Bucovina Vital Records

53,214 RECORDS

Vital Records · Bucovina · Romania / Ukraine

Background

This database contains Jewish birth, marriage, divorce, and death records from Bucovina, a region whose archives reflect more than a century of shifting borders. Bucovina was a province of the Austrian Empire from 1775 until the end of World War I, which is why the records are written primarily in old German with dates given according to the Julian calendar.

Between the two world wars, Bucovina was part of Romania, divided into the counties (judeţe) of Cernăuţi, Câmpulung, Rădăuţi, Storojineţ, and Suceava. In 1940, as a result of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, the northern half of Bucovina was annexed by the Soviet Union. Today, northern Bucovina lies in Ukraine (the western half of Chernivtsi Oblast), while southern Bucovina remains in northeastern Romania (most of Suceava County, plus a small sliver of Botoşani County).

The original registers are held at the Suceava County branch of the National Archives of Romania. Copies were obtained for the JewishGen Romania Research Division by a research assistant in Romania, and are made available for genealogical research only.

Source & Acquisition: Direcţia Judeţeană Suceava a Arhivelor Naţionale, Strada Ştefan cel Mare nr. 33, cod 720003, Suceava, Romania. Records were acquired by the JewishGen Romania Research Division through a research assistant working on site.
The Three Record Types

The database is organized around three register types kept by the civil registrars of Bucovina’s Jewish communities. Coverage by town and year is shown in the table further down this page.

Births

1843–1909

Detailed birth registers including parents, grandparents (where listed), mother’s maiden surname, place of birth, and witness names.

5 towns · 30,168 records
Marriages & Divorces

1834–1909

Marriage and divorce registers covering both spouses, their parents and birthplaces, witnesses, and rabbinical seals where present.

4 towns · 6,265 records
Deaths

1855–1910

Death registers including age, cause of death, place of death, and the name of the deceased’s father.

5 towns · 16,781 records
Coverage by Town

Records come from the civil registrars of five Bucovinian towns. The table below shows the year ranges indexed for each record type. Towns are listed by their pre-WWI German name alongside their modern Romanian name, since both appear in the original registers and on this site.

Pre-WWI German Modern Romanian Births Marriages Deaths
Kimpolung Câmpulung Moldovenesc 1857–1889 — 1857–1877
Gurahumora Gura Humorului 1877–1900 1864–1907 —
Radautz Rădăuţi 1857–1879 1841, 1870–1877 1857–1887
Solka Solca 1896–1909 1899–1909 1896–1910
Suczawa Suceava 1843–1904 1857–1901 1857–1877, 1898–1906
Surrounding villages covered

These records also include registrations from many neighboring villages. Villages are listed by their pre-WWI German name with the modern Romanian name in parentheses where one exists.

Ballaczana (Bălăceana), Bossancze (Bosanci), Brohoja, Bunince (Buninţi), Chilischeny (Chilişeni), Danilla (Dănila), Dorna Kandreni (Dorna Cîndrenilor), Florinta, Frumosa (Frumosul), Gropi (Vîlcelele), Gurasolcze (Gura Solcii), Hariatzka, Hatna (Dărmăneşti), Ipotestie (Ipoteşti), Itzkany (Iţcani), Jacobestie (Iacobeşti), Joseffalwa (Vorniceni), Kalinesti (Călineşti), Komanestie (Comăneşti), Kostina (Costîna), Lipoweni (Lipoveni), Lisaura, Liteny (Liteni), Ludihumora (Humureni), Merecei (Măriţei), Mihoweni (Mihoveni), Mittoka (Mitocu Dragomirnei), Parhoutz (Părhăuţi), Parzik, Petroutz (Pătrăuţi), Pojeni (Poieni), Reusseny (Răuseni), Romanestie (Romîneşti), Russ Lunkaschuora, Russ Manastiora (Ruşii Mînăstioarei), Russ Plawalar (Plăvalări), Russ Pojeni (Poeni-Suceava), Sekuriczeny (Securiceni), Skeja (Scheia), Slobodzia (Slobozia), Solonetz (Soloneţ), St. Illie (Sfîntu Ilie), Strojestie (Stroeşti), Teschoutz (Tisăuţi), Theodorestie (Todireşti), Theodoruka, Uidestie (Uideşti), Zaharestie (Zahareşti).

Fields Recorded

Each register type captures a different combination of fields. Open the drawers below to see exactly what is indexed for births, marriages and divorces, and deaths.

Birth Records

Birth registers are the most detailed of the three. A typical entry may include the following:

Register number
Page number in register
Place recorded
Year of registration
Record number
Surname (not all individuals had one)
Given name
Father’s name
Paternal grandfather (rare)
Paternal grandmother (rare)
Mother’s name
Maternal grandfather
Maternal grandmother
Mother’s maiden surname
Day, month, year of birth (Julian)
Place of birth
Declarant
Witnesses
Comments (occupation, residence, legitimization)
Archive reference (register, type, record number)
Marriage & Divorce Records

Marriage and divorce registers are recorded together, with each entry flagged for type:

Register number
Page number(s) in register
Place recorded
Year recorded (Julian)
Marriage or divorce indicator
Record number
Day, month, year of event (Julian)
Husband’s place
Husband’s surname & given name
Husband’s father’s name
Husband’s mother’s name
Wife’s place
Wife’s surname & given name
Wife’s father’s name
Wife’s mother’s name
Mother’s maiden name
Marriage or divorce place
Witnesses & comments
Other comments
Source of the record
Death Records

Death registers are typically the briefest, but often capture cause of death and parentage:

Register number
Page number in register
Place recorded
Year recorded
Record number
Surname
Given name
Father’s name
Age
Cause of death
Day, month, year of death (Julian)
Place of death
Comments
Archive reference (register, type, record number)
Research Notes

Two things to keep in mind when working with these records: the original handwriting and the calendar in use.

Reading the Records: Old German & the Julian Calendar

The original registers are written almost entirely in old German, often in Kurrentschrift or other 19th-century cursive hands. Some pages have Latin column headings with German entries beneath; multi-language headers (German, Latin, Romanian) appear in later registers. Handwriting quality varies widely, and some pages are extremely difficult to read.

Dates in these registers are recorded according to the Julian calendar, which through the 19th and early 20th centuries ran roughly 12–13 days behind the Gregorian calendar used today. When comparing a Bucovina date to a record from a Gregorian-calendar country, this offset must be accounted for.

Search Tips: Spelling Variations & Soundex

Names in these records were transliterated by clerks working in old German, often from Yiddish or Hebrew originals. Spelling varies considerably across registers and even within a single register.

We strongly recommend searching using the Daitch–Mokotoff Soundex as well as the exact name. Soundex matches names by sound rather than spelling, which is essential for German-language registers of Eastern European Jewish families.

Acknowledgements
This database is dedicated to the memory of Robert Wascou, z”l, whose leadership made this project possible. Its continued growth is a tribute to his vision.

These records are extremely difficult to read, and many hours of work went into transliterating and validating each entry. The transliterators and validators did their very best to be as accurate as possible.

Transliteration & validation: Edna Loebel, Malcolm Singer, Hannelore Condiescu, Nathan Schachter, Gregory Oken, Israel Rabin, Noam Silberberg, Bruno Segal, Jacob Szabo, Yossi Yagur, Steven Emanuel, Freyda Ravitz, Davia Kimmel, Joel Ross, Max Preston, Martina Lelgemann, and Edgar Hauster.

Support: Rosanne Leeson, Barbara Hershey, Jeni Armandez, Avraham Groll, Warren Blatt, Michael Tobias, and Bruce Reisch.

If you can transliterate or translate from old German, Romanian, or Cyrillic-Romanian, and would like to help expand this database, please contact Bruce Reisch.

Databases like this one are made possible entirely through volunteer effort and generous donors. Your contribution helps fund transcription, translation, and preservation of Romanian Jewish records.

Support the Romania Research Division

Last updated September 2017.
For questions, contact the JewishGen Romania Research Division.