The synagogue of Sciacca, memorial site of the jewish presence in Sicily

Abstract

The permanence of jews in Sicily lasted, in a pacific balance with the other peoples, for almost a millennium and a half until the end of the Middle Ages, when, with the 1492 Granada edict, the sovereigns of Spain, Isabella of Castile and Ferdinand of Aragon, extended the expulsion order even to the island. Since then a curtain of oblivion was lowered on the presence of Jews in Sicily and on their precious cultural contribution to the development of the Sicilian identity; only for a few years, after centuries of silence and damnatio memoriae, there has been an increasing interest in the research in this field. The present work wants to bring to the memory and witness the jewish presence in Sicily through the study of the synagogue of Sciacca, recently identified in the urban center, of which there is still little and fragmentary information.