The Jewish Galicia Tour
The intriguing history of Jewish Galicia which, in different historical periods straddled various countries and empires. Our tour will bring you back to the times of their gorgeous past and give you a chance to see the life of people in provincial towns nowadays.
After a short 30 min ride we get to Zhovkva – one of the most charming little towns in Galicia. Built by Polish noblemen and once an ideal Renaissance town, nowadays it’s full of provincial magic and slow-moving pace of life. Zhovkva used to be the center of a fairly large Jewish community with many synagogues around the town. After the extermination of the Jewish people of Zhovkva by German soldiers during WWII most places related to Jewish heritage were destroyed, miraculously the seventeenth-century Renaissance synagogue has survived and now is considered one of the most remarkable of its kind in Europe. The interior is completely lost, but the walls and the hall are preserved. After exploring once majestic Zhovkva Main Synagogue we take a walk through the streets of the former Jewish quarter, with many houses still being preserved. It is in Zhovkva that you can find the East West Street, the road on which many of Phillippe Sands’ relatives lived that he accounts for in the book with the same name.
We can’t leave Zhovkva without a look at its famous Medieval castle and a walk through the beautifully preserved trade galleries around Rynok Square. You pass by the church of St Lawrence’s Cathedral built in 1618 and the Basilian Fathers Monastery of the Nativity of Christ with the picturesque baroque Church of the Holy Heart of Christ.
On the way to Brody, the birthplace of the famous Jewish-Austrian writer Joseph Roth, you learn more about the history of the region and its Jewish community. Upon arrival we visit 18th century Synagogue, Gymnasium and one of the largest in Galicia Jewish Cemetery that despite the devastation of wars, is one of the best-preserved Jewish cemeteries in Ukraine. But one of the oldest Ashkenazi cemetery in Central and Eastern Europe is located in Busk where we go after visiting Brody. There we visit a massive brick synagogue founded in the 1740s and heavily damaged in World War II. The hulking ruins of the fortress synagogue have loomed over the center of town near Rynok Square for decades, but recently, as part of a larger project to highlight the town’s multicultural history, new sign has been installed at the site — in Ukrainian and English it describes the building and explains the importance of Jewish history of Busk. History of community that perished in the Holocaust…
Highlights:
1. Brody Synagogue
The Jewish community of Brody was one of the oldest and most well-known Jewish communities in the western part of Ukraine. The town has been known since the 12th century and the earliest mentions of a wooden synagogue in Brody date back to the late sixteenth century. Because of frequent fires, the wealthy Jewish community...
