Poroshkovo Jewish Cemetery
This cemetery is in the farmyard of a family living in Poroshkovo. Before our 1997 visit, it had been identified as a cemetery containing our Friedman family's graves and was cleaned before our visit. Haystacks and a cornfield are next to--almost in--the cemetery. In addition to the stones shown here, there were many stones that were worn beyond recognition, or broken.
The family told us that at some time in the past, a man living in the area removed some stones to use as tabletops in his shop. However, he had bad dreams in which ghosts appeared to him, so he replaced the stones in the cemetery.
Click on thumbnails for a larger view of each stone. Note the Cohen blessing hands on the stones of Cohanim. Also note the willow design which is very common on gravestones of Hungarian Jews; the Poroshkovo area, like other riverfront villages in Hungary, is lush with willow trees.
As is traditional in Jewish cemeteries in the 19th century, men's graves are at one end of the cemetery, women's at the other end. Quite a few of the deceased were rabbis, and one woman is noted as a teacher. Photographs are arranged in order as found in the cemetery. A list of names follows the photographs.
LIST OF NAMES (note: only a few Hungarian names are given; even with last name FRIEDMAN(N), first names are Hebrew or Yiddish)
Friedman, Berta (Spitz Ernone) Basha bas Shmuel haCohen
Friedman, Chana Esther, wife of Friedman, Shmuel haCohen
Friedmann, Chentshe, wife of Friedmann, Dov HaCohen
Friedman, David ben Shmuel
Friedmann, Dov ben Moshe HaCohen
Friedmann, Moshe Tzvi ben Eli (Ari?) HaCohen
Friedmann, Rivkah bas Moshe HaCohen (Wife of David Polatshek)
Friedmann, Yakov ben (David?) Moshe HaCohen
Polatshek, David (not buried here, but named on gravestone of wife Friedman, Rivkah)
Spitz, Erno (not buried here, but named on gravestone of wife Friedman, Berta)
Chana bas Avraham haCohen
Eliahu ben Jacob HaCohen
Meir ben Tzvi
Moshe Meir ben David
Tzvi Ari
Yitzhak HaCohen
Yehudah Yitzhak ben Simeon HaCohen
Photographs of Poroshkovo Jewish Cemetery from The Center of Jewish Education in Ukraine
(Under construction--will be re-activated soon.)
Copyright © 2008, 2011 Lynn Saul