Les Juifs de Féodosia (Kaffa)

Kaffa (Feodosia), a former Genoese trading post on the Crimean coast, sheltered one of the oldest Jewish presences on the peninsula, attested for a long time and composed of several groups: Greek-speaking Romaniotes, Turkic-speaking Krymchaks of rabbinical rite, and Karaites. A commercial crossroads of the Black Sea under Genoese and then Ottoman domination, the city offered Jews a role in trade. The community later experienced integration into the Russian Empire. During the German occupation of Crimea in 1941–1942, the Jews of the city, in particular the Krymchaks, were massacred by the Einsatzgruppen, and the community was almost entirely annihilated.

Sources & resources

• The YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe ↗
• Encyclopaedia Judaica — 2e éd., Keter/Macmillan