The Levitt-Burshtein Family Tree
Our family tree naturally centres on us: Michael and Riva Levitt (née Burshtein) and our children, Amber and Yonatan. On my side it includes the surnames Levitt (my late father's side), Klahr/Taylor, Ginsberg/Giness and Miller (my mother's paternal side), Rosenbom/Rosenbaum/Ross and Kravitz/Taylor (unrelated Taylors on my mother's maternal side), Burshtein, Sacks/Zak, and Levitt again (the same Levitts) on mymwife's father's side, and Kurtz on my wife's mother's side. On the whole we all originated in Lithuania or Poland/Russia, ending up in the UK, USA, South Africa and Israel and other places.
Amber & Yonatan have a family photograph album going back through the generations, annotated, with details of relevant parts of their family tree. You can view it here.
A note about surnames. But for a very few exceptions, surnames of Jews in eastern Europe were invented during a short period of time, around the turn of the nineteenth century, when their adoption was forced by state authorities to promote census and conscription. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, in many communities they were marginal for Jewish self-consciousness. In Hebrew documents, Jews were referred to by their proper given name and that of their father, eg מנחם מענדל בן מיכאל (Menachem Mendel ben Micha'el, Menachem Mendel son of Michael). Additional names indicated either descent from the Cohanim (Jewish priestly caste of the tribe of Levi) or Levites (the assistants to the Cohanim, also of the tribe of Levi). Among the expressions that label the Cohanim, the most common are הכהן (ha'Kohen, literally "the priest") and the acronym כ״ץ (Katz), from כהן צדק meaning "priest of righteousness." Levite origin is expressed by הלוי (ha'Levi, literally "the Levite") and the acronym סג"ל (Segal), from סגן לוי meaning an "assistant of the Levites." Thus in the instance of Menachem Mendel, his name becomes מנחם מענדל בן מיכאל הלוי (Menachem Mendel ben Micha'el ha'Levi, Menachem Mendel son of Michael, the Levite).
The Levitt family appears to have held the surname, Levitt, at least since the beginning of the nineteenth century: the name is simply a Europeanisation of הלוי (ha'Levi), and would have been chosen automatically because of the importance of the status of the Levite, together with the Cohen, in Judaism which means that these patrilineal descents have been maintained over millenia.
Although the family seems would have used "Levitt" rather than ha'Levi in official documents, it was nevertheless subject to the vagaries of transliteration in different languages, as well as those of suffixes used in some of those languages. So for Levitt we have:
Thus where the surname has been transliterated from records in Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian, Polish and/or Lithuanian, I have, in the case of variants of Levitt, standardised with two Ts, even though individuals may be recorded as being registered as Levit, Levitan, Levitaete etc. But where surnames have been changed or Anglicised in English-speaking countries I have spelled them as the individuals chose or registered them, eg Rosenbaum and Ross are variants of the original Rosenbom.
My master family tree is held and backed up offline, and has Hebrew text as well as Jewish data such as Hebrew dates etc, as well as pictures. The online version is available through Ancestry.com via this link, and lacks the Hebrew and Jewish data. At present it also lacks pictures. However I hope to add these as time goes on, as well as adding further pages to this website with stories of family members.
If you have any comments, corrections, or additional dates and other information you can help add, please contact me either through the facility on Ancestry.com, or contact me direct.
Amber & Yonatan have a family photograph album going back through the generations, annotated, with details of relevant parts of their family tree. You can view it here.
A note about surnames. But for a very few exceptions, surnames of Jews in eastern Europe were invented during a short period of time, around the turn of the nineteenth century, when their adoption was forced by state authorities to promote census and conscription. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, in many communities they were marginal for Jewish self-consciousness. In Hebrew documents, Jews were referred to by their proper given name and that of their father, eg מנחם מענדל בן מיכאל (Menachem Mendel ben Micha'el, Menachem Mendel son of Michael). Additional names indicated either descent from the Cohanim (Jewish priestly caste of the tribe of Levi) or Levites (the assistants to the Cohanim, also of the tribe of Levi). Among the expressions that label the Cohanim, the most common are הכהן (ha'Kohen, literally "the priest") and the acronym כ״ץ (Katz), from כהן צדק meaning "priest of righteousness." Levite origin is expressed by הלוי (ha'Levi, literally "the Levite") and the acronym סג"ל (Segal), from סגן לוי meaning an "assistant of the Levites." Thus in the instance of Menachem Mendel, his name becomes מנחם מענדל בן מיכאל הלוי (Menachem Mendel ben Micha'el ha'Levi, Menachem Mendel son of Michael, the Levite).
The Levitt family appears to have held the surname, Levitt, at least since the beginning of the nineteenth century: the name is simply a Europeanisation of הלוי (ha'Levi), and would have been chosen automatically because of the importance of the status of the Levite, together with the Cohen, in Judaism which means that these patrilineal descents have been maintained over millenia.
Although the family seems would have used "Levitt" rather than ha'Levi in official documents, it was nevertheless subject to the vagaries of transliteration in different languages, as well as those of suffixes used in some of those languages. So for Levitt we have:
- לויט (pronounced "le-veete") in Yiddish and transliteration to modern Hebrew
- Levitas in Lithuanian (for a man)
- Levitaite in Lithuanian (for an unmarried woman)
- Levitiene in Lithuanian (for a married woman)
- Levitan in Slavic
- Lewita or Lewite in Polish
- Levitt in English
- Levit in German and alternate transliteration to English
Thus where the surname has been transliterated from records in Yiddish, Hebrew, Russian, Polish and/or Lithuanian, I have, in the case of variants of Levitt, standardised with two Ts, even though individuals may be recorded as being registered as Levit, Levitan, Levitaete etc. But where surnames have been changed or Anglicised in English-speaking countries I have spelled them as the individuals chose or registered them, eg Rosenbaum and Ross are variants of the original Rosenbom.
My master family tree is held and backed up offline, and has Hebrew text as well as Jewish data such as Hebrew dates etc, as well as pictures. The online version is available through Ancestry.com via this link, and lacks the Hebrew and Jewish data. At present it also lacks pictures. However I hope to add these as time goes on, as well as adding further pages to this website with stories of family members.
If you have any comments, corrections, or additional dates and other information you can help add, please contact me either through the facility on Ancestry.com, or contact me direct.
Copyright 2014 Michael Levitt. All rights reserved.
If you wish to license any of my content, please contact me.
If you wish to license any of my content, please contact me.