Theater of Acculturation: The Roman Ghetto in the Sixteenth Century.

Kenneth R. Stow. Theater of Acculturation: The Roman Ghetto in the Sixteenth Century.

Seattle and London: University of Washington Press, 2001. x + 246 pp. + 20 b/w pls. index. bibl. $22.50 ISBN: 0-295-98025-7.

Kenneth Stow, after studying some six thousand notarial documents (Notai ebrei) of the sixteenth-century Roman Jewish ghetto, and publishing or summarizing many of those in a separate work, has attempted here to synthesize his findings into a picture of the Jews' identity-preservation strategies in Rome. The sixteenth century was a singularly difficult time in the history of Roman Jews: they were placed in an enforced ghetto, their holy books were burned by papal order, and they were economically marginalized. Stow attempts to address the problem of how the ghetto's inhabitants succeeded in negotiating the intense pressures placed on them by these worsening conditions without losing their unique self-image as both Romans and Jews. Some did not succeed, to be sure--they either converted or left--but their numbers were small. The majority managed to deal with the changes by a sort of theatrical bravado, continuing to act out the roles they wanted to see themselves playing on the impoverished stage of their tiny ghetto.

Stow explains that these Jews practiced a strategy of selective absorption of Roman Christian cultural elements, creating an ongoing limited acculturation that never went too fast or too far. A central institution in this process, and in the limited self-rule of Roman Jews, was that of the Jewish notary. In a period when isolation and concerted attempts at conversion were the order of the day, the very existence of this office seems anomalous; but Jewish notaries existed, kept records in Hebrew, and served as the backbone of Jewish self-rule. They did answer to the authority of the papal vicar. However, their tenuous authority was genuinely respected both in the eyes of the Christian government and those of the Jews, in whose "theater of acculturation" they played the leading part.

Stow's book is a useful contribution to a larger trend, led by Elliot Horowitz, Robert Bonfil, Roni Weinstein, and Stow himself, to move away from a "We participated too!" picture of early modern Jewish life in Italy. These scholars have shifted the focus away from intellectual, artistic, and political achievements to social history and the rhythms of everyday life. Stow's notarial sources present such a different picture of life in this period, in fact, that one is sometimes jarred by the absence of Johannes Reuchlin, Jacob Mantino, Solomon Molkho, Elijah Levita, and the other figures about whom we are accustomed to hearing in sixteenth-century Roman Jewish life. We are focused instead on notaries like Abraham Scazzocchio and Isaac Piattelli, their un-glamorous clients, and the day-to-day accommodation being made to Roman Christian society. It is a useful exercise.

The book is structured around three main essays that were originally delivered as a lecture series at Smith College. They have not been subdivided, and they often wander from topic to topic. The prose can be heavy going, with many complex, almost Germanic sentences that tax the reader unnecessarily (e.g., 37). One may also question whether Stow's comparisons between the experiences of sixteenth-century Roman Jews and those of modern German and American Jews are really compelling. As a guide to everyday life in the sixteenth-century Roman ghetto, however, there is no denying that the volume is fresh and very informative.