There is a veritable explosion of new genealogy websites, with data reaching far back into antiquity. And the further back you go, the higher the probability of common ancestors. Thanks to several newly discovered websites, I was able to trace the ancestry of my great-grandmother Anne Samuelsdatter (which I share with the Samuelson’s, and with all descendants of Isaac, Louise, and Axel Larson) back to the earliest Norwegian settlement of Iceland, in the 800′s AD, and beyond, to kings of Kvenland (Finland) dating to the 200′s!
These sites do not give their sources, and none claim to be 100% reliable, but a quick search about Icelandic and Finnish history reveals several documents containing that kind of information. Of course, any documents about facts that old were written centuries after the fact, transcribed from oral tradition such as songs, poems, stories, and legends. For now, I am accepting the data, adding 50 generations to the Samuelson pedigree. Altogether, I added well over 100 names, all direct ancestors of the relatives mentioned earlier and myself. I am looking for a good way to display this info. The pedigree charts I have been putting up only cover about 5 generations.
Here are the sites: Øyer Genealogy, hosted by the Krabol farm, has exhaustive listings for all of Øyer parish. From the “father of the Samuelson’s,” Samuel Jorgensen Bjerke, back to Kolbein Harildstad (c. 1310- c. 1360), this was my source. A Google search of Kolbein Harildstad led me to a tree on Geni.com, then on to Jamie Allen‘s excellent site, and finally to a beautiful one on the Kings of Kvenland.
Speaking of shared ancestors, it turns out that Isaac Larson and his wife Anna Moen shared a common 11th great-grandfather, one Ivar Kolbeinsen Harildstad (c. 1350- c. 1394), of Fron Parish, Gudbrandsdalen. That makes Isaac and Anna 12th cousins. They could be even closer, because the 100-200 names I traced are only about 10% of the mathematically necessary ancestors. It so happens that Ivar is also the one with ancestors both among Icelandic settlers and Finnish royalty.
More of the data itself soon.
