Today, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the international memorial day on 27 January commemorating the tragedy of the Holocaust that occurred during the Second World War, our post from “Detourism: La newsletter di Venezia”, the newsletter prepared by the Tourism Office of the Town of Venice, is dedicated to the Jewish Ghetto of Venice. Enjoy your reading!

The Venice Jewish Ghetto: the origins, the history and the curiosities

The Ghetto of Venice is the most ancient Jewish district in Europe, established by the Serenissima on 29th March 1516. The word “ghetto”, now internationally used, derives from the fact that, ancient foundries, “geti” in Venetian dialect, existed in the place where Venetian Jews were compelled to live. In fact, the ancient Venetian term “gèto” corresponds to the Italian “getto”, that is a casting of melted metal. Today the Ghetto is a lively and popular quarter of the city in the Cannaregio district where the five synagogues and the Jewish Museum tell the tradition of the historical Jewish community of Venice.

For almost three centuries, from 1516 to 1797, the Venice Ghetto was a locked area of the city and the Jews were not allowed to live outside its border. Strong gates closed the two entrances of the Campo del Ghetto Nuovo and every night its inhabitants had to go back and stay locked until the following morning. With the fall of the Republic and the rise of Napoleon the discriminations against Jews were eliminated. The doors of the ghetto were removed as well as the residence obligation. Today the ghetto can be entered through three bridges, but in the past there were only two: the one leading to Rio della Misericordia did not exist. The stone jambs of the interior of the portico to the Ghetto Vecchio still show the sign of the hinges of the doors and gates that were closed at twilight.

Find out more about Venice Ghetto on the Jewish Museum of Venice web site!

[source: La newsletter di Venezia, N° 41/2020 del 30.10.2020]
[picture by Adriano – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0]

We are proud to publish some selected contents of such newsletter (see previous post: “Detourism for the Up and Down the Bridges“). On our website, in several episodes, we will only present some samples (see all posts in our archive page “Detourism Newsletter“), but the invitation addressed to all the friends of the Up and Down the Bridges is to subscribe to the newsletter directly.
Special thanks to the Councillor for Tourism for having enthusiastically welcomed this new important collaboration between TGS Eurogroup and the Tourism Office of the Town of Venice and for giving us the precious opportunity to publish on the pages of this blog some extracts from this newsletter, both in Italian and in English.

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