Expulsion of the Jews from Sicily there. The settlements of these Jews were in Greece and Turkey were large enough great to build their own congregations and to print books. The Jews have never returned en masse to Sicily. However, in 2005, for the first time since the Expulsion, a Passover seder was conducted in Sicily (in Palermo), held by the Milanese progressive Rabbi. http://www.dieli.net/SicilyPage/JewishSicily/JudaicaMessina1.html Expulsion of the Jews from Sicily The expulsion of the Jews from Sicily began in 1493 when the Spanish Inquisition reached the island of Sicily and its population of more than 30,000 Jews. At the time of expulsion from Sicily, the
History of the Jews in Sicily in Sicily." In the late ancient period the predominantly spoken language of the Jewish (and non-Jewish) population of Sicily has been the Greek language. When Greek was the main language in Jewish inscriptions, as was the case with Jewish inscriptions from Sicily, Greek names, which were locally common, appear in significant numbers in Jewish inscriptions. Still after the Muslim conquest of the island, the use of the Greek language and the ties of the Sicilian Jews to the Byzantine Empire, its economy and its Jewish communities continued to function under the new circumstances. Through these Byzantine(-Jewish) connections, the Synagogue liturgy