Grigorescu, Felicia: Forme de artă în cimitire evreieşti din nord-vestul Romaniei (Satu Mare, 2013)
Glosar de termeni
temple of the LORD... two rows of pomegranates for each network decorating the bowlshaped capitals on top of the pillars . They are sometimes made of bunches of bay laurel or woven wheat ear, bound around with a ribbon. In this form, they appear only at the important personalities of the community. On the common stones, they appear in varied forms: either two branches that cross their petiole and curve their branches, or as a circularly curved branch. Usually, the shape of the leaves is oval, but there are also representations with round or rhombic petals (Pic. 77). In the cemetery, the circlets are usually a contour for the Hebraic abbreviation of the formula here rests. Rarely, it can include another type of decorum, as well. The tulip. Mentioned in Cynthia Crewe’s paper, the tulip is rarer than the rest of the identified motifs and it appears in areas that have a significant percentage of the Hungarian ethnic group (Halmeu, Carei, from the Satu Mare County); we consider it to be a loan from the Hungarian ethnographic iconography. 4. Zoomorphic decorative elements Just as well as the vegetal motifs, the zoomorphic ones also send the observer into the Judaic antiquity, as they were primordially used in the purpose of identitary definition, but also in order to underline some features of the deceased, shown through zoomorphic symbols. In the cemeterial area, these symbols do exist, but they are rare and are lost in the mass of the monuments in the great cemeteries. The ones that were identified are mainly in the rural cemeteries, but they also appear in the urban cemeteries, more frequent in Satu Mare. In the zoophorus in the area, the lion, the deer, the bear and various birds were more frequently identified. In a rural cemetery, in Turulung, the head of a ruminant animal was identified on one of the gravestones. The dove. Among the identified birds, the dove is the most frequent of all. It appears mainly in connection with the renewal of the Earth after the Great Flood: Also he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters were abated from off the face of the groun.* 159. The association is unmistakable when the bird appears with a ramie in its pecker. It was also identified without it, on a branch, which sometimes has, besides leaves, fruit, as well. Simple compositions with animals rarely appear: a dove on a branch with leaves and flowers or a lion in a rampant position in front of a temple. The dove frequently appears in connection with vegetal shapes160, as in the case of the gravestone from the old cemetery in Oradea (Pic. 78). The lion. The presence of this animal in the sinagogical and cemeterial art is undoubtedly a modality of an identitary defining in this area, in which this animal does not live. It is a zoomorphic decorative element which rarely appears. In North-West Romania we might identify it especially in the sinagogal art. In the cemetery, it is associated with the Jewish name Ari. But its perenniality is given by the association with The Bible, I Kings 7: 40-42 159 Ibidem, Genesis 8: 8 160 Silviu Sanie, Dăinuire..., p. 236 139
