The village of Zielona is significant in my family history because it was the location of the parish church that many of my Chodkowski relatives and their spouses attended.
Austrian Military Map of the Zielona Area – 1910
SOURCE: Third Military Mapping Survey of Austria-Hungary, Sheet 39-53, Ostrolecka. Online http://lazarus.elte.hu/hun/digkonyv/topo/200e/39-53.jpg; downloaded 18 May 2010.
Słownik Geograficzny Entry for Zielona
Source: Chlebowski, Bronisław, Józef Krzywicki, Filip Sulimierski, and Władysław Walewski, eds., Słownik Geograficzny Królestwa Polskiego i Innych Krajów Słowiańskich (Geographical Dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavonic Countries) – Warsaw 1895, Volume XIV, pages 596-597.
Click on the link for a PDF copy of the Słownik Geograficzny entry for Zielona. Translated from the Polish, the entry reads:
11.) Zielona, a village on the Sona River, Ciechanów Powiat, Bartołdy Gmina, and Zielona Parish, 19 versts [0.66 miles per verst] from Ciechanów. It includes a wooden parish church, an elementary school, 18 homes, 186 residents, 403 morgs [in the Russian partition 1 morg = 1.388 acres] of which 61 belong to the peasants. A few nobles live here. In the year 1827 there were 12 homes and 62 residents. The parish church already existed here in 1567. The current [church] originated in the year 1774. In the year 1567 a few nobles lived here, having a few lots and in which there were altogether 1 ¾ włóki (1 włóka = 16.8 hectares), 4 gardens, 1 slaughterhouse, and in the parts of Zielona Stoszie ¼ włóka (Pawiński, Mazowsze, 331). The Parish of Zielona belonged to the Ciechanów Deanery (formerly it belonged to the Przasznysz Deanery) [and served] 2100 souls.
The reference to Pawiński, Mazowsze, 331 refers to:
Pawiński, Adolf. 1892. Mazowsze. Polska XVI wieku pod względem geograficzno-statystycznym, t. 5. Warszawa: skł. gł. w Księgarni Gebethnera i Wolffa.
This publication is available online at the Digital Library of Wielkopolska.
The place described here is only one of many places in Poland called Zielona. In this entry, the Sona River is mentioned. The Słownik Geograficzny entry for the Sona River was previously translated.
The maps of the Third Military Mapping Survey of Austria-Hungary and the entries in the Słownik Geograficzny were prepared at about the same time and make a good pair for studying places in and around the Congress Kingdom of Poland at the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century, a time period when the Eastern European ancestors of present-day Americans left their homelands for the United States.
Copyright © 2010 by Stephen J. Danko
Hey, my apologies for a lousy sense of geography — but I’d love a google map highlighted and labeled with the old Polish villages that you have told us about. If I had had Google Maps as a kid, my life would have been so much better — it’s the zooming in and out — the specifics to overview — the day to day view and the view of the patterns of the outside world.
Whatever — I do enjoy your geography and history lessons. Thanks