Anyone leafing through the registers of one parish from 1650 to 1900 often passes through three languages. The oldest records are in Czech or Latin; in the 18th century Latin prevails; after 1784 the records go into tables, in Moravia mostly in German, in Bohemia often still in Latin; and in the second half of the 19th century Czech comes back. But the order looks a little different in every parish. How and why the language of the records changed, we explain in the article What is a parish register. This article is about practice: what the individual words mean and how to put a whole record together from them.
All the samples are from one parish, Tvarožná near Brno, and concern one family from the village of Horákov. They show that the words change, but the facts stay the same.
A Latin record as a sentence
As late as the 1760s the priest wrote the main part of a record as one Latin sentence. This is how he recorded the death of Antonín Hromek in February 1763:
Death, Horákov, February 1763, in Latin
13.(?) [Februarii] | Obijt Antonius Hromek Incola Horakovio omnibus provisus Sacramentis | in eodem Coemeterio | Anno 65. | Idem Parochus
On 13 February died Antonín Hromek, resident of Horákov, having received all the sacraments. Buried in the same cemetery, aged 65. Buried by the same parish priest.
Moravian Land Archives, Brno, E 67, book 1981, Tvarožná 1694 to 1763, deaths, image 285
Five words are enough: obiit, here written obijt (died), incola (inhabitant, settled resident), provisus (received the last rites), coemeterium (cemetery), anno (in the year, here the age). Idem means "the same": the priest did not want to keep writing his name, so he wrote "the same priest" as the one above. From the age of 65 follows a birth around 1698. That is the clue you use to look for the baptism.
A Latin table with a house number
Sixteen years later the same book already has columns drawn in advance, and in one of them a house number. The Latin stayed; it was just split into columns:
Death, Horákov, March 1779, a Latin table
[záhlaví:] Annus, Dies | Sepeliens(?) | Provisus a quo | Mortuus 1779 | Religio | Coemeterium | Locus | Numerus | Annus | Mensis | Dies — [2. zápis:] 15 Martii | Antonius Felix Parochus loci | [značka] | Obiit Hromek Sebastianus filius Michaelis Hromek incolae(?) rustici | Cath. | in eodem coemeterio | Horakovio | 44 | 3 | 1 | 26
Headings: year and day | who buried | who gave the last rites | the deceased | religion | cemetery | place | house number | years, months, days. The record: on 15 March died Šebestián, son of Michal Hromek, resident and farmer of Horákov no. 44, Catholic, buried in the same cemetery, aged 3 years, 1 month and 26 days. Buried by Antonín Felix, the local parish priest.
Moravian Land Archives, Brno, E 67, book 1982, Tvarožná 1764 to 1788, deaths, image 110
Here Numerus, the house number, appears for the first time, and with it the key to all the other sources, as we describe in the article on house numbers and land registers. Notice the cases too. Latin inflects names: Michaelis Hromek is "of Michal Hromek", filius Michaelis "son of Michal". When you meet Georgii, Wenceslai or Joannis in a record, it is Jiří, Václav and Jan in the genitive, "of Jiří" and so on.
Latin glossary
These are the words that come back most often in the records. The meanings follow the FamilySearch and genea.cz word lists; for the social ranks we went by how our own records use them.
| Where | Latin | English |
|---|---|---|
| Baptism | baptisatus, baptisata (est) | baptised (male, female) |
| natus, nata | born | |
| levans, patrinus, patrina | godfather, godmother | |
| patrini, levantes | godparents | |
| obstetrix | midwife | |
| legitimus, illegitimus | born in wedlock, out of wedlock | |
| parentes | parents | |
| Marriage | copulati (sunt) | were married |
| copulavit | married them (the priest) | |
| sponsus, sponsa | groom, bride | |
| juvenis | young man, single | |
| virgo | maiden, single | |
| viduus, vidua, relicta | widower, widow, surviving widow | |
| testes | witnesses | |
| Burial | obiit | died |
| sepultus (est) | buried | |
| provisus (sacramentis) | received the last rites | |
| coemeterium | cemetery | |
| annorum, mensium, dierum | of years, months, days (age) | |
| quondam, olim | the late, former | |
| Family and people | filius, filia | son, daughter |
| uxor | wife | |
| incola | inhabitant, settled resident | |
| rusticus | farmer | |
| quadrantarius; semilaneus, locally also bi quadrantarius | quarter-farmer; half-farmer (two quarters of a lán, the old unit of farmland) | |
| famulus, ancilla | farmhand, maidservant | |
| Priests and places | parochus | parish priest |
| cooperator, capellanus | curate, chaplain | |
| idem, eodem (die) | the same, on the same (day) | |
| pagus | village | |
| ex | from (ex Pozořice = from Pozořice) |
September or July? The months 7ber to Xber
Almost everyone gets caught by this. The abbreviations 7ber, 8ber, 9ber and 10ber or Xber (also 7bris, Xbris) do not mean the seventh to tenth month. They mean September, October, November and December. The scribe shortened the Latin September, October, November, December: the digit replaces the first part of the word. And the numbers fit, because the Roman year once began in March, so September was the seventh month and October the eighth.
If you do not watch out for this, you shift a date by two months and then look for the record in a completely different part of the book.
A German table
After 1784 the records went into tables, at first often ruled by hand, later printed. In Moravia they were written mostly in German. The words are different, but the columns are the same: date, house number, name, religion, sex, age, illness, who buried. The record of the death of Jiří Hromek in December 1834:
Death, Horákov, December 1834, in German, with a Latin note
Dezember 22/24 | 44 | Georg Hromek Ausgedinger von Horakow | 1 – 1 – | 66 | Nervenfieber | Peter Kostroschitz Coop. — [pod čarou latinsky:] Revisa in visitatione canonica 20ma Augusti 835
Died on 22, buried on 24 December 1834, house no. 44: Jiří Hromek, retired farmer of Horákov, Catholic, male, 66 years, nervous fever (most likely typhoid). In the priest's column the curate Petr Kostrošic. Note: checked at the canonical visitation on 20 August 1835.
In 1810 Jiří Hromek was a quarter-farmer at number 44; by 1834 he is an Ausgedinger, a retired farmer: he had handed the farm over to his son and lived out his days on the retirement portion, in Czech the výměnek. One word in a column tells you that someone else had been running the farm in the meantime. And the Latin note below the line shows that Latin never quite disappeared from the German books. At a visitation a church superior inspected the book and confirmed it in Latin.
| German | English |
|---|---|
| Sohn, Tochter | son, daughter |
| Eheweib, Ehegattin | wife |
| ehelich, unehelich | born in wedlock, out of wedlock |
| ledig | single |
| Witwe (Wittib), Witwer | widow, widower |
| geboren, geb. | born; for women "née" |
| weiland, selig, gew. (gewesener) | the late, former |
| Pathe, Pathen | godparent, godparents |
| Hebamme, Wehmutter | midwife |
| Bauer | farmer |
| Halblähner, Viertler | half-farmer, quarter-farmer |
| Häusler | cottager (a house with little or no land) |
| Inmann, Inwohner | lodger, tenant without a house of his own |
| Ausgedinger | retired farmer living on the farm he handed over |
| Taglöhner, Knecht, Magd | day labourer, farmhand, maidservant |
| Herrschaft | manorial estate |
| gestorben, begraben, versehen | died, buried, received the last rites |
| getauft, Täufling | baptised, the baptised child |
Spelling was looser than today. In the records you will see Wittib for Witwe, Pathen for Paten, Czech villages in German spelling (Horakow, Posořitz) and Czech names with a German ending: Odehnalin is Odehnalová, the wife or daughter of Odehnal.
Causes of death
From 1784 the illness column in the registers of deaths is compulsory. But do not read it as a modern diagnosis. Often it is only a symptom: convulsions, wasting, fever.
| German | Latin | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Fraisen, Fraiß, Frais | spasmi, eclampsia | convulsions; the most common entry for small children |
| Blattern | variola | smallpox |
| Masern | morbilli | measles |
| Lungensucht, Lungenschwindsucht | phthisis | consumption, tuberculosis |
| Abzehrung, Auszehrung | wasting away; often tuberculosis, but also old age or a tumour | |
| Wassersucht | hydrops | dropsy (swelling) |
| Nervenfieber | nervous fever, often typhoid | |
| hitziges Fieber | acute fever | |
| Altersschwäche | senectus | old age |
| Schlagfluss | apoplexia | stroke |
| Ruhr | dysenteria | dysentery |
| Cholera | cholera | cholera |
You will see the word Fraisen on every page of a book of deaths. It means convulsions and stands next to most small children who died in their first weeks and months. In the family at number 44 in Horákov, four daughters of František Hromek died of "Fraisen" between 1835 and 1853. In this respect the registers are raw reading.
A record written in Czech
In the second half of the 19th century many parishes write in Czech. In Tvarožná the book of deaths is still in German in 1866 and already in Czech in 1874:
Death, Horákov, February 1874, in Czech
4/6 února | 37 | Kateřina manželka Matěje Hromka výměnníka(?) a domkaře v Horákově | 1 . . 1 | 77 3 17 | manželské trvání 44 8 11 | souchotiny | František Uhlíř kooperator
Died on 4 and buried on 6 February 1874: Kateřina, wife of Matěj Hromek, retired farmer and cottager in Horákov no. 37; Catholic, female, 77 years, 3 months and 17 days, married for 44 years, 8 months and 11 days. Consumption. Buried by the curate František Uhlíř.
Czech is simpler, but it has period words of its own too: výměník (retired farmer), domkař (cottager), kooperator (curate), souchotiny (consumption, tuberculosis), elsewhere psotník (convulsions in children), podruh (a lodger living with another family) or zaopatřen (received the last rites: confession, communion and anointing). And note the length of the marriage: 44 years and 8 months leads you straight to the wedding, around 1829.
Abbreviations and signs
- Coop. is cooperator, a curate. Par. or Paroch. the parish priest, Loc. a local chaplain.
- Nro., No means number, usually the house number.
- dto, detto or quotation marks „ one below the other: the same as above, for example the same village or the same priest.
- ¼ler, 4tler is Viertler, a quarter-farmer, ½ a half-farmer.
- † before a name marks a dead person: "son of † Františka" is the son of the late Františka.
- geb. is geborene, née; gew. gewesener, former.
More words are in the FamilySearch word lists (Latin, German and Czech), in the Latin glossary and the list of causes of death on genea.cz, and in the printed Latin, German and Czech dictionary of illnesses, injuries and causes of death by Boleslav Lutonský and Jaroslav Černý. And if you can make out the words but not the handwriting, the article on Kurrent will help. We will find one ancestor's record for free, with a transcription into plain English.
