how far back, is too far back??

[sheronb]

for tracing living relations in Italy? My great grandfather was born in Italy in 1872, left there, with his father in the 1890sc.

Has anyone tried to trace relations,when their own ancester left so long ago?

And with what success? Im not intending too, myself as yet, but you never know one day??

[Poipuo4]

My cousin has had success tracing one side of the family back to the early 1800s by writing to Italy for records. I am going to try to keep it to 5 or 6 generations for the time being just to have some level of sanity. I have had relative ease with finding records of family who left Italy at the turn of the century.

[sheronb]

Poipuo4

I meant tracing living relations, was just wondering if my ancester left Italy a 100 years ago, is to far back to be tracing living family?

[jcsm400]

Nope!.........Simply because most of the family stayed in the town of origin & their descendants & their descendants, etc.

jcsm

[sheronb]

thanks for that, maybe one day.............

[Poipuo4]

Actually, I attempted to do that very thing. I visited my ancestral village in Italy where my grandmother left about 100 yrs. ago. I met a lot of people with the same last name, but no one had a memory of that branch of the family. I took old pictures with me and one lady recognized a great great uncle of mine but said it was so long ago she did not remember anything.

[sheronb]

yes, i should imagine so, also ive been told, a lot of Italians cant understand this obsession with family research!! lol

[MikeSavoca91]

I have tried something like that with my great grandmother's family. One cousin said she was still in contact, and then changed her story when I was supposed to go over to Sicily to meet some cousins. I then gave up but I do think there are still people there and will try as soon as someone will help me write a letter in Italian that I can send to them. You should try it, you never know who you might find!