Abstract
Despite the expansion of research on the subject of Jewish apostates in Iberia, or conversos as they are more commonly known, we still know distressingly little about the history of Jews converted to Christianity prior to the riots of 1391. Focusing on the royal registers of King Pere III (Pedro IV of Aragon, 1336–1387) and his son Joan I (1387–1396), this article explores the issue of Jewish apostasy in the Crown of Aragon between 1378 and 1391. While Jewish conversion to Christianity is often described as the result of Christian violence, a closer look at Jewish apostates shows that reasons for conversion varied greatly in the late fourteenth-century Crown of Aragon. Jews sought conversion not only as a way out of economic and legal troubles but also in exchange for specific rewards from the king. Conversion led to much conflict between Jews and conversos and records suggest that the period experienced a rise in conversions. Yet rather than being the product of Christian harassment, which is entirely absent from the records, conversion may have been one of the few avenues left for marginal Jews to weather the declining economic conditions of the late fourteenth century.
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This article could not have been written without the invaluable help of Paola Tartakoff and Natalie Oeltjen, who so generously shared their research with me. I am also grateful to Dana Wessell Lightfoot, Janine Rivière, Julie Gilmour, Barbara Todd and the members of the University of Toronto’s Pre-Modern Discussion Group for their comments and suggestions. I have also benefited from Miriam Bodian’s helpful criticism when the earliest version of this paper was presented in Segovia as well as by the encouragement, comments and suggestions of Mark Meyerson, Kenneth Stow and the reviewer of Jewish History. Any errors remain my own. I am also grateful to the Social Sciences and Humanities Council of Canada for funding this research.
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Guerson, A. Seeking remission: Jewish conversion in the Crown of Aragon, c.1378–1391. Jew History 24, 33–52 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10835-009-9103-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10835-009-9103-1