Photos: Do ancestors resemble living relatives?

7 Dec 20126 comments

Ever heard someone say "he looks just like his father"? What about,"he looks just like his great-great-great-grandfather"?

I recently found an old family photo of one of my ancestors and noticed a striking similarity with a living relative.

When looking at old ancestral photos, I've always had a sense of familiarity. I notice a certain family resemblance to living relatives, such as their physical features or just their facial expressions.

Photographer Ulric Collette's "genetic portraits" takes this concept to a new level. Ulric merges photos of relatives and shows how alike some family members look.

MyHeritage's look-alike meter helps people answer that age-old question as to whether they look more like their mother or father.

Have you found an old family photo and noticed a resemblance between those in the photo and your living relatives?

Let us know in the comments below.

Posted by Aaron on December 7th, 2012 - 05:32

Tagged as: Family, Family History, look-alike, MyHeritage, myheritage.com, old family photos, photographs, photos, resemblance

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Dorothy
December 7th, 2012 - 16:20
Yes that is very true, the resemblance carries on through the generations.
Joyce Patton
December 7th, 2012 - 20:09
Not only have I found old photo's, I have met several of my younger relatives that look extremely similar to older relatives that are no longer alive that I knew during their lifetimes.
Mary Sitterly
December 8th, 2012 - 00:03
Yes, this is one hundred percent true. Looking though old family pictures of the early 1930's I found three pictures that I could have sworn they were of me. Not being born until the 1940's those pictures could not of been of me. Oh, I certainly look my mother, since the other photos in the 1950's matched the ones in the 1930's. Actually, if the dates were not on the pictures you would have never known. The same was true when my son asked my mother were did you get this picture of my son? My mother said that picture is a picture of your brother. Yes, the dates answered that question too.
Alice Rose Archer
December 8th, 2012 - 20:46
yes, i have .. but, my cousin passed away in 2008 .. our 2nd great grandfather and my cousin looked exactly like twins .. i found my 2nd great grandfather's picture on a website about the arizona project .. this surprised me because he lived in ohio .. technology is great .. i am now looking for more pictures of my ancestors so i can compare them with younger and living family members.
Otto Davidsson
December 9th, 2012 - 16:05
Hi!
Yes, as a matter of fact I look like my grandfather´s uncle at a certain age, and he was born in 1842. He was later the only swedish painter that has recieved the gold award at the Paris exhibition (1886). So, the resemblance was made by my relatives - not me!
Smadar Belkind Gerson
December 14th, 2012 - 02:52
I have found many remarkable resemblances. I think the most striking one is one of my second-great-grandmother. I have a very powerful almost erie photo of her. Her face is scared with pox marks, but her eyes are striking. The amazing thing is that I have her eyes. That's the first thing everyone says when they see that photo. You can check out the photo on my blog at A Photo Worth A Thousand Words http://bit.ly/Kx1WW3