The Jews of Caracal: the painted synagogue of Romanați

In Caracal, the former county seat of Romanați in Oltenia, stands a small synagogue built in 1902, according to the inscription on its façade. The exterior is modest. Inside, according to the description published by the town’s tourist information centre, there are painted walls, a ceiling painted as a starry sky, and a memorial plaque to Jewish soldiers who fell in the First World War. The community, which numbered about two hundred, has dispersed, and the synagogue is no longer in use.

A county town on the Romanați plain

Caracal, now in Olt County, was the seat of the old Romanați County, in the “Old Kingdom” (the Regat). According to JewishGen’s Cemetery Project it lies about 53 km from Craiova. The Jewish community here was always small. JewishGen gives 211 Jews in a late-19th-century census (the page gives the census year as both 1889 and 1899) and 200 in the 1930 census.

According to a text by Viorel Chirea published by the municipal tourist information centre (CNIPT Caracal), the Jewish presence in the town is documented for more than two centuries. The town’s position favoured trade, and the community had close ties to the neighbouring communities of Corabia, Craiova and Calafat. We found no translated entry on Caracal in Pinkas HaKehillot, so we add no details on the community’s institutions.

The synagogue of 1902

The Federation of Jewish Communities in Romania (FCER), which lists the synagogue among its buildings, says it was built in 1902 in a local neoclassical style, on an area of only about 80 m². The Federation describes a modest exterior and a well-decorated interior. In its general list of synagogues it appears among those not in use.

The municipal information centre gives more detail. According to the inscription on the outer wall, the building was dedicated on 2 July 1902. The inscription names the board: I. Perl (president), H. Kornbach (vice-president), D. Retter (treasurer) and I. Tober (secretary). The plan is rectangular, about 7.20 by 9.40 metres, with a ground floor and an upper floor. The tin roof is crowned with a Star of David, and the round upper-floor windows have stained-glass Stars of David. The same text says the synagogue was built for the town’s Sephardic Jews. We found no confirmation of this in another source.

The painted interior

The information centre’s description is the most detailed source we found for the interior:

• A raised platform reached by two wooden staircases with metal railings. It stands in front of three doors, and the side doors are painted with drapery.
• Painted walls: friezes and panels in red and blue, with geometric and floral motifs and plaster and metal details.
• A ceiling, partly vaulted and painted throughout as a starry sky, with a Star of David. Above the entrance are a Star of David and the Tablets of the Law, and the hall has a metal chandelier from the late 19th or early 20th century.
• A U-shaped women’s gallery on six metal columns, with numbered benches. The original wooden pews and platform survive.
• A memorial plaque on the south wall to Jewish soldiers from Caracal who fell in the war of 1916–1919, among them David Emanuel, Isac Amadu, Iancu Weiss, Moritz Löbel and Solomon Braunstein.

We have not visited the synagogue, and we found no current official source on the building’s condition or on any conservation work.

The war years

Caracal lay in the Regat, under Romanian rule. According to the Final Report of the International Commission on the Holocaust in Romania (the Wiesel Commission, 2004), Romania agreed in writing to deport the Jews of the Regat and southern Transylvania to the Belzec death camp, but the plan was not carried out. The Jews of the Regat suffered anti-Jewish legislation, expropriation and forced labour: 84,042 Jews aged 18 to 50 were registered for forced labour across Romania.

What happened to the Jews of Caracal themselves in 1940–1944? We found no authoritative source that documents it, so we give no details. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM) holds a copy of a 1942 file from the archive of the Romanian Intelligence Service containing “reports on Jews from Caracal, Craiova, Czernowitz”. We have not examined its contents. According to the municipal information centre, Rabbi Simon Scheifestein came to Caracal in the 1940s, and religious life grew stronger.

The cemetery

A 2001 survey for JewishGen’s Cemetery Project describes an Orthodox cemetery founded at the end of the 19th century. Its oldest known gravestone dates from the end of that century, and the last known burial was in 1990. The site measures about 220 by 36 metres and is enclosed by a masonry wall with a locked gate. It has 20 to 100 stones of marble, granite, slate and concrete, inscribed in Hebrew and Romanian. Most stand in their original places, and fewer than a quarter have fallen or broken. According to the survey, a pre-burial house stands within the cemetery and was then empty. The site belongs to the community, which paid for its care. The municipal information centre’s text also mentions a “synagogue” in the cemetery. We do not know the cemetery’s condition today.

The community today

According to the municipal information centre, most Jewish families left for Israel after the 1980s, and services ended in the early 21st century. Today the community has no representative in the town. The 2001 JewishGen survey estimated fewer than ten Jews in Caracal and named the Jewish Community of Craiova as the responsible religious authority. Caracal does not appear in the Federation’s contact list as a community or an attached congregation (obște).

Visiting

• The synagogue: Strada Sergent Grigore Ion 2, according to the Federation’s list of synagogues and the municipal information centre. The synagogue page on the Federation’s site gives no. 5. The building is not in use, and no opening hours are published. To see the interior, arrange in advance with the Federation of Jewish Communities in Romania or with the Jewish Community of Craiova (Str. Horezului 5, according to the Federation). You can also ask at the municipal tourist information centre (CNIPT Caracal).
• The cemetery: the 2001 survey found the gate locked and entry by permission. We found no address in a current official source. Ask through the Craiova community.
• Nearby: Craiova, which has a synagogue and an active community; Pitești.