Top To Bottom

      Starting at the very top of my Jones family tree is JA-1. Remember, capital "J" stands for Jones, capital "A" stands for the first generation from the top, and the number (#) 1 labels the first individual.  Following this system, each individual receives a distinct code which can be utilized to keep all the branches somewhat in order.  So here goes...

      The very first grandfather is Gadforch. What a name to begin the branches. There are various spellings of this name which you will find is often the case going down the many branches. In the Welsh, Cad means war, and this generation was certainly facing many conflicts. He would have lived around the same time as the Viking raids were hitting the north west shores of Wales. War(forch) would certainly be an appropriate title. I have been unable to find a meaning of "forch" (farch, varch, or vorch) but war-something- must be the title.

      It would not be correct to suggest that when doing genealogy one begins at the top of the family tree. The reality is that one begins at the very bottom. You start with yourself, then to your folks, and then to the oldest known in the family. In my case, this story (starting from the bottom) is told from my early age of nine years in this very blog, "The Jones Genealogist". If interested in how things got started you can scroll down using the columns to the right of this screen. Identify the colorful pictures of the "Followers". Then scroll down to "Featured Post", and then to what is titled "Blog Archives". Now from here 2023, you scroll down to year 2010 and click onto a monthly column of posts for that year. Scroll down to the first month shown (July), to a post dated July 7, 2010. It is titled "50 Years of Genealogy"! Wow, if you have gotten to this point you show signs of a real tree climber.

      Anyway, the first document of Cadfarch (spelled differently from above) is found in the classic Welsh genealogical text by Lewys Dwnn p. xv. The inside cover page of my copy follows. Much more will be said regarding the top of my Jones family tree.

      Top to bottom, or bottom to top, tree climbing in any direction, it is.