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    • Main contributor: James M. Beidler
    St. Maria Königin church, Germany
    St. Maria Königin church, Germany

    When searching genealogy records for German ancestors, church records—parish records, church books—are an excellent place to begin, especially before civil registration was required. The good news is that many are being placed online in digital form.

    It will be helpful to know the religion of your ancestors as different religions kept separate records. The main religious division in Germany was between Catholics and Protestants, comprised mainly of Lutherans and Reformed. Catholic records are usually written in Latin or German, while others are in the local language.

    History and its Effects on Church Record-Keeping

    The area in Europe that we now call Germany (The Federal Republic of Germany) has undergone many name changes. These name changes coincided with wars--amassing land—and in the call for religious ideology and doctrine changes.

    • In the early 1500s, Germany was called The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, with Catholicism as its religion. Rome mandated parish records in about 1563.
    • In 1521, Lutheranism came into being. It was named after Martin Luther, a priest and religious reformer, and with it, the initiation of the Protestant Reformation. Most Lutheran churches did not begin record-keeping until about 1540.
    • In the mid-1500s and into the 1600s, Calvinism, also called Reformed Christianity, was an off shoot from Lutheranism. It was named after John Calvin, a Protestant reformer. It wasn’t until the mid-1650s that Reformed churches began record keeping.
    • Within each state, the ruler chose the religion, of which there could only be one.

    These three religions have since remained the established faiths for Germany throughout the centuries until the present time, despite several country name changes, most notably German Democratic Republic (East Germany) and The Federal Republic of Germany (West Germany) in May 1949 after World War II, and with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1990, the two German states joined to form the Federal Republic of Germany. Feudal, kingdom, and religious wars played a part in many changes. But tolerance of faith has been a relative practice since WWII.

    Description of How Records Were Kept

    There are numerous types of records—originals, recopied, duplicates [transcripts], abstracts, and extracts—and it’s essential to discern the difference.

    • Originals—The contemporaneous register entries (created at the time of the event) are usually separated by the type of pastoral act and in chronological order.
    • Recopied—A new handwritten version of the original register (document) by a later priest, pastor, or other official. This work was done when the original document's ink faded or had other material defects.
    • Duplicates [Kirchenbuchduplikate]—In the first half of the 1800s, many German states began requiring this documentation as an early form of civil registration for their records. These documents are duplicates of those found in church records—baptisms, marriages, deaths, and burials.
    • Transcripts are often another name for duplicates, but transcripts are often published documents—accurate word-for-word renderings of the original register (document).
    • Abstracts—These records are summaries of the original register (document), published and rigorously checked against the original register (document).
    • Extracts—These can be used with abstracts but may indicate that only a fraction of the register (document) is included—for instance, a particular surname or time.

    Records and Their Contents

    The three established faiths—Catholicism, Lutheranism, and Reformed developed solid record-keeping traditions. While the exact types of church registers and the information found within them varied, the following are the major ones found:

    • Baptisms: As the mainstream religions practiced infant baptism, they created a birth record. Most birth records include the infant’s name, parents’ names, names of witnesses or godparents, and date of baptism.
    • Marriages: Marriage registers often include the date, the bride and groom's names, and witnesses' names. Other information about the bride and groom may be ages, birth dates, places of birth, residence, occupation, parents’ names, and if they were married before or widowed, the previous spouse’s name.
    • Burials: The church record may also be a death record, although sometimes there is only the individual's burial date. Some registers are significantly more detailed, and in addition to the name of the deceased and the date, the place of the death or burial, the deceased’s age, place of residence, cause of death, names of survivors, date and place of birth, and parents’ names.
    • Confirmations: The mainstream churches celebrated this as a rite or sacrament in which the person, usually in their teenage years, took on full church membership. These records may include the confirmed name, age, date and place of birth, and parents’ names.
    • Communicant: These records of the sacrament of holy communion show the membership of a particular church parish. These records may include the same as those listed under Confirmations.
    • Family Registers: These were supplemental summaries bringing together information on the significant pastoral acts about a particular family on one page, often with cross-references to the pages of the individual baptism registry, etc. These registers may include the husband and wife's names, birthplaces and dates, the place of their marriage and date, parents’ names, occupations, and residences. If there are siblings, they are in chronological order. They may include their name, date of birth, place of birth, confirmation and communion dates, date of marriage, and date of death (especially if stillborn, young, or before marrying).

    See Also

    Explore More About Church Records in Germany

    References

    This article was adapted from "Online German Church Registers, Duplicates, and Substitutes," a webinar by James M. Beidler on November 15, 2019. Watch the entire webinar on Legacy Family Tree Webinar.

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    Contributors

    Main contributor: James M. Beidler
    Additional contributor: Karal Seibel