Inevitably your Mexican Genealogical Research will lead you to Spanish colonial times and then even all the way to Spain. This is the point where I have stopped. Spanish Genealogical Research can be hard especially if you have no idea where to go nor where to search for my ancestors in Spain.
Fortunately for me, I recently found a PDF document titled “A Look At Spanish Genealogical Research” which is basically a collection of articles by different people and put together by I believe Brigham Young University.
I hope that after I fully read it and study it I will grasp Spanish Genealogical Research better.
I also hope that you do take the time to download and read this article even if you have not traced any of your Mexican Ancestry lines to Spain. Since you never know how long this resource will be available online.
What to Expect From this Spanish Genealogical Research PDF:
Research In Spain
Brief Introduction.
Determining Place of Origin
The author makes the argument as to why it is important to exhaust all resources in the United States before attempting to do research in Spain,
Military Records
Provides great clues as to where to find military records in Spain.
Published Sources
Provides four locations as to where to find more information about researching in Spain.
Tracing a Spanish Family through Local Records George R Ryskamp
Provides background information about notarial records and how to search for them.
Archivos Diocesanos Y Dispensas Matrimoniales George R Ryskamp
This section provides invaluable information regarding how to locate records in church archives.
Spanish Genealogical Word List
This is great for those of you that may not be fluent in Spanish or have difficulty with the meaning of some Spanish words.
Latin Genealogical Word List
Many Spanish records were also written in Latin and this guide will provide you with what you need to translate those words and make out what you are looking at.
Letter Writing Guide
This section provides you with essential addresses and also on how to write a letter requesting information for any place in Spain. Hint, you can also use them to type out emails since emails is becoming the preferred method of communicating.
Locality Analysis For Spain by George R Ryskamp
This section contains great information regarding Spain and its boundaries. It also provides several maps with details about each of its Provinces and date of origins.
Spaniards in North America by Noel Ortega
The author explains the migration patterns of Spaniards to North American and provides valuable information about Spanish culture.
As you can see this is a great resource that you must download read and analyze. It will be invaluable for your Spanish Genealogical Research.
You can download this PDF document here:
http://files.lib.byu.edu/family-history-library/research-outlines/Europe/Spain.pdf
My husband is from Spain, and I’ve been researching his family. I’ve found that his mother’s side from Villar de Ciervo, Salamanca, Spain easy to research since all the church records can be found scanned in their entirety at FamilySearch.org. For his father’s family, from Sinovas, Burgos, Spain, the records have not been microfilmed or scanned, but we were able to visit in person and see the records at the parish church. From home I use the Spain National Historic Archives website, which is searchable and shows original documents at this link: http://en.www.mcu.es/archivos/MC/AHN/
Thankyou for sharing with us you experience and tips researching Spanish records. I am sure many of our readers will find your link to be very helpful.
Moises,
Thank you for this post!
I want to let you know that your blog post is listed in today’s Fab Finds post at http://janasgenealogyandfamilyhistory.blogspot.com/2014/09/follow-friday-fab-finds-for-september-5.html
Have a wonderful weekend!
Thank you Jana.
hELLO mIOSES gARZA IM SENDING YOU THIS NOTE BECAUSE I WONT BE A MEMBER OF vILLAS dEL nORTE FOR A WHILE MAYBE THREE MONTHS ABSENCE IM HAVING EYE SURGERY THEN TAKING A BREAK THANK YOU FOR ALL YOUR HELP IN MY GENEALOGY SEARCH YOU WERE A GREAT HELP IN MY SEARCHES I FOUND OUT SOMETHING NEW MY ANCESTORS COULD HAVE BEEN HELD SLAVES ACCORDING TO WHAT I FOUND THANK YOU AGAIN HAV A GREAT SUMMER WELL WISHES TO YOU AND YOUR FAMILY IM LEAV MY e- MAIL IF YOU WANT TO GET IN TOUCH WITH ME
Hello Yolanda, thank you for letting me know. I canceled your subscription. I also found several slaves in my family and other ancestors that were slave owners too. It is sad but it is in the past. All we can do is learn from their mistakes.