Noah’s Ark of Remembrance
Birgit Fricke
T +49 (0) 69 2102-256
fricke@book-fair.com
Noah’s Ark of Remembrance
Frankfurt am Main University Library’s digitisation projects for Jewish studies in the German-speaking world
In cooperation with the Judaica Department at the Frankfurt am Main University Library, the Frankfurt Book Fair will be introducing three online databases in the International Library Centre (ILC). These represent a uniquely comprehensive collection of sources in the field of Jewish studies and offer the international academic community direct access to indispensable research material.
Editions in Yiddish
The wide-ranging database makes Yiddish literature available on the internet free of charge. The collection comprises around 800 valuable books held by the library. The works reflect the diversity of Yiddish literature from the 16th to the beginning of the 20th century in Western, Central and Eastern Europe - from translations of the scriptures for women, to everyday and utility literature such as educational introductions and medical manuals, and also including the classics of national Jewish fiction and poetry.
Printed in Hebrew characters, the texts include many extremely rare books as well as some unique specimens. The oldest book in this collection dates back to 1560 and is from Cremona, followed by a printing from Basel from 1583. The illustrations in some of the works, the socalled Minhagim books, have served over the centuries as depictions of Jewish customs.
Compact memory - Jewish periodicals in the German-speaking world
The internet archive provides online access at no charge to the most important Jewish periodicals and newspapers from the 19th and 20th century through to 1938. The publications cover all religious, cultural and political aspects of Jewish life in Central Europe, making this a significant reservoir of sources for research into the Judaism of modern times.
The online database has achieved international recognition with its inclusion in the UNESCO archives portal whose quality seal is displayed on the homepage.
Virtual collection of Judaica
With its development now under way since 2007, this database will make available on the internet in full text versions a total of 18,000 predominantly German-language books on Judaism with approx. 2 million pages dating from the 17th century to 1932. At the present time, the database already includes 3,000 volumes with approx. 400,000 pages. As a result of the Third Reich and the Second World War, the Frankfurt University Library’s historic collection of Judaica - known internationally as the Freimann Collection after its former curator - is no longer complete. The aim of the DFG-funded project is to record and digitise all parts of the collection which, as a “virtual Judaica collection” is to be made available worldwide to all those who are interested. The virtual reconstruction of the historic collection provides a resource that in its completeness will be an indispensable tool for research.
With three digitisation projects, the Frankfurt am Main Jewish Museum will present “Jewish Life in Frankfurt am Main - Online”:
- Infobank Judengasse online - detailed information on the history of the Frankfurt street, the Judengasse, the people who lived there, its houses and life in the ghetto.
- Ostend - the east district – an overview of a Jewish quarter – the history of a Frankfurt district and its Jewish inhabitants
- Frankfurt am Main 1933 - 1945 - an account of the Nazi years
in Frankfurt.
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