Abraham Salomon Camondo

Count Abraham Salomon Camondo (1781, Istanbul – 30 March 1873, Paris) was a Jewish Ottoman-Italian financier and philanthropist, and the patriarch of the Camondo family. Life and career He was born in Constantinople, during the Ottoman Empire. In 1832, he inherited a banking business and a fortune from his brother Isaac (who had died in Vienna a year before), and he was able to expand it greatly during his life, partly through real-estate investment. Camondo lived in the Galata district with his wife Clara, whom he had married on 25 May 1804, and their son Raphael (1810-1866). While Venice was under Austrian rule, he received as an Austrian subject the title of Knight of the Order of Franz Joseph, and in 1854, as the representative of the Austrian community of Constantinople, he and his family went to Vienna to attend the wedding of Emperor Franz Joseph. From his ancestors, who had settled in the Veneto, he had a cultural affinity with Italy and on 18 November 1865, he and all members of his family obtained Italian nationality. When Venice again became an Italian possession, Camondo, as a Venetian citizen, presented large gifts to several Italian philanthropic institutions, in recognition of which King Victor Emmanuel conferred upon him the title of count on 28 April 1867, with the privilege of transmitting it in perpetuity to the eldest son of the family.