Sample Sources
The sources below are those contained in our three curated collections—covering themes of Passover, Gender Roles, and Holocaust Resistance. They represent a fraction of the thousands of sources that will be available when the full site launches in 2024.
Karaite Ketubah (Crimea)
While ketubot (marriage contracts) are usually written in Aramaic, Karaite ketubot are written in Hebrew. They are often pentagonal in shape, most often with a pointed bottom. This example has a…
Torah Mantle
This Torah mantle was made in Vienna in the eighteenth century. It is embroidered with silk and metallic thread, metallic ribbon, and has metallic fringes. Set against a red background, this mantle’s…
Scroll of the Book of Esther
This scroll of Esther from Germany, created for use on the holiday of Purim, is extensively decorated, with illustrations of biblical scenes from the Esther story, as well as various flora and fauna…
Isfahan Synagogue, Persia
The use of wall niches for Torah scrolls was a feature of some of the earliest synagogues and continues today in Mizrahi communities. This striking faience-tile mosaic structure would have decorated a…
Beaker of the Polin Burial Society
This enameled glass beaker, belonging to the Polin Burial Society in Bohemia, is a fine example of the melding of Jewish and Bohemian art forms. It features painted figures carrying a body toward a…
Jewelry Box
This exquisite jewelry box was crafted in Nuremberg, Germany, before 1540 and given to a bride for her wedding. Etched in steel, copper-plated, and partly gilt, the panels, on four sides and the lid…
Circumcision Set
This silver circumcision set was crafted in Salonika in the Ottoman Empire. The cylindrical silver casket holds a circumcision knife; its handle is made from agate. A similarly shaped powder box and…
Ketubah (Hamburg)
On June 7, 1690, Samuel de Isaac Senior Teixeira married Rachel Teixeira de Mattos Senior in Hamburg. Their beautiful ketubah (marriage contract) depicts the couple under the wedding canopy…
Portrait of Samson Wertheimer
Samson Wertheimer (1658–1724) occupied a number of prominent roles, including court Jew, Austrian financier, and chief rabbi of Hungary and Moravia. This portrait was painted around the time when he…
Gravestone of Samson Wertheimer
Samson Wertheimer (1658–1724) was the chief rabbi of Hungary and Moravia, a court Jew, and Habsburg financier. His grave in the Viennese Seegasse cemetery is marked with an elaborately decorated…
Shadai’a (Dedicatory Plaque)
This shadai’a (dedicatory plaque) from the Romaniote community in Ioannina, Greece, is made of repoussé silver with an engraved Hebrew inscription. The central inscription is a rhymed text dedicated…
Ketubah (Venice)
This Venetian ketubah (marriage contract) from 1707 marks the wedding of Solomon, son of Isaac Franco de Almeida, to Brancha, daughter of David Fernandes Dias. Near the top, the ancient city of…