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| The Victoria & Albert Museum |
These attractive rimmonim of silver filigree are hung with six gilt bells with petals from which, also, six bells are suspended. They are surmounted by crown-shaped finials with five branched fleur-de-lys from which more bells are hung.
Rimmonim (literally, “pomegranates”) are the finials that top the most sacred object in the Jewish faith, the Torah scroll, which is wound on rollers called the “Trees of Life. The scroll is kept in a rigid case or covered by a cloth mantle for protection.
The torah is the focal point of the synagogue--kept in the Holy Ark (Aron ha-Kodesh). On Sabbaths, Mondays, Thursdays and holy days the Torah is removed from the ark and read in front of the congregation.
These particular rimmonim probably come from a magnificent Torah mantle that was made for the Sephardic synagogue in Amsterdam in the late Seventeenth Century.
