How To Use Orthodox Baptismal Records for Genealogy Research

Before you dive in and get overwhelmed researching Orthodox baptismal records throughout the world, here are a few insights to help you succeed with your genealogy research goals.

Pious monks of the Eastern Orthodox Church at door of monastery, Megaspelaeon, Greece. Photo courtesy of Library of Congress.

“Christening and baptism records are an important resource for genealogical research in timeframes before the advent of government sponsored civil registration. However, practices surrounding baptism, christening, and the creation of records documenting those events vary between religious traditions. In this blog series, we explore some of the varied practices and content of christening and baptism records in different Christian traditions.” 

Orthodox Christian Baptismal Records 

Orthodox Christians use the term “baptism,” rather than christening. Baptism comes from the Greek word baptismos (βαπτισμός), and indicates that the person who is baptized has been immersed, rather than sprinkled with water. Every candidate for baptism must have at least one sponsor, or godparent, who is usually listed in the baptismal record along with the child and parents. Apart from writing or sending an onsite researcher to a particular church for a baptismal record, one of the best sources of digitized Orthodox Christian baptismal records from around the world is FamilySearch. 

Orthodox Baptismal Records in the U.S.

Early Russian missionary activity was concentrated in Alaska, and later expanded to serve Russian immigrants to mainland America. FamilySearch holds digitized church registers for about fifteen Orthodox Christian parishes in Alaska. The earliest records were composed 1816, and the latest in the 1930s. 

Early Greek settlements were established in Florida and Louisiana. Later, at the turn of the twentieth century, Greek migrants often settled in the textile factory town of Lowell, Massachusetts, in New York City, and in Chicago. Churches followed. However, few of these records have been acquired by FamilySearch or published online. The best strategy for obtaining baptismal records in the United States and Canada may be to write directly to the relevant parish. 

Orthodox Baptismal Records in Greece

Baptismal records from a handful of Orthodox Christian parishes in Greece have been digitized and published online at FamilySearch, but may not be accessible except at a FamilySearch center or the FamilySearch Library in Salt Lake City, Utah. Onsite research in Greece may be required to obtain the records you are seeking. 

Baptismal Records in Eastern Europe

Orthodox Christianity was the primary faith in Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania, and present-day countries which fell within the boundaries of the Russian Empire, such as Moldova and Belarus. Orthodox communities also could be found in countries that were primarily Roman Catholic.  

Baptismal records from the church of Erdod are available from 1762 to 1860 on FamilySearch. Erdod was under the rule of the Austrian Empire, then of the Kingdom of Hungary, and now is located in Croatia. The records from 1762 were made on pre-printed forms, two entries to a page. They include the sex of the child, the date of birth, the names of the parents, their place of residence, the name of the church, date of baptism, baptismal name, and godparent’s name. 

Orthodox baptismal records from the Mikhailo-Gavrilovskii Sobor (or cathedral) in the city of Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina extend from 1844 up to 1967. These records are found at FamilySearch. Notice that the dates in the first column are written with two numbers. These represent the date according to both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The Julian calendar is the original Orthodox Church calendar and is still in use in many traditional churches. The Gregorian date is the civil date, and is currently 13 days ahead of the Julian date. This register includes columns for the birth date and birthplace, baptismal date and place, name of the child, names and address of the parents, their religious affiliation, and the name and address of the godparent. 

Baptismal records for the Orthodox parish in Janina, Albania, have been digitized for the years 1845 to 1911 at FamilySearch. They were written in Ottoman Turkish. 

Baptismal records for churches in Georgia may be written in Russian or Georgian, or both. Here’s an example of a record written in Georgian in 1913 in a parish in the Svanety district of Georgia. 

Baptismal Records in Russia and Ukraine

Some baptismal records for various churches in dioceses in Russia and present-day Ukraine may be found at FamilySearch.  For instance, the baptismal records pictured below are for the Orthodox church in the village of Sinevka in the former Poltava gubernia of the Russian Empire, now Ukraine. The collection spans the years 1909 to 1914. The information in each entry includes whether the child is male or female; date of birth; date of baptism; name of the child; full names of the parents, with their place of residence and the father’s occupation; full names of the godparents; name of the clergyman who performed the baptism. 

FamilySearch also has many records for churches that were once in the Austrian crownland of Bukovina (or Bukowina), later briefly ruled by Romania, and are now located in Ukraine. The column headings for these register entries composed in 1841 in Kisseleu are written in both German and Romanian, using Cyrillic script. Kisseleu was later Chisălău, Cernăuţi, Romania, and is now Kyseliv, Kit︠s︡man′, Chernivt︠s︡i, Ukraine. The first piece of information in these register entries is the house number of the parents’ home. The entries also include birth date, baptismal date, name and sex of the child; parents’ names, and godparents’ names. 

Many, many other Orthodox Christian church registers for Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus may be accessed through links listed at the site Каталог метрических книг в архивных фондах России, Украины и Беларуси through the following link: https://metrics.tilda.ws/. The site is written in Russian, but can be translated using Google Translate.  

Ancestry has three searchable databases of Orthodox Christian records: 

• Records from parishes in the diocese of Kiev, 1734-1930. This collection is composed of more than 6.2 million individual register entries with images, including baptisms. 

• Records from parishes in the Russian province of Samara, 1748-1934. This collection has more than 5.3 million individual register entries, including baptisms. 

• Orthodox records for parishes in Latvia, along with records for Roman Catholic and Protestant parishes in Latvia, for the years 1854-1939. This collection includes baptismal records, and consists of more than 27.8 million individual records. 

Other Orthodox communities

Findmypast holds a collection of records for the Russian Orthodox Church in London. These records are not indexed, but can be browsed. They extend from about 1835 into the 1920s. 

If you've hit a brick wall in your Orthodox church records research, you can schedule a 45-minute consultation with one of our experts to help you get back on track: wwwLegacyTree.com/genealogy-consultation