The Jewish Near-Knights of Christian Iberia
Or
“Why Were These Knights Different From All Other Knights?”
While researching when and where in Society period SCA participants could have a Jewish martial persona with a historically documented basis, I discovered many little-known groups of medieval Jewish fighters. One such stereotype-shattering group was Jews who often owned land and provided knight-like, though not knighted, military service to the Christian kings of Portugal and Spain before the 1490s expulsions of Jews from those countries. This group, therefore, provides a documented basis for openly Jewish fighter or equestrian SCAdian personae from 11th-15th C Christian Iberia.
Recruiting the Jewish near-knights
In the 11th C the Iberian Christian kingdoms were desperate for troops. The Muslims owned most of the Iberian Peninsula, and the Reconquista was going slowly at best.
One of the Iberian solutions was to recruit Jewish troops. This was an unusual decision, and not just because of the inherent religious differences: Jewish troops had been Muslim allies in Iberia for over three centuries. During the 711 CE invasion that originally took Spain from the Catholic Visigoths, the Jewish general Kaulan al-Yehudi had led a combined Jewish/Berber force (Wolkoff 25), and the Jewish warrior-poet Samuel ibn Nagrela commanded Granada’s army from 1038 to 1056 (Gerber 52-55).
However, in 1031 the tolerant but failing Umayyad Caliphate of Cordoba finally shattered into smaller warring successor states, and in the ensuing cutthroat struggles, a mis-step by a single courtier or administrator could be taken out on the entire Jewish community. In 1066 when Joseph — the son of the aforementioned warrior-poet and diplomat Samuel ibn Nagrela — was insufficiently deferential towards Muslims, a mob murdered not only him but thousands of other Granadan Jews (ibn Daud 75-76). Then the Almoravid and Almohad takeovers of Muslim Spain turned intolerance — and eventually, community destruction — into official policy, driving more and more Jews to Christian lands.
This gave the Christian kingdoms an opportunity and they took it, offering Jews conquered lands and increased status in return for settlement and military service. Many Jews accepted the deal – enough so that before the 1086 Battle of Zallaqua Alfonso VI of Leon and Castile actually argued against fighting on the Jewish Sabbath, saying that the Jews “are our ministers and scribes, and make up the majority of servants in the army and we cannot do without them” (Constable 140). Furthermore, in 1123 the Jews of Burgos organized a squadron that fought for Castile (Singer 431). These were not isolated exceptions – the 13th C Rabbi Isaac ben Moses of Vienna wrote “…as is customary yet in the land of Spain, where Israelites go with the king to fight” (Roth 37).
To get a better sense of the complex religious dynamic surrounding this little-known shift in allegiance, it is helpful to examine a specific example in more detail. In 1145, Yaḥya ibn Ya’ish was a Jewish troop leader serving the Almohadi Muslim Hamed Ibn Hussein Ibn Qasi. Only the year before, Yaḥya had won a major victory in the inter-Muslim wars by capturing the Almoravids’ castle of Mertola via a surprise night-time attack with a small force after killing the sentry (Basto 4-7). Yet when Ibn Qasi formed an anti-Almoravid alliance with the Christian King Alfonso I of Portugal, and the citizens of Mertola objected to allying with infidels, Ibn Qasi ordered Yaḥya killed. Yaḥya promptly fled to still-allied Portugal while the unappeased Mertolans opened the city gates to the Almoravid forces, which in turn captured Ibn Qasi.
Sidebar: Almoravids and Almohads
The Almoravid – from al-Murābiṭūn — dynasty emerged in the latter half of the 11th C, a confederation of Saharan Berber tribes. When Christian forces took Toledo in 1085, the divided Muslim successor or ta’ifa states asked the Almoravid kingdom in northwest Africa for help against the Christian advance. The Almoravids defeated the Christians in 1086 and then annexed the ta’ifa states for themselves, implementing many new restrictions on non-Muslims. Then in 1122 the Almohad – from al-Muwaḥḥidūn – dynasty arose, another Berber tribal confederation originating in northwest Africa but inspiring Iberian rebellions. The Almohads accused the Almoravids of religious laxity and destroyed entire Jewish communities as their rule expanded. In 1147 they took the Almoravid capital of Marrakesh, subjugated the Maghreb and moved on to Iberia in force. That an Almohadi leader would use Jewish troops and ally with a Christian king against his fellow Muslims illustrates the shifting alliances formed and broken in this struggle for power. — Editor, Tournaments Illuminated
In 1147 King Alfonso I, with Yaḥya now in his service, captured the fortified city of Santarem via a surprise night-time attack with a small force after killing the sentries. Despite the similarity to the capture of Mertola, there appears to be no hard proof of Yaḥya’s exact role, but later that year the king granted Yaḥya lordship over three villages: Unhos, Frielas, and Aldeia dos Negros (Lipner 128-129).
In 1148 King Alfonso made Yaḥya Portugal’s first chief rabbi, a post Yaḥya held until his death in battle in 1151 (Basto 8-9) – a battle involving a failed attempt to take a castle via a surprise night-time attack with a small force. The rabbinical appointment proves that Yaḥya remained openly Jewish, and thus can serve as a documented example of an openly Jewish fighter who received lands and status in return for providing military service to his liege, a Christian king of Portugal.
The Yaḥya family tapestry, which is in Hebrew – more evidence that Yaḥya did not have to convert in order to own land and fight. It begins with Yaḥya ibn Ya’ish at the bottom and tracks upwards to about 1650 CE.
Image provided by the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary
The underlying model: a version of knighthood for commoners
If land and status in return for military service sounds like the familiar knightly arrangement, it is with good reason. In their search for more and better troops the Christian kings had already made a similar offer to their commoners, who took land grants to settle the newly conquered territories, creating “commoner-knights” to supplement the noble knights.
“The caballería villana (non-noble knighthood) developed mainly in Castilian frontier towns during the latter’s slow southward advance into Andalusia … Upon achieving a certain income, any resident (vecino) who maintained a house in the town could choose to purchase and keep a horse, armor, and weaponry and to serve as a knight in both offensive and defensive operations. In return for this service, the individual caballero received tax-exempt status … and he had the eligibility to hold office in the town’s concejo (council)” (Rodgers “Caballeros Villanos”).
It is important to remember that commoner-knights were still commoners. After all, they were mostly from peasant, artist, or merchant families, possibly living in town but having a small plot of land outside the walls that helped defray the cost of steed and armor (Ray 51-52). Still, it was a win-win arrangement for both sides. The commoner received tax benefits, increased social status, political influence, and would go into battle mounted and armored instead of as just another foot slogger. The Crown, in turn, got personally loyal troops at comparatively minimal cost.
The contemporary language used to describe Jewish military service echoes the terms of the commoner-knight arrangement. For example, in Portuguese King Pedro I’s June 1366 letter of privileges granted to the Jews of Lisbon, he explicitly refers to Jews who served him with weapons and horses because they had the necessary funds (Lipner 103-104). There is even a 14th C French account of Spanish Jews in knight-like single combat: two Jews named Daniot and Turquant, “well mounted and in complete armour, fought with swords” a judicial duel in the lists (Clephan 153).
In a few cases the land-for-military-service arrangement even included holding and defending a castle. In 12th century Castile, Alfonso VIII issued a charter granting a castle and its surrounding lands on the Ebro River to the Jewish community of the northern Spanish town of Haro, which had helped him in his war against Navarre. In Aragon a castle at Baneres – near Tortosa in northeastern Spain — was given to a group of 25 Jews in return for services rendered. And a 1258 document mentions a Jewish castle and village in Portugal’s “Gardom” district (Ray 177) – possibly the modern “Guarda” district. These were actual holdings, not mere permissions to live inside the castle walls – the text of the Haro charter says “This castle, together with all its approaches and exits and with all its possessions … is to be owned and possessed by you and all your descendants in hereditary succession … he who will attack the castle … shall pay a fine of 1,000 gold pieces to the king” (Baron, 120).
The Jewish arrangement, however, had two differences – one positive, one negative.
The positive difference for Jewish troops was the right to avoid a problem that Christian commoners did not face – the Church’s demand since 1215 that all Jews wear distinctive badges and clothing, marking the wearer for exclusion and contempt. In Spain, Jews in royal service did not have to wear such badges – in fact, there is a 1290 letter from King Alfonso III of Aragon warning the Valencia city authorities that Jews in his service, explicitly including the mercenary Abrahim el Jenet, were exempt from the normal Jewish clothing laws (Lourie 368-370). As for Portugal, it was far more lenient than Spain was, with no badge rules at all until 1325, and levels of enforcement varying widely from reign to reign thereafter. Therefore my research leads me to infer that Portuguese Jewish troops probably also did not wear discriminatory clothing.
The negative difference was that just as commoners remained commoners even when they owned land, horse, and armor, Jews were still Jews and thus could not be officially dubbed knights — even as commoner-knights – despite their service and enhanced status. For example, the land records of the Spanish city of Murcia refer to a Jew named Çag Alconqui, whose twice-augmented lands were granted on the condition that he maintained horse and arms, as a full caballero-major – a person of the “highest social rank” (Ray 27). Yet Çag Alconqui had no official title, and there seems to be no reliable source explicitly proving that Yaḥya or any other Jewish fighter formally received the accolade.
Professor Jonathan Ray of Georgetown University’s Theology Department, who has published multiple books on Sephardic Jewry — one of which mentioned Çag Alconqui – sent me an e-mail confirming the absence of Iberian Jewish knights, saying that while “we have Jews approximating the rights, and status, afforded to knights (and, in some cases, lords)”, none were ever actually so dubbed.
Battlefield portrayal: Historical sources
If one wishes to portray an Iberian Jewish fighter persona on the battlefield, a key clue is provided by a 14th C illustration of armored Jews in a Verdun tower trying to fight off a rampaging anti-Semitic mob during the 1320 Shepherds’ Crusade (Master Folio 55v). The Jews are shown wearing typical 14th C armor, the only difference being their red and white French Jew’s badge, which as noted previously would not have been worn by fighters in royal Spanish or Portuguese service. Whether this image accurately represents some of the defenders or is merely symbolic, it is reasonable to conclude that even though the combatants were clearly identified as non- Christian, medieval readers were not expecting to see any difference in the armor itself and thus the illustrators saw no need to represent the armor differently. Therefore one can reasonably portray a Jewish fighter by wearing normal Portuguese or Spanish armor of one’s period.
For a 13th C portrayal one can also use the following excerpt from the 1256 royal charter to the non-noble knights of Burgos, listing what one must have in order to qualify for knightly benefits: “[a] horse of a value of over thirty maravedis, shield, lance, an iron helmet, sword, coat of mail, armor, and quilted under waistcoat that they be excused from taxes” (Constable 296).
Spain and Portugal take different paths
Since a desperate need for troops had led the Christian kings to create the Jewish near-knights, one might think that when the desperation ended, so too would Christian tolerance of Jewish fighters. That was partially, but not completely, true.
The desperation ended in 1212 when the Christians decisively defeated the Muslims at the Battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (known in Arab histories as the Battle of Al-ʿIqāb). By 1248 the Christians owned all but a small corner of Iberia; the ultimate success of the Reconquista was assured, and Jewish military services were no longer essential. Two years later Spain began copying England, France, and other countries in the practice of blood libels – false accusations of ritual murder which Pope Innocent IV had already denounced in 1247 as untrue, mere pretexts for taking the property of the accused — and Spanish Jewish conditions began a steady decline. By 1368 at the Battle of Montiel, the troops of King Henry of Castile were ordered to take no prisoners “on account of the great number of Jews and infidels who were in don Pedro’s army” (Froissart, Johnes translation, chapter CCXLV), and in 1391 Jews were massacred throughout Spain.
In contrast, Portugal, equally freed of Muslim threat, continued to protect its Jews and Jewish fighters for almost three centuries after Las Navas de Tolosa. For example, King John I responded to the 1391 Spanish massacres by passing a law protecting all Jews in Portugal from violence or forced baptism, native and refugee alike. This is not to say that Portuguese Jews had full equality – there were many minor annoyances typified by King Duarte’s offhand use of “Judeus” to mean “coward” in his 1438 jousting manual (Duarte 44). Still, the expulsions and massacres elsewhere in Europe made Portugal seem an island of freedom in comparison.
Some of the difference between Portugal and Spain may have been a Portuguese royal tradition of working with non-Christians from the kingdom’s very start. For example, De Expugnatione Lyxbonensi — “The Conquest of Lisbon” — is a reliable eyewitness account of the 1147 Christian capture of Portugal’s future capital, then still a Muslim possession. By the 16th C the work generally was attributed to one “Osbernus”; in a 1990 article in Portuguese Studies 6, Iberian studies author and University of British Columbia Professor Harold Livermore posited that the author was the Anglo-Norman monk Raol. It tells how Lisbon called for aid but the Muslim king of Evora refused, saying he “had long since entered into a truce with the king of the Portuguese” and would not break it (Raol 138-139) – an answer that crushed the defenders’ morale and was critical to royal victory.
In the end though, despite military pressures or royal traditions, it is ultimately individuals who choose their own actions. Consider the contrast between Portuguese kings Alfonso V and Manuel I. Alfonso V (ruled 1438-81) did not make even civilian Jews wear distinctive badges, and in 1481 – 90 years after the Spanish 1391 massacres and 113 years after the “no prisoners” order at Montiel – the Cortes or assembly of representatives at Evora complained to the new King John II that “We notice Jewish cavaliers, mounted on richly caparisoned horses and mules … and with gilt swords” (Wolkoff 24). Yet only 16 years later, as the price of marrying a Spanish princess, Manuel I would expel all Jews from Portugal.
Sidebar: Archers and Gunners
Though they are not the focus of this piece, the historical record also supports the portrayal of archer and gunner SCA personae. Two Jewish archers appear in an illumination in the 1220 CE Las Huelgas Apocalypse by Beatus of Liebana (folio 149v, upper left hand corner), a volume of commentary by a Spanish monk, on the Biblical book of Revelation. A 1266 Spanish listing of property owners in Jerez de la Frontera includes Jews described as mounted bowmen (Baer 113). Jews were also documented gunners, using firearms in 1366 to defend Burgos against Henry of Castile during the Castilian succession war (Roth 37).
Ongoing research and re-creation
There were indeed landed Jews who provided knight-like military service to the kings of medieval Spain and Portugal. Although they approximated knightly status, officially they were not considered even commoner-knights. Though allowed to openly operate for a time, they truly were different from all other knights. However, they can still be used to provide a solid historical basis for Society members who want to develop and portray openly Jewish fighter and equestrian personae hailing from 11th -15th C Christian Iberia.
This work is far from the final word on this subject. It is original research, as most studies of Jewish medieval history do not focus on Jewish fighters. As of this writing there are no ultimate authoritative works either popular or academic on this subject, only widely scattered pieces of the puzzle which I am carefully gathering and are slowly filling in gaps in existing knowledge, shedding new light on previous findings, and helping to clarify the truth when sources contradict each other. Still, the research to date clearly shows that the historical reality is far more complex and fascinating than the stereotypes would have us believe.
Works Cited
Baer, Yitzhak. A History of the Jews in Christian Spain, Vol. I. 1945. Trans. Louis Schoffman. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1961. Print.
Baron, Salo Wittmayer. A Social and Religious History of the Jews: Late Middle Ages and Era of European Expansion 1200-1650. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967. Print.
Basto, Artur Carlos de Barros. Don Yahia ben-Yahia: 1o Rabi-mor de Portugal. Trans. Seymour Menton. Porto: Instituto Teologico Israelistas, 1944. Print.
Beatus of Liebana. Las Huelgas Apocalypse. 1220. Illuminated manuscript. Morgan Library and Museum, New York.
Clephan, Robert Coltman. The Medieval Tournament. 1919. Mineola: Dover Publications, 1995. Print.
Constable, Olivia Remie, ed. Medieval Iberia: Readings from Christian, Muslim, and Jewish Sources. 2nd ed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012. Print.
Duarte, King Dom. The Royal Book of Jousting, Horsemanship & Knightly Combat. 1438. Trans. Antonia Franco Preto. Highland Village: The Chivalry Bookshelf, 2005. Print.
Froissart, John. Chronicles of England, France, Spain, and the Adjoining Countries. 1400. Trans. Thomas Johnes. London: William Smith, 1839. Free Google ebook.
Gerber, Jane S. The Jews of Spain: A History of the Sephardic Experience. New York: The Free Press, 1992. Print.
Ibn Daud, Abraham. Sefer ha-Quabbalah: The Book of Tradition. 1161. Trans. Gerson Cohen. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1967. Print.
Lipner, Elias. O Tempo Dos Judeus Segundo as Ordenacoes do Reino. Sao Paulo: Secretaria de Estado da Cultura, 1982. Print.
Lourie, Elena. “A Jewish Mercenary in the Service of the King of Aragon.” Crusade and Colonization: Muslims, Christians, and Jews in Medieval Aragon. Lourie, Elena, ed. Hampshire: Ashgate Variorum, 1990. Print.
Master, Virgil. Chroniques de France ou de St. Denis. Paris: 1381-1400. Illuminated manuscript. British Library, London. The image is online at http://manuscriptminiatures.com/chroniques-de-france-ou-de-st-denis-royal-20-c-vii/842/, with reprint permission available (for a fee) by AKG Images.
Raol. De expugnatione Lyxbonensi (The Conquest of Lisbon). Late 1100s. Trans. Charles David. New York: Columbia University Press, 2001. Print.
Ray, Jonathan. The Sephardic Frontier: The Reconquista and the Jewish Community in Medieval Iberia. Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2006. Print.
Rodgers, Clifford J., ed. Oxford Encyclopedia of Medieval Warfare and Military Technology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. Print.
Roth, Norman, ed. “Arms, Jews and.” Medieval Jewish Civilization: An Encyclopedia. Oxford: Routledge, 2003. Print.
Singer, Isidore, et al. ed. “Burgos.” The Jewish Encyclopedia. London: Funk and Wagnalls Company, 1906. Print.
Wolkoff, Lew. The Compleat Anachronist #110: An SCA Guide to Jewish Persona. Milpitas: The Society for Creative Anachronism, 2001. Print.