Hello All, Can anyone tell me the difference between a legitimate union and one that's written as Civilities? I found a baptism record that was first recorded as illegitimate, but then crossed out and Civilities was written over it. I was just wondering what that means? Thanks so much! Amy

Hi Amy, It is possible that the parents of the child were only married in a civil ceremony, and not in the Catholic church. This was sometimes the case when one person was of another religion. The Catholic church did not considerer the couple to be truly married, unless they were married in a Church ceremony. So when the child was born, the child may have originally been entered as illegitimate, since the parents weren't "married in the eyes of the Catholic Church", but were legally married. --Karen On May 21, 2010, at 3:15 AM, Amy Nichols wrote: > Hello All, > > Can anyone tell me the difference between a legitimate union and one > that's > written as Civilities? I found a baptism record that was first > recorded as > illegitimate, but then crossed out and Civilities was written over > it. I > was just wondering what that means? > > Thanks so much! > > Amy

Civil marriage exists only from October 1895 in Hungary (Banat was Hungary). Before that all marriages were performed and recorded by the church, only the church. After that one had to get married the civil way and could chose to get married in the church, so two separate events were registered in two separate books by two authorities. If people from two different religion got married they had to agree an advance in which faith they will raise their children. The Catholic church was generally more aggressive about asserting its "rights". If it was not pushed that hard by the Catholic priest, then often the daughters had to follow the mother's religion and the sons the father's. It does not matter how many years later the couple got married if the man declared that the children were his. Boglárka

Hello All, I solved a mystery for myself today and since I have not been able to find the answer before, I thought I would send out an email with this information in case anyone else has the same questions in the future. This really might be common knowledge, I just could never find it. For years now, I've been searching for the records for Setschanfeld, but had been told repeatedly that no one really knows what happened to them and there was even a question if parish records were even kept between the years of 1927 and 1944. But I was talking to a former resident of Setschanfeld and he was commenting on his baptism record that had come from the Zichydorf parish records. He said that he remembers the priest well that performed his baptism because he also taught religion in the school until 1935. So this is what occurred to me from looking through all the Gross Gaj and Zichydorf records for about a trillion hours (and maybe everyone else has realized this before me and I'm just late in getting it!): Setschanfeld was a filial parish of Gross Gaj and the majority of records for Setschanfeld can be found in the Gross Gaj records until 1917. But then there seems to have been a restructuring in how these parishes served the villages. In 1917 the Gross Gaj parish lost its priest named Johann Sule. The year of 1917 is marked with many different priests from different villages recording records in Gross Gaj, but eventually the new priest, Josef Kornauth, settled in and he is the priest in Gross Gaj until 1944. Josef Kornauth died in the Setschanfeld Internment Camp in 1945. In 1917, there were very few records recorded in Gross Gaj. For example, there are only 4 marriages recorded in 1917 and the baptism records end as of that year as well. In any case, when this change occurred the records for Setschanfeld almost completely stopped being recorded in the parish of Gross Gaj and there are only a handful recorded there in the next 25+ years. Setschanfeld, however, had built a rectory in 1921 and George Eck begins to show up in the Zichydord records in November 1920. Now George Eck was the priest at Setschanfeld and apparently he did not keep his own parish books in Setschanfeld. Could Setschanfeld at that point (1921) have become a filial parish of Zichydorf instead of Gross Gaj? When I was talking with the former Setschanfeld villager he said that the priest brought his books to Zichydorf and at first I did not know what to make of this, but then it occurred to me that this is what was happening. At the same time, between July 1924 and Sept 1924, Josef Harnauth (the Gross Gaj priest), also seems to have become the priest at Zichydorf. At that point, the Gross Gaj records decrease even more and there are very few records recorded in the Gross Gaj parish books. But it seems as if all the records for the towns surround Zichydorf were centralized and recorded in the Zichydorf parish books and that that transition took place between 1917 and 1924 or so. It looks as if George Eck was recording the majority of baptisms, marriages and burial for the towns of Setschanfeld, Kriva Bara, Alt-Letz, Boka, Heideschutz and a few others and Josef Harnauth recorded the majority of events for Zichydorf, Gross Gaj, Georgshausen and a few others. So it seems that church books never existed for Setschanfeld and that all the records were recorded for the village in the Zichydorf books until 1940. In 1940, there was another change and George Eck began to keep the Setschanfeld parish records at the villages church. The baptism records for 1940-1944 for Setschanfeld have been found and are available, but the books that still seem to be missing are the marriages and burials from 1940-1944. The former villager I spoke with believed that the parish records were destroyed, but I am wondering how the baptism records would have survived and not the marriage and burial records. In any case, I'm sure there are others that know much more than me about all this and I would love to see what others think and get some input and if this sounds accurate or if I'm misreading something. I'm sure Glenn Schwartz is knowledgeable about all this but he's currently in the Banat and I thought I'd send this email out to get others input until he arrives home. Thanks so much and I'm sorry for such a long, rambling email! Amy Nichols

Amy - this could mean that when the child was born, the parents were not married. But subsequently, they did marry. I have seen that noted in the records. Perhaps the marriage was a civil marriage rather than a church marriage. 100 years ago I believe all couples were married civilly and in Church. I am also not sure if the priest resided in the town. Perhaps the priest only visited the town every few months ..... not sure about that. Also remember that weddings were not permitted during Advent (four weeks prior to Christmas) and also not permitted during Lent - about seven weeks prior to Easter. That doesn't really account for not being married within the nine months of being pregnant .... but could have slowed down the process. I found the marriage record for my Glogowatz grandparents .... and then the birth record for their first son. The first son was born before they were married. Family story is that grandpa tended horses, etc. up in the hills or wherever grazing was better. Grandpa was away when the first child was born. I'm also guessing that sometimes the girl wanted to marry someone not approved by her family. I think that might have been the case for grandma and grandpa....so they took matters into their own -- and granny became pregnant. I guess they approved of the marriage at that point. Hope my round-about answer helps a little. susan ----- Original Message ----- From: "Amy Nichols" <anichols@att.net> To: <BANAT-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010 6:15 AM Subject: [BANAT-L] ? about Bap. Record - legit., illegit., civilities?? > Hello All, > > > > Can anyone tell me the difference between a legitimate union and one > that's > written as Civilities? I found a baptism record that was first recorded > as > illegitimate, but then crossed out and Civilities was written over it. I > was just wondering what that means? > > > > Thanks so much! > > Amy > > > ------------------------------- > To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to > BANAT-request@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes > in the subject and the body of the message >

The father married the mother after the birth of the child. Boglárka -----Original Message----- From: banat-bounces@rootsweb.com [mailto:banat-bounces@rootsweb.com] On Behalf Of Amy Nichols Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010 12:16 To: BANAT-L@rootsweb.com Subject: [BANAT-L] ? about Bap. Record - legit., illegit., civilities?? Hello All, Can anyone tell me the difference between a legitimate union and one that's written as Civilities? I found a baptism record that was first recorded as illegitimate, but then crossed out and Civilities was written over it. I was just wondering what that means? Thanks so much! Amy