Pakistani-Canadian Woman Shares Her Family Tree Tracing Roots To The Mughals

With the proliferation of nuclear families, our circles have become smaller. It won’t be inaccurate to say that most people can only trace their lineage to their great-grandparents.

But not too long ago, families would document their ancestry through handmade family trees dating back centuries. Recently, a Pakistani-Canadian shared one such handmade chart that traced her family tree to the Mughals. She shared photos of this detailed family tree on X. The post got over 1.4 million views since it was shared on Tuesday.

In the follow-up posts, the X user wrote that the family tree was made by her grandfather’s eldest brother. Since he is now very old and unwell, he cannot recall the process of making it. She added that he “travelled quite a bit” to research their ancestry and to confirm all details before adding them.

An X user described this family documentation as “So beautiful and important and impressive! A rare treasure.”

Someone wrote, “This used to be way more common back in the day. I also have a bunch of BOOKS just detailing family lineage back hundreds of years (~ 600 ad or so) it includes the children both male and female. I want to say it’s more common in subcontinent people but idk if the Arabs still do it.”

Another person wrote, “The families who come from a great history remember and commemorate their lineage, this is so awesome though. Everyone should certainly try and hold onto their genealogical trees, top marks to whoever did the work to compile this, my family tree goes back to Humayun.”

An X user shared they also have similar family records and recalled, “We had this too. The patwari lost all records in a fire! My uncle was very sad about this! All villages used to hold such records dating back centuries.”

Some people also lamented they do not have written information about their lineage and they only depend on the memory of their elderly family members. Making this point, an X user wrote, “Damn my grandparents don’t even remember anything of their grandparents apart from their name and some other facts about their lives.”

Another person wrote, “I’m so jealous of people that have such an extensive family tree documented. my family tree only goes to my great-grandparents.”

These days, many take the DNA Ancestry Test to trace their roots and learn about their genetic makeup.

The DNA kits just require one to swap their cheek on a q-tip like tool and that’s all.