A new issue of the journal Judaica Bohemiae (Vol. 52/2017, 1) came out at the end of June 2017. The opening study, by Iveta Cermanová, summarizes the present state of knowledge on the fate of Prague Jews during the War of the Austrian Succession at the beginning of the reign of Maria Theresa, and on their alleged collaboration with the enemy – which became a pretext for two pogroms in 1744 and for the expulsion of the Jews from the Bohemian lands. It explores the contemporary Jewish and non-Jewish sources on these events and presents a previously unknown source – the family megillah of Joseph Kirschner Shohet (1717–1766) – which describes the author’s tragic experience during the second Prague pogrom in November 1744. The following study by Magda Veselská, entitled Early Documentation of the Shoah in the Czech Lands: The Documentation Project and the Prague Jewish Museum (1945–1947), deals with the activities of individuals who gathered authentic documents during and shortly after the Second World War in order to record contemporary events and, above all, the persecution of Jews. It draws particular attention to the post-war gathering of documents and testimonies by individuals and the group around Zeev Shek (as part of the Documentation Project), and to the involvement of the Prague Jewish Museum in this work. In the ‘Documents’ section, a study by Petr Vítámvás critically assesses hitherto opinions on the beginnings of Jewish settlement in Boskovice in the Middle Ages and, by analyzing records on Jews in Boskovice municipal books, shows that Jewish settlement did not start there until the 16th century.

In the ‘Reports’ section, V. Hamáčková and A. Putík provide an overview of the life and work of Jan Heřman (1933–1986), a historian, archivist and first editor of Judaica Bohemiae, who died just over 20 years ago; Lenka Uličná provides information about a long-term project of the Jewish Museum in Prague involving the comprehensive processing of genizah finds in Bohemia and Moravia, and focuses on the preliminary research that is part of this project – the processing of finds from the Rychnov nad Kněžnou genizah; István Pál Ádám gives an overview of the conference “The Holocaust and its Aftermath from the Family Perspective”, which was held in Prague on 15–16 March 2017.

The final section of the journal contains reviews of the following books: Juden in der mittelalterlichen Stadt. Der städtische Raum im Mittelalter ‒ Ort des Zusammenlebens und des Konflikts / Jews in the Medieval Town. Urban Space in the Middle Ages ‒ A Place of Coexistence and Conflicts by Eva Doležalová et al (reviewed by Helmut Teufel); “Avigdor, Benesch, Gitl.” Juden in Böhmen, Mähren und Schlesien im Mittelalter. Samuel Steinherz zum Gedenken (1857 Güssing – 1942 Theresienstadt) by Helmut Teufel et al (reviewed by Ivan Hlaváček); Bürger zweiter Klasse? Juden auf dem Land in Preußen, Lothringen und Luxemburg by Stephanie Schlesier (reviewed by Ines Koeltzsch); Židovské identity v Československu před 2. světovou válkou a po ní [Jewish Identity in Czechoslovakia before and after the Second World War] by Michaela Peroutková (reviewed by Alena Heitlinger).