Useful database for Polish genealogy search: metryki.genealodzy.pl

 

The web site metryki.genealodzy.pl is one of several databases of records and indexes prepared and maintained by the Polish Genealogical Society. It is not as well known as its sister database, geneteka.genealodzy.pl . We thought it may be useful to briefly describe it’s contents, and write a short instruction on how to use it. It contains indexes of parish and civil records and pictures of actual records, mainly from central Poland (łódzkie and mazowieckie provinces) but there are also records from other parts of Poland (in former Kingdom of Poland, the area that used to be occupied by Russia, and also from the former Galicia area). There are 1265 collections of records from different towns listed in the main database.

How to use the website:

On the main page (metryki.genealodzy.pl) you may start by switching to English (click a flag in right top corner).

There are two main ways of using the site: First, you can either search a database by name of a person you are looking for (this database contains currently 124 indexed parishes) or browse the records. It is useful if you know the exact information about a record you are looking for, and also if you know the parish, or even a more general area and a time-frame.

In order to search by name you should chose a small icon of a magnifier in a row of icons at the top of  a page (or click following address: http://metryki.genealodzy.pl/­metryki.php?op=ch). You will see a search form on the left and a map on the right.  In a search form, you can enter the surname, the time range (Zakres lat), limit to exact search and filter by denomination. When the found information appears, you should click the icon on the map, and then a small window will open. You should then scroll down and click the  link “Wyszukaj w zespole”. It will open a new window / tab , listing all found records. The last column is a link to a scan of the actual record.

Another way of using metryki.genealodzy.pl page is browsing it, using a geographical location of a parish and then the time-frame and finding actual records.

1. On the left there is a map of Poland listing all provinces. If you click one of them and there are any records for it you will see, on the right,a  list of counties (powiat) with a number of indexed parishes in that county.

2. Another way of getting to a list of counties in a province is, on the main page, moving a mouse over a space under “Search” form (you may use this search form to find the parish, if you know the  name ). You will see a list of provinces and a number of indexed parishes for each of them. If you click the name of a province containing any records, you will see the same list of counties as in point 1.

3. Each name of a county consists of two parts – the name of a county (adjective created from a name of a seat of a county) and a name of a town that is a seat of a county. If you move mouse over a name of a county you will see, in left panel, a list of indexed parishes. There are following columns in a table: current number, signature of a collection, place, name of a collection (the name of a parish in most cases), denomination (so either Roman-Catholic (rz-k), Lutheran (ewang.), Jewish (mojż), Orthodox (prawosł) or civil records (usc)), and year-range. There are two more columns we will describe below.

4. If you click a county name you will see, in the left panel, a list of all available parishes. The columns are the same as above,  plus there is a column called ?info?, if you move the mouse over “i” icon you will see additional information about the collection name. The last column, “kzm”, contains, if available, a link to a description of a parish in a catalogue of parishes, also maintained by Polish Genealogical Society. If you move the mouse over the collection number (second column) you will see, in right panel, a list of all available years for that collection.

5. If you click a collection number in point 4 (above) you will see a table consisting of the following columns: current number, year, description of a unit (U for births, M for marriages, Z for deaths), additional info and number of entries.

6. If you click any of the years you will have the possibility of selecting births, marriages or deaths for that year, and a number of entries.

7. If you click one of them. you will see, in the right panel, links to actual records. Numbers in links refer to current numbers of the records on each page.

8. If you click any of them, a new tab or page will open with a picture of a record. First icon at the top will move you back to the main page, second icon will move you to a previous page and the third icon will allow you to save a picture to your computer. You have also options to zoom-in (Powiększ) and zoom-out (Pomniejsz), and go to the next picture (Następne zdjęcie) or to the previous page(Poprzednie zdjęcie). You can navigate a picture by dragging a gray rectangle in a smaller picture on the left.

Happy hunting!

Zbigniew Stettner
Chief Genealogy Guide
PolishOrigins Team

If you need assistance with your research, we are here to help.

9 comments

  1. I only recently started to use the Metryki site and found many of my Golebiewski ancestors. For the past week I have been unable to see the records. Any search leads to the comment “records not available”. Is the site down?

    Thanks for any help.

    Joe

  2. Hi, it looks like the search by name does not work. You can still browse the records if you know the parish. Where did your Gołębiewski family lived?

    Zbigniew

  3. Hi, I’m new to your website. I’m trying to find records for relatives. I started with #5 above. Question about “files”. How do I determine my relatives’ file when so many are provided? Do you need to go thru each one?

    Thanks

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