Deutsche Kolonisten im Königreich Ungarn (18. und frühes 19. Jahrhundert)

Genealogie als Ressource für eine historisch-anthropologische Annäherung

Abstract

A historical-anthropological approach to the everyday lives of “ordinary men” and “ordinary women” among people who emigrated to Hungary in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries faces the problem that files on emigration usually end with the very act of emigration. Moreover, in this context files shaped by quantitative numerical series are predominant, and these records hardly go beyond stereotypical statements. Files associated with non-contentious jurisdiction, on the other hand, may serve to form a bridge between the area of emigration and the area of settlement. They arose when emigrants requested their inheritance or assets in their old homeland. A plethora of ego-documents can be found in the estate files created in this way. However, they usually shed light only on short periods of the protagonists’ lives. Genealogical files provide a further resource towards a  historical-anthropological approach to actors. The files as well as genealogical data, analysed in a complementary manner, wrest the homo migrans – migrating man – from anonymity and give the individual a face as a “hero of everyday life” (Michel de Certeau). In this way, essential stages of life can be traced. This contribution presents case studies embedded in the socio-economic and historical-demographic context.