The Patron
San Bellino
Bellino di Padova is Rovigo's patron, celebrated on 26 November.
— Castellesi
CASTELLESI COMUNE
Rovigo,
Veneto
A Polesine archive that records not only residents but the people who left.
Most Italian archives record the people who stayed. Rovigo kept records of the ones who left.
The Comune di Boara Polesine fond contains a Registro emigrati America , 1887–1910 — a register of emigrants to America, kept by the comune itself.
The Comune di Rovigo fond holds an Indice decennale migrazione e immigrazione , 1901–1929 — a decennial index of emigration and immigration — alongside ruoli della popolazione for 1836–1880 , indexes to the civil-status acts for 1873–1919 , and population censuses for 1901–1921 .
And the Questura deposited its Registri dei Passaporti , 1921–1933 .
For a province that emptied twice over, that is an unusually direct set of sources.
The Emigration
Records of who left
Unlike most archives focused on residents, Rovigo preserves dedicated records of emigration, immigration and passports, including a communal register specifically naming emigrants to America.
The Landmark
Duomo di Rovigo
The Duomo di Rovigo is the principal listed church. For genealogy, the stronger local advantage is the survival of population rolls, migration indexes and whole communal archives across the Polesine.
Did you know?
ROVIGO KEPT TRACK OF THE PEOPLE WHO LEFT
Emigration appears directly in municipal records
A Boara Polesine register names emigrants to America from 1887–1910, while Rovigo adds migration indexes, population rolls and passport registers. These sources can document departure directly rather than infer it from absence.
LA PARLATA
How they speak
The local speech is Polesano, a Venetian variety with Ferrarese and Mantuan features toward the Po.
Search the emigrant registers
The Polesine is the land between the Adige and the Po , and much of it exists because it was drained. Reclamation here is not a modern project but a medieval one: the archive holds the papers of consortia whose origins run back to 1463 and 1572 — the Valdentro e Prese unite di Lendinara and the Vespara Presciane di Fratta Polesine . The Consorzio Polesana was instituted by decree of 13 November 1890 , uniting the individual consortia and hydraulic territories.
That history explains the province's records. The Consorzi di bonifica archives, together with the Catasto , allow the history of property and of environmental change to be traced in a landscape that was repeatedly remade.
It also explains its poverty. The Polesine was the poorest province of the Veneto, worked by day labourers on reclaimed estates, and it produced one of the earliest and most militant agricultural labour movements in Italy.
Its most famous son came from that world. Giacomo Matteotti , born at Fratta Polesine , was the socialist deputy murdered in 1924 after denouncing the Fascist election. The archive holds documents relating to Matteotti and his family, 1915–1940 , and the political record file of the Questura di Rovigo on Giacomo Matteotti and Velia Titta , with an analytical inventory.
Alongside it sits the Casellario Politico Centrale , 1894–1986 — 52 bundles and 20 registers with an analytical alphabetical index — the national register of people under political surveillance.
And the province emptied twice. First from the 1870s, in the great Veneto emigration to Brazil and the Americas. Then again after the flood of November 1951 , when the Po broke its banks across the Polesine and tens of thousands left permanently for Piedmont, Lombardy and abroad.
One administrative note. Grignano Polesine was an autonomous comune until 1927 , when it became a frazione of Rovigo together with Boara Polesine, Borsea, Buso, Concadirame and Sant'Apollinare con Selva .
Postcards from Rovigo
Wear Rovigo
WANT TO SEE ROVIGO REPRESENTED?
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PROVINCIA DI ROVIGO
Discover the beauty, culture and traditions of Rovigo and its remarkable comuni.
REGIONE VENETO
From the mountains to the sea, Veneto is a region of history, flavor and soul.
EXPLORE VENETO →From the passenger index
At least 144 people who gave Rovigo as their home are recorded by name among Italian arrivals in the United States — each with the ship they sailed on and the day they landed.
A floor, not a total. The index covers arrivals through 1912, holds nothing between May 1907 and December 1911, and many passengers were written down with no home town at all. Where a name is there, it is there with its record.
Have Orso look for your family →Ready to visit
An octagonal church hung with paintings, and the delta beyond
Getting there
The nearest major airport is Venice Marco Polo, Treviso, or Verona Airport, depending on the destination.
Rovigo is a quiet provincial capital in the flattest part of the Veneto, and the Polesine around it is a landscape made by hand.
Start at the Tempio della Beata Vergine del Soccorso , known as La Rotonda — an octagonal seventeenth-century church whose walls are hung with paintings from floor to ceiling.
Then the Accademia dei Concordi , founded in 1580 and still going, with its library and picture gallery — one of the oldest continuously active academies in Italy.
See the leaning Torri Donà and Grimani , the remains of the medieval castle.
Drive out to Fratta Polesine for Palladio's Villa Badoer and the house of Giacomo Matteotti , murdered in 1924.
Then go east into the Delta del Po — lagoons, fishing valleys and reed beds, a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, where the eel and clam fisheries still work.
And look at the idrovore , the pumping stations that keep this land dry. The consortia that built them have records going back to 1463 , and without them none of the province would be farmable.
Family history
Where the records are
Archives and registers
Rovigo holds a communal register of emigrants to America for 1887-1910, a decennial migration index and passport registers - but most military records went to Padova in 1951.
Archivio di Stato di Rovigo on Antenati
Lists the Comune di Rovigo population rolls of 1836-1880, the indexes of civil-status acts for 1873-1919, the decennial migration and immigration index of 1901-1929 and the censuses of 1901-1921; the Registro emigrati America of Boara Polesine for 1887-1910; the Riepilogo delle famiglie of Grignano Polesine for 1871-1892; the Buso Sarzano population rolls and citizenship acts; and records that after the suppression of the Rovigo military district in 1951 the military documentation was partly transferred to Padova, which holds the Ufficio di leva di Rovigo for classes 1855-1910 and the fogli matricolari for classes 1851-1900, while Rovigo retains the conscription lists for classes 1922-1949.
antenati.cultura.gov.itArchivio di Stato di Rovigo - fondi archivistici
Lists the communal fonds of Badia Polesine, Crespino, Ficarolo, Lendinara and Rovigo with the Provincia; the suppressed comuni of Grignano Polesine and Sant'Apollinare con Selva; the Registri dei Passaporti of 1921-1933 in 13 registers; the Casellario Politico Centrale of 1894-1986 with analytical alphabetical index; the documents on Giacomo Matteotti and his family and the Questura political record on Matteotti and Velia Titta; the Adolfo Rossi fond of 1857-1921; the Sala e Cusiani archive of 1392-1826; and the Congregazione di Carita later E.C.A. of 1875-1978.
archiviodistatorovigo.cultura.gov.itSIAS - Archivio di Stato di Rovigo
Notes that the conscription lists and the fogli matricolari e caratteristici consigned by the Rovigo district command are fundamental for genealogical research, that the notarial archive is of particular importance for its antiquity and richness with documentation from the thirteenth century, and that the Catasto and the archives of the Consorzi di bonifica allow the history of property and environmental change to be traced.
sias-archivi.cultura.gov.itGuida agli Archivi di Stato - Rovigo
Records the reclamation consortia of Valdentro e Prese unite di Lendinara and Vespara Presciane di Fratta Polesine dating from 1463 and 1572 respectively, and the institution of the Consorzio Polesana by decree of 13 November 1890.
maas.ccr.itGrignano Polesine
Confirms that Grignano remained an autonomous comune until 1927, when it became a frazione of Rovigo together with Boara Polesine, Borsea, Buso, Concadirame and Sant'Apollinare con Selva.
en.wikipedia.orgRelated places
Keep exploring
The journey does not end at the boundary of one comune. The province, the region and the neighbouring towns often hold the rest of the picture.
Your Roots. Their Story. Your Place.
Rovigo is more than a place on a map. It is a part of you.
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