Yurevichi in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania

jews first come to Yurevichi. problably during reign of John III Sobieski in the 1600s. However, the The Encyclopedia of Jewish Life states that “jews are first mentioned” in late 1700s.

Check: when are jews in Minsk, Rechitsa and Bobruisk?

Uninterrupted periods of war between 1648 to 1717. Jews wiped out of souther/eastern areas of Grand duchy.

• Grand Duchy of Lithuania expands eastward and southward, incorporating area known as Belarus today. See Grand Duchy of Lithuania in 1430
• Grand Duchy of Lithuania were Orthodox
• Grand Duchy of Lithuania becomes a large state. Court life is on a grand scale¹⁾, requiring rulers to borrow against future income
  • Jews provided loans to rulers
  • To repay the loans, the Jewish lenders were allowed to collect income on behalf of the treasure. These income sources included leasing taverns (in remote locations), tax collection and customs duty collection
  • Success in collecting such income required agility, mobility and entrepreneurship²⁾, characteristics absent from landowners.
• Jewish migration to east (e.g. from Lithuania to Belarus). Jewish merchants involved in east-west trade.

• 1654-1667: Muscovite-Polish War. By 1665, almost all Belarus captured by Muscovite and Cossack forces. Robbed and murdered Jews. Forced Jews to convert to Orthdoxy. Muscovite government demanded the annihilation or conversion to Orthodoxy of Catholics and Jews in the lands they seized.
  • Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth begins to retake Belarus in early 1660s.
  • Christians and Jews begin to return to region
  • Jewish prisoners taken from Belarus remained in Russia
  • Belorus population losses from war amount to 53 percent
• 1667: Truce of Andrusovo between Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Muscovites/Cossacks. Christians and Jews bagan gradual return to Rechitsa.
  • Polonization of Grand Duchy of Lithuania from transfer of towns and estates to Polish nobility after previous owners killed in war

Galicia: tax exemptions to people who settle on uncultivated land(???). same law forbids rabbis from wedding those without permanent earnings.