title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was born in London, son of Alfred Moss, a dentist of Bray, Berkshire, and Aileen (née Craufurd). His grandfather was Jewish, from a family that changed their surname from Moses to Moss. He was brought up at "Long White Cloud" house on the south bank of the River Thames. His father was an amateur racing driver who had come 16th in the 1924 Indianapolis 500. Aileen Moss had also been involved in motorsport, entering prewar hillclimbs at the wheel of a Singer Nine. Stirling was a gifted horse rider as was his younger sister, Pat Moss, who became a successful rally driver in her own right and also married Swedish rally driver Erik Carlsson.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was educated at several independent schools: Shrewsbury House School in Surbiton, Clewer Manor Junior School, and the linked senior school, Haileybury and Imperial Service College, located at Hertford Heath, near Hertford. He disliked school and did not attain a good academic performance. At Haileybury, he was subjected to antisemitic bullying because of his Jewish roots. He concealed the bullying from his parents and used it as "motivation to succeed". Moss received his first car, an Austin 7, from his father at the age of nine, and drove it on the fields around Long White Cloud. He purchased his own car at age 15 after he obtained a driving licence. After the Second World War, Moss was ruled exempt from doing the mandatory two-year national service for men his age because he had nephritis.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss raced from 1948 to 1962, winning 212 of the 529 races he entered, including 16 Formula One Grands Prix. He competed in as many as 62 races in a single year and drove 84 different makes of car over the course of his racing career. He preferred to race British cars, stating, "Better to lose honourably in a British car than win in a foreign one". At Vanwall, he was instrumental in breaking the German/Italian stranglehold on F1 racing (as was Jack Brabham at Cooper). He remained the English driver with the most Formula One victories until 1991 when Nigel Mansell overtook him after competing in more races.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss began his career at the wheel of his father Alfred's 328 BMW, DPX 653. Moss was one of the Cooper Car Company's first customers, using winnings from competing in horse-riding events to pay the deposit on a Cooper 500 racing car in 1948. He then persuaded his father, who opposed his racing and wanted him to be a dentist, to let him buy it. He soon demonstrated his ability with numerous wins at national and international levels, and continued to compete in Formula Three, with Coopers and Kiefts, after he had progressed to more senior categories.


title: Stirling Moss

text: His first major international race victory came on the eve of his 21st birthday at the wheel of a borrowed Jaguar XK120 in the 1950 RAC Tourist Trophy on the Dundrod circuit in Northern Ireland. He went on to win the race six more times, in 1951 (Jaguar C-Type), 1955 (Mercedes-Benz 300SLR), 1958 and 1959 (Aston Martin DBR1), and 1960 and 1961 (Ferrari 250 GT). Enzo Ferrari, the founder of Ferrari, approached Moss and offered him a Formula Two car to drive at the 1951 Bari Grand Prix before a full


title: Stirling Moss

text: -season in 1952. Moss and his father went to Apulia only to find out that the Ferrari car was to be driven by experienced driver Piero Taruffi and were incensed.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Also a competent rally driver, Moss was one of three people to have won a "Coupe d'Or" (Gold Cup) for three consecutive penalty-free runs on the Alpine Rally ("Coupe des Alpes"). He finished second in the 1952 Monte Carlo Rally driving a Sunbeam-Talbot 90 with Desmond Scannell and "Autocar" magazine editor John Cooper as co-drivers.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1954, he became the first non-American to win the 12 Hours of Sebring, sharing the Cunningham team's 1.5-liter O.S.C.A. MT4 with American Bill Lloyd.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1953 Mercedes-Benz racing boss Alfred Neubauer had spoken to Moss's manager, Ken Gregory, about the possibility of Moss's joining the Mercedes Grand Prix team. Having seen him do well in a relatively uncompetitive car, and wanting to see how he would perform in a better one, Neubauer suggested Moss buy a Maserati for the 1954 season. He bought a Maserati 250F, and although the car's unreliability prevented his scoring high points in the 1954 Drivers' Championship he qualified alongside the Mercedes front runners several times and performed well in the races. He achieved his first Formula One victory when he won the non-Championship Oulton Park International Gold Cup in the Maserati.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In the Italian Grand Prix at Monza he passed both drivers who were regarded as the best in Formula One at the time—Juan Manuel Fangio in a Mercedes and Alberto Ascari in a Ferrari—and took the lead. Ascari retired with engine problems, and Moss led until lap 68 when his engine also failed. Fangio took the victory, and Moss pushed his Maserati to the finish line. Neubauer, already impressed when Moss had tested a Mercedes-Benz W196 at Hockenheim, promptly signed him for 1955.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss's first World Championship victory was in the 1955 British Grand Prix at Aintree, a race he was also the first British driver to win. Leading a 1–2–3–4 finish for Mercedes, it was the first time he beat Fangio, his teammate and arch rival, who was also his friend and mentor. It has been suggested that Fangio sportingly allowed Moss to win in front of his home crowd. Moss himself asked Fangio repeatedly, and Fangio always replied: "No. You were just better than me that day." The same year, Moss also won the RAC Tourist Trophy, the Targa Florio (sharing the drive with Peter Collins) and the Mille Miglia.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1955 Moss won Italy's thousand-mile Mille Miglia road race, an achievement Doug Nye described as the "most iconic single day's drive in motor racing history." He was paired with motor racing journalist Denis Jenkinson, who prepared a set of pace notes for Moss, and the two completed the race in ten hours and seven minutes. "Motor Trend" headlined it as "The Most Epic Drive. Ever." Before the race, he had taken a "magic pill" given to him by Fangio, and he has commented that although he did not know what was in it, "Dexedrine and Benzedrine were commonly used in rallies. The object was simply to keep awake, like wartime bomber crews." After the win, he spent the night and the following day driving his girlfriend to Cologne, stopping for breakfast in Munich and lunch in Stuttgart.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss won the Nassau Cup at the 1956 and 1957 Bahamas Speed Week. Also in 1957 he won on the longest circuit ever to hold a World Championship Grand Prix, the Pescara Circuit, where he again demonstrated his mastery of long-distance racing. The event lasted three hours and Moss beat Fangio, who started from pole position, by a little over 3 minutes.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1958, Moss's forward-thinking attitude made waves in the racing world. Moss won the first race of the season in a rear-engined F1 car, which became the common design by 1961. At Monza that year, he raced in the "Eldorado" Maserati in the Race of Two Worlds, the first single-seater car in Europe to be sponsored by a non-racing brand—the Eldorado Ice Cream Company. This was the first case in Europe of contemporary sponsorship, with the ice cream maker's colors replacing the ones assigned by the Fédération Internationale de l’Automobile (FIA).


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss's sporting attitude cost him the 1958 Formula One World Championship. When rival Mike Hawthorn was threatened with a penalty after the Portuguese Grand Prix, Moss defended him. Hawthorn was accused of reversing on the track after spinning and stalling his car on an uphill section. Moss had shouted advice to Hawthorn to steer downhill, against traffic, to bump-start the car. Moss's quick thinking, and his defence of Hawthorn before the stewards, preserved Hawthorn's 6 points for finishing second behind Moss. Hawthorn went on to beat Moss for the championship title by one point, even though he had won only one race that year to Moss's four. Moss's loss in the championship could also be attributed to an error in communication between his pit crew and the driver at one race. A point was given for the fastest lap in each race, and the crew signaled "HAWT REC" meaning Hawthorn had set a record lap. Moss read this as "HAWT REG" and thought Hawthorn was making regular laps, so did not try to set a fast lap. The crew was supposed to signal the time of the lap, so Moss would know what he had to beat.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was as gifted in sports cars as in Grand Prix cars. To his victories in the Tourist Trophy, the Sebring 12 Hours and the Mille Miglia he added three consecutive wins (1958–1960) in the 1000 km Nürburgring, the first two in an Aston Martin (in which he did most of the driving), and the third in a Tipo 61 "birdcage" Maserati, co-driving with the American Dan Gurney. The pair lost time when an oil hose blew off, but despite the wet-weather, they made up the time and took first place.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In the 1960 Formula One season, Moss won the Monaco Grand Prix in Rob Walker's Coventry-Climax-powered Lotus 18. Seriously injured in an accident at the Burnenville curve during practice for the Belgian Grand Prix at Spa-Francorchamps, he missed the next three races but recovered sufficiently to win the final one of the season, the United States Grand Prix at Riverside, California.


title: Stirling Moss

text: For the 1961 Formula One season, run under new 1.5-litre rules, Enzo Ferrari fielded the "sharknose" Ferrari 156 with an all-new V6 engine. Moss's Climax-engined Lotus was comparatively underpowered, but he won the 1961 Monaco Grand Prix by 3.6 seconds, beating the Ferraris of Richie Ginther, Wolfgang von Trips, and Phil Hill, and went on to win the partially wet 1961 German Grand Prix.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1962, he crashed his Lotus heavily during the Glover Trophy at Goodwood held on Monday 23 April. The accident put him in a coma for a month, and for six months the left side of his body was partially paralysed. He recovered, but retired from professional racing after a private test session in a Lotus 19 the following year, when he lapped a few tenths of a second slower than before. He felt he had not regained his previously instinctive command of the car. He had been runner-up in the Drivers' Championship four years in succession, from 1955 to 1958, and third in each of the next three years.


title: Stirling Moss

text: At the Autodrome de Montlhéry, a steeply banked oval track near Paris, Moss and Leslie Johnson took turns at the wheel of the latter's Jaguar XK120 to average for 24 hours, including stops for fuel and tyres. Changing drivers every three hours, they covered a total of . It was the first time a production car had averaged over for 24 hours.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Revisiting Montlhéry, Moss was one of a four-driver team, led by Johnson, who drove a factory-owned Jaguar XK120 fixed-head coupé for 7 days and nights at the French track. Moss, Johnson, Bert Hadley and Jack Fairman averaged to take four World records and five International Class C records, and covered a total of .


title: Stirling Moss

text: In August Moss broke five International Class F records in the purpose-built MG EX181 at Bonneville Salt Flats. The streamlined, supercharged car's speed for the flying kilometer was 245.64 mph, which was the average of two runs in opposite directions.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Away from driving, in 1962 he acted as a colour commentator for ABC's "Wide World of Sports" for Formula One and NASCAR races. He eventually left ABC in 1980. Moss narrated the official 1988 Formula One season review along with Tony Jardine.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Although ostensibly retired from racing since 1962, Moss did make a number of one-off appearances in professional motorsport events in the following two decades. He also competed in the 1974 London-Sahara-Munich World Cup Rally in a Mercedes-Benz, but retired from the event in the Algerian Sahara. The Holden Torana he shared with Jack Brabham in the 1976 Bathurst 1000 was hit from behind on the grid and eventually retired with engine failure. Moss, at the wheel of the Torana when the V8 engine let go, was criticised by other drivers for staying on the racing line for over ⅔ of the 6.172 km long circuit while returning to the pits as the car was dropping large amounts of oil onto the road. He also shared a Volkswagen Golf GTI with Denny Hulme in the 1979 Benson & Hedges 500 at Pukekohe Park Raceway in New Zealand.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1980 he made a comeback to regular competition, in the British Saloon Car Championship with the works-backed GTi Engineering Audi team. For the 1980 season Moss was the team's number two driver to team co-owner Richard Lloyd. For the 1981 season Moss stayed with Audi, as the team moved to Tom Walkinshaw Racing management, driving alongside Martin Brundle.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Throughout his retirement he raced in events for historic cars, driving on behalf of and at the invitation of others, as well as campaigning his own OSCA FS 372 and other vehicles. In 2004, as part of its promotion for the new SLR, Mercedes-Benz reunited Moss with the 300 SLR "No. 722" in which he won the Mille Miglia nearly 50 years earlier. One reporter who rode with Moss that day noted that the 75-year-old driver was "so good . . . that even old and crippled [he was] still better than nearly everyone else". On 9 June 2011 during qualifying for the Le Mans Legends race, Moss announced on Radio Le Mans that he had finally retired from racing, saying that he had scared himself that afternoon. He was 81.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Lister Cars announced the building for sale of the Lister Knobbly Stirling Moss at the Royal Automobile Club in London in June 2016. The car is built to the exact specification of the 1958 model, is the only magnesium-bodied car in the world, and is the only car that was ever endorsed by Moss. Brian Lister invited Moss to drive for Lister on three separate occasions, at Goodwood in 1954, Silverstone in 1958 and at Sebring in 1959, and to celebrate these races, 10 special edition lightweight Lister Knobbly cars are being built. The company announced that the cars will be available for both road and race use, and Moss would personally be handing over each car.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In the New Year Honours 2000 List, Moss was made a Knight Bachelor for services to motor racing. On 21 March 2000, he was knighted by Prince Charles, standing in for the Queen, who was on an official visit to Australia.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 2006, Moss was awarded the FIA gold medal in recognition of his outstanding contribution to motorsport.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In December 2008, McLaren-Mercedes unveiled their final model of the Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren. The model was named in honour of Moss, hence, Mercedes McLaren SLR Stirling Moss, which has a top speed of with wind deflectors instead of a windscreen.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 2016, in an academic paper that reported a mathematical modelling study that assessed the relative influence of driver and machine, Moss was ranked the 29th best Formula One driver of all time.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Following Moss's death the Kinrara Trophy race at the Goodwood Revival meeting was renamed in his honour. It is a race for GT cars that competed before 1963.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1957, Moss published an autobiography called "In the Track Of Speed", first published by Muller, London.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 1963, motorsport author and commentator Ken Purdy published a biographical book entitled "All But My Life" about Moss (first published by William Kimber & Co, London), based on material gathered through interviews with Moss.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In 2015, when he was aged 85, Moss published a second autobiography, entitled "My Racing Life", written with motor sports writer Simon Taylor. In 2016, Philip Porter published the first volume of "Stirling Moss – The Definitive Biography" covering the period from birth up to the end of 1955, one of Moss's greatest years.


title: Stirling Moss

text: During his driving career, Moss was one of the most recognised celebrities in Britain, leading to many media appearances. In March 1958, Moss was a guest challenger on the TV panel show "What's My Line?" (episode with Anita Ekberg). In 1959 he was the subject of the TV programme "This Is Your Life". On 12 June the following year he was interviewed by John Freeman on "Face to Face"; Freeman later said that he had thought before the interview that Moss was a playboy, but in their meeting he showed "cold, precise, clinical judgement... a man who could live so close to the edge of death and danger, and trust entirely to his own judgement. This appealed to me". Moss also appeared as himself in the 1964 film "The Beauty Jungle", and was one of several celebrities with cameo appearances in the 1967 version of the James Bond film "Casino Royale". He played Evelyn Tremble's (Peter Sellers) driver.


title: Stirling Moss

text: For many years during and after his career, the rhetorical phrase "Who do you think you are, Stirling Moss?" was supposedly the standard question all British policemen asked speeding motorists. Moss relates he himself was once stopped for speeding and asked just that; he reports the traffic officer had some difficulty believing him. Moss was the subject of a cartoon biography in the magazine "Private Eye" that said he was interested in cars, women and sex, in that order. The cartoon, drawn by Willie Rushton, showed him continually crashing, having his driving licence revoked and finally "hosting television programmes on subjects he knows nothing about". It also made reference to the amnesia Moss suffered from as a result of head injuries sustained in the crash at Goodwood in 1962. Although there were complaints to the magazine about the cartoons, Moss rang "Private Eye" to ask if he could use it as a Christmas card.


title: Stirling Moss

text: He was one of the few drivers of his era to create a brand from his name for licensing purposes, which was launched when his website was revamped in 2009 with improved content. In 2004, Moss was a supporter of the UK Independence Party.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was a Mercedes-Benz Brand Ambassador, having kept a close relationship with the brand, and remained an enthusiast and collector of the brand, which includes the Mercedes-Benz W113, Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Stirling Moss among others.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was married three times. His first wife was Katie Molson; an heir to the Canadian brewer Molson. They were married in 1957 and separated three years later. His second wife was the American public relations executive Elaine Barbarino. They were married in 1964 and divorced in 1968. Their daughter Allison was born in 1967. His third wife was Susie Paine, the daughter of an old friend. They were married from 1980 until his death in 2020. Their son Elliot was born in 1980.


title: Stirling Moss

text: In April 1960, Moss was found guilty of dangerous driving. He was fined £50 and banned from driving for one year after an incident near Chetwynd, Shropshire, when he was test-driving a Mini.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss was an accomplished woodworker and craftsman, and participated in the design and construction several of his own homes.


title: Stirling Moss

text: Moss's 80th birthday, on 17 September 2009, fell on the eve of the Goodwood Revival and Lord March celebrated with an 80-car parade on each of the three days. Moss drove a different car each day: a Mercedes-Benz W196 (an open-wheel variant), the Lotus 18 in which he had won the 1961 Monaco GP, and an Aston Martin DBR1.


title: Stirling Moss

text: On 7 March 2010, Moss broke both ankles and four bones in a foot, and also chipped four vertebrae and suffered skin lesions, when he plunged down a lift shaft at his home. In December 2016, he was admitted to hospital in Singapore with a serious chest infection. As a result of this illness and a subsequent lengthy recovery period, Moss announced his retirement from public life in January 2018.


title: Buzz cut

text: A buzz cut, or wiffle cut, is a term that is used to refer to any of a variety of short hairstyles, especially where the length of hair is the same on all parts of the head. Rising to prominence initially with the advent of manual hair clippers, buzz cuts became increasingly popular in places where strict grooming conventions applied. In several nations, buzz cuts are often given to new recruits in the armed forces. However, buzz cuts are also used for stylistic reasons.


title: Buzz cut

text: Buzz cuts rose to popularity with the advent of manual hair clippers by the Serbian inventor Nikola Bizumić in the late 19th century. These clippers were widely used by barbers to chop hair close and fast. The clipper accumulates hair in locks to rapidly remove the hair from the head. This type of haircut was normal where strict grooming conventions were in effect. Buzz cut styles today include the brush cut, crew cut, and flattop.


title: Buzz cut

text: The top of a buzz cut style may be clipped a uniform short length, producing a butch cut, or into one of several geometric shapes that include the crew cut, flattop, and other short styles. Also known as a fade haircut, the back and sides are tapered short, semi-short, or medium, corresponding with different clipper guard sizes. Buzz cuts can make the face look more defined and are popular with men and boys who want a short, low-maintenance hairstyle, as well as those with thinning or receding hairlines.


title: Buzz cut

text: In countries such as Australia, China, Russia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, military recruits are given buzz cuts when they enter training; this was originally done to prevent the spread of head lice, but is now done for ease of maintenance, cooling, and uniformity.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev started dancing at the age of eight, and in 2001, moved to the United States with his professional dance partner Anya Garnis. In 2007, the couple competed on the third season of the American version of "So You Think You Can Dance", and they have since participated in the eight subsequent seasons as either choreographers or All-Star partners to the contestants.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2011, Kovalev moved to the United Kingdom to take part in the BBC's "Strictly Come Dancing" as a professional dancer. After finishing runner-up on both the ninth and tenth series with celebrity partners Chelsee Healey and Kimberley Walsh, he went on to win series twelve with his partner Caroline Flack. Despite facing backlash over her past dance experience and landing in the bottom two three times, he and his celebrity partner, Ashley Roberts, later became runners-up on the sixteenth series of the show. They currently hold the record of the highest average for any celebrity on the show – with an average of 36.9 – and another record for scoring the most perfect scores – with a total of five. Kovalev announced that 2018 was his final series on the show as he had decided to "find a new challenge" after "eight incredible years".


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: He began dancing at the age of eight, and until 2000, he competed with his partner Anya Garnis in the Amateur Latin category in Russia.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: After moving to the US, Kovalev and Garnis turned professional and from 2002 started competing in the United States, the United Kingdom and Canada. Their competitive achievements include being finalists in the US Open from 2002 to 2006.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2007, Kovalev and Garnis auditioned for season 3 of the US reality show "So You Think You Can Dance". Garnis made it to the Top 12 stage, whereas Kovalev made it all the way to the Semi-Finals. The pair have since participated in all following seasons as either choreographers or as All-Stars.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Although originally he only attended the audition to support Anya Garnis, he was asked to audition as well and together with Garnis became one of the 20 dancers chosen to compete in the show's third season from June to August 2007.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: After making it all the way to the Top 6, Kovalev was eliminated on 13 August, in the last round before the final, losing out to the two remaining males, contemporary dancers Danny Tidwell and Neil Haskell. Sabra Johnson, the remaining female contemporary dancer, went on to win the competition. Kovalev and Garnis both later took part in the "So You Think You Can Dance Tour".


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: On Season 4, Kovalev assisted Mia Michaels on a Contemporary routine, and he and his partner Anya Garnis choreographed a Cha-Cha routine performed by Courtney Galiano and Gev Manoukian.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: On Season 6, he and Garnis returned to "So You Think You Can Dance" to lead the choreography rounds during the auditions, and later that season choreographed a Jive for Russell Ferguson and Mollee Gray.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev was announced as an "All-Star" for both Season 7 and Season 8 of the show, performing all the Latin and Ballroom dances with the female finalists, including winners Lauren Froderman and Melanie Moore.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For Season 9, the following year, he returned to choreograph a Cha-cha routine for contestants Janelle Issis and Dareian Kujawa on the third week of live shows.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Finally, on 16 July 2014, Kovalev returned with Garnis to choreograph a new Jive routine for contestants Bridget Whitman and Emilio Dosal during Season 11.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In September 2011, Kovalev joined BBC's "Strictly Come Dancing" as the new professional dancer of its ninth series, replacing Jared Murillo who had left after only one series with the BBC programme. He has since reached the finals three out of five series, finishing runner-up on his first and second series, and winning on his fourth.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: As a "Strictly" professional dancer, Kovalev holds the record for most perfect scores, with a total of 13. He was also the second dancer to reach the finals three times (after Brendan Cole) as the runner up of Series 9 and 10, and the winner of Series 12.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Along with his Series 12 partner the late Caroline Flack and Series 16 partner Ashley Roberts, Kovalev holds the record for the longest consecutive run of perfect scores, after scoring a 40 for each of their last four dances. Flack and Kovalev were also the first to receive a perfect score for all three of their dances in the final.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev has received the highest score in the history of "Strictly Come Dancing" for ten of the show's eighteen dance styles and is the first "Strictly" professional dancer to receive a perfect score for the Paso Doble and also for the Tango. Furthermore, he has received a ten from at least one of the judges for all of the show's dance styles, except the Waltz.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: He holds the record for the highest score ever awarded to the Paso Doble and the Rumba, with Series 9 partner Chelsee Healey; to the Charleston and the Tango, with Series 10 partner Kimberley Walsh; to the Salsa, the Cha Cha Cha, the Charleston and the Showdance, with Series 12 partner Caroline Flack; and to the Jive, the American Smooth, the Salsa, the Showdance and the Charleston with Series 16 partner Ashley Roberts. Kovalev and Walsh also received the only perfect score for the Series 10 Fusion dance, dancing to a mashup of the Cha Cha Cha and the Tango.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The couple received the only perfect score ever awarded for the Paso Doble and made it all the way to the finals, finishing as runners-up to Harry Judd and his partner Aliona Vilani.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For the tenth series it was revealed that he would be dancing with Girls Aloud singer Kimberley Walsh.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The couple received the first perfect score ever awarded for the Tango and made it all the way to the finals, finishing as the runners-up to Olympic gymnast Louis Smith and his partner Flavia Cacace.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: By coming second, Pasha became the first male professional dancer to reach two consecutive "Strictly" finals, and the third professional dancer to do so overall after Lilia Kopylova and Aliona Vilani.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For the eleventh series, Kovalev was partnered with "Countdown" & "The Gadget Show" co-presenter, Rachel Riley.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: During their time at the competition, the couple were never at the top or bottom of the leaderboard, and on Week 6, despite receiving their highest score of the series, they were eliminated after losing out in the dance-off to Abbey Clancy and Aljaž Skorjanec.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For the twelfth series of the show in 2014, it was announced that Kovalev would partner former "The Xtra Factor" presenter, the late Caroline Flack.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The couple earned the first perfect 40 of the series for their salsa in the semi-finals, followed by an additional 3 in the finals giving them a perfect total of 120 points, a feat unmatched in the history of the competition. On 20 December 2014, the couple were crowned the champions of the series.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: As the reigning Strictly champions, The couple performed their Salsa routine a second time during the launch show of Series 13.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For the Thirteenth series of the show in 2015, Kovalev returned as the reigning Strictly champion, and was paired up with "BBC Breakfast" weather presenter Carol Kirkwood.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Although the couple regularly landed at the bottom of the leaderboard, they successfully made it seven weeks without ever being in the bottom two. Kirkwood also set a record for joint lowest scoring Rumba on the show, tied with previous contestant Fiona Phillips, with just thirteen points out of a possible forty. On their seventh and final week, they were eliminated by "EastEnders's" Kellie Bright and Kevin Clifton in the dance off.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For series fourteen Kovalev was partnered with BBC news presenter Naga Munchetty. They were eliminated in week 4 against Anastacia and Brendan Cole in unanimous decision by the judges.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For series fifteen Kovalev was paired with British actress Chizzy Akudolu. They were the first couple eliminated after losing to Brian Conley and Amy Dowden in the first dance-off of the series, on 1 October 2017.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: For Series 16, Kovalev was partnered with former The Pussycat Dolls singer, Ashley Roberts. The couple went on to become the highest scoring couple of all time.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The pair matched Kovalev's previous record, set in 2014 with his former partner Series 14 winner the late Caroline Flack, of scoring perfect 40s for all three dances in the final. They also set the records of achieving the most 40s during a series, with five, as well as the highest average score in the history of the series with 36.94.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2008, Kovalev and Garnis appeared on the sixth season of "Dancing with the Stars" in a results show performance, dancing to "Come On Over" by Jessica Simpson.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In early 2009 he again performed with Garnis on the international dance show "Superstars of Dance", representing Russia in the duet category, but they were then replaced by another couple in the 19 January episode.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In early 2010, the pair guest-choreographed for the third season of "So You Think You Can Dance Australia".


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: On 4 January 2013, Kovalev guest starred in the music video of "One Day I'll Fly Away", the lead single of "Centre Stage", his series 10 partner Kimberley Walsh's first solo album. Filming occurred on 4 January 2013 at Pinewood Studios, and the music video premiered on 17 January 2013. It features Walsh performing the song in different settings, until she is joined by Kovalev and they perform a ballet number.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In March 2013, ahead of Comic Relief's Red Nose Day 2013, comedian Miranda Hart took part in a "Strictly Extravaganza", where she attempted to dance ballroom with Kovalev, as one of her five "Miranda's Mad March" challenges.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: On 18 November 2011, Kovalev took part in a "Strictly" BBC Newsreaders programme benefiting Children in Need, where he partnered with newsreader Emily Maitlis for a group dance.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2016, Kovalev was partnered with Olympic champion rower Helen Glover for the "Strictly Come Dancing" Children in Need Strictly Special, taking place on 18 November.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: On 23 March 2012, Kovalev and his Strictly Series 9 partner Chelsee Healey took part in the Sport Relief 2012 "Strictly Come Dancing Underwater" special, in aid of Sport Relief, competing against winners Harry Judd and Aliona Vilani. After receiving even scores from the judges, the pair won the show due to head judge Len Goodman breaking the tie in their favour.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2014, during a Paralympian special for Sport Relief 2014, Kovalev was partnered with Paralympic gold medalist Hannah Cockroft. After performing a group dance with the other contestants, the couple was declared the winners by the judges.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In December 2012, Kovalev and Healey were partnered again for a Strictly Allstar group dance during the 2012 Strictly Come Dancing Christmas Special.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In December 2013, Kovalev was partnered with West End star Elaine Paige during the 2013 Strictly Christmas Special. The couple received a total of 39 points for their Cha-Cha, the highest score of the night, with only judge Len Goodman giving them a 9. They ultimately lost to comedian Rufus Hound after a vote by the studio audience.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In December 2015, the full lineup of the 2015 Christmas special featured six returning contestants, including four former champions, in a change to recent tradition. Kovalev was partnered with television and radio presenter Lisa Snowdon, who finished in third place in the sixth series of the show. The pair earned 37 points from the judges for a Quickstep to "Let It Snow!", but eventually lost to series 9 winner Harry Judd.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The celebrity lineup of the 2016 Christmas special, which like the previous year, featured six returning contestants, was announced on 7 November 2016. Kovalev was partnered with New Zealand writer and actress Pamela Stephenson, and danced the Cha-Cha to "Jump" from the "Love Actually" soundtrack. The pair earned 39 points from the judges but lost to comedian Melvin Odoom.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: The full line-up of the 2017 Christmas special, which features six returning contestants and their professional partners, was announced on 6 November 2017. Kovalev was partnered with ex-partner and Series 10 runner-up Kimberley Walsh and danced the Jive to "Run Rudolph Run". The pair earned 39 points from the judges, the highest score of the night, but lost to newscaster Katie Derham.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In August 2009, Kovalev and his partner Garnis joined the cast of Jason Gilkison's production "Burn the Floor", one of the leading ballroom based shows in the world, during its stint on Broadway. The pair succeed departing Dancing with the Stars performers Maksim Chmerkovskiy and Karina Smirnoff.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Later in 2010, the pair joined the touring company of the show from 7 September to 28 November. Kovalev left the show in the summer of 2011 to join the BBC's Strictly Come Dancing.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev and professional partner Anya Garnis started dating as teenagers in the late 1990s, after meeting in dance class in Siberia. In 2001, the couple moved to the United States together.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev started dating his former "Strictly" partner Rachel Riley in 2013, and the couple now live together in London.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In May 2019, Riley and Kovalev announced via social media that they were expecting their first child in December. The couple subsequently married in Las Vegas on 28 June 2019. Their daughter was born on 15 December 2019. They welcomed their second daughter on 5 November 2021.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: In 2007, Kovalev headlined the "So You Think You Can Dance Season 3 Live Tour", along with the other Top 10 contestants, visiting 50 cities in the United States.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Although eliminated in the Top 12 stage of the competition, his professional partner Anya Garnis was invited to take part as an alternate performer. The pair were able to perform together on the tour due to dancer Lacey Schwimmer needing a replacement in some of her routines because of an injury to her meniscus.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev took part in the "Strictly Come Dancing Live! 2012 Tour" with his celebrity partner Chelsee Healey from 20 January to 26 February, and was partnered with Series 10 finalist Dani Harmer on the "2013 Tour", starting 18 January 2013.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: He didn't take part in the "2014 Tour" with partner Rachel Riley, and the following year, he opted to focus on his own tour, with Tristan MacManus stepping in to partner with the late Caroline Flack during the "2015 Tour".


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev formed a new professional partnership with fellow Strictly professional Katya Virshilas. With their show "An evening with Katya and Pasha" they toured the UK from 27 March to 6 May 2012.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Beginning March 2015, Kovalev performed throughout Britain, with original partner Anya Garnis as his special guest, on his "Life Through Dance" Tour.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev announced his 2016 "It's All About You" tour, including 74 shows from 18 March to 12 June. Professional partner Anya Garnis guest starred once again.


title: Pasha Kovalev

text: Kovalev announced his appearance at Dancing With The Stars Weekend Friday 24th – Sunday 26 April 2020 at Celtic Manor Resort Hotel.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: Chelsy Yvonne Davy (born 13 October 1985) is a Zimbabwean businesswoman who is the owner and founder of the jewellery brand "Aya" and the travel agency "Aya Africa".


title: Chelsy Davy

text: Davy was born in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, to Charles Davy, a South African safari farmer, and Beverley Donald Davy, a former Coca-Cola model and winner of the 1973 Miss Rhodesia contest. She has a younger brother, Shaun, and grew up at her family's homestead in the Lemco Safari Area.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: Her father Charles was one of the largest private landowners in Zimbabwe, and was reported to own of land. He maintained business ties with controversial politician Webster Shamu, of whom he has said, "I am in partnership with a person who I personally like and get along with. I am not involved in politics in any way." After being criticised by the press, however, Davy sold his share in the business.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: Davy was briefly educated at Cheltenham College (not Cheltenham Ladies' College as has been widely reported) before moving to Stowe School in Buckinghamshire. She received a bachelor's degree in economics from the University of Cape Town in 2006, and a law degree (LLB) from University of Leeds in 2009. In September 2011, Davy began work as a trainee solicitor at London law firm Allen & Overy.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: After studying at the Gemological Institute of America, Davy launched a jewellery brand, Aya, in July 2016.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: In 2020, Davy announced that Aya would be branching out into the luxury travel sector to organise African holidays, in an interview with "Tatler Magazine". She then announced the launch of Aya Africa on Instagram.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: Davy had what the press described as a "turbulent" relationship with Prince Harry, a member of the British royal family. The pair met in early 2004 while Davy was a boarder at Stowe School, and were an on-again, off-again couple until May 2010. Davy announced the end of the relationship on Facebook.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: In 2011, addressing rumours of a possible reconciliation, Prince Harry publicly professed himself "100 percent single", and Chelsy, who attended the wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton on 29 April 2011, stated that she would not marry Prince Harry due to the rising incompatibility of their life choices within the relationship.


title: Chelsy Davy

text: In November 2021, private investigator Gavin Burrows claimed on a BBC documentary that Davy's communications were targeted and her voicemails were hacked in an attempt by media outlets to gather information on Prince Harry, an act for which he apologised. Burrow's claims "are yet to be tested in court and are strongly disputed" by "The Sun" and the now-defunct "News of the World".


title: John Bennett Perry

text: John Bennett Perry (born January 4, 1941) is an American actor, singer and former model. He is the father of actor Matthew Perry.


title: John Bennett Perry

text: Perry was born on January 4, 1941, in Williamstown, Massachusetts, the son of businessman, bank director and civic leader Alton L. Perry (1906–2003) and Maria (née Bennett, 1910–1970). He attended college at St. Lawrence University, where he was a member of Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity. He married twice. His first wife was Suzanne Langford, a former press secretary to Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau, with whom he fathered Matthew Perry. Perry and Langford divorced before Matthew's first birthday. He has a daughter, born 1982, with his second and current wife, Debbie.


title: John Bennett Perry

text: His stage credits include the 1967 musical, "Now Is the Time for All Good Men". He also appeared as a member of the crowd part in the “Tomorrow Belongs To Me” scene in the 1972 film "Cabaret".


title: John Bennett Perry

text: Perry has appeared in numerous films such as "Lipstick" (1976), "Midway" (1976), "The Legend of the Lone Ranger" (1981), "Only When I Laugh" (1981), "Independence Day" (1996) and "George of the Jungle" (1997), and on such television programs as "The West Wing"; "L.A. Law"; "Days of Our Lives"; "Little House on the Prairie"; "Centennial"; "240-Robert"; "Nakia"; "Falcon Crest"; "Murder, She Wrote"; "Diagnosis Murder"; and "Magnum, P.I.". He played General Douglas MacArthur in the 1989 film "Farewell to the King".


title: John Bennett Perry

text: In the 1978–79 TV season, he and Stephanie Edwards co-hosted "EveryDay", a syndicated daytime talk/variety series that also featured Murray Langston, Tom Chapin, Bob Corff and Anne Bloom. He and Edwards were both nominated for a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Host or Hostess in a Talk, Service or Variety Series.


title: John Bennett Perry

text: He appeared alongside his son, Matthew Perry, in the 1997 movie "Fools Rush In", and in the episode "My Unicorn" of the sitcom "Scrubs", each time as the father of his real-life son's character. He also appeared in an episode of "Friends", "The One with Rachel's New Dress", playing the father of Rachel Green's boyfriend Joshua.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The history of the Jews in Poland dates back at least 1,000 years. For centuries, Poland was home to the largest and most significant Ashkenazi Jewish community in the world. Poland was a principal center of Jewish culture, because of the long period of statutory religious tolerance and social autonomy which ended after the Partitions of Poland in the 18th century. During World War II there was a nearly complete genocidal destruction of the Polish Jewish community by Nazi Germany and its collaborators of various nationalities, during the German occupation of Poland between 1939 and 1945, called the Holocaust. Since the fall of communism in Poland, there has been a renewed interest in Jewish culture, featuring an annual Jewish Culture Festival, new study programs at Polish secondary schools and universities, and the opening of Warsaw's Museum of the History of Polish Jews.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: From the founding of the Kingdom of Poland in 1025 until the early years of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth created in 1569, Poland was the most tolerant country in Europe. Historians have used the label "paradisus iudaeorum" (Latin for "Paradise of the Jews"). Poland became a shelter for Jews persecuted and expelled from various European countries and the home to the world's largest Jewish community of the time. According to some sources, about three-quarters of the world's Jews lived in Poland by the middle of the 16th century. With the weakening of the Commonwealth and growing religious strife (due to the Protestant Reformation and Catholic Counter-Reformation), Poland's traditional tolerance began to wane from the 17th century. After the Partitions of Poland in 1795 and the destruction of Poland as a sovereign state, Polish Jews became subject to the laws of the partitioning powers, including the increasingly antisemitic Russian Empire, as well as Austria-Hungary and Kingdom of Prussia (later a part of the German Empire). Still, as Poland regained independence in the aftermath of World War I, it was the center of the European Jewish world with one of the world's largest Jewish communities of over 3 million. Antisemitism was a growing problem throughout Europe in those years, from both the political establishment and the general population. Throughout the interwar period, Poland supported Jewish emigration from Poland and, on the international arena, the creation of a Jewish state in Palestine. The Polish state also supported Jewish paramilitary groups such as the Haganah, Betar, and Irgun, providing them with weapons and training.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1939 at the start of World War II, Poland was partitioned between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union (see Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact). One-fifth of the Polish population perished during World War II; the 3,000,000 Polish Jews murdered in The Holocaust, who constituted 90% of Polish Jewry, made up half of all Poles killed during the war. Although the Holocaust occurred largely in German-occupied Poland, there was little collaboration with the Nazis by its citizens. Collaboration by individual Poles has been described as smaller than in other occupied countries. Examples of Polish attitudes to German atrocities varied widely, from actively risking death in order to save Jewish lives, and passive refusal to inform on them, to indifference, blackmail, and in extreme cases, participation in pogroms such as the Jedwabne pogrom.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In the post-war period, many of the approximately 200,000 Jewish survivors registered at Central Committee of Polish Jews or CKŻP (of whom 136,000 arrived from the Soviet Union) left the Polish People’s Republic for the nascent State of Israel, North America or South America. Their departure was hastened by the destruction of Jewish institutions, post-war violence and the hostility of the Communist Party to both religion and private enterprise, but also because in 1946–1947 Poland was the only Eastern Bloc country to allow free Jewish aliyah to Israel, without visas or exit permits. Most of the remaining Jews left Poland in late 1968 as the result of the "anti-Zionist" campaign. After the fall of the Communist regime in 1989, the situation of Polish Jews became normalized and those who were Polish citizens before World War II were allowed to renew Polish citizenship. The contemporary Polish Jewish community is estimated to have between 10,000 and 20,000 members. The number of people with Jewish heritage of any sort may be several times larger.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The first Jews to visit Polish territory were traders, while permanent settlement began during the Crusades. Travelling along trade routes leading east to Kyiv and Bukhara, Jewish merchants, known as Radhanites, crossed Silesia. One of them, a diplomat and merchant from the Moorish town of Tortosa in Spanish Al-Andalus, known by his Arabic name, Ibrahim ibn Yaqub, was the first chronicler to mention the Polish state ruled by Prince Mieszko I. In the summer of 965 or 966, Jacob made a trade and diplomatic journey from his native Toledo in Muslim Spain to the Holy Roman Empire and then to the Slavic countries. The first actual mention of Jews in Polish chronicles occurs in the 11th century, where it appears that Jews then lived in Gniezno, at that time the capital of the Polish kingdom of the Piast dynasty. Among the first Jews to arrive in Poland in 1097 or 1098 were those banished from Prague. The first permanent Jewish community is mentioned in 1085 by a Jewish scholar Jehuda ha-Kohen in the city of Przemyśl.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: As elsewhere in Central and Eastern Europe, the principal activity of Jews in medieval Poland was commerce and trade, including the export and import of goods such as cloth, linen, furs, hides, wax, metal objects, and slaves.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The first extensive Jewish migration from Western Europe to Poland occurred at the time of the First Crusade in 1098. Under Bolesław III (1102–1139), Jews, encouraged by the tolerant regime of this ruler, settled throughout Poland, including over the border in Lithuanian territory as far as Kyiv. Bolesław III recognized the utility of Jews in the development of the commercial interests of his country. Jews came to form the backbone of the Polish economy. Mieszko III employed Jews in his mint as engravers and technical supervisors, and the coins minted during that period even bear Hebraic markings. Jews worked on commission for the mints of other contemporary Polish princes, including Casimir the Just, Bolesław I the Tall and Władysław III Spindleshanks. Jews enjoyed undisturbed peace and prosperity in the many principalities into which the country was then divided; they formed the middle class in a country where the general population consisted of landlords (developing into "szlachta", the unique Polish nobility) and peasants, and they were instrumental in promoting the commercial interests of the land.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Another factor for the Jews to emigrate to Poland was the Magdeburg rights (or Magdeburg Law), a charter given to Jews, among others, that specifically outlined the rights and privileges that Jews had in Poland. For example, they could define their neighborhoods and economic competitors and set up monopolies. This made it very attractive for Jewish communities to pick up and move to Poland.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The first mention of Jewish settlers in Płock dates from 1237, in Kalisz from 1287 and a Żydowska (Jewish) street in Kraków in 1304.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The tolerant situation was gradually altered by the Roman Catholic Church on the one hand, and by the neighboring German states on the other. There were, however, among the reigning princes some determined protectors of the Jewish inhabitants, who considered the presence of the latter most desirable as far as the economic development of the country was concerned. Prominent among such rulers was Bolesław the Pious of Kalisz, Prince of Great Poland. With the consent of the class representatives and higher officials, in 1264 he issued a General Charter of Jewish Liberties (commonly called the Statute of Kalisz), which granted all Jews the freedom of worship, trade and travel. Similar privileges were granted to the Silesian Jews by the local princes, Prince Henry Probus of Wrocław in 1273–90, Henry of Glogow in 1274 and 1299, Henry of Legnica in 1290 – 95 and Bolko of Legnica and Wrocław in 1295. Article 31 of the Statute of Kalisz tried to rein in the Catholic Church from disseminating blood libels against the Jews, by stating: "Accusing Jews of drinking Christian blood is expressly prohibited. If despite this a Jew should be accused of murdering a Christian child, such charge must be sustained by testimony of three Christians and three Jews."


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: During the next hundred years, the Church pushed for the persecution of Jews while the rulers of Poland usually protected them. The Councils of Wrocław (1267), Buda (1279), and Łęczyca (1285) each segregated Jews, ordered them to wear a special emblem, banned them from holding offices where Christians would be subordinated to them, and forbade them from building more than one prayer house in each town. However, those church decrees required the cooperation of the Polish princes for enforcement, which was generally not forthcoming, due to the profits which the Jews' economic activity yielded to the princes.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1332, King Casimir III the Great (1303–1370) amplified and expanded Bolesław's old charter with the Wiślicki Statute. Under his reign, streams of Jewish immigrants headed east to Poland and Jewish settlements are first mentioned as existing in Lvov (1356), Sandomierz (1367), and Kazimierz near Kraków (1386). Casimir, who according to a legend had a Jewish lover named Esterka from Opoczno was especially friendly to the Jews, and his reign is regarded as an era of great prosperity for Polish Jewry, and was nicknamed by his contemporaries "King of the serfs and Jews." Under penalty of death, he prohibited the kidnapping of Jewish children for the purpose of enforced Christian baptism. He inflicted heavy punishment for the desecration of Jewish cemeteries. Nevertheless, while for the greater part of Casimir's reign Jews of Poland enjoyed tranquility, toward its close they were subjected to persecution on account of the Black Death. In 1348, the first blood libel accusation against Jews in Poland was recorded, and in 1367 the first pogrom took place in Poznań. Compared with the pitiless destruction of their co-religionists in Western Europe, however, Polish Jews did not fare badly; and the Jewish masses of Germany fled to the more hospitable cities in Poland.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: As a result of the marriage of Wladislaus II (Jagiełło) to Jadwiga, daughter of Louis I of Hungary, Lithuania was united with the kingdom of Poland. In , broad privileges were extended to Lithuanian Jews including freedom of religion and commerce on equal terms with the Christians. Under the rule of Wladislaus II, Polish Jews had increased in numbers and attained prosperity. However, religious persecution gradually increased, as the dogmatic clergy pushed for less official tolerance, pressured by the Synod of Constance. In 1349 pogroms took place in many towns in Silesia. There were accusations of blood libel by the priests, and new riots against the Jews in Poznań in 1399. Accusations of blood libel by another fanatic priest led to the riots in Kraków in 1407, although the royal guard hastened to the rescue. Hysteria caused by Black Death led to additional 14th-century outbreaks of violence against the Jews in Kalisz, Kraków and Bochnia. Traders and artisans jealous of Jewish prosperity, and fearing their rivalry, supported the harassment. In 1423 the statute of Warka forbade Jews the granting of loans against letters of credit or mortgage and limited their operations exclusively to loans made on security of moveable property. In the 14th and 15th centuries rich Jewish merchants and moneylenders leased the royal mint, salt mines and the collecting of customs and tolls. The most famous of them were Jordan and his son Lewko of Kraków in the 14th century and Jakub Slomkowicz of Luck, Wolczko of Drohobycz, Natko of Lvov, Samson of Zydaczow, Josko of Hrubieszow and Szania of Belz in the 15th century. For example, Wolczko of Drohobycz, King Ladislaus Jagiello's broker, was the owner of several villages in the Ruthenian voivodship and the soltys (administrator) of the village of Werbiz. Also, Jews from Grodno were in this period owners of villages, manors, meadows, fish ponds and mills. However, until the end of the 15th century, agriculture as a source of income played only a minor role among Jewish families. More important were crafts for the needs of both their fellow Jews and the Christian population (fur making, tanning, tailoring).


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1454 anti-Jewish riots flared up in Bohemia's ethnically-German Wrocław and other Silesian cities, inspired by a Franciscan friar, John of Capistrano, who accused Jews of profaning the Christian religion. As a result, Jews were banished from Lower Silesia. Zbigniew Olesnicki then invited John to conduct a similar campaign in Kraków and several other cities, to lesser effect.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The decline in the status of the Jews was briefly checked by Casimir IV the Jagiellonian (1447–1492), but soon the nobility forced him to issue the Statute of Nieszawa, which, among other things, abolished the ancient privileges of the Jews "as contrary to divine right and the law of the land." Nevertheless, the king continued to offer his protection to the Jews. Two years later Casimir issued another document announcing that he could not deprive the Jews of his benevolence on the basis of "the principle of tolerance which in conformity with God's laws obliged him to protect them". The policy of the government toward the Jews of Poland oscillated under Casimir's sons and successors, John I Albert (1492–1501) and Alexander the Jagiellonian (1501–1506). In 1495, Jews were ordered out of the center of Kraków and allowed to settle in the "Jewish town" of Kazimierz. In the same year, Alexander, when he was the Grand Duke of Lithuania, followed the 1492 example of Spanish rulers and banished Jews from Lithuania. For several years they took shelter in Poland until he reversed his decision eight years later in 1503 after becoming King of Poland and allowed them back to Lithuania. The next year he issued a proclamation in which he stated that a policy of tolerance befitted "kings and rulers".


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Poland became more tolerant just as the Jews were expelled from Spain in 1492, as well as from Austria, Hungary and Germany, thus stimulating Jewish immigration to the much more accessible Poland. Indeed, with the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, Poland became the recognized haven for exiles from Western Europe; and the resulting accession to the ranks of Polish Jewry made it the cultural and spiritual center of the Jewish people.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The most prosperous period for Polish Jews began following this new influx of Jews with the reign of Sigismund I the Old (1506–1548), who protected the Jews in his realm. His son, Sigismund II Augustus (1548–1572), mainly followed his father's tolerant policy and also granted communal-administration autonomy to the Jews and laid the foundation for the power of the "Qahal", or autonomous Jewish community. This period led to the creation of a proverb about Poland being a "heaven for the Jews". According to some sources, about three-quarters of all Jews lived in Poland by the middle of the 16th century. In the 16h and 17th centuries, Poland welcomed Jewish immigrants from Italy, as well as Sephardi Jews and Romaniote Jews migrating there from the Ottoman Empire. Arabic-speaking Mizrahi Jews and Persian Jews also migrated to Poland during this time. Jewish religious life thrived in many Polish communities. In 1503, the Polish monarchy appointed Rabbi Jacob Pollak the first official Rabbi of Poland. By 1551, Jews were given permission to choose their own Chief Rabbi. The Chief Rabbinate held power over law and finance, appointing judges and other officials. Some power was shared with local councils. The Polish government permitted the Rabbinate to grow in power, to use it for tax collection purposes. Only 30% of the money raised by the Rabbinate served Jewish causes, the rest went to the Crown for protection. In this period Poland-Lithuania became the main center for Ashkenazi Jewry and its "yeshivot" achieved fame from the early 16th century.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Moses Isserles (1520–1572), an eminent Talmudist of the 16th century, established his yeshiva in Kraków. In addition to being a renowned Talmudic and legal scholar, Isserles was also learned in Kabbalah, and studied history, astronomy, and philosophy. The Remuh Synagogue was built for him in 1557. "Rema" (רמ״א) is the Hebrew acronym for his name.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: After the childless death of Sigismund II Augustus, the last king of the Jagiellon dynasty, Polish and Lithuanian nobles (szlachta) gathered at Warsaw in 1573 and signed a document in which representatives of all major religions pledged mutual support and tolerance. The following eight or nine decades of material prosperity and relative security experienced by Polish Jews – wrote Professor Gershon Hundert – witnessed the appearance of "a virtual galaxy of sparkling intellectual figures." Jewish academies were established in Lublin, Kraków, Brześć (Brisk), Lwów, Ostróg and other towns. Poland-Lithuania was the only country in Europe where the Jews cultivated their own farmer's fields. The central autonomous body that regulated Jewish life in Poland from the middle of the 16th to mid-18th century was known as the Council of Four Lands.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1648, the multi-ethnic Commonwealth was devastated by several conflicts, in which the country lost over a third of its population (over three million people). The Jewish losses were counted in the hundreds of thousands. The first of these large-scale atrocities was the Khmelnytsky Uprising, in which Bohdan Khmelnytsky's Ukrainian Cossacks massacred tens of thousands of Jews and Catholic Poles in the eastern and southern areas of Polish-occupied Ukraine. The precise number of dead is not known, but the decrease of the Jewish population during this period is estimated at 100,000 to 200,000, which also includes emigration, deaths from diseases and "jasyr" (captivity in the Ottoman Empire). The Jewish community suffered greatly during the 1648 Ukrainian Cossack uprising which had been directed primarily against the Polish nobility and landlords. The Jews, perceived as allies of the Poles, were also victims of the revolt, during which about 20% of them were killed.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Ruled by the elected kings of the House of Vasa since 1587, the embattled Commonwealth was invaded by the Swedish Empire in 1655 in what became known as the Deluge. The kingdom of Poland which had already suffered from the Khmelnytsky Uprising and from the recurring invasions of the Russians, Crimean Tatars and Ottomans, became the scene of even more atrocities. Charles X of Sweden, at the head of his victorious army, overran the cities of Kraków and Warsaw. The amount of destruction, pillage and methodical plunder during the Siege of Kraków (1657) was so enormous that parts the city never again recovered. The Polish general Stefan Czarniecki defeated the Swedes in 1660. He was equally successful in his battles against the Russians. Meanwhile, the horrors of the war were aggravated by pestilence. Many Jews along with the townsfolk of Kalisz, Kraków, Poznań, Piotrków and Lublin fell victim to recurring epidemics.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: As soon as the disturbances had ceased, the Jews began to return and to rebuild their destroyed homes; and while it is true that the Jewish population of Poland had decreased, it still was more numerous than that of the Jewish colonies in Western Europe. Poland continued to be the spiritual center of Judaism. Through 1698, the Polish kings generally remained supportive of the Jews. Although Jewish losses in those events were high, the Commonwealth lost one-third of its population – approximately three million of its citizens.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The environment of the Polish Commonwealth, according to Hundert, profoundly affected Jews due to genuinely positive encounter with the Christian culture across the many cities and towns owned by the Polish aristocracy. There was no isolation. The Jewish dress resembled that of their Polish neighbor. "Reports of romances, of drinking together in taverns, and of intellectual conversations are quite abundant." Wealthy Jews had Polish noblemen at their table, and served meals on silver plates. By 1764, there were about 750,000 Jews in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The worldwide Jewish population at that time was estimated at 1.2 million.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1768, the Koliyivshchyna rebellion west of the Dnieper river in Volhynia led to ferocious murders of Polish noblemen, Catholic priests and thousands of Jews by the Ukrainian Haidamaka Cossacks. Four years later, in 1772, the military Partitions of Poland had begun between Russia, Prussia and Austria.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The culture and intellectual output of the Jewish community in Poland had a profound impact on Judaism as a whole. Some Jewish historians have recounted that the word Poland is pronounced as "Polania" or "Polin" in Hebrew, and as transliterated into Hebrew, these names for Poland were interpreted as "good omens" because "Polania" can be broken down into three Hebrew words: "po" ("here"), "lan" ("dwells"), "ya" ("God"), and "Polin" into two words of: "po" ("here") "lin" ("[you should] dwell"). The "message" was that Poland was meant to be a good place for the Jews. During the time from the rule of Sigismund I the Old until the Nazi Holocaust, Poland would be at the center of Jewish religious life. Many agreed with Rabbi David ben Shemu’el ha-Levi (Taz) that Poland was a place where "most of the time the gentiles do no harm; on the contrary they do right by Israel" ("Divre David;" 1689).


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: "Yeshivot" were established, under the direction of the rabbis, in the more prominent communities. Such schools were officially known as gymnasiums, and their rabbi principals as rectors. Important "yeshivot" existed in Kraków, Poznań, and other cities. Jewish printing establishments came into existence in the first quarter of the 16th century. In 1530 a Hebrew Pentateuch (Torah) was printed in Kraków; and at the end of the century the Jewish printing houses of that city and Lublin issued a large number of Jewish books, mainly of a religious character. The growth of Talmudic scholarship in Poland was coincident with the greater prosperity of the Polish Jews; and because of their communal autonomy educational development was wholly one-sided and along Talmudic lines. Exceptions are recorded, however, where Jewish youth sought secular instruction in the European universities. The learned rabbis became not merely expounders of the Law, but also spiritual advisers, teachers, judges, and legislators; and their authority compelled the communal leaders to make themselves familiar with the abstruse questions of Jewish law. Polish Jewry found its views of life shaped by the spirit of Talmudic and rabbinical literature, whose influence was felt in the home, in school, and in the synagogue.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In the first half of the 16th century the seeds of Talmudic learning had been transplanted to Poland from Bohemia, particularly from the school of Jacob Pollak, the creator of "Pilpul" ("sharp reasoning"). Shalom Shachna (c. 1500–1558), a pupil of Pollak, is counted among the pioneers of Talmudic learning in Poland. He lived and died in Lublin, where he was the head of the "yeshivah" which produced the rabbinical celebrities of the following century. Shachna's son Israel became rabbi of Lublin on the death of his father, and Shachna's pupil Moses Isserles (known as the "ReMA") (1520–1572) achieved an international reputation among the Jews as the co-author of the "Shulkhan Arukh", (the "Code of Jewish Law"). His contemporary and correspondent Solomon Luria (1510–1573) of Lublin also enjoyed a wide reputation among his co-religionists; and the authority of both was recognized by the Jews throughout Europe. Heated religious disputations were common, and Jewish scholars participated in them. At the same time, the "Kabbalah" had become entrenched under the protection of Rabbinism; and such scholars as Mordecai Jaffe and Yoel Sirkis devoted themselves to its study. This period of great Rabbinical scholarship was interrupted by the Chmielnicki Uprising and The Deluge.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The decade from the Cossacks' uprising until after the Swedish war (1648–1658) left a deep and lasting impression not only on the social life of the Polish-Lithuanian Jews, but on their spiritual life as well. The intellectual output of the Jews of Poland was reduced. The Talmudic learning which up to that period had been the common possession of the majority of the people became accessible to a limited number of students only. What religious study there was became overly formalized, some rabbis busied themselves with quibbles concerning religious laws; others wrote commentaries on different parts of the Talmud in which hair-splitting arguments were raised and discussed; and at times these arguments dealt with matters which were of no practical importance. At the same time, many miracle-workers made their appearance among the Jews of Poland, culminating in a series of false "Messianic" movements, most famously as Sabbatianism was succeeded by Frankism.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In this time of mysticism and overly formal Rabbinism came the teachings of Israel ben Eliezer, known as the "Baal Shem Tov", or "BeShT", (1698–1760), which had a profound effect on the Jews of Eastern Europe and Poland in particular. His disciples taught and encouraged the new fervent brand of Judaism based on "Kabbalah" known as Hasidism. The rise of Hasidic Judaism within Poland's borders and beyond had a great influence on the rise of Haredi Judaism all over the world, with a continuous influence through its many Hasidic dynasties including those of Chabad-Lubavitch, Aleksander, Bobov, Ger, Nadvorna, among others.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1742 most of Silesia was lost to Prussia. Further disorder and anarchy reigned supreme in Poland during the second half of the 18th century, from the accession to the throne of its last king, Stanislaus II Augustus Poniatowski in 1764. His election was bought by Catherine the Great for 2.5 million rubles, with the Russian army stationing only away from Warsaw. Eight years later, triggered by the Confederation of Bar against Russian influence and the pro-Russian king, the outlying provinces of Poland were overrun from all sides by different military forces and divided for the first time by the three neighboring empires, Russia, Austria, and Prussia. The Commonwealth lost 30% of its land during the annexations of 1772, and even more of its peoples. Jews were most numerous in the territories that fell under the military control of Austria and Russia.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The permanent council established at the instance of the Russian government (1773–1788) served as the highest administrative tribunal, and occupied itself with the elaboration of a plan that would make practicable the reorganization of Poland on a more rational basis. The progressive elements in Polish society recognized the urgency of popular education as the very first step toward reform. The famous "Komisja Edukacji Narodowej" ("Commission of National Education"), the first ministry of education in the world, was established in 1773 and founded numerous new schools and remodeled the old ones. One of the members of the commission, "kanclerz" Andrzej Zamoyski, along with others, demanded that the inviolability of their persons and property should be guaranteed and that religious toleration should be to a certain extent granted them; but he insisted that Jews living in the cities should be separated from the Christians, that those of them having no definite occupation should be banished from the kingdom, and that even those engaged in agriculture should not be allowed to possess land. On the other hand, some "szlachta" and intellectuals proposed a national system of government, of the civil and political equality of the Jews. This was the only example in modern Europe before the French Revolution of tolerance and broadmindedness in dealing with the Jewish question. But all these reforms were too late: a Russian army soon invaded Poland, and soon after a Prussian one followed.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: A second partition of Poland was made on 17 July 1793. Jews, in a Jewish regiment led by Berek Joselewicz, took part in the Kościuszko Uprising the following year, when the Poles tried to again achieve independence, but were brutally put down. Following the revolt, the third and final partition of Poland took place in 1795. The territories which included the great bulk of the Jewish population was transferred to Russia, and thus they became subjects of that empire, although in the first half of the 19th century some semblance of a vastly smaller Polish state was preserved, especially in the form of the Congress Poland (1815–1831).


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Under foreign rule many Jews inhabiting formerly Polish lands were indifferent to Polish aspirations for independence. However, most Polonized Jews supported the revolutionary activities of Polish patriots and participated in national uprisings. Polish Jews took part in the November Insurrection of 1830–1831, the January Insurrection of 1863, as well as in the revolutionary movement of 1905. Many Polish Jews were enlisted in the Polish Legions, which fought for the Polish independence, achieved in 1918 when the occupying forces disintegrated following World War I.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Official Russian policy would eventually prove to be substantially harsher to the Jews than that under independent Polish rule. The lands that had once been Poland were to remain the home of many Jews, as, in 1772, Catherine II, the "Tzarina" of Russia, instituted the Pale of Settlement, restricting Jews to the western parts of the empire, which would eventually include much of Poland, although it excluded some areas in which Jews had previously lived. By the late 19th century, over four million Jews would live in the Pale.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Tsarist policy towards the Jews of Poland alternated between harsh rules, and inducements meant to break the resistance to large-scale conversion. In 1804, Alexander I of Russia issued a "Statute Concerning Jews", meant to accelerate the process of assimilation of the Empire's new Jewish population. The Polish Jews were allowed to establish schools with Russian, German or Polish curricula. They could own land in the territories annexed from Poland. However, they were also restricted from leasing property, teaching in Yiddish, and from entering Russia. They were banned from the brewing industry. The harshest measures designed to compel Jews to merge into society at large called for their expulsion from small villages, forcing them to move into towns. Once the resettlement began, thousands of Jews lost their only source of income and turned to Qahal for support. Their living conditions in the Pale began to dramatically worsen.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: During the reign of Tsar Nicolas I, known by the Jews as "Haman the Second", hundreds of new anti-Jewish measures were enacted. The 1827 decree by Nicolas – while lifting the traditional double taxation on Jews in lieu of army service – made Jews subject to general military recruitment laws that required Jewish communities to provide 7 recruits per each 1000 "souls" every 4 years. Unlike the general population that had to provide recruits between the ages of 18 and 35, Jews had to provide recruits between the ages of 12 and 25, at the qahal's discretion. Thus between 1827 and 1857 over 30,000 children were placed in the so-called Cantonist schools, where they were pressured to convert. "Many children were smuggled to Poland, where the conscription of Jews did not take effect until 1844."


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The "Pale of Settlement" (, , , , , ) was the term given to a region of Imperial Russia in which permanent residency by Jews was allowed and beyond which Jewish permanent residency was generally prohibited. It extended from the eastern "pale", or demarcation line, to the western Russian border with the Kingdom of Prussia (later the German Empire) and with Austria-Hungary.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The archaic English term "pale" is derived from the Latin word , a stake, extended to mean the area enclosed by a fence or boundary.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: With its large Catholic and Jewish populations, the Pale was acquired by the Russian Empire (which was a majority Russian Orthodox) in a series of military conquests and diplomatic maneuvers between 1791 and 1835, and lasted until the fall of the Russian Empire in 1917. It comprised about 20% of the territory of European Russia and mostly corresponded to historical borders of the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth; it covered much of present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Poland, Moldova, Ukraine, and parts of western Russia.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: From 1791 to 1835, and until 1917, there were differing reconfigurations of the boundaries of the Pale, such that certain areas were variously open or shut to Jewish residency, such as the Caucasus. At times, Jews were forbidden to live in agricultural communities, or certain cities, as in Kyiv, Sevastopol and Yalta, excluded from residency at a number of cities within the Pale. Settlers from outside the pale were forced to move to small towns, thus fostering the rise of the "shtetls".


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Although the Jews were accorded slightly more rights with the Emancipation reform of 1861 by Alexander II, they were still restricted to the Pale of Settlement and subject to restrictions on ownership and profession. The existing status quo was shattered with the assassination of Alexander in 1881 – an act falsely blamed upon the Jews.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The assassination prompted a large-scale wave of anti-Jewish riots, called "pogroms" (;) throughout 1881–1884. In the 1881 outbreak, pogroms were primarily limited to Russia, although in a riot in Warsaw two Jews were killed, 24 others were wounded, women were raped and over two million rubles worth of property was destroyed. The new czar, Alexander III, blamed the Jews for the riots and issued a series of harsh restrictions on Jewish movements. Pogroms continued until 1884, with at least tacit government approval. They proved a turning point in the history of the Jews in partitioned Poland and throughout the world. In 1884, 36 Jewish Zionist delegates met in Katowice, forming the Hovevei Zion movement. The pogroms prompted a great wave of Jewish emigration to the United States.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: An even bloodier wave of pogroms broke out from 1903 to 1906, at least some of them believed to have been organized by the Tsarist Russian secret police, the "Okhrana". They included the Białystok pogrom of 1906 in the Grodno Governorate of Russian Poland, in which at least 75 Jews were murdered by marauding soldiers and many more Jews were wounded. According to Jewish survivors, ethnic Poles did not participate in the pogrom and instead sheltered Jewish families.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The Jewish Enlightenment, "Haskalah", began to take hold in Poland during the 19th century, stressing secular ideas and values. Champions of "Haskalah", the "Maskilim", pushed for assimilation and integration into Russian culture. At the same time, there was another school of Jewish thought that emphasized traditional study and a Jewish response to the ethical problems of antisemitism and persecution, one form of which was the Musar movement. Polish Jews generally were less influenced by "Haskalah", rather focusing on a strong continuation of their religious lives based on Halakha ("rabbis's law") following primarily Orthodox Judaism, Hasidic Judaism, and also adapting to the new Religious Zionism of the Mizrachi movement later in the 19th century.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: By the late 19th century, "Haskalah" and the debates it caused created a growing number of political movements within the Jewish community itself, covering a wide range of views and vying for votes in local and regional elections. Zionism became very popular with the advent of the "Poale Zion" socialist party as well as the religious Polish Mizrahi, and the increasingly popular General Zionists. Jews also took up socialism, forming the Bund labor union which supported assimilation and the rights of labor. The Folkspartei (People's Party) advocated, for its part, cultural autonomy and resistance to assimilation. In 1912, "Agudat Israel", a religious party, came into existence.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Many Jews took part in the Polish insurrections, particularly against Russia (since the Tsars discriminated heavily against the Jews). The Kościuszko Insurrection (1794), November Insurrection (1830–31), January Insurrection (1863) and Revolutionary Movement of 1905 all saw significant Jewish involvement in the cause of Polish independence.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: During the Second Polish Republic period, there were several prominent Jewish politicians in the Polish Sejm, such as Apolinary Hartglas and Yitzhak Gruenbaum. Many Jewish political parties were active, representing a wide ideological spectrum, from the Zionists, to the socialists to the anti-Zionists. One of the largest of these parties was the Bund, which was strongest in Warsaw and Lodz.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In addition to the socialists, Zionist parties were also popular, in particular, the Marxist Poale Zion and the orthodox religious Polish Mizrahi. The General Zionist party became the most prominent Jewish party in the interwar period and in the 1919 elections to the first Polish Sejm since the partitions, gained 50% of the Jewish vote.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1914, the German Zionist Max Bodenheimer founded the short-lived German Committee for Freeing of Russian Jews, with the goal of establishing a buffer state ("Pufferstaat") within the Jewish Pale of Settlement, composed of the former Polish provinces annexed by Russia, being "de facto" protectorate of the German Empire that would free Jews in the region from Russian oppression. The plan, known as the League of East European States, soon proved unpopular with both German officials and Bodenheimer's colleagues, and was dead by the following year.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: While most Polish Jews were neutral to the idea of a Polish state, many played a significant role in the fight for Poland's independence during World War I; around 650 Jews joined the "Legiony Polskie" formed by Józef Piłsudski, more than all other minorities combined. Prominent Jews were among the members of KTSSN, the nucleus of the interim government of re-emerging sovereign Poland including Herman Feldstein, Henryk Eile, "Porucznik" Samuel Herschthal, Dr. Zygmunt Leser, Henryk Orlean, Wiktor Chajes and others. The donations poured in including 50,000 Austrian kronen from the Jews of Lwów and the 1,500 cans of food donated by the Blumenfeld factory among similar others. A Jewish organization during the war that was opposed to Polish aspirations was the Komitee für den Osten (Kfdo)(Committee for the East) founded by German Jewish activists, which promoted the idea of Jews in the east becoming "spearhead of German expansionism" serving as "Germany's reliable vassals" against other ethnic groups in the region and serving as "living wall against Poles separatists aims".


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In the aftermath of the Great War localized conflicts engulfed Eastern Europe between 1917 and 1919. Many attacks were launched against Jews during the Russian Civil War, the Polish-Ukrainian War, and the Polish–Soviet War ending with the Treaty of Riga. Almost half of the Jewish men perceived to have supported the Bolshevik Russia in these incidents were in their 20s. Just after the end of World War I, the West became alarmed by reports about alleged massive pogroms in Poland against Jews. Pressure for government action reached the point where U.S. President Woodrow Wilson sent an official commission to investigate the matter. The commission, led by Henry Morgenthau, Sr., concluded in its Morgenthau Report that allegations of pogroms were exaggerated. It identified eight incidents in the years 1918–1919 out of 37 mostly empty claims for damages, and estimated the number of victims at 280. Four of these were attributed to the actions of deserters and undisciplined individual soldiers; none was blamed on official government policy. Among the incidents, during the battle for Pińsk a commander of Polish infantry regiment accused a group of Jewish men of plotting against the Poles and ordered the execution of thirty-five Jewish men and youth. The Morgenthau Report found the charge to be "devoid of foundation" even though their meeting was illegal to the extent of being treasonable. In the Lwów (Lviv) pogrom, which occurred in 1918 during the Polish–Ukrainian War of independence a day after the Poles captured Lviv from the Sich Riflemen – the report concluded – 64 Jews had been killed (other accounts put the number at 72).


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In Warsaw, soldiers of Blue Army assaulted Jews in the streets, but were punished by military authorities. Many other events in Poland were later found to have been exaggerated, especially by contemporary newspapers such as "The New York Times", although serious abuses against the Jews, including pogroms, continued elsewhere, especially in Ukraine. The above-mentioned atrocities committed by the young Polish army and its allies in 1919 during their Kiev operation against the Bolsheviks had a profound impact on the foreign perception of the re-emerging Polish state. The result of the concerns over the fate of Poland's Jews was a series of explicit clauses in the Versailles Treaty signed by the Western powers, and President Paderewski, protecting the rights of minorities in new Poland including Germans. In 1921, Poland's March Constitution gave the Jews the same legal rights as other citizens and guaranteed them religious tolerance and freedom of religious holidays.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The number of Jews immigrating to Poland from Ukraine and Soviet Russia during the interwar period grew rapidly. Jewish population in the area of former Congress of Poland increased sevenfold between 1816 and 1921, from around 213,000 to roughly 1,500,000. According to the Polish national census of 1921, there were 2,845,364 Jews living in the Second Polish Republic; but, by late 1938 that number had grown by over 16% to approximately 3,310,000. The average rate of permanent settlement was about 30,000 per annum. At the same time, every year around 100,000 Jews were passing through Poland in unofficial emigration overseas. Between the end of the Polish–Soviet War and late 1938, the Jewish population of the Republic had grown by over 464,000.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The newly independent Second Polish Republic had a large and vibrant Jewish minority. By the time World War II began, Poland had the largest concentration of Jews in Europe although many Polish Jews had a separate culture and ethnic identity from Catholic Poles. Some authors have stated that only about 10% of Polish Jews during the interwar period could be considered "assimilated" while more than 80% could be readily recognized as Jews.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: According to the 1931 National Census there were 3,130,581 Polish Jews measured by the declaration of their religion. Estimating the population increase and the emigration from Poland between 1931 and 1939, there were probably 3,474,000 Jews in Poland as of 1 September 1939 (approximately 10% of the total population) primarily centered in large and smaller cities: 77% lived in cities and 23% in the villages. They made up about 50%, and in some cases even 70% of the population of smaller towns, especially in Eastern Poland. Prior to World War II, the Jewish population of Łódź numbered about 233,000, roughly one-third of the city's population. The city of Lwów (now in Ukraine) had the third-largest Jewish population in Poland, numbering 110,000 in 1939 (42%). Wilno (now in Lithuania) had a Jewish community of nearly 100,000, about 45% of the city's total. In 1938, Kraków's Jewish population numbered over 60,000, or about 25% of the city's total population. In 1939 there were 375,000 Jews in Warsaw or one-third of the city's population. Only New York City had more Jewish residents than Warsaw.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The major industries in which Polish Jews were employed were manufacturing and commerce. In many areas of the country, the majority of retail businesses were owned by Jews, who were sometimes among the wealthiest members of their communities.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Many Jews also worked as shoemakers and tailors, as well as in the liberal professions; doctors (56% of all doctors in Poland), teachers (43%), journalists (22%) and lawyers (33%).


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Jewish youth and religious groups, diverse political parties and Zionist organizations, newspapers and theatre flourished. Jews owned land and real estate, participated in retail and manufacturing and in the export industry. Their religious beliefs spanned the range from Orthodox Hasidic Judaism to Liberal Judaism.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The Polish language, rather than Yiddish, was increasingly used by the young Warsaw Jews who did not have a problem in identifying themselves fully as Jews, Varsovians and Poles. Jews such as Bruno Schulz were entering the mainstream of Polish society, though many thought of themselves as a separate nationality within Poland. Most children were enrolled in Jewish religious schools, which used to limit their ability to speak Polish. As a result, according to the 1931 census, 79% of the Jews declared Yiddish as their first language, and only 12% listed Polish, with the remaining 9% being Hebrew. In contrast, the overwhelming majority of German-born Jews of this period spoke German as their first language. During the school year of 1937–1938 there were 226 elementary schools and twelve high schools as well as fourteen vocational schools with either Yiddish or Hebrew as the instructional language. Jewish political parties, both the Socialist General Jewish Labour Bund (The Bund), as well as parties of the Zionist right and left wing and religious conservative movements, were represented in the "Sejm" (the Polish Parliament) as well as in the regional councils.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: The Jewish cultural scene was particularly vibrant in pre–World War II Poland, with numerous Jewish publications and more than one hundred periodicals. Yiddish authors, most notably Isaac Bashevis Singer, went on to achieve international acclaim as classic Jewish writers; Singer won the 1978 Nobel Prize in Literature. His brother Israel Joshua Singer was also a writer. Other Jewish authors of the period, such as Bruno Schulz, Julian Tuwim, Marian Hemar, Emanuel Schlechter and Bolesław Leśmian, as well as Konrad Tom and Jerzy Jurandot, were less well known internationally, but made important contributions to Polish literature. Some Polish writers had Jewish roots e.g. Jan Brzechwa (a favorite poet of Polish children). Singer Jan Kiepura, born of a Jewish mother and Polish father, was one of the most popular artists of that era, and pre-war songs of Jewish composers, including Henryk Wars, Jerzy Petersburski, Artur Gold, Henryk Gold, Zygmunt Białostocki, Szymon Kataszek and Jakub Kagan, are still widely known in Poland today. Painters became known as well for their depictions of Jewish life. Among them were Maurycy Gottlieb, Artur Markowicz, and Maurycy Trebacz, with younger artists like Chaim Goldberg coming up in the ranks.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Many Jews were film producers and directors, e.g. Michał Waszyński ("The Dybbuk)", Aleksander Ford ("Children Must Laugh").


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: Scientist Leopold Infeld, mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, Alfred Tarski, and professor Adam Ulam contributed to the world of science. Other Polish Jews who gained international recognition are Moses Schorr, Ludwik Zamenhof (the creator of Esperanto), Georges Charpak, Samuel Eilenberg, Emanuel Ringelblum, and Artur Rubinstein, just to name a few from the long list. The term "genocide" was coined by Rafał Lemkin (1900–1959), a Polish-Jewish legal scholar. Leonid Hurwicz was awarded the 2007 Nobel Prize in Economics. The YIVO (Jidiszer Wissenszaftlecher Institute) Scientific Institute was based in Wilno before transferring to New York during the war. In Warsaw, important centers of Judaic scholarship, such the Main Judaic Library and the Institute of Judaic Studies were located, along with numerous Talmudic Schools (Jeszybots), religious centers and synagogues, many of which were of high architectural quality. Yiddish theatre also flourished; Poland had fifteen Yiddish theatres and theatrical groups. Warsaw was home to the most important Yiddish theater troupe of the time, the Vilna Troupe, which staged the first performance of "The Dybbuk" in 1920 at the Elyseum Theatre. Some future Israeli leaders studied at University of Warsaw, including Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Shamir.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: There also were several Jewish sports clubs, with some of them, such as Hasmonea Lwow and Jutrzenka Kraków, winning promotion to the Polish First Football League. A Polish-Jewish footballer, Józef Klotz, scored the first ever goal for the Poland national football team. Another athlete, Alojzy Ehrlich, won several medals in the table-tennis tournaments. Many of these clubs belonged to the Maccabi World Union.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: An ever-increasing proportion of Jews in interwar Poland lived separate lives from the Polish majority. In 1921, 74.2% of Polish Jews listed Yiddish or Hebrew as their native language; the number rose to 87% by 1931, contributing to growing tensions between Jews and Poles. Jews were often not identified as Polish nationals, a problem caused not only by the reversal of assimilation shown in national censuses between 1921 and 1931, but also by the influx of Russian Jews escaping persecution—especially in Ukraine, where up to 2,000 pogroms took place during the Civil War, an estimated 30,000 Jews were massacred directly, and a total of 150,000 died. A large number of Russian Jews emigrated to Poland, as they were entitled by the Peace treaty of Riga to choose the country they preferred. Several hundred thousand refugees joined the already numerous Jewish minority of the Polish Second Republic. The resulting economic instability was mirrored by anti-Jewish sentiment in some of the media; discrimination, exclusion, and violence at the universities; and the appearance of "anti-Jewish squads" associated with some of the right-wing political parties. These developments contributed to a greater support among the Jewish community for Zionist and socialist ideas, coupled with attempts at further migration, curtailed only by the British government. Notably, the "campaign for Jewish emigration was predicated not on antisemitism but on objective social and economic factors". However, regardless of these changing economic and social conditions, the increase in antisemitic activity in prewar Poland was also typical of antisemitism found in other parts of Europe at that time, developing within a broader, continent-wide pattern with counterparts in every other European country.


title: History of the Jews in Poland

text: In 1925, Polish Zionist members of the Sejm capitalized on governmental support for Zionism by negotiating an agreement with the government known as the Ugoda. The Ugoda was an agreement between the Polish prime minister Władysław Grabski and Zionist leaders in eastern Galicia, including Leon Reich. The agreement granted certain cultural and religious rights to Jews in exchange for Jewish support for Polish nationalist interests; however, the Galician Zionists had little to show for their compromise because the Polish government later refused to honor many aspects of the agreement. During the 1930s, Revisionist Zionists viewed the Polish government as an ally and promoted cooperation between Polish Zionists and Polish nationalists, despite the antisemitism of the Polish government.