research problems with parish records

[mezzogiorno62]

as we all know,civil records only go back to 1820 in sicily and 1809 on the mainland. research going further back depends on accessing parish records. and therein lies the problem. first off,unless all your italian ancestors originated in a tiny comune with only 1 parish,and that parish has been in existence for over 200 years,there's no way to determine which parish will contain the desired information. example: my paternal grandfather was born in luogosano(avellino)population barely 1000. just 1 parish. and the only parish record i ever recieved from there was the 1803 marriage of my 2nd great grandparents. my paternal grandmother was born in barcellona pg(messina),a fairly large city and home to many parishes. i got lucky and was able to get her baptismal record.that was it. thats only 2 parish records accessed in 20 years of research. another problem is having no approximate dates to work with. once you get back 200 years or so,you can only guess approximate time frames regarding births,marriages,or deaths. we usually know when our grandparents were born,as well as where, as that information can be found in records here,but going back further involves lots of educated guesswork,with no exact or even approximate dates to work with. and most parish priests are not inclined to lookup requests for records where there may be many years of possible research. they may check 5 or 10 years(and thats doubtful) but anything more than that is very unlikely. add to all these obstacles damaged or missing records. thats why it amazes me when some researchers claim success in tracing lineages back over 200 or more years. some even claim 300 or more years. considering the uncertainty of guessing approximate time frames,the problems of even finding the correct parishes(regarding cities),and the general unwillingness of parish priests to cooperate, the few successful searches into pre civil registration parish records are nothing short of miraculous. its amazing anyone can get back into the early 1800s,the time frame of our great and great great grandparents,never mind further back. on the other hand,i've had great success with my maternal french canadian ancestry. records of birth,marriage,and death began in canada(quebec) upon the arrival of the first settlers ca.1608. the plus there was that parish records doubled as civil records from the beginning-no separation. basically 1 set of records spanning 400 years. theres a database at ancestry called the drouin films. in 1940 all the vital records of quebec as well as surrounding areas with a french population were filmed. now this collection is available at ancestry online. and this is a searcheable database. you can literally enter a name,adding search criteria such as approximate dates,and locate an ancestor. covers approximate years from 1608 up to 1940. maybe 10 or more generations can be quickly compiled by rearching this collection. and the original ancestral places in france are found with the earliest arrivals. nothing remotely similiar to this in italian genealogy. its either research the lds films/database,which only go back 200 years( film lending ended in 2017),or write endless letters of inquiry to the ancestral comunes(if we even know them),or worse yet,letters of inquiry to unresponsive parishes,even if we know them. if only italian genealogy were half as fruitful as french canadian genealogy. and i'm long experienced in both. i have 273 charts documenting virtually all births,marriages,and deaths in my french canadian lines,going back into the late 1500s and early 1600s,as opposed to 1 incomplete chart for my italian lines,barely going back into the early 1800s. 20 years of hard research and 1 incomplete 5 generation chart. one can only hope the italians will take up the challenge. the drouin collection was a collaborative effort and agreement between quebec genealogists and the regional archives. for that to happen in italy,genealogists there would need the cooperation of the various state archives and local comunes. can you imagine that ever happening? even lds and the www.antenati@beniculturali.it site are having problems with cooperation regarding the release of records for the public. all kinds of issues regarding rights,licensing,etc. and we're talking about records well over 100 years old,which in no way affect anyone's privacy. the italians are a much larger group than the french canadians,but there's no comparison in how one group values their heritage over the other. the facts speak for themselves.

[carubia]

Often church records are grouped together in collections spanning multiple years, even decades, with an index at the front, so it can be easier for search for, say, a marriage or death record than with civil records, where you have to check each year's index. Yesterday I looked up some church marriages online in Bisacquino over a 40-year range in minutes that would've taken a long time if I had to rely only on civil records.

I have traced numerous lines in Sicily back to the 16th c., but I benefit from the work of a genealogist who photographed all the church records in various towns in Agrigento province. I pretty much only require marriage records and sometimes census records (although those are not parish records). So long as you have an index, and the place is not so big that you have multiple couples with the same names at the same time, it is not difficult.

[mezzogiorno62]

like i said,success in following lines back beyond civil registration depends upon specific conditions. a helpful onsite genealogist,a cooperative priest,or a very small comune to research. none of these specialized conditions are necessary in french canadian research. the only major stumbling blocks i've encountered are the misspelling of surnames by the priest who entered the information,and the confusion of dit names,which are basically alternate surnames used in place of the original family surnames. but for the most part,the surnames have become standardized. once you know the spelling of the original family surname,following the lines are much easier. dit names are basically nicknames. upon arrival in canada,for example,someone named desforges,from picardy in france,would be known as picard. same family different surname. some kept the original while others used the alternate. but once you know the alternate surnames and their equivalents,its relatively easy to follow the lines. dit names could denote the place of origin in france, or an occupational or physical description. as i said,these alternate surnames and their useage can become confusing, but once you understand the system it becomes relatively easy to follow a family line. just imagine if every vital record of birth,marriage,and death in italy, going back 300 or 400 years, regardless of region,province,or locality,could be entered into one massive database searcheable by surname. wouldn't that be great? but knowing italian genealogy as i do that will never happen. research,in the best of conditions,and especially predating civil registration,will depend on very specific conditions and situations,not the least being lots of luck.

[carubia]

Well, your French Canadian research depends on the work of people who indexed all those records and filmed them and put them online. Those are pretty "specialized" conditions.

And how many French Canadians are there? How far back does their history go? How many churches records were filmed? Compare that to the population of Italians, including those that emigrated, and Italy's thousands of years of history.

[mezzogiorno62]

consider this. the french in canada had to create the specialized conditions for the success of genealogical research there. that involved the love of their culture,language,and religion. they had the dedication and unity of purpose. and the fact is, church records in canada,which actually doubled as civil records, go back to the early 1600s, not much later than the beginning of church records in italy. napoleon actually set the standards for record keeping in both. he organized record keeping in italy and france, and this model was recreated in quebec. look at both the italian and french civil records in france and those in canada.very similiar. ironic that an italian, napoleon, was the driving force in standardizing record keeping in both italian and french record keeping. simply put,if the italians had filmed 300 years of records in the 1940s,the way the french had done with their 300 years of records in quebec at the same time,imagine how far italian genealogy could have progressed? lastly,the driving force in french canadian genealogy has been the dedication to their language and religion, which they felt was in danger of being lost after the british conquest of canada. similiarly,considering the much greater history of foreign invasion in italy-greeks,arabs,spanish,french,and virtually everyone else in the area-its odd that the same desire to preserve their culture didn't effect the italians and cause them to strive to preserve and protect their recorded history. if only there had been a similiar group of italian genealogists dedicated to this as there had been in france and french canada. but,at the end of the day,i guess its like comparing apples and oranges.

[mezzogiorno62]

note: the only difference in the format of the vital records between french canada and italy is regarding the age of the subjects at the time of marriage. in italy the age of the subjects are given-correct or not-in the record.in quebec those of age-21 or over-are simply listed as majeur(of majority)-and those under 21 are listed as mineur(under the age of majority). thats pretty much it. all the other information,like names of parents and witnesses is the same.