Mapping Jewish communities in Austrian Galicia
In this section of the website we offer views of individual towns with Jewish communities existing at least by the end of the 19th century. Clearly some Jewish communities had existed in the region for several centuries. According to the Encyclopedia of Jewish Life Before and During the Holocaust Jews had arrived in L’wow from Byzantium and Khazaria in the 10th century and in later centuries Jews streamed in from parts of Germany and Poland. Karaites arrived as well in the 13th century. Thus, before 1772 when this region became the Austrian province once called Galicia, Jews there already had a lengthy history.
In 1772, when Galicia was annexed to the Habsburg Empire, there were between 150,000 and 200,000 Jews living there (5–6.5% of the total population). By 1857, the number had risen to 449,000 (9.6%). In 1900, Galician Jews numbered 811,000 (11.1%) and in 1910 about 872,000 (10.9%).
See full article at the YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe.
The large scale images linked below are taken from the Second Military Survey of the Habsburg Empire (1861-1864). The provincial scale image from 1916 employs Carl Flemming's Generalkarten #13, Galizien und Nordost-Ungarn found at polona.pl.
