The Central Archives began in 1938 as the Jewish Historical General Archives. Reestablished by the government of Israel in 1969 as the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, one of its major aims is-- to compile a "central catalogue of comprehensive material (about the Diaspora), a great part of which was hitherto unknown, and to enable historians and scholars to avail themselves of the data thus gathered." As a result, notes the archives, they are in possession of the "most extensive collection of documents, pinkassim and records concerning Jewish history in the Diaspora, from the Middle Ages to the present day.
Library: 11,000 volumes
Original archive material: 6 km of shelves
Microfilmed archive material: 8,000,000 frames
The CAHJP is the place for research on the Jews of France, Germany and Italy, but has fewer records for Eastern European communities.
Records in this repository are arranged by geographical area. Read through the section on the Central Archives in the Guide to the Archives in Israel (Alsberg, 1973) to see holdings up to 1973.
The political borders that define countries in this archive are those that were in existence between the two World Wars.
Genealogical Sources
Family Papers
In 1994 in preparation for the Fourth International Seminar on Jewish Genealogy Harold Lewin of the Israel Genealogical Society listed the family data from three catalogue drawers pertaining to private archives. His list of families gives the name of the family with reference number, a given name, city or country, period and the file number.
It is estimated that the existing list has some 800 entries
and that currently, the list holds some 2000 entries.
The following is a completely random list of some (mostly indirect) genealogical sources at the
CAHJP in Jerusalem.
The list represents only a small fraction of the genealogical material available at the Central Archives, but gives an indication of some of the kinds of materials available at the Archives.
It was prepared by a volunteer of the IGS and may contain inaccuracies.
Partial List of Genealogical Resources
Primary Source Material for German-Jewish Genealogy At the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People
by Esther Ramon and Hadassah Assouline,
AVOTAYNU Volume XV, Number 2 Summer 1999, By permission of Gary Motokoff
List of German State archives which possess enlargements or films of registers (our G5)
List of addresses of the above mentioned archives.
Jews of Bamberg and Upper Franconia
Jews of Bamberg and Upper Franconia is on a CD Rom. Michael Bernet digitalised the unpublished book by Rabbi Max Katten: Judfamilien Bambergs und Oberfrankens in der Emancipations epoche 1780 - 1933 (Upper Franconian and Bambergian Jewish Families in the Emancipation Epoch: 1780 - 1933). It includes rabbinic families like Brilln/Bruell.
P 27 Diamant Collection
Paul Diamant was a historian and collected data on Jews from Central Europe. His collection consists of handwritten notes of various people connected to his family.
The list contains 12 pages citing the families for which he compiled notes.
This sample includes material from pp.9-10 (Files E - J)
P 237 Ele Toldot
Ele Toldot was compiled by Shlomo Ettlinger. This collection of notebooks reportedly has an individual page of data for every Jew who died in Frankfurt-am-Main until about 1810.
Ettlinger also made a work on his children's direct ancestors. There is also a copy in the National Library in Jerusalem.
Poor Ashkenazim in 1809 in Amsterdam
Poor Ashkenazim in 1809 in Amsterdam, compiled by Moshe Mossel has 2,760 names in Dutch and Hebrew--family names and those of relatives; information includes life span, physical defects, means of support and marital status. By 1809, 87% of those listed already had taken family names--although they were not always the same names after 1812.
Sources in Poland
The Archives conducted surveys in a number of state archives in Poland and compiled lists of material relating to Jews. A selection of the materials uncovered was microfilmed. Some of the material is of genealogical interest.
A detailed guide to the material on Polish Jewry at the Central Archives, in the original and in microfilm, has been published by
Avotaynu.
Jewish Colonization Association (JCA)
Was founded in Paris by Baron Hirsch. Its purpose was to assist the Jews of Eastern Europe through emigration or productivization of the Jews in Eastern Europe itself. The archives hold the files of JCA's main office. Among other documents, one can find lists of Jews emigrating to South America and lists of settlers in various settlements in Eretz Yisrael, which were supported by JCA
Sephardic Sources
The material relating to Sepharadim is soon to appear in the book
Guide to Sephardic and Oriental Genealogical Sources in Israel by Yitzchak Kerem and Mathilde Tagger".