I found a beautiful map of Silesia in 1741 on the Ostrava City Archive’s website, which is http://earchiv.ostrava.cz.
Here is a direct link to the description of the map. To view it, click, “zobrazit digitálnie kopie.” That will open up the map in a new tab in your browser. This is what you will see:
The full title is:
| Carte generale du duché de Silesie divisée en ses XVII moindres principautés et domaines. Sup. et ducatus Silesiae un suos XVII minores principarus et dominia divisi novva tabula in lucem edita a Covens et Mortier Amsterodami 1741. |
My translation of the French:
A General Map of the Duchy of Silesia divided in its 17 smallest principalities and dominions.
Published by the World Mortier Amsterdam 1741.
Here is the part of the map that interests me:
I’m sitting here trying to figure out the historical jurisdictions of my ancestor’s villages of origin: Velké Kunčice (Groß Kunzendorf) and Vratimov (Ratimau). Velké Kunčice was razed ~1950 to make way for the Nová hut’ iron and steel works complex. It doesn’t exist anymore.
I have heard rumors about people searching for Vratimov records in Polish archives. Someone even said that Vratimov was part of the Wroclaw diocese? That seems…far.
There is ~40 year gap of parish records for these villages between ~1780 and 1835. The parish records we do have post 1835 are the bishop’s transcripts – not originals! Agh!
Anyway, this map is too old to shed any real light on my 1840’s problem. But it is so beautiful!