Parish books stored in the municipal offices (Zámrsk archive)

I often stumble upon a question where to find parish books which are not yet in the archives. I wrote a guide how to find in which municipal office the parish books are stored, but there are other ways how to find out. 

Zámrsk archive offers information about parish books stored in the municipal office - you can find it on their website. There is a list available which covers all the parish books till 1949 which are still stored in the municipal offices in the former Easter Bohemian region.

Oh no, that parish book is still in Municipal Office! (updated August 2020)

How well I know that situation. I need a record from the end of 19th or beginning of 20th century which should be in the archives - but it's still in the parish book which is stored in local municipal office. It's not so bad if the municipal office is near, but if I would have to travel 150 miles to get one parish record, I have to think about it twice. And this is still quite easy for me as I'm living in the Czech Republic. So - what to do in such cases?

Card indexes (Opava archives)

Opava archives (which cover central and northern Moravia and Silesia) contain quite much information. Such as... Tons of different archival sources, not only parish books or census records, but much more. One of those sources are card indexes - or registration cards of the people who lived or moved in the town. You can find similar resource in the Prague municipal archive - Prague conscriptions.

What does 2nd or 3rd degree of relationship mean?

When you are researching your family history, one of the thing you can notice in the marriage notes are dispensations (permissions) to marry because of 2nd, 3rd or 4th degree of relationship. Well, we can translate that one quite easily - but what does it in fact mean?

Czech cemeteries - why there are no old gravestones?

There is one request which appears repeatedly in the guide requests I get - can we visit a local cemetery and look for the gravestones of my family? 

Sure we can. We can walk around the parish cemetery to which the village/town your ancestors lived in belonged. But if your ancestors immigrated to the U.S. hundred and more years ago, we most probably won't find them. Why?

German-speaking inhabitants of the Czech lands

I found an interesting map of the percentage of native German speaking inhabitants in the court districts of the Czech lands before the WWII. It shows the density of the German speaking population in the border area - Czechoslovakia was forced to give up these parts of the country to Germany in the Munich agreement of 1938.

Estates V - When it all ended?

The beginning of the estates dates back to the medieval ages as you could have read in the previous blog post. But when - and how - it all ended? 

Orlík castle on a painting by Vilém Ströminger, 19th century.