A closer look
Jewish Community of Casale Monferrato: at a glance
The Jewish community of Casale Monferrato is one of the twenty-one Italian Jewish community gathered in the UCEI.
A small community is defined and currently has just about ten members. The community is based in the alley Solomon Olper 44. Current president is Adriana Torre Ottolenghi.
History
The first safe news about the presence of Jews in the city date back to the years immediately after 1492, the year of the Spanish diaspora. The Jewish community of Casale...Explore this chapter
The first safe news about the presence of Jews in the city date back to the years immediately after 1492, the year of the Spanish diaspora.
The Jewish community of Casale Monferrato is first developed under the Paleologhi, then under the Gonzaga in the 16th century and practiced as an activity especially trade, even on a large scale.
In 1640 the Jona family became the official wheat supplier of the whole city.
In 1708, following the end of Gonzaga's domination, the community passed under the Savoy, whose policy of relative tolerance favoured Jewish presence in the region, but predicted the establishment of the ghetto in 1723.[1]
In 1761, according to the General Census, were resident in ghetto 136 families, equal to 673 people.
In 1848, with the Albertine Statute, the Jews of Casale Monferrato obtained emancipation; in the town there were 850 Jews. Later the community went thinning because many preferred to settle in expanding industrial cities (especially Turin and Milan).
Casale Monferrato remained however (with Turin, Alessandria and Vercelli) one of the four main centres of presence in Piemonte, officially recognized by the Falco law that in 1930 reorganized Italian Jewish communities.
Before the Shoah there were still 112 members and residents in the city.
In the early years of World War II, between 1941 and 1943, Casale Monferrato was with Acqui Terme one of the two municipalities of Alexandria designated as a place of free internship for foreign Jews. There were 7 people in everything, of Croatian or German origin, who in the previous years I had found refuge in Italy, establishing itself in Genoa or Trieste.[2] After September 8, 1943, with the German occupation, the group of refugees immediately left the country and dispersed; they will almost all escape capture and deportation.[3] They were arrested in Casale Monferrato and deported 19 members of the local Jewish community (the number increases considerably if they also consider the housekeepers arrested in other locations).[4] A memorial, by Antonio Recalcati, recalls in the atrium of the local synagogue the 59 Jews of Casale and the 4 of Moncalvo deported and dead in the extermination camps.[5]
Testimonials of the Jewish presence
Synagogue · Museum · Show of the LightsExplore this chapter
Synagogue
The synagogue, of German rite, rich in furnishings and inscriptions, is an example of Piedmontese baroque and is considered one of the most beautiful in Italy.[6] It was built in 1595 and expanded in the eighteenth century as a result of community growth. In 1868 the synagogue was further expanded following emancipation, an event celebrated by a bilingual (Jewish-Italian) inscription unique in its kind in Italy. After a decadence period the synagogue was restored completely in 1969 by the Superintendency to the monuments of the Region Piemonte, which declared it a national monument.
Museum
Located within the buildings annexed to the Synagogue, and in a part of the Matroneo, the museum preserves historical pieces and documents including decorative elements of the law rolls (I'm going to be And atarot). Precious and interesting fabrics, hand-embroidered and finely decorated, are also preserved.
Show of the Lights
In the place where anciently stood Mikveh (tank for the purification bath), and where the ancient oven of the Azzime, Since the 2000s, a permanent exhibition of Chanukkah's Lights has been set up, unique in its kind. It is possible to admire a rich exhibition of Chanukkiot (the typical 9-arm candlesticks of the Chanukkah Festival), reinterpreted with various materials and shapes, by numerous Italian and international artists. The name of Emanuele Luzzati is striking among the various works.
Ghetto
The borders of the ghetto, established in 1723, are still perfectly recognizable today, between Via Balbo, Via Roma and Piazza San Francesco, with houses with connecting courtyards and numerous internal passages. In via Alessandria you can see the hook, used for the closure of the ghetto, and the image of Our Lady, placed in the Christian side on the border with the Jewish quarter.
Cemeteries
The old cemetery, located in via Negri, in use until 1932 and then abandoned, preserves old gravestones.
The new cemetery, still in use, with access to the intersection between via Negri and via Cardinal Massaia, is characterized by the presence of various monumental tombs.
Chief Rabbis
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- Samuel Solomon Olper (1855 - 1859)
- Flaminio Servi (1872 - 1904)
- Aldo Lattes (1904 - 1909)
- Giuseppe Levi (1910 - 1917)
- Carlo Cesare Rocca (1917 - 1926)
- Ezechiele Segre (1926 - 1941)
- Raffaello Lattes (1942 - 1945)
Notes
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- ^ The Jewish family, up qqcasale.e-brei.net.
- ^ Foreign Jews interned in Piemonte.
- ^ Samuele Litter, arrested in the Genoa area, is the only one of them to appear in the lists of deported and victims of Auschwitz. CDEC Digital Library.
- ^ CDEC Digital Library.
- ^ Shoah Atrium and Memory.
- ^ Annie Sacerdoti, Guide to Jewish Italy, Marietti, Genoa 1986.
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