First published 1997
In 1858 Bologna, six-year-old Edgardo Mortara clings to his father as Catholic police force their way into the family home. The officers wrench the crying boy from Momolo Mortara's arms and carry him to a waiting carriage bound for Rome. His mother collapses as her son disappears, her sobs echoing through the city streets. The Mortara family discovers their child was seized because their Catholic servant girl claimed she had secretly baptized him years earlier when he fell ill as an infant. Church law forbids Christian children from being raised by Jewish parents. While Edgardo is taken to a monastery for conversion, his desperate parents search for any way to recover their son. Their private tragedy becomes an international scandal that reaches the Rothschilds in Britain, Napoleon III in France, and activists across America. The fate of one Jewish boy transforms into a symbol of the broader struggle between religious authority and secular governance in Italy.
Genres: historical-fiction, 20th-century, 19th-century, activism
Vibes: emotional, intimate, suspenseful, thought-provoking
Tropes: family-secrets, forced-proximity
Setting: Bologna, Rome, Britain, France, America
Period: 1858
350 pages · Hardcover · Knopf