Les Juifs de Dubrovnik (Raguse)

The maritime Republic of Ragusa (Dubrovnik) tolerated Jews as intermediaries in trade between Christendom and the Ottoman Empire, while subjecting them to restrictions and confining them to a ghetto established in the sixteenth century. The community, of Sephardic tradition, included merchants and physicians, and some of its members played a role in the commercial exchanges and diplomacy of the city. The synagogue of Dubrovnik, fitted out as early as the sixteenth century in the ghetto street, is one of the oldest preserved in Europe and bears witness to this centuries-long presence. The community always remained small and declined in the modern and contemporary eras.

Sources & resources

• Encyclopaedia Judaica — 2e éd., Keter/Macmillan
• Jewish Virtual Library ↗