Part of the fun of genealogy is discovering your ancestors. And part of that process is uncovering old records like baptism and marriage records. One record leads to an older record, and so on back in time. What is the oldest record you have ever discovered related to an ancestor?
One of the oldest records I’ve uncovered is a baptismal record for my seventh great-grandfather, Joannis Martin Gossé. He was baptized March 25, 1691 at St. Remi Catholic Church in Baerendorf, Alsace, France.
What makes this record interesting is the signature (or mark) of his father, my eighth great-grandfather, Christian Gossé, seen as a figure-eight symbol at the bottom. Years later in 1717 he used the same symbol to sign this son’s marriage record.
Of course it was not uncommon for people of the era to be illiterate. Records from this time are filled with symbols representing the signatures of parents, brides and grooms.
See the Joannis Martin and Margaretha Gossé family group sheet.
Author: Mike
By way of background, I have over forty years experience as a software engineer. I enjoy genealogy as a hobby, which I started in earnest in 1994. I've always liked family history. Now whenever I uncover some fascinating fact about an ancestor, I also take time to read about that era in history. Whether it be the Napoleonic Wars, the Erie Canal, Steamships, the Port of Hamburg, or hurricane tracks, there's always something new to learn.
By 2000 I published my family tree on the Internet. Unfortunately there were no software tools then that did precisely what I wanted. So I created GED-GEN, a Windows program to automatically generate a genealogy website. It converts a GEDCOM data file to a series of web pages in family group sheet format. Since 2002, people from all over the world have used GED-GEN for their websites.
Today I continue to research my family history, with the help of distant cousins. I am also actively creating digital images of my collection of genealogical evidence.
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