An Important Torah Ark Curtain, Italy, 1717

An Important Torah Ark Curtain, Italy, 1717

This tour-de-force of needlework is a unique example of a Torah ark curtain embroidered with the entirety of the text of the Ten Commandments as they appear in Exodus 20. The text is stitched in gilt thread within two arched columns that are decorated with swags of fruit-filled vines above and elaborate urns below. The Hebrew verses are gracefully embroidered onto the silk ground and are spaced according to the traditional layout of the text of the Ten Commandments in a Torah scroll.

The borders of this Torah ark curtain are profusely embroidered with finely stitched floral motifs. Many synagogues have the custom to hang curtains specific to each of the seasons or Jewish holidays, and this curtain was likely hung in front of the Torah ark on Shavuot, the holiday that commemorates the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai. According to Jewish tradition, when Mount Sinai was chosen as the designated place for this momentous event, the mountain was miraculously carpeted with flowers. It is possible that the lavish border of embroidered flowers surrounding the Ten Commandments on this magnificent textile was intended as a visual reference to the flowers that adorned Mount Sinai when the Ten Commandments were given to the Jewish people. While there are a few other Torah ark curtains from Italy embroidered with an image of Mount Sinai and intended for use on the holiday of Shavuot, this is the only known curtain with the text of the Ten Commandments embroidered in full.

A cartouche beneath each of the three columns contains the following enigmatic inscription: “I will reveal my secret to the One Who supports those who run [toward God], for behold my oath is fulfilled.” The initial letters of each of these words are marked and, taken together, spell out the name of the woman who created this extraordinary textile: Esther Kohenet. The name Kohenet indicates that she was the daughter of a kohen; it was a title used by women of this station in eighteenth-century Italy. The date, 1717, is stitched in pearls at the bottom of the curtain.

Literature

Vivian B. Mann (ed.), Gardens and Ghettos: The Art of Jewish Life in Italy (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), 275-278.

Bracha Yaniv, Ceremonial Synagogue Textiles: From Ashkenazi, Sephardi, and Italian Communities, trans. Yohai Goell (London: The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2019), 193-265.