This series comprises wood engravings, presenting Jewish life and Jewish people, during the period when Jews were the third largest nation in the region. In the second half of the 19th century only the Poles and Ukrainians were more numerous than the Jews – there were one-third fewer Czechs and Slovaks combined, and three times fewer Serbs. Poland under the partitions was the second largest agglomeration of Jews in the world. Jewish prayer houses and Jewish schools, mykvaot and cemeteries, and – naturally – Jewish homes had stood here for centuries. And Jewish homes were located predominantly in small towns, less often in cities, and least often in the countryside. The 19th-century Jewish-themed wood engravings, made by some of Poland’s most prominent graphic artists, published in Polish illustrated journals, while perhaps not spelling out these facts precisely, certainly testify to them, or illustrate them. The creators of the images include some of the most renowned Polish artists of the era: Andriolli, Brandt, Chełmoński, Fałat, the Gierymski brothers, Gerson, Gottlieb, Grottger, Kossak (father and son), Kostrzewski, Matejko, the Pillati brothers, Rodakowski, Siemiradzki, Wierusz-Kowalski, Witkiewicz, and others.