In order to research your family history, you must first know where to look. Find out more about genealogy in Sweden!
Denmark, Norway and Sweden have wonderful records for genealogy. Here are a few sites and sources for Scandinavian research.
If you are attempting to trace your Swedish ancestors back to their homes in Sweden, there is one particular record set that you will need to know. Husförhörslängder. (Hey, I said you’ll need to know it, not know how to say it).
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
Beginning Swedish genealogy can be daunting. But don’t let language barriers or unfamiliar naming traditions deter you! Check out these getting-started tips from an expert and get started on finding your Swedish roots.
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
Nowadays, finding Swedish genealogy records online is practically as easy taking candy from a baby. Search for the Swedes in your family tree online with these tips.
Norwegian genealogy records are helpful in finding our ancestors as long as we understand some fundamental ways Norwegians operate.
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
Family History Templates are an essential tool for organizing and storing information about family members.
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
In order to research your family history, you must first know where to look. Find out more about genealogy in Sweden!
Researching Scandinavian ancestors? Learn about important Scandinavian naming patterns and how they impact your genealogy research.
An Amazing Free British Genealogy Resource: The Gazette. This post looks at the often overlooked family history resource covering 350 years.
Genealogy can be costly! Check out this list of ten free tools that you can use in your Swedish family history research.
Swedish History top facts. All you really need to know about the history of Sweden. For example a weird queen, a blood bath, and of course Vikings.
In this article, Mary Harrell-Sesniak searches old newspapers to learn about some of the codes and ciphers our ancestors used.
Historical directories are useful for finding British and Irish ancestors in trade. We look at where to find them online; many are free.
Planning a trip? Doing some research? Just like maps? Check out our map of Sweden to learn more about the country and its geography.
Until quite recently, Sweden have not commonly used family surnames. Instead we have had a patronymic tradition, which means that all children got their fathers first name as their surname, with the suffix -son (for men) or -dotter (for women). So if a man named Lars Andersson had children, his sons would automatically had their surname as Larsson and his daughters would have Larsdotter as their surname. It was first in the late 1800 and early 1900 that we stopped using patronymic surnames and changed them into family names. About the same time women started to take their husbands surname as their own when getting married. Before this all women kept their surname their entire life, married or not. When the change from patronymic surnames was completed all women that had their patronymic surname (ending with -dotter) to become the male version, ending with -son instead. So Elisabeth Svensdotter suddenly was changed to Elisabeth Svensson. Quite boring I think. That is the reason that we in Sweden have so many family names ending with -son (Andersson, Svensson, Larsson, Nilsson, Olsson, Johansson, Persson, Karlsson, Gustafsson, Eriksson, and so on...) As you probably understand, there was literary hundreds of thousands of people living in Sweden that shared the exact same name during all periods of time. But there was some of them that adapted a family name instead. Sometimes just to avoid being mistaken to be someone else (since there often were maybe 10 Lars Larsson living in the same small village...), some started using a non-patronymic surname, sometimes this was passed on to their children, sometimes not. Most common surnames (besides the patronymic ones) are very often connected to nature and names of places where people lived. This gives quite many possible combinations, but also many of these surnames was adopted by many unrelated people in many different locations at the same time, making these family names not that unique and not very helpful to determine if people with the same family name were related or not... Some very common words that are current in many Swedish surnames are to mention a few; Berg (mountain), Gren, (branch on tree), Blad (leaf on tree), Kvist (twig on tree), Ström (stream in water), Lund (grove of trees), Ny (new), Söder (south), Nord (north), Väst (west), Öst (east), Sand (sand), Fors (rapids water), Sjö (lake)... And often names of trees or animals are used, many times in combination with the above. Some examples; Flowers from a Linden tree Lind (lime or linden), Ek, (oak), Gran (spruce, fir), Tall (pine), Hassel (hazel), Örn (eagle), Falk (falcon), Björk (birch), Asp (aspen), Äng (meadow), Lönn (maple)... So by combining these we can generate almost all common surnames that is in top 100 here in Sweden... My own surname Lindberg is a perfect example that is one of the most common surnames here. Some people also got special names if they were soldiers. These soldier names was most of the times only used by the soldier himself and not passed on to his children, but sometimes they became family names also. Most of these military names were either directly connected to the place the soldier served under or some classical ones like for example; Trygg (confident, safe), Hård (hard), Stark (strong), Grym (cruel), Dunder (thunder), Stolt (proud)... Also noblemen, priests, merchants and some craftsmen like smiths often used a family name as a surname. The only family names that was protected was the one reserved for the noblemen. No one else outside the family could use a registered surname used by a noble family. But besides that, no rules, so many people used the same surnames without being related at all. But since early 1900 there is strict regulations and procedures when someone want to change or create a new surname. Today the name must be unique or if it exists you must have a connection to this surname not so long ago in ones family. In my family the Lindberg surname was first used by my great great grandfather, and he took it the year 1874 when he was 16 years of age. Before that his surname was Lindman, but that name came from the soldiers that served in Lindö In Vallentuna parish. (all soldiers there always was named Lindman). So he could not use Lindman since he was not the soldier and he had to change. Why he decided for Lindberg is not sure. But maybe he wanted to keep some of Lidman and since he lived at a farm that was named Berga, he maybe was influenced by that? The boring part is that Lindberg is so very common here in Sweden, so sometimes I wish he would have had a little more fantasy when he made the change. But of course I am very proud of my family name anyway!
Researching Scandinavian ancestors? Learn about important Scandinavian naming patterns and how they impact your genealogy research.
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
"Shared Stories" is a blog feature by SearchingScandinavia.com where we let our readers contribute to our shared history! Find out how to participate by...
21 Counties of Sweden
Researching your Polish genealogy may seem a little intimidating at the start. Read these get-started tips from a Polish genealogy veteran at Legacy Tree Genealogists. Then you’ll know how to dive right into your Polish family history–and where to turn if you need a little help.
How to find English Parish Registers using Bespoke Genealogy's free English Parish Register guide. Details of physical and online collections
You will find that the Swedish letters å, ä, and ö are commonly used, when you research your ancestors in Sweden. Read about them here!
