From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Town quarter and cadastral area of Prague, Czech Republic
Josefov
(also
Jewish Quarter
;
German
:
Josefstadt
) is a town quarter and the smallest
cadastral
area of
Prague
,
Czech Republic
, formerly the
Jewish ghetto
of the town. It is surrounded by the
Old Town
. The quarter is often represented by the flag of
Prague's Jewish community
, a yellow Magen David (
Star of David
) on a red field.
History
[
edit
]
Jews are believed to have settled in Prague as early as the 10th century. The first
pogrom
was in 1096 (the first crusade) and eventually they were concentrated within a walled
Ghetto
. In 1262,
P?emysl Otakar II
issued a
Statuta Judaeorum
which granted the community a degree of self-administration. The
ghetto
was most prosperous towards the end of the 16th century when the Jewish Mayor,
Mordecai Maisel
, became the Minister of Finance and a very wealthy man. His money helped develop the ghetto.
In 1850, the quarter was renamed "Josefstadt" (Joseph's City) after
Joseph II, Holy Roman Emperor
who emancipated Jews with the
Toleration Edict
in 1781. Two years before Jews were allowed to settle outside of the city, so the share of the Jewish population in Josefov decreased, while only Orthodox and poor Jews remained living there.
Most of the quarter was demolished between 1893 and 1913 as part of an initiative to model the city on
Paris
. What was left were only six synagogues, the old cemetery, and the Old Jewish Town Hall (now all part of the
Jewish Museum in Prague
and described below).
Currently Josefov is overbuilt with buildings from the beginning of the 20th century, so it is difficult to appreciate exactly what the old quarter was like when it was reputed to have over 18,000 inhabitants. Medieval Josefov is depicted in the 1920 film
The Golem
, composed of cramped, angular, squinted buildings, but this impression is used purely to convey the
expressionist
nature of the film.
Historical sites
[
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]
Further reading
[
edit
]
- V?ete?ka, Ji?i; Kud?la, Ji?i (1993).
The fate of Jewish Prague
. Grafoprint-Neubert.
ISBN
80-901208-5-7
- Prague City Tourism (2017).
Prague: Jewish
. Prague City Tourism.
Gallery
[
edit
]
-
Jewish Cemetery and surrounding buildings
-
The cemetery itself
-
The surrounding buildings
-
A few steps apart
-
A monument of a pregnant woman made of mirrors
See also
[
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]
References
[
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]
External links
[
edit
]
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Former names shown in
italics
|
Big municipal
districts
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Small municipal
districts
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Cadastral
areas
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50°05′25″N
14°25′10″E
/
50.09028°N 14.41944°E
/
50.09028; 14.41944
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International
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National
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Other
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