Discovering Sephardic Roots with DNA and Records

If you know, or suspect, your family has Sephardic Jewish roots and you want to trace their origins, it can be hard to know where to begin. Sephardic Jews have resided in numerous countries around the Mediterranean, in North Africa, and in the Middle East.

Even if you have the name of a city where your ancestors may have lived, it can be difficult to start your search because many countries have changed names or borders, and immigrants often listed large cities as their birthplaces instead of the less prominent villages. As well, many Jews kept their religious identity secret out of fear of discrimination.

Now, though, it’s easier than ever to start this search with the AncestryDNA^® release of new Middle East ancestral journeys. Your DNA results, along with access to billions of historical records on Ancestry^®, can jumpstart your research. In the 72 new Middle East groups that reflect different ancestral journeys, you’ll find several that reflect paths taken by people of Sephardic Jewish descent and that can spur your own discoveries.

Discover Sephardic Roots Among Your AncestryDNA^® Middle East Ancestral Journeys

Recently a client shared her AncestryDNA test results with me and excitedly told me that her family story, passed down over many generations that said she was a Sephardic Jew, was now proven. Part of her family was from Eastern Europe, and she knew a lot about them. But, the Sephardic story had always been a question. So, she took an AncestryDNA test to see if it could help her discover more about her Sephardic history. Her results seemed to confirm the story of her Sephardic heritage. Now she needed help to figure out more. 

How can you find out more? As is the case with all genealogical research, start with what you know and follow the clues in the records.

Learn Your Ancestor’s Personal Stories by Exploring Ancestry Records

My client identified her great-grandmother Sara* as probably being Sephardic. The family thought she came to the U.S. in the early part of the twentieth century, but didn’t know when she arrived, where she came from, the names of her parents or siblings.

Through a search in Ancestry records of ship passenger lists, we were  able to find the date of Sara’s arrival in the U.S. and the name of the ship on which she arrived. She arrived in 1910 and the ship manifest (like the one pictured below) included her last residence as Angora, Turkey, where her mother Ester still lived. Angora, now known as Ankara, is the capital of Turkey. The manifest also listed the relative Sara was joining, her brother Jacob in Manhattan, New York.