THE JEWISH GHETTO IN VENICE

The Jewish Ghetto in Venice is a very particular area where I often go …it is near Santa Lucia, immediately after Ponte delle Guglie.

Did you know that the word ‘ghetto’ derives from the Venetian word ‘geto’?

In the early Middle Ages, in this part of the city there was an ancient foundry (a “geto” in Venetian) which was used to forge the bombarde, the small cannons of Venetian ships. When, for political reasons, in 1516 the Republic of the Serenissima established by law that all Jews should live and reside here, the population came mostly from Central Eastern Europe and it was precisely because of their pronunciation that the Venetian term “geto” , was crippled into “ghetto” (German read), originating the term we use today all over the world.

how to arrive to the jewish ghetto in Venice
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