The Site
Located at the base of the Harz Mountains, Halberstadt played an important role from the Middle Ages until the 19th century. In the area of the city centre there are remarkable examples of religious architecture and traditional timber constructions, epitomising its rich historical heritage. The area surrounding the city centre was heavily bombed during the Second World War and exhibits examples of post-War socialist housing constructions.
Notably, the town served up until the rise of National Socialism, as the epicentre of a significant Jewish community, playing a crucial role in shaping Germany's distinctive Jewish culture. Halberstadt had been home to a thriving Jewish community dating back to at least the 13th century.
Around 1700, Berend Lehmann, the Court Jew to August the Strong of Saxony and a Halberstadt resident, established the Klaus. The term "Klaus" in the context of Jewish heritage derives from the Western Yiddish "Klaus" or Eastern Yiddish "klojs, klous", which in turn comes from the term "Klause" in German or "clausura" in Medieval Latin, meaning "closed space" or "enclosure." A Klaus was traditionally a study house or school funded by community members where Jews could engage in Torah and Talmud studies. It often functioned alongside a synagogue, providing a dedicated space for religious learning and discussion. In most traditional settings, a Klaus was not just a place of study but also a communal centre for scholarly and religious activity. Today, such Klaus (plural: klojsn) are still found within Hasidic communities, such as those in Brooklyn, where they continue to serve as vital centres for religious study and community life.
The Klaus in Halberstadt was housed in a half-timbered building and was envisioned to be a “perpetual hub” for respected Jewish scholars to immerse themselves in Torah study. Lehmann aimed to etch his legacy into the annals of Jewish history through this initiative, attracting erudite scholars and fostering a culture of learning. Throughout the mid-19th century, the Klaus in Halberstadt became synonymous with erudition, emerging as a bastion of Jewish Neo-Orthodoxy under the stewardship of distinguished rabbis such as Eger, Auerbach, Hildesheimer, and Hirsch.
From the mid-19th century, the Hirsch family, a prominent Halberstadt business family, became important sponsors for the preservation of the Klaus’ legacy. Founded by the son of Rabbi Hirsch from Göttingen, the Aron Hirsch & Sohn company burgeoned into a leading entity in the German metal industry. Reflecting the community's Neo-Orthodox ethos, the Hirsch family upheld observant Judaism and traditional scholarship alongside secular culture and modern cosmopolitanism. In 1857, Joseph Hirsch commissioned a new building, featuring a synagogue sanctuary and a Bet ha Midrash (a house of learning) on the second floor.
The 1938 pogrom left the Klaus unscathed, but the subsequent “Aryanisation” carried out under National Socialist racist policies transferred ownership to the Regional Finance Office, repurposing it as a "Jewish house." Tragically, all Jews housed here were deported to Warsaw in 1942, none surviving. From 1944 to 1945, the Klaus served as a forced labour camp under Nazi sub-organisations. The two-story high sanctuary was split in two by a false ceiling and barracks were built in the garden and courtyard. The building housed refugees in the immediate aftermath of the Second World War. Following the war, the Klaus was used for a brush factory, and residential units. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall and the German reunification, the restitution process returned the Klaus to the Jewish Claims Conference.
During the 1997 restoration of the Klaus, a surprising discovery was made in the room farthest to the back on the second floor of the half-timbered building: a ceiling trellis, remnants of the Sukkah which had been integrated into the structure. Aerial photographs from the 1920s revealed metal plates in place of tiles in this area. These plates could be opened to allow meals under the open sky during the Jewish festival of Sukkot, with the trellis adorned with fir branches from the Harz Mountains. The last occupants of this apartment were Rabbi Dr. Philipp Frankl (1876, Preßburg/Bratislava – 1944, Buchenwald Concentration Camp) and his wife Bella, née Spiro (1883, Fulda – 1960, Amsterdam). They had emigrated to Amsterdam before Second World War, joining their daughter Charlotte. Rabbi Frankl was deported to the Westerbork Concentration Camp in June 1943, later transferred to Buchenwald Concentration Camp, where he died on March 17th, 1944. His wife Bella and daughter Charlotte survived the Ravensbrück and Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camps. In 1952, the metal plates were removed from the roof, noted in the roofer's invoice as "Sukkah – torn down."
In 1712, Berend Lehman had also commissioned the construction of a splendid Baroque synagogue, hidden from view behind other buildings. The synagogue's cupola surpassed the neighboring buildings in height, a pioneering architectural concept in Germany. In the late 19th century, the Hirsch family invested in modernising the synagogue, adding an entrance hall. However, during the "Night of Broken Glass" on November 9th, 1938, the synagogue was plundered, and Torah scrolls burnt in the street. The following day, the building inspection ordered its demolition, with the Jewish community of Halberstadt bearing the costs. Today, only the outer wall of the entrance hall remains, serving as a poignant reminder of the destruction.
Today the Moses Mendelssohn Academy and Berend Lehman Museum are housed in the Klaus and integrate the remnants of the Baroque synagogue to the sites of Jewish heritage under their watch, reclaiming the area as a hub of Judaic knowledge and remembrance since 1998. An art installation now marks the site of the former synagogue, a testament to resilience and commemoration.
The Training Course
The 2025 European Heritage Training Course in Halberstadt continues a long-standing engagement with the conservation of Jewish heritage in the city, an effort undertaken in collaboration with the Moses Mendelssohn Academy. Since 2018, annual training courses and projects have focused on the documentation and preservation of representative elements of Halberstadt’s historic Jewish quarter focusing on the three Jewish cemeteries of the town, the remnants of the Baroque synagogue, and the Klaus. In 2025, the participants will contribute to ongoing conservation interventions at the remnants of the Baroque synagogue, a historically noteworthy room within the Klaus, and finally on the garden´s historical stone wall.
The conservation of the remains of the Baroque synagogue represents an ongoing effort to safeguard one of the most tangible witnesses of Jewish life in Halberstadt. Destroyed during the events of 1938/39, only partial remnants of the original structure survive today. These include sections of the outer walls that were once part of the synagogue’s elaborate interior. Over the past years, conservation efforts have focused on stabilising the surviving masonry, addressing structural vulnerabilities, and mitigating further deterioration. In 2025, the training course will continue the conservation of painted surfaces still preserved on the surviving walls, securing fragments of polychrome decoration that once adorned the synagogue’s interior. These interventions will require surface stabilisation, gentle cleaning to reveal underlying decorative elements, and consolidation of material layers to prevent further loss.
The second area of intervention will be the Sukkah room within the Klaus, where conservation work began in 2024. This space contains layers of historical wallpapers, which conceal earlier decorative schemes beneath them. The task will focus on research into these underlying layers, carefully uncovering selected areas to document and analyse the stratigraphy of decorative elements while ensuring their stabilisation. This process will provide insights into the aesthetic evolution of the room over time and contribute to broader research efforts concerning the building’s past functions and adaptations. The work will involve the precise removal of later wallpaper layers in selected areas, stabilisation of fragile sections, and treatment of disassociated material layers using conservation techniques suited to the preservation of historic interiors.
The third area of work will situate the participants in the garden area behind the Klaus. This is the location where the National Socialist forced labour camp was set-up, with barracks built next to the historic stone walls that enclose the garden of the Klaus. Today, all that remains are the historic stone walls which still exhibit memory traces of this traumatic use of the garden, in the way of carvings and other markings that the prisoners left on the stones. In 2024, the training course focused on documenting these markings and assessing the current state of conservation of the walls. Conservation work has already been carried out on a segment of the structure, but another section remains in need of intervention. The participants will begin by surveying the wall, identifying missing stones, structural vulnerabilities, and surface damage. Special attention will be given to the mortar joints, which hold the stones together and ensure the structural stability of the wall. After assessing the extent of loss and deterioration, participants will carry out conservation treatments, including the application of mortar using the hot lime mortar technique to repair damaged joints and restore the integrity of the wall.
The conservation work at the site is led by a certified restorer with a specialisation in the restoration of plaster, stucco, and wall paintings. The training course will provide the participants with hands-on experience in a range of conservation techniques, including the stabilisation of historic painted surfaces, pigment consolidation, and controlled removal of overlying material layers. These practical exercises will be complemented by theoretical input on Jewish heritage, and methodologies for preserving sites of memory.
As part of the educational programme, participants will also present case studies from their own countries, focusing on sites of memory or monuments built by communities that no longer exist. This component of the course encourages reflection on the broader significance of heritage conservation in maintaining cultural narratives and fosters a comparative understanding of challenges faced in different historical and social contexts.
The training course offers a rare opportunity to engage directly with the preservation of Jewish heritage in Halberstadt, contributing to the continuity of conservation efforts at these historically and culturally significant sites.
The training course will take place from August 18th to August 30th, 2025, and is jointly organised by European Heritage Volunteers and the Moses Mendelssohn Academy Halberstadt.
