Bruno Schulz set his *Cinnamon Shops* in the town of Drohobych, but before the war a similar scene could also be found in Lublin. One need only walk down the grand Krakowskie Przedmieście towards Podzamcze and enter the dense labyrinth of Lubartowska, Nowa and Szeroka streets. There, trade mingled with the hubbub of voices, the scent of spices, damp wood and freshly baked bread. Behind the hand-painted shop signs lay dozens of little worlds: indigo shops, furrier’s workshops, printing houses and bakeries run by Jewish families for generations. Today, that Lublin no longer exists. The memory of it has survived mainly in the photographs of Stefan Kiełszna, which, when juxtaposed with contemporary views of the street, give us a glimpse into a world that has passed away.
Podzamcze, or the other Lublin
Pre-war Lublin had two distinct faces. Around Krakowskie Przedmieście, elegant townhouses, offices and cafés were concentrated. A few hundred metres further on began Podzamcze, a densely built-up district at the foot of Lublin Castle, full of trade, prayer and the daily hustle and bustle. It was there that the Jewish heart of the city beat. Lubartowska was then one of the busiest streets in this part of Lublin. From early morning, the cries of traders, the clatter of carts and conversations in Polish, Hebrew and, of course, Yiddish filled the air. The tenement houses stood side by side, their ground floors almost entirely filled with shops, warehouses and workshops. The outbuildings, meanwhile, housed warehouses, bakeries and small craft workshops. Laundry was drying in the courtyards, children played amongst the wooden staircases, and in the evenings the residents would sit in front of their doorways and spin tales of times long past.
This part of the city was bustling with life almost non-stop. Herring was sold straight from barrels lined up along the street, whilst the scent of spicy herbs, dried fruit and fresh bread wafted from nearby stalls. In the accounts of residents from that time, we see a picture of a district that was darker and more crowded than the grand city centre, yet at the same time incredibly vibrant and filled with an almost magical energy.
The ‘cinnamon shops’ of Lubartowska Street
That magical world was captured in photographs by Stefan Kiełsznia in the 1930s. He walked along Lubartowska and Nowa Streets (today Nowa Street is an extension of Lubartowska) and photographed scenes of thriving trade. The photographer captured, among other things, shop windows, signs written in Polish and Yiddish, and ordinary residents standing outside their workplaces. The photographs feature colonial warehouses, fabric shops, shoemakers’ workshops, printing works, bakeries and chemists’ stores.
Next to Hersz Halbersztadt’s shop selling paints and painting supplies on Nowa Street, there were other family businesses belonging to the Ajchenbaums, the Cukiermans and other merchant families who had been associated with the Lublin region for decades. The shops served as workplaces, homes, centres for social gatherings and spaces for family conversations. Here, private life and commerce intertwined almost without any boundaries. Narrow passageways led to dark outbuildings, which housed workshops and warehouses. Mannequins in elegant clothes were displayed in the shop windows, whilst signs advertising ‘textiles’, ‘haberdashery’ or ‘footwear’ hung above the entrances. In the evenings, the light from the lamps reflected off the shop windows, creating an atmosphere well known from Schulz’s prose.
Lublin’s “Cinnamon Shops”
The world described by Bruno Schulz had something of a dreamlike labyrinth about it. Ordinary shops took on an almost fairy-tale character there. A similar atmosphere hung over pre-war Nowa Street. Many residents made a living from small-scale trade passed down from generation to generation. The shopkeepers had known their customers for years, and street life had its own rhythm, dictated by religious holidays, market days and prayer times. On Lubartowska and Nowa Streets, one could encounter Orthodox Hasidim in long caftans, Zionist youths, students of the Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin, and poor traders trying to sell at least a handful of goods each day.
Founded by Rabbi Majer Szapira, the Yeshivat Chachmei Lublin was one of the most famous Talmudic academies in Europe. Synagogues, prayer houses, libraries and charitable organisations operated in the vicinity. Before the war, Jews made up as much as a third of the city’s population! The Podzamcze district was the most important centre of their religious and economic life.
World War II in Lublin
September 1939 brought a tragic collapse of this idyllic everyday life. German repression very quickly hit the Jewish inhabitants of Lublin. Their trade was restricted, shops were seized and property was confiscated. Fear began to dominate Lubartowska Street, gradually replacing the former bustle of the street. In March 1941, the German occupiers established the Lublin ghetto, covering a significant part of Podzamcze. Thousands of people were gathered into a small area and crammed into cramped dwellings. Hunger, disease and terror became a daily reality. Witnesses recalled crowds streaming through the streets with the remnants of their belongings and children begging for food.
A year later, Operation Reinhardt began. As part of this operation, most of the ghetto’s inhabitants were deported to the extermination camp at Bełżec, whilst many were also murdered at the nearby Majdanek. Shopkeepers, printers, furriers and bakers vanished from the streets. Yiddish shop signs, family businesses and the bustle of the multilingual neighbourhood were lost. A world built up over centuries was destroyed and trampled underfoot in less than two years.
A city of remembrance for its Jewish inhabitants
At the turn of the 1940s and 1950s, the Podzamcze district was transformed beyond recognition. Even during the occupation, the Germans demolished a large part of the historic buildings there. Szeroka Street, formerly the main thoroughfare of Jewish Lublin, practically ceased to exist. In its place, new transport routes were built in the 1950s, and the empty spaces were partly filled with stylised townhouses. Lubartowska and Nowa Streets themselves survived, but the former residents never returned to them. In 1948, there were barely 500 Jews living in Lublin. As a reminder, before the war there were over 40,000. Most of the survivors later emigrated to Israel, the United States and other countries. New tenants moved into the empty flats. Jewish inscriptions, religious symbols and family-run shops known for generations disappeared. Memories of this part of the city began to fade gradually. It was only through the digitised photographs of Stefan Kiełszni, archival documents and the work of the Brama Grodzka Centre – Teatr NN that the image of the old city could be brought back to life.
The Jewish quarter from a bird’s-eye view, the 1930s and today. Source: biblioteka.teatrnn.pl and Google Earth
Looking at photographs from before the Second World War today, one can see ordinary scenes: a shopkeeper standing in front of a shop window, a cart driver sitting on his cart, children playing on the pavement and women returning from their shopping. None of them could have even imagined the hell that history was about to unleash upon them, or that the world of Nowa or Lubartowska Street would cease to exist. That is precisely why Lublin’s former Jewish quarter resembles Schulz’s great “Cinnamon Shops” – a city of scents, voices and images preserved only in memory and in photographs.
Source:Lublin Provincial Conservator of Monuments, teatrnn.pl
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Shops on Lubartowska Street (then Nowa Street) in the mid-1930s and today. Source: NAC – National Digital Archives/photographs by Stefan Kiełszni and Mateusz Markowski/whitemad.pl
