Czech Republic, Southern Bohemia, Trebon Archive Church Books - FamilySearch Historical Records

= Czech Church Books, 1441–present =

Why This Record Was Created
Church books were first created to identify those who had received church sacraments. After 1869 they were also used as an official record of vital events by civil authorities.

The earliest Czech book was created in 1441 (a book of christenings from Horní Jiřetín). Books have been kept to the present, but because of privacy laws, they are available for research only through 1905.

Population Converage
The church books cover a majority of the population.

Record History
The edict of the Council of Trent in 1563, which mandated the creation of church books, applied to Czech congregations. Austrian emperor Joseph II issued the Edict of Toleration on October 13, 1781, which allowed Protestants, Jews, and others to keep their own church records under the supervision of the Catholic Church. Though the Protestants were allowed to keep registers starting in 1771, they were copied into Catholic registers. In 1781 Protestants continued to keep registers under Catholic supervision.

Starting February 10, 1784, Joseph II required that all church birth entries include the full names of both parents and all grandparents, along with their towns of origin and their military conscription numbers or unique address, such as Plichtice č. 5 (č is an abbreviation for čislo, or "number"). The emperor also required that records be kept in Latin or German, though Czech was often used. Column headings, which had started around 1784 (sometimes earlier), were also made compulsory.

In 1790 the Austrian government (under which Czech records were kept) created a law requiring indexes to be kept. In 1802 another law was passed requiring all older matriky (church books) to be indexed. Only rarely are volumes not indexed.

Starting in 1869, the civil authorities took charge of the record-keeping of births, marriages, and deaths. However, individual churches continued to actually record these events. The official legal copy was kept by local officials when many of the clergy refused to perform Catholic rites for non-Catholics. Everyone was registered under this new system, not just those appearing in Catholic or Protestant registers

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