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.

The new, fully-updated edition of Collins Tracing Your Family History is the definitive handbook for anyone interested in tracing their family’s past.

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!

An ideal guide to tracing your Scottish ancestors combining the traditional methods of researching family history with new methods offered by information technology and the internet.

Discover your Scottish roots! You take the high road, and I'll take the low--and your family tree will be in Scotland before you know it. This book will help you uncover your Scottish heritage, from identifying your immigrant ancestor to tracking down records in the old country. With help from Scottish genealogy expert Amanda Epperson, you'll learn about church records, civil registrations, censuses, and more, plus how to find them in online databases and in archives. Inside, you'll find: • Basic information on how to start family history research, including identifying and tracing immigrant ancestors • Step-by-steps for finding and using records from both the United States and Scotland • Crash-course guides to Scottish history, geography, surnames, and naming conventions Whether your ancestors hail from the Highlands or the bonnie, bonnie banks of Loch Lomond, this book will help you grow your family tree in Scotland.

This new and updated edition of the guide includes information on how to access family data utilising electronic resources and the Internet - a must if conducting research from an overseas base - and is a very welcome addition to the family library.