Museo Sefardí (Sephardic Museum)
It only took 500 years after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain for this museum to open, in an attempt to explain Judaism and Jewish history to a city where the Jewish population was essential to the functioning of the court and the country for centuries. In the years since it opened it has blossomed into one of the most visited spots in Toledo.
The most important section is the Sinagoga del Tránsito, built in 1355 by Samuel Leví with a special dispensation from Pedro I. Leví had significant influence with the king, having served Pedro as royal treasurer, among other roles. It was the only Toledo synagogue untouched in the 1391 attacks on the city’s Jewish ghetto. The building was Christianized after 1492, so only some of the scrollwork on the walls is original. Restorations in 1910 and 1992 filled in most of the blanks in the original scripts, which include psalms inscribed along the tops of the walls and a poetic description of the Temple on the east wall.
Museum display cases chronicle the Jewish communities on the Iberian peninsula from the Roman era to 1492. Another gallery traces the painfully slow changes in Spanish law. The expulsion order was not formally revoked until—wait for it—1968.
The museum fits nicely with the Museo del Greco next door and San Juan de los Reyes across the street to make a full morning.
It only took 500 years after the expulsion of the Jews from Spain for this museum to open, in an attempt to explain Judaism and Jewish history to a city where the Jewish population was essential to the functioning of the court and the country for centuries. In the years since it opened it has blossomed into one of the most visited spots in Toledo.
The most important section is the Sinagoga del Tránsito, built in 1355 by Samuel Leví with a special dispensation from Pedro I. Leví had significant influence with the king, having served Pedro as royal treasurer, among other roles. It was the only Toledo synagogue untouched in the 1391 attacks on the city’s Jewish ghetto. The building was Christianized after 1492, so only some of the scrollwork on the walls is original. Restorations in 1910 and 1992 filled in most of the blanks in the original scripts, which include psalms inscribed along the tops of the walls and a poetic description of the Temple on the east wall.
Museum display cases chronicle the Jewish communities on the Iberian peninsula from the Roman era to 1492. Another gallery traces the painfully slow changes in Spanish law. The expulsion order was not formally revoked until—wait for it—1968.
The museum fits nicely with the Museo del Greco next door and San Juan de los Reyes across the street to make a full morning.
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