Abstract This article examines how the method of analytical life, family, and generational history can be applied to the complex social-history analysis of transformations and changes in the social behavior of individuals and communities. The first part reviews the theoretical and methodological issues concerning this possible historical approach, discusses how this approach might be different from traditional historical interpretations, and then briefly summarizes the range of possible sources and their utility. The second part applies this analytical approach to a case study that examines the life histories of six generations of a lower-nobility family to analyze the specificities of social-position changes. It highlights the long-term process by which the family lost its landholdings and became day laborers and then gradually improved its social status, becoming petty bourgeois and later members of the lower-middle class.