The oldest ghetto in Europe, five surviving synagogues, and a living community: the Jewish story is woven into the city.
In a nutshell: the oldest ghetto in Europe, five surviving synagogues and a living community, all woven into the Cannaregio district. It sits inside the Cannaregio neighbourhood and its Ghetto chapter, so read those alongside this page.
In 1516 the Republic of Venice confined its Jewish population to a small island in Cannaregio - the site of an old foundry, called geto in Venetian. The word 'ghetto' entered every language from this patch of Venice. The community was locked in at night, allowed out by day, and forbidden to own land or build outward - so it built upward, creating the tall, tight buildings that still distinguish the neighbourhood.
The Ghetto's confinement never stopped its flourishing. Venetian Jews were merchants, doctors, printers and scholars; the first Hebrew printing press in the world operated here, and the Ghetto became a centre of Jewish learning that drew students from across Europe. When Napoleon's troops arrived in 1797, they tore down the gates - the Ghetto became an open neighbourhood, though the name and the buildings remain.
What makes the Venetian Ghetto unique is that its synagogues are hidden - plain on the outside, magnificent within, built on the top floors of the tall houses because the community could not build new structures. Five survive, each a different tradition: the Schola Grande Tedesca (Ashkenazi, 1528), the Schola Canton (1532), the Schola Italiana (1575), the Schola Levantina (1541, Sephardi) and the Schola Spagnola (1580s, Sephardi) - the last two among the most beautiful Jewish interiors in Europe, with carved wooden arks, gilded galleries and the warm light of the lagoon.
The Jewish Museum of Venice (Museo Ebraico, Campo del Ghetto Nuovo) tells the story through silver ritual objects, textiles, marriage contracts (ketubot) and the oldest printed Hebrew books. Guided tours from the museum visit the synagogues in small groups - the only way to see the interiors, and very much worth planning around.
The Campo del Ghetto Nuovo holds two of the most moving monuments in Venice. The Memorial to the Shoah by Arbit Blatas - five bronze reliefs showing the deportation of the Venetian Jews in 1943–44 - lines a wall of the campo. Across from it, another Blatas relief on the campo's far side remembers the community deported to the camps: of the 246 Jews taken from Venice, only eight returned.