Language:
English
Year of publication:
1994
Titel der Quelle:
History and Memory; Studies in Representation of the Past
Angaben zur Quelle:
6,1 (1994) 5-34
Keywords:
Jews History Middle Ages, 500-1500
;
Jews Historiography
Abstract:
Dealing with medieval Jewish historical narratives, distinguishes between "timebound narratives", aiming to inform a group of contemporaries, and "timeless narratives", written for the future and whose purpose is to project the event on the entire Jewish historical experience. As an illustration, two letters are analyzed: a letter written by an Egyptian Jewish merchant who describes the forced conversion of the Jews of Aden in 1198, witnessed by him; and the "Orléans letter" - an elegy for the Jewish martyrs in Blois, murdered by their Christian neighbors in 1171 following the alleged murder of a Christian. The Orléans elegy gives precise details, appeals to biblical paradigms, glorifies Jewish heroism and the willingness of the Blois Jews to be sacrificed, but omits the motif that the incident occurred as divine punishment for Jewish sins or shortcomings, because this was consonant with contemporary Christian anti-Jewish arguments.
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