Reference
The geography of the search
To find a document you need to know the administrative address it was filed under. That address changed over time — and so did the village names.
First steps · step 2 of 6
Know your village? See how many books have been gathered for it.
To the villages ↓ Browse the case catalogue →How it was organised
Until 1917 our villages belonged to Podolia Governorate. The administrative ladder ran as follows:
- Governorate — Podolia, centred on Kamianets-Podilskyi.
- Uyezd (district) — Olhopil. Our town stood 20 versts from Olhopil.
- Volost — Miastkivka, centred on Miastkivka itself.
- Parish — the church unit, which did not match the volost.
The key point for searching: registers were kept by parishes, not volosts. So you search by the church a village belonged to — and that church could stand in the neighbouring village. Volost membership matters for secular records: court cases, revision tales, estate inventories.
Miastkivka volost in 1885
The sharpest snapshot comes from Zverinsky's 1885 gazetteer. The volost then held eight settlements with a combined population of about 13,600.
| Name in 1885 | Type | Households | Residents | Name today |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Miastkovka | town, volost centre | 635 | 4161 | Horodkivka |
| Voloska Verbka | village | 186 | 1147 | Verbka |
| Vysoka Hreblia | hamlet | 88 | 559 | Vysoka Hreblia |
| Horiachkivka | village | 451 | 2592 | Hariachkivka |
| Dzhuhastra | village | 254 | 1519 | Dzhuhastra |
| Leonivka | hamlet | 128 | 604 | Leonivka |
| Olshanka | village | 304 | 1758 | Vilshanka |
| Khrystyshche | village | 227 | 1296 | Khrystyshche (outside the community) |
Seven of the eight settlements belong to today's Horodkivka community. The core territory has not shifted in 140 years — which is why the formula “Miastkivka volost → Horodkivka community” describes very nearly the same ground.
How many cases each village has
- Miastkivka (Horodkivka) 122 cases
- Ротмистрівка · part of Miastkivka 22 cases
- Hutsalivka · part of Miastkivka 7 cases
- Мар'янівка · part of Miastkivka 1 case
- Verbka (Волоська Вербка) 33 cases
- Hariachkivka (Горячківка) 9 cases
- Dzhuhastra 2 cases
- Vilshanka (Ольшанка) 2 cases
- Vysoka Hreblia 2 cases
- Leonivka 1 case
- Khrystyshche none yet
Outside the 1885 volost, but present in the cases:
- Stara Verbka 4 cases
- Жабокрич 4 cases
- Olshanka, Balta uyezd 2 cases
- Михайлівка 2 cases
- Піщанка 2 cases
- Holovanivsk (Голованевск) 1 case
- Андріяшівка 1 case
- Заболотне (Чоботарка) 1 case
The number counts archival cases in the catalogue that mention the village. Zero is shown too: it means we have not found the books yet, not that none existed. Know where the books of this village are kept? tell us.
The Horodkivka community today
The Horodkivka rural community was formed in 2020, centred on Horodkivka, Tulchyn district, Vinnytsia region. Until 19 July 2020 this was Kryzhopil district. The community covers 25 settlements: 19 villages and 6 hamlets.
Villages that were not part of Miastkivka volost belonged to neighbouring volosts and uyezds, or were founded later. Their documents sit in different archival collections — which is why coverage for them is thinner.
Names that mislead
- Horodkivka is a Soviet-era name. It appears in no document before 1917. Our town was written Miastkovka, Miastkivka, Miastkówka, Miaskovka.
- There was another “Horodkovka”. A separate state-owned village of that name lay in the neighbouring Luh volost of the same Olhopil uyezd. Its records have nothing to do with our history.
- The river has several names too. Markivka, called Shumylivka in its upper course and Kosnytsia in older sources. One river, a left tributary of the Dniester.
You have the address — what next
The next question is which document to look for under it. Registers were kept by the parish, revisions by the treasury chamber, and when neither survives, what remains are the act books of courts and notaries.