Professional Sephardic Genealogist

My name is David Mendoza. I am a professional Sephardic Jewish genealogist working in London. I have also lived in Portugal, Brazil and Israel.

I am president of the Sephardic Genealogical Society and co-host of the weekly Sephardic World lectures. I have twenty years experience researching Sephardic Jewish genealogy.

Currently, much of my work is helping applicants for Portuguese citizenship under the Sephardic nationality concession. For citizenship applications, I only take on clients who I believe have a reasonable chance of obtaining Portuguese citizenship.

I believe, so far, my clients have a 100% success rate although obviously I cannot make promises for a situation outside my control. For a fixed fee I can research and organize your genealogy documents for your Portuguese nationality application. A professional Sephardic genealogist is probably a cheaper option than using a lawyer. Hopefully your interest extends beyond just obtaining a Portuguese passport and this will open the door to your own study into your personal Sephardic history.

If you are looking to hire a professional Sephardic genealogist I can be contacted at: [email protected]. Please let me know the Sephardic families you are researching, and whatever you know about them.

If you have Latin American ancestors who you believe may have Sephardic origins, your first call should be to a genealogist with expertise on that country. My focus is on Jewish diaspora communities and Inquisition records.

The Genealogy of a Professional Sephardic Genealogist

My personal research interest is in my own family who very likely crossed from Spain to Portugal in 1492 and, with other Jews, were forcibly converted in Portugal in 1497. At some date after 1580 the family moved to Spain, perhaps because of the work opportunities there. They enter the archival record in the mid-17th Century in Andalucía. Family members appeared at the famous 1680 Madrid auto-da-fe. My direct ancestor was arrested by the Seville Tribunal of the Spanish Inquisition. While this was happening, his family escaped to the Sephardic Jewish community of Amsterdam.

A Spanish Inquisition letter reports that my ancestor had escaped from the Inquisition open prison. A few years later he appears as a witness to a wedding in Amsterdam. The family later left Amsterdam to move to London. A nephew who had lived with the family in Amsterdam returned to Portugal and then Brazil where he shared Jewish knowledge with New Christians. He was arrested by the Portuguese Inquisition and taken to Lisbon, where he refused to be reconciled to the Catholic Church and was burnt alive.

This is a very ordinary Sephardic family. Almost every Western Sephardic Jewish family has an incredible story that has been forgotten over the years but can now be recovered.