Shtetls, small towns primarily populated by Ashkenazi Jews, were an important feature of Eastern European Jewish life before World War II. They were mainly found in the areas that constituted the 19th-century Pale of Settlement in the Russian Empire, as well as in Congress Poland, Austrian Galicia, the Kingdom of Romania, and the Kingdom of Hungary. Those locations correspond to the modern-day countries of Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, Slovakia, Ukraine, Moldova, Romania, and southern Latvia. The shtetl as a phenomenon in Eastern Europe was eradicated by the Nazis during the Holocaust.
Quote: “This culinary equator highlights the fact that each shtetl had its own history and traditions, inspired by the local milieu. Each shtetl had its own recipes, stories, legends, and klezmer tunes. Even Judaism varied. Hasidism thrived in scores of shtetls, with many communities simultaneously supporting several distinct groups of Hasidim. Where there were Hasidim, there were likely Mitnagdim, the opponents of Hasidism, who practiced traditional historical Judaism. From different flavors of gefilte fish to different flavors of Judaism, the small market towns of Eastern Europe supported their own identities.”
Sources: Wikipedia (introduction), My Jewish Learning (introduction and quotation)
Learn more about the shtetls of Eastern Europe from Wikipedia. ►
Read “What Were Shtetls? Clearing up myths about these Eastern European villages where Jews lived” ►
Watch “What Life in the Jewish Shtetl Was Like | The Jewish Story | Unpacked” [7:13]. ►
Watch “Walking around the Shtetl in Chmielnik” [18:40]. ►
Photo: Ukranian Jewish Encounter
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