(Author: David Saks, Vol. 79, #2, Summer, 2024)
As the truism goes, South African Jewry is a primarily a community of Lithuanian origin, and while it inevitably needs much qualifying, that is substantially true. During the half century roughly commencing in the early 1880s, a large majority of the community indeed arrived from “Lithuania” – in actual fact the greater Lithuanian region, an area including what is today the modern-day state of Lithuania, the adjoining territories of eastern Poland and western Belarus and, of course, Latvia. (When talking about Litvaks, by the way, don’t forget the Latvaks, who tend to be somewhat overlooked. Until quite recently, there used to be an Association of Latvian Jews in South Africa, and when looking at the origins of prominent South African Jews is one is quite struck by how many in fact came from that country).
In my own case, I can claim to be 100% Litvak, with all of my great-grandparents having come not just from the greater Lithuania area but from what is now Lithuania proper. They also originated from roughly the same part of Lithuania, namely the area in the north-central part of the country incorporating the towns of Shavli/Siauliae, Shadover/Seduva, Kurshen/Kuršėnai and Legum/Lygumai. That is not as common as one might think. When the origins of many, perhaps most of SA Jews who can be classified as ‘Litvaks’ are examined, one finds that generally speaking at least one or perhaps more of their forebears actually came from what is now eastern Poland, Belarus or Latvia. Back then, as should be remembered, all those territories were not distinct countries but constituted part of the then empire of Tzarist Russia. Consequently, it was quite common for our Litvak forebears to say that they came from ‘Russia’, though that was seldom literally the case. One of the exceptions was Moscow-born Benjamin Ginsberg, founder of Rooibos tea. His story is told by Boris Gorelik in the Spring 2020 issue of Jewish Affairs: ‘A Ceylon of the Cederberg’: Benjamin Ginsberg and the commercialisation of Rooibos Tea – Jewish Affairs
Important though the Litvak connection was, it was by no means the only one. In actuality, a substantial minority of Jewish South Africans came out from other places, also in Europe for the most part but even there not exclusively so. Of these countries of origin, Germany was by some way the most significant in terms of numbers. In fact, it was from there that many of the community’s pioneers hailed, arriving long before the great influx from Eastern Europe. A number of them carved important niches for themselves in the general history of the country and its early development, among them the Mosenthal brothers in the Eastern Cape, Jonas Bergtheil in Natal and the Baumann family in Bloemfontein. The most significant influx of German Jews occurred much later, however, with the arrival during the 1930s of some 6000 refugees from Nazi Germany. The surnames of many of these ‘Yekkes’ – examples include Hammerschlag, Seliger, Jonas, Stahl and Homburger – attest to their non-Litvak origins.
It was Anglo-Jewry that provided the core membership of the community in the early decades. English Jews began arriving as early as the 1820 Settlers, among whom were three Jewish families and several of whose members would later be among the founders of the country’s first Jewish congregation, Tikvat Israel (today’s Cape Town Hebrew Congregation) some twenty years later. Indeed the first president of that congregation, Benjamin Norden, had been an 1820 Settler. Jews from England continued to arrive following the diamond and gold rushes (‘Randlords’ like Barney Barnato and Lionel Phillips come to mind) and while greatly outnumbered by East European immigrants they for a long time dominated the ranks of the communal leadership. It is relevant to note, however, that a high proportion of Jews who arrived from the UK after 1880 were in fact also first-generation immigrants from Eastern Europe who had only been in the country for a few years before going on to South Africa.
The next major non-Litvak group within SA Jewry is unusual for having originated not in northern European countries but the Mediterranean region, in the main from the Aegean island of Rhodes. Jews from this area have added a distinctively Sephardi element to a community that is otherwise of overwhelmingly Ashkenazi origin. Again, it is in the surnames that the difference is most immediately apparent, not Rabinowitz, Feinstein or Friedlander but names with an obvious Hispanic or Italian flavour – Capelouto, Gaspari, Da Costa, Amato and Franco to name a few. Unlike other groups, Sephardi Jews did not come out to South Africa in the first instance but settled initially in what then the Belgian Congo. The violence and general chaos that accompanied the Congo’s attaining independence led to most of the community relocating to countries further south, notably the then Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe) in addition to this one. Most of the latter have since also settled in South Africa. SA Jewry’s Rhodes-Sephardi legacy was a prominent theme in the Chanukah 2014 issue of Jewish Affairs: Chanukah-2014.pdf.
When looking at those Jews who arrived during the 19th Century, primarily in what was the then Zuid-Afrikaansche Republiek and thereafter was known as the Transvaal, one also sometimes comes across such names as De Vries, De Jong, Goudvis, Van Gelderen and others of obviously Dutch origin. These in the main were among a number of Hollanders brought out by President Paul Kruger to man his civil service during the 1890s. While being a relatively small component of the whole, Dutch Jews thus also form part of the greater mix of SA Jewry. Even in the community today, one comes across the occasional Dutch surname.
Before concluding, it is important to note a few of the other countries from which South African Jews, albeit in much smaller numbers, came from. They include Romania, Hungary, Russia proper and, through the ex-Israelis who have permanently settled here, even places like Morocco and Iraq.
When all is said and done, it nevertheless remains true that the majority of South African Jews do indeed trace their origins to the greater Lithuania area. Current estimates in that regard suggest a figure of around 70%, and it might be somewhat more. As can be seen from this necessarily brief overview, however, the community is far from being homogenous.
- David Saks is the former Associate Director of the South African Jewish Board of Deputies. He has been editor of Jewish Affairs since 1999.
