Ebenfurth Synagogue

OVERVIEW

The story of Ebenfurth Synagogue

Ebenfurth is a small walled town on the river Leitha in the district of Wiener Neustadt, close to the border with Burgenland. In the seventeenth century it had a Jewish community that, according to the German Wikipedia article on the town, produced notable scholars and had its own synagogue and cemetery, with a Jewish quarter or ghetto at what is now the Annaplatz. A 2020 press report on gravestones found at Ebenfurth Castle says Jews made up 20 to 30 percent of the town's population when they were expelled.

The synagogue stood against the town wall beside a watch tower, at the western edge of the Jewish quarter. Sandra Glatz, who studied it for a 2013 diploma thesis at the Vienna University of Technology, assigns it to the Jewish settlement of the seventeenth century; a list of Austrian synagogues gives about 1600 as its date. After the expulsion of 1670-71 the building no longer served as a synagogue and was used for a long time as a dwelling. It was pulled down in 1994. Its carved stone door surround, bearing a Hebrew abbreviation of Psalm 118:20, was rescued in 1995 and set into the old town wall on Annagasse. Glatz describes it as the only entrance portal of an early modern synagogue preserved in Lower Austria.

LOCATION

Where it stood for nearly 400 years

Historic: by the town wall next to a watch tower, at the edge of the Jewish quarter (today Annaplatz), Ebenfurth. Sources give Annagasse 2 or Annaplatz 2 for the synagogue; the surviving door surround is in the wall at Annagasse 15, 2490 Ebenfurth. Approximate.

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The Jewish community

Jews are recorded in Ebenfurth in the early modern period, when Lower Austria's Jews lived in small rural and market-town communities under the protection of local lords. Glatz lists Ebenfurth among the confirmed synagogue sites and communities with a prayer room in the region, citing the historian Barbara Staudinger. The German Wikipedia article on the town says the community had a synagogue and a cemetery and that notable scholars came from it, without naming them. A Jewish quarter was laid out at what is now the Annaplatz, inside the town wall. The community was large relative to the town: the 2020 report on the castle finds gives Jews as 20 to 30 percent of the population at the time of the expulsion. Its cemetery was in use at least from 1622 to 1669, the range of dates on 28 gravestones and fragments found in 2020 in the foundations of a wall at Ebenfurth Castle, where they had been reused as building material. The names of the community's rabbis and leaders were not found in the sources read.

Architecture and design

Very little is documented about the building. Glatz, whose thesis set out to reconstruct it, found too few historical plans, records and photographs and had to rely on comparison with other synagogues of the period. What is known is that it stood directly against the town wall next to a watch tower. Photographs taken while it was being demolished in 1994 show that the prayer hall had a simple barrel vault, and photographs of the building show a pitched saddle roof of about 40 to 45 degrees, although Glatz notes that the roof may not have been original. She suggests the windows were probably rectangular with stone frames. The one surviving element is the stone door surround of the entrance, a rectangular frame carrying a Hebrew inscription in the form of a notarikon, an abbreviation, of Psalm 118:20: 'This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous shall enter into it.' The size of the hall, its seating, the position of the Torah ark and bimah, and any women's section are unknown, and no architect or builder is recorded.

Life inside the synagogue

No description of worship in the Ebenfurth synagogue was found in the sources read. The building was the house of prayer of a seventeenth-century community that also kept its own cemetery and, by the account of the German Wikipedia article on the town, produced scholars of some standing. The inscription over its door, taken from Psalm 118, verse 20 ('This is the gate of the Lord; the righteous shall enter into it'), marked the threshold as the gate through which the righteous enter to pray. Glatz's thesis, which compares the small rural synagogues of medieval and early modern Lower Austria, discusses features such as the women's section and the ritual bath, but she could not establish the internal arrangement at Ebenfurth. Who led prayers here, whether the community had its own rabbi, and how many men regularly attended are unknown. Its cemetery gravestones, dated between 1622 and 1669, give the best evidence for the period in which the synagogue was in use.

Destruction

The synagogue was not destroyed by violence. After the community was expelled in 1670-71 the building passed to other uses and, according to the list of Austrian synagogues on German Wikipedia, served for a long time as a dwelling house. No source read describes damage in 1938 or during the Second World War. The building was demolished in 1994. Glatz writes that the demolition destroyed all the information the building itself could have given about its history and form, and that a single-family house was built to close the gap in the street shortly afterwards. Who owned the house in 1994, and who decided on and carried out the demolition, is not recorded in the sources found. Photographs were taken during the demolition and show the vaulted interior. The carved stone door surround was saved in 1995, restored under the town's village renewal programme, and is now set in the wall along Annagasse.

The community’s fate

The Jewish community of Ebenfurth came to an end with its expulsion from the town in 1670-71. The German Wikipedia article on the town dates the expulsion of the Ebenfurth community to 1670; the 2020 report on the castle finds gives 1671 and says the Jews then made up 20 to 30 percent of the town's population. Where the expelled families went, and whether any of the community's scholars can be traced afterwards, is not recorded in the sources read. The cemetery was abandoned, and its gravestones were later broken up and built into the foundations of a wall at Ebenfurth Castle, where 28 stones and fragments dated 1622 to 1669 were found during repair work in 2020. No source read mentions a later Jewish congregation in Ebenfurth, and the synagogue was never used for worship again. The town's article mentions Aryanisations and attacks during the Nazi period, but gives no details of Jewish residents then.

The site today

The plot where the synagogue stood, against the town wall near the Annaplatz, is now occupied by a single-family house built shortly after the demolition of 1994. The old town wall of Ebenfurth survives and is a protected monument. The synagogue's stone door surround, with its Hebrew inscription from Psalm 118, is set into the wall that bounds the plot along Annagasse at number 15, where a photograph of 2012 shows it. A bronze plaque beside it identifies it as the gate of the former synagogue of the Ebenfurth ghetto before 1670. The gravestones found at Ebenfurth Castle in 2020 were to be restored and displayed there. The exact parcel of the synagogue has not been fixed from a cadastral source.

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