Expulsion of Jews from Austria

Bas-relief with an inscription on the expulsion of Jews from Vienna

The expulsion of Jews from Austria is a campaign of persecution and discrimination of Jews in the Austrian Archduke , which was initiated by Duke Albrecht V in 1420. It ended with the confiscation of property, forced baptism , the destruction of synagogues , the deportation of most of the Jewish diaspora, and the burning of more than two hundred Jews in Vienna. Subsequently, the persecution spread to Moravia .

Model of the synagogue on Judenplatz

The events are most thoroughly described in the Austrian Chronicle by Thomas Ebendorfer and in a Jewish source called Vienna Persecution ( lat. Wiener Gesera ). During excavations in the district of Vienna, the foundation of the destroyed synagogue was discovered, which is currently turned into a memorial exhibit of the .

Another reminder of those events is the Latin inscription in the Gothic script on the Christian bas-relief, conveying the moral atmosphere of that time:

By baptism in the Jordan River , bodies are cleansed of disease and evil, and all secret sins are taken to flight. So the flame, furiously kindled in 1421 throughout the city, cleared him of the terrible crimes of the Jewish dogs. As once the world was cleansed by water, so now it was cleansed by fire