PICCIOTTO

PICCIOTTO , family of merchants and community leaders from Leghorn, Italy. Of its members hillel Ḥayyim (d. 1773) traveled to *Aleppo for the first time in 1732 and settled there in 1771. His son, Ḥai moses (d. 1816), author of Va-Yeḥal Moshe (Vienna, 1814), a collection of sermons and ethics, also died in Aleppo. He was the father of raphael (d. 1827), the Austrian consul in Aleppo for about 50 years; in 1818 he emigrated to Tiberias, where he died. In 1806 he was honored by Austria with the title of "Ritter von Picciotto." He was also the Russian consul in Aleppo. His son, Ezra (d. 1822), was the Austrian consul from 1818 until his death in the earthquake of Aleppo. He was then replaced by his brother elijah, who held his position until 1840. A third brother, hillel, was Prussian consul in Aleppo from 1824. When Wolf Shorr visited the town in 1875, he found that this family provided "most of the envoys of Europe's kingdoms, such as Germany, Austria, Belgium, Sweden, Holland, and others." moses ben ezra (1818–1894) acted as Austrian, German, and Danish envoy in Aleppo and defended his brethren in 1875 at the time of the blood libel brought about by the Armenians.

moses haim (1806–1879) emigrated from Aleppo to London in 1843 and died there. He played an active role in the affairs of the Sephardi Bevis Marks community and was also its president. He was also a member of the Board of Deputies over a long period. During the Spanish-Moroccan War of 1859, when a great number of Jewish refugees fled to Gibraltar and the situation of the Jews in *Morocco worsened, a committee of support was formed in England and Moses Ḥaim was its emissary to report on the exact conditions of the Jews. His report was published under the title Jews of Morocco Report (London, 1861). His son, James (1830–1897), was a historian of English Jewry and also a hymnologist. He was for many years secretary to the Morocco Relief Fund. From 1872 onward he published in the Jewish Chronicle a series of discursive historical essays based to some extent on original sources. These were republished in volume form in 1875 under the title Sketches of Anglo-Jewish History – the earliest popular work on Anglo-Jewish history. He was among the founders of the Jewish Historical Society of England. Another member of the family, Joseph (1872–1938), was the first Jewish senator to be appointed by King Fuad of *Egypt (1924). He was also a member of the Chamber of Commerce in *Alexandria and a member of the Economic Council of the Egyptian government. As a Zionist, he was vice president of the "Pro-Palestine" Society founded in Egypt in 1918. For many years he was also the vice president of the Alexandrian Communal Board and president of the local B'nai B'rith.

bibliography:

M. Franco, Essai sur l'histoire des israélites de l'empire ottoman (1897), 209, 232; A.M. Hyamson, Sephardim of England (1951), 294, 353, 399; J. Picciotto, Sketches of Anglo-Jewish History (1956²), 15–22 (introd.); Hirschberg, Afrikah, 2 (1965), 306. add. bibliography: odnb online.

[Haim J. Cohen]