We still have the purchase agreement in our documents, says curator Lejla Bear. +387 61 900 531 Today, for the first time in its rich, tumultuous history, the Sarajevo Haggadah is accessible to the general public; it is kept in an especially secure space, under strictly defined environmental conditions, and is displayed on special occasions. Sarajevo Haggadah (Wikipedia). Mittls stealing of the clasps is inexcusable, and the Haggadah acts as a vessel for the reader to better understand Mittls, Dennis Kelly uses pathetic fallacy in the setting of Leahs monologue to describe how open she is as a person. The problem is compounded by the fact that portraits in medieval manuscripts of this nature often reflect the faces of the family that commissioned the artist. Lea Maestro, a young Bosnian Jewish woman standing behind the Haggadah in the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina. We know little of the first five-hundred years of the Haggadah. Re: Sarajevo Haggadah. A complete set of half page plates in Gothic style depicts the entire biblical story from Genesis through Deuteronomy. The haggadah escaped destruction at the hands of the Nazis during World War II when the Muslim National Museum librarian, Dervis Korkut, hid the haggadah in a countryside mosque. Dont ever rush those things like were used to rushing through our whole lives. Despite Hannas first encounter with Michael seems to be innocent, Hanna later initiates the first sexual act between the two. It may have been a present for the wedding of members of two prominent families, Shoshan and Elazar, because their coats of arms a shield with a rosette/rose (shoshan in Hebrew) and a wing (elazar in Hebrew) are featured on the page showing the coat of arms of the city of Barcelona. Gitl was supposed to be related to Hannah, not Rivka. Permanent Delegate of Bosnia and Herzegovina to UNESCO (June 2022), Print and Online Media Council in Bosnia and Herzegovina adapts its press code to digital journalism, RFP Social Media 4 Peace: Enhanced promotion and support of peacebuilding narratives and initiatives through digital technologies and social media in Bosnia and Herzegovina (deadline : 28 January 2022), OIC : Supply and delivery of information-communication technologies equipment (notebook computers) for education institutions (Deadline : 10 January 2022), Selma Selmans artistic expression empowering Roma women and girls in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Reimagining Education for Marginalized Girls and Boys during and post COVID-19 in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 16 days of activism against gender-based violence: female-artists from South-East Europe, Culture Territory project, Office of International Standards and Legal Affairs, Protection of human rights (Procedure 104). Global Voices stands out as one of the earliest and strongest examples of how media committed to building community and defending human rights can positively influence how people experience events happening beyond their own communities and national borders. 8) The exact name of who commissioned the Sarajevo Haggadah is not known; however, the haggadah could have been a wedding present when two members of the Shoshan and Eleazar families got married. The Haggadah serves as a way to show the reader that Mittl is truly doing is a truly horrible thing. When you buy through these links, we may earn an affiliate commission. This priceless masterpiece of medieval Judaica most likely originated in 14th century Spain and may have been made as a wedding present, celebrating the union of two families whose coats of arms appear in the bottom corners of the book. Why? Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com. The desire to illuminate this ubiquitous liturgy is still alive and well. The name of the original owner is not known, and it appears to have been taken out of Spain in 1492, when Jews were expelled by the Alhambra Decree.There is a note written by a Catholic priest, Giovanni Domenico Vistorini, who inspected the Haggadah in 1609 for any anti-Christian . They presented the document to Victor Mizrahi, the President of the Jewish community Skopje, who immediately contacted Jerusalem for assistance. Sign up to receive the best of Global Voices! Tweet on Twitter . Thanks to funds by the French Embassy at Bosnia and Herzegovina and UNESCO, the Haggadah is now exhibited twice a week, on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12:00 p.m. to 1 p.m., as well asevery first Saturday of the month during the same time slot. (RNS5-DEC10) In an illumination from the Sarajevo Haggadah, a depiction of the first plague. In the, Mittl was a book a book binder which suggest that he would have a love, or at least an appreciation, for books. It probably left the Iberian Peninsula along with the Jews exiled by the Alhambra Decree of 1492, and a Church censors notation dated 1609 indicates that it somehow passed the scrutiny of the Inquisition in Italy. After surviving both world wars, the . A fervent advocate of the multi-ethnic culture of Sarajevo, he predicted that the Nazis would seize the Haggadah for the bizarre Museum of Jewish Civilization in Prague that Hitler had planned in future commemoration of the destruction of the Jewish people. Korkut, at great risk, hid the Sarajevo Haggadah in a mosque in a Muslim village in the Bjelanica Mountain, where it remained until the end of World War II. The Haggadah is owned by the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo. About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features NFL Sunday Ticket Press Copyright . It takes you to a whole new perspective of the Holocaust, not just through facts, but actually living it. . The story focuses on imagined events surrounding the protagonist and real historical past of the still extant Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the oldest surviving Jewish illuminated texts. http://www.unesco.org/new/en/media-services/single-view/news Diversity of Cultural Expressions (2005 Convention), Global Education Monitoring Report (GEM Report), Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO (IOC), Observatory of documentary and digital heritage for UNESCO's Memory of the World Programme for Latin America and the Caribbean (MoWLAC), Report on Public Access to Information (SDG 16.10.2) 2021, Reshaping Policies for Creativity - 2022 Report, UNESCO Director-General's Report on the Safety of Journalists and the Danger of Impunity 2020, UNESCO Director-General's Report on the Safety of Journalists and the Danger of Impunity 2022, UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL), UNESCO International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP), UNESCO International Institute for Higher Education in Latin America and the Caribbean (IESALC), UNESCO's International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (IICBA), World Trends in Freedom of Expression and Media Development - Global Report 2021-2022. Its pages are stained with wine, evidence that it was used at many Passover Seders. His despair drives him to act unethically, and shows the reader where Mittls personal priorities are. These clues and other oddities where are the book's clasps? [5], During World War II, the manuscript was hidden from the Nazis and Ustashe by the Museum's chief librarian, Dervi Korkut, who risked his life to smuggle the Haggadah out of Sarajevo. The Sarajevo Haggadah, because of its aesthetic value and historical significance, is foremost among them. Originating in Northern Spain in the second half of the 14th century, the "Sarajevo Haggadah" is a valuable manuscript written on parchment, with superb illuminations. Mysterious girl at the Seder table (Sarajevo Haggadah). He is entrusted with the rebinding of the Haggadah, the first work he has received in weeks. In 2013 the New York Metropolitan Museum of Art attempted to arrange for a loan of the Haggadah, but due to internal political battles within Bosnia and Herzegovina, the loan was eventually refused by Bosnia's National Monuments Preservation Commission. 3) The Sarajevo Haggadah is divided into three parts. Subscribe to comments on this post via email. In keeping with its destiny, the Sarajevo Haggadah could not find peace even in the museum collection. Our weekly email is chockful of interesting and relevant insights into Jewish history, food, philosophy, current events, holidays and more Dr. Henry Abramson serves as a Dean of Touro University in Brooklyn, New York. The Sarajevo Haggadah came, as many Jewish and Moorish refugees fleeing the Spanish Inquisition, via Italy, to a tolerant Bosnia & Herzegovina, (BiH). The circumstances under which it made its way into Bosnia, as well as when that happened, are unknown. At a young age, she was forced to marry a severely abusive man named. Bosnia and Herzegovina, Contact Info: We know very little about the how the Haggadah traveled from Spain, where it was created, to Sarajevo where it now resides, so whats the harm in a little creative guesswork? In the poem War Photographer we come to know about the human conditions in war. It is traditional for Ashkenazi Haggadot to have illustrations in the margins, providing a frame for the text, as . In 1492, when Spain expelled the country's Jews, a refugee brought the book to Italy. The Winter, 2002, issue of the literary journal Brick published Ramona Koval's account of the disputes surrounding the proposed UNESCO-funded display of the original codex in the context of the post-Dayton Agreement UN-supervised 1995 peace settlement. Geraldine Brooks certainly deserves a lot of praise for so vividly making this 500-year-old Jewish manuscript come alive. Haggadah in Hebrew . This is not, as one review I read claimed, a novel so far from fact it is in the leagues of novels where the Confederacy win the American Civil War. His advice for young people is the following: When visiting the National Museum, take a better look at the exhibits, read the inscriptions and mention on social networks what [you have] read and learned during that visit. Elements like these have baffled art historians, including Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Geraldine Brooks, whose novel People of the Book is a fictionalized account of the Sarajevo Haggadahs history. It has Bosnian nafaka (blind luck), Bear says vividly. The story of this book inspired Geraldine Brooks, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author, to trace the tortuous and terrifying travels of the Sarajevo Haggadah in her 2008 novel "People of the Book." It is one of the oldest Sephardic Haggadahs in the world, originating in Barcelona around 1350. Groundwater, making the invisible visible. As part of the "The three lives of the Sarajevo Haggadah" exhibition, organised by the UNESCO Regional Bureau, with the support of the US Embassy in Sarajevo, a noteworthy reproduction of the Sarajevo Haggadah was displayed in its original size, with the goal of highlighting the artistic and aesthetic uniqueness of the manuscript.The exhibition emphasised both the sophisticated visual . Before Ha had to flee Saigon, she was headstrong and selfish, but she was also a girl who loved her mother and couldn't wait to grow up. At her core, Ha was a normal little girl. The first 34 leaves feature 69 illuminated miniatures showing the Creation of the World, slavery in Egypt, coming out of Egypt under Moses' leadership, and beyond, all the way to the succession of Joshua, son of Nun. Rivka was supposed to be at the camp before Hannah arrived. Sarajevo Haggadah. The Sarajevo Haggadah. Kada ga je tadanji direktor muzeja Joza Petrovi obavjestio da su stigli Nijemci, on je Hagadu sakrio u pantalone i rekao da su je predali drugom oficiru to jutro. Therefore, it serves my life by making me wonder that everything I know might just be a lie this whole time. A Kindle Scribe Review. I have removed these from the Mittl family Bible, you must see these are very fine (p. 125). Moreover, the play has been set as a circle order so all the events are tightly linked together. By Geraldine Brooks. In the beginning of the novel The Swallows of Kabul, written by Yasmina Khadra, the audience is introduced to the character of Musarrat, Atiqs wife. The Germans went to look for that officer, who had been created in the minds of Dervi and Joza, while the two of them stayed to think about what they would do with the Haggadah. Its monetary value is undetermined, but a museum in Spain required that it be insured for $7 million before it could be transported to an exhibition there in 1992. The first part consists of 34 pages with a total of 69 illuminated miniatures depicting Biblical events from the Creation to slavery in Egypt to the succession of Joshua after the death of Moses. Almost 60 years later, Sarajevo was once again engulfed in violence. The Sarajevo Haggadah The Choice Of Images. Hannah believed when Tant Rose said If [she] made a few sacrifices and worked hard [she] would be famous(1). On the museums birthday and for European Museum Night, I see the same friends who sometimes manage to bring some other people. Aaron contributed to the story by adding a side of Hannah that suggests that she likes to tell stories. Mittl, a book binder often used by the Austrian National Museum, suffers from a disease that causes him physical pain and mental difficulties. Hannah was a very hard worker and by working night and day she became very good at playing the piano. TheSarajevo Haggadahis probably one of the most famous of them. . Information about historical places connected to a 500 years old Jewish History in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The amazing story of the 700 year old Haggadah, the Muslim librarian who saved it from the Nazis, and how his children were miraculously saved by Israel. To quell rumors that the government had sold the Haggadah in order to buy weapons, the president of Bosnia presented the manuscript at a community Seder in 1995. The Grand Mufti presented it as a symbol of interfaith cooperation and respect, while recounting the protection of the Jewish book by Muslims on two occasions in history. Petrovi, aided by the curator Dervi Korkut, took enormous risks, dodged the demand, and arranged for the Haggadah to be stowed somewhere safe. To recovery and beyond:The report takes stock of the global progress on the adoption and implementation of legal guarantees on Access to Informati, Addressing culture as a global public good. Share on Facebook. A dog serving a hare (Barcelona Haggada, c.1350). The "complex and moving" (The New Yorker) novel by Pulitzer Prize winner Geraldine Brooks follows a rare manuscript through centuries of exile and war.Inspired by a true story, "People of the Book" is a novel of sweeping historical grandeur and intimate emotional intensity by an acclaimed and beloved author. While the politicians argue, funding for seven of Bosnia's most significant cultural institutions has dried up, forcing the closure of the National Gallery last year and the Historical . This is an awful book. A popular online lecturer, he is currently working on a three-volume history of the Jewish people for Koren Publishers (Jerusalem). In other words, this particular illumination is most likely a representation of the first owners of the Sarajevo Haggadah who felt the mysterious woman (girl?) Proclaimed a movable national monument by Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2003, it was registered by UNESCO as documentary heritage to the Memory of the World Register in 2017, providing recognition to its importance worldwide. 7) The illuminations in the Sarajevo Haggadah show both Christian and Islamic influences. The Birds Head Haggadah is held at the Israel Museum and the famous Sarajevo haggadah at the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Another very obvious difference from the book to the movies was that in the book Hannah lived with Gitl, but in the movie Hannah lives with Rivka. It also marks a significant change in Rutis life and helps explore what her religion means to her. The premise is captivating - a 500-year-old haggadah is found in Sarajevo in 1996, and the novel sets out to explore the book's journey across Europe in those intervening years. We also offer all handmade souvenirs, made by the local Jewish community members. The National Museum subsequently authorized the publication of a limited number of reproductions of the Haggadah, each of which has become a collector's item. As a History student myself, this novel particularly appealed to me as from what I had gathered from my mothers fevered urgings for me to read it, it struck precisely at what interests me about my subject in the first place. I guess a novel about the long and arduous journey of a 15th century Jewish prayer book isnt your typical holiday reading. In this image, there is also an African woman, dressed in the clothes of a prosperous Sephardic Jew and holding a piece of matzo, or unleavened bread. FLOC'H. When the Axis . The novel Inside Out and Back Again describes the life of a family of refugees searching to find home. Hannah has to remember anything and everything. This is a . The location of the gang and Leah were set on the wood and the field emphasizes their contradiction as human being. This site is licensed as Creative Commons Attribution 3.0. Sarajevo Haggadah is from today, again available to the visitors in the regular time slots on Tuesday and Thursday from 12:00 to 13:00 hrs, as well as every first Saturday of each month during the same time slot. The utilization of comprehensive details presents where the narrators true care, The novel "Cane" focuses on the racial, social, and economical problems faced in both the rural south and urban north. The Sarajevo Haggadah is housed in Bosnia's National Museum, a building that was almost destroyed in the 1990s, during four years of war. This content contains affiliate links. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed this novel, particularly the way Brooks wove the clues Hanna finds together into a coherent story so readers can truly picture every step of the Haggadahs long and dangerous journey. Sarajevo Haggadah contains a portrayal of the human image, which is prohibited in Judaism. To stay independent, free, and sustainable, our community needs the help of friends and readers like you. are the springboard for Geraldine Brooks's panoramic third novel, "People of the Book." . When the director of the museum at the time, Joza Petrovi, informed him that the Germans had arrived, he hid the Haggadah in his trousers and said that they had handed it over to another officer that morning. In 1957, a facsimile of the Haggadah was published by Sndor Scheiber, director of the Rabbinical Seminary in Budapest. Please consider making a donation to help us continue this work. The Sarajevo Haggadah, one of the most valuable and unique items in the collection of the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, has been publicly exhibited only on very rare occasions before 2018 usually on Passover and the museums birthday for lack of appropriate conditions. Others are a mixture of history and fiction, including the butterfly wings left when the Haggadah was hidden from the Nazis by a Sarajevan Muslim during World War Two and stowed away in the mountains, and the clasps stolen by an ailing bookbinder in 1894 Vienna. The writer . It left Spain in 1492 after the Expulsion of the Jews, and surfaced again in Italy in the 17th century. The Sarajevo Haggadah is an illuminated manuscript that contains the illustrated traditional text of the Passover Haggadah which accompanies the Passover Seder. sarajevo haggadah clasps An incomparable work of art appraised at $700 million, its wine-stained pages indicate that it was more than a precious family heirloom, it was actually used at Seder tables. Za nju je bio zaduen kustos Dervi Korkut, koji je bio iznimno uen ovjek. Used with permission. [8], In 1985 a reproduction was printed in Ljubljana, with 5,000 copies made. These serve as gateways for Brooks . Introduction. Because texts from the Haggadah are read with family every Passover, there is a relatively large number of such books - the most famous being the Sarajevo . Late 14th century: The Rylands Haggadah, is produced in . Sign up for True Story to receive nonfiction news, new releases, and must-read forthcoming titles. The Sarajevo Haggadah was created in Barcelona, circa 1350, for a prominent Jewish family. Most recently, and hopefully for the last time, this valuable tome was endangered at the beginning of the siege of Sarajevo in 1992, when the National Museum found itself on the first line of defence. There are many ways to take action with UNESCO -everyone can make a difference. Photograph by Midhat Poturovi/Transitions, used with permission. The exhibition aims to raise awareness about the Sarajevo Haggadah around the world, so that its incredible story, which confirms the importance of cultural and religious harmony for the preservation of peace, can continue inspiring us to safeguard humanitys rich cultural diversity, Link : Exhibition "Three lives of the Sarajevo Haggadah". And despite my reservations about her storyline it was a satisfying ending to see Hanna become a person of the book herself by dropping an Australian tree seed into the pages of the Haggadah for a future conservator to find. In May 2006, the Sarajevo publishing house Rabic Ltd., announced the forthcoming publication of 613 copies of the Haggadah on handmade parchment that attempts to recreate the original appearance of the 14th century original, alluding to the 613 Mitzvot.[9]. Keep an eye on your inbox. Notice the wine stains and hand-written commentaries, indicating the haggadah having been in extensive use during Passover celebrations. Its Passover narrative is preceded by much more than a likely series of illustrations from Exodus, however. [citation needed], Klein initiated an international campaign to raise the required funding. Dear visitors, It is with great pleasure that we would like to inform you that the original Sarajevo Haggadah is once again available to the public at regular times every Tuesday, fourth and first Saturday of the month from 12:00 to 13:00. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Global Voices is supported by the efforts of our volunteer contributors, foundations, donors and mission-related services. Geraldine Brooks got the idea for her new book, "People of the Book: A Novel," while covering the Bosnian war as a foreign correspondent. We bring people and nations together through education, culture and science. 826 Words4 Pages. However, we notice the tragedy ends when Leah leaves, which explains she is the person who holds everything together. From the Golden Haggadah, c. 1320, northern Spain, probably Barcelona ( British Library, MS. 27210, fol. With funding in hand and with Dr. Pataki, from Stuttgarts Akademie Der Bildenden Knste, ready to begin the restoration project a climate-controlled room was refurbished in Sarajevos National Museum to house the Haggadah as the centerpiece, surrounded by documents of the Catholic, Orthodox and Muslim faiths. It is a manuscript written on parchment, with a series of superb illuminations. Whenever he visits as Sephardic community, whether in Sarajevo, zmir, Thessaloniki or Plovdiv, De Lucas says he is struck by that fondness. The Sarajevo Haggadah, because of its aesthetic value and historical significance, is foremost among them. Submitted addresses will be confirmed by email, and used only to keep you up to date about Global Voices and our mission. The novel People of the Book, by Geraldine Brooks (2008), crafts a fictionalised history of the Haggadah from its origins in Spain to the museum in Sarajevo. Please read our attribution policy to learn about freely redistributing our work Some Rights Reserved, The history of the Sarajevo Haggadah, the medieval Jewish book that survived the Inquisition, the Holocaust, and the Yugoslav Wars, National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, puppet regime the Nazis had installed in Croatia, Zero benefits for Albania from China's Belt and Road Initiative, People fleeing from Russia: We were deprived of home too, Fake Russian fact-checkers spread propaganda about the war in Ukraine, The unspoken racism behind Peru's protests, The impact of Chinas expanding footprint in Uzbekistans automobile industry, Poisonings and evictions in Paraguay driven by Europe's meat industry. The illuminations are decorated using gold, silver, and copper leaf. The passage ends when the narrator shares her memory of eating, a bowl of pink mullet and green figs cooked in coconut milk, (lines 74-75) even clarifying that it was cooked by her grandmother. Copyright 2023 IPL.org All rights reserved. I expected great things from Brooks - March is a book I treasure - but this novel is a third-rate Da Vinci code, written with about the same amount of skill. The museum took heavy shelling then, from which it has still not recovered. Korkut gave it to a Muslim cleric in a village on a mountain of Bjelasnica, where it was hidden in a mosque. Feminism is the most flagrant theme in the novel; however, other themes such as the supernatural and heritage are also shown through the main character, Clara Trueba. The mystery of the Sarajevo Haggadah. If you want to read about another amazing haggadah made in Barcelona in the middle of the 14th century, check out this previous Book Riot post on 10 Things You Need to Know about the Golden Haggadah. 1) The Sarajevo Haggadah consists of 142 leaves of extraordinarily thin, bleached calfskin vellum. When offering the clasps to Hirschfeldt he says, but he could hardly reveal the fact without exposing himself as a thief (Brooks, 124) This quote reveals another aspect of Herr Mitt that he is a thief. Among the amazing stories associated with the document is that of Dervis Korkut, a Muslim intellectual who served as the Chief Librarian of the Museum during the Nazi occupation. The Sarajevo Haggadah was again at risk during the siege of Sarajevo (1992-1996). Sarajevo wanted the Haggadah exclusively. See all those languages up there? mission us: prisoner in my homeland. Adviser for culture and religion Association of Jewish communities of Bosnia and Herzegovina. sarajevo haggadah clasps sarajevo haggadah clasps. In May 2006, a Sarajevo publishing house Rabic Ltd., announced the forthcoming publication of 613 copies of the Haggadah on handmade parchment that attempts to recreate the original appearance of the 14th century original. Branilaca Sarajeva 24 Over the following four years, 10,000 Jews were killed in Bosnia, out of a population of 14,000. We translate Global Voices stories to make the world's citizen media available to everyone. Well-known related manuscripts to this Haggadah include the Rylands Haggadah and the Simeon Haggadah. It is these people who seem to have inspired Brooks in her novel. It was then sent to Vienna for analysis, and was returned after a few years of vicissitudes. As she works on the manuscript in Sarajevo under the watchful eye of the United Nations in the middle of the Bosnian War, she finds small clues in the books pages and bindings that offer a glimpse into its past. This is not to diminish Brookss meticulous and scholarly research, but merely to point out that the fun of this novel is in its, albeit very well-informed, guesswork. Photo by the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Later, Mittl notices the remarkable beauty of the silver clasps on the Haggadah. The Sarajevo Haggadah. Book begins in the present day with Hanna Heath, a 30-year-old Australian book restorer called to Sarajevo . I like pointing out falsities and anachronism in historical fiction as much as the next person (you should have seen me when I first watched The Crucible) but accuracy was never the point of this novel. Newsletter powered by Mailchimp (Privacy PolicyandTerms). If we were to pick the brightest gems from the treasure trove of material and intangible heritage kept in the National Museum of Bosnia and Herzegovina, there is no way we could leave out the illuminated Jewish codex known around the world as the Sarajevo Haggadah, Including: tickets and a professional guide for the Sarajevo Haggadah. Used with permission. The Haggadah includes various prayers, blessings, rituals, fables, songs and information for how the seder should be performed. 325. It affected me in a way that made me rethink the fact that maybe the country I live in might also be teaching students lies or that they are not teaching every detail of history. Art historian Dr. Marc Michael Epstein has decoded many of the mysterious iconographic elements in the haggadah. Based on human rights and fundamental freedoms, the 2005 Convention ultimately providesa new framework for informed, transparent and parti, UNESCOs e-Platform on intercultural dialogue is designed for organizations and individuals to learn from shared knowledge or experiences from infl. Micro Preemie Ethics; The Sarajevo Haggadah. The Seder illumination of the Sarajevo Haggadah with the mysterious African woman in the bottom left, who Brooks identifies as the slave Zahra bint Ibrahim-al-Tarek who created the images to help her Jewish masters deaf-mute son understand his religion. UNESCO is the United Nations Laboratory of Ideas. A special vault on the museum's restored second floor . In the spring of 1942 he hid an orphaned Jewish girl in his home, telling his wife Servet to pretend she was, perhaps like the mysterious woman in the Haggadah, a Muslim servant. The development of this website is supported by the Swiss Government. It helps illustrate the setting and strong language of the South, along with the beauty and brutality of it as well. Mariam is the banished child, due to Nana and Jalil having intercourse while unmarried, resulting in Mariam being illegitimate.