THE MUSEUM OF MOROCCAN JUDAISM
An ethnographic museum dedicated to Jewish culture, housed in an elegant villa in Casablanca.
Built in 1948, the elegant villa that now houses the museum was once a Jewish orphanage. A function it performed until the late 1970s. Morocco was home to the largest Jewish community in the Arab world. In the 1960s, Casablanca had a Jewish population of over 70,000. In 1997, the same year as the opening of the Musée d'Art et d'Histoire du Judaïsme in Paris, a cultural space was created where Jews and Muslims could meet, as well as this ethnographic museum showcasing Moroccan Jewish tradition in Fez, Essaouira and Marrakech, Moroccans having flocked from all these cities to work in Casablanca. This museum of Jewish culture is unique in the Arab world. A very pleasant feature of the visit: the birdsong of the adjoining gardens accompanies the discovery of beautiful pieces of Moroccan Jewish craftsmanship! Nineteenth-century silver bracelets and fibulae, pendants, amulets and anklets. A showcase features dolls dressed in Judeo-Moroccan costumes. A larger section is devoted to sacred art: meguillah cases, Thoras covered with their mantle embroidered in gold thread, synagogue furniture. There's also a fine example of Azemmour embroidery dating from the 18th century. There's also a section featuring tebahs from ancient synagogues, or carved wooden reading platforms where the rabbi officiates. A beautiful collection to discover in a very pleasant setting.
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