As part of its yearly update, Ancestry has added new images to its Quebec, Canada, Notarial Records, 1637-1935, collection. While the number of records, 16,529,462, remains the same, new images were recently added to the index-only sections of the database.
These new images of notarial documents were scanned by Bibliothèque et Archives nationales du Québec (BAnQ) during the past several months and have now been linked to the index.
Quebec’s notary documents are unique in North America, and they are incredible sources of information about ancestors. These documents can contain marriage contracts, wills, estate inventories, guardianships, leases, powers of attorney, mortgages, loans, deeds, sales, apprenticeships, and business partnerships.
In 2016, Ancestry partnered with BAnQ to digitize 300 years of the province’s notary records.
In the notarial records collection, the indexes are called Répertoires. and the actual notarial records are called Actes.
Free research guide
To learn about Quebec’s notarial records, Ancestry has produced a very good research guide and a list of tips, which are free to subscribers and non-subscribers.
If you find a relative’s name in the index that interests you and the Acte is not available on Ancestry, first look for it on FamilySearch. Patricia Greber explains how to search for notarial records on FamilySearch in her blog post, 4 Steps For Finding Quebec Notary Records Online.
If the record is not available on FamilySearch, my blog post, How to order a notary record from the Quebec Archives after finding it in an index on Ancestry, explains how to order it from BAnQ for a responsible price.
