“But however I caught it, recovered it, oregon came by it,
What worldly ’tis made of, whereof it is born,
I americium to learn…”
–William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, 1.1.3-5
*
It was a acold January day erstwhile I archetypal came to the Ghetto. I got determination overmuch aboriginal than I had hoped. I had spent overmuch of the time elsewhere and had mislaid way of time. It was already opening to get dark. The campo seemed deserted. Shutters were closed and, isolated from the tinkling of h2o successful the wells, determination was hardly a sound. There were nary streetlights; hardly adjacent the glimmer of a lamp. But successful the branches of the trees, thousands of tiny lights were shining.
Having thing other to do, I wandered idly crossed the square. On a partition opposite, I spotted an imposing bronze plaque. It was hard to marque retired successful the gloom. Squinting, I could conscionable spot the representation of a bid pulling what looked similar trucks. Hundreds of people—and astir them, soldiers with guns. I caught my breath—a crisp intake of icy air. Behind the plaque, successful a ample irregular recess acceptable with a metallic grille, determination was an inscription with names. Not acold off, determination was different with a date. I picked retired the numbers slowly. 5 December 1943. I stopped. 5 December. My birthday.
Just then, I heard a dependable coming from my right. A gentle song, joyful and defiant. Turning, I saw a airy successful a ground-floor model and a tiny radical of men dressed successful black, shawls pulled up, nodding their heads successful prayer. Then it struck me. It was Friday. The Sabbath was beginning. Something stabbed astatine my heart. Without knowing why, I burst into tears.
Most of all, the Ghetto’s communicative is simply a testament of hope. Despite each they endured, its inhabitants not simply survived but thrived.
It was successful that infinitesimal that my fascination for the Venetian Ghetto began. Although I did not recognize it astatine the time, I had glimpsed—felt—the essence of its past. To astir of us, the connection ‘ghetto’ volition beryllium familiar. We cognize the tragic stories of the Warsaw Ghetto, the Łódź Ghetto, and the horrors which followed. We person heard it utilized of the ‘imprisoned cities’ of Black Americans successful parts of Harlem and Chicago, Brownsville and Detroit. We person seen it reimagined successful poems and songs. But it was there, successful an out-of-the-way country of Cannaregio, that the word—and its benighted history—was born.
*
In galore ways, determination was thing peculiarly caller astir the Venetian Ghetto. It was surely not the archetypal clip Jews had been confined to a 4th which was ‘obligatory, separate, and enclosed.’ Far from it: by the clip it was established connected March 29, 1516, the signifier of enforced segregation was already a painfully acquainted diagnostic of European life. From astatine slightest the thirteenth century, Jews successful Prague, Frankfurt-am-Main, Marseilles, and much than a twelve different cities had been required to unrecorded successful specified neighborhoods, chopped disconnected from the surrounding country by barriers and robust gates.
But the Ghetto was not ‘just’ the culmination of earlier trends. There was nary conscious effort to exemplary it aft Jewish quarters elsewhere, nary wide consciousness of its past, and nary imaginativeness of however it mightiness germinate much than a fistful of years successful the future. Rather, it was an advertisement hoc creation, occasioned by the tumult of the Italian Wars, and framed by Venice’s—perhaps myopic—determination to reconcile spiritual prejudice with its astir pressing economical needs.
Like galore different European states, Venice had agelong regarded Jews arsenic a menace to its Christian identity. Preachers and patricians perpetually warned that, if allowed to unrecorded unchecked successful the city, Jews would ‘infect’ the Christian faithful, poisoning the minds of the pious and stealing souls distant from salvation. Yet the Venetian authorities knew that it could not negociate without a Jewish presence, either. By the aboriginal sixteenth century, the Republic’s system was already showing signs of decline. The ‘working poor’ were particularly vulnerable, but since the Venetians were unable–or unwilling—to connection immoderate signifier of recognition connected their ain account, they had nary prime but to trust connected Jewish moneylenders instead. The Ghetto was simply the easiest mode of allowing Jewish loans to support flowing portion keeping the spiritual ‘risks’ to a minimum.
At first, it was intended to beryllium a impermanent measure; yet the illness of Venice’s maritime trade—once the guarantor of its prosperity—demanded that the Ghetto not lone beryllium retained but expanded. Jewish merchants, primitively from Spain and Portugal, were invited to marque the Ghetto their location and, successful doing so, assistance revive Venice’s flagging commerce with the Levant. One Ghetto swiftly became three; and arsenic agelong arsenic Venice’s fortunes continued to worsen, their beingness was each but guaranteed—so overmuch truthful that, by the mid-seventeenth century, their presumption could good beryllium regarded arsenic a barometer of Venice’s decline.
Though each of the Ghetto’s 3 areas (the Ghetto Nuovo, the Ghetto Vecchio, and the Ghetto Nuovissimo) retained its own, chiseled quality until remarkably late, it was ever cramped, unsanitary, and marred by privation. Its residents were taxable not conscionable to innumerable petty restrictions, but to an ineradicable, if often variable, hostility. Comparisons with Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice are invidious, but possibly unavoidable. Although astir scholars present hold that Shylock’s ‘pound of flesh’ owes much to antisemitic hysteria successful London than to regular beingness successful the lagoon, the maltreatment helium suffers astatine Antonio’s manus successful the Rialto marketplace would not person been each that unrecognizable, astatine slightest successful a somewhat earlier period. Insults were common, threats familiar. Accusations of humor libel periodically recurred. Physical attacks were not unknown. There are cases of Jewish corpses being abused connected their mode to the cemetery; and adjacent 1 lawsuit of a begetter watching arsenic his lad was stabbed to decease successful the street.
Over the 300 years of its existence, the Ghetto became a byword for the forcible segregation of Jewish communities. And aft its gates were yet pulled down, it lived on—as overmuch successful caput arsenic successful space. To get James Baldwin’s phrase, its limits were ‘set forever.’ Jews, though relieved of their fiscal burdens and recognized arsenic citizens, often struggled to flight the Ghetto’s shadow, and Venetian antisemitism, shorn of its spiritual mantle, took connected the much vicious garb of race.
The Ghetto’s communicative is thing but simple, however. Though its precocious walls were intended to support the Christian population, they sometimes did much to support the Jewish radical within. Particularly aft Venice’s interruption with the papacy successful the aboriginal seventeenth century, the authorities went to large lengths to shield judaizers from the Inquisition’s glare and recast the Ghetto arsenic a refuge. On different occasions, its walls could beryllium remarkably porous. The Ghetto was, aft all, founded successful the anticipation of regular speech betwixt Jews and Christians and was enlarged successful the anticipation that it would beryllium a model of sorts onto the East. Jews often lived extracurricular the Ghetto; and, astatine times, Christians made their homes wrong its walls. Conversions were common; apostasy not unknown; and the beingness alleged Marranos (Jews from Spain oregon Portugal who had converted to Christianity) made it virtually intolerable to gully a wide favoritism betwixt spiritual communities. Even astatine the tallness of Jewish segregation, Jews mightiness enactment successful concern with Christians, telephone connected Christians to arbitrate successful disputes, oregon beryllium welcomed into Christian homes arsenic friends. And erstwhile segregation was ended, we find Jewish councillors astatine the bosom of civic politics, Jewish restaurants being haunted by Venetian gourmands, and Jewish soldiers taking their spot successful the conflict archetypal for Italian unity, past for Italian freedom.
The longer I person studied this astir singular place…the much intelligibly person I travel to spot its indispensable truth: that its top monument is its endurance; its top blessing, its memory; and its top hope, its people.
Most of all, the Ghetto’s communicative is simply a testament of hope. Despite each they endured, its inhabitants not simply survived but thrived. They were, successful a sense, a microcosm of the Jewish world. Having each fled persecution abroad, the aboriginal residents belonged to 3 ‘national’ groupings, worshipped according to 2 abstracted rites (Ashkenazi and Sephardic), and spoke immoderate fig of antithetic languages. At assorted times, they practiced a dizzying scope of professions: from doctors and rag-traders to merchants and copy-editors. More than once, they helped support the Venetian system from collapse. They founded nary less than 8 glittering synagogues, each a masterpiece of its kind; they founded innumerable charities; and they administered their ain affairs with antiauthoritarian probity. They were poets and scientists, musicians and philosophers; they enactment connected plays and held festivals; and they transformed Venice into the top centre for Hebrew printing successful the world. And astir 5 centuries aft the Ghetto’s foundation—long aft the horrors of the Holocaust—I recovered them inactive there, connected that acold wintertime evening, proud, defiant, and afloat of hope.
*
In looking backmost astatine the Ghetto’s past, I person utilized 3 lenses. The archetypal is context. As volition possibly already beryllium apparent, the Ghetto is simply a merchandise of overmuch wider Jewish diasporas. Those who lived determination came arsenic refugees oregon migrants from Germany, Spain, Portugal, the Ottoman Empire, modern Ukraine—and possibly adjacent beyond; and the Ghetto’s communicative cannot beryllium told but done their own. At the aforesaid time, it is arsenic intolerable to recognize the Ghetto but successful narration to Venice’s ain fortunes. Just arsenic the Ghetto’s instauration was precipitated (if not needfully caused) by the catastrophic defeats Venice suffered during the Italian Wars, truthful its consequent past was shaped by the diminution of Venetian shipping, its fractious narration with the Ottoman Empire and the papacy, its displacement towards the land, and its subjugation—to France, to Austria, and yet to Italy. I person truthful tried to nexus the regular happenings successful Cannaregio with the bigger representation arsenic intelligibly arsenic I can. As volition go clear, this has often necessitated giving a bully woody of attraction to Venice’s economical situation, the authorities of its nationalist finances and—most of all—the workings of recognition markets. These are, understandably, often alternatively tricky topics; but I person done my champion to debar unnecessary technicalities whenever possible.
The 2nd lends is environment. Although the Ghetto’s communicative often unfolds crossed a ample canvas, arsenic a communicative of negotiations and charters, wars and finances, the Ghetto itself was ne'er thing little than a lived environment. Whatever the squalls raging about, those fewer tiny blocks structured and shaped the regular lives of Venice’s Jewish population. It was there, successful those squares and streets, that radical had their homes, ate their meals, celebrated, worshipped, and mourned. The cloth of the Ghetto is the warp and weft of its societal existence. At each signifier of the narrative, I person truthful tried to springiness arsenic wide an content arsenic I tin of the built situation and its evolution: the authorities of the tenements, the shops and synagogues, the wells, drains, and bridges. In this, I person been helped immeasurably by the abundance of superior materials inactive disposable and by the galore fantastic studies which person been produced successful caller decades, astir notably by Donatella Calabi, Ennio Concina, and Ugo Camerino—not to notation the outstanding conservation enactment which has preserved truthful galore of the Ghetto’s buildings for posterity.
The 3rd is personalities. Although this publication traces the Ghetto’s past from the accomplishment of the archetypal Jews successful Venice down to the contiguous day—a play of immoderate 700 years—it is supra each a communicative of individuals. The Ghetto itself was a spot to live; and though its destiny was often shaped by factors beyond the power of immoderate 1 person, it was ever a surviving assemblage of families, friends, acquaintances, and rivals. As such, I person tried to archer the Ghetto’s communicative done the experiences, and (where possible) the voices of its inhabitants. Particularly for earlier periods, this has, admittedly, not ever been easy. Far less first-hand accounts person travel down to america than we mightiness like. As a result, non-Jewish sources person needfully had to beryllium privileged, a information which has the unfortunate effect of reinforcing Jewish exclusion. From the mid-sixteenth period onwards, however, the concern is rather different. Thanks to the wealthiness of materials which person survived, we are fortunate to beryllium capable to reconstruct galore lives successful exceptional detail. Some of these are ‘significant’ figures who made immoderate noteworthy publication to cultural, political, oregon spiritual life, oregon who are different good represented successful the documentary record, specified arsenic the writer Sara Copia Sullam, the learned rabbi Leon Modena, the revolutionary Daniele Manin, and the doc Giuseppe Jona. But I person tried too, equilibrium these with the lives of much mean people, too, similar Simcà Todesca, the housewife who recovered a babe connected her doorstep, and the children who were separated from their parents during the Second World War.
This publication cannot unreal to completeness, however. It is the historian’s curse to spot the past done a solid darkly; and adjacent the astir strenuous efforts spend thing much than a little and incomplete glimpse into the Ghetto’s history. Yet the longer I person studied this astir singular place, the much profoundly I person dug into its records and remains, the much intelligibly person I travel to spot its indispensable truth: that its top monument is its endurance; its top blessing, its memory; and its top hope, its people.
_______________________________
From The First Ghetto: Venice and the Origins of Modern Antisemitism by Alexander Lee. Copyright © 2026. Available from Basic Books, an imprint of Hachette Book Group. The First Ghetto has been shortlisted for the 2026 Cundill History Prize.
English (US) ·