Jewish Cemetery (at Zagajnikowa Street)

The new Jewish cemetery in Łódź, at Bracka Street 40 with an entrance from Zmienną Street, is the largest Jewish necropolis in Poland and one of the largest in Europe. It covers more than 40 hectares, with approximately 160,000 gravestones preserved, and in its southern part lie victims of the Łódź ghetto.

When the cemetery was established and by whom

The cemetery was opened on 10 November 1892 on land transferred to the Jewish community by industrialist Izrael Poznański. It lies in southern Bałuty, in a block between Bracka, Zagajnikowa, Zmienną and Inflancka streets, and covers approximately 42 hectares divided into 131 sections. Between 180,000 and 230,000 people were buried here. The necropolis is entered in the heritage register under number A/276 from 17 September 1980, and in 2015 it was declared a Monument of History by presidential decree. It is maintained by the Jewish Religious Community in Łódź.

Poznański's Mausoleum and the pre-burial house

The two most recognisable structures in the cemetery were designed by the same architect, Adolf Zeligson. The mausoleum of Izrael Poznański is considered the largest Jewish tomb in the world, and inside its dome a restored historical mosaic has been preserved. The pre-burial house with an area of 850 square metres was opened in April 1898; its construction was financed by Mina Konstadt with a sum of 18,000 roubles.

Among those buried are the parents of Julian Tuwim and the parents of Arthur Rubinstein, as well as industrialists, doctors and activists of the pre-war community. Gravestones from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries show the full scale of the former community: from modest headstones to monumental factory owners' tombs.

Ghetto Field

The Ghetto Field is the collective section of the cemetery at Bracka Street, where over 40,000 prisoners of the Łódź ghetto were buried between 1940 and 1944. Sources give figures of approximately 43,000 to 45,000 dead. The graves are mostly unmarked, marked with low, uniform plaques. In the pre-cemetery section stands a monument dedicated to the victims of the ghetto and extermination camps, and a separate plaque commemorates 5,000 Czech Jews interned in the Łódź ghetto, most of whom died in Chełmno nad Nerem.

Rules of visit

This is an active cemetery and a place of remembrance, so religious rules apply here, not tourist customs. Men enter only with head covering; a regular cap is sufficient. The cemetery is closed on the Sabbath and Jewish holidays. People looking for graves of relatives can use the database of buried persons maintained by the Monumentum Iudaicum Lodzense Foundation based at Pomorska Street 18. The Foundation also collects memories of the buried. Part of the Ghetto Field is cared for by volunteers gathered around the Guardians of Memory.

Practical information

• Address: Bracka 40, 91-717 Łódź. The entrance for visitors is from Zmienną Street; there is a car park at the entrance.
• Hours given by the administrator: Sunday to Friday, with the exception of Jewish holidays. From 1 April to 1 November, 9-17; from 2 November to 31 March, 9-15; on Fridays until 15:00. It is worth confirming these before visiting, as they depend on the holiday calendar.
• What to expect: an extensive, partly overgrown area with a network of paths, requiring comfortable footwear and at least two hours. The main points of interest are Poznański's mausoleum, the pre-burial house and the Ghetto Field. Men are required to wear head covering.