A Jewish Renaissance in Fifteenth-Century Spain (review)

Mark Meyerson makes a compelling case for a “Jewish renaissance in fifteenth-century Spain,” a renaissance not of brilliant Jewish scholars or effective polemicists against Christianity but of demographic, social, and economic success. Meyerson has successfully plumbed the resources available in the royal archives of the Crown of Aragon in Barcelona and local Valencian repositories to chronicle the rise of Morvedre (Murviedro in Castilian, presently Sagunto) as an important urban center and the concomitant growth of its Jewish community. He is determined to combat the previously accepted notion that Iberian Jews suffered from a continual decline in their fortunes dating from the riots and forced conversions that beset the Jewish communities of Castile and Aragon during 1391 and 1392 and extending through the expulsions of the Jews from all the Iberian kingdoms at the end of the fifteenth century.

Meyerson is equally interested to continue a trend among historians of Sephardic Jews to focus on local history so that eventually the notion of Sephardic Jewry as a homogenous unit will be irrevocably altered. With the publication of his companion volume on the Jews in Morvedre from its founding until 1391, he has successfully traced the fortunes of a particular community from its beginnings to its dissolution. He charts the varying fortunes of these Jews that he convincingly argues owe as much to local dynamics as to the peninsular contours of Sephardic life under Christian rule.

The dramatic rise in the economic success of Morvedran Jews resulted from the after-effects of the riots of 1391 that effectively destroyed the Jewish community in the capital city of Valencia just to its south on the Mediterranean coast. The Jews of Morvedre had been protected by local Christians mindful of their significance to the economic health and specifically the credit market of their city, a town that did not exhibit tension toward its Jewish inhabitants in the decades prior to the riots. The castle in Morvedre served as a haven for their persecuted Valencian coreligionists whose support placed a tremendous financial strain upon local Jews. Although Juan I of Aragon expressed concern about the close physical proximity of Jews and conversos—Morvedran Jews could travel to Valencia, which by 1397 did not have an official Jewish community—his successor Martí instead was more mindful of the infringement by zealous Inquisitors upon the royal prerogative.

After the death of Fernando I (the supporter and host of the disputation at Tortosa from 1413 to 1414), the situation of the Jews improved and reflected a measure of stability and even optimism during the reigns of Alfonso IV (1416–58) and Juan II (1458–79). Indeed the Morvedran Jewish population tripled to 700 individuals from 1390 through 1492, owing to immigration and to natural increase. Meyerson masterfully describes how the Jews shifted their financial energies from the credit market to tax farming, which helped protect them from the wrath of the population. They produced, sold, and transported wine—chiefly through Majorca—and were heavily involved in the textile industry. Jewish silversmiths, cobblers, and tailors pursued their crafts. The Jewish quarter was expanded and prosperous Jews cleverly managed their taxation burden.

Jews were not compelled to wear an identifying badge and were only occasionally forced to listen to conversionary sermons. Morvedran Jewish merchants working in Valencia pursued relationships with local conversos and the separation of these groups was not enforced. Local authorities prevented the Inquisition from intervening in these relationships.

After establishing that the Morvedran Jewish community enjoyed a political and economic renaissance, Meyerson explores a number of issues that, while integral to the history of fifteenth-century Iberian Jewries, do not directly buttress his overarching thesis. For example, Meyerson’s research, based on archival materials, allows him to make tentative observations about the behavior...