380 Milanese
was the chief of Alghero’s customs house, while Antonio Angelo Carcassona
(1553–1554) occupied important ecclesiastical posts.56
4.3 Archaeological Markers of the Jewish Community
A problem arises with regard to the material culture of Alghero’s Jewish com-
munity and the lack of specific identifying features that have thus far emerged
through archaeological research. The rarity of distinctive handcrafted goods
(lamps, ceramics, seals, metal cult objects, or pottery with Hebrew script re-
lated to dietary customs imposed by the general rules of cacherout) appears
to be a widespread phenomenon in Jewish archaeological settings throughout
Europe. Urban excavations in London have revealed that the Jewish commu-
nity used handcrafted, quotidian objects similar to those circulating in the rest
of the city.57 More material evidence has been recovered through emergency
excavations in Amsterdam, but the traces always consist of metal cult objects
or ones with Hebrew script (kasher) that are related to the dietary habits of the
community and dictated by religious demand.58 It is necessary to emphasize
that, thus far, no archaeological finds distinctly characterized as Jewish have
been uncovered in excavations in the city of Alghero, and that the material
culture in the Jewish quarter does not seem to differ from that circulating in
the rest of the city.
In the absence of manufactured items of a religious nature, that is, mate-
rial culture with explicitly Jewish connotations, a more refined archaeologi-
cal project focusing on differences in everyday material culture could bring
to light unexpected modes of demonstrating Jewish presence (in Alghero and
elsewhere) through archaeology. An indirect way of identifying the Jews of
Alghero would be to study the remains of food, with an eye on those foods
permitted as kasher (appropriate) and those listed as prohibited, such as pork,
horsemeat, mollusks, crustaceans, and certain types of fish.59 Indeed, the par-
ticular importance assigned to poultry, geese, and fowl is known, but a study
of faunal remains has yet to be conducted. Any attempt to do this would first
need to study the meat diet of the Jewish quarter’s residents in the fifteenth
56 Sorgia, “Una famiglia di Ebrei,” pp. 287–308.
57 Jacqueline Pearce, “A Rare Delftware Hebrew Plate and Associated Assemblage from
an Excavation in Mitre Street, City of London,” Post-Medieval Archaeology 32 (1998),
pp. 95–112.
58 Jan Baart, “Post-Medieval Archaeology in Holland,” Archeologia Postmedievale 1 (1997),
pp. 37–50.
59 Ariel Toaff, Mangiare alla giudia: la cucina ebraica in Italia dal Rinascimento all’età mod-
erna (Bologna, 2000).