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This Noble House explores the preoccupation with biblical genealogy that emerged among Jews in the Islamic Near East between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries. Arnold Franklin looks to Jewish society's fascination with Davidic ancestry, examining the profusion of claims to the lineage that had already begun to appear by the year 1000, the attempts to chart the validity of such claims through elaborate genealogical lists, and the range of meanings that came to be ascribed to the House of David in this period. Jews and Muslims shared the perception that the Davidic line and the noble family of the Prophet Muhammad were counterparts to one another, but captivation with Davidic lineage was j...
This volume brings together articles on the cultural, religious, social and commercial interactions among Jews, Christians and Muslims in the medieval and early modern periods. Written by leading scholars in Jewish studies, Islamic studies, medieval history and social and economic history, the contributions to this volume reflect the profound influence on these fields of the volume’s honoree, Professor Mark R. Cohen.
"This book is a work of medieval history and the history of gender and sexuality. It looks at the biblical King David, who has multiple paradigmatic identities in the Middle Ages: king, military leader, adulterous lover, sinner. It views David primarily from the perspective of medieval European Christian society but also from the medieval European Jewish viewpoint"--
Unfree Lives illuminates Yemen’s forgotten history of slavery, as well as the transregional dimensions of slave trading in the Red Sea and wider Indian Ocean world. By analyzing Arabic narrative and administrative sources, Magdalena Moorthy Kloss reconstructs the lives of women and men who were trafficked to Yemen as children and then placed in various subaltern positions — from domestic servant to royal concubine, from quarryman to army commander. In this first in-depth study of unfree lives in Yemen, Moorthy Kloss argues that slaves and former slaves made significant contributions to social, economic and political processes in the medieval period. She highlights the gendered nature of slavery through a nuanced examination of the social identities of eunuchs and concubines. Unfree Lives also includes detailed information on slave trading between the Horn of Africa and Yemen in the 13th century, as well as an account of the little-known Najahid dynasty that was founded by Ethiopian slaves.
A groundbreaking new history of the shared legacy of expulsion among Jews and Christian moneylenders in late medieval Europe Winner of the Wallace K. Ferguson Prize, Canadian Historical Association Beginning in the twelfth century, Jewish moneylenders increasingly found themselves in the crosshairs of European authorities, who denounced the evils of usury as they expelled Jews from their lands. Yet Jews were not alone in supplying coin and credit to needy borrowers. Across much of Western Europe, foreign Christians likewise engaged in professional moneylending, and they too faced repeated threats of expulsion from the communities in which they settled. No Return examines how mass expulsion b...
Volume 7 of the Posen Library captures unprecedented transformations of Jewish culture amid mass migration, global capitalism, nationalism, revolution, and the birth of the secular self Between 1880 and 1918, traditions and regimes collapsed around the world, migration and imperialism remade the lives of millions, nationalism and secularization transformed selves and collectives, utopias beckoned, and new kinds of social conflict threatened as never before. Few communities experienced the pressures and possibilities of the era more profoundly than the world's Jews. This volume, seventh in The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, recaptures the vibrant Jewish cultural creativity,...
The eighth volume in a landmark series, this anthology of Jewish culture and civilization encompasses the period between the world wars An anthology of Jewish culture between the world wars, the editors' selections convey the variety, breadth, and depth of Jewish creativity in those tempestuous decades. Despite--or perhaps because of--external threats, Jews fought vigorously over religion, politics, migration, and their own relation to the state and to one another. The texts, translated from many languages, span a wide range of politics, culture, literature, and art. This collection examines what was simultaneously a tense and innovative period in modern Jewish history.
The Posen Library’s groundbreaking anthology series—called “a feast of Jewish culture, in ten volumes” by the Chronicle of Higher Education—explores in Volume 9 global Jewish responses to the years 1939 to 1973, a time of unprecedented destruction, dislocation, agency, and creativity “An extensive look at Jewish civilization and culture from the eve of World War II to the Yom Kippur War . . . It’s a weighty collection, to be sure, but one that’s consistently engaging . . . An edifying and diverse survey of 20th-century Jewish life.”—Kirkus Reviews, starred review “Readers seeking primary texts, documents, images, and artifacts constituting Jewish culture and civilizatio...
The Posen Library's groundbreaking anthology series—called "a feast of Jewish culture, in ten volumes" by The Chronicle of Higher Education—offers with Volume 1 an exploration of the culture of ancient Israel, including its literature, legal documents, and visual arts "Readers seeking primary texts, documents, images, and artifacts constituting Jewish culture and civilization will not be disappointed. More important, they might even be inspired. . . . This set will serve to improve teaching and research in Jewish studies at institutions of higher learning and, at the same time, promote, maintain, and improve understanding of the Jewish population and Judaism in general."—Booklist, Star...
This book presents up-to-date information on the origins of the Ashkenazic Jewish people from central and eastern Europe based on genetic research on modern and pre-modern populations. It focuses on the 129 maternal haplogroups that the author confirmed that Ashkenazim have acquired from distinct female ancestors who were indigenous to diverse lands that include Israel, Italy, Poland, Germany, North Africa, and China, revealing both their Israelite inheritance and the lasting legacy of conversions to Judaism. Genetic connections between Ashkenazic Jews and other Jewish populations, including Turkish Jews, Moroccan Jews, Tunisian Jews, Iranian Jews, and Cochin Jews, are indicated wherever they are known.