Obj. ID: 32193
  Funerary Art  Jewish cemetery in Drobeta Turnu Severin, Romania

"The Jewish cemetery is situated in the northern part of the city. It is divided into two parts: the larger part is Sephardi and the smaller one is Ashkenazi. The entrance to the Sephardi section is marked by a free-standing gate bearing the Hebrew inscription:

ברוך דיין האמת

Translation: Blessed be the True Judge.

According to a Romanian inscription underneath, the gate was donated by David de Mayo. His gravestone – a wide stele of black marble – is the most prominent headstone in the whole cemetery.

The majority of the Sephardi tombstones are vertical steles, like in the Ashkenazi cemeteries, but there are also horizontal slabs characteristic of the Sephardi cemeteries in the Balkans. Some tombstones unite both traditions and have horizontal and vertical parts, like the tombstone of the cantor Abraham Farhi (d. 1902), who served the community for 38 years. Another such example is the large granite tombstone of Mordechay B. Abraham (d. 1884): His name appears on the vertical pier, while parts of the Hebrew epitaph are written on the sides of the horizontal slab, as is customary among the Sephardi Jews. Some Sephardi tombstones were produced by Ashkenazi tombstone makers in Transylvania. For example, the tombstone of Moritz S. Elias (d. 1929) was made by F. Steiner in Arad. We were able to document other works of this stonemason in our research expeditions supported by The Morris and Beverly Baker Foundation, in Deva, Geoagiu, Ilia, Vințu de Jos, Brad, Petroșani, and Făgăraș.

Many tombstones in the Ashkenazi sector of the cemetery are inscribed with German epitaphs. German was used not only in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, like in many other cemeteries in Romania, but even as late as 1971. This demonstrates the high level of acculturation into the German culture among the Ashkenazi Jews of Turnu Severin. The appearance of many headstones points to the strong connections between the Jews in Turnu Severin and Transylvania, even before the annexation of that region to Romania in 1918. The same connections became clear from the signatures of stonemasons. We found only one gravestone bearing the signature of P. Caraianis from Craiova, but several others are inscribed with the name of C. Kapfer from Timişoara in Transylvania." [Levin, 2025, pp. 20-22]

Jewish cemetery in Drobeta Turnu Severin, Romania - Ashkenazi section