Jun 26th, 2009

How is a village made?

I’ve been homing in on a village in Lanarkshire where four generations of my Somerville ancestors lived.

As it was a small village (around 500 people in the 1850s and possibly less than that in earlier centuries), it’s possible to get a fair overall view of who lived there and how the village families were inter-related.  I did a blanket search for Somerville BMDs 1538-1854 in the Old Parish Records on scotlandspeople and came to the conclusion that this family (or families) must have made up a majority of the population for nigh on two centuries. The records, by the way,  date back to a little before the Scottish Reformation and end as national registration takes over from the parish records.

As for women marrying (more…)