Civil Registration in South Africa (of Births, Marriages & Deaths)

Here is a table showing the generally accepted dates of the commencement of Civil Registration of Births, Marriages and Deaths in the four historical provinces of South Africa. Please note that these dates are a guide only. In some cases, although the law had been passed that made Civil Registration official, it was sometimes not implemented until much later and records prior to this are incomplete.

There is a full set of records available at the various archive repositories around the country under the Home Affairs archival group. For example records for the Western Cape have the prefix HAWC (Home Affairs Western Cape). The Eastern Cape is HAEC, the Northern Cape HANC and so on. These records can only be accessed at the various archive repositories and are not available online.

You can request assistance from the National Archives of South Africa – please visit their website for contact details.