Jewish Family Search team specializes in providing professional genealogical research services on the Jewish families with roots in Transcarpathia. We’ve carried out extensive research on both: Jewish families residing in the villages in Carpathian highlands in northern part of the region, as well as more urbanized and communities in the southern, more Hungarian part of Sub-Carpathia.

Map of Sub-Carpathia from the Czechoslovakian (interwar) period

Unlike in many other areas in Ukraine, primary sources for genealogy of the Jews of Transcarpathia in large extent survived the 20th century archival losses. Available material covers almost every town and village in the area from the end of the 19th century. For some areas, however, the earliest genealogical sources date back even to the 1st half of the 19th century.
Because of multi-ethnic composition of the area and often-shifting borders any archival inquiry requires basic at least knowledge of Hungarian, Czech, Ukra
inian, Russian and Rusyn. This complicated history is reflected by several names of the region:

• Zakarpattia, Закарпаття (Ukrainian),
• Podkarpatská Rus, Subcarpathia (Czech),
• Kárpátalja (Hungarian),
• Transcarpathia, Carpathia
• קארפאטארוס

Archival records are held in three branches, two in Uzhhorod and one in Berehovo.

Genealogical sources

Genealogical research that we recommend should cover:

Vital records

Entrance to the State Archives of the Uzhhorod Oblast

This collection consists of two series:

1. Vital registration prior to 1895, led by local rabbis. The earliest existing entries date back to 1837. It exists for selected areas, among others: Berehove (Beregovo, Beregszasz), Svaliava (Svaljava, Szolyva). Volovets (Volovec, Volóc), Zhukovo (Zsukó), Uzhhorod (Užhorod, Ungvár), Mukachevo (Mukačevo, Munkács), Vynohradiv (Vinogradov, Sevljuš, Nagyszőlős).
2. Civil registration introduced in 1895. The latest available records come from 1943 (as at 2019). Later records are withheld from public access due to privacy reasons.

Census lists

Three important collections with full census lists exist in the archives:

1. The 1921 census of Transcarpathia enumerated by the government of Czechoslovakia. Existing material covers whole region.
2. The 1869 census. Exists only for the Ung County (the Uzhhorod district). Data for
3. In addition the 1931 census lists from Transcarpathia are held in the archives in Prague.

Most of these records were not transcribed and made searchable on-line. Recently, JewishGen started translating selected vital records, but vast majority of the records is still available only in the archives.

Research inquiries

Your family tree may greatly benefit from the research in archival sources! Feel free to contact us and share with us your Transcarpathian family story. We will send you free of charge detailed proposal listing existing sources and estimation of time and costs of researching them.

Death record registered in 1885 in Benedykivtsi (Benedike, Benedeki, Benedikovce).

An example of a Jewish family listed in the 1921 census. Note numbers in red ink assigned after enumeration for the purposes of data coding.

Let the Carpathian mists of research be dispelled…