Family histories have been cherished for millennia. For instance Confucius’s genealogy, created originally by hand and first printed in 1040 (presumably using the newly invented ceramic characters) to record the descendants of the Chinese sage Kong Qiu, who died 479BC.
Or the Icelandic Íslendingasögur written in ink in the 13th and 14th centuries, and our family histories too, closer in time, enlisting copious notebooks, scraps of paper and scrolls of wallpaper to make a record of our research and to note the names and dates etc of our relations.
Little changed from century, to century there are numerous merits to these analogue ways of recording, yet there’s also a lot to be said for tech too.
In this new series in over the coming months we will be looking at some of the many ways in which digital aids can transform our research processes. We’ll be looking at the must-have technology items for the family historian, and exploring some of the newer and just “nice to have ones” too. As ever, we would be very interested to learn your views on the matter, and to hear about the tools you use; we will include mention of as many reader recommendations as possible and for those
