Guide to the monuments of Jewish culture under the patronage of the Museum

Maria Zawadzka, 16 November 2016
“Monuments of Jewish culture in Poland”is a new, richly illustrated guide to Jewish sites that are worth seeing and knowing. It was published under the patronage of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews and premieres on June 7th, 2011.

Among books published under the patronage of the Museum are academic texts, albums and historical atlases. The new guide published by Carta Blanca presents monuments of the Jewish culture in Poland and encourages all readers to organize holiday trips.

The involvement of the Museum in the creation of this book was extremely important, especially thanks to the materials made available by the community portal Virtual Shtetl which contains information devoted to about 2000 towns located within the borders of contemporary and prewar Poland. The great contribution of Magda Prokopowicz, responsible for the content editing, should also be acknowledged.

The book presents 11 regions and describes 170 places (both famous cities such as Łódź or Kraków and small towns and villages) where big Jewish communities once lived. Their historical contribution to the development of every town has been presented in the publication.

Apart from these historical materials, the guide also contains information about famous figures, short texts devoted to the history of synagogues, cemeteries and prayer houses, as well as jokes, tidbits and anecdotes. The guide is illustrated with 370 beautiful photos by Anna Olej-Kobus and Krzysztof Kobus, highly regarded travelers and photographers. The publication also includes a glossary of the most important terms, an atlas of all monuments at a scale of 1:1 500 000 and an introduction to the history, culture and tradition of Judaism.  

The guide – a publication for the general public – will answer such questions as:

- which synagogue is considered to be the most beautiful in Poland?

- where can you taste kosher cuisine?

- when are Yom Kippur, Passover, Purim and other Jewish holidays celebrated?

- what city hosts the biggest European Jewish Culture Festival every year?

- what is the town of Leżajsk famous for?

- what does the name Umschlagplatz mean?

- what cemetery has the biggest collection of tombstones and unique macevot?

- what is currently located at the big factory of the Łódź industrialist Izrael Poznański?

- where can the atmosphere of the prewar shtetl still be felt?

- how to find the borders of the former Warsaw Ghetto?