A pedigree chart is a diagram of your direct ancestors — and only them. You (or whoever the chart is for) sit at the left; one step right are your two parents; then four grandparents, eight great-grandparents, doubling with each generation. No siblings, no cousins, no in-laws: just the straight lines of descent.

Pedigree chart vs. family tree

The words get used interchangeably, but the chart is the stricter instrument. A family tree can include everyone — siblings, spouses, descendants, the whole orchard. A pedigree chart answers exactly one question: who do you descend from? That discipline is why researchers reach for it first — it shows at a glance which lines are documented and which aren’t. (For the related idea of a single documented line, see what is a family lineage.)

How to read one

  • Fathers upper, mothers lower — each person’s paternal line continues on the upper branch, maternal on the lower, by convention.
  • Each slot carries the vitals — name, with birth, marriage, and death dates and places as known.
  • Women appear under maiden names — the chart records who people were born as; married names hide the line you’re trying to follow.

The blank spaces are information

An honest pedigree chart has empty slots — the ancestors not yet proven. Those blanks are the research agenda: each one names exactly what’s missing. Be wary of any chart with every slot confidently filled; completeness that outruns the records is usually borrowed from someone else’s unverified tree. In our own reports, a slot without evidence stays blank — the blank is the truthful statement.

From chart to story

The chart is the skeleton; the point is what hangs on it. A Sapling report pairs the chart — as an interactive tree you can explore and a printed pedigree built for keeping — with the researched narrative of the people in it. See both in the sample report, or start with a free assessment and we’ll tell you how much of your chart the records can fill.

Sapling.Family is a family-history research service led by Professor Cisco Bradley, a historian at Pratt Institute. Every project begins with a free assessment of your family’s records. Browse all our guides, or explore a complete sample report.