FREE 4+ Large Family Tree Samples in MS Word | Google Docs | Pages | PDF

Have you turned down a family reunion invitation to avoid enduring awkward introductions and handshakes of families you’ve never seen your entire life? Have you never met any of your cousins? Estranged family members and unknown relatives are a common scene in any household. However, there’s a great joy and pride in knowing the rest of your family other than the ones you share your roof with. You can start your research and have a large family tree This helps you get to know your surname’s origin, ethnicity, and history so you can have a better understanding of your identity. Read more about family trees below.

Have you turned down a family reunion invitation to avoid enduring awkward introductions and handshakes of families you’ve never seen your entire life? Have you never met any of your cousins? Estranged family members and unknown relatives are a common scene in any household. However, there’s a great joy and pride in knowing the rest of your family other than the ones you share your roof with. You can start your research and have a large family tree This helps you get to know your surname’s origin, ethnicity, and history so you can have a better understanding of your identity. Read more about family trees below.

4+ Large Family Tree Samples

1. Large Family Tree Template

2. Free Large Family Tree Template

3. Free Printable Large Family Tree Template

4. Sample Fitzgeralds Family Tree

5. Fourth Generation Large Family Tree

What Is a Large Family Tree?

A family tree is a visual illustration that presents a person’s lineage. Also known as a pedigree chart, this tree diagram documents family’s relationships and connections along with other details such as the place of birth, birthdate, and the date of death to help each member understand their familial background better.

Why Trace Your Lineage

Did you know that the largest family tree in the world consists of 13 million individuals? Yes, it’s crazy big with a lineage tracing back more than five centuries ago. Using the data through Geni.com, a popular genealogy site, computational geneticist Yaniv Erlich made 5.3 million family trees, the largest one having more than 13 million individuals.

This posits an integral question: why trace your family lineage? If you barely know anyone above your great grandparents’ name, why is it important to identify them? Here are some reasons why you should track your lineage:

1. It establishes your identity. Determining your roots and knowing the ones that came before can help you build your identity and lets you realize who you are and how several interwoven stories came together to have you.

2. The next generation can inherit this knowledge. Collecting information in completing your family tree chart is valuable knowledge that you can pass down to generation after generations.

3. It reinforces old traditions. You’ll find out interesting and forgotten family traditions that you can share and celebrate with the current generation.

4. It solidifies family connections. If you’ve been estranged from some of your family members, tracing your lineage allows you to identify and connect with them, bridging the gaps and establishing relationships that were not given attention to for many years.

5. It brings honor to the past. Identifying the generations that came before you also means learning their stories and understanding their sacrifices to bring your generation to life. This boosts your sense of family pride and motivates you to emulate their values and strength for your children and the generation that will come after them.

How to Organize a Large Family Tree

Creating large family trees can be tricky. Here are some tips on how you can make it:

1. Decide on the Number of Generations

Start the process by identifying how far back do you want your family tree to trace. Do you want to limit it up to your great-great grandfather’s name or go all the way back to the Renaissance? Besides deciding how many decades you plan to include on your chart, you might also want to know how detailed you want your family tree to be. Do you want to only the names, birthdates, and the death years? Perhaps you want to include addresses and interesting facts? To help you decide which choice to make, identify your sources. Determine if your family has a broad knowledge about your lineage or if you have the right people to call or visit for information. 

2. Do the Draft

Don’t start organizing your family tree just yet. After you’ve completed all individuals on every layer of your diagram, organize a draft of your layout. This might be challenging if your clan’s composed of numerous family members and a long line of descendants. Through your draft, create an outline of how you’ll arrange your details. Experiment with different structures and choose which fits your family tree best. Aside from putting the structure together, you also need to decide how you’ll incorporate your details on the layout.

3. Divide Generations by Layers

When organizing your family tree, aim to divide generation after generation into different layers. This is why it’s important to do a draft first to decide how you’ll fit an entire generation in a single line of your layout. The purpose of this is to identify the different individuals in a particular generation. The division also helps your audience understand your presentation better. This contributes to your family tree’s quality significantly.

4. Keep It Simple

Avoid complicating your layout with too many design elements in hopes of having a creative family tree design. Your primary goal should be to make your family genogram’s data comprehensible to its audience. If you want to make it visually appealing, be consistent with your shapes and spaces. Make sure that your tree shapes are not too close or too far from each other. You also need to arrange the text neatly and in uniform placements all over your illustration. If you want to apply color, use shades that won’t cover the details or distract the audience from interpreting the data.

FAQ

If there’s anything worth your time studying and researching, nothing comes close to your family. It’s not only a way to help you identify who they are and their stories, but you’ll also understand who you and where you came from in a more in-depth manner. You’ll also feel closer than you ever were to the rest of your family. Stat your genealogy project with our high-quality large family tree templates. Download now!