LitvakSIG - Revision List

by Davida Noyek Handler, Vitalija Gircyte, Carol Coplin Baker,
Alexander Karnovsky and Judith Langer Caplan

Revision Lists (“Reviski Skaski”) are census lists, which were first recorded in 1772. Up to, and including 1858, the census was called a revision list. Revision Lists were revised or updated, sometimes several times, until the next census was recorded. Such information frequently covered a period of ten years or more. Revision Lists are by far the most useful of all of the 19th century records. These records were written in Russian (Cyrillic) except for those in the Memel (Klaipeda) Archive, which were written mainly in German. Some records contain additional notations written in Yiddish or Hebrew. This major table contains revision, family, census, and town residents lists for the years from 1795 until the early 20th century, for most of the districts in the old Vilna and Kovno guberniyas - more than 150 towns that today lie within Disna, Kaunas, Lida, Oshmiany, Panevezys, Raseniai, Siauliai, Telsiai, Trakai, Ukmerge, and Vilnius districts.

This ongoing ALD project will help to provide a "portrait" of the presence of our Jewish ancestors' lives in Lithuania. It is important to read the full description of the Revision List at least once and to be able to refer back to it as needed.

FIELDS INCLUDED IN THE REVISION LISTS TABLE

Town / Uyezd / Guberniya : All spellings within the translated databases use the current Lithuanian names. To check on alternate spellings or names for your shtetl, or to find out in which Uyezd or Guberniya was located, please go to the Shtetl, Uyezd, Guberniya table page.

Family Name (Surname) : Very few surnames appear in the earlier Revision Lists. Although the majority of Jews in Lithuania did not have surnames, some families began using surnames as early as 1816. This is where you must use your ingenuity, and deductive reasoning. Without surnames, one must rely exclusively on patronymics, hoping that names repeated within a family will show a trend. A patronymic is a name derived from the name of one's father or other paternal ancestor, usually by the addition of an affix such as "ovich" or "ovna" as in Davidovich (son of David) or Moshovna (daughter of Moshe or Moses). By 1834, family names began to appear more frequently

See Online Journal article, "Excel, Schmexcel - Dig UpThose Relatives!"

Relationship to Head of Household: While large numbers of Jews gradually moved to the cities, many 18th and 19th Century shtetls had fewer than a thousand people - and many of these residents were fairly closely related. The chances of finding distantly related cousins within this field are very likely. This field describes how each person in the household is related to the head of the household.

Age at last revision / Age : Age given at present enumeration. In addition to the adults listed, names and ages of children born between the years that the census and each revision were recorded. By finding an ancestor listed in 1816, aged approximately 65 - 70, you could assume his/her birth year to be 1746 -1750.

Reason Left : This field explains what happened to people registered on the list since the last census. People left their shtetl for a variety of reasons - for instance if they moved to another town, if boys were conscripted (or in some cases, were declared “missing” in an attempt to avoid conscription by the “khappers”), or if someone died in the interim period. Other reasons given were “expelled from the community” - “converted” - “moved to ............” etc.

In 1902 a list of Jews who avoided military service (e.g. because of emigration to the USA) was published in the Latvian newspaper "Kurlandskiye gubernskiye vedomosti" [KGV]. The relatives who remained in Russia were forced to pay "the enormous pain in 300 rubles." In KGV the authorities announced they were searching for the members of the family of the person who had avoided military service (in 1901), and published the names of the relatives and their ages, including the draft avoider's parents and brother; and searched their property, asking for payment in the amount of 300 rubles. So it would seem that 300 rubles was the standard fine to be paid by the family for draft evasion for the early part of the 20th Century at least. This applied to families within the entire Pale of Settlement.

Some families were able to buy their son’s way out of the conscription, but most were extremely poor. The cost of buying one's self out of the army was even greater than the cost of a steerage ticket to England or the USA. When the emigrant attempted to send money “back home” to help pay these fines, the letters were frequently opened by the post office authorities to search for money orders or cash, and the money seldom reached the families most in need of it.

Year Left: Self explanatory

Page # : The page number in the original document on which this record appears.

Comments: While the comments within this field do not appear on the original lists, this field was added by LitvakSIG to record comments by translators, and for information on the original list which may not fit into a specific column or field. For instance, a family may have always lived in Kaunas, however, if they were officially registered in Uzventis they would be listed on the Uzventis Revision list - not on the Kaunas Revision list.

Family Registration # : Registration number during this census count. References such as "2 to 43" mean that this registration “2” on the additional revision list is related to registration“43” on the primary revision list.

Former Registration #: Family registration number given during the last census count.

Type of Record: Denotes if the record is a Revision List, an Additional Revision List (lists made after the original revision, documenting those who may have been absent at last revision, or other changes in status), a Tax List, Voter's List, or any other type of record.

Archive/Fond/Inventory/File# / : KRA/ indicates the Kaunas Regional Archives.

LVIA/ indicates the Lithuanian State Historical Archives in Vilnius = Lietuvos Valstybes Istorijos Archyvas.

Fond/Inventory/File# indicates the number and location of the specific file. So that KRA/I-106/1/5345 would mean Kaunas Regional Archives / Fond I-106 /Inventory 1 / File 5345.

Some Useful Definitions of Terms:

Guberniya: A Province of the Russian Empire. Based on the American administrative system "guberniya" could be qualified or understood as a state. There were 60 guberniyas in 1914, including 15 in the Pale of Settlement and 10 in the Kingdom of Poland. Each guberniya was divided into several uyezds (districts).

Uyezd: The term "Uyezd" is very old and was in use for several hundred years up until Lithuania became an independent country in 1919. The Old Russian administrative terminology was changed by the Bolsheviks (communist) government. They used the term "Oblast" instead of "Guberniya" and "Rayon" instead of "Uyezd." This new system is still being used in the Russian Federation, Belarus, and Ukraine. Based on the American administrative system "uyezd" could be understood as a county. All Uyezd names have been listed according to their current Lithuanian spelling. Russian, Yiddish or Polish equivalents have been provided within our Shtetl, Uyezd, and Guberniya table for easy identification, as they would have been in documents of the mid-19th century. Once the Uyezd has been determined, the guberniya can be determined by using this table.

Map of the seven uyezds in Kaunas Guberniya

(Click on picture for enlarged view)

Shtetl: Where possible, towns have been listed according to their current Lithuanian spelling. Russian, Yiddish or Polish equivalents have been provided within our shtetl / uyezd / guberniya table for easy identification, as they would have been in documents of the mid-19th century. The Revision Lists cover towns within most of the Guberniyas, and the database is continuously updated.

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