New collections!
Greek Ancestry’s collections are updated on a monthly basis. Over 350,000 records available today! Stay tuned!
Reconnection of the Gkounelas Family – 79 Years Later
A few weeks ago, on October 28th, like every year, Greece celebrated the “OXI” day. This year, however, caught me and my family by surprise! Attention: the following story has (surprisingly) nothing to do with COVID-19.
An Unexpected Journey: Tale of “Dimitri” and his abduction
By Alexandra Kiritsy Mysteries are contained within all of our genealogies. Sometimes we are fortunate enough to crack them, but all too frequently, the nature of time and space seem to veil the truth forever. …
NEW! Greek Ancestry’s City Directories Collection
Great news! 86,000 CITY DIRECTORY records have just been published on Greek Ancestry! What’s even better? The records are offered at DISCOUNT, for $3 only! Search now! City Directories are broadly used in genealogy research …
International Greek Ancestry Conference (Jan. 29-31, 2021)
Save the date – spread the word – join us!
New Records! Messinia & Attiki
Geia sou! We would like you to know that we just released new records for the prefectures of Messinia and Attiki! The villages covered by the new records are: Messinia – Voutena, Makraina [Makrena], Kouloukada, …
Thessaloniki – La Madre de Israel
By Alexandra Kiritsy & Gregory Kontos When Jewish colonists were brought to the newly founded city of Macedonia around 315 B.C., no one could have imagined that Thessaloniki’s history would be closely associated with Jewish …
“My Big Fat Greek Ancestry Summer” Webinar
Despite the pandemic, the past summer was very productive for Greek Ancestry: new collections, new research tools, new analyses and a brand new platform! We would like to share all our news with you this …
Preserving the Records of Greek Orthodox Parishes in America
Greek Ancestry and EMBCA (Eastern Mediterranean Business Culture Alliance) are pleased to announce a groundbreaking initiative to preserve birth, marriage and death records of the earliest Greek communities in America. These documents are rich, untapped …
Statistics Meet Genealogy: Male Aging Patterns in Lakonia (1910s-1930s)
In June 2020, a special article presenting statistics on naming patterns in the prefecture of Chania, Crete, was published on Greek Ancestry. That analysis was based on our database of Male Register records of approximately …
“Lakonian Ancestry” on Aug. 21st – Australia
Dear Spartan brothers and sisters in Australia and New Zealand, Join us this Friday, Aug. 21st, at 6pm (GMT+10) for a presentation on “Laconian Ancestry” organized by Pallaconian Brotherhood of Melbourne & Victoria “Leonidas” and …
Parish Voter Lists
By Gregory Kontos To dive into family history, you need to understand your sources. This has been quite often noted in Greek Ancestry articles and webinars, yet it has to be repeated until it becomes …
Hellenic Genealogy Tourism Conference
Tune in at 2pm EST – 9pm Greece to attend this special conference, organized by the EMBCA, the Hellenic Genealogy Geek and AHEPA:
Finding Yiayia’s “Pirates”
By Alexandra Kiritsy and Andrew Jendrzejewski Our biggest goal with “Yiayia & Me” is to spark curiosity in family history among Greeks. We simply hope to inspire individuals to spend time with their ancestors–of both …
Special Week Ahead
From Sunday, July 26th to Saturday, August 1st, Greek Ancestry is celebrating its 6-month anniversary. How? Sunday, 26th – “Hellenic Genealogy Tourism”: EMBCA, Hellenic Genealogy Geek and AHEPA are organizing a special webinar to be …
Reflections Of My Homeland: The diary of a man from Palaia Fokaia, Asia Minor
By Alexandra Kiritsy Geia sas, everyone! We are very excited to bring you another article about life in Greek villages around the turn of the century. This week’s piece takes us to Asia Minor, where …
20,000 New Records: Achaia & Arcadia
Today, July 1st, 20,000 new records have been added to Greek Ancestry’s databases! Old handwritten voter lists of Arcadia, including the areas of Levidi, Tripoli, Tegea, Kaltezes, Dimitsana, Lagkadia, Valtetsi, Daras, Tsipiana, Alonistaina and many …
Statistics Meet Genealogy: Naming Patterns in Chania, Crete (1850s-1910)
By Gregory Kontos Your grandfather was born in a village close to Chania, Crete in 1902. His name was Antonis, and you are wondering how common a name that was back then. His surname was …
Reflections Of My Homeland: An Account of Village Life in Geraki, Lakonia
Foreword by Alexandra Kiritsy I have always found imagining the world of my Greek yiayia, say, around the turn of the 20th century, to be a difficult task. Looking back at old black-and-white photographs of …
The great importance of “little” source citations
By Gregory Kontos A source citation is a little note of a relatively standard format which indicates where a piece of information was found: the archive, the collection, the folder, the subfolder. Such notes are …