Site Tag: Attraction

Built in 1531-1532 and renovated in later centuries. The name derives from its position on a corner (in Venetian, canton) of the square.

The main façade with its characteristic five windows is on Rio Ghetto Novo; wedged between walls and roofs, one can make out from below the wooden structure of the bimah, with a domed lantern above it.

Like the Scola Grande Tedesca, it had originally a central plan and was later rearranged in the traditional bifocal layout, with the bimah and aron placed on the shorter sides, and pews lined up along the longer sides.

The entrance way is preceded by a narrow hallway with windows onto the main hall; this was most likely used by women, before the matroneum was built on the upper level (1736), and later by those who did not have a place in the hall.

Inside, wood panelling with seats runs along the walls, which are decorated in the upper section with paintings depicting passages from Biblical stories. The gilded wooden gratings of the matroneum overlook the hall above the entrance. The aron (1672), in carved, gilded wood, presents a tripartite structure with a central tabernacle and benches on either side. A striking stained glass window stands out at the centre of the split tympanum.

At the opposite end is the bimah (1780), richly decorated with plasterwork and framed by a lowered arch, supported by twisting pillars in the shape of intertwined branches.

The Scola Grande Tedesca was founded by the Ashkenazi group in 1528; it was renovated in 1732-1733 and then again in the 19th century. From the square the five large windows are the only recognisable element of the synagogue in the context of the surrounding houses. On the side of the San Girolamo canal, meanwhile, the visible element is the liagò which holds the aron. Originally built with a central plan layout, in 1860 it acquired – almost certainly for static reasons rather than religious – the “bifocal layout” typical of the Venetian scole (and also found in many other Italian synagogues), whereby whereby the bimah and aron are placed on opposite walls, with the pews facing a central corridor.

The lavish aron (1672), flanked by two benches, presents a tripartite structure, gilded and embellished with architectural elements. Its doors are decorated on the outside with floral motifs and on the inside with the Ten Commandments in mother-of-pearl inlay.

On the opposite side, the bimah has a canopy structure with a trabeation held up by eight columns and decorated with the same ornamental motifs as the aron.

The lower section of the walls is clad in cherry wood panelling, forming a continuous bench. The upper section has marmorino stucco panels. Above it, running along the entire perimeter of the room is a red frieze with the text of the Ten Commandments inscribed in gold.

The oval shape of the sumptuous matroneum gives harmony to the irregular layout of the hall.

This is the largest of Venice’s synagogues, and is still used regularly, alternating with that of the Scola Levantina. It was founded in around the mid-16th century by Jewish exiles from the Iberian peninsula.

The seventeenth-century design is the result of the work of a commission which included a Jewish “architectural expert”, a certain Juda Camis, who was presumably associated with the workshops of the Venetian architects of the period, such as Antonio Gaspari, Giuseppe Sardi and Baldassarre Longhena. Externally, it bears an austere façade with four large arched windows on the first floor, and a row of square windows beneath the cornice, corresponding to the level of the women’s gallery.

A staircase built in 1894 leads from the ground floor atrium to the main sanctuary. The interior is very bright thanks to the large windows. Facing each other on the shorter sides are the aron and the bimah, while the pews are arranged along the longer sides. The aron, similar to that of the Scola Levantina, has dark marble columns and a double tympanum, and is framed by an arch with a sky blue background with golden stars. Works carried out in the late 19th century included the addition of the semi-circular balustrade in front of it; at the same time, an organ was installed in the canopied structure of the bimah and the officiant’s position was moved to the near the aron. In 1980, the original layout was restored.

On the ground floor of the building, a small room contains the antique furniture of the Scola Kohanim, one of the private synagogues which used to exist in Venice, which was originally in the Ghetto Novo area.