In many ways, this democratization of genealogy owes its existence to the Internet. With the search features and tools offered online, you can begin to study the techniques of genealogy within the comfort of your own home. Other electronic databases, like census records and birth/marriage/death records, allow for much easier exploration of genealogy, either of your own or of perhaps a historical personage or celebrity by whom you are interested. With a few quick keystrokes, a mountain of information related to genealogy is available at your fingertips. What was once the work of many days of hard labour can be done by a quick keyword search at a good genealogy source like the Census website or even Google, or Wikipedia.

While genealogy is certainly made easier by the Internet, many traditionalists still find great satisfaction in the physical searches which genealogy entails. Imagine tracking down the roots of your genealogy as far as it goes-let’s say to a small country village. Taking a day trip to meet the town historian, check the local records and churchyards to see if you can go back that one step farther is an exciting part of genealogy, leading to meeting new people and exploring new places. Genealogy can be a study performed from an armchair, or it can entail travel and physical searching-the choice is up to you. Genealogy is also a fun thing to do in a group-why not talk to a relative and find out if they are interested in discovering your shared genealogy together?

Popular TV programs like “Who Do You Think You Are” are sparking a resurgence in interest in genealogy. In it, a celebrity traces back his family tree as far as he or she can go and invariably finds at least one or two stories of interest to the viewer. Tracing your own genealogy will doubtless yield equally intriguing facts, rumours and questions-and they are made all the more intriguing because they relate to you. Genealogy is all about the surprises that make our own ancestry special, and it is a rare person indeed who does not find something surprising in their own genealogy.

Whether it turns out that your ancestors were princes or paupers, soldiers or sailors, butchers or bakers, genealogy is fascinating both for the techniques it involves and the results it yields. From meeting long-lost relatives to interesting conversations with well-known ones, the fruits of the study of genealogy are wide-ranging, far beyond the collection of simple facts. As it has been said, in knowing the past, we discover the present-nowhere is this more true than in genealogy.

The metaphor of a “tree” to represent your ancestors and relations in the term “family tree” is an apt one. The idea is as follows: from the solid base of the tree (you, or whoever else’s family tree you are considering), a solid “trunk” of direct ancestors proceeds upwards. The trunk of the family tree expands the farther up you get (you have more great-grandparents than you have grandparents). The “tree” metaphor of “family tree” is made all the more apt by the “branches” that break off from the “trunk”: members of your family who are not your direct antecedents split off “sideways” in a pictorial representation of your family tree.

One of the interesting things about a family tree is that the farther away from you that you trace it, the tree starts growing faster and faster. Depending on how high you wish to climb your family tree, and how far out you are willing to crawl on its branches, you can discover all sorts of things. Who knows what relatives you can trace at the loftiest heights of your family tree, or who is a distant cousin out on the branches?

Once you have completed some of the research to make up your family tree, it can be a lot of fun to physically create a representation of it. You have probably seen elaborate representations of a noble family tree or two in history textbooks-the lineage of the kings and queens, for example. Why not try your hand at creating your own family tree? Materials are available online to help you make a gorgeous decorative family tree suitable for framing and display. Make sure to leave space on it, of course-family trees are constantly pushing down new roots as new generations are born (or discovered, if you have caught the family tree research bug!). Whether you choose the a streamlined linear representation or a more elegant scripted picture, family tree graphic representations can be a unique and attractive centerpiece to a living room, bedroom or study.

A family tree can be a lot of fun both to research and to draw up, and is a great thing to bring along to your next family gathering. See how far you can trace yours, and what interesting people may be hiding in the leafy canopy of your family tree-with the tools for research and for physical creation of your family tree easily available on the internet, getting started could not be easier.

When a person talks about their ancestry, they can mean many things. For a start, ancestry can be about a place. It is fascinating to know where one “came from” as far back as one can trace. It is perhaps equally interesting to find out a great great aunt’s unknown exotic origins as it is to find that your family has been a fixture of local life for generations. Depending on how far back you wish to trace your ancestry, and by which methods you intend to use, you can find out that all sorts of places you thought had no connection to you are actually very special to what has made you exist! From as general as “I have German ancestry” to as specific as “I have ancestry in a little town on the Ruhr in the 14^th century”, a study of your ancestry can really connect you to new (or old!) places.

Ancestry is also about family. Tracing back your ancestry can help you to find out who helped to make up your unique genetic (and cultural) identity, and what they were like. Tracing your ancestry can help you to discover old family secrets, long lost jokes, and priceless new memories. Ancestry searches are also a great way to reconnect with distant relatives.

The study of ancestry is an ancient one. Think of how much of our history is dependent on ancestry: to take one example, our current Queen derives her monarchy from her ancestry, traced back to the Norman conquest. To go even farther back, the French monarchy from Charlemagne justified its rule by a (very questionable!) claim to be descended from the Caesars of Rome. Who knows what your ancestry might be?

With the advances in record-keeping technology afforded by the internet, looking up your ancestry is easier now than it ever has been. However, some of the real fun of ancestry is flipping through old tomes in dusty archives, and the thrill of discovery and connection with ancient writing on crinkly pages. Who knows where tracing your ancestors may take you? Tracing your ancestors can be a hobby that lasts a lifetime-or it can be a fun way to while away a wet weekend. That is one of the great things about ancestry research-it can be as big or as easy a task and goal as you like.

So, start looking into your ancestry today for a rewarding and intellectually stimulating hobby. Ancestry, after all, is ultimately about identity-in discovering our ancestry we discover much about ourselves. Getting started could not be easier, with lots of help for a novice is available on the Internet; there’s no reason not to start right away!

Before long the amount of information you have on your ancestors should be growing nicely. In order to keep track of all this you will need to devise some kind of system to keep paperwork and ancestry records in order. It’s a personal choice how to do this whether it is alphabetical, chronological or family groupings, is entirely your choice. As for the family tree itself you could opt for one of the computer packages that allow you to input your genealogy information and will generate diagrams to show various lineage.  These programs offer a great solution to the sometimes complicated matter of putting your family tree in order, with options to insert photographs and personal information as well as being your own database of your ancestral information.

Looking after the physical records is important especially original documents that become worn and thin overtime. Regular plastic wallets contain acetone which breaks down the certificates. Proper certificate folders are acetone free and can be bought in the unusual sizes that certificates come in. Also use acetone free tissue paper and plastic boxes to store your ancestry records as these will prevent premature ageing of your treasured family records.

A great starting place to learn more on your ancestry is asking any older generations of the family. Starting with yourself and working backwards, ask questions, get out the family album and find out what your family already knows. You never know someone may have already started a family tree.

This beginning starting point can provide very valuable information and is often a fantastic basis for your ancestry research. Even though some family information may be sketchy or may sound like a tall story, these passed down snippets of information could have an element of truth. Any photographs, certificates, letters, diaries or newspaper cuttings can help you compile your family tree and create a picture of who your ancestors were.

Try to identify who you would like to trace back first, maybe one side of the family or a branch to start with. A family tree can grow so quickly your head can be spinning with the amount of information you find. By setting a target and limiting your search into sections your ancestry search will be more manageable.

Armed with as many names, dates and places as you can gather a great starting place is the internet. A growing number of archived records are now online to view. Some are available at no charge for example the birth, marriages and death indexes can be searched online. These records can also be seen in local libraries, ask for the BMD indexes and you’ll be surprised at the amount of information at your finger tips.

From these records you’ll be able to send off for copies of original documents. The BMD records have a code you should note down and by getting in touch with the General Register Office (GRO) you can order and pay for these certificates. Certificates have so much information within them, from one person you can find spouses information, occupations, maiden names and addresses.

Libraries offer a fantastic resource and many have free computer access to ancestry.com which is a genealogy database. Here you can see the census returns of England, Wales and Scotland from 1841 to 1901. As well as this online resource your local library has a wealth of local records. Once you know where an ancestor came from by getting in touch with that local library, records such as local business directories, burial records, local maps and local newspapers can be accessed.

Your Ancestry is a very personal journey into your families past. Like a good novel your ancestry could hold untold secrets, intrigue and mystery. Delving into your family history will bring the past to life for you, generations gone by with stories waiting to be discovered. Be warned though some family historians come face to face with sad facts as well as happy.  Keep in mind many of our forbears lived in poverty stricken times, even wealthy families suffered child deaths and untreatable illnesses.

The draw of being a detective into your family history is a strong one and many have begun the sometimes lifelong search into the past.

Ancestry UK aims to provide budding family historians with a valuable resource to enable easier research, valuable links to research material and search tips to help you on your ancestral journey.

People have many different reasons for starting their ancestral search. It may be a yearning to discover what happened to a lost relative, a wish to learn more about a grandparent who didn’t reveal their past, or just a desire to go back in history to see how our forbearers lived. All these reasons and more will start a journey of discovery into our past and build a family tree to be proud of.