In Jewish communities in Eastern Europe, people would visit the graves of deceased relatives not only as an act of remembrance, but to talk to them, ask them for blessings and present them with requests which they could take to God on behalf of the living. The practice, known in Yiddish as “geyn af keyver-oves” – going to ancestral graves – was particularly common during the month of Elul, on the anniversaries of deaths, and before important events like family weddings. At these times, it was believed that the souls of the deceased waited by their graves to be visited. People would also geyn af keyver-oves in times of crisis, like if someone was seriously ill, to ask the dead for help.

These are excerpts of graveside petitions collected by YIVO in response to a survey launched in 1928, and transcribed by Itzik Gottesman in a 2003 article in YIVO Bleter. Most of them are from Łodź. The final petition, in which a wife talks very intimately (to say the least!) to her deceased husband and asks him to bless her new marriage, was collected in Laskarev (Łaskarzew), also in Poland.

Klogenishn for keyver-oves from Lodz, collected by Leybl Shvartsberg, 15^th December 1928

A wife to a husband   

My loyal husband! I’ve come here to your grave to tell you that our daughter is unwell. Try to obtain a cure for her. Our eight-year-old son has started walking.

A sister to a sister

Dear sister! I’ve come here to inform you that my husband is dangerously ill. Go, do everything you can for him. When you were alive, he loved you as much as he loved me. Go and persuade the eternal one to grant my husband a complete recovery.

A relative to a relative 

Dear kinsman Shloyme! Follow your paths to find my brother, Chaim ben Yankev, who fell in the Russian army during the World War. Ask him to come to me in a dream to tell me where he is buried, because no one knows where his skeleton ended up.

Overheard, a husband to a wife 

My dear wife! See to it with the creator of the universe that I might find a good stepmother for your children. You know that I cannot manage without a woman to look after your children. See that you have your way, it makes no difference to me [who my wife is] …

From a brother to a brother

My dear brother, I your brother, Ploni Ben Ploni, have come here to ask you to go down your familiar paths to reach the Master of the Universe, and beg him that my son, who is up for military recruitment, should not fall into the gentiles’ hands. And see to it that I will get a dowry for my daughter. Loyal brother, as a sign that I was here, I’m placing a stone on your headstone.

A wife at keyver-oves – collected in Laskarev by Isroel Briv

She lay down on the grave of her deceased husband and began:

Dear husband Moyshe-Nokhem. My sweet Moyshe-Nokhem, oh it’s been so long, and I haven’t been able to forget you. Your “thing” filled my every limb with pleasure. Dear Moyshe-Nokhem, see that you advocate for me and for my new husband, that things won’t be bad for us. Even in such [physical] matters, things are not bad for us. He has the same nature as you had … but I shouldn’t say sinful things. He also likes the things you used to like, Moyshe-Nokhem (quietly) Sweet Moyshe-Nokhem, do you remember how you used to press me so tightly that you almost squeezed my insides out of my belly? Be well, Moyshe-Nokhem, good day, Moyshe-Nokhem. Make efforts for me, Moyshe Nokhem.

Cite this : Annabel Gottfried Cohen, “Petitioning the ancestors”, extracts from Itzik Gottesman, “Klogenishn gezamlt fun der etnografisher komisye bay YIVO, 1928” (Laments collected by the YIVO Ethnographic Commission, 1928), YIVO Bleter, New York, 2003. Trans. Annabel Gottfried Cohen.

Original article available at https://hebrewbooks.org/50820.