Berdichev (Berdychiv) genealogy records

Berdichev genealogy records are the surviving documents used to trace families from Berdichev (today Berdychiv), a major trading town of Kiev Gubernia in the Russian Empire. The two main sources are metrical books, the church and synagogue registers of births, marriages and deaths kept from the early 1800s, and revision lists (revizskie skazki), the household census lists compiled for taxation. Most are held in archives in Kyiv and Zhytomyr and have not been published online.

Names and jurisdiction

Berdichev received town rights in 1593 and passed from Poland to Russia in 1793. In the Russian Empire it belonged to Kiev Gubernia and was the seat of Berdichev Uezd, the structure under which most records from before 1917 are filed. Some lists from before the 1840s are filed under Makhnivka Uezd instead. After 1920 it was part of the Ukrainian SSR, and since 1991 it has been part of independent Ukraine.

Documents name the town Berdichev, Berdychiv, Бердичев (Russian), Бердичів (Ukrainian), Berdyczów (Polish), Berditschew (German) or בערדיטשעוו (Yiddish). Searching under every spelling matters, because indexes and catalogues use all of them.

Location and geography

Berdichev lies in central Ukraine, south of Zhytomyr. It was a major trading town, famous for its fairs, with one of the largest Jewish communities in the Russian Empire alongside Orthodox and Roman Catholic parishes. Which book holds a family’s records therefore depends first on its faith and, for Christians, on its parish, and that is the first thing to establish in a search.

Records analysis

Metrical books and revision lists are among the best sources for tracing a family. Metrical books record births, marriages and deaths year by year, and revision lists show who lived in each household, with ages, so they let you follow a family back to the years before parish registers begin. The tables below show what survives for Berdichev, church by church and year by year.

But these are not the only sources, and often not the whole story. Archives also hold secondary records, such as police and court files, property and tax records, guild and estate lists, school and military papers and petitions, and these can reveal much more about a family than a name and a date. This is where deep archival research makes the difference. We work with the main sources and with the secondary ones, because together they tell a fuller and more interesting story of the family.

Not finding something online does not mean it does not exist. Most archival records from the Russian Empire have never been digitised or indexed, so a search on popular genealogy websites can come back empty even when the documents survive in the archive. If you have already searched on your own and found nothing, that is a reason to talk to a professional, not to stop.

Drevo Research carries out comprehensive archive research across borders and archives. Tell us what you know and we will tell you what we can find.

Berdichev genealogy records by church and year

The tables show which years survive for each church and record series. Years without records are left out, so gaps are easy to see. The original books are held in Ukrainian state archives, which are administered by the State Archival Service of Ukraine.

Vital records

Metrical books recording births and baptisms, marriages and deaths, kept separately by each religious community until 1920.

Jewish

Only a few Jewish metrical books of Berdichev have been found in the archive catalogues so far: the births of 1916, the deaths of 1917–1918, and one further book for 1845–1849 whose record types are not stated. Berdichev had one of the largest Jewish communities in the empire, so the gaps matter, and they are a reason for a direct search in the archives.

Orthodox

Orthodox books of the three parish churches of Berdichev survive from 1796.

Roman Catholic

Revision lists and censuses

Revision lists (revizskie skazki) are the household lists compiled for each tax census. They name every member of a household with age and relationship, which makes them the key source for following a family back before the metrical books begin. Below are the revision lists, censuses and family lists found for Berdichev. Many earlier lists are filed by uezd rather than by town, so Berdichev families can also appear in uezd-wide files. The uezd-wide lists of Makhnivka and Berdichev uezds are included below, because they cover the town as well as the countryside.

Christian and general

Jewish

History and genealogy

Berdichev became one of the great commercial centres of the Russian Empire, and by 1897 it had about 53,700 residents, roughly 80% of them Jewish, one of the highest Jewish shares of any town in the empire. Its fairs and banking drew merchants and families from across Ukraine, Poland and beyond, so Berdichev families often appear in the records of other places, and the other way round.

In September and October 1941, after the German occupation, the Jewish community was destroyed in mass shootings and the liquidation of the ghetto, and estimates of the dead run from 20,000 to 30,000. For families who left or were lost, the surviving archive records are often the only trace that remains.

Also found in records and indexes as: Berdychiv, Berdyczów (Polish), Berditchev, Berdichoff, Barditshev (Yiddish), Бердичев, Бердичів.