Samuel Schwarz (12 February 188010 June 1953), or Samuel Szwarc, was a Polish-Portuguese Jewish mining engineer, archaeologist, and historian of the Jewish diaspora, specifically of the Sephardic and crypto-Jewish communities of Portugal and Spain. He is known for his rediscovery of the Jews of Belmonte, Portugal, and restoration of the Synagogue of Tomar. Life and work Early life Samuel Szwarc was born in Zgierz, Poland, on 12 February 1880, the first of ten eventual sons. His youngest brother was Polish-French painter and sculptor Marek Szwarc. Their father Isucher Moshe Szwarc (1859–1939) was an Orthodox Jew heavily involved in Zgierz's Jewish community and the late Haskalah movement. In Zgierz Isucher was known for his bibliophilia and owned an extensive library. He was also a fervent Zionist, participating in the First Zionist Congress and subsequent congresses. Samuel studied at a cheder and a Jewish high school in his youth. His father considered sending Samuel to the Hildesheimer Rabbinical Seminary in Berlin, but ultimately sent him to study in Paris in 1896 when he was 16 years old. From 1896 to 1897 Samuel studied at the École nationale des arts décoratifs, eventually transferring to the École nationale supérieure des mines de Paris in 1898. Szwarc graduated from the École nationale supérieure des mines in 1904. Between 1904 and 1914 he worked as a mining engineer throughout Europe and Africa, including in the Baku oilfields in Azerbaijan; coal mines in Sosnowiec, Poland, and England; tin mines of the Arnoya Mining Company in the Ourense and Pontevedra provinces of Spain from 1907 to 1910 and again in 1912; and at a gold mine of the Monte Rosa Gold Mining Company in Alagna Valsesia, Italy, in 1911. Szwarc was a notable polyglot, speaking Russian, Polish, German, English, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Hebrew, and Yiddish, likely assisting him in his frequent work travels. In 1913 Samuel attended the Eleventh World Zionist Congress in Vienna with his father. While there he met Agatha Barbasch, daughter of Russian banker and militant Zionist Samuel Barbasch. They married in April 1914 in Odessa and honeymooned throughout Europe. When World War I broke out, making work in Western Europe impossible, Samuel and his wife decided to move to Lisbon, Portugal, as he had heard positive things about the country during his stint in Spain. They arrived in Portugal in 1915, and Samuel began working at the tungsten and tin mines of Vilar