Kazimierz Jewish Quarter and Former Ghetto Guided Walking Tour Krakow

Kazimierz, Krakow's Historic Jewish Quarter

Kazimierz was founded in 1335 by King Casimir the Great as a separate royal town on an island in the Vistula, and it carries his name to this day. Jews expelled from the old centre of Krakow at the end of the 15th century settled in its north-eastern corner, and for more than four centuries the district was one of the great centres of Jewish learning and trade in Europe. It only became part of Krakow in 1800.

On a Kazimierz walking tour you see how that history is written into the streets: Gothic churches on one side, synagogues and former prayer houses on the other, courtyards, old shop signs and small squares. Today the quarter is also lively, with galleries, bookshops and cafes, and every summer it hosts a well-known Jewish culture festival. Is Kazimierz worth visiting? For anyone who wants to understand Krakow beyond the Main Market Square, it is essential.

The Old Synagogue and Szeroka Street

The tour begins at the Old Synagogue at the southern end of Szeroka Street. Built in the 15th century and rebuilt in Renaissance style after a fire in 1557, it is the oldest surviving synagogue building in Poland and one of the oldest in Europe. Devastated during the German occupation, it was restored after the war and now houses a museum on the history and culture of Krakow's Jews.

Szeroka, meaning wide, is less a street than a long square, and it was the centre of Jewish Kazimierz. Our guide explains how the community was organised, where the ritual bath and the Jewish town hall stood, and why the old houses here look so different from those in the Old Town. Allow time for photographs: the lime trees, the low facades and the synagogue at the end make it one of the most atmospheric corners of the city.

Remuh Synagogue and the Old Jewish Cemetery

At the northern end of Szeroka stands the Remuh Synagogue, a small building from the 16th century that is still used for prayer today. Behind it lies the Remuh Cemetery, one of the oldest Jewish burial grounds in Poland, with Renaissance tombstones carved with symbols such as hands raised in blessing, lions and crowns. During the war it was badly damaged; after 1945 broken fragments were gathered into a moving memorial wall along the cemetery boundary.

The guided walk stops outside and tells the story of the rabbis and scholars buried here. If you want to go inside, the synagogue and cemetery work with their own small entrance tickets, paid on site, and they are closed on Saturdays and Jewish holidays. Men are asked to cover their heads; a simple cap is fine. The Holocaust memorial on Szeroka, a quiet place of remembrance, is also part of this section of the tour.

Ashkenazi and Sephardic Stories in the Lanes of Kazimierz

Between Szeroka and the old Christian part of Kazimierz runs a web of narrow streets, among them Józefa, Izaaka, Kupa and Miodowa, each linked with a synagogue, a school or a family business. Here our guide explains who the Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews were, how their customs differed, and how Krakow's community combined religious scholarship, crafts and commerce over the centuries.

You pass several of the district's surviving synagogues, including the Tempel Synagogue on Miodowa Street and the 17th-century Isaac Synagogue, and learn how many of these buildings were turned into workshops or warehouses during and after the war. The walk also touches on daily life before 1939, when roughly a quarter of Krakow's population was Jewish. It is the part of the Jewish Quarter Krakow tour where the past feels closest, because so much of the old street plan survives.

Podgorze and the Former Krakow Ghetto

In March 1941 the German occupiers forced the Jews of Krakow out of Kazimierz and into a small walled area across the river in Podgorze. Around 15,000 people were crowded into a few streets, behind walls whose top edge was shaped like tombstones. Between 1942 and March 1943 the ghetto was emptied in brutal deportations, most of them to the Belzec extermination camp, and the remaining people were sent to the Plaszow camp or murdered on the spot.

The walk crosses the Vistula to this district, which looks ordinary today and is easy to pass without noticing. With our guide you learn where the ghetto gates stood, how families lived several to a room, and how a Polish pharmacist kept his shop open inside the ghetto and helped its residents. This is the most sombre part of the Krakow ghetto tour, and the guide tells it with care and respect.

Ghetto Heroes Square and the Empty-Chair Memorial

The tour ends on Ghetto Heroes Square, the former Plac Zgody, where residents were assembled before deportation. In 2005 the square was transformed into a memorial: oversized bronze chairs stand empty across the paving, with smaller chairs at the tram stops, recalling the furniture and belongings left behind when the ghetto was cleared. It is one of the most powerful memorials in Krakow, simple and silent.

On one side of the square is the Pharmacy under the Eagle, today a museum about the ghetto, and a short walk away on Lwowska Street a fragment of the original ghetto wall still stands. From the square, trams run back to Kazimierz and the Old Town in a few minutes, and the factory museum on Lipowa Street is within easy walking distance if you want to continue exploring wartime Krakow after the tour.