Tuesday, June 23, 2009

Sketches of Your Ancestral Hometown


While not strictly an artifact of your family history, it can be nice to add some context to your story by including an image or photo of the town / village / region where your family once resided. Especially in cases in which you now live far away, or the place has been modernized extensively. Seeing the town as your ancestor may have seen it can give you some insight into their world.

Unfortunately, photography wasn't invented until the 19th century, so you won't find any photos of the cities your more distant relatives lived in. You can, however, almost certainly find a lithograph, or pen drawing of the town, particularly if it was larger than a few buildings. These lithographs are works of art in themselves, often highlighting important buildings in town, monuments, geographical features, or coastlines. A look at one can give you an idea of what it might have been like to live there hundreds of years ago.

But, where to look? You might be able to find one on the internet by doing a Google Image search, but often images found online are low quality. Your best bet is likely at the closest university library. Any university that has a history department will do, and in many cases you won't even need to be a student or alumni to use the library.

What you're looking for is a history book about the region in question. For instance, if your ancestors were from Harwich in the east of England, look for a "History of Harwich" or perhaps a "History of Essex", the county in which Harwich is located. Historians love to include lithographs in their academic books and the versions you find in the book will almost certainly be higher quality than the ones you find online. Most university libraries will allow you to photocopy pages from the book.

Then you can take your new treasure home and gaze upon your ancestral home, just as your ancestors knew it.