Galicia Jewish Records

Go to Jewish Genealogy Research Main Page

Maps of Galicia

 * To view a 1914 map of Galicia, click here.
 * Visit the Gesher Galicia Online Map Room by clicking here.
 * For a Jewish population density map of Europe in 1900, click here.
 * For a map showing the percentage of Jews in the Pale of Settlement and Congress Poland, c. 1905, click here.
 * To view an additional historical map showing the historical percentage of Jews in governments, click here. Definition of "Pale of Settlement" from Wikipedia.org: The Pale of Settlement (Russian: Черта́ осе́длости, chertá osédlosti, Yiddish: דער תּחום-המושבֿ, der tkhum-ha-moyshəv, Hebrew: תְּחוּם הַמּוֹשָב, tḥùm ha-mosháv‎) was the term given to a region of Imperial Russia in which permanent residency by Jews was allowed and beyond which Jewish permanent residency was generally prohibited. It extended from the eastern pale, or demarcation line, to the western Russian border with the Kingdom of Prussia (later the German Empire) and with Austria-Hungary. The English term "pale" is derived from the Latin word "palus", a stake, extended to mean the area enclosed by a fence or boundary.

Gazetteer of Galicia

 * Genealogical Gazetteer of Galicia, by Brian J. Lenius (determine what is now in Poland and what is in the Ukraine; identify Jewish record jurisdictions) Family History Library call number 943.86 E5L Copies may be found in the reference area and the stacks.

History of the Jews in Galicia

 * To visit the Galicia Jewish Museum online click here. The Galicia Jewish Museum exists to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust and to celebrate the Jewish culture of Polish Galicia, presenting Jewish history from a new perspective.

Gesher Galicia's Databases

 * Gesher Galicia is an organization that promotes and conducts Jewish genealogical and historical research for Galicia, a province of the former Austro-Hungarian Empire, which is today part of eastern Poland and southwestern Ukraine. Their major research initiative —The Galician Archival Records Project — is acquiring and indexing a variety of metrical, property, school, voter, tax and magnate records for Galicia.
 * Although their organization's primary focus is researching Jewish roots in Galicia, the diverse community records in our databases contain names that span all the ethnic and religious groups that once lived in this region.  This is a membership website, but has links that can be searched for free . Gersher Galicia.

Division of Galicia (1918)

 * Galicia was divided between Poland and the Ukraine at the end of the First World War.
 * Use maps and gazetteers to determine whether your family's home city/town became a part of Poland or of the Ukraine.
 * Continue research by using resources on these two pages:
 * Poland Jewish Records
 * Ukraine Jewish Records
 * Note: For towns near the border between Poland and the Ukraine, pertinent records may have ended up in an archive now on the other side of the border.