5/26/14

Matrilineality

Matrilineality is a system in which descent is traced through the mother and maternal ancestors.  It is also a societal system in which one belongs to one's mother's lineage, which can involve the inheritance of property and or titles.

A matriline is a line of descent from a female ancestor to a descendant of either sex in which the individuals in all intervening generations are mothers...a mother line.  In a matrilineal descent system an individual is considered to belong to the same descent group as her or his mother.  This matrilineal descent pattern is in contrast to the more common pattern of patrilineal descent from which a family name is usually derived.

My Great Great Grandfather Rene Marion's matrilineal line to the Napier Family Tree was two generations of females which included his mother Francis Stone Pittman and his Grandmother Julia Napier Stone.  This matriline of research converts to patrilineal research with Mary Julia Napier Stone's father and Rene Marion's namesake...Rene Napier. 

This Napier Patriarch line of research and documentation for Tracks of My Scottish Ancestors
continues through Rene's 14th Great Grandfather Alexander Napier.
I hope you will enjoy the climb up the Napier Family Tree with the story entitled...
Revealed there...
The Etymology and Historical Origin of the name Rene

3 comments:

  1. This kind of thing has always interested me. I don't know my father besides a name and have always wondered how hard it would be trace back through that line.

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  2. Sounds like you could be a member of Colonial Dames - nscdaga.org/

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  3. Matrilineality makes sense. Aside from babies being switched at birth, you can be sure who the mother is. Not always true when it comes to the father.

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