Metadata: Religion and worship, religious issues and ritual objects
Collection
- Country:
- Italy
- Holding institution:
- Centre of Contemporary Jewish Documentation
- Holding institution (official language):
- Fondazione Centro di documentazione ebraica contemporanea
- Postal address:
- via Eupili 8, 20145 Milano
- Phone number:
- +39 02316338
- Web address:
- http://www.cdec.it/
- Email:
- cdec@cdec.it
- Reference number:
- I° versamento: boxes 2, 25, 40; II° versamento: box 4
- Title:
- Religion and worship, religious issues and ritual objects
- Title (official language):
- Religione e culto, questioni religiose e oggetti cultuali
- Creator/accumulator:
- Milan Jewish Community
- Date(s):
- 1883-1970
- Extent:
- 7 registers, 8 files
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
- The documents collected in this sub-series have been selected on the basis of relevance of their contents for Jewish culture and religion. They deal with issues such as kashrut, religious ceremonies such as Jewish marriage, cremation and burial according to Jewish tradition with related requests submitted to the rabbinical council as well as circulars and a statistical summary of abjurations, conversions and repudiations until 30 November 1934. The sub-series also includes documents about ritual objects such as furnishings, prayer books, correspondence concerning imports and exports of various goods including tefillim accompanied by a brief description of the artefact, and registers of "expenses for ritual objects" which records the costs of various purchases, including prayer books but also stationery.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The Community of Milan, with its origins as a section of Mantua’s Community, developed around the middle of the 19th century, following the arrival of numerous Mantuan Jews who fled the violent antisemitic demonstrations of 1842. In Milan, without a real official and organised community, the relations with the mother community were governed by the Austrian civil code, according to which smaller communities must refer to the larger ones. Only in 1855 was the Jewish Consortium established, the first Jewish organisation in Milan, which in 1866 broke away from Mantua. The consortium did not assume the legal characteristics dictated by the Rattazzi law but reaffirmed its nature as a voluntary association with the only commitment for the members being the contributions for its maintenance. Thanks to the sudden economic, industrial and commercial development of Milan, the community grew rapidly: in 1890 it had 2,000 members, in the 1930s 8,000 Jews arrived from Piedmont, Marche, Tuscany and Veneto but also from Germany and from Central and Eastern Europe. In October 1930 the Council of Ministers approved the Royal Decree 1731, the new law on the Jewish communities and on the Union of the Italian Jewish Communities. A few days after the approval of the decree, Federico Jarach was elected the first president of the Jewish Community of Milan. In 1938 on the eve of antisemitic laws, the Community of Milan had just 5,000 members out of a total Jewish population of about 8,000 people. At the end of the Second World War, the Community of Milan became a crossing point for many refugees and survivors of the Nazi concentration camps, collaborating with relief organisations such as the Joint, ADEI-WIZO, the ORT, and UNRRA using the building of via Unione 5 as the main reception, research and sorting centre for Jews returning from concentration camps. In the 1950s the community welcomed groups of Jews from Egypt, Syria, Libya, Lebanon, Iraq and Iran who settled in Milan because they were fleeing the Arab-Israeli wars, giving rise to an integration process that changed the original face of the Milanese community. Today it includes the districts of Como, Pavia, Sondrio and Varese.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Contemporary Jewish Documentation Center - Milan
- Author of the description:
- Paola Cipolla
