Jewish cemetery in Šmerļi

The new Jewish cemetery was founded in the mid-1920s, taking over the functions of the already filled Old Cemetery. The author of the project was the famous Jewish architect Paul Mandelstam. The layout of the cemetery was created according tohis project, the fence and the hall for mourning ceremonies were built, which have survived to this day.

In the summer of 1990, a memorial stone to Žanis Lipke and his wife Johanna, who saved more than fifty Jews during the Nazi occupation, was erected at the cemetery by theJewish community of Riga.

Among the people buried in the cemetery are philologist Naum Pereferkovich, artistsMikhail Yo and Haim Rysin, philosopher Max Schatz-Anin, composers Oskar Strok andVladimir Khvoinitsky, writer Mark Razumny, chess player Mikhail Tal, academic Yuli Anshelevich and other famous people.

The victims of the Holocaust from Eglaine and Dobele were reburied in the cemetery and a memorial to German Jews killed in Riga by the Nazis, as well as other commemorative signs are located in the cemetery.

Most of the graves in the cemetery are digitised – you can find information about the burial site, as well as photographs of gravestones on the cemetery's website.

2021:

• Two new paving stone walkways were laid.
• An information stand with a detailed plan of burial plots was installed.
• Seven unattended fallen gravestones were restored.

2020:

• Walkway improvement work was carried out.
• Work began on the restoration of unattended fallen gravestones.
• A long-term plan of measures for the improvement of the cemetery's territory and burial sites is in the process of approval.
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2019:

• The entrance group of the cemetery was renovated.