The City Board of Tartu

Collection description

Scope and content:: The collection contains the materials of the city board and city council of Tartu from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The materials shed light on social, economic and cultural realities. Certain documents, such as plans of buildings, originate from earlier periods from the 1620s on. Protocols of the city council are also included in the collection.

Several files (in particular files 309 and 486) include Jewish-related materials. These include lists of members of the local Jewish community, correspondence on the election of members of the community council and the appointment of rabbis' deputies of Riga (Meir Kropman in 1882 and Chaim-Fishel Epstein in 1915). A list of Jewish real-estate owners in Tartu (1897-1901) is also included, as well as a scheme of the local prayer house with seat owners indicated (1878) and the regulations of the prayer house (1877). Materials related to the community's bid to approve the establishment of a Jewish cemetery can also be found in the collection (including maps and protocols,1894).

The files also include correspondence on the maintenance and safekeeping of Jewish vital records and statistical data and correspondence on the issuing of birth certificates, death certificates and other official papers (such as a 1909 correspondence with Ya'akov Bernstein-Kogan), including copies of the certificates issued.

Archival history:: In 1924 the city of Tartu transferred the records of the city board to the Central State Archive of Estonia. Since 1945 the records have been kept at the Historical Archives of Estonia, Tartu.

Administrative/biographical history:: The city board of Tartu was created in 1877, according to the municipal statute enacted in the Russian empire in 1870. It served as the executive arm of the city council, supervising finance, infrastructure, health, education and other issues.

Access points: persons/families:: Bernstein-Kogan, Ya'akov; Epstein, Chaim-Fishel; Kropman, Meir

Subject terms:: Cemeteries; Jewish community; Jewish community records; Rabbis; Real estate; Statistics; Synagogues; Vital records

Access, restrictions:: The collection is open for reference at the Historical Arсhives of Estonia, Tartu.

Finding aids:: Finding aids in Russian and Estonian are available at the Historical Arсhives of Estonia.

For further reference see: Центральный государственный исторический архив Эстонской ССР. Путеводитель, Москва, Тарту 1969, 93-95; Arhiivijuht, I. Tartu 2003, 305-306.

Basic data on the collection is available at the web portal of the National Archives of Estonia: http://ais.ra.ee, Detailotsing – Leidandmed – EAA.2623.

Yerusha Network member:: Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People

Author of the description:: Tatjana Schor, Historical Archives of Estonia, and Alex Valdman, Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, 2015