The following was taken from the archives of the German-Bohemian mailing list. It's a little hard to tell who wrote what, so I tried to divide the conversations by using line breaks.
~Debbie
I am researching my surname origin and am having little luck. My surname is MOHELNITZKY. Many of my relatives claim that it is German-Bohemian but I have no proof of this. I come from a mainly germanic community in central Wisconsin. If you recognize my surname or have ideas of origin please contact me.
Dave,
I have a query about the surname Mohelnitzky.
I am arguing that I don't think it is Czech...I have never seen a Czech name ending in "tzky" or even "nitzky" for that matter. I think it is misspelled if it is Czech or it is maybe from Galicia or another Polish province of the old empire. Please give me your opinion....would the 'nitzky" ending identify it with a given country?
Karen
The name Mohlenitzky did not sound Czech to me so I queried an expert. I think the the family could be German-Bohemian but I would look for them in the Galician parts of the old Empire....I think there was a "Moravian-Galicia" around Troppau (can someone tell me it that is right?) where such "Polish" names might be common.
There were a couple of uprisings in the Austrian Polish territories and each time there was a migration of refugees and fugitives into other parts of the Empire or Germany. So there is also the possibility that the family migrated to Bohemia before emigrating to the US. Read a little history to find out when these migrations occurred during the 19th Century. You should also learn about the partitions of Poland - first was in 1772 I think - when Austria got Galicia.
A copy of my query to Dave Zincavage is posted below. To find out more about the name or the references cited, please write to Dave.
There are specific Heimat organizations for Galicia and I have seen Galician yearbooks published by Preussler in Nuernberg. All in German of course.
Dave's reply:
Sure, America. "-nitzky" in an anglicized spelling of what would be "-nicki" in Polish. The name would be MOGILNICKI in Poland. Kasprzycki lists several. Fred quotes Rymut as listing 322 families of that name in contemporary Poland.
Dave
Aug. 19, 1997:
This is posted just because it may be of interest to some list members. I have asked for the name of the Heimatbuch to be forwarded to Dora Selig for the website.
<< I spent my early youth next to the town of MOHELNICE and have a Heimatbuch for Mohelnice and Zabrech (Mueglitz & Hohenstadt in German). The book describes the roots of the name Mohelnice and pegs them as Slav/Celtic and Mueglitz as Germanic having the same meaning in both languages namely "Burrial Hill" >>
Karen