Philo-Atlas. Handbuch für die Jüdische Auswanderung. Mit 20 mehrfarbigen Karten, über 25 Tabellen und Übersichten, über 600 Stichworten au 280 Textspalten

First edition, 5 x 7 inches. (6), 284pp (numb. in 2 columns and two page numbers per page). Original decorated brown cloth with black text imprinted on spine and front cover cloth, 18,5 x 14 cm. With 20 coloured maps (1 folded) of countries and regions around the world, including one world map displaying distances from Berlin, after Gretel Wiesenthal. A small colour-stain in lower corner back cover and both covers quite warped, otherwise a good copy.

Title translates as, Philo-Atlas: Guide for Jewish Emigration. Styled after the popular "Philo Lexikon," this publication is a remarkable record of its time. Issued barely two weeks prior to the outbreak of Kristallnacht (9/10 November, 1938), this appears as nothing but a tourist guide-book. Yet its contents reveal a far more urgent need: An alphabetical survey of countries world-wide with their respective rules for obtaining entry-visas. "These are no tourist formalities, for now survival depends on them. Which countries still accept migrants? How much money do they demand? For which occupations is there a need? Which diseases need one be prepared for? Where to find local organizations who can assist immigrants?"

The Jewish owned Philo Verlag, was forcibly closed a month following the publication of this guide, by which time the Nazis decided they were no longer willing to permit Jews to leave Germany - even if they could find a country willing to take them in, which after the Evian Conference of earlier that summer, was most unlikely. The Jews who remained in Germany were now quite trapped. Quoted from Kestenbaum & Company Auction House sold lot.

Thousands of Jews flee Germany in the first weeks and months after the Nazis seize power. Most of them are trying to escape persecution for their work as journalists or artists or for their political involvement in the workers' parties. But most Jews in Germany do not initially consider leaving the country. With the rise in discrimination and expropriation in the years that follow, increasing numbers of people seek to emigrate. However, the application of the "Reichsfluchtsteuer," (Reich Flight Tax), which had been introduced into law in 1931 - seizing 25 percent of an emigrant's assets, and imposing regulations impeding the transfer of the rest - makes it increasingly difficult to obtain entry permits for the target countries. Jewish organizations now see their main task as advising and supporting emigrants and preparing them for a new existence in the exile countries. By mid-1938, 143,000 of the approximately 500,000 Jews living in Germany in 1933 have left. Quoted from Closed Borders web site.