The ancient Jewish ghetto in Venice is in the Cannaregio district, one of the most authentic Venetian areas in the city, and yet quite unknown to tourists. In a multicultural and multiethnic city, as Venice was, in an area far away from the center of power, the Jewish ghetto was born in 1516. We will try to understand what distinguishes this area from all other Jewish quarters in Europe at that time as well as to learn the history of the Venetian Jewish community till nowadays.

Luisella Romeo lives and works in Venice, where her family has lived since the mid 1700's. She has been a registered tourist guide since 2000. She finds the history as well as the present time of her city very fascinating and loves narrating stories of Venice with some sense of humor too! After graduating in North American Literature and Language, she received a scholarship from UC Berkeley and travel grants from the Fulbright program to continue her studies there. While there, the first man she met became her Italian husband! She loves traveling, but in the end, she always wanted to come back to Venice and is very happy to be able to show Venice to others.