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| Jewish Monferrato / Monferrato's Jewish Culture Moncalvo and the "APpaM" custom The Jewish-Piedmontese dialect Treasures from the Monferrato's Jewish kitchen The Jewish community of Moncalvo and the "Appam custom" After the expulsion of Jews from France in 1394, may of them moved to Italy. In the Jewish communities of Asti, Fossano and Moncalvo, began thus a new prayer custom, called APpaM from the initials in Hebrew of these three towns, that joined the French custom and the German one. This custom got almost entirely lost during the past century and today, only some melodies of prayers remembered by the few Jews still living there remain of this special cultural and religious mark. Back to the Top The Jewish-Piedmontese dialect In Piedmont, as in other regions of Italy, the Jews introduced in the local dialect some Hebrew expressions, often changed to be more similar to Italian, thus creating new original languages. By adding words from the Sacred Texts in Hebrew or in Aramaic, Jews could communicate without letting non Jews, often servants or merchants, understand. This dialect nevertheless became so common that often even non Jews used it. The Jewish-Piedmontese dialect was also used to write comedies, poems and ballads, as La gran battaja dj’ abrei d’Moncalv (The big battle of the Jews in Moncalvo), which talks about a quarrel among many Jews in the ghetto of Moncalvo, stopped immediately when they heard that a non Jewish policeman was arriving. This dialect got in disuse after the Emancipation in 1848, when the Jews began wanting to efface the differences between them and the other Italian citicens. Back to the Top
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