Atlante Linguistico, 1741
REGIONS
Jews who lived in Trentino-Alto Adige absorbed different political and cultural influences according to their location. In Trento and Riva del Garda, they were exposed to Italian influences, while, in Bolzano and Merano, mostly Austro-Hungarian ones.
Medieval Jewish chronicles attribute the beginnings of Jewish settlement in Calabria to captives exiled by Titus after the destruction of the Temple in 70 C.E. However, there is no concrete evidence proving that Jews were present in Calabria until the first half of the fourth century. We do know that the Calabrian community became prosperous around this time, and […]
There is evidence that Jews have lived in Tuscany since the Early Middle Ages, although it was in the period of Medici rule that Jewish-owned banks and moneylenders really began to grow. Florence and Pisa had the largest Jewish populations, although many of the smaller towns also had significant Jewish communities. On one hand, the […]
There were Jewish communities in Umbria from the second half of the thirteenth century, when Jewish settlement in the region became permanent and continuous, until the expulsion of the Jews decreed by Pope Pius V in 1569. Umbria was an important geographical and political entity in central Italy during the late Middle Ages and was […]
The history of the Jews in Basilicata is at least 2000 years old. This area, which is a mix of mountains and rich fertile plains, is south of Rome but north of Calabria and Apulia. Most of the Jewish communities in this area were settled in the Roman Era by Jewish merchants or by Jewish […]
There were probably Jews living in Sicily during the period of the Second Temple. The great Jewish rhetorician Caecilius of Calacte moved from Sicily to Rome around 50 C.E. and the epigraphic records start in the third century. After this period, records are scarce. In 590, Pope Gregory the Great ordered the ecclesiastical authorities to reimburse […]
During the 15th and 16th centuries, Jewish families from Rome, Pisa and Ancona conducted business in Molise where they also had temporary residence. During World War II, because of the isolation of the region, the fascist regime established Jewish internment camps and internment locations in Agnon, Maranello, Boiano, Camponasso, Campomarino, Cantalupo del Sannio, Cascalenda, […]
Between the 15th and 18th centuries, several important trades began to flourish in the small towns of Abruzzo, including paper making, printing and jewelry. Small settlements of Jews lived in the region from the 13th century until 1511. Today, there are no longer organized Jewish communities in the region. Aquila: The first record of Jews living in Aquila dates […]
Austria annexed Trieste in 1382 and did not relinquish the city to Italy until after World War I. However, the city has been able to remain culturally Italian since this time. Jews may have lived in Trieste as early as the 11th century and certainly from the 14th, although the kehillah was not formally organized until 1746. […]
While Jews did not settle in Venice until the 13th century, many Jewish merchants and moneylenders visited and worked in the city beginning in the 10th century. Jews were mentioned in documents from 945 and 992 that forbade Venetian captains from accepting Jews onboard their ships. In 1252, Jews were not allowed to settle in the […]
References to Jews in Lombardy date to the fourth century; subsequently there is only slight evidence down to the very end of the 12th century, when Jews are found engaged in moneylending. In 1225, the Jews were expelled from Pavia and Cremona. In 1278, they began to be harassed by the conversionist sermons of the […]
The settlement of Jews, in various parts of the island, goes as far back as the year 19 CE. During the reign of the emperor Tiberius, 4,000 Jewish youths were banished from Rome to Sardinia as a penalty for the misdeeds of four Jewish swindlers. Pretending to be collectors for the treasury of the Temple […]
Jews settled in Liguria later than in many other regions. In Genova, the local merchants, fearing Jewish competition, did not allow the Jews to settle there until 1648. Smaller Jewish communities, now mostly extinct, were in La Spezia, San Remo, Lerici and Monterosso.
The Jewish settlement in what now is Emilia Romagna had begun to gradually spread by the 13th century, with evidence today of a Jewish presence in at least 37 localities. During the 15th and 16th centuries, the Jewish communities in many centers, big and small, in Emilia and Romagna enjoyed long periods of coexistence and […]
When Italy became a unified country 150 years ago, the Region of Piemonte was its center and the catalyst of its early development. As the oldest minority in Europe, Italian Jews held a high stake in a process that sanctioned their emancipation, and they actively participated in shaping the new national life. Since the 15th […]
The Jewish community of Campania can perhaps be dated as far back as the Greek colonies that established themselves throughout the region, in cities including Pozzuoli, Nola, Bacoli, Marano, Capua, Herculaneum and Stabiae. Certainly, they began to settle throughout the Mediterranean after Alexander the Great took Judaea. Historians give the date of 70 B.C. as a […]
Jews lived in Apulia from ancient Roman times until 1541, when they were banished from all of Southern Italy. They arrived after the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem in 70 AD, when emperor Tito brought back 5,000 Jewish war prisoners, who subsequently settled in and around Taranto. The records are sparse over the next two […]
The history of the Jews in Marche dates back more than a thousand years. Land records as early as 967 show that Jews were owners of vineyards and olive groves. Documents dating from that year record a land sale by Peter, bishop of Ravenna, to Elijah “The Righteous”. Over the centuries, this region had at […]
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