Grigorescu, Felicia: Forme de artă în cimitire evreieşti din nord-vestul Romaniei (Satu Mare, 2013)
Glosar de termeni
Regarding the name we have already mentioned the fact that the Jews only had one name (the surname), after which they would add the name and the father’s name, according to the formula “x the son of y”, this method of person identification being applied on the tombstone too. Sometimes there are other secondary elements such as: own positions or father’s position - primary school teacher, scholar, judge, rabbi, leader of the community, age, place of origin or lamentations. There is a well-known dispute concerning some exaggerations regarding the moral virtues in the Jewish tombstone epitaphs. According to a study carried out in the cemetery from Bialystok, certain virtues such as: ’’Torah scholar”, “excellent knower of Torah”, “he spent his time studying Torah”, “He studied Torah day and night”, etc are questionable whether they can all be true. These manlike virtues are conjugated by a series of epithets used for the deceased women: of value, respectable, honorable, faithful, reliable, goodhearted, having the fear of God. Sometimes, several such attributes have been given to only one person. These attributes have been characterized as “a baroque ornament made of a crown of words and phrases” which sometimes would have overestimated the deceased. Moreover, Monika Kraiewska shows that through these repetitive virtues and characteristics on the tombstones, the teachings of the Torah, the systems of values accepted by the Jewish community are perpetuated and made popular170. III.B.3. The pedestal The pedestals, although they seem to play just a secondary role in the architectural unit of tombstones, are the ones supporting them and highlighting their artistic values. They aren’t compulsory, there are lots of modest monuments whose main part is directly tamped into the ground or they have a slight extension on the lower part. In some other cases the tombstones have prominent pedestals with one, two or three descending levels, the pedestal being able to reach the stone’s height. (Pic. 87). The material the pedestal is made of can differ from the stone itself. In most cases the pedestals are simple prisms with a wider base than the rest of the stone having sometimes a scratched aspect in the setts. In some cases, through the exhausting method of this zone their decorative role has been increased. As an example, we can mention the monuments of the cemeteries from Oradea, where decorative elements of the pedestal have been identified. In this way some pedestals present a decorative element having a shape of a volute in vertical position. This appears sometimes solely on one of the pedestal’s level, some other times flanking symmetrically the upper level of the pedestal, and in its state of grace it appears diagonally situated in each of the four corners of one level of the pedestal. Another decorative element identified in the Jewish cemeteries from Oradea is the placement of a laconic epitaph on one of the arch keystone of the pedestal (Pic. 88). Some pedestals present sidewise on the lower part segments with flutings, some others have blunted margins or mouldings at the joining with the stone itself. In the old parts of the cemeteries where the old pedestals have been kept and the monument has been degraded and partially overthrown, we’ve noticed an assembling 170 Heidi M. Sypek, Esther from Bialystok, Stories from the Past, Pictures from grave stones, http://www.jewishmag.com/143mag/bialystok_poland_bagnowkajewish_cemetery/bialystok_poland_bag nowkajewish_cemetery.htm 144
