Thus there existed, in Castile, an antagonism between the edicts against the Jews and the interests of the state; and this antagonism roused the mob, inspired alike by ecclesiastical fanaticism and envious greed against their Jewish fellow-townsmen, to the perpetration of bloody outrages. The fury of the orthodox was also excited against the new-Christians, or Marranos, because, happier than their former fellow-believers, they were promoted to the highest offices in the state by reason of their superior talents.
The marriage of the Infanta Isabella with Don Ferdinand, Infante of Aragon, on the 19th of October, 1469, marked a tragical crisis in the history of the Spanish Jews. Without the knowledge of her royal brother, and in open breach of faith – since she had solemnly promised to marry only with his consent – she had followed the advice of her intriguing friends, and had given her hand to the Prince of Aragon, who, both in Jewish and in Spanish history, under the title of "The Catholic," has left an accursed memory behind him. Don Abraham Senior had promoted this marriage, hoping by it to increase the welfare of his brethren. Many new complications arose in Castile out of this union. Isabella's partisans, anticipating that under her rule and that of her husband the persecution of the Jews would be made legal, took up arms in Valladolid, Isabella's capital, and fell upon the new-Christians (September, 1470). The victims assumed the defensive, but were soon compelled to surrender. Thereupon they sent a deputation to Henry, begging him to protect them. The king did, indeed, collect troops, and march against the rebellious city, but he had to be grateful that he himself was well received by the citizens, and could not think of punishing even the ringleaders.
Two years later the new-Christians underwent a persecution, which surely must have caused them to repent having taken shelter at the foot of the cross. The religious populace blamed the Marranos, not altogether without reason, for confessing Christianity with their lips while in their souls they despised it. It was said that they either did not bring their children to be baptized, or if they were baptized, took them back to their houses and washed the stain of baptism off their foreheads. They used no lard at their tables, only oil; they abstained from pork, celebrated the Jewish Passover, and contributed oil for the use of the synagogues. They were further said to have but small respect for cloisters, and were supposed to have profaned sacred relics and debauched nuns. The new-Christians, were, in fact, looked upon as a cunning and ambitious set of people, who sought eagerly for the most profitable offices, thought only of accumulating riches, and avoided hard work. They were believed to consider themselves as living in Spain as Israel did in Egypt, and to hold it to be quite permissible to plunder and outwit the orthodox. These accusations were not by any means merited by the new-Christians as a body, but they served to inflame the mob, and caused it to hate the converts even more bitterly than the Jews themselves.
The outbreak above referred to arose as follows: A certain princess was going through the streets of Cordova with the picture of the Virgin under a canopy, and a girl, a new-Christian, either by accident or design, poured some water out of a window on the canopy. The consequence was a frenzied rising against the converted Jews. An excited smith incited the Christian mob to avenge the insult offered to the holy picture – for it was said that the girl had poured something unclean upon it – and in an instant her father's house was in flames. The nobles sought to defend the Marranos, and in the skirmish, the smith was killed. This so enraged the already furious mob that the men-at-arms were forced to retire. The houses of the new-Christians were now broken into, plundered, and then reduced to ashes; while those who had not been able to save themselves by flight were massacred in the most barbarous manner (March 14th–15th, 1472). The fugitives were hunted like wild beasts in the chase. Wherever they were seen, the most horrible death inevitably awaited them. Even the peasant at work in the field struck them down without ado. The slaughter which thus began at Cordova spread rapidly from town to town. Those of the Cordovan fugitives who had found a temporary refuge in Palma lost no time in seeking a stronghold to afford them protection from the tempest of persecution. One of their company, Pedro de Herrera, held in the highest respect both by his fellow-sufferers and the governor, De Aguilar, went to Seville to seek an interview with the duke of Medina-Sidonia, lieutenant-governor of the province. He asked for the fortress of Gibraltar as a city of refuge for himself and his brethren, under their own command. In return, he promised to pay a considerable yearly tribute. The duke had signified his consent to this proposition, and the new-Christians had betaken themselves to Seville to sign the contract, when the friends of the duke took alarm. They believed that the Marranos were not to be trusted, and expressed the fear that they might enter into an alliance with the Moors, and deliver the key of the Spanish coast into their hands. The duke, however, insisted upon completing the contract, whereupon the opponents of the scheme gave the signal to the mob of Seville, which instantly rose against the new-Christians in an outburst of fanatical frenzy. It was with difficulty that the governor protected them. They were forced to return hastily to Palma, were waylaid by the country people, and ill-treated and plundered (1473).
Thus the plan of Pedro de Herrera and his friends served only to bring greater misery upon them, endangering the whole body of new-Christians as well as the Jews themselves. As early as this, the idea took shape among both the converted and the unbaptized Jews to leave the now inhospitable Peninsula and emigrate to Flanders or Italy.
Attacks upon the new-Christians were now so frequent that they suggested to the cunning and ambitious minister, Pacheco, the means of carrying out a coup d'état. This unscrupulous intriguer, who for two decades had kept Castile in constant confusion, saw with secret chagrin that the reconciliation of Don Henry with his sister and successor bade fair to completely annul his influence. To bring about new complications he determined to gain possession of the citadel (Alcazar) of Segovia, at that time occupied by the king. With this end in view, he instigated, through his dependents, another assault upon the baptized Jews, during the confusion of which his accomplices were to seize Cabrera, the governor of the castle, and, if possible, the king himself. The conspiracy was betrayed only a few hours before it was to be carried into action; but the attack upon the new-Christians was perpetrated. Armed bands perambulated the streets of Segovia, broke into the houses of the Marranos, and slew every man, woman and child that fell into their hands (May 16th, 1474).
The crowning misfortune of the Jewish race in Spain came in the death of Don Henry in the following December. The rulers of the united kingdoms of Aragon and Castile now were his sister, the bigoted Isabella, who was led by advisers hostile to the Jews, and Ferdinand, her unscrupulous husband, who pretended to be excessively pious. Sad and terrible was the fate that impended over the sons of Jacob throughout the length and breadth of the Pyrenean Peninsula.
CHAPTER IX.
THE JEWS IN ITALY AND GERMANY BEFORE THE EXPULSION FROM SPAIN
Position of the Jews of Italy – The Jewish Bankers – Yechiel of Pisa – His Relations with Don Isaac Abrabanel – Jewish Physicians, Guglielmo di Portaleone – Revival of Learning among Italian Jews – Messer Leon and Elias del Medigo – Pico di Mirandola, the Disciple of Medigo – Predilection of Christians for the Kabbala – Jochanan Aleman – Religious Views of Del Medigo – German Rabbis immigrate into Italy – Joseph Kolon, his Character and his Feud with Messer Leon – Judah Menz an Antagonist of Del Medigo – Bernardinus of Feltre – Jews banished from Trent on a False Charge of Child-Murder – The Doge of Venice and Pope Sixtus IV befriend the Jews – Sufferings of the Jews of Ratisbon – Israel Bruna – Synod at Nuremberg – Emperor Frederick III.
1474–1492 C.E
The Spanish Jews would have belied their native penetration and the wisdom born of bitter experience had they not foreseen that their position would ere long become unbearable.
Because they did foresee it, they turned their gaze towards those countries whose inhabitants were most favorably disposed towards Jews. Italy and the Byzantine Empire, just wrested from the cross, were now the countries of greatest toleration. In Italy, where men saw most clearly the infamy of the papacy and the priesthood, and where they had most to suffer from their selfishness, the church and her servants were utterly without influence over the people. The world-wide commerce of the wealthy and flourishing republics of Venice, Florence, Genoa and Pisa, had in a measure broken through the narrow bounds of superstition, and enlarged men's range of vision. The interests of the market-place had driven the interests of the church into the background. Wealth and ability were valued even in those who did not repeat the Catholic confession of faith. Not only the merchants, but also the most exalted princes were in need of gold to support the mercenary legions of their Condottieri in their daily feuds. The Jews, as capitalists and skillful diplomatists, were, therefore, well received in Italy. This is proved by the fact that when the city of Ravenna was desirous of uniting itself to Venice, it included among the conditions of union the demand that wealthy Jews be sent to it to open credit-banks and thus relieve the poverty of the populace.
Jewish capitalists received, either from the reigning princes or the senates, in many Italian cities, extensive privileges, permitting them to open banks, establish themselves as brokers, and even charge a high rate of interest (20 per cent). The archbishop of Mantua in 1476 declared in the name of the pope that the Jews were permitted to lend money upon interest. The canonical prohibition of usury could not withstand the pressure of public convenience. The Jewish communal regulations also tended to guard the bankers from illegal competition, for the rabbis threatened with the ban all those members of the community who lent money on interest without proper authorization.
A Jew of Pisa, named Yechiel, controlled the money market of Tuscany. He was, by no means, a mere heartless money-maker, as the Christians were wont to call him, but rather a man of noble mind and tender heart, ever ready to assist the poor with his gold, and to comfort the unfortunate by word and deed. Yechiel of Pisa was also familiar with and deeply interested in Hebrew literature, and maintained friendly relations with Isaac Abrabanel, the last of the Jewish statesmen of the Peninsula. When Alfonso V of Portugal took the African seaboard towns of Arzilla and Tangier, and carried off Jews of both sexes and every age captive, the Portuguese community became inspired with the pious desire to ransom them. Abrabanel placed himself at the head of a committee to collect money for this purpose. As the Portuguese Jews were not able to support the ransomed prisoners until they found means of subsistence, Abrabanel, in a letter to Yechiel of Pisa, begged him to make a collection in Italy. His petition was heeded.
The Jews of Italy were found to be desirable citizens, not only for their financial ability, but also for their skill as physicians. In his letter to Yechiel, Abrabanel asked whether there were Jewish physicians in the Italian states, and whether the princes of the church employed them. "Physicians," he said, "possess the key to the hearts of the great, upon whom the fate of the Jews depends."
A celebrated Jewish doctor, Guglielmo (Benjamin?) di Portaleone, of Mantua, first was physician in ordinary to Ferdinand of Naples, who ennobled him; he next entered the service of Duke Galeazzo Sforza, of Milan, and in 1479 became body physician to Duke Ludovico Gonzaga. He was the founder of a noble house and of a long line of skillful Italian physicians. There even arose an intimate relation between Jews and Christians in Italy. When a wealthy Jew – Leo, of Crema – on the marriage of his son, arranged magnificent festivities which lasted eight days, a great number of Christians took part, dancing and enjoying themselves to the intense displeasure of the clergy. Totally forgotten seemed the bull in which Nicholas V had quite recently forbidden under heavy penalties all intercourse of Christians with Jews, as well as the employment of Jewish physicians. In place of the canonically prescribed livery of degradation, the Jewish doctors wore robes of honor like Christians of similar standing; while the Jews connected with the courts wore golden chains and other honorable insignia. The contrast between the condition of Jews in Italy and that of their brethren in other lands is well illustrated by two similar incidents, occurring simultaneously in Italy and Germany, but differing greatly in their issues.
The mother of a family in Pavia, in consequence of differences with her husband, had given notice of her desire to be received into the Catholic Church. She was put into a convent where she was to be prepared for baptism. The bishop's vicar, with other spiritual advisers, was earnestly occupied with the salvation of her soul, when she was suddenly seized with remorse. The bishop of Pavia, far from punishing her for this relapse, or seeking to oppose her desire, interceded for her with her husband. He advised him to take her out of the convent forthwith, and testified most favorably as to her behavior, so that her husband, a descendant of the family of Aaron, might not be obliged, under the Jewish law, to put her away.
In the same year a spiteful fellow in Ratisbon, Kalmann, a precentor (Chazan), took the fancy to turn Christian. He frequented the convent, attended church, and at length the bishop received him in his house, and instructed him in the Christian religion. To curry favor with the Christians he calumniated his fellow-believers by asserting that they possessed blasphemous writings against Christianity. Kalmann also came to rue the step he had taken. He secretly attended the synagogue, and at length, during the absence of the bishop, left his house, and returned to the Jews. The clergy of Ratisbon were infuriated against him, arraigned him before the Inquisition, and charged him with having sought to blaspheme the church, God, and the blessed Virgin. He was specially charged with having said that, if baptized, he would remain a Christian only till he found himself at liberty. On the strength of this, he was condemned, and put to death by drowning.
Wherever even a little indulgence was granted the Jews, their dormant energy revived; and the Italian Jews were able to display it all the sooner from the fact that they had gained a certain degree of culture in the days of Immanuel and Leone Romano. They took an active part in the intellectual revival and scientific renascence which distinguished the times of the Medici. Jewish youths attended the Italian universities, and acquired a liberal education. The Italian Jews were the first to make use of the newly-discovered art of Gutenberg, and printing-houses soon rose in many parts of Italy – in Reggio, Ferrara, Pieva di Sacco, Bologna, Soncino, Iscion, and Naples. In the artistic creations of the time, however, in painting and sculpture, the Jews had no share. These lay outside their sphere. But several educated Jews did not a little for the advancement and spread of science in Italy. Two deserve especial mention: Messer Leon and Elias del Medigo, the latter of whom not only received the light of science, but also shed it abroad.
Messer Leon, or, by his Hebrew name, Judah ben Yechiel, of Naples, flourished between 1450 and 1490, and was both rabbi and physician in Mantua. In addition to being thoroughly versed in Hebrew literature, he was a finished Latin scholar, and had a keen appreciation of the subtleties of Cicero's and Quintilian's style. Belonging to the Aristotelian school, he expounded several of the writings of the philosopher so highly esteemed in synagogue and church, and wrote a grammar and a book on logic, in the Hebrew language, for Jewish students. More important than these writings is his Hebrew rhetoric (Nófeth Zufim), in which he lays down the laws upon which the grace, force and eloquence of the higher style depend, and proves that the same laws underlie sacred literature. He was the first Jew to compare the language of the Prophets and Psalmists with Cicero's – certainly a hardy undertaking in those days when the majority of Jews and Christians held the Scriptures in such infinite reverence that a comparison with profane pagan literature must have seemed a species of blasphemy. Of course, this was possible only in the times of the Medici, when love for Greek and Latin antiquities rose to positive enthusiasm. Messer Leon, the learned rabbi of Mantua, was liberal in all respects. He was never weary of rebuking the formal pietists for striving to withhold foreign influences from Judaism, as though it could be profaned by them. He was rather of opinion that Judaism could only gain by comparisons with the culture of the ancient classical literatures, since thereby its beauty and sublimity would be brought to light.
Elias del Medigo, or Elias Cretensis (1463–1498), the scion of a German family that had emigrated to Crete, is a striking figure in later Jewish history. He was the first great man produced by Italian Judaism. His was a mind that shone clearly and brilliantly out of the clouds which obscured his age; the mind of a man of varied and profound knowledge, and of both classical and philosophical culture. So completely had he assimilated the Latin literary style that he was able, not only to issue works in that language, but also to present Hebrew syntax under Latin analogies.
Medigo kept aloof from the vacuity of Italian sciolists, who were under the spell of the newly-discovered neo-Platonic philosophy introduced by Ficinus. He gave allegiance to those sound thinkers, Aristotle, Maimuni, and Averroes, whose systems he made known to Christian inquirers in Italy, by tongue and pen, through the medium of translations and in independent works. That youthful prodigy of his time, Count Giovanni Pico di Mirandola, made the acquaintance of Medigo, and became his disciple, friend and protector. Mirandola, who was a marvel by reason of his wonderful memory, wide erudition, and dialectic skill, and was, moreover, on friendly terms with the ruling house of the Medicis in Tuscany, learnt from his Jewish friend the Hebrew language, and the Arabic development of the Aristotelian philosophy, but he might also have learnt clearness of thought from him.
On one occasion a quarrel on a learned subject broke out in the University of Padua. The professors and students were divided into two parties, and, according to Christian custom, were on the point of settling the question with rapier and poniard. The University, acting with the Venetian senate, which was desirous of ending the dispute, called upon Elias del Medigo to act as umpire. Everyone confidently expected a final settlement from his erudition and impartiality. Del Medigo argued out the theme, and by the weight of his decision brought the matter to a satisfactory conclusion. The result was that he became a public lecturer on philosophy, and discoursed to large audiences in Padua and Florence. The spectacle was, indeed, notable. Under the very eyes of the papacy, ever striving for the humiliation and enslavement of the Jews, Christian youths were imbibing wisdom from the lips of a Jewish teacher. Against the protectors of Jews in Spain it hurled the thunders of excommunication, while in Italy it was forced passively to behold favors constantly showered upon the Jews by Christians.
Pico di Mirandola, a scholar rather than a thinker, took a fancy to plunge into the abysses of the Kabbala. He was initiated into the Kabbalistic labyrinth by a Jew, Jochanan Aleman, who had emigrated from Constantinople to Italy. Aleman, himself a confused thinker, made him believe that the secret doctrine was of ancient origin, and contained the wisdom of the ages. Mirandola, who had a marvelous faculty of assimilation, soon familiarized himself with the Kabbalistic formulæ, and discovered confirmations of Christian dogma in them; in fact, he found far more of Christianity than of Judaism. The extravagances of the Kabbala demonstrated in his eyes the doctrines of the Trinity, the Incarnation, Original Sin, the Fall of the Angels, Purgatory, and Eternal Punishment. He lost no time in translating several Kabbalistic writings from Hebrew into Latin in order to bring this occult lore to the knowledge of Christian readers. Among the nine hundred points which Pico, at the age of twenty-four, pledged himself to defend – to which end he invited all the learned of the world to Rome, and undertook to pay the cost of their journeys – was this: No science affords more certainty as to the Godhead of Christ than Kabbala and magic! Even Pope Sixtus IV (1471–1484) was by this means so strongly attracted to the Kabbala that he was eager to procure Latin translations of Kabbalistic writings for the benefit of the Catholic faith.
It is a striking proof of his sober mind and healthy judgment that Elias del Medigo kept himself aloof from all this mental effeminacy and childish enthusiasm for the pseudo-doctrine of the Kabbala. He had profound contempt for the Kabbalistic phantom, and did not hesitate to expose its worthlessness. He had the courage openly to express his opinion that the Kabbala is rooted in an intellectual swamp, that no trace of this doctrine is to be found in the Talmud, that the recognized authorities of ancient Judaism knew nothing of it, and that its supposed sacred and ancient groundwork, the Zohar, was by no means the work of the celebrated Simon bar Yochaï, but the production of a forger. In short, he considered the Kabbala to be made up of the rags and tatters of the neo-Platonic school.
Del Medigo had, in fact, very sound and healthy views on religion. Although a warm adherent of Judaism, entertaining respect also for its Talmudic element, he was yet far from indorsing and accepting as truth all that appears in the Talmud. When requested by one of his Jewish disciples, Saul Cohen Ashkenasi, of Candia, to give his confession of Jewish faith, especially his views on the signs which distinguish a true religion, Elias Cretensis issued a small but pregnant work, "The Investigation of Religion" (Bechinath ha-Dath), which gives a deep insight into his methods of thought.
It cannot be maintained that Del Medigo suggested novel trains of thought in his work. In general, the Italians were not destined to endow Judaism with new ideas. Moreover, he occupied the standpoint of belief rather than of inquiry, and his aim was to defend, not to cut new paths. Standing alone in the mental barrenness of his age, Del Medigo's sound views are like an oasis in the desert. He must be credited, too, with having recognized as deformities, and with desiring to remove, the additions to Judaism by Kabbalists and pseudo-philosophers.
Unfortunately, the rabbis who emigrated from Germany to Italy assumed an attitude distinctly hostile to philosophical investigation and its promoters, Elias del Medigo and Messer Leon. With their honest, but one-sided, exaggerated piety, they cast a gloomy shadow wherever their hard fate had scattered them. Fresh storms breaking over the German communities had driven many German Jews, the most unhappy of their race, into transalpine lands. Under Emperor Frederick III, who for half a century had with astounding equanimity beheld most shameless insults to his authority on the part of an ambitious nobility, a plundering squire-archy, a demoralized clergy, and the self-seeking patricians of the smaller towns, the Jewish communities but too often saw their cup of bitterness overflow. Frederick himself was by no means hostile to them. On the contrary, he frequently issued decrees in their favor. Unhappily, his commands remained for the most part a dead letter, and his laxity of rule encouraged the evil-minded to the commission of the most shameful misdeeds. It was dangerous for the German Jews to go beyond the walls of their cities. Every man was their foe, and waylaid them to satisfy either his fanaticism or his cupidity. Every feud that broke out in the decaying German empire brought misery to them.
Among exiles from Mayence were two profound Talmudic scholars. They were cousins, by name Judah and Moses Menz. The former emigrated to Padua, and there received the office of rabbi, while the latter at first remained in Germany, and then passed over to Posen. As the result of expulsion or oppression, many rabbis were emigrating from all parts of Germany, and on account of their superior Talmudic knowledge these German emigrants were elected to the most distinguished rabbinical positions in Italy. They re-indoctrinated with their prejudice and narrowness of vision the Italian Jews, who were making determined efforts to free themselves from the bonds of the Middle Ages.
The most distinguished rabbis of Italy were at that time Judah Menz and Joseph Kolon, and precisely these two were most inimical to any liberal manifestation within Judaism, and most strenuously opposed the advocates of freedom. Joseph ben Solomon Kolon (flourished 1460–1490) was of French extraction, his ancestors having been expelled from France; but he passed his youth in Germany, and belonged to the German school. He subsequently lived with his relatives in Chambéry until the Jews were hunted out of Savoy. With many companions in misfortune he went to Lombardy, where he gained his living by teaching; finally he became rabbi of Mantua. Endowed with extraordinary penetration, and fully the equal of the German rabbis in the depth of his Talmudic learning, Joseph Kolon was celebrated in his day as a Rabbinical authority of the first magnitude, and his academy rivaled the German school itself. He was consulted by both German and Italian communities. On scientific subjects and all matters outside the Talmud he was as ignorant as his German fellow-dignitaries. A resolute, decided nature, Joseph Kolon was a man of rigid views on all religious matters. His ruggedness involved him in unpleasant relations with Moses Kapsali in Constantinople, and in a heated controversy with the cultured Messer Leon in his own community. However well they might agree for a time, Joseph Kolon, the strict Talmudist, and Messer Leon, the cultured man of letters, could not long tolerate each other. When the conflict between them broke out, the whole community of Mantua took sides in their feud, and split into two parties as supporters of the one or the other. The strife at length became so keen that in 1476–1477 Duke Joseph of Mantua banished them both from the city; after which Kolon became rabbi of Pavia.
Still more strained were the relations between the rabbi Judah Menz and the philosopher Elias del Medigo. The former (born 1408, died 1509), a man of the old school, of comprehensive knowledge of Talmudic subjects, and of remarkable sagacity, was most resolutely opposed to scientific progress and freedom in religious matters, and after his expulsion from Mayence transplanted the narrow spirit of the German rabbis to Padua and Italy in general.
The relatively secure and honorable position of the Jews in Italy did not fail to rouse the displeasure of fanatical monks, who sought to cover with the cloak of religious zeal either their dissolute conduct or their ambitious share in worldly affairs. The colder the Christian world grew towards the end of the fifteenth century with regard to clerical institutions, the more bitterly did the monastic orders rage against the Jews. Preaching friars made the chancels ring with tirades against them, and openly advocated their utter extermination. Their most desperate enemy at this time was the Franciscan Bernardinus of Feltre, a worthy disciple of the bloodthirsty Capistrano. The standing text of his sermons was: Let Christian parents keep a watchful eye on their children lest the Jews steal, ill-treat, or crucify them.
He held up Capistrano, the Jew-slayer, as the type and model of a true Christian. In his eyes friendly and neighborly intercourse with Jews was an abomination, a most grievous sin against canonical law. Christian charity, he admitted, directs that Jews, being human, be treated with justice and humanity; but at the same time the canonical law forbids Christians to have any dealings with them, to sit at their tables, or to allow themselves to be treated by Jewish physicians. As the aristocracy everywhere, in obedience to their own interests, took the part of the Jews, Bernardinus inflamed the lower classes against the Jews and their patrons. Because certain Jewish capitalists had been successful, he depicted all Jews as vampires and extortioners, and roused the ill will of the populace against them. "I, who live on alms and eat the bread of the poor, shall I be a dumb dog and not howl when I see the Jews wringing their wealth from Christian poverty? Yea! shall I not cry aloud for Christ's sake?" Such is a fair specimen of his preaching.
Had the Italian people not been actuated by strong good sense, Bernardinus would have become for the Jews of Italy what, in the beginning of the same century, the Dominican, Vincent Ferrer, had been to the Jews of Spain, and Capistrano, to the communities of Germany and the Slav countries. The authorities sorely hindered Bernardinus in his business of Jew-baiting, and his bloodthirsty sermons mostly failed of effect. When he was conducting his crusade in Bergamo and Ticini, Duke Galeazzo, of Milan, forbade him to proceed. In Florence, in fact everywhere in Tuscany, the enlightened prince and the senate took the part of the Jews with vigor. The venomous monk spread the report that they had allowed themselves to be bribed with large sums by Yechiel of Pisa and other wealthy Jews. As Bernardinus was inciting the youth of the city against the Jews, and a popular rising was imminent, the authorities ordered him to quit Florence and the country forthwith, and he was compelled to submit (1487). Little by little, however, by dint of untiring repetition of the same charges, he managed so far to inflame public opinion against the Jews that even the Venetian senate was not always able to protect them. Finally, he succeeded in bringing about a bloody persecution of the Jews, not, indeed, in Italy, but in the Tyrol, whence it spread to Germany.