The show “YOU!” research how to build your family tree and determine how many Latvian genes we have

HERE! In the plot, the church of Dace Dom in Krustej, in search of the coats of arms of the old families, talks to the heraldic expert Edgars Sims about the family crests and their meaning. Sims still deals with family crests today, researching family history, surnames, values, occupation and other information, but this tradition of creating such crests, of course, came from the German nobility. But nowadays there is no shortage of people in Latvia who order the coats of arms of their families. “It is a symbol that will remain for many generations. It’s a myth that the crest is for nobles only, “says Edgars Sims.

In the National Archives of the State of Latvia, the documents through which people search for their ancestors and create family trees are studied. On average, a person in Latvia can study about six generations of his family. That means 125 to 250 people, says family tree researcher Agnese Luse in the Dacian archive. “Who studied all these direct ancestors?” rhetorically about the claim that someone is a pure Latvian, asks the researcher.

Agnese Lūse admits that very different peoples have lived in the territory of present-day Latvia and the fact that they have decided to speak Latvian determines nationality rather than ethnic origin.

And also a conversation with the translator and writer Raimonds Auškāpas about his family tree and its meaning. Auškāps studied her family history and shares a beautiful personal story about her grandmother, who is Russian but raised three children to become Latvians.

Watch!” on TV3 every Wednesday at 9.45pm, but all program recordings are available “TV3Play” here.

The program is produced by “VFS Films” and the project is co-financed by the Media Support Fund from funds from the Latvian state budget. “HERE!” the Latvian Investment and Development Agency is the partner. Supporters of the program include the Latvian State Film and Photographic Document Archive and the Latvian National Library, M50, Radio SWH, co-producers “Kultfilma” and “Zebra”.