The Lithuanian Jewish community has roots that go back to before the time of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. Lithuania was historically home to a large Jewish community and an important center of Jewish scholarship and culture from the 18th century until the community was almost entirely eliminated during the Holocaust. Before World War II, the Lithuanian Jewish population numbered some 160,000, about 7% of the total population. Vilnius alone had a Jewish community of nearly 100,000, about 45% of the city's total population with over 110 synagogues and 10 "yeshivot" in the city.