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Marks of Distinction: Christian Perceptions of Jews in the High Middle Ages PDF

410 Pages·2012·2.976 MB·English
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Marks of distinction Marks of distinction Christian Perceptions of Jews in the High Middle Ages Irven M. resnIck The Catholic University of America Press Washington, D.C. Copyright © 2012 The Catholic University of America Press All rights reserved The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standards for Information Science—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. ∞ Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Resnick, Irven Michael. Marks of distinction : Christian perceptions of Jews in the high Middle Ages / Irven M. Resnick. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references (p. ) and index. isbn 978-0-8132-1969-1 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Judaism— Relations—Christianity. 2. Christianity and other religions—Judaism. 3. Physiognomy—Religious aspects— Christianity. 4. Human body—Social aspects—Europe. 5. Human body—Religious aspects—Christianity. 6. Church history—Middle Ages, 600–1500. I. Title. bm535 .r+ 305.892´4040902—dc23 2011050255 Contents List of Illustrations vii Acknowledgments ix List of Abbreviations xi Introduction 1 1. Introduction to Medieval Physiognomy 13 2. Physical Deformities and Circumcision 53 3. The Jews and Leprosy 93 4. The Dietary Laws, Food, and Illicit Sexuality 144 5. The Jews and Melancholy 175 6. Planetary Influences; or, the Jews and Saturn 215 7. Case Studies Revealing a Jewish Physiognomy 268 Conclusion 320 Bibliography 325 Index 379 List of Illustrations following page 178 Figure 1. A friar preaching a (conversionary) sermon to Synagoga and a synagogue elder, from a fourteenth-century French Franciscan missal. MS Douce 313, fol. 139r. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Figure 2. The circumcision of Isaac, replaced by baptism, from the thirteenth-century Bible moralisée. MS Bodl. 270b, fol. 14v, roundels A1 and A2. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Figure 3. Historiated initial depicting a hook-nosed Jew circumcising boys, from “The Bible of Robert De Bello.” Burney fol. 90r. Used by permission. ©The British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. Figure 4. Jesus healing a leper (cf. Matt. 8:2), from the Vita gloriossime virginis Mariae atque venerabilis matris filii dei vivi veri et unici. MS. Canon. Misc. 476, fol. 66r. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Figure 5. The leprous Constantine comforts the women. Santi Quattro Coronati, Rome, interior: Chapel of Saint Sylvester (c. 1246). Used by permission of Art Resource. Figure 6. A crippled leper, seated, with a bell, c. 1400. Lansdowne 451, fol. 127. Used by permission. ©The British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. Figure 7. The Third Crusade of the Pastoureaux: Jews throwing their children from a tower, from the Chroniques de France ou de St. Denis. Royal 20 C. VII, fol. 55v. Used by permission. ©The British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. vii viii list of illustrations Figure 8. Initial E(t), depicting a soldier of Antiochus slaying a Jew who refused to eat unclean meat, from a thirteenth-century French bible. MS. Canon. Bibl. Lat. 41, fol. 359v. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Figure 9. Saturn eating his children, from a fifteenth-century English manuscript. MS Rawl. B 214, fol. 197v. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Figure 10. Initial showing the Jew Samuel’s wife and son, who convert to Christianity (10a); and image of the Jew Samuel ritually murdering the child martyr Adam of Bristol (10b), from the “Passion of Adam of Bristol.” Harleian MS 957, no. 7, fol. 22r (a fourteenth-century codex). © The British Library Board. All Rights Reserved. Figure 11. A hook-nosed Jew menacing Christ, from William of Not- tingham’s Commentary on the Gospels (fourteenth century). MS Laud Misc.165, fol. 280r. Used by permission of The Bodleian Library, University of Oxford. Acknowledgments In the course of my research, I have benefitted from the as- sistance of countless librarians and scholars. Much of this work was completed during my many research visits to the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, for whose hospitality I remain grateful. Thanks are also due to the National Endow- ment for the Humanities, which enabled me to direct a summer institute for university faculty, “Representations of the ‘Other’: Jews in Medieval Christendom,” in 2003, 2006, and 2010 at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies. Its faculty par- ticipants prodded me to rethink many of the notions I had con- sidered well established. Special thanks are due to the visiting scholars who contributed to the institutes: Anna Sapir Abulafia, Anthony Bale, Robert Chazan, Jeremy Cohen, Denise Despres, Chaim Hames, Daniel Lasker, Sara Lipton, Miri Rubin, and Robert Stacey. In addition, in 2006 I made good use of the won- derful library resources in London, while a Distinguished Visit- ing Fellow at Queen Mary, University of London. Finally, I must thank Luke Demaitre, who carefully read the chapter on leprosy and the Jews and offered very helpful criticism. Any errors that remain are, of course, my own. ix

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