Editing Synagogue architecture (section)

===Central Europe: Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth===
Significant exceptions to the rule that synagogues are built in the prevailing style of their time and place are the [[wooden synagogues in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]] and two forms of masonry synagogues: synagogues with bema support and nine-field synagogues (the latter not confined to synagogues).

====Wooden synagogues====
{{main|Wooden synagogues in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth}}
[[File:Synagoge Kurkliai.JPG|thumb|The 1936 Kurkliai Synagogue in [[Kurkliai]]]]
[[File:Wolpa_Synagogue_Poland_1920.jpg|thumb|[[Wołpa Synagogue]] in [[Vowpa]], [[Belarus]]]]

[[Wooden synagogues in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth]] were a unique Jewish artistic and architectural form.<ref name="Zimiles et al p 5">{{cite book | editor = Stacy C. Hollander | author1 = Murray Zimiles | author2 = Vivian B. Mann | author3 = American Folk Art Museum | author4 = Fenimore Art Museum (Cooperstown, N.Y.) | author5 = Farmers' Museum (Cooperstown, N.Y.) | date = 2007 | title = Gilded Lions and Jeweled Horses: The Synagogue to the Carousel | publisher = UPNE | page = 5| isbn = 978-1-58465-637-1 | oclc = 1022726182 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=eBC5UsySVBQC}}</ref> Characteristic features include the independence of the pitched roof from the design of the interior domed ceiling. They had elaborately carved, painted, domed, balconied and vaulted interiors. The architectural interest of the exterior lay in the buildings' large scale, the multiple, horizontal lines of the tiered roofs, and the carved [[corbel]]s that supported them. Wooden synagogues featured a single, large hall. In contrast to contemporary churches, there was no [[apse]]. Moreover, while contemporary churches featured imposing vestibules, the entry porches of the wooden synagogues were a low annex, usually with a simple lean-to roof. In these synagogues, the emphasis was on constructing a single, large, high-domed worship space.<ref name="Hollander2007">{{cite book | editor = Stacy C. Hollander | author1 = Murray Zimiles | author2 = Vivian B. Mann | author3 = American Folk Art Museum | author4 = Fenimore Art Museum (Cooperstown, N.Y.) | author5 = Farmers' Museum (Cooperstown, N.Y.) | date = 2007 | title = Gilded Lions and Jeweled Horses: The Synagogue to the Carousel | publisher = UPNE | pages = | isbn = 978-1-58465-637-1 | oclc = 1022726182 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=eBC5UsySVBQC}}</ref>{{page needed|date=June 2017}}<ref name="Zimiles et al p 5" /><ref name="Wischnitzer1964">{{cite book | author = Rachel Wischnitzer | date = 1964 | title = The Architecture of the European Synagogue | publisher = Jewish Publication Society of America | pages = 125–147| oclc = 1465235 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=6p1BAAAAIAAJ}}</ref><ref name="Krinsky1996">{{cite book | author = Carol Herselle Krinsky | date = 1 January 1996 | title = Synagogues of Europe: Architecture, History, Meaning | publisher = Courier Corporation | pages = 53–58| isbn = 978-0-486-29078-2 | oclc = 11470019 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=uv1c0gkDgLsC}}</ref>

According to art historian Stephen S. Kayser, the wooden synagogues of Poland with their painted and carved interiors were "a truly original and organic manifestation of artistic expression—the only real Jewish folk art in history."<ref>{{cite web |last1=Piechotka |first1=Maria |last2=Piechotka |first2=Kazimierz |title=Wooden Synagogues |url=https://www.commentary.org/articles/alfred-werner/wooden-synagogues-by-maria-and-kazimierz-piechotka/ |website=Commentary Magazine |date=1 July 1960}}</ref>

According to [[Louis Lozowick]], writing in 1947, the wooden synagogues were unique because, unlike all previous synagogues, they were not built in their region's and era's architectural style, but in a newly evolved and uniquely Jewish style, making them "a truly original folk expression," whose "originality does not lie alone in the exterior architecture, it lies equally in the beautiful and intricate wood carving of the interior."<ref name="Godfrey p. 92">{{cite book | author = Mark Godfrey | date = 1 January 2007 | title = Abstraction and the Holocaust | publisher = Yale University Press | page = 92| isbn = 978-0-300-12676-1 | oclc = 1008453832 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=fJu2-D2nhRwC}}</ref>

Moreover, while in many parts of the world Jews were proscribed from entering the [[List of construction trades|building trades]] and even from practicing the decorative arts of painting and woodcarving, the wooden synagogues were built by Jewish craftsmen.<ref name="Godfrey p. 92" />

Art historian [[Ori Z. Soltes]] points out that the wooden synagogues, unusual for that period in being large, identifiably Jewish buildings not hidden in courtyards or behind walls, were built not only during a Jewish "intellectual golden age" but in a time and place where "the local Jewish population was equal to or even greater than the Christian population.<ref name="Soltes2005">{{cite book | author = Ori Soltes | date = 1 November 2005 | title = Our Sacred Signs: How Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Art Draw from the Same Source | publisher = Basic Books | page = 180 | isbn = 978-0-8133-4297-9 | oclc = 1022724571 | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=zcD-swEACAAJ}}</ref>

====Synagogues with bimah-support====
[[File:Synagoga_w_Łańcucie_1.jpg|thumb|[[Łańcut Synagogue]], bimah-tower]]

In the second half of the 16th century masonry synagogues whose interiors present an original structural solution, found in no other kind of building, were constructed in the  Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. These were synagogue halls whose bimah was surrounded by four pillars. Placed upon a podium, connected above by [[Arcade (architecture)|arcading]], in one powerful pier, the pillars constituted the ''bimah-support'' (or ''bimah-tower'') supporting the vault, consisting of four barrels with [[lunette]]s intersecting at the corners. The bases of the vault-rips rested on the podium or were transmitted through a [[balustrade]], solid or pierced. A small [[cupola]] covered the field above the bimah. These cupolas were occasionally significantly lowered in comparison with the remaining fields of vaulting. Thus a kind of inner chapel, built inside the bimah-tower, was created.<ref>Maria und Kazimierz Piechotka: ''Landscape With Menorah: Jews in the towns and cities of the former Rzeczpospolita of Poland and Lithuania.'' Salix alba Press, Warsaw 2015. Page 73. {{ISBN|978-83-930937-7-9}}</ref>

One of the first synagogues with a bimah-support was the [[Old Synagogue (Przemyśl)]], which was destroyed during World War II. Synagogues with a bimah-tower were built up to the 19th century and the concept was adopted in various Central European countries.<ref>https://publikationsserver.tu-braunschweig.de/servlets/MCRFileNodeServlet/dbbs_derivate_00009149/Doktorarbeit.pdf Bimah-support. Retrieved July 29, 2019.</ref>

====Nine-field synagogues====
Around the beginning of the 1630s the first synagogues with nine-field vaulting were constructed. This design has a set of four large columns or piers placed squarely in a rectangular central space, supporting three rows of three vaults on the ceiling.  They allowed for much greater halls than hitherto and were also called ''nine-bay synagogues''. The [[Great Suburb Synagogue]] in [[Lviv]] and the synagogue in [[Ostroh]] were erected virtually at the same time (1625 and 1627). In these halls the vaulting rested on four tall pillars and on corresponding wall [[pilaster]]s. The columns and the pilasters were situated in equal spacing and dividing the roof-area into nine equal fields. In these synagogues the bimah was a free-standing podium or a bower situated within the central field between the pillars.<ref>Maria und Kazimierz Piechotka: ''Landscape With Menorah: Jews in the towns and cities of the former Rzeczpospolita of Poland and Lithuania.'' Salix alba Press, Warsaw 2015. Page 75. {{ISBN|978-83-930937-7-9}}</ref>