Jews in Tallinn ca. 1400-1700

Eeva Annikki Lehtinen Although it sounds probable that Jews did live in the area, because of the difficulties they faced, they probably were not living openly Jewish lives. However will look more into it.

http://www.eja.pri.ee/Community/Community_eng.pdf

A man called Johannes is believed to be the first Jew who lived in Estonia, as it is documented. His name appears in written documents (Aeltestes Denkelbuch) for the first time in 1333 when a certain baker Johannes Jode paid five marks to the Town Council of Tallinn.

Unfortunately, what for has not been mentioned. Although Jews do not use the name Johannes and the man's Jewish origin is in doubt anyway, he has still been regarded the first Jew to settle in Estonia. Traditionally, it was referred to the word 'Jode' as a reference to Jews.

In 1411 Pawel was mentioned as the next Jew in archive documents. He had been fined for unfounded accusations. The name of this same person was mentioned again in 1413 in connection with the purchase of shop rooms in Kullassepa Street, Tallinn.

The life stories of both Johannes and Pawel will remain in the mist of history — we shall never be able to tell what happened to them. Neither do we possess any data about how many people actually expected to find their "Jewish luck" in Estonia throughout centuries. On the other hand, we know that coming to Estonia and living here was not easy for Jews. 


You might do DNA testing, but as Malka says, there does not to appear to be much on Jews in Estonia prior to the mid 1800s since they were prohibited from living in Estonia. Certainly many Prussian Jews settled in Courland to the South in the 1500s - 1700s and much more is known about the Latvian Jews. They were expelled at least once and encouraged to emigrate in the 1800s, which is how a number of them ended up in Southern Ukraine in Jewish agricultural colonies.

I suppose it's possible that individual Jews from Courland went to Estonia, assuming they were somehow granted the right to live there.

Thank you, Malka and Hatte Anne!
We were tested (my brother and I). Our YDNA is N like most Finns have, and mtDNA is U5a2e, only matches are one in Finland and one whose ancestors came from Lithuania. We have several DNA-cousins who say they are Jews, but most are distant cousins. We have ancestors in Lithuania, too, but they may be German. I have not found the common ancestors with these cousins. FTDNA calculator tells we have alittle Ashkenazi heritage, and some calculator that we have Morocco and Jemen Jews. I suppose that our Jewish ancestors lived ca ten generations ago, and maybe in our maternal line, but we don't know where they came from.

I love mysteries like this. I would definitely look at Lithuania and Latvia (Courland primarily) as possible sources of any Jewish ancestry you have. As the DNA studies show, individual male traders traveled all over the place and married local women.

Thank you Hatte Anne!

The only non Finnish mtDNA match who has Lithuanian ancestors, told that her son was told in Argentina that he could have Lithuanian Jewish ancestors. The family names they have are not very Jewish but three of five is in the register of immigrants to Argentina. This match have only HVR1 test, and FF, but she doesn't match in FF.
This is all I have.

I do know a lot about the Jewish population in Argentina since my husband's family went from Ukraine to Argentina in 1904. They were from Latvia (Courland) prior to 1840 when the Tsar moved 5000 Jews from four towns in Courland to Southern Ukraine. And before that from Prussia. There were a lot of population movements in Central and Eastern Europe and lots of families split between Latvia, Lithuania, and Ukraine, with distant relatives in Central Europe (Austro-Hungarian Empire). And lots of Lithuanian Jews went to Sweden in the early 1800s, as well as to Paris.

Thank you, Hatte Anne!

Did you see how we are related, a long path... Do you have surnames of Jewish families which went from Lithuania to Sweden? We have many cousins from Sweden who are not Forest Finns' desendants. We have some connection to Ukraine, too.

There were a lot of families who went to Sweden from Lithuania. I'll see if I can find something on the Internet. I have all 25 years of articles from Landsmen (journal of Jews from the Suwalki - Lomza regions of Poland/Lithuania, many of whom have relatives in Sweden). But Landsmen is in paper form only.