Sephardi Jewish couple from Sarajevo, Austria-Hungary; 1900. x
The Jewish community in Sarajevo dates from at least 1541 when Jewish merchants and traders from Thessaloniki (present-day Greece) arrived. In 1577, they built a Jewish quarter in the city which was called El Cotijo – or the courtyard. The first synagogue was built in 1581 and the present-day Sarajevo Synagogue – which is from 1902 – stands in that exact same spot after fires caused the the previous synagogues to burn down in 1679 and 1788. Jewish life in Sarajevo was nearly extinguished by the Holocaust when 85% of its up to 12,000 Jewish people were killed. Currently, less than 700 Jewish people still live in Sarajevo, but Ladino is still widely used.
