What you actually get

When you buy this product, you download three files:

• EPUB: full ebook “Find Your Slovak Ancestral Village: The Essential Guide to Historical and Modern Place Names and Location Mapping.”​

• PDF: formatted version of the same book, ideal for printing, highlighting, and quick on‑screen reference.​

• XLSX: full Slovak village database with 22,500+ historical name variants, modern village names, district, county, region (W/C/E), GPS coordinates, and Google Maps links.​

All three files are for your personal research use. Do not share or repost the database or text publicly.​

Who this is for

This package is built for:

• U.S.-based researchers with Slovak roots who have a village name from Ellis Island manifests, census, naturalization, draft cards, or vital records, but can’t find it on a modern map.​

• Genealogists working with Slovak, Hungarian, German, or phonetic English place names who need to connect them to current Slovak municipalities.​

• Anyone tired of forum guesses and Wikipedia lists, who wants a structured, evidence-based way to identify villages and plan real-world visits.​

What problems it solves

Typical problems this system addresses:

• Village name appears in multiple contradictory forms (Hungarian, Slovak, German, phonetic English).​

• The place name in U.S. records doesn’t exist in modern Slovakia or is now in Poland, Ukraine, or Hungary.​

• You see only a historical county like “Saros” or “Zemplen”, not a clear village.​

• Maps and tourist websites don’t help, and online lists don’t show merged or defunct localities.​

The book gives you a clear workflow, and the database is the lookup tool that turns that workflow into actual village identifications.​

Inside the ebook

The ebook is not theory; it’s a practical manual built around real cases and workflows. Main parts:​

• Navigating Slovak geography and administrative history

  • How historical Hungarian counties, later Czechoslovak regions, and modern Slovak districts fit together.​

  • When terms like župa, kraj, and “county/region” matter, and how to interpret them on records across 19th–20th centuries.​

• Where to find (and lose) village names in U.S. records

  • How village names show up or disappear in passenger lists, census schedules 1900–1950, naturalizations, draft cards, vital records, and immigration files.​

• Decoding, translating, and troubleshooting village names

  • Hungarian, Slovak, German, and English variants.​

  • Common handwriting and phonetic distortions: missing diacritics, swapped letters, Americanized spellings.​

  • Handling merged, renamed, or vanished villages, including those now outside Slovakia.​

• Step‑by‑step workflows and a full case study

  • A detailed end‑to‑end workflow: collect variants, group spellings, anchor historical county/region, test candidates in the register and maps, and confirm with context.​

  • Real case study (William Kaperak): moving from chaotic spellings like “Snvcz / Canvitch / Senois / Senvis” plus “Saros” to a precise village (Krásna Lúka) with GPS coordinates.​

• Guide to the Slovak Village Index

  • How to read and interpret each register/database entry: historical name, current name, district, county, historical county pair (Slovak/Hungarian), region code (W/C/E), GPS.​

  • Spelling‑variant patterns (falu/falva, c/cz, s/sz, ly/j, i/y, etc.) and how to use them when your record doesn’t match exactly.​

• Slovak Village Index (printed subset)

  • 6,000+ historical village name forms with their modern equivalents and key data, forming a practical lookup tool even without the full database.​

About the Excel village database

The XLSX database extends the printed index to 22,500+ historical village names.​

Each row typically includes:

• Historical village name (Hungarian/German/variant form) as used in older records.​

• Modern Slovak municipality name.​

• Current district (okres) code and county (kraj) code.​

• Historical county names in Slovak and Hungarian (e.g., Gemer/Gömör, Zemplín/Zemplén).​

• Region code (W = Western, C = Central, E = Eastern Slovakia).​

• GPS coordinates pointing directly to the village or its modern administrative successor.​

You can open the file in:

• Microsoft Excel (Windows/macOS)

• LibreOffice Calc (free, Win/macOS/Linux)

• Google Sheets (upload the file to your Drive)​

If it opens read‑only, you simply save your own copy and work in that.​

How you actually use it

Typical user workflow:

1. Extract every place name variant for your ancestor from U.S. and local records (ship manifests, census, naturalization, draft cards, vital records, relatives’ records).​

2. Use the book’s spelling‑variant rules to normalize and guess plausible Hungarian/Slovak forms.​

3. Use any historical county/region clues (e.g., “Saros/Šariš,” “Zemplen/Zemplín,” “Nyitra/Nitra”) to limit the search area.​

4. Search the XLSX by historical name (and variants) and compare candidates by county, region, and GPS.​

5. Confirm the best candidate with Google Maps, parish/archival jurisdictions, and timelines (mergers, border changes, renaming).​

6. Use the modern municipality name, district, and region to contact archives, parishes, or plan village visits.