Legend
The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Partitions of Poland.
Boundaries shown are ca. 1795.
Congress Poland
The Polish Republic in the interwar period
ca. 1930s
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Gdańsk
(Ger., Danzig), port city, center of trade and industry on the Baltic. Gdańsk was a Hanseatic port in Royal Prussia and became the capital of Westpreussen (West Prussia) during the nineteenth century. From 1920 to 1939, it was known as the Danzig Free City (under the ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Gniezno
town in the Wielkopolska province of Poland. In the eleventh century, Gniezno (known in Yiddish and German as Gnesen) was established as the first capital of the Polish state; since the year 1000 it has been the seat of an archbishop. Jews likely lived in the town as ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Poznań
city in Wielkopolska province, Poland; known in Hebrew and Yiddish as Pozna and in German as Posen. Poznań’s Jewish community was one of the earliest to be established on Polish soil; the first reference to Jews living in the town comes from 1379. While tradition dates ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Leszno
town in the Wielkopolska province of Poland. Established by the Leszczyński family, Leszno (known as Lissa in Yiddish and German) granted its population civic rights in 1547. Jews were living in Leszno as early as the beginning of the sixteenth century; records indicate ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Opatów
(Apt), a town between Kraków and Lublin in Małopolska (Little Poland) dating back to the twelfth century. In 1502, Opatów was sold by the Lubusz bishops to noble owners, who permitted Jewish residence from 1538. Eighty Jews paid a poll tax in 1578, making Opatów one of ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Zamość
(Yid., Zamoch, Zamoshtsh), city in Lublin province. Founded in 1580 by Jan Zamoyski, Zamość became the principal town of his family estate. The first mention of Jews in Zamość dates from 1583; Zamoyski granted them a privilege of settlement in 1588. This privilege was ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Chełm
former Polish royal town, now in the province of Lublin. According to local tradition, the Jews of Chełm (Yid., Khelem) were granted their first privilege by King Władisław Jagiełło, though tombstones once thought to be from the fifteenth century are now considered of a was ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Sandomierz
town in the Świętokrzyskie province on the Vistula River, and one of the oldest Jewish communities in Little Poland. In the period of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Sandomierz (Yid., Tsuzmir) played an important role as a trade center on a river route to Gdańsk and ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Zhovkva
(Yid., Zhovkve; Pol., Żółkiew; Rus., Nesterov between 1951 and 1992), town with a Jewish presence from the late sixteenth century; under Ukrainian sovereignty since 1991. Zhovkva was a private town in the Polish Commonwealth until 1772, when it became a part of the ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Kraków
[To trace the history of Jewish presence in the city of Kraków, this entry is divided chronologically into two articles, the first treating the period through the Polish partitions and the second from 1795 until 2000 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Leżajsk
town now in the southeastern Polish province of Rzeszów. A royal town founded in the fourteenth century, Leżajsk (also Leżańsk; Yid., Lizhensk) had a Jewish presence by 1521. In 1538, seven Jewish families paid the poll tax, and by 1577 the number of taxpayers had ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Przemyśl
(Ukr., Peremyshl; Yid., Pshemishel), city in southeastern Poland. It is presumed that at the beginning of the eleventh century a Jewish trading post existed in Przemyśl. Larger groups of Jews settled in the town in the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries, and ... GO TO ARTICLE »
L’viv
(Yid., Lemberg; Ger., Lemberg; Pol., Lwów; Rus., Lvov; Latin, Leopolis), city in contemporary western Ukraine, about 65 km (40 miles) from the border with Poland. Jews lived in the city from the time of its establishment in the mid-thirteenth century; some, mostly ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Ternopil’
(Pol. and Rus., Tarnopol), city in western Ukraine (previously in eastern Galicia). Tarnopol was founded in 1540 by the Polish governor, Grand Crown Hetman Jan Tarnowski. Jews settled there soon after its founding.In a privilege granted in 1550 and renewed in 1740 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Hrodna
city now in Belarus; also known in Polish and Russian as Grodno and in Yiddish as Horodno or Grodne. Grodno's Jewish community, one of the oldest in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, existed as early as the fourteenth century. Its privilege, allegedly obtained in 1389 from ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Minsk
capital of the Republic of Belarus since 1991. From the beginning of the fourteenth century, Minsk was part of Lithuania; from the mid-sixteenth century it belonged to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. In 1793, the city was annexed to the Russian Empire and became ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Vilnius
(Pol., Wilno; Rus., Vilna; Yid., Vilne), capital of the republic of Lithuania. In 1323, Gediminas made Vilnius the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The city became part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569. It fell under the domination of the Russian ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Zhytomyr
city on the Teterev River (a tributary of the Dnieper); administrative center of Ukraine’s Zhytomyr oblast. In existence since the ninth century, Zhytomyr (Rus., Zhitomir; Pol., Żytomierz) was from the 1330s attached to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and from 1569 it was ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Vitsyebsk
city in Belarus. The first reference to Jews in Vitsyebsk (more commonly known to Jews as Vitebsk) dates from the mid-sixteenth century. In 1627 a synagogue was built and in 1634, Jews received permission to engage in com-merce, have their own cemetery and synagogue ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Radom
Founded by Peter the Great (r. 1682–1725) in 1703, Saint Petersburg is located at the northwest periphery of Russia, on the Gulf of Finland. In 1712, it replaced Moscow as the capital of the Russian Empire. Over the course of the next two centuries, Saint Petersburg was ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Slutsk
town in Belarus. The first evidence of Jewish life in Slutsk (Pol., Słuck) dates from 1583, when the town formed part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth; its Jewish community was granted a formal privilege in 1601. By 1623, Jews owned 16 houses. Though affected by ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Pinsk
city in southern Belarus. Pinsk’s Jewish community was founded in 1506 (and from ca. 1690 Pinsk was twinned with the town of Karlin) and was one of the five chief communities of “Lite” (Jewish Lithuania), extending its authority over at least 26 smaller Jewish settlement ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Warsaw
capital of Poland from 1596 to 1794 and again since 1918. Warsaw’s importance in Polish and Jewish history is a relatively late phenomenon. For much of the Middle Ages, the Duchy of Mazovia, in which Warsaw was located, was a sparsely populated region, only loosely ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Kalisz
town in Wielkopolska province, Poland. Kalisz (Yid., Kulish) is considered to be the oldest town in Poland. Jews first settled there as early as the twelfth century, where they minted coins for the prince. In 1264, Prince Bolesław the Pious issued a privilege or charter ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Lublin
[To treat the history of Jewish settlement in Lublin, this entry is divided into two articles, the first on the pre-Partition period and the second on the post-Partition period until the present ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Berdychiv
A city on the Hnylopiat’ River (Dnieper basin), Berdychiv (Yid., Barditshev; Rus., Berdichev; Pol., Berdyczów) is the district center of Ukraine’s Zhytomyr oblast. From 1569 it belonged to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth; from 1793 the town was in the Volhynia ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Volodymyr Volyns’kyi
A city on the Luga River (a tributary of the West Bug), Volodymyr Volyns’kyi (Pol., Włodzimierz; Yid., Ludmir; Latinized as Lodomeria) is the district center of Ukraine’s Volyn’ oblast. An important regional center of Volhynia since the tenth century, it passed in 1319 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Luts’k
A city on the Styr’ River (a tributary of the Pripiat’), Luts’k (Pol., Łuck; Rus., Lutsk) is the administrative center of Ukraine’s Volyn’ oblast. Mentioned in the Ruthenian Chronicles of 1085, from 1320 it belonged to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, from 1569 to 1795 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Dubno
A town on the Ikva River (Pripiat’ basin), Dubno is the district center of Ukraine’s Rivne oblast. From the 1320s, it belonged to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and from 1569 to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. From 1795 it was in the Russian Empire and from 1796 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Brody
a town in present-day Ukraine, about 80 kilometers northeast of L’viv (Pol., Lwów). Brody (Yid., Brod) was founded at the ford over the Styr River (bród is Polish for ford) in 1586 by Stefan Żółkiewski. Jewish settlement began at the end of the sixteenth century and ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Ostrog
(Pol., Ostróg; Yid., Ostre), town on the Goryn’ River (a tributary of the Pripyat’), a district center of Ukraine’s Rovno region. From the 1320s, Ostróg was part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, and from 1569 it belonged to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. After ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Kam’ianets’-Podil’s’kyi
(Pol., Kamieniec Podolski; Rus., Kamenets Podol’skii), city on the Smotrich River (a tributary of the Dniester) and district center of the Khmel’nyts’kyi region of Ukraine. In the 1430s the town passed from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania to Poland; from 1569 to 1792 ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Medzhibizh
city in the Podolian region of Ukraine. Medzhibizh (Rus., Medzhibozh; Pol., Międzyboż; Yid., Mezhbizh) documents its history from the twelfth century, and the Jewish community’s from 1511. Located at the convergence of the Boh and Buzek Rivers and at the intersection ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Nemyriv
(Pol., Niemirów; Rus., Nemirov), town on the Ustia River, a tributary of the Southern Bug, the district center of the Vinnytsya region of Ukraine. From 1569, the town belonged to the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, from 1649 it was within the region of Cossack autonomy ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Shklov
(Bel., Sklou; Pol., Szkłów), district city in the Mogilev region, Belarus. Jews first received a charter to settle in Shklov in 1668. In the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Shklov became an important commercial center, where, in the words of a visiting ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Trakai
A town in southeastern Lithuania, Trakai was home to many Jews as well as to the most ancient and important Karaite community in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The town was founded before 1321 and served as the ancient capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Zabłudów
(Yid., Zabludove), town on the Meletina River (in the Western Bug basin) in the Białystok district and province of Poland. Zabłudów is first mentioned in archival sources in 1525. From 1569, the town was in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth; from 1795 it was belonged ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Tykocin
town in the Podlasie province of Poland; known in Yiddish as Tiktin. The first Jews settled in Tykocin in 1522 when the town’s owner, Olbracht Gasztołd, brought in 10 families from Grodno (Hrodna) and permitted them to build a synagogue, establish a cemetery, and ... GO TO ARTICLE »
Map
The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Partitions of Poland. Boundaries shown are ca. 1795.