Alessandro Lavopa: “Every family has an extraordinary story in its past”

One can amuse oneself with artificial intelligence and even step into the shoes of an ancient Roman commander such as General Robertus Vannaccius. But until the time machine is invented, there is only one way to truly unlock the hermetic door to one’s personal past: genealogical research into historical documents. Whereas people used to consult archives in search of supposed noble ancestry, today they do so out of a growing curiosity to find out where we come from, since the question of ‘where we are going’ remains the undisputed domain of clairvoyants. Interest in genealogical research, which is well established in countries such as the United States and France, is also spreading in Italy. This is evidenced by the ‘Portale antenati’ (Ancestors Portal), launched by the Ministry of Culture in 2011, and is borne out by Alessandro Lavopa, born in Bari in 1986, who founded the ‘Storie di famiglia’ (Family Stories) project eight years ago, through which he explores the past to trace his ancestors, chart their lives and reconstruct a family tree as far back as possible.

It may serve practical or administrative purposes, or fulfil a search for identity in a world that is increasingly fluid and uncertain about the future. Almost all of us knew our grandparents, yet we almost always remain unaware of even their grandparents’ names, even though they probably held them in their arms and helped shape them. On reflection, therefore, the thread linking us to our great-great-grandparents is not as distant as it might seem: knowing where they were born and died, when they married, and what they did for a living sheds light on our past and holds fascinating stories, even if those ancestors were mere farmers. Even the most ordinary lives can be extraordinary: simply discovering that someone survived childhood and went on to have children – unlike several of their siblings who died in infancy – is in itself a marvellous adventure.

Access to documents. This applies both to local councils, from which it is not possible to request a full copy of a birth certificate for historical purposes, and to the National Archives, where the documents may not have been deposited or digitised. Now the procedure has become even more complicated because the archives have introduced a hefty fee for remote searches, whilst many small local authorities in the north-east, overwhelmed by requests for registry records from people of Italian descent, are charging up to 300 euros per document instead of seeking a solution. In this way, they discourage applications, yet pass on delays and inefficiencies to users.

Of all kinds. A significant proportion comes from abroad and is what fuels ‘roots tourism’ amongst the descendants of emigrants keen to trace their origins. I also work with a number of firms specialising in probate genealogy to trace any relatives in the event of unclaimed inheritances. I advise anyone who receives an email of this sort to check it carefully before deleting it as a scam. It might even be genuine.

More than five hundred in eight years. Initially, I did not anticipate that it would become a steady source of income, but the activity has gradually expanded, even though I still operate more in the spirit of a freelancer than an entrepreneur. I am a genealogist with a background in history.

I completed my studies in Paris, earning a postgraduate degree from the École des hautes études en sciences sociales and another in archival science from the École nationale des chartes. Seeking experience in a very different setting, I seized the opportunity to work at the departmental archives of the French Antilles and spent almost three years in Martinique. Had I opted for an internship in Paris, I would probably have been captivated by the city’s charm; instead, being so far away, I found myself longing to return to Bari, where I had left my parents.

As a child on holiday, I visited a castle and wondered how many people had lived there and what stories lay hidden within those walls. At university, I enrolled in History despite everyone telling me that a degree in that subject would be of little use, as the prevailing mindset was that of a ‘practical degree’. I would, however, advise every student to pursue what they enjoy: within my own discipline alone, few would have foreseen the role of a successful populariser of history, let alone that of a genealogist, even though in France genealogical research was already a pastime almost as widespread as gardening. It could become so in Italy too: exploring the past is an engaging pursuit because it is full of surprises.

The case of Pope Leo XIV, with the discovery that his paternal grandfather was of Sicilian origin, was called Giovanni Riggitano and changed his surname to Prevost due to a troubled romantic affair. We never know what a family tree might reveal. Curiosities lurk in every nook and cranny, and the list of ancestors doubles with every generation: by the tenth generation, there are theoretically more than a thousand, and if we were to go further back, we might discover that an enemy of ours is actually a cousin. In reality, however, tracing one’s lineage back as far as the mid-16th century is already an exceptional achievement.

Every birth certificate, every baptism certificate is a time machine.