The true meaning and significance of heritage is that it gives people and communities a genuine sense of connection with the past Obviously we feel connected to our personal heritage usually we know who and what our grandparents were and we will have heard stories about how they lived But beyond that there is a wider basic need to learn about our past in order to help us understand and interpret our individual and national futures Heritage represents a fundamental desire for continuity  assurance about the past goes a long way to assuring our future It is through this continuity that we achieve our own place in history our own immortality