In these pandemic times, the question of when tourism can resume remains in the lap of the gods. However, this does not mean that tourist service providers and organisations have nothing to do. After all, this preparatory phase for the coming season is the perfect time to work on new ideas and themes, and to transform them into market-oriented, topical travel offers. The Romantic Road Tourist Working Group (Romantische Strasse Touristik Arbeitsgemeinschaft) is adding an additional component to the impressive range of subjects on its programme, which takes the 1700th anniversary of Jewish life in Germany as the occasion for inviting guests to discover traces of Jewish history along the Romantic Road. The result is a wide variety of interesting insights into a cultural and religious life illuminated and animated by important historical witnesses and locations.
From the mikveh, via taharah, to the Talmud: Jewish life in Germany has a long tradition with documentary evidence dating back to 321 CE. Before that, in 313, Roman Emperor Constantine introduced religious freedom for all with the Edict of Milan. Some years later, on 11 December 321, he issued an edict permitting the appointment of Jews to the Curia of Cologne Council. This is the occasion to celebrate a Jewish-German festive year in 2021, i.e., 1700 years later, and put the spotlight on the vicissitudinous history of Jewish life in Germany.
With its Community Centre and Museum Shalom Europa, the Jewish Community in Würzburg and Lower Franconia, for example, offers a special meeting place with the aim of portraying traditional Jewish life in all its numerous facets. This includes not only theological aspects but also the museum building and the synagogue itself, as well as the 900-year history of Jews in Würzburg. The museum invites all visitors to become acquainted with basic Jewish values and to learn about an accessible orthodoxy that brings to life the cultural context of a Christian city with its Jewish contributions. A special feature of Shalom Europa is the world’s biggest collection of medieval gravestones that were saved from a medieval Jewish cemetery and are known as the ‘Jewish tombstones from the Pleich’. Today, more than 1,500 gravestones and fragments from the period between 1129 and 1346 can be seen in exhibition in the basement of the museum. www.museumshalomeuropa.de
One of Germany’s oldest cemeteries is to be found in Wertheim: the Jewish cemetery was created in 1406 and in use until into the 20th century, which makes it even older than the renowned cemetery in Prague. It was enlarged in 1714 by the foundation of the Viennese banker Samson Wertheimer. The cemetery is situated opposite the Main Bridge on Castle Mount and, with 72 gravestones from the 15th century alone, is one of Germany’s oldest resting places and the oldest preserved Jewish cemetery in Baden-Württemberg. The last burial took place in 1938. A guided tour, which also includes the Jewish cemetery, focuses on the history of Jewish life and work in Wertheim. www.tourismus-wertheim.de
As a milestone of the Hohenlohe-Tauber Jewish Culture Route, Weikersheim’s Jewish cemetery is situated somewhat outside the town. The cemetery was opened in 1730. Prior to that, the Jewish community had to pay a toll and death duty to bury their dead in land belonging to the Teutonic Order in Unterbalbach. It was Count Carl Ludwig, who lived in Weikersheim at the time, who gave the Jewish community permission to construct their own cemetery in accordance with Jewish burial laws, which state that the deceased must be buried facing east and that there must be a distance of six hand-widths between the individual graves. Additionally, the gravestones remain standing until they are illegible. The grave of Lämmle, the head of the Jewish community, bears the number 220 and the inscription, “Here lies Lämmle ben Ascher Seligmann” and the date in Hebrew, which translates as Thursday, 17 July 1742. Lämmle Seligmann was the banker to Count Carl Ludwig. The newest gravestone has the number 707 and the year 1941, after which there remains no trace of the last two Jews in Weikersheim. www.weikersheim.de
Creglingen’s Jewish Museum is located in the town centre. Entitled ‘Roots and Destinations’, the permanent exhibition revolves around Jewish history in Creglingen and Archshofen, two rural communities in the Tauber Valley, from the early 17th century until 1939. It shows Jewish life, ways, destinies and life with the memories of the common past of Jews and gentiles in this part of Franconia. www.stiftung-jmc.de
Visitors looking for Jewish history in Rothenburg ob der Tauber should follow in the footsteps of the well-known Rabbi Meir Ben Baruch, whose renowned Talmud School is commemorated by a plaque at Kapellenplatz. In Rothenburg, too, Jews were more or less tolerated some of the time. At other times, they were persecuted without mercy. In 1520, Jews were banned from entering the town and it was not until 350 years later, in 1870, that the first families of Jewish descent began settling in Rothenburg again. Numerous traces and historical witnesses to centuries of Jewish history are still to be found in the town. Visitors can take part in informative guided tours or embark on an individual tour taking in the ‘Kapellenplatz’ (Chapel Square), the ‘Weisser Turm’ (White Tower) with the ‘Judentanzhaus’ (Jewish Dance Hall), the ‘Judengasse’ (Jews’ Lane) and the ‘Klosterhof’ (Convent Garden). The house at 10 Judengasse still contains a mikveh, a bath for ritual immersion. At present, the building is being fully renovated by the ‘Deutsche Stiftung Denkmalschutz’ (German Foundation for Monument Protection). www.rothenburg-tourismus.de
Harburg in the Donau-Ries district of Swabia has a Jewish cemetery dating back to the 17th century. Located outside the town, the cemetery lies on a hillside, adjacent to a forest. The first documentary mention of the cemetery is dated 10 March 1671 when the Count of Oettingen promised to sell half a morgen of agricultural land (about 1,000 m2) at the Hühnerberg mountain for use as a Jewish resting place. The last burial there took place in 1938. Today, there are still 269 gravestones in place. There is a taharah house near the entrance, where the ritual washing of corpses took place. Also worth seeing is the ‘Hertle Haus’ in the centre of Harburg, which was built in 1693. During renovation work in 2005, a Jewish bath, a mikveh, was found in this historically listed, over 300-year-old building. www.stadt-harburg-schwaben.de
The Jewish Museum Augsburg Schwaben also holds major exhibitions on subjects of topical interest. It was founded as Germany’s first independent Jewish museum in 1985. At that time, the main aim was to present examples of the rituals and culture of Swabian, German and European Judaism, which had been almost fully eliminated by the National Socialists. Since then, the orientation has changed significantly: away from spotlighting ‘the’ Judaism and ‘the’ Jewish religion to pluralistic approaches describing the multifarious realities of Jewish life. Today, the museum lifts the curtain on many different aspects of Jewish life and the relationships to current social developments in temporary exhibitions, the permanent exhibition and in public areas. For example, ‘Shalom Sisters*! Jewish-feminist positions’ is the name of an exhibition in a variety of places in Augsburg, which will run until the end of August 2021. www.jmaugsburg.de
Further interesting programmes, routes, places and sights can be found on the Romantic Road website and information packages, which are available on request from www.romantischestrasse.de
