Spanish and Portuguese Citizenship for Sephardi Jewish Descendants: An Oral History Collection

Interview with Eduardo Avila – Highlights

Rina Benmayor:  Can you explain something about your Sephardic ancestry or where does the Sephardi part come into your life? 

Eduardo Avila: Actually, as I was telling you about, after I had my accident, I decided that the violence here in our country [Brazil] had reached some levels that make it almost unbearable to live here. And then, I decided to move away from this view and move out, go to a different place, and I think I thought that citizenship would be a nicer, easier way to achieve this opportunity, to move out. And then, I started to do my own genealogy, I started to look back for my grandparents and so on. I tried to look for some ancestor who would give me the opportunity to request some citizenship. I find out that most of my ancestors were from Azores, the islands in Portugal.  Some Spanish people, as well, that came to Brazil or even came to Portugal and from Portugal to Brazil.  And I also had a lot of German ancestors and ancestry, but German laws didn’t really allow us to pursue citizenship. And when this Sephardic law appeared, I already had my genealogical tree already assembled, and I knew lots of my ancestors.  And then, when I found out about these laws, was in 2015 or 2016 I think, I decided to look for some Jews in my family. And I started to learn a lot about this culture stuff and what the Sephardic heritage says about that, and what they bring [to] this culture.  And what I find out is our family has a lot of Sephardic —I don’t know how to say costumes…

Benmayor: Oh, customs, practices, practices.  

Avila:  Practices, yeah.  But since we never knew that we used to be Sephardic…  My mother’s family used to cover the mirrors when somebody died, cover the mirrors at the house, or….  I don’t know why they also covered the mirrors when there was a storm.  When somebody died or when there was a storm.  And some other little stuff like hygiene habits, they lit candles in the Friday, or I don’t know exactly, but something that can be, that are similar to Jewish culture, to Sephardic culture. And then I think, “Well, maybe there’s something there.”  And I start to investigate, to really look for it, and I found that my seventh great-grandfather, he was the first man, the first inhabitant here in Porto Alegre, the man who founded the city. I found out that his seventh grandfather, or my tenth fourth [fourteenth] grandfather, was actually from a very known Sephardic family from Ilha da Madeira in Portugal.

Benmayor: And what was the name? 

Avila: My tenth fourth [fourteenth] grandfather was João Rodrigues Neto Calata.  That’s his name, and her [his] mother was Beatriz Calata, from the Elvas in Portugal, also a city where there used to be a lot of Sephardic Jews, and his father was Rodrigo Alvarez Nieto, from the Nieto family.  He was Spanish, born in Salamanca.  They are not sure if he was from Salamanca or Ciudad Rodrigo.  It was probably one of those two cities, but they know that he was also a Jew from Spain. And from there, I was able to trace back all the documents that connect myself with these ancestors and then I applied for the citizenship.

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