Schnorrers - Wandering Jews in Germany 1850-1914

The lives of those many Jewish people who achieved great success in Germany have been well documented, but there is another side to this story-that of the hundreds of thousands of poor migrants, beggars and wandering Jews who struggled to eke out a meager living as they moved from community to community.

Some of those beggars told stories (in Yiddish: "Schnur"), which is why they were called Schnorrers. These Schnorrers wandered from place to place in search of work and food. Our book tells their story.

Dr. Roni Aaron Bornstein has a PhD in European History from Tel Aviv University. The author spent several years in various German and Jewish community archives all over Germany, where he was exposed to a large number of primary sources, published here in English for the first time. Dr. Bornstein is currently the owner and CEO of a number of companies, as well as the chairman of the Israel-Japan Friendship Society and Chamber of Commerce.