The Jews in medieval Normandy : a social and intellectual history
Notes resistance on the part of proponents of a homogeneous Christian culture in France to the idea of the existence of a significant Hebrew-based Jewish culture and Jewish presence in medieval Normandy, centered around Rouen. Based on archaeological and textual documentation, considerable evidence is presented about a thriving Jewish culture, which was, however, threatened by both Christianity and royalty. Jews in Normandy suffered from both the First and Second Crusades. Discusses the 1096 Crusader pogrom at Rouen, citing previously unknown evidence of considerable French participation. In 1269, King Louis IX forced Jews to wear a special badge. Soon after, Abraham ben Samuel, a local religious leader, was forced into a disputation with Pablo Christiani in an effort to convert the Jews. Various restrictions and confiscations culminated in the mass expulsion of 1306, from which the Jewish community never fully recovered. (From the Bibliography of the Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism)
History
xxxii, 621 pages : illustrations, maps ; 26 cm
9780521580328, 9781107406872, 0521580323, 1107406870
36461619
Introduction; 1. The earliest sources; 2. Extent and antiquity of Jewish settlement in Normandy; 3. From Robert of Normandy until the First Crusade; 4. The Jewish quarter of Rouen in the twelfth century; 5. School and community in the reign of Henry I and Angevin times; 6. Masters of the law in the mid-twelfth century; 7. Abraham Ibn Ezra and his literary activities in Normandy; 8. Disciples of the masters: Rouennaise scholars during the reign of Henry II Plantagenet; 9. The civil status of the Jews from Henry II to John Lackland; 10. The Tosafists; 11. From the last years of Philip Augustus to the reign of Louis IX; 12. The final decades; Appendices; Bibliography.