Friday, November 17, 2017

Stabile cadaster maps (updated in Nov 2017)

I promised to write a post about Stabile cadaster maps and mapping so here it is. It provides information about stabile cadaster - what it was, why it was done, when and so on - as well as information about maps - where to find them, what types of maps are available and so on. So, let's take a look on it!

What, when and why?
Stabile cadaster (stabilní katastr in Czech) was a set of information about all land types in Hapsburg monarchy. Mapping of stabile cadaster was done in first half of 19th century during the reign of Franz I. and the reason to do such mapping was quite simple - to have enough information to assess real estate duties. 

Bohemia was mapped during years 1826-1843, Moravia during years 1824-1836. Cadastral maps with scale 1:2880 were created during this mapping which provide basis to Czech cadaster till today.  There are two different types of them available - imperial maps and indicator sketches.

Indicator sketches were working sheets where overall situation was mapped. They contain both plot and house numbers as well as names of the owners. Imperial maps are final product of the cadaster and contain only plot numbers. It's clear that indicator sketches are a little treasure for anyone who is interested in genealogy. :)

Where to find them? 
Maps of Bohemia are stored in the National Archives in Prague, maps of Moravia and Silesia in Moravian Land Archives in Brno. And both are available online from http://archivnimapy.cuzk.cz. As the website is available in Czech only I've prepared a guide to it. All you are going to need is proper name of your ancestors' village (including diacritis so the best way is to copy-paste it) and lot of time...


Once you get to the website you see the screen as above.


Write a name of the village or town you are looking for to the searching field in the top left corner and then press Hledat (don't press Enter, it doesn't work in some of the browsers).


The search results will list all the villages/town with the name you searched for.


I chose Desná in Jablonec nad Nisou district for my purposes. When you click on the name of the village, the map will zoom there. 


Once you are sure you have the correct village/town (use information about district - okr. in Czech), click on the map itself.


You will receive a list of maps available for that area - stable cadaster maps are usually the first ones in the list.


When you click on the picture of the skica, new window will appear with the map. 


Now you can work with the map, zoom in and out and try to find out information about your ancestors. And I think I'll write another blog post about content of the maps because this blog post is already quite long. :)

19 comments:

  1. Thanks for the very informative post!! In my ancestor's case, he seems to have owned multiple plots of land around his village (Ceska Trebova), but also there are plots in the names of his wife and several children. Is this usual to have women and children owning land at this time (1839)? This was a farmer/weaver, not the aristocracy. Thanks for any insights you can give me.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Diana, are you sure all of those plots belonged to one family? It could happen that some plots are owned by wife or children when they inherited it from some other family member.

      Delete
  2. I love the Czech map resources. I do have one question. My Svec family line is from Radnice (Rokycany) and when looking at the map of the city, there are both red and black numbers for the same properties. I have been to Radnice and the numbers on the map don't seem to match the current house numbers. So how do I identify the buildings on the maps that are found on the birth/marriage/death records? Thank you for your time and excellent blog.

    Mike

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hi Mike, some towns and villages use two types of numbering today - descriptive number and orientation numbers. You need to have descriptive numbers (číslo popisné) to get the correct house. Could you give me an example of house number in Radnice where your ancestors were born?

      Delete
  3. Excellent directions on how to do this. I was able to locate many ancestor's villages and find quite a few named on the maps. Thank you.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Is there anyway to purchase a copy of the stability katastr map? We have found over 400 years of ancestors in a village and we would love to have a copy that shows many of their names on the map. Thank you

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It's possible to order the maps from National Archives - however I have to say I'm not sure if they are able to send those maps online. Could you give me information about the map/village you want and I'll try to ask them?

      Delete
    2. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    3. I would be interested in the 1842 map of Gebirgsneudorf (Nova ves Horach). I would not need it sent online if I could purchase a copy and have it sent to the United States. Congratulations on your new child. I am new to genealogy and your website has been a gold mine of information. Thank you!

      Delete
  5. Great post again. Thank you, Mary

    ReplyDelete
  6. Thanx a lot for this post. I'm new at genealogy.
    I'm half Czech and Mom ask me to search all my anchestors as she got some names. This map is incredible, so are you !!

    ReplyDelete
  7. This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Thanks a lot for this post. I'm new at genealogy from this area. I'm a small % Czech on my paternal side would like to search ancestors. Thank you!

    ReplyDelete
  9. This post was wonderful. Thank you for taking the time to take us through the site and show us how to use it!! We appreciate your expert help.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Thank you for this amazing guide. May I ask you about the second part of the stabile cadastre, the written documents parts with the land owners and descriptions of the crop, etc.? Are they digitised as well or are they only located at the archives? I would like to see these documents for Letohrad (Kunčice and Orlice).

    ReplyDelete
  11. Thank you for taking the time to put this guide together. I am 50% Czech so I am very interested in exploring the maps.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Thank you for the information. I was able to confirm that lot 17 had farmland associated with the property.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Thank you for sharing info on the Cadaster maps - I hadn't known of these before seeing your posting, and was excited to findmy ancestors village of Rozna (and discovering from the map its previous name of Roschina). However, the only maps available ere the ones w/o names (Imperial maps). How do I find the associated Indicator maps that you mentioned have names on them? Thanks again!!!

    ReplyDelete