Jewish Cemetery of Venice - Judischer Friedhof - Universitas Judeorum

The Jewish Cemetery of Venice, (Jüdischer Friedhof) founded between 1386 and 1389 and located on the island of the Lido di Venezia, was the burial place of Jews in Venice until the end of the 18th century. It is one of the oldest Jewish cemeteries in Europe that still exists.

In Jewish culture the cemetery is not a place of mere suffering or worship: it is a place that gives man the opportunity to reflect on his past life, thinking about how to best live what remains.

The cemetery is sacred, not only as a place of worship, but as an eternal school of life. The very word cemetery in the Jewish tradition is called "Bet Ha-Chjim" or House of life.

Under the dogage of Antonio Venier, in 1386 the Magistracy of Piovego was authorized to grant the "Universitas Judeorum" an isolated area.

In 1715 the cemetery suffered major damage and losses caused by the construction of the new defensive fortifications of the Fort of San Nicolò. The area was increasingly disordered, to the point that in 1774 the republic granted a new burial area.

Over time, what remained of the now ancient cemetery became an area of abandoned and ruined tombstones, immersed in marshy and unkept, almost ghostly vegetation.

At the end of the 19th century, the island of Lido became one of the most prominent holiday destinations in all of Europe. In 1925 a shooting gallery known as "Tiro a Segno Nazionale" was erected right next to the ancient cemetery. On the one hand, the construction of the building brought to light many lost tombstones, on the other it also further reduced the territory of the ancient cemetery.

To try to restore and protect what remained, the area was protected by a high brick wall, with a gate in front of the lagoon on which the words "ANCIENT ISRAELITIC CEMETERY" were engraved.

The whole area was therefore remodeled: the vegetation was taken care of and many of the tombstones were rearranged and aligned to give a more harmonious order to the whole, without taking any account of the structure of the tombstones, nor of their correspondence with the underlying burials.

From the beginning of the war the cemetery again fell into ruins, with the graves submerged in the marshy ground among the wild vegetation and apparently destined for oblivion.
Only in 1993 did the first recovery works of the area and the subsequent restoration of the tombstones begin, now the cemetery can be visited.

Map: Jewish Cemetery of Venice - Judischer Friedhof - Universitas Judeorum