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Jewish treasures, monuments and books in Italy.
Jewish treasures, monuments and books in Italy.
It is difficult to determine the exact year that the first Jews arrived in Cherasco. However, it probably occurred following the expulsions from southern France. Bankers In 1580, Meir De Benedetti led the only existing bank in town and his name appeared again in the papal tolerance edict of of 1584. Sixteenth century Piedmont was theater to […]
Cuneo is home to exquisite and, at times, dazzling synagogues, which remain empty, for the most part, of worshipers. Jews expelled during the years 1306 to 1394 from France moved steadily into the Piedmont region through the nearby alpine passes. In 1430, the Duke of Savoy tried to check the growing Jewish presence within his duchy by […]
Up until the twelfth century, the episcopal and imperial powers alternated in the rule of Asti. In 1275, the Emperor Henry VII donated the city to Amedo V of Savoy. In 1387, Gian Galeazzo Visconti, lord of the city, gave it as dowry to his daughter when she married Louis d’Orleans. After the fall of the […]
The first known Jewish settler in Alessandria was Abraham, son of Joseph Vitale de Sacerdoti (Cohen), who opened a loan bank in or around 1490. The subsequent history of the community has continued to center around, and to a great degree consist of, the record of his descendants, later known by the name Vitale. ” […]
Carlo Giordano, Isidoro Kahn, The Jews in Pompeii, Herculaneum, Stabiae and in the Cities of Campania Felix. 3rd edition revised and enlarged by Laurentino García y García; translated by Wilhelmina F. Jashemski. Reprint 2003. Rome: Bardi, 2001. Reviewed by David Noy, University of Wales Lampeter This book was first published in Italian in 1966, with […]
The Jewish Community of Naples is centrally located in Via Cappella Vecchia, in the San Ferdinando district of Naples, near Piazza dei Martiri. It is the southernmost Jewish community in Italy – the only one south of Rome – with jurisdiction over the regions of Campania, Molise, Apulia, Basilicata, Calabria and Sicily. While the synagogue is […]
BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO’, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers up to the expulsion of 1541. In many […]
Between the 9th and 12th centuries, Otranto was one of the main centers of Jewish learning in Apulia. As the Jewish community prospered, thanks to commerce and entrepreneurial ventures, scholars gave lasting contributions to the study of the Bible, the Mishnah and the Talmud of Babylon. At the time of the forced conversion, under the […]
Santa Maria al Bagno was the largest DP camp in southern Italy. Established in 1943 when the first group of 500 refugees arrived in Puglia. At its peak in early 1946, the camp housed 2,300 Jewish refugees and about 3,000 non-Jewish refugees. The camp was structures in four sites and more than half of the […]
GALLIPOLI, BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers up to the expulsion of 1541. In […]
The first Jews in Oria, Taranto and Otranto arrived after the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem. The affluent community they formed was for centuries a center of cultural and economic exchange for the Mediterranean basin. Following an attack by Saracen raiders in the 10th century, the community lost most of its assets and […]
Lecce was the capital of what was formerly known as Terra d’Otranto. It had one of the most prominent Jewish settlements in the Neapolitan kingdom before the expulsion of the Jews. Though there is no evidence of a Jewish presence prior to the 15th century, there are traces its existence Lecce at the time of […]
GALLIPOLI, BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO’, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers up to the expulsion of 1541. In […]
The Giudecca of Manduria is located in the area of the Chiesa Matrice and developed around the synagogue, which still stands today. The Jews of Manduria lived prosperously in the city until the 13th century when Charles of Anjou imposed harsh life conditions on the Jews hoping that this would force them to convert. With […]
GALLIPOLI, BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO’, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers up to the expulsion of 1541. In […]
After Pompeo’s conquest of Jerusalem in 63 AD, Jews were brought back to Italy as prisoners. They arrived in Brindisi; some remained there, but most settled in Terra d’Otranto. More arrived after the destruction of the Temple. As chronicled by Ahimaaz in the XI century, Jews from the Middle East continued to arrive in […]
Few traces remain of the Jewish Community that flourished in Taranto during the Middle Ages. Much can be inferred from funereal epigraphs found here (as well as in Brindisi, Venosa and Bari). It is worth noting that these tombstones are all in Hebrew, which shows that the Jewish communities of Apulia were using their original […]
GALLIPOLI, BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO’, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers, up to the expulsion of 1541. In […]
In this small costal town south of Bari, Jews were appreciated for their mercantile acumen, up to their expulsion in the early 1500’s. City view, Monopoli
GALLIPOLI, BARLETTA, BITONTO, RUTIGLIANO, OSTUNI, NARDO’, COPERTINO and GROTTAGLIE are among the many small towns, sometimes barely villages, with a documented Jewish presence as early as Roman times. Larger or smaller groups (sometimes just a few families) alternated between settling down and moving around between these various centers, up until the Expulsion of 1541. In many […]
The four synagogues of Trani were converted into churches during the wave of anti-Judaism that followed the fall of Apulia to the Kingdom of Naples. Three hundred of the Jews remaining in the city were forced to convert to Christianity. The four synagogues were renamed Santa Maria in Scolanova, San Leonardo Abate, San Pietro Martire, and […]
Jews settled and prospered in Molfetta until the early 16th century, when the area fell into Spanish possession. Before the expulsion of the Jews in 1507, Ferdinand II instructed the local population not to honor the usurious debts contracted with the Jewish moneylenders, in order to prevent them to leave the town after receiving payment. Ferdinand […]
One the most famous centers for Jewish culture in Apulia was in Siponto. Many students from this town went to Mespotamia in the early eleventh century, in order to follow the lessons of the Babylonian Talmud. Upon their return they founded an influential Talmudic education center, headed by Rabbi Leon Elhanan.
San Nicandro Garganico is a small town in the Gargano National Park dating back to the 10th century. Although there is no evidence of a historic Jewish presence here, in the late 1920’s, San Nicandro became the theater of the only case of contemporary mass conversion to Judaism. A local shoemaker called Aldo Manduzio discovered […]
Hebrew manuscripts from the Historical Archive in Pesaro. (Read article) The Archive of the Jewish Community of Pesaro is today part of the Historical Archive of the Jewish Community of Rome.
Buildings and narrow streets in the Ghetto of Pesaro The Ghetto of Pesaro extended through what today are Via Mazzolari and Via Sara Levi Nathan, Via delle Scuole, Via dei Negozianti, Via delle Botteghe and Via Almerico da Venutra. The ancient via dei Negozianti (Merchants’ Street) was renamed after Sara Levi (1819-1882), a friend of […]