred years is a good limit for me. Heck, I'd be content to get that far! I can only trace one of my main four lines to a home country, and I've been stuck for quite a while in those mid- to late-1700s in America.
Because I'm at a standstill, I wonder what else to look for -- I've gathered as many death certificates, newspaper notices, photographs of people and gravestones, stories, etc. as I can, but I don't know what else to "fill in" except to try to keep finding maiden names (but most of these are not direct ancestors and thus not as important to me). Any ideas to kind of flesh out the research, learn more about how these people lived? I've read a lot of online info (google books and other academic and verifiable sources) about what life was like in certain counties/states, etc.
I have about 2,500 entries and am thinking of unsubscribing to Ancestry. I have many supposed matches, but most of them don't connect, so I have a feeling there was an illegitimacy (or more) in the past 150 or so years -- either that, or many, many "cousins" have never been tested.
I also can't find many matches on FamilyTreeDNA. In addition, I have no HVR1 OR HVR2 matches at all, but I have three "Genetic Distance -3" (whatever that means); two are in the US, and two are in England, but all are in the <0.1% range or lower.
I haven't tested with 23andMe but might do so, though I really don't want to know my health risks.
When I hit roadblocks after years of research, I unsubscribed from Ancestry and now only search from FamilySearch, which is free; I've also found some things on relatives with FamilySearch that I wasn't finding with Ancestry, which allowed me to further extend my tree. Though unsubscribed from Ancestry, I can still add, view, and edit my family tree. Also, I can still message and view DNA matches (and even order and add another DNA test) even though my account with Ancestry is no longer "active."
On my paternal side, I have info back into the 1300s, but that's just because there's a well known (and documented) person on that side. On my maternal side, back to 1800 is as far as I got.
I have several lines that go back forever, I think if you descend from Royalty it's easier. I'd love to do one of the DNA tests to see what ancestors I can verify. Anyone else tried 23you and me, or others?
I have several lines that go back forever, I think if you descend from Royalty it's easier. I'd love to do one of the DNA tests to see what ancestors I can verify. Anyone else tried 23you and me, or others?
No royalty here! That's okay. I've not tried 23 and me, and probably won't.
I have found that many of my ancestors are buried not far from where I sit. Maybe this summer I'll go on a cemetery tour and visit, as macabre as that sounds.
Great answers, everyone! It's fun to hear of your adventures.
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