The Azores are a few specks on the map, and on a forgotten chapter in Jewish history

Text and photos by Odom Edelstein

The “Arquipélago dos Açores,” more commonly known as the Azores, is a chain of islands 900 miles off the coast of Portugal, just a cluster of specks on the map.  But this off-the-beaten-track destination featuring breathtaking natural beauty, a bovine population that outnumbers the human inhabitants two to one, and a running motif of roosters, is also the site of a long-forgotten chapter in Jewish history

MY wife and I spent our shanah rishonah saving up for a honeymoon in Europe, planning on knocking some countries off our bucket lists.

We just differed on where we wanted to go. She loves to visit well known cities with a rich history, culture, and clean bathrooms, while I prefer the untrodden trail. We compromised by deciding that I could put one atypical destination onto our itinerary of seven cities. After killing a few hours scanning Google Maps, I settled on the Azores — a group of nine volcanic islands in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, about 900 miles off the coast of Portugal, of which it’s an autonomous region. In my criteria: It was unique, it was remote… and the flight and hotel were cheap.

When we traveled, the only direct flights from the US to the Azores left from Boston, where a large Portuguese diaspora is based. Our TAP Air flight was scheduled to take off from Boston Logan at 8 p.m., but was delayed until midnight. Turns out the reason was that the pilot and crew had wanted to take an unscheduled jaunt around the city, which they did, confident that the flight wouldn’t leave without them. Apparently, this happens every Sunday night.

Eventually we took off, and after a six-hour flight, we arrived in Ponta Delgada, the capital of São Miguel, the largest of the Azorean islands.

Temporary Haven

There was a Jewish presence at some point in time on all nine islands that make up the Azores, but São Miguel’s community was the largest and most established. The first Jews there were expats fleeing from Portugal.

In 1496, King Manuel I of Portugal wanted to marry the daughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain. One of their conditions for the match was the forced conversion or expulsion of Portugal’s Jews, following the precedent they had set four years earlier. Manuel gave the community a deadline to convert or leave, but before the time was up, he used a royal decree to forcibly convert everyone who hadn’t escaped yet. All those who remained on the mainland were either exiled to North Africa or forced into becoming “New Christians,” the eventual targets of the Portuguese Inquisition.

The original Jewish settlers on São Miguel were Portuguese Jews whose boats ran ashore on the island on their way to the Ottoman Empire, Morocco, or Amsterdam in an attempt to escape before the deadline. As the Azores were relatively unpopulated, the passengers thought it might be a safe location to rebuild their community. They built shuls, schools, cemeteries, mikvaos, and practiced shechitah.

It really was safe for a time… until the Inquisition caught up. In 1575, the Portuguese Inquisition burned 104 members of the community at the stake for practicing Judaism. While there were periods of quiet, the Inquisition only officially dissolved in 1821.