Genealogy for beginners: getting off to a good start

Exploring your family tree is like travelling back in time. With a few clicks you can today find your ancestors in digitised sources - but sooner or later most people hit the same wall: the Gothic script. This guide shows you how to get off to a good start with genealogy, and what to do when the script becomes unreadable.

Start with what you know

Begin with yourself and work backwards: parents, grandparents, great-grandparents. Note down names, years of birth and places. Ask older family members and look for old papers at home - baptism certificates, letters, diaries. Every name and date is a thread you can follow further back.

The most important sources: parish registers and censuses

The backbone of Danish genealogy is the parish registers (baptisms, marriages, burials) and the censuses from 1787 onwards. Most have been digitised and are freely available on the National Archives' Arkivalieronline. The only problem is that the sources from before 1875 are written in Gothic handwriting. Read more about finding your way around them in our article on reading parish registers and censuses.

When the script blocks your way

This is where many people get stuck: the source exists, but the Gothic script cannot be deciphered. You can either learn to read the script yourself - see our guide to deciphering Gothic script - or you can upload a photo of the page to MormorsBreve and get readable text in minutes. Many genealogists use AI to move forward quickly and save their energy for the detective work itself.

Save and share your findings

Enter your findings into a genealogy program or a simple chart, and always save a reference to the source. That way you - and your descendants - can always find your way back. And remember: behind every name there is a person and a story. A single deciphered letter can tell you more about an ancestor than ten dates.