Old Synagogue (Przemyśl)
synagogue
The Old Synagogue (Polish: Stara Synagoga w Przemyślu) was a former Orthodox Jewish congregation and synagogue, located in Przemyśl, in the Subcarpathian Voivodeship of southeastern Poland. Designed by Bononi and completed in 1594, the fortress synagogue served as a house of prayer until World War II when it was desecrated by arson by Nazis in 1939 as they were retreating from the eastern bank of the San River; it fell into ruin in 1941 and the debris was cleared after the war.
The stone building was rectangular in shape, typical of the Renaissance style of the time. The rectangular main hall remained the only section of the original building after a range of outhouses were added in later years. They included a yeshiva, two additional halls of prayer and offices.
History
The first legal regulation regarding the Jewish community of Przemyśl dates from March 20, 1559. The privilege, granted by King Sigismund Augustus, stipulates that "Jews have been living on the Jewish street in Przemyśl for a long time" have the right to settle permanently in Przemyśl and grants them trading rights. Jews were now considered under the royal jurisdiction, i.e. the waywode's court, (which is mentioned in acts of the year 1576 as the "Jews' court"). It appears from a lawsuit of the year 1560 that the Jews then possessed a wooden synagogue, said to have been founded by two wealthy Spanish immigrants.
“Old Synagogue (Przemyśl)” enters the record as synagogue. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Synagogue, Przemyśl and synagogue can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q951072. Authority coordinates are 49.784, 22.772. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1594, 1939, 1941 and 1559.
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This entry incorporates text from “Old Synagogue (Przemyśl)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.