# History of the Jews in Campania and Basilicata

Part of a series on :
Jews and Judaism :
Etymology
Who is a Jew? :
Religion
God in Judaism (names)
Principles of faith
Mitzvot (613)
Halakha
Shabbat
Holidays
Prayer
Tzedakah
Land of Israel
Brit
Bar and bat mitzvah
Marriage
Bereavement
Baal teshuva
Philosophy
Ethics
Kabbalah
Customs
Rites
Synagogue
Rabbi :
Texts
Tanakh
Torah
Nevi'im
Ketuvim
Talmud
Mishnah
Gemara
Rabbinic
Midrash
Tosefta
Targum
Beit Yosef
Mishneh Torah
Tur
Shulchan Aruch
Zohar :
History
General
Timeline
Land of Israel
Name "Judea"
Antisemitism
Anti-Judaism
Persecution
Leaders
Modern historiography
Historical population comparisons
Ancient Israel
Twelve Tribes of Israel
Kingdom of Judah
Kingdom of Israel
Jerusalem (in Judaism
timeline)
Temple in Jerusalem (First
Second)
Assyrian captivity
Babylonian captivity
Second Temple period
Yehud Medinata
Maccabean Revolt
Hasmonean dynasty
Sanhedrin
Schisms (Pharisees, Sadducees, Essenes, Zealots, Sicarii)
Second Temple Judaism (Hellenistic Judaism)
Jewish–Roman wars (Great Revolt, Diaspora, Bar Kokhba)
Rabbinic period and Middle Ages
Rabbinic Judaism
History of the Jews in the Byzantine Empire
Christianity and Judaism (Jews and Christmas)
Hinduism and Judaism
Islamic–Jewish relations
Middle Ages
Golden Age
Modern era
Haskalah
Sabbateans
Hasidism
Jewish atheism
Emancipation
Old Yishuv
Zionism
Soviet Union
The Holocaust
Israel
Arab–Israeli conflict :
Communities
Ashkenazim
Galician
Litvak
Mizrahim
Sephardim
Teimanim
Beta Israel
Gruzinim
Juhurim
Bukharim
Italkim
Romanyotim
Cochinim
Bene Israel
Berber
Related groups
Bnei Anusim
Lemba
Crimean Karaites
Krymchaks
Kaifeng Jews
Igbo Jews
Samaritans
Crypto-Jews
Anusim
Dönmeh
Marranos
Neofiti
Xueta
Mosaic Arabs
Subbotniks
Noahides :
Population
Judaism by country
Lists of Jews
Diaspora
Historical population by country
Genetic studies
Land of Israel
Old Yishuv
New Yishuv
Israeli Jews
Africa
Algeria
Angola
Bilad-el-Sudan
Botswana
Cameroon
Cape Verde
Benin
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Djibouti
Egypt
Ethiopia
Eritrea
Eswatini
Gabon
Gambia
Ghana
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Ivory Coast
Kenya
Libya
Madagascar
Malawi
Mali
Mauritius
Morocco
Mozambique
Namibia
Nigeria (Igbo)
Republic of the Congo
São Tomé and Príncipe
Sierra Leone
Somalia
South Africa
Sudan
Tanzania
Tunisia
Uganda (Abayudaya)
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Asia
Afghanistan
Bahrain
Cambodia
China
Hong Kong
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Israel
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kurdistan
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Laos
Lebanon
Malaysia
Mongolia
Myanmar
Nepal
Oman
Pakistan
Philippines
Qatar
Saudi Arabia
South Korea
Singapore
Sri Lanka
Syria
Tajikistan
Taiwan
Thailand
Turkey
United Arab Emirates
Uzbekistan
Vietnam
Yemen
Europe
Armenia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Belarus
Bulgaria
Cyprus
Czechia
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Hungary
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Moldova
Netherlands
Norway
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Serbia
Spain
Sweden
Ukraine
United Kingdom
Northern America
Canada
United States
Greenland
Latin America and Caribbean
Argentina
Bolivia
Brazil
Chile
Colombia
Cuba
Dominican Republic
Ecuador
El Salvador
Guyana
Haiti
Jamaica
Mexico
Paraguay
Peru
Puerto Rico
Suriname
Uruguay
Venezuela
Oceania
Australia
Fiji
Guam
New Zealand
Palau :
Denominations
Orthodox
Modern
Haredi
Hasidic
Reform
Conservative
Karaite
Reconstructionist
Renewal
Science
Haymanot
Humanistic :
Culture
Customs
Minyan
Wedding
Clothing
Niddah
Pidyon haben
Kashrut
Shidduch
Zeved habat
Conversion to Judaism
Aliyah
Hiloni
Music
Religious
Secular
Art
Ancient
Yiddish theatre
Dance
Humour
Cuisine
American
Ashkenazi
Bukharan
Ethiopian
Israeli
Israelite
Mizrahi
Sephardic
Literature
Israeli
Yiddish
American :
Languages
Hebrew
Biblical
Yiddish
Yeshivish
Jewish Koine Greek
Yevanic
Judeo-Tat
Shassi
Judaeo-Iranian
Judaeo-Spanish
Judeo-Gascon
Ghardaïa Sign
Bukharian
Knaanic
Zarphatic
Judeo-Italian
Judaeo-Georgian
Judeo-Aramaic
Judeo-Arabic
Judeo-Berber
Judeo-Malayalam
Domari :
Politics
Jewish political movements
Autonomism
Bundism
Feminism
Leftism
Secularism
Territorialism
World Agudath Israel
Zionism
General
Green
Labor
Kahanism
Maximalism
Neo-Zionism
Religious
Revisionist
Post-Zionism :
Category
Portal :
vte :
The History of the Jews in Campania and Basilicata is at least 2000 years old. This area, which is a mix of mountains and rich fertile plains, is south of Rome but north of Calabria and Apulia. Most of the Jewish communities were settled in the Roman Era by Jewish merchants or by Jewish captives after the fall of Jerusalem in the year 70. However, the region was mostly abandoned by the Jews by middle of the 16th century. Today, only the city of Naples has a Jewish population. And, unlike the southern provinces, there seems to be no interest by neofiti descendants to revive the Jewish faith.

## Basilicata
### Matera

The Jews lived in the region of Matera in a section behind the Lanfranchi Seminary. Later known as the Seminary Ghetto. The town of Aliano, located in Potenza, is the setting of the Jewish author, Carlo Levi's memoir, Christ Stopped at Eboli. The regions of Apulia, Calabria and Basilicata remained firmly under Byzantine control until the 11th century.

### Venosa

The town of Venosa, is located east of Naples and just outside Campania. The Jews settled in this Roman colony before the 3rd century. Many Jewish inscriptions were discovered there. Fifty-four epitaphs from a Jewish catacomb have been studied. They date from the third to the sixth centuries and are composed in Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. By the 1970s more inscriptions were discovered including 23 epitaphs belonging to a cemetery. All are in Hebrew and date from the ninth century. The 11th-century Chronicle of Ahimaaz reads of an envoy of a Torah academy in Jerusalem who came to Venosa. He stayed and taught the Midrash in the town. In 1041, after the conquest of the town by the Normans, the Jews abandoned the area.

### Lavello

Lavello is a small town with a modest sized historical settlement of Jews. Like, Venosa, a few Jewish tomb inscriptions are known to exist. The Jewish population was engaged in trade and moneylending. The Jews emigrated from the area in the sixteenth century.

## Campania
### Amalfi

The port town of Amalfi is located in the Gulf of Salerno, southeast of Naples. The first records for the Jews living in Amalfi dates from the tenth century. The Chronicle of Ahimaaz mentions the Jews of Amalfi. The famous Cairo Geniza also mentions the Jews of Amalfi. The Jews of Amalfi were a small community, engaged in silk manufacture, garment dyeing and trade. Benjamin of Tudela writes of some 20 Jewish families there in about 1159. In 1292, measures were taken to convert the Jews to Christianity. Most Jews were banished along with the rest of the Jews in the area. The Jewish community in Amalfi was resurrected by 1306. However it finally ended when the Jews were banished again from the kingdom of Naples in 1541.

### Benevento

The town of Benevento is located in central Campania. Inscriptions in the town indicate that Jews resideded in Benevento in the 5th century. Around the year 950, Aaron of Baghdad visited the town. Hananeel ben Paltiel founded a yeshivah in the area. In 1065, the Prince of Benevento oversaw a number of Jews being forced to convert to Christianity, and was reproved by Pope Alexander II. In about 1159, Benjamin of Tudela recorded 200 Jewish families living in Benevento. Two Hebrew inscriptions on a sepulchral stone from 1153 also attest to the existence of a Jewish community in this period. Jewish trade and craftmanship included dyeing and weaving and later, moneylending. By the early 16th century they also traded corn. In 1442, Alfonso of Aragon became the ruler of the area and granted some privileges to the Jews. However, in 1458, after Alfonso's death, Benevento returned to pontifical rule. Under Papal rule, Benevento was spared the Jewish expulsion from southern Italy by the Spanish Crown in 1541. Unfortunately, after the election of Pope Paul IV in 1555, the Jews felt increasing pressure to convert and several Jews did convert, among them a Jew by the name of Raphael Usiglio. In 1569 the Jews were expelled from Benevento as well as the other small towns under Papal rule. The Jews returned to Benevento in 1617, but in 1630 they were expelled for the last time, and never to return again.

### Capua

The town of Capua, is north of Naples. The Jewish community dates back to the end of the Roman Empire. The Jews continued to live there after the area fell to the Byzantines. The Jewish community flourished in the 10th century, and the ancestors of Ahimaaz ben Paltiel were prominent within it. Paltiel ben Samuel (born in 988) was in charge of the finances of the town. And his son, Samuel ben Hananel was appointed supervisor of the treasury and the mint of Capua. Around 1167 when Benjamin of Tudela arrived in Capua, he recorded 300 Jews living there. In 1231, Emperor Frederick II granted the Jews the monopoly of the dye-works in the area. During the Jewish persecutions in southern Italy in 1290–94, many Jews in Capua were forcibly baptized to Christianity. From the 13th to 15th century, the Jewish community in Capua was known for its bankers and physicians. In 1464 the Jews of area, including Capua, complained to King Alfonso about the burden of taxation taxes were so large that many Jews threatened to leave the kingdom. The king obliged and lowed the taxes. The Jewish community grew when Sephardic refugees from Spain and Sicily arrived in Capua in 1492 and 1493. However, the Jews of Capua suffered their own expulsion, by the Kingdom of Naples in 1510. A few Jews resided there in the following decades, but the last few Jews were finally expelled in 1541.

### Naples

The history of the Jews in Naples go back to around the 1st century under the Romans. By the 6th century, the Jewish community of Naples was under rule of the Byzantines. In 1159, when Benjamin of Tudela visited the city, he noted the presence of 500 Jewish families. In 1288, the Kingdom of Naples issued an expulsion order for the Jews and in 1293 any Jews still in Naples were forced to convert.
In 1492, many Jews who were expelled from Spain came to Naples, where King Ferdinand of Naples protected them. However, in 1495, the French conquered the kingdom and persecution resumed. In 1510, Spain won control of the city and expelled the Jews, but those who paid 300 ducanti were permitted to stay. In 1535, the last Jews in Naples were gone. In 1735, Jews were permitted to return to Naples. In 1831, a small group of Jews settled in the city. By 1841, the Rothschild family, acquired the Villa Pignatelli which served as the Jewish centre.
Naples's Jewish population in the 1920s were almost 1,000 members. Between 1942 and 1943, 50 Jews of Naples were saved from German deportation by being hidden by villagers in the area of Caserta. After World War II, the Jewish community of Naples numbered between 600 and 700. Today, the city's Jewish population numbers about 200.

### Pompeii

Archeological records have proven the existence of a Jewish population in Pompeii, Herculaneum and Stabia prior to the infamous eruption of Mount Vesuvius in the year 79. Most of the records are of Jewish inscriptions that hint of Jewish life in the area. For example, one inscription reads Sodom Gomor. Some archeologists believe this inscription is a commentary about the wrath of God brought down upon Rome for the destruction of the Second Temple in Jerusalem by Rome in the year 70.

### Salerno

The city of Salerno is located south of Naples. An inscription on a tombstone testifies to a Jewish settlement in Salerno, possibly as early as the 3rd or 4th century. By the Middle Ages, the town was known for a medical school founded by Jews around the year 800. Jews are mentioned in town records in 872. The Jewish quarter of Salerno is also mentioned in 1005. When Benjamin of Tudela visited Salerno in 1159, he found 600 Jews living in the area. Because of the persecutions in southern Italy around 1290–94, many Jewish families were forcibly baptized as Neofiti. However many Neofiti continued along as Crypto-Jews. In 1485, Rabbi Obadiah ben Abraham lived in Salerno and studied at the medical school. The expulsion of the Jews from the Kingdom of Naples in 1510 ended Jewish community of Salerno. In 1941, Italian fascists built the Campagna concentration camp located in Salerno. The Fascists abandoned the camp in 1943 and the inmates were allowed to go free.

## Molise

Except for a small Jewish internment camp built in Casacalenda by the Italian fascists in the early 1940s, there is little Jewish history in this area.