Memorials dedicated in Tallinn, Estonia in January and Gdansk, Poland in October add to the ever-growing number of public monuments that commemorate destroyed synagogues by — in some way — replicating or recalling the way they looked.
Built in 1885-87, the synagogue, which served the Reform community, was a monumental structure with a towering dome, built when the city was Danzig, Germany. It was demolished in 1939 by the Nazi-dominated local government (Gdansk was then the semi-autonomous Free City of Danzig). The city’s Shakespeare Theatre now stands on the site.
The memorial is a bronze replica — at 1:70 scale — designed by scuptor Michał Wysocki and urbanist Michał A. Witkowski. Its dedication took place during an accompanying academic conference on the building’s history. (Click to see photo gallery of the event, from Gdansk city web site.)
The new memorial in Tallinn was dedicated January 11 near the place where the Tallinn Choral Synagogue had stood from its construction in 1884 to its WW2: it was heavily damaged during a Soviet air bombardment in March 1944; the ruins were razed in 1947.
There are many memorials to destroyed synagogues in Europe, and they vary in design — from simple commemorative plaques to sculptural monuments.
These two new memorials add to the sub-set of monuments that seek to, one way or another, present an image of the synagogue that they commemorate.
Here are a few others:
The Holocaust Memorial in Bratislava, Slovakia is on the site of the Neolog synagogue that was razed in the late 1960s during construction of a cross-town highway. The memorial includes a silhouette of the synagogue.
In the village of Olaszliszka, Hungary, the memorial occupies the footprint of the destoyed synagogue, conserving the ruins of one wall and foundations, and incorporating a newly-build replica of the facade.
In Oswiecim, Poland, signage at the site of the destroyed synagogue includes a photo of the destroyed building.
The memorial to the main synagogue in Bialystok, Poland bears a small relief showing what the building had looked like.
