Where are all these ancestors ?

Question

I have 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents etc. You get the picture. I worked out that if you go back 50 generations (in other words to the time of the first Anglo Saxon settlers in the British Isles) I should be able to pick out trillions and trilions of ancestors. Just try doubling the number 50 times, Excel can't even display the number.
But there weren't that many people in the world at that time, so... what happened to all my ancestors ??

Answer 1

Hey Gav,

Good question - the powers of two are overwhelming. If you go back 50 generations, you would be descendant from more people than there are on earth. How can that be? Well, your tree collapses many many many times. 3rd cousin marriages, etc will divide it by two. This happens so often, we don't recognize it.

Answer 2

ok.. most of them are probably in cemeteries, although some mgith be resting in an urn on Aunt Martha's fireplace mantel. Some will have been put in a hole in the back pasture, but the stone got lost and they have been plowed around. At least one might have been on a pirate ship that sank.
LOL... you pushed my funny button this morning.
Most researchers understand that they can go back just so far, before valid RECORDS run out. Unless you were royalty, no one had much interest in keeping track of new babies or people dying. It was all they could do to feed the ones that were around. Pre birth control, parents often had families of 12 or more children. And of course, mid 40's was beyond what many people were expected to live.
And yes, there is intermarriage on a very broad scale. I really freaked my own daughter out the other night...am doing my son in law's research, and stumbled into something which is more common than thought... they share a common ancestor/ family from early Virginia. My present husband and ex husband were not raised at all in the same area, but both trace back to one ancestor (again in Virginia).. which means my children are distant cousins to their step father.
If you simply use Virginia as example..there were limited immigrants that are the "core" for many American descendents. With THOUSANDS of descendents, it is understandable that many will eventually bump into each other and marry, without knowing that they come from a common ancestor. Use that just as an analogy, then extend that back many generations.
But there's the fun of it for me, a never ending crossword puzzle.. every time I reach one ancestor, it opens up a new line to follow. I have to chuckle at some here who want one web site, to get their entire family tree by just typing in their name.. ok, they are "done", now what? They are missing the fun and the process. It's like going out for dinner once.. and saying, ok, I've done that, now I don't have to eat ever again.
If your research takes you back to the 1500's, you are doing great. By that time, many people are so hooked on the searching that they grab someone walking by, and look for their ancestors. Kinda like what I do here.

Answer 3

in a pedigree analysis you have to get the single strain of your family.... the lineage that only give the straight source of your family... and discarding the lateral or branch that evolve in the lineage..... We sometimes called it stripping... it is true that when you have to get all the entries from the sisters and brothers of the upper generation then it will just branch out into a spread with nonbeneficial entries.

Answer 4

Actually your ancestors are for more than your direct ancestors, grandparents, great grandparents, etc etc.
All of the your family in the generations that have gone before you are your ancestors. They are Linear Ancestors.
I am a direct descendant of my gggrandparents but a descendant of a lot more people in their generation.

Answer 5

I suppose the high infant mortality rate and the low life expectancy at that time would have dramatically decreased the population but if you say trillions then I have no idea.

Answer 6

Time is what keeps everything from happening at once.