Starting Research in Norway

Introduction

Beginning about 1500, but usually much later, churches required their clergy to keep christening (or baptism) records. Before 1814, the records should at least contain the christening date, the father's first name, the child's name, and generally the residence. The birth date, mother's name, and names of christening witnesses are sometimes given. A printed record format was introduced in 1814, which included columns for both parents' names, birth date, christening date, place of residence, names of witnesses, and other information.

For more information on church christening records, see Background.

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What You Are Looking For

The following information may be found in a christening entry:

The name of your ancestor. The date of your ancestor's christening or baptism. The names of your ancestor's parents. The names of the witnesses or godparents. The date of your ancestor's birth. The place of your ancestor's birth. The residence of the parents. The occupation of the father. Whether your ancestor was of legitimate or illegitimate birth.

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Steps

These 5 steps will guide you in finding your ancestor in Norwegian church records.

Step 1. Find the year of your ancestor's christening or baptism record.

Before you can search for your Norwegian ancestor's christening record, you need to know the appoximate year they were born, and where they were born.

If you have the name of a place in Norway, but don't know if it is a parish (record keeping jurisdiction), see the Norwegian Gazetteer Norsk stedsfortegnelse. Instructions for using this gazetteer are found in How to Use the Norwegian gazetteer.

If you do not know the place of birth, see the Finding the Emigrant's Town of Origin section of the Norway Research Outline.

To find the christening records available at the library, look in the Family History Library Catalog. Go to What to Do Next, select the Family History Library Catalog, and click on the tab for Town Records to see if your ancestor's parish is listed.

When looking for your ancestor's christening or baptism record, remember:

Christening records are arranged chronologically. Christening records before 1814 may be intermixed with marriage or burial records. Christening records of iIlegitimate children may be listed separately.

For helps in finding the year and place, see Tip 1.

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Step 2. Find the entry for your ancestor.

Look for a child with the right given name and birth date in the records of the town you identified in step 1. Then see if his or her father's given name matches the child's patronymic name. For example, Ole Andersen's fathers' first name is "Anders" or "Andreas." If more than one entry within a few years fits your information, you may have to check further to make sure you have the correct entry. Remember, in Norway, the surname of the child reflects the first name of the natural father, so look for that first name if the record is so arranged.

Norwegian christening records are in chronological order by the christening date, even if the birth date is listed. A child could be christened the same day as, or up to two years after, the actual birth date.

Identify all possibilities that fit your information. If your ancestor was Lars Pedersen, born in1852 according to his age later in life, find all the Lars Pedersens, born 1850 to1855 in the town your ancestor was from.

Check this town's death records beginning with the birth date of the first possible ancestor to see if any of the possible ancestors died young. If any are found in the death records, you can eliminate those possibilities.

If you have narrowed the possibilities down to one, then you must follow that person through subsequent life events such as confirmation, moves, and marriage, to make sure they turn into "your" ancestor.

For more help in finding the record entry, see Tip 2.

For help in reading the record entry, see Tip 3.

For help in verifying that you have the correct record entry, see Tip 5.

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Step 3. Find the entries for each brother and sister of your ancestor.

Once you have the entry for your ancestor, find the entries for your ancestor's brothers and sisters:

Search the christening records for entries of your ancestor's brothers and sisters. Search local death records or the christening records from surrounding parishes, especially if there are gaps of 3 or more years between the christening of siblings. Gaps of 3 or more years may indicate there was another child. To make sure you have found entries of all the family members, search death and christening records of surrounding parishes for any additional children. Search for children born before the parents' marriage. Often the father's name is given.

For help in finding the entries for the ancestor's brothers and sisters, see Tip 4.

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Step 4. Copy the information, and document your sources.

If you can, photocopy the record. If you can't, be sure to copy all the information in the entry, including:

All the people listed and all information given about them. (Remember, witnesses are often relatives.) All the dates in the entry and the events they pertain to. (Sometimes birth, marriage, and death information pertaining to the child or parents may be included. The minister may have used symbols such as * for birth, oo for marriage, and + for death.) Be sure to look for additional dates in the entry's margin. All the localities in the entry and who was from the places listed.

On the copy, document the source of the information. List:

The type of source (paper certificate, microform, book, Internet site, etc.). All reference numbers for the source. Carefully record any microfilm, book, or certificate numbers or the name and Internet address of the site you used.

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Step 5. Analyze the information you obtain from the christening record.

To effectively use the information obtained from the christening record, ask yourself the following questions:

Is this the christening entry of my direct line ancestor? Because names are so common, you must be sure you have the correct record.

Did the minister identify both parents, and is the mother's maiden name given? Were additional event dates, such as marriage, death, and introduction of the mother, etc., given in the entry's margin? (The minister may have used symbols such as * for birth, oo for marriage, and + for death.) Did more than 2 to 3 years pass since the christening of the last child? If so, another child may have been born and christened in a neighboring parish or born and died before being christened. Did you search 5 years without finding any earlier christening entries of children? If you find no other entries, begin looking for the parents' marriage record.

For help in verifying that you have the correct record entry, see Tip 5.