again - thank you for this history lesson ... I'm learning SO MUCH!! blessings~ Pam in MO ~Pam Frierdich-Staley~ Warrenton, MO http://www.michael-steppig-family-tree.com http://www.frierdich-staley-familytree.com Looking for surnames of MICHALEK (MICHAEL/EAL), DILLON, CINNAUGHT/CANNAUGHT, SCHALLOM, STEPPIG, MEES/MAES, REIS, FRIERDICH/FRIEDRICH, KRAFT, BANGERT, DIESEL, HATTER/HOERTER, KIEFER, RAPP, MENTEL, SCHELLHORN, STALEY, WEBER, THOELE, MITCHELL, PROBST, GOLD ----- Original Message ----- From: <KarenHob@aol.com> To: <GERMAN-BOHEMIAN-L@rootsweb.com> Sent: Wednesday, May 10, 2006 9:31 PM Subject: Re: [GERMAN-BOHEMIAN] Searching for family before 1700 or where did they come... In a message dated 5/9/2006 10:58:11 PM Mountain Standard Time, akibb1@verizon.net writes: but not all villages had churches and they only appear when the churches were built and the recording started. All villages belonged to a parish community. Some people walked up to 8-10 km to get to church. Shoes were expensive and they would walk in their bare feet when weather permitted or in wooden shoes with thick woolen socks (if they had no boots) and put on shoes just before entering the church. The vital records for all the villages in a single parish community would be kept in the church. Some older villages that had churches lost their pastors and the church was designated a chaple and was used only on certain days special to the community like a certain saint's day (the patron of the village). If there were enough residents in a village with a church a chaplain might be assigned. He was like an assistant pastor and he would say masses on sundays and hear confessions but the other sacraments like baptism, confirmation, marriage had to be conducted at the main parish church except emergency baptisms. Some villages built churches in the hopes that they would get a chaplain. The churches that were not consecrated parish churches might be used as meeting places for prayerful events other than Holy Mass and the sacraments. One such event might be saying goodby to and praying for village men who had been drafted. Once a church was consecrated, its use for "lay" events would be restricted. Some village chapels were very small and would not hold many people. Those small chapels would not qualify to have a chaplain but the priest would still come from the parish center to say masses there on a special day. The village would gather outside around the chapel because there might only be room inside for some of the most "important" people. The next step up for a church was to be designated a filial; (affiliated) church. They would have a priest permanently assigned but they were still not considered a parish church. In theory they served only one place rather than a whole community of several places even if people from neighboring villages preferred to go there rather than all the way to the parish center.. Filial churches could perform all the sacraments that did not require a bishop but they did not keep the records -- everything they recorded was sent to and kept at the main parish church. Filial churches could become parish churches if there were enough residents supporting them. They would then begin to keep their own records. When an ancestral village is known the next step is to learn the name of the parish community to which it belonged if it was not itself a parish center. It is also important to know how long it was a parish center. If it received that designation relatively late then some records of ancestors born there may be with another nearby parish. J.G. Sommer's 16-volume collection" Das Königreich Böhmen" lists each village in Bohemia (not including Moravia) by name and tells were its residents went to church and the name of the church. Gregor Wolny "Das Markgrafschaft Mähren" does the same for Moravia. Each author wrote one volume for each district of either Bohemia or Moravia. An author search of the World Catalog should find the works of both authors - ask your research librarian to help you find the book(s) you want -- the one(s) for your ancestral districts. Sign up for lending privelges at a college or university library to get copies of these books at the least cost. Check if that library will let you take a book that is more than 100 years old out of the library reading room. (A teacher or other person associated with the same institution may be able to get the books for free, take them to his/her office and to use them for up to three months vs. 2 weeks for a student or other borrower.) An interesting complication regarding church records is how many churches changed from catholic to protestant -- back and forth more than once -- over the period when religion became a political power tool among many of the nobility. When a nobleman converted for whatever reason he would demand that everyone of his serfs would also convert and he would designate all churches in his dominon as the denomination he chose. Even though all of the churches began as Catholic parishes, many became protestant for a time during the Hussite wars and then, again, during the reformation. They returned to Roman Catholic inbetween those two episodes. After the Thirty Years War the areas of Bohemia that needed new population were settled by Catholics. The Kaiser demanded that all noblemen either convert or swear allegiance to a Catholic Kaiser (if they fought on his side during the war) and that all the population of Bohemia should be Catholic. The city of As (Asch) was allowed to remain protestant as were parts of Moravia (different politics there). So when you are looking for ancestral vital records you may find that the church of Stes. Peter and Paul in XXX village first has documents in Latin written by a priest and then in Czech or German written by a protestant pastor and then in Latin again until German became the official language for all records after 1740. There are some military church books dated later than 1740 - 1760 that are still in Latin and I have seen reports of a few records dated as late as the 1780s that were in Czech. Always remember that if your ancestors were of a different denomination than the denomination "of record" of their parish church, the records for that parish should still be searched. Local parish churches even recorded Jewish vital records when there was no other means for that -- no nearby synagogue or Rabbi who would take care of it. Searching the films at the LDS using the keyword "Jewish" will sometimes show a title for a Catholic church. This in not a mistake. Examine the film notes for that title and there will probably be a film or two with notes saying it includes some records for Jewish residents of the area. Likewise if a search for "Evangelical" or "brethren" or "ultraquist" hits on a title that is not that denominatioon it may simply mean that at one time that church was an Evangelical church or that a few protestant records are included in the church books because there was no protestant pastor to take care of that. Karen ==== GERMAN-BOHEMIAN Mailing List ==== Visit the German-Bohemian Heritage Society Web Page! http://www.rootsweb.com/~gbhs/