71 Wooden panels from the synagogue in Náznánfalva
Náznánfalva (today Nazna, Romania), 1747
Painted wood
Following museum collection, a gift of the Jewish community of Marosvásárhely (today Târgu Mureș, Romania), 1941
In the 18th century, Náznánfalva was the second largest Jewish community in Transylvania after Gyulafehérvár (today Alba Iulia, Romania). Jews were not allowed to settle in Marosvásárhely – just as in other royal cities, so they settled on the outskirts of the city, on land in Náznánfalva belonging to the Barcsay family, where they erected a wooden synagogue for themselves in 1747. From the outside, the synagogue looked like a simple shed, but on its walls from the inside there were painted prayer texts. Already in 1910 there was a letter that called the attention of the newly founded Jewish Musem to this wooden synagogue, which was unique in Hungary. Eventually, the museum could acquire a piece of the painted wooden ceiling of the synagogue in 1941, when the territory of Náznánfalva, which had been annexed to Romania after the Trianon peace treaty in 1920, was returned for a time to Hungary by the Vienna Agreement.