From search engines and databases to DNA platforms, discover how to easily learn more about your Scottish ancestry online with this helpful guide. Scotland is a land with a proud and centuries long history that far predates its membership of Great Britain and the United Kingdom. Today in the 21st century it is also a land that has done much to make its historical records accessible, to help those with Caledonian ancestry trace their roots back to earlier times and a world long past. In Tracing Scottish Family History on the Internet, Chris Paton expertly guides the family historian through the many Scottish records offerings available, but also cautions the reader that not every record is online, providing detailed advice on how to use web based finding aids to locate further material across the country and beyond. He also examines social networking and the many DNA platforms that are currently further revolutionizing online Scottish research. From the Scottish Government websites offering access to our most important national records, to the holdings of local archives, libraries, family history societies, and online vendors, Chris Paton takes the reader across Scotland, from the Highlands and Islands, through the Central Belt and the Lowlands, and across the diaspora, to explore the various flavors of Scottishness that have bound us together as a nation for so long.

Despite the fact that there are thousands of genealogical web-sites worth visiting it is often difficult to locate the most relevant and authoritative. Search engines frequently list dozens of sites, but not the ones you require. This thoroughly revised edition lists the most important genealogical sites on the web for researching your Scottish ancestors.

This illuminating guide to discovering your Scottish family history has been fully revised and updated to take account of changes to resources and methods for researching your Scottish ancestry over the last few years. Accessible in style and comprehensive in coverage, this new edition stresses the importance of traditional methods of family history research while also embracing the exciting possibilities afforded by new technologies, sources and developments in genetic science.Indispensable to both the fledgling researcher and the more experienced family history specialist in Scotland or elsewhere, this book provides a guide to the very latest resources available to assist with research. Covering Scottish primary and secondary sources in full detail, this book also provides illustrative case studies of family history research, lists of useful websites and archives, and family history organisations and societies.Highlights of this new edition:*An updated chapter dedicated to aspects of recording, scanning and storing information*New insight into accessing English, Irish, emigrant and immigrant records*An update on developments in DNA genetics of relevance to the genealogist*A substantial and broad-ranging bibliography essential for those who want to take their research even further.

This guide provides an authoritative survey of the vast range of material held in the National Archives of Scotland - records of Scottish national and local government, Scottish churches, law courts and private families and businesses.

The revised and updated 7th edition of the bestselling guide to easily discovering more about your Scottish ancestry. Scotland has the best-maintained records and facilities of any country in the world for undertaking family research, and now that the National Archives of Scotland are available online they can be consulted by anyone from whatever country. Tracing Your Scottish Ancestors is the National Archives’ official guide and is written in an accessible style from the unique perspective of a custodian of the records. It details all the latest internet developments, including a chapter on family history on the web. It also points to more traditional resources, explaining step by step how to research records of births, marriages and wills. “Excellent help with every phase of genealogical research . . . This book will be a valuable finding aid for many people using the Scottish Record Office, and by no means only for the family historian.” —Books in Scotland “Includes the sort of online sources that have transformed the field since its first publication in 1990, this guide is indispensable for the serious investigator.” —The Scotsman

Scottish ancestry is easy to trace on the Internet, because Scotland is leading the world in making its family history records available on-line. So now, wherever you live, it is easy to grow a Scottish family tree! All the main records are already on-line: births, marriages and deaths (from 1855), old parish registers (some back as far as 1553), wills and inventories (from 1500) and ten-yearly census returns (1841-1901). In the near future, church, land, poor relief, taxation and heraldry records are expected to become available too. Whether new to family history, or to Scottish research, or to the use of the Internet for either, everyone will find this book a comprehensive and easy-to-follow guide. As well as dealing with the records of those who left Scotland for a better life in North America, Australasia, or even England and Wales, the author explains the sources for ancestors who joined the forces, how DNA can help research, and the benefits of joining a family history society. Appendices provide lists of useful websites, details of charges for access to on-line records and much information unavailable elsewhere. This book will be welcomed wherever Scottish ancestry is traced, and as much by professional genealogists as by amateurs and beginners!