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  • 17 - The Jews in Europe and the Mediterranean Basin

  • Edited by David Luscombe, University of Sheffield, Jonathan Riley-Smith, University of Cambridge
  • Book:
    The New Cambridge Medieval History
    Published online:
    28 March 2008
    Print publication:
    14 October 2004, pp 623-657

  • Summary

    The eleventh and twelfth centuries, for Jewish life in Europe and the Mediterranean basin, were characterised, above all else, by diversity and flux. Jews were spread across vast and heterogeneous area in enclaves that differed considerably from one another in size, antiquity, economic foundations, political and social relations with the non-Jewish majority, and religious and intellectual creativity. The foundations for Jewish existence lay, of course, in the realm of economic activity. By the eleventh century, the arrangements governing the existence of the Jews as a minority grouping in Muslim and Christian societies were already well worked out. Throughout Europe and the Mediterranean basin, the locus of power within the Jewish world lay in the local Jewish community. By the early thirteenth century, much had changed in Jewish life, for both good and ill. A vigorous and creative two centuries left a mixed legacy for the subsequent history of the Jews.