Translation Request

Yanni227

Dear all,

I wonder if someone is in a position to advise me how I may conduct further research into Egyptian Arabic Microfilm archives. My Greek Cypriot Grandmother and her siblings were all born in Alexandria in the early 19th Century I believe I may have found an invaluable source of information in the form of Greek Church Records which have been filmed and archieved here;

https://www.familysearch.org/en/search/catalog/260261Error

My problem is that I cannot read Arabic and that I cannot seem to find a way of searching this file for recognisable txt. Is there a way of importing these 3500 slides into some OCR software which will then allow me to search the text for my Grandmothers name (and, or, her siblings or father or mother).

I am assuming that their birth records (and death certificates of parents) will all be written in Egyptian Arabic and I am therefore wondering if I can use Google translate to translate thier names to Arabic and use some OCR software to search variants of thier Arabic equivalent names. I say Arabic equivalent because I appreciate that it may be that the sounds of the names in Greek, do not necessarily have a corresponding sound, and therefore character, in the Egyptian Arabic Alphapet.

Perhaps this is too much of a request, but this is my current dilemma and any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated.

Thankyou.

patrickjamesvogel1

Yanni, thank you for reaching out! I have no promises that I'll be able to comb this entire record set, but I could at least get started trying. Can you share any relevant ancestor names, first and last if possible?

lldaly12

Hello @Yanni227!

I did a bit of research on this for you. It looks like that particular collection is on microfilm and due to contractual agreements is not viewable online but is stored at the archive in the Granite Mountain Vault. The contract may be revisited at some point down the road but for now it's essentially inaccessible to the public.

However, have you tried looking for Ottoman records? https://www.familysearch.org/en/search/collection/4496121

This Ottoman census includes parts of Egypt and is text searchable!

You can search online in English or Arabic, but I believe the Arabic is more effective if you can use Chat GPT to give you a name transliteration.

To view the actual image of the census you will have to go to a FamilySearch Center Find a FamilySearch Location

Would love to hear how it goes!