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Danish Genealogy Blog

Professional Genealogist Lene Kottal's blog about genealogy in Denmark
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Examine How Your Ancestors Lived

Examine How Your Ancestors Lived

Danish fire insurance records contain descriptions of each building in terms of size and building materials. The records list the head of household of the house or farm, even if he was not the owner of the property. How much space do you think your ancestors had per person?

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Digitized Corvée Work Records

Digitized Corvée Work Records

Danish tenant farmers had to do corvée work for the land owner. Beginning in year 1800 land owners had to record the work done by each farmer. A lot of these records have been kept.

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Copyhold Records for Tenant Ancestors

Copyhold Records for Tenant Ancestors

Before the mid 1800s, many Danish farmers did not own the farm or house they lived in, but they leased it from the King or manors or other large estates. The tenancy, also called copyhold, was often passed on to a son or other relative, so copyhold records can provide evidence for relationships.

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Book of Deeds and Mortgages: Identify Your Ancestor’s Real Property

Book of Deeds and Mortgages: Identify Your Ancestor’s Real Property

In this post I provide an example of how you can identify the cadastral lot number of your ancestor's farm based on his listing in a census.

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Arkiv.dk: Database with Digitized Photos

Arkiv.dk: Database with Digitized Photos

The Danish National Archives do not hold all kinds of records, but luckily many Danish parishes or towns have a local history archive. More than five-hundred Danish local history and town archives have started digitizing their holdings and presenting them to the public free of charge at the website Arkiv.dk.

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Family History: Beyond Parish Registers and Census Records

Family History: Beyond Parish Registers and Census Records

I have joined the Blogging from A-Z April Challenge and in this post I reveal my theme.

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Jenny Kristine Juhl: Premarital Life of a Female Ancestor

Jenny Kristine Juhl: Premarital Life of a Female Ancestor

Most of my female ancestors spent their youth preparing for a life as a housewife and it can seem difficult to find detailed information about their premarital life. As part of the Family History Writing Challenge, I have decided to write about my grandmother’s life from she left her home about age fourteen until she married at age twenty-four. In this post and upcoming posts, I will share some of the sources I use for this story.

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Link-Lives: A Danish National Historical Life-Course and Multi-Generational Database 1787 - 1968

Link-Lives: A Danish National Historical Life-Course and Multi-Generational Database 1787 - 1968

Would you trust a machine to make your family tree for you?

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Birth Record for Jenny Kristine Juhl, born 1921 in Holsted Parish, Denmark

Birth Record for Jenny Kristine Juhl, born 1921 in Holsted Parish, Denmark

My grandmother Jenny Kristine Juhl was born in 1921 in Holsted Parish. Birth records from that time contain useful information to finding more details about her parents, but how can you figure it out, if you do not understand Danish?

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Researching 20th Century Danish Military Levying Rolls

Researching 20th Century Danish Military Levying Rolls

From 1871 main rolls were no longer kept. How can you then follow a person in the Danish military levying rolls? I will demonstrate that today using the story of Knud Pedersen, born 1898.

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Military levying: Rolls by Local and National Authorities

Military levying: Rolls by Local and National Authorities

I have been asked a general question about the difference between Danish military levying rolls kept by local and national authorities.

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Following a Person from one Danish Military Levying Roll to the Next

Following a Person from one Danish Military Levying Roll to the Next

On this Second Sunday of Advent 2018 we shall follow Lucas Christensen, born 1794 in the rural parish Særslev as a son of Christen Lucassen. The family lived in Særslev a few years, but then moved to Hårslev Parish. Lucas’ story is good for demonstrating the procedure of following a værnepligtig person from one military levying roll to the next. If you have not read my first entry in this series about military levying rolls, I advise you to do so, because some basic terms are explained in that entry.

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