Category: Shtetls

Text and photos from Seduva Lithuania

© Wojciech Konończuk – Director, Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW), Warsaw

In Seduva, a sleepy town in northern Lithuania, one of the most interesting new museums in Europe has been established.

The story of this private project is like a fairy tale

The Hardship of Travel Compensated by Landscape Beauty

North of Kaunas begins the forested region of Samogitia, with villages and towns scattered sparsely. To the naked eye, it is clear that Lithuania’s population density is three times lower than Poland’s. Here, halfway between Šiauliai and Panevėžys, lies the three-thousand-strong Šeduva (Polish: Szadów).

The town itself has not inscribed its name in history in any special way—unlike the famous Radziwiłł seats Kėdainiai or Biržai, just an hour’s drive away. Few historic buildings remain; rather, it is dominated by contemporary, rather banal architecture, reflecting the hardships of everyday life in deep Lithuanian province.

On Šeduva’s outskirts, with a breathtaking view over meadows and forests, rises a large white building. Yet it is hard to imagine a structure more harmoniously integrated into its surroundings—fascinating at first sight.

Šeduva’s Jewish Cemetery Is an Exception

This building consists of twelve interconnected volumes, reminiscent of compact small-town houses thanks to their steep shingle-like roofs. The white architecture blends with the green landscape and the blue expanse of sky.

But before one even reaches the building, the eye is caught by the cemetery. In this part of Europe, very few Jewish shtetl cemeteries have survived. Most were destroyed by the Germans during WWII, with the destruction often completed by local Christians after 1945, who reused tombstones as building material.

Šeduva’s cemetery is an exception. On an area of over a hectare, more than a thousand tombstones remain, the oldest from the late 18th century. Until recently, they were overgrown by tall grass, with only an occasional stone protruding.

A decade ago, the gravestones were carefully restored, and the stone wall surrounding the cemetery rebuilt. Today the grounds—with its lawn trimmed like an English garden—look almost unreal. There is hardly an analogy in any other Jewish cemetery in Central or Eastern Europe.

The museum in Seduva, with the renovated Jewish cemetery in the foreground. August 2025.

A Polish Museum as Inspiration

Directly behind the cemetery wall gleams the Šeduva Jewish History Museum “The Lost Shtetl.” This astonishing building, which will surely leave its mark on architectural history, was designed by Finnish architect Rainer Mahlamäki (69), best known as chief designer of Warsaw’s POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews (2007–2011). His involvement in Šeduva is no coincidence—there are multiple references to POLIN, which has become a benchmark for Jewish history museums in this part of Europe.

Around the museum stretches a memory garden, with over 200 trees planted among flowering meadows. From a distance, the building against the cloud-streaked sky seems almost transparent. The entire complex covers more than four hectares, reflecting the ambition of the undertaking.

Filling a Gap

The Lost Shtetl tells the story of the 300-year Jewish presence in Šeduva, but also aspires to representatively depict the phenomenon of thousands of Jewish shtetls scattered across the lands of the former Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth—home to the majority of the world’s Jews at that time.

A shtetl was usually a small, semi-rural town, inhabited largely by Jews, sometimes even a majority. It was a distinct world, brutally destroyed by the Germans during WWII.

Thus, the Šeduva museum fills an important gap: major Jewish museums—from POLIN to Berlin’s Jewish Museum (opened 2001)—present mostly urban Jewish life, while shtetls remain on the margins. From its opening day (Saturday, September 20, 2025), Šeduva becomes a site of great significance.

The Story of Šeduva

Like in POLIN, visitors descend long stairs underground to the 3,400 m² exhibition space. Designed by Lithuanian curators with experts from Germany, Israel, Poland, and the U.S., the modern display tells the story of Šeduva’s Jews and of the shtetl more broadly.

There is also a small cinema screening a short film—part documentary, part fictionalized—following a Jewish family from Šeduva from the early 20th century through the Holocaust. Directed by American Roberta Grossman, it stars Polish actress Karolina Gruszka. The film is woven into the exhibition in several parts, an innovative narrative technique.

The exhibition, designed under the supervision of Ralph Appelbaum Associates (New York), features enlarged historic photos of Šeduva and its inhabitants, accompanied by historical commentary.

The white corridor ends with a glass wall, offering a view of the cemetery, meadows, and forests. This is a breath of optimism: Jewish Seduva has not been erased from memory. Lithuania, August 2025.

“If I Were a Rothschild”

The displays tell the story of economic, social, and religious life (including a synagogue interior reconstruction), placed chronologically against broader historical turning points. Visitors learn about Jewish-Christian coexistence (no pogroms occurred in the Lithuanian lands before 1941), Jewish participation in Lithuania’s independence struggles, and local history reconstructed from testimonies of survivors and descendants.

Rare historical artifacts are presented, as well as the story of mass Jewish emigration from the Russian Empire—nearly 2 million Jews, many from shtetls like Šeduva or Orla, left for the U.S. from the late 19th century onward. Poor migrants from such towns significantly contributed to building modern America.

The exhibition recalls the dream of many Šeduva Jews: “If I were a Rothschild…”

It seems Šeduva has indeed found its Rothschilds. The museum is a private initiative, funded by anonymous donors of Šeduva descent through a Swiss foundation.

A Handful of Survivors

The final part tells of the tragic end. On August 24, 1941, in a nearby forest, 664 Jews were shot—mainly by Lithuanian collaborators, assisted by just two German soldiers. After the war, none returned.

The museum boldly lists the names, photos, and biographies of 27 perpetrators—neighbours of the murdered: shoemakers, farmers, drivers, labourers. This is unprecedented, as descendants of some still live in Šeduva.

Only eleven Jews survived the massacre—two Lithuanian independence veterans, a doctor, and their families—saved by local priest Mykolas Karosas and the Paluckas family. Several dozen others survived deportation east by the Soviets or managed to flee.

The museum’s narrative is honest, showing Lithuanian collaboration in the Holocaust—still a very sensitive subject in Lithuania. A jarring note is the statement that “interwar Poland and the Soviet Union both threatened Lithuania”—an inaccurate and misleading equivalence.

A Project That Will Resonate

Architect Mahlamäki designed two symbolic passageways. One is a dark, several-meter-high corridor with a glass floor over visible vegetation—evoking the forest where Šeduva’s Jews were murdered. The other is a vast white corridor ending in a glass wall overlooking the cemetery, meadows, and forests—a breath of optimism, symbolizing that Jewish Šeduva, though meant to be erased from memory, has not vanished.

The Lost Shtetl is a visionary project—needed by Lithuania and this region of Europe. For the first time, with such scale, ambition, and financial resources, the story of shtetls is told as an integral part of Jewish, Lithuanian, and Polish history.

It is likely that Šeduva’s museum will become, after POLIN, another crucial point of reference for future Jewish exhibitions worldwide.

© Wojciech Konończuk
Director, Centre for Eastern Studies (OSW), Warsaw

Translation into English was arranged by Eli Rabinowitz, WE ARE HERE! Foundation, Perth Australia