Churches | Turin churches |
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Israelitic TempleThe Jewish community, after the emancipation of 1848 sanctioned in 1857 decided in 1859 to build his own temple in Turin, buying the area in via Cannon d'Oro (the actual via Montebello) and giving the task to Alessandro Antonelli. The building projected by Antonelly, the future Mole Antonelliana, will never become a Synagogue because the cost of the work was very high from the start and it obliged the community to sell again the construction not yet completed to the Turin Municipality. The community goes in search of another area, soon localized not very far from the Valdese Temple. The project, 1880, was committed to Enrico Petiti, who realized a building of huge dimension; there are a great number of décor elements reprised by indefinite middle-east repertoires, exotic anyway, like bulb domes which crown the side towers.  Israelitic Temple In 1884 the actual building is inaugurated, in piazzetta Primo Levi (already known as via San Pio V) and in 1942 during a bombing an incendiary bomb hit the temple, leaving intact the perimetral walls but demolishing the interior décor and all the furniture. In 1949 the Synagogue was reconstructed. In 1972 in the crypt of the Synagogue, in the rooms used for the cooking of the unleavened breads, the architect Giorgio Olivetti realized a Synagogue of an amphitheatre shape, with the roof vaults and the walls left rough with bricks in view; the holy furniture (Aron and Tevà) comes from the demolished baroque Synagogue of Chieri. A little wall of holed bricks separates this little Synagogue from a prayer room. Six rows of pews are placed in front of a precious wooden "Aron" of the 18th century coming from the temple of German rite of the ghetto of Turin and then moved to the old retirement house of Piazza Santa Giulia where it was until 1963. On the little panels, painted in black in 1849 in mourning for the death of Carlo Alberto, are painted two valuable golden images that recall Jerusalem. The tours the Jewish Temple are possible only by reservation. Information: |