Metadata: Historical Section
Collection
- Country:
- Italy
- Holding institution:
- Mantua Jewish Community Archive
- Holding institution (official language):
- Archivio della comunità ebraica di Mantova
- Postal address:
- via G. Govi 11, 46100 Mantova
- Phone number:
- +39 0376321490
- Web address:
- http://digiebraico.bibliotecateresiana.it/
- Email:
- comebraica.mn@virgilio.it
- Title:
- Historical Section
- Title (official language):
- Sezione storica
- Creator/accumulator:
- Mantua Jewish Community
- Date(s):
- 1790-1988
- Language:
- Italian
- Extent:
- 506 folders and 128 registers
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The "Historical" section preserves the interesting correspondence of the Community on matters of administration, management of the patrimony, assistance and education. It also includes:
Documents of the Israelite Commission for Worship and Charity (1836-1931), organised in files attached to the minutes of the sessions according to a detailed list of titles (1. hospitalised; 2. population; 3. pious houses / hospitalisation administration; 4. hospitalisation appointments / employees; 5. office expenses; 6. worship / temple; 10. taxes; 13. charity / subsidies 15. administrative / office expenses, 18. active rentals, 19. possessions, 20. restoration / maintenance, 21. miscellaneous, 23. education, 24. German oratory, 27. cemetery, 28. assembly; 29. bequests; 30. accounting).
Documents of the Pious Jewish Houses of Shelter and Industry (1839-1943). Its first nucleus was established on 1 January 1825 by Marquis Marsilio Benzoni with the support of its own donors. It was moved in 1828 to a larger building divided into two sectors, one for the shelter of adults, the other for the training of young people in a trade. The administration of the Pious Houses was the task of the Israelite Commission, which chose among its most capable contributors those who could play the role of director and deputy director, and whose correspondence and accounting documents are kept here.
Documents of the Jewish community of Mantua (1931-1946); of the directors of the Major Temple of Mantua (1843-1867); of brotherhoods and various institutes, including the Pio Istituto Samuele Trabotti (1835-1943), which was founded thanks to the testamentary bequest of Samuele Trabotti of 24 February 1834, meant for the education of deserving young people and to the creation of a dowry for poor girls; here are kept mainly the minutes of the Congregation that ran the institute, which was attended by the major rabbi as its president and which was responsible for the allocation of funds; the Consortia Bikur Kolim ("support of the sick” in Hebrew), Mazal Bedullà ("endowment of the unmarried"), the Israelite Kindergarten.
- Administrative/biographical history:
-
The first mention of Jews in Mantua dates from the 12th century, when Abraham ibn Ezra finished his grammatical work “Zahot”(1145) there. Apparently, he was in the city again in 1153. There are no further references to Jews in connection with Mantua until they are mentioned in the new statutes of the city at the end of the 13th century, when a large number seem to have lived there.
Under the Gonzagas, in 1610 Jews in Mantua constituted about 7.5% of the population. Jewish bankers were invited to start transactions in Mantua and its province, where some 50 Jewish settlements of varying sizes flourished, such as Bozzolo, Sabbioneta, Guastalla, Viadana, Revere, Sermide, and Ostiano.
Until the 19th century, the Jewish community of Mantua was the only important one in Lombardy. The Gonzagas treated the Jews relatively well for the times, by honouring their agreements, protecting Jewish merchants from the guilds and from physical violence. The Jews engaged in various trades and crafts: banking, jewellery, clothing, printing, and were also very involved in court life and culture.
Duke Vincenzo Gonzaga decided that a ghetto should be established in the capital in 1602. This plan was started in 1610. The Mantuan community was the last of the large Italian communities to be confined to a ghetto and among those who did not object to the foundation of a ghetto.
By 1761, there were 2,114 Jews living in the city. During the 18th century, the Jewish community of Mantua was one of the largest in Italy. When the duchy passed from the Gonzaga to the Austrian Empire in 1707, it was the largest community in Lombardy and together with Trieste and Gorizia one of the few Italian dominions of the Habsburgs.
Under the Habsburgs the situation of the Jews improved: between the 1770s and 1780s there were between 2,100 and 2,200 individuals within the city (8-10% of the entire city population). As part of the Austrian Empire, Mantua’s Jewish community underwent the legal and social transformations of the Austrian Jewish emancipation, with an unstable equilibrium between individual and communal rights. By 1791, the emperor Leopold had granted Mantuan Jewry legal equality together with the possibility of buying houses in and outside the ghetto.
Although not all restrictions were abolished, the Austrian reform in favour of Jews continued during the French and Napoleonic eras. During French rule, the ghetto was abolished. The Jews of Mantua, like their coreligionists elsewhere in Italy, took an active part in the Italian Risorgimento. In 1866 when Mantua became part of Italy Jews were fully emancipated.
Migrations had halved and impoverished the community of Mantua; the area of the ghetto was progressively abandoned, with only the poorest of the population remaining. Between 1894 and 1904, the ghetto began to be demolished. By 1901, Mantua had lost nearly half of its residents, with only 1,093 Jews affiliated with the community. In 1930, there were 500 Jews living in Mantua. This decreasing trend continued in the years of persecution and deportations from 1938 to 1945 and after World War II. During World War II, over 50 Jews were deported to the death camps or killed.
For further information see: Italia Judaica. "Mantova", https://www7.tau.ac.il/omeka/italjuda/items/show/655
F. Cavarocchi, La comunità ebraica di Mantova fra prima emancipazione e unità d'Italia, Giuntina, Firenze, 2002.
E. Colorni, La comunità ebraica mantovana: appunti di storia, Mantova, Mantova ebraica, 2000
- Access points: locations:
- Mantua
- Access points: persons/families:
- Trabotti, Samuele
- Yerusha Network member:
- Contemporary Jewish Documentation Center - Milan
- Author of the description:
- Samuela Marconcini; Centro di documentazione ebraica contemporanea; 2019