In 1541 Jews of the Levant were moved into the nearby old foundry or ghetto vecchio. Finally in 1633 the area was further enlarged by adding the ghetto novissimo to house western Jews.5 At this time (1632) there were 2,412 Jews in the ghetto out of a total Venetian population of 98,244. With the extra space the ghetto was able to house nearly 5,000 Jews by 1655.6 To live thus enclosed, the Jews paid not only ordinary taxes and custom dues, but a special annual tax of 10,000 ducats a year
