Mauzóleum Chatama Sófera | |
48°08′30″N17°05′30″E / 48.1418°N 17.0918°E | |
Location | Nábrežie armádneho generála Ludvíka Svobodu Street (Official Website: http://www.chatamsofer.sk/) |
---|---|
Designer | Martin Kvasnica |
Completion date | 2002 |
Opening date | July 8, 2002 |
Dedicated to | Moses Sofer |
Old Jewish Cemetery | |
---|---|
Details | |
Established | 17th century |
Location | Nábrežie armádneho generála Ludvíka Svobodu Street, Bratislava |
Country | Slovakia |
Type | mostly demolished in 1943 |
Chatam Sofer Memorial, formerly the Old Jewish Cemetery is the burial place and memorial of Moses Sofer, a prominent orthodox rabbi from the 19th century, built on the site of a 17th-century Jewish cemetery in Bratislava, Slovakia. [1] [2] [3] The historical cemetery was mostly destroyed with the construction of the road tunnel under Bratislava Castle in 1943 but negotiations with the clero-fascist Slovak leader Jozef Tiso allowed an important fraction of the cemetery containing the graves of the rabbis to be preserved encased in concrete. Later, when the tunnel was converted for public transport trams a tram stop was constructed above the site. In 2002 a modern memorial was erected above the site and it was partially opened to the public. [4]
The fenced area of the Chatam Sofer Memorial is roughly equivalent to the area of the former Old Jewish Cemetery of Bratislava. It is located at Nábrežie armádneho generála Ludvíka Svobodu Street and it is bordered by the tram tunnel to the east, a wall to the north, and the River Park development to the south across the street. It is approximately 70 meters distant from the river Danube.
There is a public transport bus stop (one in each direction) and a tram stop (also one in each direction) called Chatam Sofer next to the memorial.
In the 17th century, Jews were allowed to settle in the area below Bratislava Castle on the estates of the Counts of the Pálffy family. The Jewish community established a graveyard near the river Danube which served until 1847. Since then, the Jewish community has used the Orthodox and Neolog cemetery located on Žižkova Street nearby. Until the mid-20th century the area was immediately adjacent to the Danube, set apart from any houses and quiet as traffic for Bratislava Castle and the city traversed Žižkova Street and other roads above the site. [5] In the 1940s, new structures were erected nearby to serve the International Danube Fair, later to become Park kultúry a oddychu. At the same time, the riverbank was extended and the area filled with roads and tram lines and construction of the tunnel under the Bratislava Castle Hill commenced.
The Old Jewish Cemetery continued to be well maintained until 1942-1943, when it was confiscated by the Slovak State and its anti-Semitic clero-fascist leader Catholic priest Jozef Tiso in 1943 to build a roadway and the cemetery was largely demolished. Most of the graves were exhumed and reburied at the Orthodox cemetery in a communal grave behind the beit tahara. Only the most precious section, where famous Bratislava rabbis were buried – 23 graves surrounding the Chatam Sofer's tomb – was preserved on the original site; members of the Jewish community helped to renovate the burial grounds of the Chatam Sofer after the war. [6] Negotiations with the regime enabled the community to preserve this section of the cemetery including the Chasam Sofer's grave, enclosed in concrete, below the surface of the new road. Several explanations have been offered for the regime's compliance with the community's desires, One says it as a consequence of a large bribe while others cite foreign pressure or for fear of a curse if the graves were destroyed.
This construction allowed the area of the cemetery to become one of the main access points to the Bratislava city center and today, the memorial is seen daily by thousands inside public transport buses and trams passing by. Until the 2000s, the area was separated from the Danube by a public park. The Bratislava City Magistrate and Mayor of Bratislava Andrej Ďurkovský sold this land to the company Henbury Development, which constructed the River Park development a few meters away from the site.
Following the declaration of independence by Slovakia in 1992, new negotiations were undertaken to restore public access to the preserved graves. In the mid-1990s, the International Committee for Preservation of Gravesites of Geonai Pressburg was formed to support and oversee relocation of tram tracks and construction of a mausoleum. In 1999, the Mayor of Bratislava, Jozef Moravčík, Chairman of the Committee Romi Cohn and Chairman of the Bratislava Jewish Religious Community Peter Salner signed a Memorandum of Understanding to allow access to the site.
The architect of the new Chatam Sofer Memorial was Slovak Martin Kvasnica and the construction was undertaken by the company Raft. Construction of the mausoleum was completed after overcoming numerous technical, financial and religious issues and it opened on July 8, 2002.
Since 2002, the site is accessible to the public with restrictions. All visits must be arranged through the local Jewish Community at least 48 hours in advance and visitors must be accompanied by a local guide at all times. There is an entrance fee of $6 per visitor, with an additional $20 for access outside of normal operating hours. There is also a strict protocol and dress code to be adhered to including long trousers, hats for men and covered arms for women. Although in theory the site is accessible also to the citizens of Bratislava, in reality the Memorial is visited almost exclusively by foreign Jewish visitors, becoming an important pilgrimage site.
In 2020, a building adjacent to the Memorial was purchased to serve as a hospitality facility, welcoming guests coming to visit the Chatam Sofer's grave and other Jewish sites in Bratislava. Hot and cold refreshments are usually available, as well as bathrooms. The facility will eventually host a shul, mikvah, and other amenities.
These lists of cemeteries compile notable cemeteries, mausolea, and other places people are buried worldwide. Reasons for notability include their design, their history, and their interments.
Jozef Gašpar Tiso was a Slovak politician and Catholic priest who served as president of the First Slovak Republic, a client state of Nazi Germany during World War II, from 1939 to 1945. In 1947, after the war, he was executed for treason in Bratislava.
Nitra is a city in western Slovakia, situated at the foot of Zobor Mountain in the valley of the river Nitra. It is located 95 km east of Bratislava. With a population of about 78,353, it is the fifth largest city in Slovakia. Nitra is also one of the oldest cities in Slovakia; it was the political center of the Principality of Nitra. Today, it is a seat of a kraj, and an okres.
Moses Schreiber (1762–1839), known to his own community and Jewish posterity in the Hebrew translation as Moshe Sofer, also known by his main work Chatam Sofer, Chasam Sofer, or Hatam Sofer, was one of the leading Orthodox rabbis of European Jewry in the first half of the nineteenth century.
Petržalka is the largest borough of Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. Situated on the right bank of the river Danube, the area shares a land border with Austria, and is home to around 100,000 people.
Slavín is a memorial monument and military cemetery in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. It is the burial ground of thousands of Soviet Army soldiers who fell during World War II while taking over the city in April 1945 from the occupying German Wehrmacht units and the remaining Slovak troops who supported the clero-fascist Tiso government. It is situated on a hill amidst a rich villa quarter of the capital and embassy residences close to the centre of Bratislava.
The (First) Slovak Republic, until 21 July 1939 known as the Slovak State, was a partially-recognized clerical fascist client state of Nazi Germany which existed between 14 March 1939 and 4 April 1945 in Central Europe. The Slovak part of Czechoslovakia declared independence with German support one day before the German occupation of Bohemia and Moravia. It controlled most of the territory of present-day Slovakia, without its current southern parts, which were ceded by Czechoslovakia to Hungary in 1938. The state was the first formally independent Slovak state in history. Bratislava was declared the capital city.
The Old Town of Bratislava is the historic center and one of the boroughs of Bratislava, in the Bratislava Region of Slovakia. It is coextensive with the smallest Slovak administrative district by area, Bratislava I. It contains the small, but preserved medieval city center, Bratislava Castle and other important landmarks. Bratislava's Old Town is known for its many churches, the Bratislava Riverfront and cultural institutions, it is also the location of most of the foreign states embassies and important Slovak institutions including the National Council of the Slovak Republic; the Summer Archbishop's Palace, seat of the Government of Slovakia; and Grassalkovich Palace, seat of the President of Slovakia.
Vojtech Lázar "Béla" Tuka was a Slovak politician who served as prime minister and minister of Foreign Affairs of the First Slovak Republic between 1939 and 1945. Tuka was one of the main forces behind the deportation of Slovak Jews to Nazi concentration camps in German occupied Poland. He was the leader of the radical wing of the Slovak People's Party.
The history of the Jews in Slovakia goes back to the 11th century, when the first Jews settled in the area.
Old Jewish Cemetery may refer to:
A Jewish cemetery is a cemetery where Jews are buried in keeping with Jewish tradition. Cemeteries are referred to in several different ways in Hebrew, including beit kevarot, beit almin, beit olam [haba], beit chayyim and beit shalom.
Bratislava, historically known as Pozsony and Pressburg, is the capital and largest city of the Slovak Republic and the fourth largest of all cities on the River Danube. Officially, the population of the city is about 475,000; however, some sources estimate daily number of people moving around the city based on mobile phone SIM cards is more than 570,000. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia at the foot of the Little Carpathians, occupying both banks of the River Danube and the left bank of the River Morava. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital to border two sovereign states.
The Pressburg Yeshiva, was the largest and most influential Yeshiva in Central Europe in the 19th century. It was founded in the city of Pressburg, Austrian Empire by Rabbi Moshe Sofer and was considered the largest Yeshiva since the time of the Babylonian Talmud.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Bratislava, Slovakia.
Ivan Kamenec is a Slovak historian.
Yehuda Modern was among the most distinguished and respected Hungarian rabbis of the nineteenth century despite the fact that he never held any rabbinic position.
The first record of the Jewish community in Bratislava, capital of Slovakia, dates from 1251. Until the end of World War I, Bratislava was a multicultural city with a Hungarian and German majority and a Slovak and Jewish minority. In 1806 when the city was part of the Kingdom of Hungary, Rabbi Moses Sofer established the Pressburg Yeshiva and the city emerged as the center of Central European Jewry and a leading power in the opposition to the Reform movement in Judaism in Europe. Pressburg Yeshiva produced hundreds of future leaders of Austro-Hungarian Jewry who made major influence on the general traditional orthodox and future Charedi Judaism.
Bratislava Riverfront is a riverfront on the river Danube located on the Old Town side of Bratislava, Slovakia. It extends from the Karloveská bay near the Lafranconi Bridge to the Port of Bratislava and Harbour Bridge. In the past, the riverfront included the Coronation Hill, where the newly crowned Kings of Hungary would recite an oath and make crosses with their sword in four cardinal directions to show their resolution to defend the country. The hill was demolished in 1870 when the shores of the Danube were strengthened.
Aron Grünhut was a Bratislava-based Jewish activist who helped 1,365 Slovak, Czech, Hungarian, and Austrian Jews illegally emigrate to Palestine before and during World War II. Grünhut later received an unauthorized Salvedorean visa from George Mandel-Mantello for himself and his family.