Obj. ID: 50369
Jewish Funerary Art Jewish cemetery in Wiskitki, Poland
According to ESJF European Jewish Cemeteries Initiative, the Jewish cemetery is located at Spółdzielcza Street, about 850 metres north-west of the town centre, and covers geodetic plot no. 569 shaped like a rectangle, with an area of 0.63 hectares. The cemetery was established in the first half of the 19th century. In 1841, the synagogue supervision leased a plot of land intended for a cemetery. Until the 1870s, the cemetery also served as the burial place for Jews from the nearby Żyrardów.
Most probably, during World War II, the cemetery was devastated, and continued to degrade in the following decades. Most of the tombstones were removed, and the fence was torn down (its remains were recorded in the 1991 Cemetery Chart). At the beginning of the 21st century, the area was overgrown with dense, wild vegetation (shrubs and trees), making the cemetery difficult to access. About 70 tombstones have survived within the cemetery in various conditions, mostly in the form of sandstone stelae and granite fieldstones. The oldest identified tombstones are dated 1852. When comparing the number of tombstones noted in the record books with the actual number of preserved tombstones, the latter constitutes only about 4% of all the tombstones. The list of tombstones is available at http://cmentarza-zydowskie.pl/wiskitki.htm.
The cemetery is fenced with a modern concrete fence (2 m high), there is an iron entrance gate with a star of David. The fence was installed by ESJF in cooperation with FODZ in 2016. A plaque commemorating the Jews of Wiskitki was placed at the entrance. The project was implemented by the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in cooperation with the ESJF – European Jewish Cemeteries Initiative. The owner of the cemetery is the Wiskitki Commune. The cemetery is listed in the Register of Immovable Monuments of the Masovian Voivodeship. There are about 60 gravestones.
