Sephardic Synagogue

Maramureş

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Sighet’s only remaining synagogue is north of Piaţa Libertăţii. It was built in the Moorish-Renaissance style in 1904. You can look around for free, but it’s customary to leave a donation (10 lei). Before WWII the Jewish community here numbered just over 10,000 people – about 40% of Sighet’s population at the time. Sadly, today the local Jewish community numbers around 200.

Most of the Jews perished at Auschwitz-Birkenau after being shipped there in 1944, when Hungary (which ruled over the area at the time) agreed to surrender its Jews to Nazi Germany. Some 38,000 eventually perished and the majority of the survivors chose to emigrate.

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Nearby Maramureş attractions

1. Jewish Community Centre

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Next door to the Sephardic synagogue is this Jewish Community Centre, where you can also arrange to visit the town’s Jewish Cemetery.

3. Maramureş Ethnographic Museum

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One of three branches of the Maramureş Museum – the others are the Elie Wiesel Memorial House and the Village Museum – this ethnographic museum displays…

4. Elie Wiesel Memorial House

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The late Jewish writer and 1986 Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel (1928–2016) was born in and later deported from this house on the corner of Str…

7. Monument to Holocaust Victims

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This monument to the 38,000 Jews from Maramureş and surrounding areas slaughtered in WWII Nazi extermination camps was erected in 1947.