Parish Affiliations of Villages in the Former Archdiocese of Wilno
Parish Affiliations of Villages in the Former Archdiocese of Wilno
by Jonathan D. Shea and Diane Bojniewicz Szepanski
ISBN 0-9631579-5-7 Copyright 2006
This publication (currently out of print) lists tens of thousands of towns and villages with the name of the parish church with which the locality was affiliated. Place names repeat frequently in Europe. For example, there are three pages of listings for the common place name Nowosiolki alone!!
This book identifies each of them with precision, thereby enabling the researcher to see how they are distributed and search in other sources for corroborating geographical data to determine which village is the correct one. It focuses on the old Archdiocese of Wilno, a territorially expansive Roman Catholic diocese located in the Russian Empire in the 19th century.
Wilno Archdiocese Map – click to enlarge
The land area spans portions of three modern day countries; eastern Lithuania, the northeastern corner of Poland and the northwest portion of Belarus. While guides of this type exist for most of Eastern Europe, there was no compiled source for individuals whose family roots lie in the area under study.
The database below will allow you to search for the villages (located in the former Archdiocese of Wilno – now known by its Lithuanian name, Vilnius – as of the late 19th century). The purpose of the project is to help genealogists locate the villages they are from which their ancestors came and identify the parish that served each village — a key step in gaining access to the birth, marriage, and death records that comprise the most significant sources of genealogical information.
Duplicate Entries
Please note that many places in this part of the world share the same name. The reason Gaj, for instance, appears in the list 7 times is because there are 7 places in the database by that name. If you contact the authors to ask about a specific town or village, your chances of receiving a helpful reply are greatly enhanced if you can provide some information that helps clarify which place you need.
Polish Names
The information sources available to the authors were mostly in Polish, and that’s why the Polish versions of place names predominate in the list.
Purchase Information
If you find a place in the list and believe it is your village, you can send a request for more information to the authors.
The numbers in parentheses following the village name indicate the total number of villages that bear this name. Therefore, if there is a (3) after a particular village, this means that there are three villages with this name all belonging to three different parishes. Please use these guidelines before calculating the correct fee.
Please send the names of your village(s), along with a check for $3.00 for each village requested, payable to Diane Szepanski. (please do not make it payable to PGSCTNE or LANGUAGE & LINEAGE PRESS ). Please enclose your e-mail address or send a self-addressed, stamped envelope.
Please send request to:
Wilno Diocese Request
Diane Szepanski
138 Fern Dr
Plantsville, CT 06479
If you have questions about this service, you can e-mail Diane Szepanski.
Enter your search criteria below
| wdt_ID | Village Name |
|---|---|
| 1 | Abnełka |
| 2 | Abrahimowszczyzna |
| 3 | Abramiki |
| 4 | Abramiszki |
| 5 | Abramowsk |
| 6 | Abramowszczyzna (4) |
| 7 | Abramy |
| 8 | Abszuty |
| 9 | Abugaliszki |
| 10 | Achrymowce |