The Works

Lineage scrolls and yichus sefarim,
and how a commission proceeds.

Two kinds of work leave this studio. Both begin in the archives and end as a single object made for one family. What follows sets out what each contains, how a commission proceeds from a first conversation to delivery, and what has been made so far.

The lineage scroll — מגילת יוחסין

A scroll sets a family’s whole line out at once, to be installed and read. It is made for a room — a chasunah, a family gathering, a wall at home — where people stand in front of it and find themselves on it.

Every scroll carries the date of birth and the yahrzeit where they are known, and a generation count beside each person, so that a reader can see at a glance how far back a line runs and where they stand within it. The tree is drawn and set by hand rather than generated, and printed once, to museum standard, on stock intended to last.

A surname index can be added where a tree is large enough that finding a particular family within it would otherwise take time.

The yichus sefer — ספר יחוס

A sefer is for documentation rather than display: a hardcover volume, bound to be kept on a shelf, opened, and handed on. It carries the same tree, with the same dates and generation counts, and then everything a scroll has no room for.

That means comprehensive footnotes citing the source behind each connection, and Hebrew translations of the vital records the line rests on — birth, marriage and death registers, often in the language of whichever authority kept them.

Where a family wants them, a sefer can also carry indexes of names, surnames, sefarim, yahrzeiten and towns; an archival facsimile section reproducing the documents themselves alongside ancestor portraits and gravestone photographs; and a leather binding.

How a commission proceeds

1. Initial review. A conversation, to understand the family, the work intended, and what material is already held. Some families arrive with a great deal; others with a name and a town.
2. Scope estimate. An estimate is prepared, as accurately as the information allows, of the likely size of the final tree and the work required to reach it.
3. Research. The main stage. Further details may be asked for as the work develops, and significant findings are shared as they emerge rather than held back to the end.
4. Planning and production. Once the research is complete the work is planned as a scroll, a sefer, or both, and proceeds through design, layout, printing, presentation and delivery.

Where a line needs specialist research to complete — a particular archive, a particular language — suitable researchers can be engaged as an additional service.

Preliminary research

Some families cannot be scoped without research first: there is not yet enough on the table to say how large the tree will prove or how far it will run. In those cases research is done in blocks. After each block the findings are reported and a recommendation given as to whether further research is advisable.

This buys research time and assessment. It does not promise that a particular connection will be found — no honest researcher can promise that. Where the work does proceed to a full commission, what has been found shapes the scope and structure of it.

On sources

First-hand sources where they exist. Reliable sources where they are needed. Anything that cannot be verified does not enter the work — not as a footnote, not as a dotted line, not as a family tradition set down as fact. A tree is only worth the sources beneath it, and a scroll hanging at a chasunah will be read by people who know the family.

On scale

A tree’s size is settled by what the archives yield, not by what the paper will hold. Works that have left this studio run from a few hundred names to more than sixteen hundred: 825 male ancestors on one scroll, 1,250 on the Megillah built into the mechitzah at a Lakewood chasunah, 1,400 and 1,650 on others.

A thousand names is a large undertaking but not an unusual one. What governs it is the depth of the lines rather than the number itself — a family documented eight generations back on every branch passes a thousand people without strain, while one with two well-recorded branches and six that stop at a great-grandfather does not. Past roughly a thousand names a surname index earns its place, and the choice between scroll and sefer stops being a matter of taste: a sefer holds the footnotes and the records a scroll has no room for.

Questions asked

Can one studio do both the research and the design?

Yes, and that is how the work here is done. The research and the drawing are not handed between two firms: the same studio that traces a line sets it. Where a particular archive or language needs a specialist, a researcher is engaged for that part and the work stays under one roof.

How many names can a Hebrew family tree hold?

There is no fixed ceiling. Finished works run past 1,650 ancestors. Beyond about a thousand names a surname index is added so a reader can find a particular family without searching the whole tree.

How long does a large tree take?

Research is the long stage, and its length depends on the family rather than the format. Findings are reported as they emerge rather than held to the end, and where a family cannot yet be scoped, research is done in blocks with a recommendation after each as to whether going further is advisable.

Should a large family tree be a scroll or a book?

A scroll is made to be installed and read in a room — at a chasunah, at a gathering, on a wall at home. A sefer is made to be kept, opened and handed on, and carries what a scroll cannot: footnotes citing the source behind each connection, Hebrew translations of the vital records, indexes, and an archival facsimile section. Some families commission both.

What is needed to begin?

Whatever is held. Some families arrive with a great deal — documents, photographs, an existing tree; others with a name and a town. The first stage is a conversation to establish which, and what the finished work is meant to be.

Each work is scoped individually according to its material, the depth of research, its format and finish — and is prepared as a single, unrepeated object. By appointment; each enquiry is read personally.

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