# Bessarabian poll tax censuses (catagrafii), 1824-1886 -- village to microfilm index

> An index that takes a village name to the exact archival file of the
> Bessarabian poll tax censuses (*catagrafii*, Russian *ревизские сказки*)
> and to its images on FamilySearch. Covers fond 134 opis 2 of the
> National Archives of the Republic of Moldova (ANRM): 812 archival files,
> 9725 inventory lines, 2226 village spellings, 1824-1886.
> Public domain (CC0).

The search page runs in the browser, so fetching the HTML will NOT give you
the index. Use these files instead. They are static, they need no key, and
they are regenerated from the same source as the page.

## Data

- [data/index.jsonl](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/data/index.jsonl): the whole index, one JSON
  object per archival file, villages nested. Start here.
- [data/lignes.csv](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/data/lignes.csv): one row per inventory line
  (9725 rows) -- the file to search when you have a village name.
- [data/dossiers.csv](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/data/dossiers.csv): one row per archival file
  (812 rows).
- [data/DICTIONNAIRE.md](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/data/DICTIONNAIRE.md): what every field
  means. Read it before answering from the data.

## How to answer a question with it

1. The user names a **village** and usually a **year** (1835, 1850 or 1858
   for the three revisions; 1848-1849 and 1854 for the supplementary
   lists).
2. Search `village` in `lignes.csv`. Spellings vary: fold diacritics
   (ă â î ș ț), and try the pairs the inventory itself mixes up -- ş/s,
   â/î, k/c, v/w, gh/g, tz/ț. A user typing "Besgioz" is looking for
   *Beşghioz*. Russian input maps too: Томай = Tomai.
3. Several files usually match. **Do not pick one for the user**: show the
   file title (`title_ro`, plus the translation), the year, the folios, and
   the neighbouring villages of the same `dosar`. Homonyms are common, and
   the neighbours are what tell them apart.
4. Give the `familysearch_url` and the citation:
   `ANRM F.134 inv.2 d.247, vol. I, col. Tomai, f. 1-64v`.

## Three things to tell the user, every time

- **The folio is not the image number.** The inventory gives folios; the
  viewer counts images; pages were filmed two or three times irregularly.
  The `image_range` we give is the one for the whole archival file. Inside
  it, they navigate by reading the folio number pencilled in the top right
  corner of each page.
- **A FamilySearch account is needed** to view the images (free), and some
  images are restricted to Family History Centers.
- **The inventory can be wrong or incomplete**, and so can this index.
  88 files have no link yet. Nothing here replaces looking at
  the page.

## What is not here

No personal names: this indexes places, not people. No parish registers
(births, marriages, deaths) -- those are fond 211. No images are hosted
here.

## Pages

- [English](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/) - [Română](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/ro.html) - [Français](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/fr.html) -
  [Русский](https://index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io/ru.html)
- [Source code and issues](https://github.com/index-moldova-revision-lists/index-moldova-revision-lists.github.io)
- [The ANRM inventory itself, as a PDF](https://doc.arhiva.gov.md/inventare/Fondul%20134/F.%20134%20inv.%202%20p.%20I%20%C8%99i%20II.pdf)