AncestralologyFollow

See, I'm a bit more purist, as a large proportion of amateur genealogists like us aren't as meticulous/scrupulous about validating traces. My brother got an entirely different route to me working back from the 1760s to the early 1500s. Turned out he'd copied bits of a tree that were sloppily researched and had picked the wrong Daniel Brookes in the 18th century.

A tricksy bid'ness!

My one set of grandparents had a history done as far back as 1700's Mostly a mashup of Irish/English Scottish lineage with some Native thrown in there. Nothing remarkable in the family, probably just a bunch of Potato Farmers and Sheepshaggers.

When they came to North America they settled in Upper Canada, (Ontario) and the families really didn't move around much, kind of established themselves around Southwestern Ontario. Had a couple Great Uncles who fought and died in 1812 war, one in York area (Toronto) the other in detroit. Had a great grandfather who burned down washington as a lieutenant in the British Service. (My Great Aunt has some paraphernalia from his service still sadly not the book of matches used in the burning of the US Capitol). A Great Grandmother married a native man and down the line my Gramps was popped out, and my Grand Mothers family mostly stuck to the farming business keeping it Irish/English.

So on that side I am mostly English/Irish/Native technically I could apply to have my Status Card and get all those sweet native deals But :effort:. "Earliest" Use of the name (and my surname) is around 1100 in Scotland/Maiden name is common as **** Scottish and has been around since before time I think. (Google says 925AD vOv)

No big historical tree has been done on my other side, English/Scotish mostly from what we have been able to tell. The surname on that side dates back to the Norman invasions of England, so around 1200AD and the Maiden name back to 1000 AD. Both names have been in North America since the earliest settlers. Family Rumor is one of our ancestors did some exploration of the West and named a couple mountains after his family at the time. Could be coincidence but who knows.

So basically I have Older names (all from around 900-1200AD) from the British Isles, with a little bit of Native added in. As far as I know my ancestors to this point have always been Canadian as well. If it counts I am related to Joe Thornton of the San Jose Sharks (2nd Cousins w/e that is). But I don't know anyone currently "famous" or of old time fame other than that and the gent who burned your capitol down.



Edited, Mar 12th 2014 7:43am by rdmcandie

That's what she said.

The native stuff is especially untrustworthy since they usually changed their names and hid their origins... and the Irish stuff is difficult too since they were probably more worried about not starving than keeping records (at least on my side)..



but, It's true about going off of names alone.
You need to make sure you have those specific dates to pin-point it...
For example in my line that goes back to Sitting Bull.. it would appear that he also had a BROTHER that had the same exact name ( Tȟatȟaŋka Iyotȟaŋka).. so we can't be sure if our line is to him or his brother.. it also appear that his brother may have married the particular wife of his that we descend from.



I used to like to tell people that I was descended from the Quadi and the Marcomanni tribes that fought against Marcus Aurelius.. since the name of the village that my German line is from is in the same area as those tribes and the name of the village was of the same language (Allemannic).... in the same vein I could claim descendency from Teutonic Crusaders since they are the ones that settled that particular village..
but of course no one could ever proove any of that. but it used to make for fun party topic (to me!). At least now I have this Wild Boar guy I can talk about and be honest lol.