Legends Of Jewish Krakow

The first appearance of Jews in Poland and their adventures during their early years of settlement in the country are concealed in undocumented shadows of history. What survived are legends of origin that early chroniclers, historians, writers, and folklore scholars transcribed, thus contributing to their preservation. According to the legendary chronicles Jews resided in Poland for a millennium and developed a vibrant community. Haya Bar-Itzhak examines the legends of origin of the Jews of Poland and discloses how the community creates its own chronicle, how it structures and consolidates its identity through stories about its founding, and how this identity varies from age to age. Bar-Itzhak also examines what happened to these legends after the extermination of Polish Jewry during the Holocaust, when the human space they describe no longer exists except in memory. For the Polish Jews after the Holocaust, the legends of origin undergo a fascinating transformation into legends of destruction. Jewish Poland—Legends of Origin brings to light the more obscure legends of origin as well as those already well known. This book will be of interest to scholars in folklore studies as well as to scholars of Judaic history and culture.

GENERATIONS starts with the author's overview of Polish/Jewish interactions over a thousand years from the times of Ibrahim ibn Yakub, a Jewish traveler-merchant-diplomat from Arab Spain, who in 965 A.D. was the first to mention a town called Kracko and continuing all the way to the Holocaust. It then proceeds from pre-historic legends to historic details about Krakovian Jewish courtiers serving the King Casimir the Great in 1350 and the Polish Renaissance Queens Elizabeth of Bohemia and Bona Sforza around 1500, all at the royal court in Krakw. The major part of the book deals with the history of Krakw Jewry as illuminated by the specific lives and genealogy of the author's Aleksandrowicz forebears and their friends and neighbors. It ends with the author's experiences as a child in Krakw (1925-1943) and his survival in the Ghetto, the concentration camps in Plaszw, Mauthausen, Melk and Ebensee. The book is the result of 11 years of research. It contains a number of copies of original historic family documents written in archaic Polish, which the author transcribed and translated into English, scores of other documents and photographs, a bibliography and an index.

The Great Jewish Cities of Central and Eastern Europe: A Travel Guide and Resource Book to Prague, Warsaw, Cracow, and Budapest is the most comprehensive guidebook covering all aspects of Jewish history and contemporary life in Prague, Warsaw, Cracow, and Budapest. This remarkable book includes detailed histories of the Jews in these cities, walking tours of Jewish districts past and present, intensive descriptions of Jewish sites, fascinating accounts of local Jewish legend and lore, and practical information for Jewish travelers to the region.