Wine and Cicchetti

 

Joseph booked us a wine and cicchetti tour for the evening. Of course I'd never heard of cicchetti but it's a finger food prepared typically with some sort of fish, cheese or meat prepared in a number of ways served on small slices of bread or deep fried. It's a Venetian thing and there are bars that specialize in these finger foods.

We went to three of those bars with a group of other tourists that were fun to get to know. Our guide Ricardo was a native Venetian who was very knowledgable on the history and customs of Venice and clearly kept us off the tourist path.

Ricardo concentrated his story of Venice and the Jewish ghetto. Venice was a city that welcomed diversity and new ideas so they welcomed the Jews when they arrived in sufficient numbers in the 1500's. The word ghetto has its origins in Venice and means foundry. The Jews were allowed to live on a small island that had housed the foundaries during mideival times. There they were allowed to practice their religion in peace under the protection of the government. However, to keep the Jewish people from infiltrating the politics, business, or intermarriage they had a strict curfew that kept them on the island at night. The curfew was enforced by the Christians who patrolled the canals surrounding the island. During Napoleons reign the curfew and living restrictions were abolished and during WW II all the Jews were rounded up and sent to concentration camps. Now there is only a small population of Jews on this island.

As you can imagine the island was quite small but housed 4000 people. They are some of the tallest buildings in Venice simply because they had no place to go but up.

On our stroll through the Jewish ghetto and side streets we passed several small wine bars. Literally an open window with a bar and a few chairs with a room full of wine.

 

 

 

 

 

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