YOYSEF URMAN

YOYSEF URMAN (April 21, 1912-1986)

            He was born in Romanovka, Bessarabia.  He graduated from a Tarbut school and Bolhrad high school.  From 1930 he was living in Czernowitz, where he graduated in linguistics from the local university.  In 1945 he settled in Moscow.  There he held the chair in Romanian language in the military institute for foreign languages.  For his Zionist activities, he was sent in 1950 to the Volkuta gulag.  In 1956 he returned to Czernowitz and in 1980 he made aliya to Israel.  From 1932 he published articles in Tshernovitser bleter (Pages from Czernowitz), Oyfgang (Arise), Di vokh (The week) in Bucharest, the daily newspaper Unzer tsayt (Our time) in Kishinev, Letste nayes (Latest news) in Tel Aviv, Yerusholaimer almanakh (Jerusalem almanac), Yisroel shtime (Voice of Israel), and others.  He also wrote for Romanian Jewish publications.  Among his books: Der rambam (The Rambam [= Maimonides]) (Czernowitz: D. Shternfeld, 1936), 385 pp. (Romanian translation, 1938); Tsu der frage fun yidishn yishev in dorem-besarabye (On the question of the Jewish settlement in southern Bessarabia) (Bolhrad, 1938), 150 pp.  He also wrote (in Romanian) a grammar of the Romanian language and a Romanian-Russian dictionary published in Moscow.