Floods uncover long-hidden Jewish cemetery in Holland

AMSTERDAM — The heat wave scorching Western Europe has helped identify visually, for the first time in decades, the exact layout of the oldest Jewish cemetery in the Netherlands.

Thanks to scorching 100-degree temperatures recorded this month, the grass that usually covers the sunken headstones at the 400-year-old Beth Haim Cemetery near Amsterdam has died and turned yellow, while the grass between the headstones remains green. The precise outline of each headstone became visible to the naked eye for the first time in decades, the NIW Jewish weekly reported.

The phenomenon is connected to Beth Haim’s status as a Sephardic-Portuguese cemetery, established by Jews who fled the Inquisition in the 15th and 16th centuries. In that community, headstones are not placed vertically, but laid horizontally on the ground over the grave.

However, because the Netherlands has unusually soft soil, the headstones gradually sank into the ground and eventually became completely covered with grass. But because of the drought, the grass growing over the headstones died, while the deeper-rooted grass between them survived.

For the first time in years, visitors can see the plots where their loved ones are buried at Beth Haim, provided they consult the records that show who is buried where.

Due to the heat, the cemetery’s management is enforcing a temporary ban on yahrzeit candles, fearing that lighting candles in the current weather would start brush fires.

Approximately 28,000 people are buried at the cemetery, which remains in the service of the Portuguese Israelite Community of Amsterdam.