Genealogy Research in Italy

The town of origin is the most important piece of information needed to begin your research of Italian ancestry. Genealogy records are not indexed for Italy, as a whole, yet. It is important to know the town of origin for an immigrant ancestor so that the records of that town can be studied.

Usually, the hardest thing to do in the research process is to determine of precise town of origin for an immigrant ancestor. In fact, it is often more difficult than adding four or five new generations to the pedigree once the location is known. Once the name of the immigrant ancestor's town of origin is known, then there are several resources to help determine more about the records that will benefit your ancestral pursuits.

However, if the town of origin for the immigrant ancestor is not known, then the next steps in research will vary quite a bit. Unfortunately, there are no indexed sources allowing an Italy-wide searches for inhabitants or for surnames. Although emigration resources and a variety of records from families living in Italy today can aid the researcher, interviews with family members and a careful search of all sources in the United States (or other country of final residence) are the greatest help in finding clues to a precise location in Italy. Immigration records, naturalization, and even culturally-oriented church records can also be of tremendous value.