Opened in 1907, the Jewish cemetery of Merano occupies a plot of land between the municipal cemetery and the German Military Cemetery. Tree-lined avenues divide the burial areas, which are identified by a multitude of memorial stones, plain and neat but at the same time impressive. In 1931 the bodies of the many Austrian Jews killed in the region during World War I were transferred to the cemetery. Other remains had previously been moved from the ancient burial ground originally used by the Jews of Merano, a field located on the site of today’s Marconi Park, along Via Innerhofer. This cemetery had been purchased in 1872 and expanded in 1891, thanks to a generous donation from the Koenigswarter Foundation, an institution founded in the same year, which in the following period was to sponsor a great many Jewish activities, especially the organisation of a sanatorium for indigent Jews and the construction of the city’s synagogue.
Before this time the Jewish community in Merano had used the Jewish cemetery of Bolzano, which still exists.
Via San Giuseppe
For visits, please ask for the key at the synagogue.
