Genealogists researching the multi-ethnic heritage of the Burgenland of Austria and adjoining areas of former West Hungary.

WELCOME TO THE BURGENLAND GENEALOGY SOURCE

The Province of Burgenland, located in the southeast of Austria, was formed from parts of the Hungarian counties (Megye) of Vas, Sopron and Moson following WW-I (see map). While it is Austria's youngest province, it can claim to be one of the oldest also, as it has a fascinating history worthy of being studied in detail. The population is comprised mainly of people of Germanic, Croatian and Hungarian descent. From the 1850's through the 1950's, many inhabitants emigrated to the United States, Canada, South America and elsewhere. Our primary purpose is to develop genealogical data concerning those emigrants. We can help locate Burgenland villages through their Hungarian, German, and Croatian names, identify parishes and locations of municipal offices, and identify available church and civil records. In our monthly newsletter, we publish family names and data appearing in old records plus items and articles of Burgenland historical and cultural interest. We link researchers through an e-mail network. We engage actively in uncovering records available for genealogical research. Through the Burgenland Bunch Homepage, you can hyperlink to many other related sites. If your interest is the Burgenland, we can help you.

Read this month's Newsletter here
        ●  Archived online-formatted newsletters (2006-current) are here
        ●  Archived email-formatted newsletters (1997-2009) are here

Enter Key Words below to search many of the Burgenland Bunch pages...

History of the Group:
Formed and organized by Gerry Berghold when he established e-mail connections with other Burgenland researchers in the summer of 1996. Our first newsletter, "THE BURGENLAND BUNCH NEWS," was e-mailed to members on January 11, 1997. This web page was first posted on January 25, 1997. Read more here.

Geschichte des Vereins:
Im Sommer 1996 von Gerry Berghold auf der Basis von e-mail-Kontakten zu anderen Burgenland-Amerikanern gegründet. Erster e-mail-newsletter "THE BURGENLAND BUNCH NEWS" am 11. Jänner 1997 an die Mitglieder versandt. Diese Homepage besteht seit 25. Jänner 1997. Für weitere Informationen in deutscher Sprache senden Sie bitte ein e-mail an Klaus Gerger.

Join the Bunch:

If you wish to join the Burgenland Bunch, have your information listed and receive newsletters, you must fill out the New Member Information Form at the link here or below. The only requirement for membership is that you show a family connection to Burgenland; membership is free (but nonetheless still valuable!). We ask you to submit at least your name, city and state (or country) of residence, email address for replies, Burgenland family names being researched, villages (if known) and place settled by immigrants. Please try to include all requested data; deviation from this may cause your request to be ignored... but more information is also welcome.

Dem "Burgenland Bunch" beitreten:
Wenn Sie dem Burgenland Bunch beitreten, auf der Webseite mit der Mitgliederliste eingetragen werden, und die Newsletters per E-mail erhalten wollen, müssen Sie das "New Member Information Form" (elektronisches Beitrittsformular) ausfüllen. Das Formular fragt nach Ihrem Namen, Wohnort, Land und E-mail Adresse, den von Ihnen geforschten Familiennamen, falls bekannt auch den Herkunftsorten im Burgenland bzw. angrenzenden Gebieten, sowie, falls zutreffend, den Orten der Emigration. Versuchen Sie bitte, alle Daten einzuschließen. Abweichungen können dazu führen, dass Ihre Anmeldung nicht behandelt werden kann.

Membership Registration Forms:

Join the Bunch (see notes below)
  ●●● use this New Member Information & Registration Form

     ● Please check our Membership List to verify that you have not already joined.
     ● Use the Change Form below to change information about an existing membership.
     ● New members are automatically subscribed to our newsletter e-mail notification.

Update your Information
  ●●● use this Change Member Information Form (members only)

Resubscribe to the BB Newsletter E-mail Notification (members only)
  ●●● use this Newsletter Resubscribe Form

Cancel your Membership or Unsubscribe from the Newsletter E-mail Notification
  ●●● use this Cancel/Unsubscribe Form (members only)

     ● Canceling your membership includes an automatic unsubscribe from the newsletter e-mail notification.
     ● Unsubscribing from the newsletter e-mail notification does not imply canceling your membership.
     ● The current newsletter is on our home page; past newsletters are in our archives.

NOTICE (Informal Terms and Conditions): The Burgenland Bunch (BB) was formed and exists to assist Burgenland descendants in their research into their heritage and, toward that end, reserves the right to use any communication you have with us (email, letter, phone conversation, data upload, etc.) as part of our information exchange and educational research efforts.
    ● If you do not want your communication to be used for this purpose, indicate that it is "confidential" and we will attempt to abide by that request.
    ● Correspondents who communicate with the BB without requesting confidentiality retain their copyright but give a non-exclusive license to the BB allowing us to forward to BB members, publish in our monthly newsletter or on our website, and/or subsequently and permanently archive all or parts of such communications.
[First Posted 15sep2007]

The full, formal Burgenland Bunch Website Usage Agreement can be found here: Agreement

Burgenland Bunch Main Index:

IF A NEW MEMBER OR YOU WISH TO JOIN THE BB, CHECK OUT THESE WEB PAGES FIRST:

BB Website Usage Agreement: This is the full, formal Burgenland Bunch Website Usage Agreement (the Informal Terms and Conditions are in the Notice shown above). If you read the full agreement, you will see it is solely designed to protect the Burgenland Bunch from harm or suit and, if you do not like our terms, gives you no recourse except not to use our site. In general, we are much more flexible and understanding than these terms express, and we would rather work with you than against you, but we must protect ourselves and the organization. We hope you understand.

Invitation Letter: Read, download and follow instructions if you wish to join the Burgenland Bunch. Read to see what the BB can do for you. Also contains a list of our editorial staff who can be contacted for questions.

Members: Names, e-mail addresses and interests of over 3,000+ Members (some email addresses are inactive, please send in your update!).

Surnames: Over 9,000 surname entries being researched by members. New ones added frequently.

Villages: Hundreds of villages being researched by members as well as thumb-nail village histories of many of them.

Burgenländers Honored and Remembered (BH&R): Burial locations and tombstone information of 27,000+ Burgenland immigrants. BB members are encouraged to provide information about their deceased Burgenland-born ancestors for inclusion on the site.

USEFUL DATA AND RESOURCES:

Albert's Village Data: Bezirks (districts), parishes, German and Hungarian names for all villages. Find where church (parish) and civil records are located for your family village of origin.

Burgenland Bunch Facebook Page: The official BB-affiliated Facebook page originally founded by Jenni Wiggins-Montoya as the "Burgenland Genealogy Group" page... 1,900+ members and growing!

District Maps: Maps of the Burgenland districts and their neighboring regions, with village names in Austrian, Hungarian and Croatian form.

Emigration & Deportation: Emigration & Deportation Lists from a few villages.

FamilySearch (LDS) Microfilms: FamilySearch.org Microfilm numbers for Burgenland villages.

Note: For assistance in reading the long-form Hungarian civil records, see newsletters No.265, No.266 and No.267 for a sample translated birth, death and marriage record, respectively.

Gazetteers: PDF files of Gazetteers (place names) of the Countries of the Hungarian Crown.

Genealogical Word Translations: German and Latin genealogical words translated to English, courtesy of Felix Gundaker.

German Script Letters: Examples of the various German-script handwriting.

Houselists: Names of home owners and house numbers (from about 1857).

Hungarian Maps: Maps of Hungary and/or the portions of pre-1921 West Hungary that relate to Burgenland.

Internet Links: Hundreds of our favorite internet links, frequently reviewed. Hyperlinks to other websites which may help you.

People on the Border: English translation by Frank Teklits of Johann Dobrovich's book about the History of the Burgenland Croats.

Place Names in Burgenland: A listing of Burgenland villages and other places (farms, churches, etc.) that provides the place names, the Gemeinde in which the place is, the type of place, and the geographic latitude and longitude data that allows it to be mapped via GoogleMaps.

Query Board: View and post Burgenland queries and get answers -- courtesy of Austrian GenWeb. Over 5,800 questions and answers.

Recipes: Index to the Burgenländische recipes and discussions of food that have appeared in the BB Newsletters.

Songbook: Web page of Burgenland ethnic songs and more. Find a lullaby your grandmother may have sung.

The History of Neuberg im Burgenland: English translation of Dr. Robert Hajszan's Neuberg history book "Zur Geschichte von Neuberg im Burgenland / Ranija Povijest Nove Gore."

The Political Geography of Burgenland: PDF of Andrew F. Burghardt's 1958 dissertation (prepared in the public domain as a National Academy of Sciences report). [Note: Firefox will incorrectly display many of the maps and figures in this document; use another browser or set Firefox to open pdfs in Acrobat Reader.]

Village, Church and Regional History Books (Chroniks) List: A listing of known Burgenland Village, Church and Regional history books (Chroniks).

Village Thumbnail Histories: "Thumbnail" histories for most Burgenland Villages.

Vital Records Transcriptions: Contributed transcriptions of Catholic, Lutheran, Jewish and Civil vital records:
► Apetlon: BB member Rebecca Chamberlain's complete transcription of 3,853 birth records from 1771 through 1826 and 989 marriage records from 1746 through 1826.
► Deutschkreutz: Links to the Austrian Jewish Museum's complete transcription of 1,940 Jewish births, 422 Jewish marriages and 1,682 Jewish deaths from 1833 to 1895 (extended to 1920 for deaths). Includes translations of instructions and column headers.
► Deutsch Schützen: BB Member Susan O'Meara's complete transcription of the 435 marriage records from 1828 through May 1876, the 173 death records from 1828 through July 1832, and the 306 birth records from 1828 through 1835. In addition, there are 34 selected marriage records from 1876 to 1895, 164 selected death records from 1832 to 1895, and 137 selected birth records from 1836 to 1895.
► Eisenstadt: Links to the Austrian Jewish Museum's complete transcription of 403 Jewish births, 201 Jewish marriages and 434 Jewish deaths from 1895 to 1938 (except births, currently limited by law to 1919). Includes translations of instructions and column headers.
► Großpetersdorf: BB Member Patrick Kovacs's transcriptions of 587 Catholic marriage records from 1797 to 1827, of 1211 Catholic marriage records from 1828 to 1895, and of 530 Civil marriage records from 1895 to 1920.
► Güssing: BB Members Ed Marx and Thomas Steichen's complete dual transcription of all 4,310 Catholic birth records for the parish of Güssing for 1861 to 1895; plus 185 records by Klaus Gerger for missing images, making 4,495 records in all.
► Jennersdorf: BB Members Edward Schraith and Thomas Steichen's complete transcription of all 8,850 Catholic birth records and all 1,670 Catholic marriage records for 1828-1895 for the parish of Jennersdorf, and Ferenc Zotter's complete transcription of all 3,600 Civil death records from 1895 to 1920.
► Kondorfa: BB Member Jane Horvath's complete transcription of all 1,385 Catholic birth records from 1855 to 1895.
► Krobotek: BB Member Ed Malesky's selected transcriptions of 258 Catholic birth records from 1828 to 1860, 99 Catholic death records from 1828 to 1895, and 61 Catholic marriage records from 1800 to 1895.
► Kukmirn: BB Member Patrick Kovacs's complete transcription of 8,733 Lutheran birth records and 1,849 Lutheran marriage records from 1828 to 1895, and 649 civil marriage records from 1895-1920.
► Mischendorf: BB Member Patrick Kovacs's complete transcription of 735 Civil marriage records from 1895 to 1921, 881 Catholic birth records from 1815-1827, and 81 Catholic death records from 1817-1827.
► Moschendorf: BB Member Frank Teklit's complete transcription of all 3,874 Catholic birth records from 1783 to 1895, 3,650 Catholic death records from 1788 to 1895, and 1,045 Catholic and Civil marriage records from 1789 to 1923.
► Neuhaus am Klausenbach: Sabine Gober's transcription of 3,732 Catholic marriage records from 1828 to 1895 and 2,294 Civil marriage records from 1895 to 1920.
► Rotenturm: BB Member Patrick Kovacs transcription of 1,033 Catholic marriage records from 1828 to 1895 and 857 Civil marriage records from 1895 to 1920, and BB Member Christian Saurer's transcription of 412 Civil marriage records from 1921 to 1945.
► Sankt Kathrein: BB Member Frank Teklit's complete transcription of all 3,247 Catholic birth records from 1804 to 1895, 2,846 Catholic death records from 1804 to 1895, and 789 Catholic and Civil marriage records from 1804 to 1905. The birth database was supplemented by Werner Stubits, who provided 19 records not previously transcribed, and by Thomas Steichen, who provided 9 records not previously transcribed.
► Sankt Martin an der Raab: Ferenc Zotter's complete transcription of all 1,854 Catholic marriage records and 7,624 Catholic death records from 1828 to 1895, plus the complete 10,486 Catholic birth records from 1737 to 1817 and the complete 880 Catholic marriage records from 1797 to 1828.
► Sankt Michael: BB Member Bernhard Antal's complete transcriptions of all 4,817 birth records from 1780 to 1827, all 1,585 Catholic marriage records from 1749-1827, and all 2,326 Catholic death records from 1794 to 1827; BB Member Margaret Roosdahl's complete transcription of all 6,787 Catholic birth records, 1,355 Catholic marriage records and 5,386 Catholic death records from 1828 to 1895; BB Member Patrick Kovacs's complete transcription of 1,167 Civil marriage records from 1895 to 1921; and Bernhard Antal's transcription of all 807 coroner death records from 1894 to 1925.
► Sankt Nikolaus: BB Member Margaret Roosdahl's complete transcription of all 5,810 Catholic birth records, 1,131 Catholic marriage records and 4,644 Catholic death records from 1828 to 1895.
► Stadtschlaing: Links to the Austrian Jewish Museum's complete transcription of 1,603 Jewish births, 288 Jewish marriages and 757 Jewish deaths from 1841 to 1920. Includes translations of instructions and column headers.
► Steingraben: BB Members Charles von Breitenbach's and Thomas Steichen's complete transcription of all 747 Catholic birth records, 204 Catholic marriage records and 559 Catholic death records from 1828 to 1895, and the 304 civil birth records, 69 civil marriage records and 200 civil death records for the village of Steingraben that appear in the Gerersdorf Catholic parish records or the Gerersdorf civil recording district books.
► Strem: BB Member Ed Marx's complete transcription of all 689 Catholic birth records for the parish of Strem for 1877 to 1895.
► Szent Péterfa, Hungary: BB Member Frank Teklit's complete transcription of all 17,037 Catholic and Civil birth records from 1681 to 1925, 10,201 Catholic and Civil death records from 1682 to 1906, and 3,686 Catholic and Civil marriage records from 1683 to 1934.
► Tadten: BB Member Kyle Sattler's complete transcription of all Catholic records from 1726 to 1789, constituting 2,198 birth records, 488 marriage records, and 1,780 death records.

Wallern in der Geschichte seiner Häuser: Father Graisy's book about the history of the houses of Wallern.

LIST OF LINKS... ONCE YOU'VE SEEN THE ABOVE, PLEASE VISIT THESE WEB PAGES:

AustriaGenWeb: A link to the Modern Austria WorldGenWeb page hosted by Charles Wardell, which contains links to GenWeb pages and query boards for the current Austrian provinces as well as the states of the old Austro-Hungarian Empire. In addition, the pages have historical, geographical and other information useful for performing genealogical research.

Berghold Award: Photos from presentation of Burgenland award to BB founder, Gerry Berghold.

Burgenland Government Website: The official (German language) website of the Office of the Burgenland Regional Government.

Burgenländische Gemeinschaft (BG): Webpage of the association established in 1956 with the objective to build a global community of Burgenländers, notably of Burgenländers who emigrated to other European countries, to the USA, or to other overseas countries, and to foster their attachment to their homeland.

Burgenländische Gemeinschaft Newsletter Archive: PDF Archive of the BG Newsletters from 1956-2011, presented by permission of the BG.

Church and State Resources:

Note:
Per a 2013 Austrian law, there is unrestricted access to birth records over 100 years old, marriage records over 75 years old, and death records over 30 years old. Records newer than these cutoffs are restricted to immediate relatives only, and only via direct record request, not by browsing.

The privacy laws for Hungary allow unrestricted access to birth records 90 years old or older, marriage records 60 years old or older, and death records 30 years old or older.

For Burgenland, "official" vital records were/are held as follows:
 - from their varied beginnings (1686-1740) to 1895, by the Burgenland churches and/or their archives.
 - for 1895-1921, by the Hungarian Anyakönyvi Kerület (District Registrars), now archived in Budapest.
 - since 1921, by the Austrian civil Standesamts (Registrar's Offices).
However, the churchs continued to maintain ecclesiastical parish books after civil authorities took over the "official" vital records responsibilities.

Images of vital record duplicates are also available online via FamilySearch (LDS), predominantly for the 1828-1920 period, and consist of records held by the Hungarian National Archives in Budapest. Churches were first required to send duplicates to the Hungarian Archives starting in 1827.

More information about Availability of Burgenland Records can be found in Newsletter 230.

Local Catholic Churches: List of Catholic Parishes in Burgenland

Diocesan Archives Eisenstadt (Catholic)
Address: St. Rochus Street 21, A-7000 Eisenstadt, Austria
Phone: 0043/2682 / 777-234; Fax: 0043/2682 / 777-252
E-mail: museum@martinus.at
Website: www.martinus.at
Holdings: 1) Files of the Apostolic Administration Burgenland and of the Diocese of Eisenstadt since 1922;
               2) Pfarrarchive (parish archives), 117 parishes, about 17th-19th century;
               3) Parish registers: 107 parishes, from the beginning until ca. 1820, duplicates from 1922.

Local Lutheran Churches: List of Evangelical (Lutheran) Parishes in Austria

Archive of the Evangelical Church in Austria (Lutheran)
Address: Evangelical Church in Austria, Severin Schreiber-Gasse 3, Dept. of Matriculation, Archives, Library, A-1180 Vienna, Austria
Phone : +43/1/4791523/519; Fax: +43/1/4791523/440
E-Mail: archiv@Evang.at

Hungarian-era Lutheran Parishes: Information can be found in the Church Directories at library.hungaricana.hu/hu/collection/edt_eok_gyulekezeti_nevtarak/. The Györ Superintendency is documented in the "Dunántúli evangélikus egyházkerület névtára" (Transdanubian Evangelical Church-District Directory), which are available for various years.

Civil Records: The Standesamt hold the government records of births, marriages, and deaths, from 1 January 1939.
List of Current Standesamt Addresses in Austria

Burgenlandisches Landesarchiv (State)
Address: Landhaus Alt, Europaplatz 1, 7000 Eisenstadt, Austria
Phone: 057-600 / 2358
E-Mail: post.a7-landesarchiv@bgld.gv.at
Website: www.burgenland.at/kultur-wissenschaft/wissenschaft/landesarchiv

Dedication Page: Dedication page honoring our founder, Gerry Berghold.

Events: Provides pictures and text about past Burgenland-related events.

FAQ: Frequently Asked Questions by Burgenland Bunch members.

Genealogical Research - Helpful Hints: How to use Diocesan Archives - Diocesan Library - Diocesan Museum in Eisenstadt (capital of Burgenland) when visiting Austria. Library contains fragments of the oldest church records extant.

Gerry Berghold's Burgenland Library - Catalog: Gerry Berhold's collection of Burgenland and genealogical books were placed at the Allentown Family History Center, 1881 Van Buren Dr, Whitehall, PA, and are available there for public use. This link provides the catalog of available books.

How To Use The BB Website: A primer about how to develop a Burgenland genealogy.

Just A Little Interest In Genealogy?: The simplest, but least rewarding, approach to Burgenland family history.

Midwest Burgenland Bunch: An affiliate of the BB based in St. Paul, MN (has a local BH&R also).

Notice to Users: Whether a new contact or long-time Burgenland Bunch member, please read.

Spirit of Gradišće - Őrvidék Group: Hannes Graf has closed this website. Much of its material was contributed to the BB and is now available on our website, accessible via the links below:

► Father Graisy Book: Hannes' version (provides additional translations of "special pages")
► Burgenland Buildings: Articles about castles, churches, parks, etc. in Burgenland
► Burgenland Villages: Articles about villages in greater Burgenland
► Croatian History in Austria/Hungary: A translation of Burgenland-Croatian history material
► Burgenland Articles: Burgenland-related articles that do not fit elsewhere above

Staff: A Photomontage of all Staff Members.

Where We Are: States and countries where BB residents reside.

OTHER IMPORTANT RECORDS: (not on our website)

► Early Urbaria (Property Tax Records):
    ■ 1715 Urbariam: https://adatbazisokonline.hu/adatbazis/az-1715_-evi-orszagos-osszeiras/hierarchia
    ■ 1720 Urbariam: https://adatbazisokonline.hu/adatbazis/az-1720_-evi-orszagos-osszeiras/hierarchia
         - Tutorial on using the above Urbaria: Newsletter 259 #04
         - Cross-reference of Urbárial village names: Newsletter 259 #05
Notes:
 - the above websites are presented in the Hungarian language.
 - for Burgenland, use counties (megye) Moson, Sopron or Vas. However, Vas is not included in the 1715 census.
 - estates and villages are usually listed by their Hungarian names, though a few German names are used (spelling is 'freeform' regardless of language)
 - Warning: the BB Newsletter tutorial article listed above was written in 2015; the site has since been reimplemented and the exact steps given in the article no longer apply. However, the current implementation is quite similar so the tutorial can still be useful; just expect screens to look somewhat different and minor things to not be identical!
    ■ 1767 Urbariam: http://archives.hungaricana.hu/en/urberi/
         - Tutorial on using the above Urbar: Newsletter 257 #04
         - Cross-reference of Urbárial village names: Newsletter 259 #05
Notes:
 - the above website is in English for the first page; additional pages are in Hungarian.
 - for Burgenland (counties Moson, Sopron or Vas), expand a county by clicking the + sign to the left of its name in the "Contents" section of the page. Select a village by doubleclicking on the village name (villages are listed by their Hungarian names) then click the initial image on the next page, which will give the full list of page thumbnails.
 - the actual name list usually starts about 10 pages down the list of page thumbnails... click a page to expand it.
 - note that there also usually is a detail list toward the end of the page thumbnails... see this also, if interested.

► Church Books Online: (as of August 2024)
    ■ Matricula Images with Indexes for Austria (free): http://data.matricula-online.eu/en/oesterreich/

    ■ Matricula and Other Indexes: http://www.GenTeam.at/en/ (free but requires registration to use)

    ■ Eisenstadt RC Diocese Archive: https://matriken.at/en (fee required, see the site for available parishes and years)

► Burgenland property GIS (Geographical Information System):
    ■ http://gis.bgld.gv.at/WebGIS/synserver?project=Kataster (free but requires pre-registering to use)

► HUNGARICANA: the common website of Hungarian archives, museums and libraries, operated by the Hungarian Library of Parliament (Országgyűlési Könyvtár). The English-language home page is found here: http://hungaricana.hu/en/. However, search listings are returned in Hungarian and the most documents are in Hungarian, Latin or German.

The main databases are (see details in databases menu):

• Library: publication of archives, museums, libraries
• Postcards: more than 300.000 postcards
• MAPIRE: Historical Maps of the Habsburg Empire
• Maps: unique historical maps from the biggest Hungarian collections
• Documents: medieval charters, notarial records, criminal cases, civil law cases, etc.
• Old Hungarian Library (RMK)

    - Tutorial on using the above Maps database: Newsletter 258 #04