subject: Tracing Your Irish Family History [print this page] All the information that you will gather are useful, and you will need to take note of these. To trace your Irish family history, there are two pieces of information that are very pertinent the townland and the religion of your ancestors. The townland is the place or village where they used to reside in. regarding their religion, you will be able to know which parish they attended when you have this information. Those who registered in the parishes can still access their data locally and at the parish if still available.
One of the places where you can gather accurate data about your Irish family history is the parish where your ancestors were registered. However, you first need to check if this parish still exists until this date. These parishes kept their baptismal data, marriage certificates, and burial records. However, there might be gaps in their records if these were not maintained before. You have to be patient in checking these ones and also, you need to be very keen so that you will not miss any important data listed in there. You can also ask the priests and vicars, should you want to clarify any information that you have found. They are available to help you in tracing your Irish family history.
When finding the records for your Irish family history, you can rely on the International Genealogical Index (IGI). This website is free and it contains church record collections. You can find here records on the births, marriages and deaths of Irish citizens if their parish has agreed to share their data with them. Most of the data you will find here are regarding baptismal data. The facts and figures here are pretty much reliable, since these were all fully transcribed. You will not need to wordy about the spellings especially when it comes to the places. However, not all parishes in Ireland have records on this website. If the parish you are looking for is not available, then you will have to check on your other options so that you may trace your Irish family history. Another site that you can search on when tracing your Irish family history is the IFHF.
They have an extensive database on Irish births, marriages and deaths. However, viewing a record will require some fees. When searching here, you have to be precise about the data you are entering so that you will find what you are looking for.
You can also do some search for your Irish family history at the National Archives of Ireland and the National Library of Ireland. These can be accessed for free unlike the other websites. There is also Irelands network of Heritage Centers which is under the IFHF. This will have data on each county, and will either do your own search or pay an individual to do that for you. That would be your own choice.
