Jewish cemetery (Heiligenstadt in Upper Franconia)

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Jewish cemetery in Heiligenstadt, 2011

The Jewish cemetery in Heiligenstadt in Upper Franconia in the Bamberg district is a Jewish burial site that was built around 1700 and was occupied until the end of the 19th century.

location

The 2280 m² cemetery, surrounded by a low stone wall, is located about 900 m northeast of Heiligenstadt in Franconian Switzerland on a mountain in the Im Kühlich forest .

history

Jewish cemetery in Heiligenstadt, 2011

Jews were already living in Heiligenstadt before the Thirty Years' War . The Jewish cemetery was first mentioned in 1608 when a Jewish woman wanted to have her deceased child buried there. In 1617 five Jewish residents were named in the village who were liable to pay taxes to the Lords of Streitberg . In the second half of the 17th century, Jews were able to settle in Heiligenstadt again.

Burials in the cemetery of the Jewish community were subject to dues to the rulers, from 1690 to the barons of Stauffenberg who lived here . In 1776/77 the following “corpse” fees were paid: “1 florin Meyer Jud relocates because of his in-law, 30 kr. Löb Jud because of his child, the Swiss woman because of her son Moschem. "In 1807 the account books of the Stauffenberg Rent Office in Burggrub noted: " Income money in ordin. Recognition of the Jewish burial 2 fl. 24 kr., Income from the Jewish burial 1 fl. From an extinct person, 30 kr. from a child. ”In 1821 the annual rent was 1 fl. 40 kr. set. For burials an additional 1 fl. 15 kr. (Adult) and 37 ½ kr. (Child) to pay. In 1840 the rent was increased to nine guilders per year.

In 1852 the proportion of Jews in Heiligenstadt reached its peak with 20.4% (87 of a total of 426 inhabitants). Subsequently, the number of Jewish residents fell sharply due to emigration as a result of the Bavarian Jewish edict of 1813 . In 1890 only 12 residents of Jewish faith were counted in the village. The youngest graves in the northeast corner of the Jewish cemetery in Heiligenstadt date from 1887, 1896 and 1897. In the 1950s, the senior teacher Hans Spörl published a home chronicle containing a detailed report by an unknown contemporary witness about the funeral rites of the Heiligenstadt Jews:

Gravestone in the newer part, 2011

“Strange things happened at Jewish funerals. The (or the) dead person was driven on a cart, pulled by a horse, to the cemetery on the Kuhlich, above the Wischberg. The grave had been dug quickly beforehand. The dead were placed in the “ death shirt ”, which was sewn while they were still alive, in the simple, unplaned coffin, which the local carpenter had made into a box from four boards without nails and screws. A bag of coins was given to the dead man. The women, with the exception of the closest blood relatives, had to stay in the house. Flowers were not allowed to be donated, not even the smallest bouquet. With the usual headgear, the men laid the coffin in the grave, the dead man's face facing east. It all happened with the greatest haste. Everyone present threw three shovels of earth into the grave. The Jewish teacher (in my youth it was the Jewish teacher von Aufseß), meanwhile read the Kaddish , the prayer for the dead, from the prayer book . And then the striking thing happened: the Jewish teacher scratched the black suit of the suffering man with a penknife - as a sign of mourning - or (in the case of a suffering woman) the scarf, which then widened the tear with his hand. The mourners stripped grass three times as they left and threw it behind them. The rite later changed insofar as Christians were also allowed to accompany the funeral procession and the Jewish women were allowed to go as far as the Wischberg. Instead of tufts of grass, stones were thrown after the funeral procession. Occasionally one sees stones lying on the tombs as a sign that a relative had visited the grave. "

On February 15, 1902, the few remaining Jewish residents of Heiligenstadt were assigned to the Jewish community in Aufseß , whose deceased were buried in the local cemetery . As early as 1910, there were no longer any Jewish people living in Heiligenstadt. From 1911, the local beekeeping association used the then completely overgrown cemetery in Heiligenstadt for its own purposes.

In 1921 young people knocked over tombstones there, although an anti-Semitic background was expressly denied. In 1936 there were anti-Semitic riots in which 13 gravestones were overturned and partially damaged. In 1939 Johann Casper bought the cemetery for 200 Reichsmarks for forestry use, whereby the tombstones were to remain. After Casper had to give the cemetery back for political reasons, the Stauffenberg forest and pension administration submitted a private purchase agreement to the district administrator of Ebermannstadt on January 22, 1941 . As a result, the Stauffenbergs had acquired the cemetery property from the religious community in Bamberg , which had been the legal owner since 1931. The wish of the Heiligenstadt police to remove gravestones was strictly rejected by the Stauffenbergs. A notarial certification of the purchase contract took place on January 21, 1943. When the temporary owner Johann Casper complained in 1945 to the District Office Ebermannstadt about the return of the cemetery, it could be proven beyond doubt that the property had been owned by the Stauffenberg landlords since the 18th century the Jews had a right of first refusal.

91 gravestones , including 45 old stones, have been preserved in the Jewish cemetery in Heiligenstadt .

literature

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Dieter Zöberlein: Community chronicle market Heiligenstadt i. OFr. Heiligenstadt 1995.
  2. ^ A b Alemannia Judaica : Heiligenstadt - Jewish history / synagogue . As of May 1, 2011.
  3. ↑ a b Local Studies Working Group in the Franconian Switzerland Association (ed.): Jewish life in the Franconian . Palm and Enke, Erlangen, Jena 1997, ISBN 3-7896-0573-5 .
  4. ↑ Hans Spörl: The history of the market town of Heiligenstadt from archives, documents and other sources. Heiligenstadt 1952.
  5. ↑ Alemannia Judaica : Aufseß - Jewish history / synagogue . As of June 24, 2010.
  6. ^ Alemannia Judaica : Heiligenstadt - Jewish cemetery . As of November 17, 2010.
  7. ^ House of Bavarian History : Jewish cemeteries in Bavaria - Heiligenstadt . As of April 6, 2011.

Web links

Commons : Jüdischer Friedhof (Heiligenstadt in Upper Franconia)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 49 ° 52 ′ 11 ″  N , 11 ° 10 ′ 31 ″  E