Krakow Jewish Culture Festival Founder Receives Award

Janusz Makuch, the director and co-founder of the annual Festival of Jewish Culture in Krakow, Poland, has been presented one of Poland's highest civilian awards, the Poland Restituta medal. Polish President Lech Kaczynski presented Makuch with the award at a ceremony in Warsaw marking the 65th anniversary of the wartime Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

This year the Festival will take place June 28-July 6. The Preliminary Program is already online.

Plans to build on Jewish cemetery in Ukraine halted

JTA runs a brief story stating that the US Embassy intervention helped halt plans to build two high rises on the site of the Jewish cemetery in Vinnitza, Ukraine. See the story HERE.

More than 700 Jewish cemeteries (or sites of Jewish cemeteries) are scattered around Ukraine. I visited a number of them when researching the new edition of "Jewish Heritage Travel."

Most Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine are abandoned, and even those where there are Jewish communities are often very neglected. Many cemeteries have had their tombstones uprooted. The cemeteries in western Ukraine in particular are noted for the intricacy of their decorative carving. You can see some examples on my web site.

The most comprehensive list of Jewish cemeteries and other Jewish heritage sites in Ukraine is the downloadable survey overseen by the U.S. Commission for the Preservation of America's Heritage Abroad.

Video Interview with me in Krakow about Jewish heritage

Last summer, at the Festival of Jewish Culture in Krakow, I was interviewed for a project on the Festival that has now become an informative web site. Put together by Zach Rait, and sponsored by, among others, the Taube Foundation, it features photographs and film clips of many aspects of the Festival, as well as interviews with me and others -- ranging from Festival director Janusz Makuch to the late Chris Schwarz, who founded the Galicia Jewish Museum and, sadly, died only about a month after last year's Festival took place.

New video interview with me

Here's the second of two interviews I did in January for "Tracing Your Family Roots," a cable TV show near Washington DC. In it I talk about the changes I've seen over the past two decades regarding attitudes toward Jewish heritage sites in east-central Europe, in the condition of the sites on the ground, and in the development of Jewish heritage tourism as a niche market.

Links to Some Recent Developments

Here are links to some articles about recent Jewish Heritage developments.

BARBADOS. A MAJOR historical Jewish structure was recently uncovered
close to the synagogue in The City. University of the West Indies
students, led by doctoral candidate Michael Stoner, uncovered a mikvah
during an archaeological dig.
http://www.nationnews.com/story/306441874580391.php#

ISTANBUL. Quincentennial Foundation Museum of Turkish Jews.
http://www.turkishdailynews.com.tr/article.php?enewsid=99002

PORTSMOUTH. History lives on in restored synagogue in Portsmouth. The
former synagogue, which once had about 200 members, officially opens
today as a museum and cultural and community centery.
http://hamptonroads.com/2008/03/history-lives-restored-synagogue-portsmouth

VIENNA. Austrian archaeologists last week announced they had found the
earliest sign of Jewish habitation in Austria, in the form of a silver
pendant they found inside a third-century C.E. grave, which bears the
"Shma Yisrael" prayer.
http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/965077.html

Ancient Synagogue Discovered in Cologne, Germany

Archeologists have discovered the foundations of an ancient synagogue near the city hall in Cologne, Germany. According to news reports, they date from the 4th century CE, making this the oldest synagogue yet found in Germany. A synagogue built on the same site some 500 years later had until now been the oldest discovered in the country.

Oldest Trace of Jewish Presence Found in Austria

Researchers from the University of Vienna have discovered the oldest trace of Jewish presence in the territory of today's Austria -- what appears to be the grave of a Jewish child in a Roman cemetery dating from the 3rd century CE. Located near Halbturn in the Burgenland, the eastern part of Austria, the grave is one of about 300 in the Roman cemetery. It contained a golden scroll in a silver amulet. Inscribed in Greek on the scroll are the words of the Shema.

Click here for full press release and pictures.

More on Villa Tugendhat

The Czech Culture Minister has listed four pieces of furniture from the Tugendhat villa in Brno as part of the national cultural heritage. See March 7 article here.

Tzaddik's Grave Vandalized in Poland

The tomb of the great early Hasidic Master Elimelekh in Lezajsk, Poland, one of the major sites of Jewish pilgrimage in Poland, was vandalized the night of March 4-5, just two weeks before the anniversary of his death in 1788. Vandals scrawled anti-Semitic slogans and a big swastika on the building protecting the grave site in the Lezajsk Jewish cemetery. Police are investigating.

See a picture here: http://fodz.pl/?d=2&id=538&l=en

Video Interview with me

Here's a link to a half-hour  video interview with me that appeared on a Jewish genealogy TV show near Washington DC in February.

If I can, I'll upload the whole video....