Jewish tombstones with Hebrew inscriptions have an added value togenealogists, in that they not only show the date of death and sometimesthe age or date of birth, but they also include the given name of thedeceased's father. This permits you to go back one more generation.

Here are a few helpful pointers if you cannot read Hebrew.

At the top of most Jewish tombstones is the abbreviationפּ'נ,which stands forpo nikbar orpo nitman, meaning“here lies”.

At the end of many Hebrew tombstone inscriptions you will findthe abbreviationת נ צ ב ה,which is an abbreviation of a verse from the Bible, the first book ofSamuel, 25:29, “May his soul be bound up in the bond of eternal life”.

If any Hebrew characters at all are written on a tombstone, they aremost likely to be the person's Hebrew name.  A Hebrew name alwaysincludes apatronymic, the person's father's given name. This is a unique feature of Jewish tombstones, and a great boon toJewish genealogy.

The Hebrew wordבן,ben, means “son of”,as in “Yaakov ben Yitzhak”, meaning“Yaakov, the son of Yitzhak”. The Hebrew wordבת,bat, means “daughter of”. On tombstones, these words will often appear asב'ר, an abbreviation forben reb, meaning “son (or daughter) of the worthy”,followed by the father's given name. The wordreb is a simple honorific, a title of respect,akin to “Mr.” —it doesnot mean Rabbi.

The Jewish Calendar

Dates are written in Hebrew according to theJewish calendar. This calendar, which starts its “year one” with the Creationof the World, was probably designed by the patriarch Hillel II inthe fourth century.  He calculated the age of the world bycomputing the literal ages of biblical characters and other eventsin the Bible, and came up with a calendar that begins 3760 yearsbefore the Christian calendar.

Years:

The letters of the Hebrew Alphabet each have a numerical value,specified in the chart on the left. When a Hebrew date is written, you must figure out the numerical valueof each letter and then add them up. This is the date according to theJewish calendar, not thecalendar we use in every day life, known as the Gregorian calendar(also referred to as the Common Era, civil or Christian calendar). In September 2009, for example, the Jewish year was 5769. Given a Hebrew date, you need to do only a little bit of math tochange the Hebrew year into a secular year.

Often a Hebrew date after the year 5000 on the Jewish calendarwill leave off five thousand.  For example, the Hebrew year5680 will be written as 680 rather than 5680. To compute the civil (Gregorian) year, simply add the number 1240to the shortened Hebrew year.

Here's one example: If the year is written asתרפג,the letterת is 400, the letterר is 200,פ is 80, andג is 3. 400 + 200 + 80 + 3 = 683. The 5000 is usually left off, so the actual year would be 5683. By using our formula, 683 plus 1240 is 1923. That is the civil year.

Months:

The Hebrew year begins on Rosh Hashanah, which occurs on theGregorian calendar in September or October. Therefore, the dates listed for the months of Tishri, Heshvan,Kislev and sometimes Tevet must be read as applying to thepreceding year of the civil (Gregorian) calendar.

Converting Calendar Dates:

The complete transposition of a Hebrew date to a Gregorian dateuses a very complex formula. It is easiest to simply refer to one of the published or onlinereference works, such as:

• The Comprehensive Hebrew Calendar, 5703-5860, 1943-2100, by Arthur Spier (Jerusalem, New York: Feldheim Publishers, 1981); or
• 150 Year Calendar, by Rabbi Moses Greenfield (Brooklyn: Hotsaat Ateret, 1987).

For more information about the Jewish calendar,see the JewishGen InfoFileIntroduction to theJewish Calendar.

Some Hebrew Phrases

In addition to names and dates, here are the common Hebrew words whichappear on tombstones:

Here lies	po nikbar
Son of	ben
Daughter of	bat
Title, i.e. "Mr."	reb, rav
Son/Daughter of the honored	ben reb
The Levite	ha-levi
The Cohen	ha-kohen
The Rabbi	ha-rav
Dear, Beloved(masc.)	ha-yakar
Dear, Beloved(fem.)	ha-y'karah
Father	av
My father	avi
Our father	avinu
Mother	eem
My mother	eemi
Our mother	emanu
My husband	baali
My wife	ishti
Brother	akh
My brother	akhi
Our brother	akhinu
Sister	akhot
Aunt	dodah
Uncle	dod
Man	ish
Woman	ishah
Woman(unmarried)	b'tulah
Woman(married) = "Mrs."	marat
Old(masc., fem.)	zakain, z'kaina
Child(masc., fem.)	yeled, yaldah
Young man/woman	bakhur, bakhurah
Died(masc., fem.)	niftar, nifterah
Born(masc., fem.)	nolad, noldah
Year, Years	shanah, shanim
Day, Days	yom, yamim
Month	khodesh
First of the month	rosh khodesh

Hebrew Abbreviations on Tombstones:

There are many many different Hebrew abbreviations that are foundin tombstone inscriptions and Hebrew literature. Abbreviations are usually indicated by a quote mark or an apostrophe. Often, the apostrophe is used to abbreviate a single word, whereas thequote mark indicates an abbreviated phrase. For more information, see the following works:

• “Hebrew Abbreviations for Genealogists”,by Edmund U. Cohler, Ph.D., inMass-Pocha(Newsletter of theJewish Genealogical Society of Greater Boston).
      - Part I: IV,1 (Winter 1994/95), pages 4-7.
      - Part II: IV,2 (Spring 1995), pages 14-18.
      - Part III: IV,3 (Summer 1995), pages 16-17.
• Hüttenmeister, Frowald Gil. Abkürzungsverzeichnishebräischer Grabinschriften.  (Frankfurt am Main:Gesellschaft zur Forderung Judaistischer Studien in Frankfurt am Main[Society for Furthering Judaic Studies in Frankfurt am Main], 1996). 349 pages. {Frankfurter judaistische Studien, Volume 11. In Hebrew and German. Hebrew title:Otsar rashe tevot ve-kitsurim be-matsvot bate ha-almin}. ISBN #3-922056-08-3. OCLC 925532369.
• “Reading Hebrew Matzevot Key Words, Abbreviations, & Acronyms”,compiled by Dr. Ronald D. Doctor.(June 2008). 21 pages. http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~orjgs/Abrrev.pdf.

Symbols on Tombstones:

In addition to the inscription, symbols on the tombstone can beclues.

• Twohands, with four fingers each divided into two sets of two fingers, is the symbol of a priestly blessing — this signifies aKohen, a descendant of the biblical high priest Aaron.
• Apitcher signifies aLevite — in ancient days, members of the tribe of Levi were responsible for cleaning the hands of the Temple priest.
• A candle orcandelabra often is used on the tombstone of a woman; and the six-pointedStar of David on that of a man.
• Abroken branch ortree stump motif on a tombstone often signifies someone who died young, whose life was cut short.

Bibliography:

• Kurzweil, Arthur. From Generation to Generation: How to Trace Your Jewish Genealogyand Personal History. (New York: HarperCollins, 1994). Chapter 9, pages 342-358. OCLC 823528084.
• DOROT,The Journal of theJewish Genealogical Society(New York):
      - XI, 2 (Winter 1989-90), pp 2-3: “Getting the Most Out of Your Cemetery Visit”.
      - XI, 4 (Summer 1990), pg 16; and XII, 1 (Autumn 1990), pg 8:“Tools of the Trade”.
• Krajewska, Monika. A Tribe of Stones: Jewish Cemeteries in Poland.  (Warsaw: Polish Scientific Publishers, 1993).  242 pages. {Mostly illustrations}. OCLC 925571139.
• Rath, Gideon.  “Hebrew Tombstone Inscriptions and Dates”, inChronicles (Newsletter of theJewish Genealogical Society of Philadelphia), Vol. 5, No. 1 (Spring 1986), pages 1-4.
• Schafer, Louis S. Tombstones of Your Ancestors.  (Bowie, MD: Heritage Books, 1991, 2007).  160 pages, paperback.  {Doesn't deal specifically with Jewish tombstones}. OCLC 233523010.
• Schwartzman, Arnold. Graven images: Graphic Motifs of the Jewish Gravestone.  (New York: H.N. Abrams, 1993). 144 pages. OCLC 891405959.
• Strangstad, Lynette. A Graveyard Preservation Primer.  (Nashville, Tenn.: Association for Gravestone Studies, 1988, 1995, 2013). 126 pages. OCLC 1007570142.
• Association for Gravestone Studies, 278 Main Street, Suite 207, Greenfield, MA 01301.   (413) 772-0836.   {Produces a quarterly newsletter,Markers, and access to a lending library.}  https://www.gravestonestudies.org.
• Caplan, Judith Shulamit Langer-Surnamer.  “Tombstone Translation Topics: How to Decipher and Read a Hebrew Tombstone”.  In:19th Annual Conference on Jewish Genealogy: Syllabus.  (New York: Jewish Genealogical Society, 1999), pages 217-221.   Also InJewish Genealogy Yearbook 2000 (20th International Conference on Jewish Genealogy, Salt Lake City, IAJGS, 2000), Section 1, pages 80-84.

Links:

• International Association of Jewish Genealogical Societies (IAJGS)Cemetery Project:
      · Inventory of Jewish cemetery locations worldwide.
      ·http://www.iajgsjewishcemeteryproject.org.
• JewishGen Online Worldwide Burial Registry (JOWBR):
      · Database of three million Jewish burial records, from 7,800 cemeteries in 128 countries.
      ·https://www.jewishgen.org/databases/cemetery.
• Jewish Cemeteries in the New York Metropolitan Area (JGSNY):
      ·List of Cemeteries  · Map  · Travel Directions  · Burial Societies.