After years of disagreement, local officials and Italy’s umbrella Jewish group reached an agreement to turn an armory built on top of a centuries-old Jewish cemetery into a “House of Remembrance” museum.

The Jewish cemetery of San Nicolò is located in Mantua, a small northern Italian town in the Po Valley with a Jewish history dating back to the 12th century. The graveyard was built in 1442 with the approval of the noble Gonzaga family, who reigned over Mantua during the Renaissance era. It served the needs of the small local Jewish community until the 18th century and is believed to be the resting places of at least two famed Italian kabbalist masters: Rabbis Menachem Azariah da Fano and Mosheh Zacuto.