‘The Lost Shtetl’ Jewish history museum to open in Lithuania’s Šeduva

A new museum dedicated to Jewish shtetl life in Lithuania will officially open in the northern town of Šeduva on September 20, just days before the country marks its Holocaust Remembrance Day.

The Lost Shtetl Museum will showcase the culture, history and everyday life of the Jewish community that lived in Šeduva during the interwar period. Admission, guided tours and educational programmes will be free not only during the opening weekend but for the entire first year, the museum announced Wednesday.

Jolanta Mickutė, head of education at the museum, highlighted the symbolic timing of the opening. “The Jewish community of Šeduva was executed in the nearby Liaudiškiai forest on August 25–26. In two days, 664 Jews – men, women and children – were murdered,” she said in a statement. “More than 80 years later, we’ve invited descendants of survivors to return. Together, on August 25, we will honour the victims and mark the museum’s opening as a memorial site for the Šeduva Jewish community.”

Marija Dautartaitė, a museum representative, told BNS that Israeli President Isaac Herzog and First Lady Michal Herzog were among the first to view the exhibition during a private visit.

“He attached a symbolic artefact typical of Jewish culture, a mezuzah,” she said. “Mezuzahs were traditionally affixed to Jewish homes and contained a prayer to bless and protect the house. We held a symbolic ceremony yesterday.”

The museum aims to present the richness of shtetl life, which was an integral part of Lithuania’s cultural and historical identity before the Holocaust. The museum building, designed by Finnish architect Rainer Mahlamäki, resembles a small town, with a synagogue roof shape among modest house silhouettes. Adjacent to the site is a Memorial Park that evokes the landscape in which the Jewish community of Šeduva lived for nearly 300 years.

Construction of the museum began in 2018 near the Old Jewish Cemetery. It now stands as one of the memorial sites recognised by the Information Centre of the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin.