Relations, relations!

How related are your parents? The answer might surprise you if they are Portuguese. Most often, they were born, married and died in the same town or even parish. And so, many of the marriage records contain reference to church dispensation. In other words, the bride and groom were allowed by the church to marry, and furthermore, it will mention the degree of kinship.

This interesting tidbit of information can also break "brick walls", as it did in one case for me. I had a direct ancestor whose father was listed as "unknown" in his baptism record. This is quite a common occurrence, when the parents were unmarried and the father, usually due to differences in social class, did not want to assume paternity officially. In my case, in all subsequent records, his surnames pointed his paternity to a specific prominent family in the village. It was when I found the marriage of one of my ancestor's grandson's who married a great-granddaughter of the person I thought to have the greatest probability of being his biological father, that this was confirmed 100%. This bride and groom were "dispensed" in the second and fourth degree of kinship. By doing the math, I finally had confirmation and could then continue to grow that branch of the family.

And so, again, we have to be thankful for these records which contain such invaluable information.