overview opening hours admission about the place The Jewish cemetery is a significant historical monument. There were over 40,000 persons buried here, among them many important rabbis and intellectuals. Mighty, representative tombstones mark the graves of the first Jewish entrepreneurs. There are Baroque and Empire tombstones in the cemetery, as well as tombstones decorated in the historicizing styles. opening hours january—december mon—thu 9:00—17:00 fri 9:00—16:00 sat closed sun 9:00—17:00 It is closed on Saturdays and Jewish holidays. more about opening hours admission free více o vstupném admission free opening hours january—december mon—thu 9:00—17:00 fri 9:00—16:00 sat closed sun 9:00—17:00 It is closed on Saturdays and Jewish holidays. history The Old Jewish Cemetery at Žižkov, also known as the First Israelite Cemetery at Olšany, was established in 1680 as a plague burial ground for Prague’s Jewish community. Burials also took place here during another plague in the second decade of the eighteenth century. Following the prohibition of burials within the city in 1787, the cemetery came into regular use and remained in operation until 1890. The cemetery is an important site of both historical and artistic significance. Around 40,000 people were buried here, including many prominent rabbis and scholars. The most frequently visited grave is that of Chief Rabbi of Prague Ezekiel Landau, also known as Noda bi-Yehuda (1713—1793) [8]. In 1993, to mark the anniversary of his death, his tombstone and those of other members of his family were fully restored. Other prominent Jewish figures buried here include representatives of the Enlightenment and the modern Jewish intelligentsia, such as Landau’s pupil and member of the rabbinical college Eleazar Fleckeles (1754—1826) [15]; the physician Jonas Jeiteles (1735—1806) [2]; his son Baruch Jeiteles (1762—1813) [4]; and the historian David Podiebrad (1803—1882) [18]. Imposing tombstones mark the graves of some of the earliest Jewish entrepreneurs, including Joachim Popper (1721—1795) [9] and members of the Jerusalem [10, 11, 12], Pribram [13, 14] and Dormitzer [16] families. The cemetery also traces the development of funerary art, from Baroque tombstones through imposing Empire-style monuments and headstones decorated in various historicist styles to the more conventional forms of the second half of the nineteenth century. The cemetery originally covered a much larger area than the surviving section with tombstones that is now open to the public. Most of it was cleared in the early 1960s and converted into a park, now known as Mahler Gardens. In the second half of the 1980s, the communist regime devastated the cemetery during the construction of the Žižkov Television Tower. A large part of the burial ground was dug up, tombstones were knocked over and broken, and the remainder was covered with soil and converted into a park. In 1999, the Jewish Museum in Prague took over the surviving section of the cemetery on Fibichova Street, which is protected as a cultural monument. Following essential building work and initial restoration, the cemetery opened to the public in September 2001. However, work continued to restore the tombstones, and by the end of 2013 a total of 164 headstones and four raised tombs had been restored. The cemetery is now managed by the Jewish Community of Prague.