A museum inside Portugal's oldest synagogue reopened on Tuesday following a two-year renovation.
The Interpretive Center of Tomar Synagogue and Abraão Zacuto Luso-Hebraic Museum in Tomar, Portugal – a little more than a 90-minute drive from the country's capital, Lisbon – was built in the 15th century.
It was abandoned until it was restored in 1921 by a Polish-born Jew, Samuel Schwarz.
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The synagogue's façade is deceivingly mundane. Inside, is a small but tall space with a multileveled domed ceiling and four pillars, representing Judaism's four matriarchs: Sarah, Rebeka, Rachel and Leah.
Schwarz, a mining engineer, documented Jewish customs in rural Portuguese locales in a 1925 book titled "New Christians in Portugal in the 20th Century."
The customs had been preserved in towns like Belmonte and Trancoso by descendants of Jews who kept practicing their faith in secrecy after the Inquisition, a state-sponsored campaign of persecution that began in Spain in 1492 and reached Portugal in 1536.
