This blog is three years old today! As I’ve said in previous blog anniversaries, when I first started this blog, I never imagined that I would get the response that I have. I’ve had people contact me from all over
G is for Germans
What’s next in the Family History Through the Alphabet challenge? Germans! Germans and the German language have a long history in Latvia. Ever since the first bishops of Bremen came to Latvian territory in the late 12th century to Christianize
Making Sense of Exonyms
So after puzzling through the various alphabets and orthographies, you have been able to establish what your ancestors’ names would have looked like back in the nineteenth and early twentieth century. This is a great first step towards tracking them
Important Latvian/German/Russian Words
Language can be one of the biggest obstacles to tracing Latvian genealogy. However, it is not an insurmountable one. Most records follow specific patterns, and once you know what to look for in the patterns, you can easily find what
Navigating Raduraksti
I make many references to LVVA’s Raduraksti. It is the best resource for people researching their Latvian family history if they’re not able to go to the LVVA itself. The collection of documents available there is growing – recently they
The Big Three
BÄ“rziņš, Kalniņš, Ozoliņš – these are what I call the “big three”. They are the most common Latvian surnames. With these names more than any others it is imperative that you know where your ancestor was from. But what do
Changes in Orthography
What happens when you apply the orthography of one language to a fairly unrelated language? A right mess, that’s what. As mentioned before, up until the 1890s most church books in Latvia were written in German. German is, as its
Languages in the Records
If in the course of your research you have come across a Latvian ancestor, and you do not speak Latvian, you may feel like you have hit a big stumbling block to continuing your research. Good news! The block may