The growing Jewish population in Kraków in the 17th century needed additional cemetery. The New Jewish Cemetery was established in 1800 on land purchased from the Catholic Augustinian Order.
After the Nazi invasion of Poland in 1939, the cemetery was closed and the Germans sold the tombstones to local stonemasons. Less valuable slabs were used as construction material and for paving the road to the concentration camp in nearby Płaszów. Without tombstones the New Jewish Cemetery turned into an open field with bones on the surface. After the end of the war, many stone pillars or matzevot were recovered from the Płaszów camp and placed back in the cemetery.
