THE ODYSSEY OF THE PORTUGUESE JEWS
by Manuel Luciano da Silva, M.D.
The cultural session, entitled "The Odyssey of the Portuguese Jews," held on Sunday, February 21 , 1999, was a great success. The event took place in the main amphiteater of the new building of the Faculty of Economics of the Roger Williams University, in Bristol, Rhode Island. Even before the scheduled time, the hall was full of people including the aisles. The subject matter that was going to be dealt with, had awakened great interest among the cultural élite of New England, so much so that the audience was composed of individuals who came from various localities in Rhode Island, as well as from neighbouring states: Massachusettes, Connecticut, New Hampshire and even New York. Various groups had no choice than to return to their homes because there was no more space in the amphiteater.
The session was kicked off by Mr. Steven Gorban, Director of the group called "Saudades-Sephardic Project", whose objectives are to utilize all the good intentions of the Portuguese Sephardic Jews uniting in a brotherly manner and in communion with all the Portuguese scattered throughout the world. Mr. Gorban emphasized that: "Five hundred years ago, due to the Inquisition, the Portuguese Sephardic Jews had been separated from all other Portuguese. The time has come for us to initiate a new period called "The Next 500 Years" and employ all our energies to stimulate the friendship and the spirit of mutual respect among all Portuguese Sephardic Jews, Catholics and Moors".
After a short introduction by Mr. Gorban, I initiated my lecture with color slides. I started by showing, albeit schematically, a geographic information for better comprehension of the relationship between Judea or Palestine and the territory that much later became Portugal. I showed a map of the Atlantic Ocean recalling that it was 125 million years ago that the separation of the continents started, when Portugal was part of New England!...
And America still continues to creep away from Europe, about one inch per year, therefore causing the great threat of a huge earthquake in California. The theory of the separation of the continents started with the German metereologist Alfred Wegener, who wrote, in 1915, a book "The Origins ofthe Oceans". He was very much criticized by the geologists, but today his theory is totally accepted.
It was due to the separation of the continents that the Mediterranean Sea (meaning: sea in the middle of the earth) was born, resulting much later on, in the establishment of several countries around its shores. After the last glacial age, ten thousand years ago, the human race began to scatter throughout Europe and the peoples from Mesopotamia and Middle East started to use the Mediterranean Sea for fishing, transportation, and colonization.
The honors must go to the Phoenicians - today's Lebanon - because they possessed an abundance of special cedars on their mountains and began to build their typical vessels which allowed them to navigate with ease throughout all the Mediterranean. Perhaps because they had a need of communication, the Phoenicians invented the CONSONANTS which we use today in our alphabet. Their neighbours, the Greeks, invented the VOWELS and PUNCTUATION. It was the mathematician Pithagoras (famous for his hypotenuse), who invented the musical staff as well as the punctuation:period, komma or coma, the colon and semicolon. It needs to be mentioned that COLON in Greek is the same as ZARCO in Hebrew.
The Egyptians tarried in the margins of the Nile, basing their civilization on agronomy and agriculture. They preferred to navigate in the Nile only. The Phoenicians were followed by other peoples such as the Greeks and the Romans, and even later by the Arabs, and they started using frequently theMediterranean and even dared to pass the Strait of Gibraltar, and settle along the European shores of the Atlantic, including the maritime coast of the future Portugal.
NAMES OF PORTUGALThe Greeks -five thousand years ago -- called the peninsula which comprehends Spain and Portugal today, Iberian Peninsula and the people as IBEROS, which means "MOST OCCIDENTAL", or "SUNSET". Afterwards came the Jews, considered "the People of the Diaspora"-- they established themselves about four thousand years ago in the Iberian Peninsula and they started to be called Sephardic, which likewise means "MOST OCCIDENTAL", or "SUNSET". And finally came the Moors, who after conquering a large chunk of the peninsula started calling our territory "ALGARVE", which also means "MOST OCCIDENTAL", or "SUNSET". The Romans called our native land "LUSITANIA" which means LAND OF LIGHT. That is true because even today Portugal is, of all European countries,the one that has the largest number of sun-hours per year. The concept of naming the most western part of the Mediterranean "OCCIDENTAL" -- such as Iberos, Sephardic, and Algarve -- can be verified today by the name places that exist on the northwesternmost corner of Spain: "Finis Terra". The sameidea can be verified on the westernmost part of England where one finds the name "Land's End".
With such a variety of names, the Portuguese people preferred to create a proper name: Portus + cale, which gave origin to PORTUGAL. (Portus referred to the City of Porto (or Oporto) on the north margin of the river Douro, plus Cale, which was located opposite, on the southern margin of thesame river,and is today the City of Gaia).
PORTUGUESE JEWSAfter this lengthy but necessary geographic introduction, I started showing slides of Portugal. First I showed the Castle of St. Michal in Guimarães, where the first king of Portugal, Afonso Henriques was born. I stressed that the first adviser to this king was Egas Moniz, a Portuguese Sephardic Jew.Then I showed a color photograph of Prof. Doctor Egas Moniz, born in Avanca, north of Portugal, and direct descendent of the first Egas Moniz, and who, after eight hundred years, in 1949, won the first Nobel Prize in Medicine for Portugal, because he invented the techniques of lobectomy and angiography. Next I switched over to the city of Coimbra, for two motives. First to show to the audience, the buildings of the first Portuguese University, founded in 1290, by King Dinis, and also to emphasize that in my presentation, I was going to speak about the Portuguese Sephardic Jews who became physicians after graduating from the "noble and hoary (vetusta..) University of Coimbra", and also for my personal gratification since I graduated from the same Medical Faculty in 1957.After this clarification I started to mention the names of several Portuguese Sephardic Jews who were personal physicians to the various kings of Portugal. Abraham Zacuto was the physician for the great King John II. He was also an astronomer and a mathematician who wrote "Almanac Perpetuum" and made the Tables of Navigation in Hebrew, which were used later by another Portuguese Sephardic Jew name Cristóvâo Colon during his voyage to the Caribbean in 1492, and also were used by the great Vasco da Gama. It was during his stay in Tomar (Jewish name meaning "mountain" ) that Zacuto built the Arco (or Zarco) Synagogue, which is now open to the public and of which I showed several color slides. Another Jew who was part of the crew in the fleet captained by Cristóvão Colon was Master Luis de Torres, who, besides being a polyglot, was also a Portuguese Sephardic Jews. Isaac Abravanel was the private physician of the Count of Braganza, who was condemned to death because he was involved in a plot to assasinate king John II, and this Portuguese Sephardic physician left Portugal, going to Turkey, where he became the physician of Sultan Mehmet II, the Great. Jose Vezinho (from Viseu) was also physician to the king. He was also mathematician and astronomer and worked on the project of the Sagres School of Navigation. This Portuguese Sephardic Jew was member of the Commission that reviewed Cristóvâo Colon's plan to reach India by sailing westward. Until the Inquisition (1497) ALL the Portuguese kings were looked aftermedically by Portuguese Sephardic Jews. In general all the Portuguese kings treated the Portuguese Sephardic Jews with kindness because they admired their professional capacity not only in medicine and surgery, but also in mathematics, finance,also as bankers and even as artisans.
INQUISITIONUpon the marriage of King Manuel I with the daugher of the Spanish Catholic Kings in 1496, the Inquisition - which had started in Spain in 1483 (by Torquemada) - began in Portugal in 1497.
This tragic measure brought about the exodus of the Jews. Even the famous Abraham Zacuto was forced to leave Portugal. The Law of the Inquisition specified that all the Jews had to convert to Catholicism or else they were liable of being burned at the stake ( Auto-da-Fé).
For this reason many Portuguese Sephardic Jews fled to the mountains of Beira Alta and Beira Baixa (the highest mountains in Portugal) and became known as crypto-Jews. Those who converted to Catholicism were called "Marranos" (in reference to pigs) or "Conversos", meaning "New Christians". The slide that I showed of an "Auto-da-Fé" on the Praça do Comércio - the main plaza in Lisbon facing the river Tagus -- was, undoubtedly, the darkest page of Portuguese History. The most famous physician of the 16th century was the Portuguese Sephardic Jew, Garcia de Orta, who became a brilliant professor, and author of medical treatise , who taught in the Goa Medical School. Even after being buried, the Inquisitors dug up his bones and burned them and threw his ahses into the sea !
EXPULSION OF THE JEWSWith the expulsion of Portuguese Sephardic Jew physicians, as well as other Jewish wise men, Portugal suffered such a terrible loss of intellectual values that even today, it has not yet recoverd from such a "desesperatum", or despair. Portugal lost a lot from the Inquisition, whereas many other nations gained from the intelligence and professional qualities of the Portuguese Sephardic Jews. It is after the Inquisition that we begin to see famous Portuguese Sephardic Jews as physicians in all countries throughout Europe, not only as professors in various Medical Schools, but also as private physicians of chiefs of government including kings and queens. Thus we see Portuguese names in various distinguished positions such as Costa, Da Costa, Bueno, Cardoso, De Castro, Da Silva, Fonseca and Nunez. João Rodrigues Castelo Branco also known as Amatus Lusitanus, besides being a good physician was also a botanist in Antwerp, and even became professor of medicine in Ferrare. He was also the physician who treated Pope Julius II. Daniel Fonseca fled to France and afterwards became the private physician of Prince of Budapest. Judah Abravanel went to Naples, Genoa and Venice becoming a famous physician. Filoteu Montalto, after he left Portugal for Florence, became the private physician of Duke Frederick. Afterwards he was called to heal Queen Catherine of Medici, in Paris, France, because she suffered from migraine headaches, and the Portuguese physician prescribed for her "tobacco powder" because at that time tobacco was considered as "miraculous leaves".
Jacob Mantinho went to Italy and became professor of medicine in Rome and private physician to Pope Paul III. Rodrigues da Fonseca was professor of medicine in Pisa and Padua. Fabrisio de Aguapendente was professor of anatomy in Bologna and discovered the valves in the deep veins of the legs and thighs. Rodrigues de Castro went on to Hamburg, Germany, and later went to treat Queen Crhistine of Sweden. A large group of Portuguese Sephardic Jews went to Amsterdam, where they built the largest synagogue in the world outside of Israel. It is in this city that we are going to find many Portuguese Sephardic Jews such as Fernando Mendes, who later went to London to become private physician of Queen Catherine of Braganza, wife of Charles II, who suffered from gout. The Portuguese Sephardic Jew prescribed, for the first time in England, colchicine, and this drug is still used today, all over the world, for the teatment of gout. The Portuguese Sephardic Jews went to North Africa, To Turkey, Holland, Italy, France, Germany and England. It was the Portuguese Sephardic Jews who taught the British how to fry fish ( fish and chips) because they took along with them to England olive oil from Portugal. It was Queen Catherine of Braganza who introduced in Britain the fasion of "five o'clock tea" and it was this same queen who inaugurated the use of the fork to the Royal House of England, and also introduced tangerines.
This same queen gave the name to the largest borough of New York City, which is called "Queens" in her honor. I was not, by any means, loath to state in my lecture that the First Queen of Bristol, Rhode Island, was 100% Portuguese because the first map of the streets of Bristol (1680) show a street with the name "King" (in honour of King Charles II) and another street with the name "Queen" (in honor of Queen Catherine of Braganza) and this street is continued by a street even today with the name of Caterine Street!
The Portuguese Sephardic Jews emigrated also to Azores, Madeira, Cape Verde, Guinea, Sâo Tomé and Principe, and Brazil, involving themselves in the sugar industry, and other professions including medicine. From Holland they went to Recife in the north of Brazil because the Dutch had invaded that Portuguese territory , and from there they moved on to Curaçao and to New Amsterdam, which later is known as New York, after the British wrested this city from the Dutch.But the Portuguese Sephardic Jews were always looking for a place where they could have religious freedom. They decided to go to Newport, because the founder of the State of Rhode Island, Roger Williams, guaranteed complete religious freedom. It was in New port that the Portuguese Sephardic Jews built the Touro Synagogue, which is the oldest synagogue in the United States of America. This synagogue is in excellent condition today, and is a smaller copy of the one in Amsterdam, Holland. Please note that the name of the synagogue is TOURO in Portuguese, not TORO in Spanish. The pressident of the Committee and one of the founders who built the Touro Synagogue was Aaran Lopez, born in Lisbon, Portugal. He became the first elected president of the Touro Synagogue. It was in this synagogue of Newport that Dr. Mário Soares, as President of the Portuguese Republic, ten years ago, asked for forgiveness from the Portuguese Sephardic Jews, for the atrocities that their ancestors suffered because of religious persecutions implemented by the terrible Inquisition in Portugal.
Then I showed slides of the Jewish Cemetery in Newport where we could see the names of Abraham Touro, Aaron Touro, Aaron Lopez, Moses Levy, Moses Seixas, Jacob Rodrigues Rivera and Meyer Benjamin, all Portuguese Sephardic Jews. The Portuguese Sephardic Jews of Newport became businessmen: importers and exporters, and they used perfect Portuguese in their correspondence, as it can be verified by the letters that exist today in the Historical Society of Newport. Many Portuguese Sephardic Jews became famous in America: Bernard Mannes Baruch, adviser to EIGHT American Presidents, Moses Seixas who was the founder of the Bank of Rhode Island, Dr. Samuel Nunez who became private physician to King John V in Portugal, and Moses Michael Hays who founded the Bank of Boston. One thing is certain for sure: the Portuguese Sephardic Jews always honored their name and the Portuguese traditions in all the countries where they went to live. This alone is enough to merit our admiration. We should add to the list of the famous Portuguese Sephardic Jews, Pedro Nunes, great mathematician and inventor of the Nonius, as well as Baruch Spinoza, eminent Philosopher of the 17th century. We should include also the poet Gil Vicente, Fernâo Mendes Pintos, the traveler and explored to China and author of "Peregrinação" and even the greatest poet Luis Vaz de Camões, author of "Os Lusíadas" because his parents also migrated from Spain to Portugal. Were they Jewish ? I think so.
MONTICELLODuring my lecture I continued to show panoramic color slides of Portugal so that my presentation of so many names would not be tiresome, and also to create a certain expectation. From the City of Newport I jumped on to Monticello, State of Virgina. We then visited, with the help of color slides, the famous house built by President Thomas Jefferson, author of the Declaration of Independence. With slides, I also showed the magnificent aspect of today's conditions of Monticello, in contrast with the devastating appearance of this famous house just a few years after President Thomas Jefferson died, when Monticello was even sold in a public auction.
It was a Portuguese Jewish family by the name of LEVY who bought and preserved Monticello during EIGHTY EIGHT YEARS, avoiding its total destruction. The discovery that the Levy family was a Portuguese family was made by the historian Humberto Carreiro from Bristol, Rhode Island, who several years ago, when he went to Virgina to visit his daughter, in a visit to Monticello, observed the Portuguese name MACHADO engraved on a plaque of Rebecca Machado Levy, who was the mother of Rachel Phillips Levy and grandmother of Uriah Philips Levy who bequeathed in his will, the estate of Monticello, as a gift to the American People. Genealogical research confirmed that the Levy family was indeed a Portuguese Sephardic Jewish family! It is interesting to note that until recently in Faro, Southern part of Portugal, there were Levy families living there, and even today there are Levy families living in Guimarães, the first capital of Portugal.
STATUE OF LIBERTYTo emphasize the odyssey of the Portuguese Sephardic Jews in America I showed a slide of the Statue of Liberty in the Bay of New York, and asked this question: "¿Is this statue also Portuguese Sephardic Jewish ?" Of course the entire audience had a good laugh. But in a few seconds the laughter subsided when I revealed that on the base of this famous statue, the largest in the world, there exists a bronze plaque (1903) which contains a poem of 14 verses written by Emma Lazarus, a Portuguese Sephardic Jewish poet, niece of the famous Supreme Court Justice, Benjamin Cardozo, also a Portuguese Sephardic Jew!
CRISTOVÃO COLONAnd to wind up my lecture I declared that the famous navigator that everybody confuses with Christopher Columbus, or Colombo, was indeed a Portuguese Sephardic Jew, with the name Cristóvão Colon or Salvador Fernandes Zarco, born in Cuba, Alentejo, Portugal. We then ,by means of slides, made a trip to the Vatican Library in Rome, to observe the two Papal Bulls by Alexander VI, dated Mary 3, and May 4, 1493, on which we would see , very clearly, the name of the navigator as CRISTOFÕM COLON. It must be mentioned that Colombo means "pigeon", but the navigator was no pigeon... Afterwards we analyzed the Navigator's Sigla, and then I reminded every one in the audience that Colon is the same as Zarco in Hebrew, explaining the reason of the name Salvador Fernandes Zarco. To confirm the name Salvador Fernandes Zarco, we followed with the analysis of the Monogram, which was deciphered by my wife, Silvia. I concluded with the analyses of the last 12 letters that the famous navigator wrote to his son Diogo Colon, and we verified that in ALL of them we can observe: (1) the Sigla, (2) the Monogram, and (3) the Blessing in Hebrew.
My next to last slide was dedicated to the Portuguese Consul in Bordeaux, France, Aristides de Sousa Mendes, who saved many thousand of refugees' lives by giving them visas to go through Portugal during the 2nd World War, including more than ten thousand Jews. My last slide was a photo of today's President of Portugal, Dr. Jorge Sampaio, who was elected freely and democratically, by the Portuguese people. He is a direct descendent of Portuguese Sephardic Jews (belong to the Bemsaude Family). It took 500 years for the Portuguese to elect a President of Jewish extraction! This is the best example that, from now on, and forever more, we should stop with the differences and jealousies among Jews, Catholics and Moors. There are investigators who believe that sixty percent of the Portuguese population has Jewish blood. This should not be surprising since the Jews were settled in Portugal two thousand years before Christ was born! This is the reason why the Portuguese names derived from vegetables, trees, rivers and mountains have their origin in Portuguese Sephardic Jews. Consult your family name to verify if you have or not Jewish origin!
After me, Professor Robert Waxler of the University of Massachussets, in Dartmouth, took the podium and described the present situation of the restoration of the Synagogue in Ponta Delgada, São Miguel, Azores. Then, Mr. George Pacheco of Fall River, explained how he does his genealogical family research, and to close the program, Mrs. Ada Jill Schneider of Somerset, Mass, read a poem written by herself, inspired in the maritime currents in the Atlantic, dedicated to the odyssey of the Portuguese Sephardic Jews of the Azores.
Jay Rosenberg, Musician, gave us an excellent show of Sepahrdic music and songs, during 20 minutes, using a variety of instruments.
Within two weeks we have already four requests to repeat the same cultural program.
"The New Colossus"
Poem by Emma Lazarus
was inscribed on a tablet in the pedestal in 1903.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset, gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning , and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-side welcome; her mild eyes command.
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
"Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
with silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor
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