GuidedResearch:Why Can't I Find the Record - Scotland Marriages

This page will give you additional guidance and resources to find marriage information for your ancestor. Use this page after first completing the marriage section of the Scotland Guided Research page.

Mandatory marriage registration started in 1855. Before this, marriages and banns can be found in church records (mainly the Church of Scotland or Roman Catholic Church). Although the oldest marriage records date to 1553, many churches only have records starting in the 18th or early 19th century.

Additional Databases and Online Resources

 * 1553-1855: Church Registers - Banns and Marriages at ScotlandsPeople (free to search, $ to view image)
 * 1855-1943: Statutory Register of Marriages at ScotlandsPeople (free to search, $ to view image)
 * 1561-1910: Scotland Marriages 1561-1910  at FindMyPast ($)
 * 1561-1910: Scotland, Select Marriages, 1561-1910  at Ancestry ($)
 * 1571-1997: Scotland, Extracted Parish Records, 1571-1997  at Ancestry ($)

ScotlandsPeople ($) is the premiere website for Scotland marriage records. The site requires the user to register in order to search the index for free. It costs a small fee to view any image. ScotlandsPeople is the only site with the images to Scotland church and vital records; all other sites only have indexes to these records. The FamilySearch Catalog has some these records available online as digital images.

Additional Records with Marriage Information
Substitute records may contain information about more than one event and are used when records for an event are not available. Records that are used to substitute for marriage events may not have been created at the time of the marriage. The accuracy of the record is contingent upon when the information was recorded. Search for information in multiple substitute records to confirm the accuracy of these records.

Tips for finding marriages
Success with finding marriage records in online databases depends on a few key points:
 * Your ancestor's name may be misspelled. Try the following search tactics:
 * Try searching using the spouse's name.
 * Try different spelling variations of the first and last name of your ancestor.
 * Try a given name search (leave out the last names).
 * Try broadening the name search, such as using wildcards or searching for similar sounding names (instead of exact matches only).
 * Example: check "Name Variants" on FindMyPast, "Sounds like" or "Similar" on Ancestry, and "Fuzzy matching" or "Name Variants" on ScotlandsPeople


 * Expand the date range of the search.
 * Try searching with the county name only instead of by parish.
 * If your ancestor's name is common, try adding more information to narrow the search.

Known Record Gaps
Records Start Mandatory marriage registration started in 1855. Before this, marriages and banns can be found in church records (mainly the Church of Scotland or Roman Catholic Church). Although the oldest marriage records date to 1553, many churches only have records starting in the 18th or early 19th century. While parishes were required to record baptisms and marriages beginning in 1552, many parishes did not comply with the requirement until much later.

Records Published

Records Destroyed Some church records may have been lost or destroyed, although more specific information is not known. Civil registration records are generally complete.