Illustration of a Swedish household examination record following a family

Swedish Household Examination Records (Husförhörslängder)

A guide to husförhörslängder, Sweden’s remarkable household examination records: what they contain, how they let you follow whole families across time, and how to read them.

Illustration of a Swedish church record book (kyrkobok)

Swedish Church Records: Births, Marriages and Deaths

How to use Swedish church records: the birth and baptism, marriage, and death and burial registers kept by the Church of Sweden, often reaching back to the 1600s.

Illustration of locating a Swedish ancestral parish on a map

How to Find Your Swedish Ancestral Parish

Can’t find your Swedish records? You need the parish first. The best sources for finding your ancestral Swedish parish: emigration records, passenger lists and church records abroad.

Illustration of a Swedish ancestor moving between parishes

Swedish Moving Records: Following Families Between Parishes

How to use Swedish moving records (in- och utflyttningslängder) to follow ancestors as they moved between parishes—one of the keys to tracing mobile Swedish families.

Illustration of the Riksarkivet Swedish national archive

Using Riksarkivet: Sweden’s Free National Archives Online

How to use Riksarkivet, the Swedish National Archives’ free digital research room, for genealogy: its vast digitised church records and how to navigate them by parish.

Illustration of the ArkivDigital colour-image Swedish records subscription

ArkivDigital: Is the Paid Swedish Records Subscription Worth It?

An honest guide to ArkivDigital, the paid Swedish records subscription: its high-quality colour images and search tools, how it compares to the free Riksarkivet, and when it’s worth it.

Illustration of the Swedish patronymic naming system

Swedish Naming Conventions: Patronymics and More

How Swedish names work in genealogy: the patronymic system (Andersson, Andersdotter), women keeping their own names, soldier names, farm names, and the research implications.

Illustration of reading old Swedish parish register handwriting

Reading Old Swedish Records: Handwriting and Key Words

A practical guide to reading old Swedish genealogy records: the old handwriting, the key Swedish (and Latin) words, dates and abbreviations, and how to build the skill.

Illustration of breaking through a brick wall in Swedish genealogy research

Breaking Through Swedish Genealogy Brick Walls

Stuck on your Swedish family tree? Solutions for the most common Swedish genealogy brick walls: unknown parish, patronymic confusion, soldier names, vanished movers and record gaps.

Illustration of the great Swedish migration to America

The Swedish Great Migration to America

The story of the Swedish great migration: over a million Swedes who left for America, why they went, how they travelled via Gothenburg, where they settled, and how to trace them.