ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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The history of the Jews in Corsica concerns an ethnoreligious minority present in the French region since the 1800s, the year of the beginning of a great migration of the Jews.

Over the centuries, Jews arrived from Egypt, but also from Italian cities such as Naples, Padua, Genoa, Milan and Turin. It is estimated that more than 25% of the race population has Jewish origins.

There are still several signs of the ancient Jewish presence on the island: for example the origin of the toponym of the village of Cazalabriva literally means "Jewish house", while still today in some regions of Corsica remains the very ancient tradition of giving new names of Jewish origin like Mouse (Mosè).

First migration mizrahì
In the beginning of the year, 800 mizrahì Jews from Egypt settled in the vicinity of Porto Vecchio (in particular to Levie), in Southern Corsica, and then spread throughout the region, integrating themselves with the local population (in some mountain villages the Christian churches have traces of Jewish inscriptions along with the Latin ones). Most of them spoke and wrote mostly in Hebrew.

Migration from southern Italy
Between the 1500s and 1530s, a group of a thousand Jews from Naples and other parts of southern Italy fled to persecution and moved to the central mountains of Corsica.

Migration of aschenazites

Aschenazi from Padua
Many Aschenazi Jews of Padua, forced to live within the ghetto established in 1516, emigrated to Corsica between 1590 and 1684, when there were numerous anti-Semitic violence following unfounded voices on alleged acts of cruelty committed by the Jews against the Hungarians during the siege of Buda led by the Republic of Venice in support of the imperial army: only the intervention of a Franciscan Father The courses called them Padovani, which literally means coming from Padua: the name Padovani is today a very popular surname in Corsica.

Aschenazites from the rest of northern Italy
The phenomenon of persecution continued in northern Italy and the most known Jewish immigration developed between 1750 and 1769, when at the end of Genoese domination lasted four hundred years, a number of 5,000 and 10,000 Jews arrived in Corsica, mainly from Milan, Turin and Genoa, as well as those from Padua.

The first French republic welcomed the Jews who arrived in Corsica, recognizing them the same rights as other citizens, also being able to freely practice their religion (which at the time did not happen in many countries). The climate of tolerance favoured a large number of marriages