Ludza Great Synagogue – the oldest wooden synagogue in the Baltics, built in 1800 by Rabbi W. Altšuler as a wooden house and clad with red bricks. It is one of the city’s 7 former Jewish houses of prayer, and one of the few oldest synagogues built in the 19th century in Europe. Destroyed during the war, it has just been restored to its original appearance as a branch of the Ludza Museum of Local History, with a prayer room, modern exhibitions for the documentary film-maker Herz Frank and his father, the Ludza photographer Wulf Frank, as well as an exhibition on the fate of the Jewish families of Ludza. The ancient wooden constructions, the starry sky in the ceiling, the restored ancient drawings and the furniture are particularly valuable.

At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, Ludza was called the Jerusalem of Latvia, because at that time 59% of the population of Ludza was Jewish. The tragic fate of the Jews is commemorated by a memorial stone to the Jews shot in 1941 on the site of the former ghetto, next to the synagogue. The Jewish cemetery is located on J.Soikāna Street.

Photos from the archives of the Ludza TIC.