50 km from the centre
Jodensavanne: the remains of a Jewish plantation colony
Jodensavanne on the Suriname River was a Jewish plantation settlement from the seventeenth century with its own synagogue, Beracha Ve Shalom, built in 1685. The ruin and the cemeteries can still be visited.
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Sephardic Jews, fleeing Portugal and Brazil, were granted unusual freedoms in Suriname and from the late seventeenth century built their own settlement here, with plantations and a stone synagogue, the first of that scale in the Americas.
It was also a slaveholding community. Both facts belong to this place, and neither cancels the other.
What stands today is a ruin in the forest, with the synagogue foundations and two cemeteries whose stones carry Hebrew, Portuguese and Dutch side by side. Jodensavanne was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2023.
Frequently asked questions
What is Jodensavanne?
Jodensavanne is the ruin of a Jewish plantation settlement on the Suriname River, founded by Sephardic Jews in the late seventeenth century. Its synagogue Beracha Ve Shalom, built in 1685, was the first stone synagogue of that scale in the Americas. The site was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2023.