Why Genealogy Has Its Own Language
If you have ever tried to research your family history and felt like you were reading a foreign language, you are not imagining it. Genealogy has a vocabulary built up over centuries, borrowed from law, medicine, religion, and government record-keeping. Terms like "testate," "relict," and "consanguinity" show up in documents all the time, and if you do not know what they mean, you can misread an entire record.
This glossary is meant to fix that. Every term here is defined in plain English, the way a friend who happens to know a lot about genealogy would explain it to you. No jargon piled on top of jargon. Just clear, honest definitions you can actually use.
The terms are organized alphabetically within sections by theme, so you can either read straight through or jump to the section most relevant to what you are working on right now.
A
Abstract - A summary of a document that captures the most important information without copying the full text word for word.
Administrator (of an estate) - A person appointed by a court to manage and settle the estate of someone who died without a will. Different from an executor, who is named in a will.
Ahnentafel - A numbering system used to chart direct ancestors. Your number is 1. Your father is 2, your mother is 3. Each person's father is double their number; each person's mother is double their number plus one. It is German for "ancestor table."
Alien - In historical documents, this term refers to a person who was not yet a citizen of the country where they were living. It has nothing to do with nationality in a negative sense; it was a legal status.
Ancestor - Any person from whom you are directly descended, going back through your family line. Parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and so on.
Ancestral file - A database, often used in reference to systems maintained by genealogical societies, that compiles pedigree and family group information contributed by researchers.
Appellation - A formal word for a name or title used to identify a person.
Archives - A place, either physical or digital, where historical records and documents are preserved for research. National, state, county, and church archives are all common in genealogy.
Attest - To witness and confirm that a document or statement is genuine. Witnesses to wills and legal documents are said to attest to them.
B
Banns - Public announcements, typically read aloud in church on three consecutive Sundays, that a couple intended to marry. Banns records can be a valuable source when marriage certificates are missing.
Beneficiary - A person named in a will or insurance policy to receive property or money after someone dies.
Bequeath - To leave personal property to someone in a will. You bequeath movable things; real estate is typically devised.
Bond (surety bond) - A legal document in which one person guarantees that another will perform their duties. Common in probate records, where an administrator would post a bond before managing an estate.
Bounty land - Land granted by the U.S. government to veterans in exchange for military service, primarily during the Revolutionary War through the Mexican War era.
C
Census - An official count of the population, typically recording names, ages, relationships, birthplaces, and occupations. In the United States, a federal census has been taken every ten years since 1790.
Certified copy - An official duplicate of an original document, authenticated by the agency that holds the original. A certified copy carries legal weight that a photocopy does not.
Chain of title - The sequence of historical transfers of property ownership from one person to the next, documented through deeds. Tracing a chain of title can reveal family connections across generations.
Christening record - A church record of a baptism, which usually includes the child's name, parents' names, date, and sometimes godparents. Before civil registration, christening records were often the only record of a birth.
Civil registration - The government system for recording births, marriages, and deaths. Most countries adopted civil registration at different times; knowing when your ancestral country began keeping civil records tells you where to look.
Cluster genealogy - A research strategy where you study not just your direct ancestor but also their neighbors, friends, church members, and associates. People often migrated in groups and witnessed each other's documents.
Collateral line - A family line that shares a common ancestor with you but is not your direct line. Your great-aunt's descendants are your collateral relatives.
Codicil - An amendment or addition to an existing will that changes, adds to, or removes something from the original document.
Consanguinity - A blood relationship between people descended from a common ancestor. Courts used consanguinity rules to determine whether relatives could marry or inherit.
Conveyance - The legal process of transferring property from one owner to another. Deed records document conveyances.
Coverture - A historical legal doctrine in which a married woman's legal identity was absorbed into her husband's. Under coverture, a wife could not own property, sign contracts, or sue in her own name. It affects how women appear, or do not appear, in old records.
Curtesy - A widower's right under old common law to a life interest in his deceased wife's property, provided they had children together.
D
DAR - Daughters of the American Revolution. A lineage society that requires members to prove descent from a Revolutionary War patriot. Their records and databases are a significant genealogical resource.
Death certificate - An official document recording a person's death, typically including name, date, place, cause of death, and sometimes parents' names and birthplaces. Information provided by a grieving family member is not always accurate.
Decedent - A person who has died. Used frequently in probate and legal documents.
Declaration of intent - The first step in the U.S. naturalization process, in which an immigrant formally declared their intention to become a citizen. Also called "first papers."
Deed - A legal document that records the transfer of real property (land or buildings) from one person to another.
Descendant - Any person who comes after you in your family line, including children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, and so on. The opposite of an ancestor.
Devise - To leave real estate (land or property) to someone through a will. The person receiving real estate is called a devisee.
Direct line - Your unbroken line of descent from parent to grandparent to great-grandparent and so on backward through time. These are your direct ancestors.
Dower right - A widow's legal right under old common law to a portion of her deceased husband's estate. Deeds sometimes include a wife's relinquishment of dower rights as part of a land sale.
E
Emigrant - A person who leaves their home country to settle in another. The same person is an emigrant from their origin country and an immigrant to their destination country.
Enumeration district - A specific geographic area assigned to a census taker. Knowing a family's enumeration district can help locate them in census records.
Estate - Everything a person owns at the time of their death, including property, money, debts, and personal belongings.
Executor / Executrix - The person named in a will to carry out its instructions. Executor is the masculine form; executrix is the feminine.
F
Family group sheet - A standard form used in genealogy to record one family unit: parents and their children, with dates and places of birth, marriage, and death.
FAN club - Friends, Associates, and Neighbors. A term used in genealogical research to describe the people who appear around your ancestor in records. Studying the FAN club is central to cluster genealogy.
Fraternal organization - Groups like the Elks, Masons, Odd Fellows, and Knights of Columbus that many ancestors belonged to. These organizations sometimes kept membership and death records.
Freedmen's Bureau - A U.S. government agency established after the Civil War to assist formerly enslaved people. The Bureau's records, including labor contracts, marriage records, and ration records, are an important resource for African American genealogy.
G
Gazetteer - A geographical dictionary or index that describes and locates places. Helpful for identifying old place names that no longer exist or have changed.
Generation - A single step in a line of descent. You are one generation from your parents, two from your grandparents, and so on.
Grantor / Grantee - In deed records, the grantor is the person selling or transferring property; the grantee is the person receiving it. Deed indexes are organized by grantor and grantee.
Guardianship records - Court records created when a legal guardian was appointed for a minor or an adult who could not manage their own affairs. These records often name parents, ages of children, and other relatives.
H
Heir - A person legally entitled to inherit property from someone who died without a will.
Homestead Act - U.S. legislation passed in 1862 that allowed citizens to claim 160 acres of public land if they settled on it for five years. Homestead records can document a family's arrival in a new area.
Household - Everyone living together under one roof as recorded in a census. A household might include extended family, boarders, servants, or farm workers.
I
Immigrant - A person who moves into a country from another. See also: emigrant.
Index - An alphabetical or organized list of names and references that helps researchers locate specific records within a larger collection.
Intestate - Dying without a valid will. When someone dies intestate, the court determines how their estate is distributed according to the law.
Inventory (probate) - A detailed list of a deceased person's belongings and their estimated values, filed with the probate court. Inventories give a vivid picture of how an ancestor actually lived.
K
Kinship - The relationship between people who are connected by blood, marriage, or adoption.
L
Land grant - An official transfer of public land to a private individual, often by a government or colonial authority. Early American land grants are important records for colonial-era research.
Land patent - The original document conveying ownership of land from a government to a private individual. Land patents are often the earliest ownership records for a piece of property.
Legacy - Property left to someone in a will, or more broadly, what a person leaves behind for those who come after them.
Legatee - A person who receives personal property (not real estate) through a will.
Letters testamentary - A court document giving an executor the legal authority to administer a deceased person's estate.
Lineage society - An organization that requires members to prove descent from a specific group of ancestors, such as Revolutionary War soldiers, Mayflower passengers, or colonial settlers. Examples include the DAR, SAR, and Mayflower Society.
M
Manifest - A ship's passenger list, often filed with customs or immigration authorities. Passenger manifests can include names, ages, birthplaces, destinations, and the names of contacts in the new country.
Marriage bond - A document, common before the mid-1800s, in which someone guaranteed that there was no legal obstacle to a marriage taking place.
Marriage register - A church or civil record listing marriages performed within a jurisdiction, sometimes with more detail than a certificate.
Maternal line - Your family line traced through your mother's side.
Matrilineal - Traced or passed down through the mother's line.
Microfilm / Microfiche - Photographic film used to store miniature images of documents. Before digitization, most genealogical records were accessed on microfilm at libraries and archives. Many older records are still only available this way.
Migration - The movement of people from one place to another, either within a country or between countries. Tracing migration patterns helps predict where your ancestors' records might be.
Mortality schedule - A supplemental U.S. census schedule (1850 to 1880) listing people who died in the twelve months before the census was taken. It includes name, age, sex, birthplace, and cause of death.
N
Naturalization - The legal process by which a foreign-born person becomes a citizen. Naturalization records often include detailed biographical information.
Nee - A French word meaning "born as," used to indicate a woman's maiden name. "Mary Smith, nee Jones" means Mary was born Mary Jones.
Nuncupative will - A will spoken aloud, usually on a deathbed, and witnessed by others who later wrote it down. These are more common in older records.
O
Obituary - A published notice of a person's death, often including biographical details and survivors. Obituaries are secondary sources because they rely on information provided by family members.
Original source - The actual, physical record or document itself, as opposed to a transcription, abstract, or index.
Orphan - Historically, this term could refer to a child who had lost just one parent, not necessarily both. Many orphan court records involve children whose father had died but whose mother was still living.
P
Patent - See land patent.
Paternal line - Your family line traced through your father's side.
Patrilineal - Traced or passed down through the father's line.
Pedigree chart - A visual diagram showing a person's direct ancestors, branching backward through parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents. Also called an ancestor chart.
Pension record - Records created when a veteran or their widow applied for a government pension based on military service. Pension files often contain detailed family histories, affidavits, and personal statements.
Plat map - A map showing the division of land into lots or parcels, including the names of owners. Plat maps can place your ancestor physically within their community.
Primary source - A record created at or near the time of the event by someone with direct knowledge of it. A birth certificate signed by the attending physician is a primary source for the birth date. Compare to secondary source.
Probate - The legal process of settling a deceased person's estate, including verifying the will, paying debts, and distributing assets. Probate records are among the richest sources in genealogy.
Proof standard - The level of evidence required before a genealogical conclusion can be accepted as reliable. Genealogical proof requires a thorough search, complete citations, analysis of sources, resolution of conflicts, and a written conclusion.
Q
Quaker records - Records kept by the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), known for their exceptional detail and accuracy. Quaker birth, marriage, and death records are often more complete than government records of the same era.
Quitclaim deed - A deed that transfers whatever interest a person has in a property, without guaranteeing that they actually own it. Quitclaim deeds often appear in family property transfers.
R
Registry of deeds - The local government office responsible for recording and preserving land records.
Relict - An old legal term for a widow or widower. If a document refers to someone as the "relict" of another person, it means the surviving spouse.
Repository - Any place where records are stored and preserved, such as an archive, library, courthouse, or church.
Research log - A record kept by a genealogist of every source they have searched, what they were looking for, and what they found (or did not find). Keeping a research log prevents duplicating effort.
Residence - Where a person was living at a specific point in time. Residence is different from birthplace.
S
SAR - Sons of the American Revolution. The male counterpart to the DAR. Members must prove descent from a Revolutionary War patriot.
Secondary source - A record created after the event occurred, or by someone who did not have firsthand knowledge. An obituary is a secondary source. Secondary sources can still be valuable but should be verified against primary records when possible.
Soundex - A phonetic indexing system that groups surnames that sound alike under the same code. Used for the 1880 through 1930 U.S. federal census indexes. Helpful for finding names that were recorded differently than expected.
Surrogate court - In some U.S. states, the court that handles probate matters. The surrogate is the judge or official who oversees the proceedings.
T
Testate - Dying with a valid will. A person who dies testate has their estate distributed according to the instructions in the will.
Testator / Testatrix - The person who writes and signs a will. Testator is masculine; testatrix is feminine.
Transcription - A word-for-word copy of an original document. Transcriptions can contain errors introduced by the transcriber; always try to verify against the original.
Twelfth-generation ancestor - This term is sometimes used loosely, but in formal numbering, it refers to an ancestor in the twelfth generation back from you, roughly 350 or more years removed.
U
Unindexed record - A record that has not been entered into a searchable name index. Finding names in unindexed records requires browsing through original images page by page.
V
Vital records - Official government records of births, marriages, and deaths. The availability of vital records varies widely by location and time period.
Vital statistics - The data collected through vital records: births, marriages, divorces, and deaths.
W
Widow / Widower - A woman or man whose spouse has died and who has not remarried.
Will - A legal document in which a person states how they want their property distributed after death and names an executor to carry out those wishes.
Witness - A person who signs a document (such as a will or deed) to confirm that they observed it being signed. Witnesses were often neighbors, relatives, or business associates, which can help identify connections.
Works Progress Administration (WPA) - A Depression-era U.S. government agency that employed workers to index and transcribe historical records. WPA indexes, though sometimes containing errors, opened up many records to broader research.
Common Record Types You Will Encounter
Beyond single terms, genealogy research revolves around specific categories of records. Here is a brief overview of the most important ones and what you will typically find in them.
Census Records
Census records are taken at regular intervals by a government to count the population. In the U.S., they were taken every decade starting in 1790. Earlier censuses list only heads of household; later ones name every member of the household with ages, relationships, birthplaces, and more. The 1940 census is currently the most recent one open to the public.
Vital Records
Birth, marriage, and death records are collectively known as vital records. The date when governments began keeping these records varies by country and even by state or county. In the U.S., most states did not require civil registration until the late 1800s or early 1900s. Before that, church records often fill the gap.
Probate Records
Probate records are created when a person's estate is settled after death. They include wills, inventories of possessions, administrator and executor bonds, and final accounting documents. Probate records can name children, grandchildren, in-laws, and other relatives who might not appear anywhere else.
Land Records
Deeds, patents, grants, and plat maps document the ownership and transfer of land. Land records often predate other record types, and because property was valuable, they were carefully kept. In the U.S., the Bureau of Land Management holds original land patent records going back to the founding of the country.
Military Records
Military records include draft registrations, enlistment records, service records, discharge papers, and pension files. Pension files in particular often contain detailed personal history, sworn statements, and family information that goes far beyond what you would find in a census.
Immigration and Naturalization Records
Passenger lists, declarations of intent, petitions for naturalization, and citizenship papers document the journey of immigrants to a new country. These records became increasingly detailed over time. By the early 1900s, passenger manifests were asking for the immigrant's height, eye color, nearest relative in the home country, and who they were going to stay with in the U.S.
Church Records
Before governments required civil registration, churches kept the records. Baptisms, marriages, and burials were recorded in parish registers, sometimes going back hundreds of years. Church records can be held by individual parishes, regional archives, or national collections depending on the denomination and country.
A Note on Source Citation
One of the most important habits in genealogy is citing your sources. Every time you record a fact, you should note exactly where it came from: the name of the record, where it is held, and what it says. This matters for two reasons.
First, it lets you or anyone else go back and verify the information later. Second, it helps you assess how reliable the information is. A birth date recorded on a census forty years after the birth is less reliable than the same date on the original birth certificate. Without a citation, you cannot make that judgment.
The standard reference guide for genealogical citations is "Evidence Explained" by Elizabeth Shown Mills. If you plan to do serious research, it is worth having nearby.
Where the Records Are
Knowing what a term means is one thing. Knowing where to find the actual records is another. Here are the main places genealogical records are held.
FamilySearch.org is a free resource run by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. It holds billions of records and is the single largest free genealogy database in the world.
Ancestry.com is a subscription service with an enormous collection of digitized records, including most U.S. census records, vital records, military records, and immigration records.
The National Archives holds federal records for the United States, including military service records, pension files, naturalization records, and land records.
State archives hold birth, marriage, and death certificates, as well as court records, land records, and legislative records specific to that state.
County courthouses are where many older deed, probate, and court records are still physically held. Some have been digitized; many have not.
Local and regional libraries often maintain local history collections, newspaper archives, cemetery records, and county histories that are not available anywhere else.
The Language Is the Key
Every term in this glossary is a door. Once you know what "intestate" means, you can read a probate record clearly. Once you understand "coverture," you can explain why your great-great-grandmother barely appears in any documents before her husband died. Once you know what "banns" are, you can find marriage evidence in church records even when no certificate exists.
The stories of your family are there. They are in courthouses, churches, ship manifests, pension files, and census rolls. The vocabulary you build now is what lets you read them.
If you want a place to start preserving the stories you already know, that is exactly what Memoracy is for. Every day, you get one prompt. One question worth answering. Over time, those answers become something your family will carry long after you are gone.
Sign up and start your first story on Memoracy today.
