If your ancestors came from Metzenseifen then you probably have kin to many of these families. In my research on the Pimsner family tree, I have seen often mentioned surnames that include Gedeon, Ballasch, Bodenlos, Mellar, Frantz, Schmidt, Broestl and so many more! And over the years, the spelling of these names have changed – some have added letters or, like Ballasch, removed letters; in this case, differing generations have removed the ‘s’ so that the name is now spelled Ballach.
My Pimsner ancestors have found ways to marry all these families. The big question for me is just how are all these various families related to each other?
Metzenseifen was not a particularly large village from what I can tell. According to Duncan Gardner’s web page “… The town of Metzenseifen was founded in the 1300s by German-speaking settlers, apparently from the lower Rhine region. The German dialect, known as Mantakisch, is still spoken today by older residents of Medzev and their children (though the majority population is now Slovak speaking). The population in the two parts of town in the late 1800s (and today) was 3500 (Unter-Metzenseifen) and 1500 (Ober-Metzenseifen, a half-mile north of Unter-Metzenseifen).”
Finally, Mr. Gardner’s website states the following: “… Surnames of German-speaking families from Metzenseifen: Gedeon (Gedeohn), Wagner, Tischler, Goebl, Broestl, Schuerger, Schuster, Ballasch, Stroempl, Tomasch, Bodenlos, Froelich, Eiben, Kundt (later Kundtz), Schmiedl, Sorger, Antl, Muellner; Stefany, Tache, Kovats, Friedl, Glosner, Imling, Koosch, Malicsky, Schmidt, Flegner, Krupitzer, Poehm, Boehm, Ruehrkraut, Schmotzer, Hennel (Hoenl), Holop, Pimzner, Ruzsbaczky, Lazar, Schenk, Filakovszky, Franz, Frint, Gallus, Hoffelder, Huebler, Klein, Kozman, Kuchar, Lengyel, Lepesch, Majer, Poser, Progner, Pukelnik, Quallich, Roob, Roth, Schmeer, Scholtz, Streidl, Szedlay.
In Ober-Metzenseifen the most frequent names were: Eiben, Schmotzer, Meder, Frindt, Gedeon, Stark, Antl, Grentzer, Zawatzky, Jalsch, Lang, Mazorlik, Mueller, Schuerger, Tohol, Tomasch.”
