# Spinka <table class="place-meta"> <tr><td>Hebrew / Yiddish</td><td dir="rtl">ספינקא</td></tr> <tr><td>Local name(s)</td><td>Săpânța (Romanian); Szaplonca (Hungarian); Spinka / שפּינקע (Yiddish); Sapynka (Ukrainian)</td></tr> <tr><td>Region (today)</td><td>Săpânța commune, Maramureș County, Romania</td></tr> <tr><td>Coordinates</td><td>47°58′N 23°42′E</td></tr> </table> <table class="place-meta place-eras"> <tr><th>Era</th><th>Town name</th><th>Country / jurisdiction</th></tr> <tr><td>to 1918</td><td>Szaplonca</td><td>Kingdom of Hungary, Máramaros County (Austria-Hungary from 1867)</td></tr> <tr><td>1918–1940</td><td>Săpânța</td><td>Kingdom of Romania (Maramureș)</td></tr> <tr><td>1940–1944</td><td>Szaplonca</td><td>Hungary (re-annexed under the Second Vienna Award, Aug 1940)</td></tr> <tr><td>1944–1947</td><td>Săpânța</td><td>Romania (restored)</td></tr> <tr><td>present</td><td>Săpânța</td><td>Romania — Maramureș County</td></tr> </table> ## Overview **Spinka** is the Yiddish name of **Săpânța** (Hungarian *Szaplonca*), a village in the Maramureș region of northern Romania, just south of the Tisza river on today's Ukrainian border. It is famous in Jewish history as the seat of the **Spinka Hasidic dynasty**, founded there in the 1870s by Rabbi Yosef Meir Weiss (author of *Imrei Yosef*), whose son and successor Rabbi Yitzchak Isaac Weiss (*Chakal Yitzchak*) was murdered in the Holocaust. An important Jewish community lived in the village — roughly 573 Jews in 1877 rising to about 1,020–1,040 by 1920. Under Hungarian control from 1940, the Jews of Săpânța were deported by the Horthy authorities to **Auschwitz** in May 1944, where most were killed; survivors emigrated to Israel and the United States and re-established the Spinka dynasty in Williamsburg, Borough Park, Monsey, Bnei Brak and elsewhere. Săpânța today is best known secularly for its "Merry Cemetery," and no Jewish community remains. <small>Sources: Wikipedia — "Săpânța"; Wikipedia — "Spinka (Hasidic dynasty)"; International Jewish Cemetery Project — "Săpînţa / Szaploncza / Spinka".</small> ## People with events here | Person | Event | | --- | --- | | [[Jonas Basch (b.1914)]] | Born 11/20/1914 | | [[Efraim Fishel Basch (b.1921)]] | Born 1921 | | [[Eliyahu Basch (b.1923)]] | Born 1923 | | [[Yehoshua Basch (b.1923)]] | Born 1923 | | [[Henya Shayawitz (b.1930)]] | Born 1930 | | [[Pesach Shayawitz (b.1932)]] | Born 1932 |