The Jews of Craiova: Sephardim and Ashkenazim in Oltenia

Craiova, capital of Oltenia in western Wallachia, was one of the oldest Jewish communities in Romania and a centre of Judeo-Spanish culture, close to the Danube and the communities of Bulgaria. Ashkenazim settled alongside the Sephardim in the 19th century, and the two communities lived side by side into the 20th. Today the city has one synagogue, the Coral Temple on Strada Horezului, and a large cemetery.

Sephardi beginnings

According to the Encyclopaedia Judaica, Sephardi Jews lived in Craiova as early as the first half of the 17th century. The 1906 Jewish Encyclopedia suggests that Jews settled in the city even earlier, perhaps after their expulsion from Hungary in the 14th century, and notes an organised community with a rabbi at the beginning of the 17th century. From 1718 to 1739 Oltenia was under Austrian rule: in 1727 Emperor Charles VI granted privileges to Bulgarian colonists that barred Jews, Turks and Greeks from displaying goods at the town fairs, except the great annual fair. When the region returned to Wallachia in 1739, Jews could again trade freely.

In 1790, after a Romanian landowner granted them land for a cemetery, the Sephardim founded a burial society. The 1831 census of Wallachia recorded 82 Jewish families in the city. The Sephardim had roots in Bucharest and in the Bulgarian communities along the Danube, and surnames such as Alvo, Benvenisti, Farchi, Frances and Leon reflect that link.

Two communities in one city

By the mid-19th century the Ashkenazim were the majority, although their community was officially recognised only in 1913. In 1865 they opened a boys’ school that ran until 1948; the Sephardi school ran separately until 1887, when the institutions merged. According to the Jewish Encyclopedia, each community had its own synagogue and burial society but they shared a cemetery and a school, and the tensions between them left Craiova without a rabbi — unusual for an important community. The Encyclopaedia Judaica mentions two synagogues, of 1842 and 1880. In 1860 the city had 490 Jews, and by the end of the 19th century 2,891.

The city was not peaceful. On 10 May 1883, the national holiday, a mob smashed the windows of Jewish shops and wounded several people, and a few days later a synagogue was set on fire. In 1884 a bomb was thrown into the theatre during a performance by a Jewish company. According to the Jewish Encyclopedia many Jews left the city as a result. In 1930 Craiova had 2,274 Jews, 3.6% of the population.

The synagogue on Strada Horezului

The only remaining synagogue is the Coral Temple, also known as the Great Synagogue, on Strada Horezului. Its history is not entirely clear. The Federation’s list of synagogues gives 1829 as the year of construction; according to a heritage leaflet on Craiova, a Sephardi synagogue built on the site in 1832 fell into disrepair, and the Coral Temple was inaugurated on the same plot in 1887. According to a local article from 2010, the original building went up in 1829–1832, was rebuilt in 1887 by an architect named Birkental, lost its Moorish-style turrets in later renovations, was damaged in the earthquake of 4 March 1977 and was repaired in 1982. The Sephardi synagogue, “Beit El”, was destroyed in the same earthquake. In 1937 the city had three synagogues.

On the outer wall of the synagogue is a memorial to the Jews of Craiova who fell in the Balkan Wars and the First World War, 1912–1918: 62 names, among them six officers, all physicians.

The Second World War

At the end of 1940, under the “National Legionary State”, Iron Guard members boycotted Jewish shops and marked them with signs. In January 1941 Jewish merchants were arrested on charges of “economic sabotage” and forced to sign over their businesses for less than their value; more than a hundred firms were looted, and the police confiscated radios. By the end of 1941 most shops had passed to Romanian owners. The 1941 census counted 1,817 Jews in the city.

The Jews of Craiova were not deported, but the city became a station on the road of other deportees. On 30 June 1941 the prefect announced that 250 women and 250 children from Dorohoi County would be housed in the city; according to the Encyclopaedia Judaica, about 1,800 Jews from northern Moldavia were forcibly moved to Craiova. In September 1941 Jews from Siret were gathered at the railway station and sent on to Rădăuți. The city’s own Jews were conscripted for forced labour: on 13 May 1942 a detachment of 73 left for Balta in Transnistria, and in August–September 1943 another detachment worked in Bacău County. In spring 1943 fifteen Jews from Ploiești also arrived in the city, and the impoverished community struggled to help them.

After the war and today

After the war the community grew with refugees from Transnistria and Bukovina who did not want to return to northern Bukovina, now under Soviet rule; in 1947 about 2,500 Jews lived in the city. Most emigrated to Israel within a few years. In 1969 about 75 families and one synagogue remained, in 2004 there were 89 Jews, and the 2011 census counted 25. In 1998 an Institute of Jewish Studies was founded at the University of Craiova. The community, now called the Jewish Community of Oltenia, is led by the academician Corneliu Sabetay and is also responsible for the Jews of Orșova.

The cemetery

The Jewish cemetery is at Strada Bucovăț 209, next to a Catholic cemetery. According to a JewishGen survey from 2001 it covers about 3.5 hectares, is walled with a locked gate, and has a tahara house, hundreds to thousands of gravestones in Hebrew, German and Romanian, and a memorial to Jewish soldiers. The oldest known gravestone dates from 1876. Those buried here include Mauriciu Dorosteanu (1862–1935), first president of the Sephardi community, and Rabbi User Segal (1905–1959).

Visiting

• Synagogue and community offices: Strada Horezului — no. 5 on the Federation’s contacts page, no. 15 on its list of synagogues. Telephone per the Federation’s website: +40 351 434 036. No opening hours have been published — arrange in advance.
• Cemetery: Strada Bucovăț 209; locked gate, visits by arrangement with the community.