Gracia Mendes Nasi

Gracia Mendes Nasi (1510–1569) was a Portuguese Jewish merchant and philanthropist born in Lisbon to a converso family. On her husband Francisco Mendes's death in 1535 she inherited part of his fortune, and in 1542 took control of the Mendes banking and trading house. From 1549 she openly practised Judaism in Ferrara.

In 1553 she settled in Constantinople, where she ran escape networks for converso families fleeing the Inquisition. In 1558 Suleiman the Magnificent granted her a long-term lease of Tiberias, and she financed its rebuilding as a refuge for Jewish exiles.