The OId Jewish Cemetery is a cemetery in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is located on the slopes of Trebević mountain, in the Kovačići-Debelo Brdo area, in the south-western part of the city. It is the largest Jewish cemetery in Southeast Europe. It was in use for approximately four hundred years from the beginning of the 16th or 17th century until 1966.
Established by Sephardic Jews during the Ottoman period, it also became the burial ground for Ashkenazi Jews after they arrived in Sarajevo with the Austro-Hungarian Empire in the late 19th century. It contains more than 3850 tombstones and covers an area of 31160 square meters. It has four monuments dedicated to the victims of fascism: a Sephardi one designed by Jahiel Finci and erected in 1952, two Ashkenazi ones, and one dedicated to the victims of Ustasha militants.[1]
During war of the 1990sThe Jewish Cemetery was on the front line during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and was used as an artillery position by Bosnian Serbs. It was thus severely damaged by bullets and fire caused by explosions. It was also heavily mined but was completely cleared in 1996.[2]
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