The Center for Contemporary Jewish Documentation Foundation (CDEC) is Italy’s main research institution on the Holocaust and anti-Semitism, but thanks to a growing digital library project launched in 2015 it is also a key online source of visual and archival documentation of Jewish built heritage.
CDEC’s Digital Library, launched with the support of Italy’s Culture Ministry, contains extensive archival, photographic, and audio-visual materials dedicated to contemporary Jewish life and history in Italy. These include material related to Jewish built heritage.
“Originally, the project was born to gather materials connected to the Shoah in Italy,” Laura Brazzo, responsible for the CDEC archive and Digital Library, told JHE. “But then, starting from the Shoah, it expanded its contents.”
The photo gallery, for example, contains dozens of pictures in which synagogues are the main background of images that show daily life before and after the Shoah.
“The contents of the CDEC archive are based mainly on personal and family stories and memories. Therefore, Jewish heritage sites in the photo gallery and elsewhere on the Digital Library are principally in the context of family gatherings, such as weddings, bar/bat mitzvahs, and other Jewish holidays,” Brazzo said.
The photos include much detailed information. The photo above and at right show a group of girls (several are identified) at their bat mitzvah ceremony in May, 1946, pictured in the community hall of the synagogue in Turin, which was used for worship while the synagogue itself was awaiting restoration after wartime bomb damage. CDEC says it was the first bat mitzvah celebration in the city after the war and represented an important step in the revival of Jewish life after the Shoah. (Click HERE and HERE to see full information about the pictures.)
It’s also possible to find postcards and other types of photos of synagogues.
For example, there are two photos of the synagogue in Gorizia – from before and after World War I.
Gorizia was on the Isonzo front during World War I, and suffered heavy damage. The first photo of the synagogue shows its original decorations and ornaments; the second shows the heavy damage it suffered during the war.
Other photos show Shoah memorial plaques installed in several synagogues in Italy, as well as memorial monuments in Jewish cemeteries, inside and outside the country.
A rare image from the Italian concentration camp of Ferramonti di Tarsia in Calabria – an internment camp for mainly non-Italian Jews and others – appears to be that of a postcard that features a drawing of the synagogue organized by its inmates. It bears a handwritten note reading (in German) “in memory of Ferramonti” and the date December 9th, 1942. This image comes from the Fondo Israel Kalk collection, a section of the archives mainly dedicated to non-Italian Jews in Italy, during and after the Shoah.
In addition to the material in the Digital Library, other Jewish heritage-related materials can be found in the archive (archivio, in Italian) and the library (biblioteca, in Italian) sections of the website.
The archive includes extensive material that has not been digitized and can only be accessed in person. Among these holdings, Brazzo said, are the original plans for the reconstruction, after WWII, of the synagogue in Milan by architect Eugenio Gentili Tedeschi.
“The Digital Library is a useful and necessary tool that has enormous potential,” CDEC Director Gadi Luzzatto Voghera told JHE. The digitalization, he said, “contributes to the conservation of unused and sometimes neglected documents and helps link them to other relevant material, reducing distances and greatly increasing the possibility of access. The Digital Library is aimed at facilitating both research and study, using new technologies to strengthen a cardinal principle of Jewish culture.”
NOTE: The Digital Library has a good search function, but since the website is exclusively in Italian, it requires search terms to be in Italian. The most direct way to look for Jewish heritage materials is through the photo gallery (fototeca, in Italian), by searching for synagogues and Jewish cemeteries (sinagoga or tempio and cimitero ebraico, in Italian).
Established in 1986, CDEC is a non-profit foundation and independent research institute. Its main goals are to raise awareness and enhance research around the culture and reality of Italian Jews from the Emancipation to today, with a special focus on contemporary Italy and the Shoah. The Foundation also works actively to research, document, and combat racism and anti-Semitism.
Cick to access the Digital Library