Shylock Reconsidered: Jews, Moneylending, and Medieval Society

Shatzmiller, Joseph

Business & Money

Univ. Of California Pr.

Jews were excluded from most professions in medieval, predominantly Christian Europe. Bigotry was widespread, yet Jews were accepted as doctors and surgeons, administering not only to other Jews but to Christians as well. Why did medieval Christians suspend their fear and suspicion of the Jews, allowing them to inspect their bodies, and even, at times, to determine their survival? What was the nature of the doctor-patient relationship? Did the law protect Jewish doctors in disputes over care and treatment? Joseph Shatzmiller explores these and other intriguing questions in the first full social history of the medieval Jewish doctor. Based on extensive archival research in Provence, Spain, and Italy, and a deep reading of the widely scattered literature, Shatzmiller examines the social and economic forces that allowed Jewish medical professionals to survive and thrive in thirteenth- and fourteenth-century Europe. His insights will prove fascinating to scholars and students of Judaica, medieval history, and the history of medicine.

Jews, Medicine, and Medieval Society

History

Europe

University of California Press

Demonstrating that similarities between Jewish and Christian art in the Middle Ages were more than coincidental, Cultural Exchange meticulously combines a wide range of sources to show how Jews and Christians exchanged artistic and material culture. Joseph Shatzmiller focuses on communities in northern Europe, Iberia, and other Mediterranean societies where Jews and Christians coexisted for centuries, and he synthesizes the most current research to describe the daily encounters that enabled both societies to appreciate common artistic values.
 Detailing the transmission of cultural sensibilities in the medieval money market and the world of Jewish money lenders, this book examines objects pawned by peasants and humble citizens, sacred relics exchanged by the clergy as security for loans, and aesthetic goods given up by the Christian well-to-do who required financial assistance. The work also explores frescoes and decorations likely painted by non-Jews in medieval and early modern Jewish homes located in Germanic lands, and the ways in which Jews hired Christian artists and craftsmen to decorate Hebrew prayer books and create liturgical objects. Conversely, Christians frequently hired Jewish craftsmen to produce liturgical objects used in Christian churches.
 With rich archival documentation, Cultural Exchange sheds light on the social and economic history of the creation of Jewish and Christian art, and expands the general understanding of cultural exchange in brand-new ways.

Cultural Exchange: Jews, Christians, and Art in the Medieval Marketplace (Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World)

Arts & Photography

History & Criticism

Princeton University Press

Demonstrating that similarities between Jewish and Christian art in the Middle Ages were more than coincidental, Cultural Exchange meticulously combines a wide range of sources to show how Jews and Christians exchanged artistic and material culture. Joseph Shatzmiller focuses on communities in northern Europe, Iberia, and other Mediterranean societies where Jews and Christians coexisted for centuries, and he synthesizes the most current research to describe the daily encounters that enabled both societies to appreciate common artistic values. Detailing the transmission of cultural sensibilities in the medieval money market and the world of Jewish money lenders, this book examines objects pawned by peasants and humble citizens, sacred relics exchanged by the clergy as security for loans, and aesthetic goods given up by the Christian well-to-do who required financial assistance. The work also explores frescoes and decorations likely painted by non-Jews in medieval and early modern Jewish homes located in Germanic lands, and the ways in which Jews hired Christian artists and craftsmen to decorate Hebrew prayer books and create liturgical objects. Conversely, Christians frequently hired Jewish craftsmen to produce liturgical objects used in Christian churches. With rich archival documentation, Cultural Exchange sheds light on the social and economic history of the creation of Jewish and Christian art, and expands the general understanding of cultural exchange in brand-new ways.

Avec Le Marchand de Venise, en 1605, Shakespeare a grave pour des siecles, via son personnage de Shylock, l'image du preteur d'argent juif comme usurier detestable et cruel. Pourtant, a cote d'expressions de ressentiment et de frustration, des documents du Moyen Age central et tardif (XI-XVemes siecles) expriment aussi de la reconnaissance et de la gratitude envers un preteur juif genereux et bienveillant.Ce retournement de l'image de Shylock apparait en detail dans les minutes du proces, tenu a Marseille en 1317, dans lequel le juif Bondavin, de Draguignan, eut a defendre sa reputation de preteur. Il fit comparaitre pour sa defense vingt-quatre temoins, tous Chretiens, qui confirmerent l'estime dont il jouissait. Ce proces, dans son deroulement, donne l'occasion d'entendre les opinions et les sentiments de personnes ordinaires (et non pas de theologiens ou de canonistes): marchands, hommes de lois, artisans?Le cas Bondavin, situe dans son contexte, compare a d'autres affaires similaires, permet ainsi a Shatzmiller d'etudier et d'analyser les attitudes dominantes en Europe medievale a l'egard du credit juif.Son travail permet d'abandonner l'idee d'un Moyen Age domine par une histoire ininterrompue de haines et de malentendus entre Juifs et Chretiens, pour reconnaitre, a l'inverse, des liens d'amities, de respect, de generosite et de reconnaissance mutuelle entre les deux communautes.Cet ouvrage ouvre egalement de nouvelles perspectives sur la situation du pret a interet dans l'Europe medievale et, par la, eclaire de lumieres inedites la pensee economique de l'Occident medieval.Joseph Shatzmiller, professeur d'histoire medievale a Duke University (Caroline du Nord), a publie de nombreux ouvrages concernant les communautes juives de Provence au Moyen Age, les medecins juifs et la societe medievale.

Shylock Revu Et Corrige (Histoire) (French Edition)

Les Belles Lettres

The volume presents Avenzoar’s Regimen of Health (from twelfth-century Spain) in its medieval Latin and Hebrew translations from Arabic, together with an English version, and demonstrates in detail how the translation team—one Jew, one Christian—negotiated its collaborative result.

The Regimen Sanitatis of Avenzoar: Stages in the Production of a Medieval Translation (Études Sur Le Judaïsme Médiéval, 79)

Literature & Fiction

McVaugh, Michael R.

Bos, Gerrit

Brill Academic Pub

Collected Studies (Volume 3): Maimonidean Argument in France

Academic Studies Press

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Books by Shatzmiller, Joseph