Heritage

Venice

16th century
In 1516 Venice's growing Jewish community was confined to a quarter known as the "Ghetto Nuovo" (New Ghetto). Although Jews throughout Europe had often lived in their own separate neighborhoods, this was the first time the word "ghetto" was used to describe their quarter.

The Venetian ghetto's population grew at a rapid pace. In 1541 a new quarter called, somewhat confusingly, the "Ghetto Vecchio" (Old Ghetto), was opened. Venetian Jews lived a crowded existence within the ghetto walls. Nevertheless, they developed a vibrant cultural and communal life.

Economically too, Venetian Jews thrived, playing a prominent role in the development of maritime trade routes between the Adriatic and the Aegean. Jews controlled about a fifth to one-third of Venetian trade with Ottoman Turkey.

1780s
By the 1780s, Venetian Jewish industrialists had expanded into shipowning and manufacturing. This provoked a reaction from reformers who wished to revitalize stagnant native Venetian
enterprises. Senator Andrea Tron helped enact new laws that restricted the activities of Jews and foreigners, including immigrants of Slavic origin from Dalmatia.
Rome

Rome
1542 to 1555

During the Counter-Reformation, the situation of Rome's Jewish community deteriorated. The Inquisition was instituted in the city in 1542, and in 1543, the House of Catechumens was established. In this building, maintained at the Jewish community's expense, potential Jewish converts to Christianity were confined and indoctrinated until they accepted baptism. Talmudicliterature was banned in Rome and the authorities burned many Hebrew books in a huge bonfire on Rosh Ha-Shanah, 1553.

Cardinal Caraffa, the head of the Inquisition, took an active role in these persecutions. When he became Pope Paul IV in 1555 and instituted anti-Jewish laws, the Jews of Rome sufferedalong with all other Jewish residents of the Papal States. They were ordered into a ghetto, which, for the next 300 years, remained the only place Jews were permitted to live in Rome.