Colonial Justice and the Jews of Venetian Crete
THE MIDDLE AGES SERIES
Ruth Mazo Karras, Series Editor
Edward Peters, Founding Editor
A complete list of books in the series is available from the publisher.
Colonial Justice and the Jews of Venetian Crete
Rena N. Lauer
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA PRESS
PHILADELPHIA
This book was published with the generous assistance of a Book Subvention Award from the Medieval Academy of America.
Copyright © 2019 University of Pennsylvania Press
All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations used for purposes of review or scholarly citation, none of this book may be reproduced in any form by any means without written permission from the publisher.
Published by
University of Pennsylvania Press
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19104-4112
Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
ISBN 978-0-8122-5088-6
In gratitude to my parents,Phyllis and Chaim Lauer
Contents
Introduction. Networks of Jewish Life in Venetian Crete
Chapter 1. The Jewish Community of Candia
Chapter 2. Jewish-Christian Relations, Inside and Outside the Jewish Quarter
Chapter 3. Colonial Justice and Jewish-Christian Encounter
Chapter 4. Jewish Choice and the Secular Courtroom
Chapter 6. Inviting the State into the Kahal
Conclusion. Crete’s Jewish Renaissance Men in Context
A Note on Usage
Names and Orthography
Orthographic flexibility (or inconsistency, one might say) rules the Latin records used in this study. Even within one document, a single person’s name may be identified using different spellings, for example: Kali, Cali, Calli, and Kalli. In addition, some of these individuals also have Hebrew names apparent in the Jewish sources. These names are usually related to, but different than, their Latinate names and must also be rendered consistently for this study. In recording names in the text, therefore, I have standardized the spelling either by using the common English spelling or by choosing a single orthography that reflects the most common usage (for example, Cali). I have rendered Isaac, Judah, and Joseph following standard English usage. The Hellenized-Latinate version of Elijah used so commonly in these sources has many spellings: Liachus, Ligiachus, Lingiachus, Lighiachus, and so forth. I have chosen the Italianate Liacho, which reflects how the name might have been pronounced. While some men named Elijah in Hebrew were called Liacho in the vernacular, many others were called Elia. This distinction remains consistent in the ducal records, and I have retained it according to that information.
When Hebrew is transliterated, the ח has been rendered h and the כ has been rendered kh.
Dating
Venice began its year on 1 March. The Jewish calendar follows a modified lunar calendar with a new year beginning in the autumn at the start of the month of Tishrei. For ease of understanding, I have changed all Venetian and Jewish dates to the familiar Julian calendar (solar, Christian, beginning the year with 1 January) unless otherwise specified. Thus, for example, a ducal record marked 4 February 1439 will be rendered 4 February 1440 in this study, since the 1439 dating is according to the Venetian calendar, which did not begin the new year until 1 March.
Coinage and Currency
In Crete during this period, the money of account was the hyperperon (a unit borrowed from the Byzantine coinage system), calculated in terms of the Venetian grosso. One hyperperon (in Venetian, a perpero) equaled twelve Venetian grossi. Twelve grossi also equaled about twenty-six soldi.1 Notarial and ducal records almost always mention prices and fines in Cretan hyperpera, with smaller fractions of hyperpera calculated in grossi. Cretan hyperpera should not be confused with the hyperpera of Constantinople, nor should this money of account be confused with an actual coin. There was no mint in Crete during this period.2 Taqqanot Qandiya mentions ducats (in this period, the gold ducat coin equaled about 2 Cretan hyperpera)3 and florins, in addition to grossi, suggesting the range of coins and moneys of account used in transactions.4 It also mentions dinarim, a general currency designation in Hebrew that probably refers to hyperpera.5
Abbreviations and Archival Citations
TQ = Elias Artom and Umberto Cassuto, Taqqanot Qandiya u’Zikhronoteha (Statuta Iudaeorum Candiae eorumque Memorabilia). Jerusalem: Mekize Nirdamim, 1943.
Material
