My father did mention an Austrian connection more than once. My father stated this his mother would occasionally say that his father (Peter Zych) was not really Polish but Austrian. Of course, if you look at the changes in the borders of the countries in that area the last couple of centuries, you can see that the borders were changed many times. Because of the spelling of the surname and the location of the towns my father remembers, I've always wondered about a Czech connection, also. Thank you for your kind reply and I too will keep in touch. My e-mail is
zych@earthlink.net. Have you ever researched the suffix -al as to its possible origins? May prefixes and suffixes are only to indicate relationship. For example, Peter-son and Fitz-gerald, both indicating son of... Once again, thank you.