Jewish cemeteries in Rothenburg ob der Tauber

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The Jewish cemeteries in Rothenburg ob der Tauber are the now defunct Medieval Cemetery and the so-called New Cemetery in Rothenburg ob der Tauber , a town in the Ansbach district in Bavaria .

Medieval cemetery

One of the preserved tombstones of the medieval Jewish cemetery, exhibited in the Jewish Museum Franken in Fürth .

The Jewish cemetery , which dates from the Middle Ages and was occupied from around 1339 to 1520, was located in the area of ​​today's Schrannenplatz. 45 tombstone fragments have been preserved.

history

Today's Schrannenplatz was called the Judenkirchhof until 1958. As early as 1339, the square was known as the Coemeterium Judaeorum and was then outside the city wall. In 1406/07 a synagogue was built on the square. Due to the anti-Jewish agitation of the theologian Johann Teuschlein , the Jews were expelled from Rothenburg in 1520, the synagogue was plundered and converted into a chapel "Zur reinen Maria", which was demolished in 1561.

From 1520 the square was used as a Christian cemetery. The Jewish graves were desecrated during an expansion in 1532/33. The tombstones were used as building material - three stones in the outer wall of the Rothenburg Schranne, five stones on the castle wall, ten stones in the wall of the so-called Rabbi Meir garden and a double gravestone in the Judengasse. In 1914, 33 medieval tombstones (1266–1395) were discovered on the square during civil engineering work. Today most of these stones are in the RothenburgMuseum .

New cemetery

Southern part of the New Jewish Cemetery in Rothenburg ob der Tauber

The New Cemetery, which was occupied from 1899 to 1938, is located on the corner of Wiesenstrasse and Würzburger Strasse. 41 tombstones and a red-brick Tahara house have been preserved on the 296 m² area . The original furnishings of the Tahara House are missing.

history

The old Tahara house. The white cemetery wall can then be seen

After 1870 Jews settled in Rothenburg again and founded a Jewish community on September 27, 1876 . Before the new cemetery was established, the Rothenburg Jews buried their dead in the Jewish cemetery in Ermetzhofen . The new cemetery was approved by the government in Ansbach in September 1899. Karoline Hofmann, wife of the religion teacher Moses Hofmann, who died on December 20, 1899, lies in the oldest grave. The last to be buried was probably Anna Löwenthal, who died on January 28, 1938.

The cemetery was desecrated during the Nazi era between 1942 and 1943, and the tombstones were overturned. On May 26, 1943, the site was sold by the Jewish community to the city for 310 Reichsmarks , which in turn resold it to Heinrich and Ludmilla Fees from Kitzingen . They allowed the Rothenburg stonemason company Herrscher to remove the gravestones from the cemetery and process them further. In 1946 the cemetery had become a vegetable garden with only a grave.

After the end of the Second World War , the American military government confiscated the site, left it to the Jewish Restitution Successor Organization (JRSO) and requested the city of Rothenburg to restore the cemetery. In 1947 the city commissioned the Ochsenfurt stonemason company Krämer to restore the gravestones in a uniform format for the 40 desecrated graves for 4600 Reichsmarks. The new gravestones, which still exist today, were erected by the local Herrscher company, who had removed the original gravestones four years earlier.

The cemetery was redesigned again in 1971. Since there are no graves on the western half of the Tahara house, a stone wall was built to the west of the occupied part and the entrance to it was relocated. The wrought iron gate is decorated with two stars of David . The area on which the Tahara House stands is separated from the cemetery by a hedge and a wall and has run wild. It no longer counts in the cemetery.

The red brick Tahara house was inhabited after the war, but then stood empty. Nothing has survived from the original furnishings.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b There would be more to say , Fränkischer Anzeiger No. 274, section Rothenburg Stadt und Land, 26./27. November 2011
  2. ^ Rothenburg ob der Tauber: Jüdische Friedhöfe , Alemannia Judaica

literature

  • Oliver Gussmann: Jewish Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Invitation to a tour. Verlag Medien und Dialog, Haigerloch 2003. ISBN 3-933231-22-1
  • Theodore Kwasman: The medieval Jewish gravestones in Rothenburg ob der Tauber. In: Hilde Merz u. a. (Ed.): Judaica in the Reichsstadtmuseum. On the history of the medieval Jewish community in Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Rabbi Meir ben Baruch von Rothenburg to commemorate the 700th anniversary of his death (= series of publications by the Reichsstadtmuseum Rothenburg od Tauber 3, ZDB -ID 1183545-x ). Alt-Rothenburg Association, Rothenburg ob der Tauber 1993, pp. 35–180.
  • Hilde Merz: Documentation. City of Rothenburg ob der Tauber. Israelite cemetery. Rothenburg ob der Tauber 1990, [unpublished manuscript; 16 sheets]; therein: site plan, occupancy list and photos of the Rothenburg New Jewish Cemetery.
  • Winding paths of faith: The Reformation in Rothenburg was not a straight path - Reformer Teuschlein played a role. Fränkischer Anzeiger, October 30, 2008

Web links

Commons : Alter Jüdischer Friedhof (Rothenburg ob der Tauber)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files
Commons : Neuer Jüdischer Friedhof Rothenburg ob der Tauber  - Collection of images, videos and audio files