Other Resources
Trusted places to keep digging, beyond FamilySearch, Ancestry, WikiTree and Find a Grave. Most of our Loes family came from the Grevenmacher and Luxembourg areas of Luxembourg and settled around Dubuque, Iowa, with other branches from Saarland, Baden and Prussia in Germany. These links are picked with that in mind.
🇱🇺 Luxembourg genealogy
Which records to look for
- Church (parish) records, before about 1800: baptisms, marriages and burials kept by the priest, usually in Latin. In older books the different kinds of records are often mixed together by date.
- Civil records, from 1796: when Luxembourg came under French rule, every town hall started recording births, marriages and deaths. They're mostly in French, sometimes in German.
- Ten-year indexes (Tables décennales): each town made an alphabetical list of its births, marriages and deaths every ten years. Search these first when you don't know the exact year.
- Censuses: Luxembourg counted its people every few years in the 1800s. Censuses list whole households with ages.
Tips for Luxembourg
- Names change language. The same man can be Michel in French, Michael in German and Michaelis in Latin. Johann = Jean = Joannes, Nikolaus = Nicolas, Margaretha = Marguerite.
- So does Loes: look for Lös, Loes, Loess and similar spellings.
- Borders moved. Parts of the old Duchy of Luxembourg are now in Belgium (Arlon), France (Moselle) and Germany (around Trier and Bitburg). If a village "isn't in Luxembourg", look across the border.
- French dates: records from about 1796 to 1805 can use the French Revolutionary calendar, like “15 Vendémiaire an XIII”. Use a converter to turn it into a normal date.
📜 Reading old German (and Latin and French) records
Old records look scary, but birth, baptism, marriage and death entries use the same few words over and over. Learn those words and the handful of tricky letters below, and you can read most of it.
Kurrent (old German handwriting)
The everyday German handwriting until the 1940s. Most German church books and many German-language Luxembourg records are written in it. It looks spiky, and several letters look nothing like ours.
Sütterlin
A rounder, simpler version of Kurrent taught in German schools from about 1915 to 1941. Letters written by grandparents born in Germany may be in Sütterlin.
Fraktur (old German print)
The "Gothic" printed letters in old German books and newspapers, including the Dubuque Luxemburger Gazette. Much easier than handwriting once you know ſ is an s.
Tricky letters in Kurrent
The words you'll see most
Same idea in each language| English | German | Latin | French |
|---|---|---|---|
| born | geboren (geb.) | natus / nata | né / née |
| baptized | getauft (Taufe) | baptizatus / baptizata | baptisé(e) |
| married | getraut, verheiratet (Trauung, Ehe) | copulati, matrimonio juncti | marié(e)s (mariage) |
| died | gestorben (gest.), verstorben | obiit, mortuus / mortua, defunctus | décédé(e), mort(e) |
| buried | begraben, beerdigt | sepultus / sepulta | inhumé(e) |
| father / mother | Vater / Mutter | pater / mater | père / mère |
| parents | Eltern | parentes | parents |
| son / daughter | Sohn / Tochter | filius / filia | fils / fille |
| wife / husband | Ehefrau, Gattin / Ehemann | uxor / maritus | épouse, femme / époux, mari |
| godparents | Paten, Taufpaten | patrini, levantes | parrain / marraine |
| legitimate (parents married) | ehelich | legitimus / legitima | légitime |
| illegitimate | unehelich, außerehelich | illegitimus | naturel(le) |
| widow / widower | Witwe / Witwer | vidua / viduus | veuve / veuf |
| aged … years | alt … Jahre | annorum …, aetatis … | âgé(e) de … ans |
| the late (deceased) | weiland, selig (sel.) | quondam, defunctus (q., def.) | feu / feue |
👶 A baptism entry
Usually gives: the date of birth and of baptism, the child's name, whether they were legitimate, the father's name and job, the mother's name (often her maiden name), where they lived, and the godparents. Godparents were often aunts, uncles or grandparents, so note them down!
💍 A marriage entry
Gives the bride's and groom's names, ages and home villages, often both sets of parents (and whether they were already dead), and the witnesses. French civil marriages are long but very detailed.
🕯️ A death or burial entry
Gives the date of death and burial, the person's age, sometimes the cause, and who they left behind: "Witwe des…" (widow of…) or "Sohn des…" (son of…). Use the age to work out a birth year, then look for the baptism.
AI can help, but check it. Tools like Transkribus, Copilot or ChatGPT can turn old handwriting into text. They are very useful and often wrong on names and numbers.
Treat any AI reading as a first draft. Compare it to the picture letter by letter, and if you're stuck, ask a person (see the links below).
Want to type one out?
The Help Wanted page lists family documents nobody has typed out yet. Even a partial reading ("born 1832 in Medingen, father Peter…") helps everyone.
It also earns the ✍️ Transcriber badge!
💻 More useful websites
Luxembourgers in America
German records (Saarland, Baden, Prussia and more)
Graves and Iowa
🏛️ Places to visit
Hours change, so call or check the website before you goLuxembourg American Cultural Center
Belgium, Wisconsin · about 35 miles north of MilwaukeeA museum about Luxembourg immigrants, with the Dooley-Wagner Research Center, one of the largest collections of Luxembourg genealogy outside Luxembourg. It has a surname file index, and staff and volunteers can help.
- 📍 100 Peter Thein Avenue, Belgium, WI 53004
- 🕙 Wednesday–Friday 10–4 and the first Saturday of the month (September–May); Wednesday–Saturday 10–4 in summer
- 📅 The research center needs an appointment. Museum admission includes it.
- 📞 (262) 476-5086 · info@lacs.lu
Center for Dubuque History
Loras College, Dubuque, IowaDubuque County census records, Iowa state censuses, a big obituary file sorted by surname, city directories back to 1856, tax lists, plat maps and family histories.
- 📍 1450 Alta Vista St, Dubuque, IA
- 📅 By appointment only. Book online or email cdh@loras.edu
St. Donatus, Iowa
Jackson County, south of DubuqueA village settled by Luxembourg families in the 1800s. Its stone church, the hillside Way of the Cross, and the Gehlen House and Barn give a feel for how our Luxembourg ancestors lived in Iowa.
Dubuque County–Key City Genealogical Society
Dubuque, IowaLocal volunteers who know Dubuque's churches, cemeteries and records. A good group to ask when you're stuck on a Dubuque ancestor.
FamilySearch centers
All over the U.S., including Iowa and WisconsinFree help from volunteers, and the computers there give free access to some paid websites. Some records on FamilySearch can only be opened at a center.
Visiting Luxembourg?
Luxembourg City and the home villagesThe National Archives have a reading room in Luxembourg City. The National Library has luxroots.org, a database of over 3 million Luxembourg birth, marriage and death records that can only be used inside the library. Each town hall keeps its own local archives too.
Our research guides
FamilySearchFree · records & our group tree
AncestryFree account · paid records
WikiTreeFree · one shared world tree
Find a GraveFree · graves & headstones🧭Other ResourcesLuxembourg, old handwriting & moreKnow a good resource that's missing? Tell Jordan and it can be added here.