The first Jews probably settled in Mir in the 17th century. On the eve of the Second World War, 2400 members of the community lived there, half of the city’s population. A famous Lithuanian yeshiva participated in the influence of this city for the Jews of Europe. All of Mir’s Jews were murdered by bullets, except 200 who escaped the day before the last German shooting in August ...
Plus d'infosContenus associés au mot-clé “shtetl”
Pereyaslav-Khmelnitsky
The city of Pereyaslav, to which the name Khmelnitsky was added in honor of that Cossack leader, was also the birthplace of Sholem Aleichem. To lovers of musical comedy, the city is better known as Anatevka, the name it bears in Fiddlers on the Roof. Aleichem found inspiration for his novels’ many characters here: the one who seeks their fortune, the boy who joins the revolution and is ...
Plus d'infosSlonim
In the nineteenth century, more than 70% of Slonim’s population was Jewish. The ratio was 53% before the war. The ghetto was burned down between 29 June and 15 July 1942. At the city’s edge, at the site of the former cemetery, a monument commemorates the city’s 35000 Jews exterminated during the war. In the city center, set back in the relation to the marketplace, the ruins ...
Plus d'infosBrest (Brest-Litovsk)
The first city across the Polish border, Brest is located on the right bank of the Bug River. Its name evokes the famous Brest-Litovsk Treaty of April 1918, whereby Trotsky’s Red Army put an end to the war with Germany by ceding to the latter large amounts of Russian territory (the treaty was annulled in November of that same year by the Soviet government). On 22 June 1941, in Brest, ...
Plus d'infosBobruysk
The city of Bobruysk was once a typical Belarusian shtetl. In 1897, 20759 Jews lived here (60,5% of the population), while in 1926, the Jewish community had a population of 21558 (42%). To form an image of what a Jewish city once looked like, explore the downtown area of Dzerjinsky Street and its marketplace. Stroll down Karl Marx Street and Komsomolskaya Street with their typical balconies, ...
Plus d'infosTykocin
From Bialystok, a detour toward Tykocin is imperative: it has effectively preserved the structure and architecture of an old shtetl. This town, tiny today, was in times past more important than Bialystok, with a larger and older Jewish community. The community dates back to 1522 and was, in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, one of the most prominent in Poland. Like Bialystok, in ...
Plus d'infosChelmno
Located on the bank of the Ner, a tributary of the Warta in the region the Germans called Wartheland, Chelmno is where “gas trucks” were tested beginning 1941, an early form of what later became the gas chambers. Jews were assembled in the Catholic church and from there sealed in trucks, with the exhaust pipe turned inward. The number of miles between the village and forest and ...
Plus d'infosZurich
The Jewish presence in Zurich probably dates back to the 13th century. During the Middle Ages, as in many other cities in the region, the situation of the Jews varied between reception, persecution and expulsion, depending on the power in place. In the wave of major expulsions that took place between the end of the 14th and the end of the 15th century, the Jews of Zurich were expelled in ...
Plus d'infosAntwerp
The last real shtetl in western Europe, Antwerp is known for its Orthodox Jews and its diamonds industry. Barely twenty years ago, approximately 80% of Antwerp’s Jewish population used to make a living from the diamond industry. More than half of the world production of diamonds passed through these few streets near Centraal Station. The diamond centers, which can be visited, also ...
Plus d'infosYiddishland
The visitor to Eastern Europe hoping to discover a rich Jewish architectural heritage must remember that what was once the center of Judaic cultural and religious life in Europe -principally in Lithuania between the eighteenth century and the Shoah- had disappeared beyond ruins and cemeteries. The complete eradication of a Jewish presence, the sworn objective of the Nazis, was conducted with ...
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