Sephardic World

Sephardic World brings world-class speakers to a global audience for free. Our first meeting was on 3 May 2020, during the pandemic. Below are links to recordings of Sephardic World meetings. 

The Sephardic World lecture library


2020 Meetings


The Amsterdam Archives - Ton Tielen

The 1680 Madrid auto-da-fe -  David Mendoza

The first Jewish citizen of New York - Daniela Weil

Jewish Genealogy in Morocco - Jacob Marrache Fischel

Jewish marriage in Livorno - Alain Nedjar

Family Nunes Vaz, a Journey of Western Sephardic genealogy - Jarrett Ross

Suriname: Jewish Autonomy in a Slave Society - Aviva Ben-Ur

Sephardic DNA project - Adam Brown

Highlights from the Ets Haim collection - Heide Warncke

Muestro Yerusha: Jewish heritage and Identity in the Ottoman Empire - Michael Waas

Rabbis with Inky Fingers - Making 18th Century Hebrew Books - Noam Sienna

The Jews of Eighteenth Century Jamaica - Stanley Mirvis

Art of the Jewish Family - Laura Arnold Leibman

Geni.com, Good for the Sephardim? - Randy Schoenberg

The Amsterdam Notarial Archives - Harmen Snel

The Sephardic Poor of Amsterdam and London - Ton Tielen

The Jews of Italy - Luca Ascoli

Libyan Jews in the Maelstrom of Modern History - Sephardic Horizons

Syrian Jews from Aleppo to Brooklyn - Sarina Roffe

Menasseh ben Israel vs The Rabbi's - Steven Nadler

From Glory to Dispersion - the Sephardic Lisbona family from Damascus - David Lisbona

The De Sola Mendes Family and the Portuguese Inquisition - Florbela Veiga Frade

"My Heart is in the East..." Financial support for Eretz Israel from the farthest West - Ton Tielen

From Portugal to Jamaica - The Delgado Story - Steve Delgado Porter

Who owns the cemetery? Shearith Israel, New York - Zachary Edinger

Sir Moses Montefiore - Abigail Green



2021 Meetings


David Baruch Louzada 1640-1699 - Julian Land

The Dutch Pimentel Family - History and Holocaust - Esther Shaya, Henk Dijkman and Fokko Weerstra

Sephardic Jews in Diplomatic and Consular Archives - Thierry Samama

Genetic Census of the Sephardim - Adam Brown

A Journey through Curacao's Jewish History - Ron Gomes Casseres

Jews in the Maghreb - Their Surnames and their Roots - Alexander Beider 

Jewish Archives in the Ottoman Empire - Michael Waas

Alliance Israelite Universelle - Jean-Claude Kuperminc

Sephardim in the Atlantic World - Jessica Roitman

Amsterdam - Bookstore of the World - Emile Schrijver

The Farhi of the Levant - Alain Farhi

Data Mining the Deceased - Julia Creet

Sephardic Research, Past, Present and Future - Schelly Talalay Dardashti

DNA evidence of Jews in Portugal - Inês Pires Nogueiro

Vindos de Portugal - Carla Vieira

Spanish archives pre-1750 - Daniel Smith-Ramos

Genealogy of the Jews of Egypt - David Mendoza

Chasing Shadows - Bringing the Gomes da Costa family to life - Ali Erginsoy

Gibraltarian Jews in the 18th and 19th Centuries - Joshua Marrache

The Italiaender family (alias Levi Vitoria) of Amsterdam: Between Sephardi and Ashkenazi, with links to London and Copenhagen - Marius Heemstra

The Jews of Jamaica, an interview with Ainsley Cohen Henriques

The Need for a Sephardic Genealogical Society - David Mendoza and Ton Tielen

Balkan Sephardim in Early Modern Amsterdam - Tirtsah Levie Bernfeld

Trade and the Sephardic Diaspora - A Reappraisal - Daniel Strum

De Megorachim à Dhimmis aux citoyens français (From Megorashim to Dhimmis to French Citizens) - Sylviane Serruya

Esther the Queen and the Brothers Buzaglo - Ali Erginsoy

The Jews of Rhodes: Between Ottomans and Italians - Valerie McGuire

The Nação Portuguesa in Antwerp - Florbela Veiga Frade

Amsterdam Research: Ets Haim School, Library, and Charity - Ton Tielen

A Moroccan Jewish Genealogical Journey - Raquel Levy-Toledano

Sephardic Diplomatic Power - Hans Wallage

From Cobblers to Cosmopolitans: The Baruch Lousada Story - Julian Land

The Peculiar Case of Luis Méndez Chávez and the Cartagena Inquisition - Brian Hamm

The Jews of Egypt - Yves Fedida

Ashkenazim with Sephardic Ancestry? David Mendoza and Ton Tielen

15 resources every Sephardic genealogist should know - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

Sephardic Genealogy in Livorno - Alain Nedjar

Jewish Cemeteries in Jamaica - Rachel Frankel and Joseph de Leon 

The Jews of Bosnia - Francine Friedman 

Spain and the Jews: From Expulsion to Citizenship - David Mendoza


2022 Meetings

Why wasn't Spinoza excommunicated? - Yitzhak Melamed

Jewish Pirates of the Caribbean? - Ton Tielen

Jews in Georgian Society - The Laras of London - Pearl Foster

Will the real Lousada duke please stand up?! - Julian Land

The Sephardic Diaspora - Our Online Community - David Mendoza, Jarrett Ross, Ton Tielen and Michael Waas

Trade and persecution: Three Merchants between Lisbon and London - Carla Vieira

The Sephardic Archives of Amsterdam - The Early Years - Ton Tielen 

The Story of Sephardic Surnames: Fruit Trees, Catholic Themes and ‘Expert Lists’ - Michael Waas

The Sephardic Archives of Amsterdam in the Dutch Golden Age - Ton Tielen

Sephardic Traditions - What is different about Portuguese Jews? - Yehonatan Elazar-DeMota

Rabbis, Merchants and Consuls - The Marrache Family of Morocco - Jacob Marrache

Beginners Guide to Searching in the Archives of the Portuguese Inquisition - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

The Holocaust in Yugoslavia - Esther Danon Gitman

Your Sephardic Problems Answered! Q&A session with Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

The Portuguese Jews of Hamburg. The History of a Mercantile Community in the Seventeenth Century - Hugo Martins 

Dutch Sephardim: An Interview with Professor Bart Wallet

Finding Jews in Jamaican Archives - Toni Pitock and Marina Delfos Harris

Mail Order Brides, Sephardic Style (Dotar) - Ton Tielen

Servants, Masters and Families. African and Eurafrican Jews in 17th Century Amsterdam - Mark Ponte

The Moroccan Jews of Cabo Verde: Preservation of Memory - Carol Castiel

Origins of the Sephardic Mendoza Family - David Mendoza

Cardinal Errors in Sephardic Genealogy - Julian Land

Speaking for the Silenced - Richard Zimler

Peixotto: A Portuguese-Jewish family in the Americas - Haakon Lazarus Chevalier

Sephardic Music from the Inside Out - Ian Pomerantz

Opening the Archives with Technology - Bevis Marks, A Case Study - David Silvera

Finding Early London Sephardic Ancestors - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

Sephardim in ancien régime France - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

The Crypto-Judaism Movement: Are Bnei Anusim an Ashkenazi fantasy? - David Mendoza (Patrons only)

A Trip to the Dutch Wild Coast: A 1658 Sephardic Expedition - Jonathan Schorsch

Q&A with Harmen Snel, Senior Archivist at the Amsterdam City Archives - Harmen Snel

A Conversation with Ton Tielen - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

Cohen de Azevedo: Tracing a Sephardic Family - Ton Tielen

Daniel Mendoza, Regency Boxer and Improbable Jewish Hero - David Mendoza

The Romanian Legacy: Sephardic Jewish Community - Peninah Zilberma


2023 Meetings

Mining the Archives with Technology - David Silvera

Eight Centuries of a Sephardic Family: The Malka Family, 1282-2022 - Jeff Malka

Jewish Bulgaria: A Virtual Sephardic Journey - Joseph Benatov (Not recorded. Link to speaker's website)

Sephardic and Ashkenazi Genealogy: Chalk and Cheese? - David Mendoza

In Conversation with Mark Ponte - Mark Ponte

Judah Touro and the Touro Synagogue of New Orleans - Adrien Genet

The Bevis Marks Synagogue Story - Celebrating over 300 years - Marilyn Scott with Rabbi Shalom Morris

Sephardim and the Allure of Nobility - Ton Tielen

Y-DNA and the Jews - Wim Penninx

Books Every Sephardic Genealogist Should Know - David Mendoza and Ton Tielen

Anatomy of Torture: Torment as a Tool of the Spanish Inquisition - Ron Hassner

Researching Jewish Ancestors in the Ottoman Empire - David Mendoza

The Almosnino Family - Nathaniel Farouz

Sephardic Jews of Barbados - Simon Kreindler

Three Years of Sephardic World. What have we learned? - David Mendoza and Ton Tielen

Your Problems Answered - Sephardic Genealogy Q&A

The Portuguese and Spanish Nationality Laws - What went wrong? - David Mendoza

A Sephardic case study - The Baruch Lousada - Julian Land

The Golden Path: Maimonides Across Eight Centuries - David Sclar

DNA and Jewish Genealogy - Adam Brown

Using DNA to Track your Ancestors: A Case Study - Raquel Levy-Toledano

Untangling Jamaican Jewish Genealogy - Stephen Delgado Porter

Using Facebook for Researching the Jews of Egypt - Jacob Rosen-Koenigsbuch

Sephardim in Romania - Felicia Waldman

JewishGen and Sephardic Genealogy - Avraham Groll

Resources for Sephardic Genealogists in Israel - Rose Feldman

Review of 2023 - David Mendoza


2024 Meetings

Rewriting a Family History: De Sola Family - Ton Tielen

As Perfect as if Cast in Gold: Aspects of manuscript culture and Hebrew printing in Amsterdam in the 17th century - Heide Warncke

The Irresponsible Life of Joshua Cohen Rodrigues - Jair van Dijk

Ladino Culture and Jewish Identity in Bulgaria - Leah Davcheva

Portuguese Nationality for Sephardic Descendants: An Update - Isabel Comte and Teresa Santos

Finding Your DNA Cousins - Jarrett Ross

Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People - Yochai Ben-Ghedalia

Five Centuries of Five Italian Jewish Families - George Sacerdote

Ancestral Origins And Genetic Diversity of Moroccan Jews - Raquel Levy-Toledano

Digital Humanities and the Ladino Press - Benjamin Charles Germain Lee

Selomoh Ayllion: Controversial Rabbi - Ton Tielen

London’s 18th Century Secular Records - David Mendoza

Ruling the Sephardic Atlantic - Carla Vieira

Researching the Sephardic Communities of the Ottoman Empire - Jonathan McCollum

Four Overlooked Sephardic Communities: Madras, The Hague, Dublin, Gluckstadt - Ton Tielen and David Mendoza

The Lost World of Monastir: Sephardic Jews in Ottoman and Yugoslav Macedonia - David Mendoza

Your ancestry questions answered! - European Days of Jewish Culture

Denmark, Morocco and the Jews - Bent Blüdnikow

The Pardo Family Adventure - Ton Tielen 

Keeping the Faithful: Poverty, Welfare and Cohesion in the Sephardic community of Georgian London - Ali Erginsoy

The Lost World of Vlooienburg, 1600-1815 - Maarten Hell

Sephardic Customs of Amsterdam - Nachshon Rodrigues Pereira

The Lindos: Sephardic Grandees - Ton Tielen

Jewish Cookery in Inquisition Archives - Hélène Jawhara Piñer

To hear Judith Cohen's talk, Adeus Vila de Belmonte: Music in the lives of crypto-Jews in Portugal, please contact her directly. Members-only meetings are not shared, but Patreon supporters can see them on request. Unfortunately recordings of two meetings are unavailable. These are: Dotar - The Sephardic Marriage Market and The Nunes Carvalho Family, from Portugal to the Wild West.

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