Browse Exhibits (2 total)
The Jews of Corfu: Between the Adriatic and the Ionian
The island of Corfu, situated at the borders of the Agean and Ionian Seas, is not known today for its Jewish community. 250 years ago, however, Jews accounted for nearly 10% of its population. As early as the 14th century, when the state of Venice assumed jurisdiction of the island, the Jewish community of Corfu was already important enough that a Jew named David Sem was part of a six-person delegation sent from the island to Venice to swear fealty to the new rulers. The 12th century traveler Benjamin of Tudela noted a single Jew in Corfu when he arrived there in the 1160s, but within a few hundred years, that number would grow to the hundreds, reaching its peak in the mid-19th century at around 6000 people.
There were two main Jewish communities in Corfu. The Romaniote (Greek-speaking) community was the smaller and more insular of the two, dating to the Second Temple period. The Italian community arose in Corfu following Venetian occupation of the island, and welcomed Sephardic and Ashkenazic refugees fleeing eastward to the relatively tolerant Ottoman Empire.
The exhibit features prayer books, communal and legislative documents, and ketubbot. Among the stories featured include an an international dispute in Jewish law regarding the acceptability of a musical rendition of the Shema prayer in the Italian synagogue; varied legislation about the Corfu Jews’ requirement to wear the yellow badge (as had been mandated in Venice); prayers for varied holidays, penance, a property dispute, a synagogue theft; and documents relating Jewish doctors and education in Corfu.
Unfortunately, the community of Corfu was almost entirely decimated by the Nazis and so few people know about the long and creative history of the Jews on this island. It is our hope that this exhibition, featuring materials from Columbia University Libraries at both Columbia (noted with "CUL") and the Jewish Theological Seminary (noted with "JTS"), will bring more attention to this unique and understudied community.
For more on the Jews of Corfu, especially in the modern era, take a look at an online exhibition by The Jewish Museum of Greece.
Cover image from Ketubbah Corfu, CUL MS X893 K51991 (1820)
The People in the Books: Hebraica and Judaica Manuscripts from Columbia University Libraries
A printed book and a manuscript codex may contain the same text, but one can argue that the latter is inherently richer. The printing press produced a multitude of identical copies, but each manuscript is unique and individual. In a manuscript, each page had to be carefully prepared and every letter required painstaking work. Ultimately, each manuscript contains more than just the text within it. Isaac Mendelsohn, author of the first catalog of the Hebrew manuscripts at Columbia, wrote, “An old Hebrew book is...more than a mere collection of bound sheets on which a given text is [written]. The notes on the flyleaves, the remarks on the margins the names of its various owners, and the countries in which it saw service actually make it into two books - one containing the text, the passive part, and the other the history of the persons who owned and used it.”
This exhibition attempts to show the second kind of book: the book that tells a story about its authors, its owners, and its users. Occasionally, the story is found within the main portion of the text, but it is also found in the paratext: in the wine stains on a Passover Haggadah, in the candle wax in a prayer book, or in an odd notation on a title page or in a colophon. On a journey through the exhibit, it is our hope that visitors will find at least one story that inspires, intrigues, or ignites the imagination.