Location
Sopron
Within this Baroque city, where splendid thirteenth-century houses have been transformed into museums, restoration projects have brought two medieval synagogues back to life. Built in the early ...
Location
Györ
The immense gray dome of stands out against the industrial landscape. Completed in 1870, the structure reflects the prosperity of the city’s Jewish middle class -lawyers, bankers, and ...
Location
Budapest
Visiting Budapest requires at least three days. The capital was born from the unification of three cities: Buda and Óbuda on the western shore of the Danube, and Pest on the eastern shores. ...
Location
Dubrovnik
The earliest refugees from the Iberian Peninsula arrived in Ragusa (present-day Dubrovnik) at the end of the fifteenth century, at a time when the republic, still under nominal supervision by ...
Location
Split
Archaeologists have recently unearthed traces of a Jewish presence in Salona (Solin), capital of Roman Dalmatia and sister city to Split, that dates as far back as the first centuries C.E. Salona ...
Location
Dalmatian Coast
The several hundred Spanish Jews who arrived on the shores of the Adriatic had a key role for centuries in the development of these coastal principalities, and contributed greatly to their growth ...
Location
Rijeka
The Ashkenazic synagogue, built in the nineteenth century after a design by Hungarian architect Lipot Baumhorn, was destroyed in 1944. The Sephardic synagogue, built in 1928, is still used by the ...
Location
Dakovo
Created in 1879, the Jewish cemetery in Dakovo possesses the unique feature of containing individual burial sites for victims of the Shoah. A total of 566 Jewish victims of Dakovo’s Ustashi ...
Location
Osijek
In 1847, fifty or so families helped found the community in Osijek, Slavonia’s main city. A school and synagogue were quickly built, presided over by Rabbi Samuel Spitzer, author of ...
Location
Varazdin
Varazdin is an important trading town located between Vienna and Trieste. The Jewish presence probably dates from the 18th century, mainly from Moravia, Hungary and Austria. They worked there ...
Location
Karlovac
The Jewish presence in Karlovac probably dates back to the mid-19th century. A synagogue was built in Karlovac in 1870. It served the community until 1960, when it was destroyed. A commemorative ...
Location
Zagreb
Zagreb is the capital of Croatia. The Jewish presence probably dates back to the 10th century, originating from surrounding areas but also from Spain and France. A place of prayer was mentioned ...
Location
Italian border and Istria
Not one of the regions where Slovenian Jewish life was most intense, you’ll find traces of it in the towns of Koper, Nova Gorica, Piran and Stanjel.
Location
Central and Northeast Slovenia
In this region, there are few traces of Jewish life in Kidiricevo, Murska Sobota and Ptuj. However, Lendava and Maribor still have synagogues. The synagogue in Maribor is one of the oldest in ...
Location
Eisenstadt
The region’s sovereigns, the Esterházy dukes of Hungary, granted the Jews special protection within the seven districts of Burgenland. Since 1670, the region has been one of the most ...
Location
Trani
During the late Middle Ages, the city of Trani was home to a significant minority population of Jews. This community reached a high point during the thirteenth century. The giudecca of Trani was ...
Location
San Nicandro
It was in San Nicandro that the first mass conversion to Judaism since the end of antiquity took place. All the converts emigrated to Israel shortly after 1948, so unfortunately there is nothing ...
Location
Southern Italy
The communities of the southern peninsula were the wealthiest and best integrated in all of Italy during the Middle Ages. This was particularly true of Sicily, where more than 37,000 Jews lived, ...
Location
Ancona
The Jews first arrived in Ancona around 1000 C.E. In the fourteenth century, the city hosted a significant Jewish community, whose activities were organized around the port and commerce with the ...
Location
Senigallia
The history of the Jews in Senigallia is similar to that of the Jews of Urbino or Pesaro. In the eighteenth century, the Jews numbered 600 of a total population of approximately 5,500 ...
Location
Urbino
The first traces of a Jewish presence in Urbino date to the fourteenth century, when Daniel of Viterbo received authorization to work as a banker and merchant. The Jewish community prospered ...
Location
Pesaro
Documents attest to a Jewish presence in Pesaro dating back to 1214. The expulsion of the Jews from the papal states in 1569 led numerous Jewish families to Pesaro, which became the most ...
Location
The Marches
The presence of Jews in the Marches dates from as early as the twelfth century. The community developed especially after the expulsion of Jews from Spain, Sicily, and the Kingdom of Naples. There ...
Location
Trieste
A rich and influential Jewish community lived in Trieste, a large port city of the Austro-Hungarian Empire that became Italian only after the First World War. During the nineteenth century and ...
Location
Conegliano Veneto
In this little town, as in so many other towns in Venetia, there was a small but flourishing Jewish community. One can see the street of the former synagogue, whose interior ornaments and ...
Location
Venice
On 20 March 1516, Zaccaria Dolfin, an influential Venetian patrician, announced a radical turn in the history of the Jew of the Serenissima: “It is necessary to send all the Jews (zudei) to ...
Location
Padua
In the fourteenth century, Padua was one of the great centers of medieval Judaism, with a celebrated rabbinical academy where students from all over Europe came to study. These students were also ...
Location
Veneto
The Veneto region, as its name suggests, makes a visit to the mysterious and inspiring Venice a must, even inspiring a certain William Shakespeare to set several of his greatest plays there ...
Location
Mantua
Under the protection of the Gonzaga dukes, Jewish life flourished in the city of Mantua during the course of centuries. At the beginning of the seventeenth century, some 7,000 Jews lived in the ...
Location
Soncino
The only noteworthy place of remembrance in the area surrounding Milan is the small town of Soncino in the province of Cremona. In the fifteenth century, a Hebrew printing house operated there, ...