Judensand

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View from Mombacher Strasse on the Judensand

The Judensand (also: Old Jewish Cemetery Mainz ) is the oldest known burial place of the Jewish community in Magenza , the Jewish Mainz . In addition to the Holy Sand in Worms , it is considered the oldest Jewish cemetery in Europe.

middle Ages

The acquisition of the property is not documented, but according to an unsecured tradition, a property for the construction of a cemetery was acquired by a Mar Samuel and his wife Rahel as early as 1012 . The term “Judensand” is in all probability related to the agriculturally unfavorable soil structure of the site, which was therefore cheap to acquire. It was in front of the then city wall, in front of the Münstertor, in today's district of Hartenberg-Münchfeld on Mombacher Straße.

The oldest surviving mention as "Judensand" comes from 1286. In 1397 it is mentioned as "Judenkirchhof". Basic forms of Ashkenazi grave design originate from Mainz and became authoritative for Central European Judaism .

From the 11th to the 15th centuries, the Jews of Mainz were subjected to several persecutions and expulsions, which meant that the cemetery could no longer be used at times. Stones were cleared away and used as building material. However, Jews always returned to Magenza and revitalized the Jewish community. In 1438, the Jews were finally expelled from Mainz by the city council under Albrecht II. After that, the Jewish community no longer existed, but the cemetery was used for burials of Jews from places in the area.

Most of the cemetery area, however, was cleared at the end of the 15th century and put to another use. The tombstones were used as building material for roads, bridges and buildings throughout the city, and part of the cemetery area was leased by the city as a vineyard. However, underground graves and gravestones that were already sunken were preserved. The sandy subsoil of the burial ground and probably also wanton destruction meant that no tombstones were preserved in situ from the time up to the end of the 17th century, when nobody took care of the maintenance .

Modern times

In the 17th century, a Jewish community slowly re-established itself in Mainz. From 1700 the remaining part of the Jewish sand was covered again. It is the lower burial ground located today on Mombacher Strasse. This area was occupied until 1888. It covers an area of ​​1.85 hectares and was surrounded by a fence until 1813. In an inventory in 1937, around 1,500 gravestones were counted from around 1700 to 1888.

In 1862 the Jewish community bought back a piece of land that was also located on the original medieval site and was to serve as an expansion area for the already heavily occupied burial ground. This did not happen, however, because at the end of the 19th century a new Jewish cemetery was set up in the central cemetery on Untere Zahlbacher Strasse.

Medieval gravestones were repeatedly found during construction work in the city area or during excavations and construction work on the other grounds of the former cemetery. The oldest surviving tombstone - located in the Mainz State Museum - dates from 1049 and is a reminder of Jehuda ben Schneor .

Memorial cemetery

Around one hundred of the historical stones used as building material were uncovered and recovered in the 19th and early 20th centuries during construction work to straighten the Rhine and to defuse the city.

In 1926, at the instigation of Rabbis Sali Levi and Siegmund Salfeld, a memorial cemetery was created on the extension site and thus also on the area of ​​the medieval cemetery. As a sign that this is not a cemetery that has been preserved in situ, the tombstones were not oriented to the east, as is usual in Jewish cemeteries. The gravestones and memorial stones were erected along a didactic path, which should bring visitors closer to the Jewish grave culture, which has been changing over the centuries. There were around 210 tombstones, but some stones were spilled due to the sagging of the site and the weather, so that as of 2017 around 170 stones can still be seen. There is also a memorial stone for Gershom ben Jehuda and the tombstone of Jakob ben Jakar , a teacher of Rashi . A total of eight gravestones with inscriptions from the 11th century can be recognized. They are therefore among the oldest preserved, so to speak stone documents of the Mainz Jewish community.

This memorial cemetery is unique in the world. His gravestones are not only among the oldest gravestones in Europe , but also contain important information about the life of this early Jewish community and testify to their centuries-old location and roots in Germany.

present

In August 2007, the former agricultural school on a plot of land adjacent to the memorial cemetery was demolished. This was built in the early 1950s. Even then, medieval tombstones had been found, documented and left in situ during the construction work. After its demolition in 2007, city villas with unobstructed views were to be built on the approximately 9,000 square meter site. After the graves were found again, construction was stopped and the stones were examined by archaeologists and initially local representatives of the Jewish community. Since Jewish cemeteries, according to Halacha , are subject to eternal rest and graves may not be changed even centuries later, the city of Mainz, the Jewish community of Mainz and the Orthodox Rabbinical Conference in Germany decided that the building project would be abandoned and the property as Part of the Old Jewish Cemetery is treated.

The Old Jewish Cemetery in Mainz is part of the serial UNESCO World Heritage Site application for the ShUM sites , which will be sent to UNESCO in 2020 and a decision will be made in 2021.

literature

  • Germania Judaica.
    • Volume 1: From the oldest times to 1238. Marcus, Breslau 1934, pp. 174–223;
    • Volume 2: From 1238 to the middle of the 14th century. Half volume 2: Maastricht - Zwolle. Mohr, Tübingen 1968, pp. 512-521;
    • Volume 3: 1350-1519. Half volume 2: Local article Mährisch-Budwitz - Zwolle. Mohr, Tübingen 1995, ISBN 3-16-146093-6 , pp. 786-831.
  • Paul Arnsberg: The Jewish communities in Hesse. Volume 2: Beginning, Fall, New Beginning. Societäts-Verlag, Frankfurt am Main 1971, pp. 7-46, ISBN 3-7973-0213-4 (lit.).
  • Friedrich Schütz (Ed.): Jews in Mainz. Catalog for the exhibition of the city of Mainz in the town hall foyer, November 1978. Stadtverwaltung Mainz, Mainz 1978, (Lit. In addition: Friedrich Schütz: Review of an urban history exhibition in the Mainz town hall foyer November 1978, October, November 1979. Stadtverwaltung Mainz, Mainz 1979).
  • Rolf Dörrlamm: Magenza. The history of Jewish Mainz. Festschrift for the inauguration of the new administration building of the Landes-Bausparkasse Rheinland-Pfalz. Schmidt, Mainz 1995, ISBN 3-87439-366-6 .
  • Bernd A. Vest: The old Jewish cemetery in Mainz. Extended edition with contributions by Friedrich Schütz and Manuel Herz . Vest, Mainz 2000 (1st edition. 1988).
  • Jonas Bondi, Der alten Friedhof (= Menorah, H. 12), 1927 (5), pp. 22–32.

Web links

Commons : Judensand  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jonas Bondi: The old cemetery . In: Menorah . Volume 5, Issue 12. Mainz 1927, p. 22 .
  2. ^ Sali Levi: Magenza. Jewish Mainz. Introduction . In: Menorah . Volume 5, Issue 12. Mainz 1927, p. 13 .
  3. ↑ Jonas Bondi: The old cemetery . In: Sali Levi (ed.): Magenza. A compendium on Jewish Mainz in the five hundredth year of death of the Mainz scholar Maharil . Vienna 1927.
  4. ↑ Jonas Bondi: The old cemetery . In: Menorah . Volume 5, Issue 12. Mainz 1927, p. 26 .
  5. ^ A b Sali Levi: Contributions to the history of the oldest Jewish gravestones in Mainz . Mainz 1926.
  6. ↑ EPIDAT database http://www.steinheim-institut.de/cgi-bin/epidat?id=mz1

Coordinates: 50 ° 0 ′ 21.3 "  N , 8 ° 14 ′ 59.2"  E