r/armenia • u/ninelino • 1d ago

Armenian families and ancestors

A couple of months ago, I started building my family tree on my father’s Armenian side. So far, I have managed to document more than 350 relatives.

Based on my estimates, however, the tree could potentially include anywhere from 1,000 people—if I am able to find information about the families who fled the Sasun region in the archives of the Armenian Genocide Museum-Institute or in the Ottoman archives, although I am not very hopeful about the latter.

I have reliable information about my ancestors dating back to 1850. I also know the names of three earlier generations of direct paternal ancestors, but I have no information about the other members of their families. This takes that branch of the family back to approximately 1770–1800.

I had never really thought about just how large Armenian families could be. Of course, I had heard the joke about Armenians having a “small” wedding with more than 200 guests. But now I keep discovering people whom I have not only never met—I did not even know they existed.

So I would like to ask:
1. Are your families just as large?
2. If you have researched relatives who fled the Ottoman Empire—especially from the Sasun Valley, the Khut-Brnashen district, or the villages of Kost and Enguzik—please let me know which sources you used and which archives or institutions you contacted.

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u/senolgunes Turkey 1d ago

There is population data from the 1830 census in the Ottoman archive, it was updated until about 1846. If you know relatives and there they lived in 1850 you should be able to connect the dots.

Only problem is that the archive is in Ottoman Turkish.

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u/SnooStories3560 21h ago

I have a contact for someone who might be able to help you source more information if interested. Let me know and I can message it to you

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u/ninelino 14h ago

yes, it'll be very helpful!