Old Jewish cemetery (Erfurt)
The old Jewish cemetery in Erfurt was used in the 19th century for burials for the Jewish community who had resettled in the city . Anti- Semitically motivated disturbances in the peace of the dead as well as redesign of the area in the 20th century made the cemetery almost disappear. Work has been underway since 2007 to make the cemetery “visible”.
At the beginning of the 19th century, Jews were allowed to settle in Erfurt again after more than three hundred years. So a Jewish community came into being in the city again. For burials, a cemetery was created in front of the Brühler Tor at the beginning of today's Cyriakstrasse, which was first occupied in 1811. The community grew rapidly and so the space in the cemetery was soon no longer sufficient for further burials. Since the cemetery could not be expanded, the new cemetery was set up near today's Thuringia Hall for burials of the Jewish community from 1878 . The cemetery was no longer used for burials, but according to Jewish belief, graves may not be touched or dissolved, which is why the cemetery remained.
The cemetery was destroyed in 1926 by young members of the Wiking Association . The cemetery was also desecrated during the November pogroms in 1938 . Shortly afterwards, the property was expropriated by the city and the tombstones were removed in 1944. After the Nazi era , the area was restituted to the State Association of Jewish Communities, but the city of Erfurt came back into possession of the area in 1951 and leveled it. Plans to develop a green area were not implemented, instead garages were built in the 1960s, also with remains of the gravestones as a foundation.
Raphael Scharf-Katz , then chairman of the Jewish community, criticized this situation in 1989 as unbearable for believing Jews. In 1996 a memorial stone was erected to commemorate the old cemetery. Plans to restore the cemetery were realized from 2007: The garages were demolished and the area cleared, the cemetery grounds were separated from a green area. Some of the tombstones brought to safety in the New Cemetery were returned to their former place.
literature
- Rüdiger Paul Kirsten (2009): Park and Jewish cemetery on Cyriakstrasse. In: City and History. Magazine for Erfurt. No. 43, pp. 24-25.
- Jutta Hoschek (2014): November pogrom 1938 in Erfurt. From documents and memories. Jena, pp. 29-34.
Web links
- The old Jewish cemetery on erfurt.de
- Jewish cemetery in Erfurt near Alemannia Judaica
Coordinates: 50 ° 58 ′ 13.3 ″ N , 11 ° 0 ′ 39.1 ″ E