The library in this university town of Heidelberg on the banks of the Neckar River contains a collection of Hebrew manuscripts dating back to the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries. Among the manuscripts are the songs of the Jewish troubadour Süsskind von Trimberg decorated with 137 illuminated miniatures. A memorial has also been built in the city to commemorate the victims of the Shoah.
Constituting archives
The “Central Archive on the History of the Jews in Germany”, previously kept in several locations, was brought together in 2021 in the premises of a former tobacco factory.
It was made available to the public in 1987 and contains valuable documents on the communities of the various German cities as well as documents of all kinds, such as letters from Jewish soldiers fighting on the front lines during the First World War or files on survivors of the Shoah. The German Ministry of the Interior, in coordination with Jewish institutions, is actively involved in the creation and maintenance of this library.
