Pendant Found at Nazi Camp Site May Have Link to Anne Frank

2 minute read
Israel Holocaust Archaeology
This undated photograph released by the Israel Antiquities Authority shows a pendant that appears identical to one belonging to Anne Frank, Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial said Sunday. Yad Vashem says it has ascertained the pendant belonged to Karoline Cohn _ a Jewish girl who perished at Sobibor and may have been connected to the famous diarist. Both were born in Frankfurt in 1929 and historians have found no other pendants like theirs. The triangular piece found has the words "Mazal Tov" written in Hebrew on one side along with Cohn's date of birth and the Hebrew letter "heh," an initial for God, as well as three Stars of David on the other.Yoram Haimi—AP
By Zamira Rahim

Archaeologists excavating the site of a former Nazi extermination camp in Poland have unearthed a pendant bearing a striking resemblance to one owned by Anne Frank.

Experts at Yad Vashem, the World Holocaust Remembrance Center, believe that the pendant discovered in the Sobibór camp may have belonged to Karoline Cohn, like Frank an adolescent Jewish girl born in Frankfurt. In a statement on its website Yad Vashem said that researchers are looking into whether the two girls might have been related.

Researchers found that Cohn was deported from Frankfurt to a ghetto in Minsk in 1941, but believe that the pendant reached Sobibór between then and September 1943. It is not known whether Cohn survived. Frank, whose diary of life in hiding during wartime has been read by millions, died in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945.

“This pendant demonstrates once again the importance of archaeological research of former Nazi death camp sites,” said Yoram Haimi, an archaeologist from the Israel Antiquities Authority, who was part of the team behind the findings. “The moving story of Karoline Cohn is symbolic of the shared fate of the Jews murdered in the camp.”

A Star of David necklace and a metal charm etched with an image of Moses were also discovered at the site.

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Write to Zamira Rahim at zamira.rahim@time.com