Hungarian Genealogy

Finding the records that connect you to your Hungarian past.

Whether you need to prove Hungarian ancestry for citizenship or want to reconstruct your family’s history, professional genealogy begins with the same question:

Antique register books, record sheets and a magnifying glass

In short

Hungarian genealogy is the research of family history through Hungarian records: the civil registers kept since 1 October 1895, the earlier church and Jewish registers, and the archival sources that place a family in a town, a street or a profession. I do this research for two reasons: to prove ancestry for a Hungarian citizenship case, and to reconstruct Hungarian and Hungarian Jewish family histories for their own sake.

What can the surviving records tell us?

I specialize in Hungarian genealogical research, with particular expertise in complex citizenship cases and Hungarian Jewish family history.

Fragments of an old document being pieced back together

For citizenship

Genealogical Research for Hungarian Citizenship

When knowing that your family was Hungarian isn’t enough – you need to prove it.

I locate and analyze the records needed to establish ancestry and reconstruct the documentary chain between generations.

Research for Hungarian Citizenship

An old photograph album with empty photo corners where pictures are missing

Family history

Hungarian Jewish Genealogy

Reconstructing families across generations, borders and silence.

I research Hungarian Jewish families using civil, Jewish, archival and Holocaust-era sources in Hungary and across historical Hungary.

Hungarian Jewish Genealogy

Archival research

Hungarian archival research

Most Hungarian genealogy is archival work. State civil registration of births, marriages and deaths began on 1 October 1895; before that date the Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox and Jewish communities kept their own registers. Both kinds of register – together with census returns, school, residence, address, military, name-change, property and court records – are held today by the Hungarian National Archives, the county and city archives, the Budapest City Archives and the archives of the neighbouring countries that received parts of historical Hungary after 1920.

Much of this has been microfilmed or digitized and some of it is searchable online, but a great deal is not. Knowing which register may exist for a given year, religion and place, and where it is kept today, is usually what decides whether a record is found. On-site research in Budapest and the official copies are handled by my colleague Gáspár Anna.

What archival research can establish

The birth, marriage and death of each ancestor, and the relationships between them
Where the family lived, and when – down to the street
Name changes and the earlier forms of a surname
Migration, military service and naturalization
What happened to a family during the Holocaust

For citizenship cases, see genealogical research for Hungarian citizenship; for family history, see Hungarian Jewish genealogy.