Old Wooden Synagogue of Rokytnice v Orlických horách

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Die Geschichte von Old Wooden Synagogue of Rokytnice v Orlických horách

Rokytnice v Orlických horách, known in German as Rokitnitz im Adlergebirge, is a small town in the Orlické hory (Eagle Mountains) of north-eastern Bohemia, close to the border with the County of Glatz. Jewish families settled there under the protection of the local lords from the end of the seventeenth century; a heritage survey of the town by the Czech National Heritage Institute dates the arrival of the first families to 1697 and places them in the street now called J. V. Sládka, which runs directly off the main square. In about 1715-1720 the Jews of Rokitnitz put up a wooden prayer house, which also contained the community's schoolroom, and at roughly the same time laid out a small burial ground on a slope outside the town. The wooden synagogue served the congregation for about 140 years. It stood in J. V. Sládka street near the present house no. 158. In 1861 it burned down, and the same fire, or fires of that year, destroyed several other buildings belonging to the Jewish community. The congregation then built a stone synagogue on the site, or immediately beside it above the present house no. 157. That second building is not the subject of this entry; it later became a dwelling and no longer stands. Nothing is known of the wooden building's appearance, and no image of it has been found.

STANDORT

Where it stood for nearly 150 years

Historic: Jewish street of Rokitnitz im Adlergebirge, near the present house no. 158. Today: near J. V. Sládka 158, 517 61 Rokytnice v Orlických horách (approximate; the exact plot is not documented).

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Die jüdische Gemeinde

The Jews of Rokitnitz were a small rural community living under the protection of the lords of the Rokytnice estate, to whom they paid an annual protection fee. Sources differ on when they arrived: Jüdische Gemeinden says the end of the seventeenth century, the National Heritage Institute's survey gives 1697, and the JewishGen cemetery record and the English Wikipedia article give 1712. The families lived in a compact group of houses in the street now called J. V. Sládka, immediately next to the town square, which the heritage survey describes as the historic Jewish quarter of the town. Besides the wooden synagogue with its schoolroom, the community had a cemetery founded around the same time on sloping ground south-east of the Jewish street, and a ritual bath cut into the rock beneath a house that is now the municipal building no. 157. According to the JewishGen cemetery survey, the Jewish population reached its peak of about fifteen to twenty families around 1850, after which families moved away to larger towns. The independent congregation dissolved in the early 1890s, and its remaining members probably joined the community of Senftenberg (Žamberk).

Architektur und Gestaltung

The only facts recorded about the building are that it was made of wood, that it was built in about 1715-1720, and that it contained both the prayer room and the schoolroom of the community. Jüdische Gemeinden calls it a Bethaus, a house of prayer, and the National Heritage Institute survey calls it the original wooden synagogue that was at the same time a school; both treat it as a building of the community in its own right rather than a room in a private house. It stood in the street now called J. V. Sládka, near the present house no. 158, in the row of houses that made up the Jewish quarter just off the town square. Its size, plan, roof form, the arrangement of the women's section and the furnishings of the prayer hall are unknown. No drawing, plan or photograph of it has been found, and as it burned in 1861 a photograph is unlikely to exist. The stable cadastre maps of the 1840s and 1850s, which record buildings plot by plot, would probably show its footprint, but they were not examined.

Leben in der Synagoge

Very little is recorded about religious life in the wooden synagogue. It was the community's only place of worship from about 1715-1720 until 1861, and it also served as the school, so children of the Jewish families were taught in the same building in which the congregation prayed. The ritual bath cut into the rock under the house that is now no. 157, a few steps away, and the cemetery outside the town completed the basic institutions of a small Bohemian rural congregation. The names of the rabbis, teachers or cantors who served in Rokitnitz while the wooden building stood have not been found in the sources read; a chapter on the Jews of Rokitnitz by Karl Hostovsky in Hugo Gold's 1934 handbook of the Jewish communities of Bohemia is cited by Jüdische Gemeinden and probably contains such names, but it was not read. At its height around 1850, shortly before the fire, the community comprised fifteen to twenty families.

Zerstörung

The wooden synagogue was destroyed by fire in 1861. Jüdische Gemeinden states only that a fire in 1861 destroyed the Bethaus. The National Heritage Institute survey of Rokytnice adds that the original wooden synagogue and school burned down in 1861, as did some other buildings of the Jewish community, which points to a fire that spread through the Jewish street rather than one confined to the synagogue. Neither source says how the fire started, whether it was an accident or arson, or whether anyone was blamed, and no contemporary report of it was found. Nothing appears to have been saved from the building. After the fire the community rebuilt in stone: Jüdische Gemeinden says the new synagogue was put up on the same site, while the heritage survey locates it above the present house no. 157, next to the old site near no. 158. The stone successor was used until about the end of the First World War, was converted into a dwelling between the wars, was damaged during the Second World War and has since disappeared.

Das Schicksal der Gemeinde

The community never recovered its earlier size after the mid-nineteenth century. As families moved to larger towns, the independent congregation of Rokitnitz was dissolved in the early 1890s; Jüdische Gemeinden says the remaining members probably joined the community at Senftenberg (Žamberk), and the JewishGen cemetery survey gives 1893. The stone synagogue that replaced the wooden one went on being used into the early twentieth century, and the heritage survey says its activity effectively ended at the close of the First World War. The 1930 census, as reported by the JewishGen cemetery survey, counted only four Jews in the town. The English Wikipedia article on the town dates the end of Jewish presence there to 1938. The cemetery survey says members of the community were deported to concentration camps during the war, but gives no names or numbers, and no individual victims from Rokytnice were identified in this research. The cemetery was vandalised by Nazis in 1938 and during the war, partly restored in 1992, and today keeps only a few gravestones.

Der Ort heute

The wooden synagogue stood in J. V. Sládka street near the present house no. 158, in the old Jewish quarter adjoining the main square of Rokytnice v Orlických horách, which is now part of a protected urban heritage zone. Nothing of the wooden building survives. Its stone successor, built above the present house no. 157, has also gone. In the cellar of the municipal house no. 157 a ritual bath cut into the rock is still preserved. The Jewish cemetery, south-east of the former Jewish street, survives with only a few gravestones and is owned by the Jewish Community of Prague. No marker identifying the synagogue site was recorded in the sources read.

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Fotos, Dokumente, Familiengeschichten oder Erinnerungen an diese Synagoge und ihre Gemeinde halten ihre Geschichte lebendig.