49°4′12.41″N 16°27′53.71″E. town website in English: "On the western edge of Masaryk Square is a Moorish Renaissance Jewish synagogue from 1652, one of the oldest synagogues in Moravia. The former Jewish ghetto around the synagogue today has just a few preserved houses. The Jewish community was the most numerous in 1848 (650 Jews). During WWII, all 57 Jewish residents were deported to Terezín. Only one lady survived - Mrs Ruth Morgenstern who lives in Brno. After WWII, the synagogue was used as vegetable warehouse with the reconstruction started in 1991 and finished in 2004. At present the synagogue is open to the public with cultural events held there. The 1680 Jewish cemetery next to the synagogue has about 1500 visible gravestones. Of interest are the Kreisky family gravestones, relatives of the Austrian ex-chancellor Bruno Kreisky who visited Dolní Kounice.[September 2011]
website in Czech with photo: "Jewish settlement from before the Thirty Years War concentrated in the eastern part of town near the old Jewish cemetery and castle. Later, in the western part of the square, ulice U synagog , and Skalní a U škrobárny starch processing. 35 of the original 82 buildings still stand. A stone relief from 1818 with wine motif is found on the mill čp.577. The old cemetery allegedly from the second half of the 14th century or early 15th century located on a hillside east of town today has no visible tombstones. After the establishment of the ghetto a new cemetery was created. The new cemetery located 300 m SW of the square on a hill above the town dates from 1680, an area of 7789 m2 with 852 Baroque and Classicist style gravestones (a small portion transferred from the abolished medieval cemetery, the oldest surviving from 1688. The cemetery is connected with a ghetto staircase and unusual tunnel passing below the lowest part of the cemetery. Famous people buried include mj.Rabbi Heinrich Flesch." [September 2011]
Jewish Community of Brno owns, manages, and renovated the cemetery around 1997. cemetery photos [February 2009]
Jews lived there from the end of the 14th century with a "Jewish judge" mentioned in 1581. The synagogue was destroyed by the Swedes in 1643, rebuilt immediately, and existed until the Holocaust. Around the end of the 17th century, several Moravian community meetings were held in Dolni Kounice. Jews acquired property until regulations imposing the Familiants system were introduced in 1727 that also limited the number of families permitted to reside in the locality to 111. Sixteen "Jewish houses" were registered in 1674 and 35 in 1823. Dolni Kounice wasa political communitiy (politische gemeinde) with population of 595 in 1848; 206 in 1900; 71 in 1921; and 53 in 1930 (1.6% of the total population). The Jewish quarter was destroyed by fire in 1823 and in 1862 by flood. Deported to the Nazi death camps in 1942, they perished. The synagogue belongings and pinkas (minute-book) of the cḥevra kaddisha were deposited in the Jewish Museum in Prague. No community was reestablished after World War II. The synagogue building was restored by the authorities in 1969.
REFERENCES:
Encyclopedia of Jewish Life (2001), p. 320: "Dolni Kounice".
Encyclopedia Judaica.
H. Gold (ed.), Juden und Judengemeinden Maehrens… (1929), 267–78
H. Flesch, in: JGGJČ, 2 (1930), 285–92; idem, in M. Stein (ed.), Jahrbuch des traditionstreuen Rabbiner-Verbandes in der Slowakei (1923), 47–83; idem, in: Jahrbuch zur juedischen Volkskunde, 2 (1924/25), 617–18
I. Halpern, Takkanot Medinat Mehrin (1951), index, S.V. Kuniẓ.
US Commission No. CZCE000078
Alternate German name: Kanitz. Kounice. The town is in Moravia-Brno-venkov at 49°04' N, 16°28' E, 12 miles SW of Brno (Brünn). The cemetery is 0.4 km S of town. Present town population is 1,000-5,000 with no Jews.
Local government official responsible: Magistrate Frantisek Brustmann, Obecni urad, 664-64 Dolni Kounice; tel. 0502-932310.
- Regional: Engineer Jan Klobasa, Okresni urad -Referat Kultury, Moravske nam.1, 602 00 Brno. tel. 05/2197.
- Interested: Okresni Muzeum Brno-venkov, dir. mgr. Antonin Recek, Palackeho nam., 664 91 Ivancice; tel. 0502/921131. Milan Rihacek, Polni 555, 664 64 Dolni Kounice; tel. 0502/932537.
Earliest known Jewish community originated in 1581 [OR the second half of the 14th century]. Jewish population: 649 (in 1850), 53 (in 1930), and 59 (in 1942). Self-standing political community existed between 1850 and 1919. Rabbi Dr. Heinrich Flesch and the family of Austrian Chancellor Dr. Bruno Kreisky are buried here. The Jewish cemetery originated in 1680 with last known Conservative Jewish burial in 1942. Landmark-Nr. 0691 S.M. The isolated suburban agricultural site at the crown of a hill has a sign in Czech mentioning Jews, the Jewish community, and the famous individuals buried there. Reached by driving directly off a public road, access is open to all via a continuous masonry wall with a locking gate. The size of the cemetery before WWII and now is 0.7849 ha.
500 and 1,000 gravestones are mostly in original locations with 1-20 are not in original locations and 50% and 75% toppled or broken. Stones have been removed to a museum of conservation laboratory. Date from 1698. The 17th through the 20th century marble, granite and limestone flat shaped stones, finely smoothed and inscribed stones, flat stones with carved relief decoration, multi-stone monuments or obelisks have inscriptions are in Hebrew, German or Czech. Some stone have traces of painting on some surfaces, stones with iron decorations or lettering, stones with bronze decorations or lettering and stones with metal fences around the graves. No known mass graves. There is a pre-burial house in the cemetery. Brno Jewish community owns the property. Adjacent properties are agricultural or residential. Occasionally, private visitors stop. Vandalism occurred occasionally in the last ten years and between 1945 and ten years ago. Individuals or groups of non-Jewish origin, regional and Jewish groups within the country re-erected stones, cleared vegetation, and fixed the wall in 1989. Now, there is occasional clearing or cleaning by individuals. Security, weather erosion, vegetation, and vandalism are moderate threats and a slight threat from pollution or incompatible development.
Engineer-Architect Jaroslav Klenovsky, Zebotinska 13, 623 00 Brno; tel. 0 completed survey on March 7, 1992. The site was visited in II/1992. Documentation: Herman Gold.