MONCALVO

MONCALVO, small town in Piedmont, northern Italy. The first Jewish settlers in Moncalvo arrived presumably after the expulsions from France, as it was one of the only three communities following the apam (= Asti, fossano , Moncalvo) liturgy, which was of French origin (see liturgy ). The first documents attesting to the presence of Jews in Moncalvo date only from the 1570s. When Moncalvo passed to the dukes of Savoy, the situation of the Jews deteriorated. They were confined to a ghetto in 1723 and forbidden to own real estate. At that time 176 Jews lived in Moncalvo. By 1836 there were 233 and in 1860 a new synagogue was dedicated, but toward the end of the 19th century the community declined. On the eve of World War II the community ceased to exist. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Roth, Italy, index; Milano, Italia, index; Milano, Bibliotheca, index; Foà, in: Scritti… Ríccardo Bacchi (1950), 188–201; idem, in: Israel (May 12, 1932); Servi, in: Corriere Israelitico, 4 (1865/66), 315–6; Disegni, in: Scritti… Sally Mayer (1956), 78–81 (Italian section). ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: D. Colombo, "Il ghetto di Moncalvo e una sua poesia," in: RMI, 36 (1970) 436–41; M.R. Lehman, "Massa al penei Kehillot Apam u-Sevivoteihem," in: Sinai (101), 1989; P. De Benedetti, "La gran battaja"; una poesia sul ghetto di Moncalvo, Scritti sull'ebraismo in memoria di Emanuele Menachem Artom (1996), 137–51. (Daniel Carpi)