Croatia Languages

Most materials used in Croatian research are written in Croatian. You do not need to speak or read Croatian to do research in Croatian records, but you should know some key words and phrases to understand the records. Because the Roman Catholic Church was the predominant religion in Croatia, many records are in Latin. Other languages in Croatian records include Hungarian and Italian.

Croatian grammar may affect the way names appear in genealogical records. For example, names of your ancestors will vary from record to record in Croatian.

For help in understanding name variations, see the “Names, Personal” section in this outline.

Language Aids
The Family History Library has genealogical word lists for Hung (34098), German (34067), and Latin (34077).

The following books and dictionaries can also aid you in your research. You can find these and similar material at many research libraries:

Word List
Following is the Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian (BHS) word list (also known in the regional linguistic community as the Central South Slavic diasystem). This word list was formerly known as Serbo-Croatian Word List.

The Serbo-Croatian language or Croato-Serbian language is a South Slavic diasystem. Serbo-Croatian was standardized as a single language during the era of Yugoslavia, from 1918 to 1991. During this period Serbo-Croatian was one of the three official languages, alongside Macedonian and Slovenian. Following the breakup of Yugoslavia, the Serbo-Croatian language broke into its constituent parts, with Bosnian, Croatian, and Serbian becoming distinctly recognized languages. Currently in Montenegro there is a movement to have Montenegrin recognized as its own language, as well.

This list contains Croatian words with their English translations. The words included here are those that you are likely to find in genealogical sources. If the word you are looking for is not on this list, please consult a dictionary.

Croatian is a Slavic language related to Russian. It is used in genealogical sources throughout Croatia.

Polish records often contain Latin and German words. See the German Genealogical Word List (34067) and the Latin Genealogical Word List (34077). Or at the following link:http://204.9.225.220/eng/Search/rg/frameset_rhelps.asp?Page=./research/type/Word_List.asp

Language Characteristics
In Croatian, as in English, the forms of some words will vary according to how they are used in a sentence. Who-whose-whom or marry-marries- married are examples of words in English with variant forms. In Croatian any word may change, depending on usage. This word list gives the standard form of each Croatian word. As you read Croatian records, you will need to be aware that most words vary with usage. The endings of words in a document will often differ from what you find in this list.

Additional Resources
This word list includes words most commonly found in genealogical sources. For further help, use a dictionary. Several dictionaries are available at the Family History Library in the European collection. Their call numbers begin with 491.85321. See the "Encyclopedias and Dictionaries" section in this outline.

The following dictionary is available on microfilm for use in Family History Centers:

Stanislawski, Jan. English-Polish and Polish-English Dictionary. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: David McKay, 1946. (FHL film 1,045,473, item 1)

Additional dictionaries are listed in the Subject section of the Family History Library Catalog under:

POLISH LANGUAGE - DICTIONARIES

Other dictionaries and language helps, such as Polish grammar books, are listed in the Locality section under:

POLAND - LANGUAGE AND LANGUAGES

Key Words
To find and use specific types of Polish records, you will need to know some key words in Polish. This section gives key genealogical terms in English and the Polish words with the same or similar meanings.

For example, in the first column you will find the English word marriage. In the second column you will find Polish words with meanings such as marry, marriage, wedding, wedlock, unite, legitimate, joined, and other words used to indicate marriage.