Belarus Getting Started
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This page is designed to provide basic instructions for researching an ancestor from Belarus. Click on the question mark icons (
) to view "How to" Guides with step-by-step instructions for using helpful websites and interpreting records. Click on the links in the sidebar to review more detailed articles about specific topics.
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Gather and Choose[edit | edit source]
Before you begin, you should know the following about the Belarusian ancestor you are researching:
Do you know enough details to find the ancestor in Belarus?
Find the Place[edit | edit source]
If you do not know where records would be kept for the specific town the ancestor lived in, use the following tools to find out more about the location (be sure to try spelling variations for the town name if you don’t find what you need at first!):
The Spiski Naselennykh Mest Rossiiskoi Imperii (Списки населенных мест Российской Имперіи), or Spiski Gazetteer, is place name dictionary is organized by province, so you must know which province the town was part of to find it in the gazetteer. The following volumes apply to areas now in Belarus:
Towns listed nearby within its pages were geographically close to the town, so finding an ancestor's hometown on the same page as a town with a church in it might suggest that the ancestor attended that church. Many volumes include alphabetical indexes in the back of the books.
The Russisches Geographische Namenbuch, or RGN Gazetteer, can be accessed at the FamilySearch Library (FS Library INTL Book 947 E5r). If you are unable to visit Salt Lake City, try checking WorldCat for availability in a library near you.
Unlike the Spiski Gazetteer, the RGN Gazetteer is organized alphabetically. It was created during the Soviet period and provides locality information based on Russian Empire organization. If you find your town in the RGN, proceed to look it up in the corresponding province’s volume of the Spiski.
The Skorowidz Miejsowości Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej lists locations in Poland as they existed between the world wars, when the borders of Poland were further east than they are today. It provides information about where local churches were for various Christian religions.
This is a searchable database of towns throughout the world, especially in Europe, where Jewish communities have existed historically.
If you can identify the town, proceed to Find the Records. If you cannot identify the town, consider conducting more general online searches or reviewing other family records for additional details.
Find the Records[edit | edit source]
Other than World War II records, most of the Belarusian records available online are for 1918 and earlier. The following record types will be most helpful in your research:
Metrical books were kept by each religious group separately to record the births, marriages, deaths, and divorces (for non-Christians) during the Russian Empire period. You may also find confession lists, which provide a record of families belonging to a certain congregation.
Revision lists are a type of tax record that lists complete households, along with relationships between household members. The revisions were taken somewhat sporadically, with the final revision being taken in 1857-1858. Important: revision lists appear under the name of the local district (uyezd) on FamilySearch. Navigating revision lists can take a significant amount of time.
The 1897 census was the only full census that the Russian Empire conducted. The records were intended to be used for statistical purposes only, so only a few returns still exist.
Pamyat Naroda is a World War II military records database. It documents soldiers who served under the Soviet Union during the war. Sometimes their records may provide birthdates, hometowns, parents’ names, or other important details.
If you find a record, proceed to Evaluate. If no applicable records are found, visit metrics.tilda.ws to learn more about archives you could contact to request more information.
Evaluate[edit | edit source]
Once the record of an ancestor is located, decide on your next steps. Here are some ideas for future research goals:
- Found a religious record? Analyze the contents of the record. Are any additional names or places provided? These may help you to find another religious record or identify the family in a revision list.
- Found a revision list? Are any earlier revisions available? Try to find the family again in an earlier revision. You may also be able to find individual family members in local religious records.
- Found a census return or military record? Take note of any names, dates, and/or locations provided in the document. Can the information you found help you to start researching someone born pre-1918? The details you find in these records may help you to move into religious records or revision lists.
The following "How to" Guides may help you to interpret the records:
- Roman Catholic Records (other Christian records are likely to be similar in style):
- Reading Lithuanian and Belarusian Roman Catholic Birth Records Written in Russian
- Reading Lithuanian and Belarusian Roman Catholic Marriage Records Written in Russian
- Reading Lithuanian and Belarusian Roman Catholic Death Records Written in Russian
- Reading Lithuanian and Belarusian Roman Catholic Birth Records Written in Russian
- Jewish Records:
- Reading Jewish Birth Records Written in Russian
- Reading Jewish Marriage Records Written in Russian
- Reading Jewish Death Records Written in Russian
- Reading Jewish Birth Records Written in Russian
- Reading Revision List Records
- Reading the 1897 Census
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Before you finish, save everything you have found. Save links and write good notes in your sources so it is easy to relocate records as needed. Make sure you have recorded your new research goals so you know where to start next time.
Additional Steps to Consider[edit | edit source]
FamilySearch has some historical records collections for Belarus. They include religious records from the provinces of Grodno and Minsk:
- 1649-1915 Belarus, Grodno Church Books, 1649-1915 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
- 1700-1965 Belarus, Minsk Church Books, 1700-1965 at FamilySearch - How to Use this Collection; index & images
While these collections can be searched by name, the record indexes do not provide specific locations. This may lead you to mistakenly identify someone from another area as an ancestor from your family’s hometown. Use these collections carefully to avoid drawing incomplete conclusions.