Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
My Tiny, Ugly World
Never have I been content with my narrow, dark, gloomy world, and always am I aware of the contrast between the great, beautiful world and my tiny, ugly world. And always I say, “The place is too…
Jewish Women from Izmir Whitewashing
In the nineteenth century, especially in the era before photography, it was common for artists to travel to exotic or picturesque locations in Europe, North Africa, and the Near East, and to produce…
Paper Cut—Shiviti Sign
Paper cuts have been a tradition of Jewish folk art, with the earliest record of one dating to the fourteenth century. Given the widespread availability of paper in Europe by the mid-nineteenth…
A Road in the Woods in Summer
Camille Pissarro was notable among his fellow impressionist painters in that he often put trees at the center of his compositions instead of using them primarily as a framing device. He also…
The Interpretation of Dreams
A fourth dream, occurring shortly after the last one mentioned, brings me back to Rome. I see a street-corner before me and am astonished to see so many German placards posted there. On the day before…
Sermon: On the Secularization and Degradation of Iraqi Jewry
[ . . . ] But before we come to analyze the dreadful calamity [i.e., the drought] that has befallen us, and before we come to see what is the putrid humor harbored in our midst…
An Essay on Hebrew Eloquence, Exposed in a Practical Lesson by Doctor Anania Coen, First Rabbi of the Jewish Community of Florence
To truly form a sense of good taste, one must be in full command of the metaphysics of the sacred tongue, something which is so necessary (and which…
Judaism and Its History
There are facts of such an overwhelming power that even the most stubborn opinion must yield to them. Such a fact is the origin of Judaism in the midst of rude surroundings, like a vigorous…
Kerakh shel romi (City of Rome)
The Bah (Bayit Hadash) was asked concerning the practice in synagogues of using music which is sung in the houses of worship (of non-Jews). It is only forbidden regarding…
Prayer book
This siddur from Greece contains the prayers of the Romaniote (Greek-speaking Jewish) community of the eastern Mediterranean. It is open at a piyyut (liturgical poem) called “God’s Beloved Daughter,”…
The Portuguese Synagogue in Amsterdam
This image depicts the interior of the synagogue that served the Beth Israel congregation in Amsterdam. Before 1639, there were three Sephardic congregations in Amsterdam: Beth Jacob (founded possibly…
Jewish Clothing from Fürth
In 1705, the Nuremberg artist, Johannes Alexander Böner, published a slim volume about Fürth, Germany, containing several copper-engravings dealing with the life of Jews in the city. This print…