GuidedResearch:Why Can't I Find the Record - Norway Deaths

This page will give you additional guidance and resources to find death information for your ancestor. Use this page after first completing the death section of the Norway Guided Research page.

Church records in the cities of Norway generally begin in the early 1600s and in the rural areas in the late 1600s or 1700s. These include records of birth or christening, marriage, and death or burial.

Additional Records with Death Information
Substitute records can contain information about more than one event, and are used when records for an event are not available. Because the substitute records may not be created at the time of the event, it may contain incorrect information. Search for as many substitute records as possible to corroborate information found in substitute records to help improve accuracy.

Tips for finding deaths
Success with finding death records in online databases depends on a few key points:
 * Try different spelling variations of the first and last name of your ancestor (e.g. Christian, Kristian).
 * Try a given name search (leave out the last names).
 * The use of patronymics was largely discontinued after the mid 1800s, changing the way people held surnames. See this article for more information.
 * Women began adopting their husband's surname in documents in the late 1800s/early 1900s.


 * Expand the date range of the search.
 * Try searching with the county name only instead of by parish.

Known Record Gaps
Records Start Beginning about 1500, usually much later, churches required their clergy to keep burial records. Early records may be inconsistent, lost, or destroyed.

Records destroyed Any known record loss will be mentioned on the parish page. Locate your parish by navigating to the parish page starting here.