BOLZANO

BOLZANO (Ger. Bolzen), capital of Bolzano province, northern Italy. Jewish moneylenders began to settle in Bolzano after it passed to the Habsburgs in 1363. While some originated from Italy, they were predominantly of German origin. The   persecutions and expulsions which followed the blood libel in trent in 1475 also affected the Jews of Bolzano. A few began to settle in the city again in the first half of the 16th century. In 1754 Ḥayyim David Joseph Azulai found only two Jewish families in Bolzano. Jewish settlement again increased during the 19th and early 20th centuries and the Jews established a small community attached to the Jewish community of Merano. Starting in 1933, a number of Jews arrived from Germany and Eastern Europe. (Daniel Carpi / Federica Francesconi (2nd ed.) According to the 1938 census of Jews in Italy, there were 938 Jews in the province of Bolzano. When the Germans occupied Italy after the Italian armistice with the Allies on September 8, 1943, the province, along with those of Trent and Belluno, was separated from the Italian Social Republic and included in the Zona delle Prealpi (Alpenvorland), under direct German administration. About 38 Jewish residents of the province were deported during the period of German occupation. Another 207 Jews from all over Italy were deported from the transit camp of Gries, established in a suburb of Bolzano after the closing of Fossoli on August 1, 1944. (Susan Zuccotti (2nd ed.) -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ḥ.Y.D. Azulai, Ma'gal Tov ha-Shalem, 1 (1921), 12; J.E. Scherer, Die Rechtsverhaeltnisse der Juden in den deutsch-oesterreichischen Laendern (1901); G. Ottani, Un popolo piange (1945); G. Canali, Il magistrato mercantile di Bolzano… (1942). ADD. BIBLIOGRAPHY: C. Villani Cinzia. Ebrei fra leggi razziste e deportazioni nelle province di Bolzano, Trento e Belluno (1996).