On This Day
1349 – The Jewish population of Basel, believed by the residents to be the cause of the ongoing Black Death, is rounded up and incinerated.
The Basel massacre of Jews took place on 9 January 1349, as part of the Black Death persecutions of 1348–1350.[1]
Following the spread of the Black Death through the surrounding countryside of Savoy and subsequently Basel, the Jews were accused of having poisoned the wells, because they were perceived as having a lower mortality rate from the plague than the non-Jews.
The City Fathers of Basel attempted to protect their Jews but to no avail, and 600 Jews, including the community’s rabbi, were burned at the stake. Afterwards, 140 Jewish children were forcibly converted to Catholicism.[2]
Following the massacre, it was decreed that all Jews were banned from settling in the city of Basel for 200 years, although this was revoked several decades later.
Black Death Jewish persecutions
The Black Death persecutions and massacres were a series of violent attacks on Jewish communities blamed for an outbreak of the Black Death in Europe from 1348 to 1351.[1]
History of persecutions
Christians despised Jews for their lack of conviction in Jesus Christ. The official church policy was to protect Jews because Jesus was born into the Jewish race. But in reality Jews were targets of Christian loathing.[2] As the plague swept across Europe in the mid-14th century, annihilating nearly half the population, Jews were taken as scapegoats, likely because they were affected less than other people.[3][4] Accusations spread that Jews had caused the disease by deliberately poisoning wells.[5][6]
The first massacres directly related to the plague took place in April 1348 in Toulon, France, where the Jewish quarter was sacked, and forty Jews were murdered in their homes, then in Barcelona.[7] In 1349, massacres and persecution spread across Europe, including the Erfurt massacre (1349), the Basel massacre, massacres in Aragon, and Flanders.[8][9] 2000 Jews were burnt alive on 14 February 1349 in the “Valentine’s Day” Strasbourg massacre, where the plague had not yet affected the city. While the ashes smouldered, Christian residents of Strasbourg sifted through and collected the valuable possessions of Jews not burnt by the fires.[10][11] Many hundreds of Jewish communities were destroyed in this period. Within the 510 Jewish communities destroyed in this period, some members killed themselves to avoid the persecutions.[12] In the spring of 1349 the Jewish community in Frankfurth-am-Main was annihilated. This was followed by the destruction of Jewish communities in Mainz and Cologne. The 3000 strong Jewish population of Mainz initially defended themselves and managed to hold off the Christian attackers. But the Christians managed to overwhelm the Jewish ghetto in the end and killed all of its Jews.[10]
At Speyer, Jewish corpses were disposed in wine casks and cast into the Rhine. By the close of 1349 the worst of the pogroms had ended in Rhineland. But around this time the massacres of Jews started rising near the Hansa townships of the Baltic Coast and in Eastern Europe. By 1351 there had been 350 incidents of anti-Jewish pogroms and 60 major and 150 minor Jewish communities had been exterminated. All of this caused the eastward movement of Northern Europe’s Jewry to Poland and Russia, where they remained for the next six centuries. King Casimir of Poland enthusiastically gave refuge and protection to the Jews. The motives for this action is unclear. The king was well disposed to Jews and had a Jewish mistress. He was also interested in tapping the economic potential of the Jewry.[13]
Reasons for relative Jewish immunity
There are many possible reasons why Jews were accused to be the cause for the plague. One reason was because there was a general sense of anti-Semitism in the 14th century.[3] Jews were also isolated in the ghettos, which meant in some places that Jews were less affected.[14][15] Additionally, there are many Jewish laws that promote cleanliness: a Jew must wash his or her hands before eating bread and after using the bathroom, it was customary for Jews to bathe once a week before the Sabbath, a corpse must be washed before burial, and so on.[4]
Government responses
In many cities the civil authorities either did little to protect the Jewish communities or actually abetted the rioters.[16] Pope Clement VI (the French born Benedictine, Pierre Roger) tried to protect the Jewish communities by two papal bulls (the first on July 6, 1348 and another 26 September 1348) saying that those who blamed the plague on the Jews had been “seduced by that liar, the Devil” and urging clergy to protect the Jews. In this, Clement was aided by the researches of his personal physician Guy de Chauliac who argued from his own treatment of the infected that the Jews were not to blame.[17] Clement’s efforts were in part undone by the newly elected Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor making property of Jews killed in riots forfeit, giving local authorities a financial incentive to turn a blind eye.[18]
Aftermath
As the plague waned in 1350, so did the violence against Jewish communities. In 1351, the plague and the immediate persecution was over, though the background level of persecution and discrimination remained. Ziegler (1998) comments that “there was nothing unique about the massacres”.[19] 20 years after the Black Death the Brussels massacre (1370) wiped out the Belgian Jewish community.[20]
Jewish tales of Black Death in Early Modern Period
Though told for nearly 350 years, there were no written accounts of the Black Death through Jewish tales until 1696, by Yiftah Yosef ben Naftali Hirts Segal Manzpach in the Mayse Nissim. Yuzpa Shammes, as he frequently was referred to, was a scribe and shammash of the Worms community for several decades. His accounts intend to show that the Jews were not idle but that they took action against inevitably becoming the scapegoat. Despite Yuzpa’s assertion that the Jews fought against the massacres, there are contradicting accounts that claim that there was no evidence of “armed resistance”.[21] These contradicting tales display the effect of oral tradition being manipulated to fit certain circumstances.
“Ordinary folk hated the Jews because they had served the merchants and aristocrats, and with their loans and with their capital, helped establish urban economy and the city’s governing political and territorial independence. Further, the Jews had exploited artisans ‘with loans at usurious rates’.”[22] These reasons gave the “ordinary folk” the motive to kill the Jews because they were gaining political and social standings. Breuer also included that “others … saw the massacres as the revenge of impoverished debtors against privileged elite of Jewish creditors.”[23]
Born On This Day
1892 – Eva Bowring, American lawyer and politician (d. 1985)
&Eva Kelly Bowring (January 9, 1892 – January 8, 1985) was a U.S. Senator from Nebraska. Bowring was born in Nevada, Missouri. In 1928, she married Arthur Bowring. They made their home at the Bowring Ranch near Merriman in Cherry County, Nebraska.
Bowring was active in Republican politics in Nebraska. She was appointed to the United States Senate by Governor Robert B. Crosby to fill the vacancy caused by the death of Dwight Griswold, making her the first woman to represent Nebraska in the Senate. She served from April 16, 1954, to November 7, 1954. Incidentally, the fifteenth Senate term for Nebraska’s Class 2 seat, which lasted from January 3, 1949 to January 3, 1955, was unusual in that it saw six Senators serve. Bowring was the fourth of these.
After her service in the Senate, Bowring continued ranching near Merriman. She served part-time on the Board of Parole of the Department of Justice from 1956 to 1964. She died in 1985, only one day before her 93rd birthday. After her death, Bowring Ranch was donated to the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission, becoming Bowring Ranch State Historical Park.
FYI
By Rich Juzwiak: Beloved Sex Educator Dr. Ruth Westheimer Is Getting Her Own Documentary
Great comments!
By Jason Torchinsky: Watch a Bollard Show a Drunk Driver in a Speeding Car Who’s Boss
By Kashmir Hill: How Cartographers for the U.S. Military Inadvertently Created a House of Horrors in South Africa
By Chris Thompson: Beefy Baseball Hero Willians Astudillo Unabashedly Admires The Hell Out Of His Handiwork
By Andrew Paul: Panopticon’s Kentucky combined folk and black metal to take on the coal industry
Originally from Memphis, Austin Lunn grew up “dirt-ass poor” not far from the site where union busters opened fire on strikers and Kopple’s film crew in Kentucky. In his twenties, he worked various day-laborer jobs as a factory lineman or sorting trash at the local dump. During off-hours Lunn wrote and performed around the Louisville area with deep-cut metal outfits like Anagnorisis and Saor, but focused most of his original work into bedroom recordings as Panopticon.
By George Dvorsky: Blue Pigment in 1,000-Year-Old Teeth Links Women to the Production of Medieval Manuscripts
The Passive Voice: The Passive Voice – Why brands need to make 2019 their most human year ever, Publishers Endanger Free Speech and more ->
Google: Have a minute? Learn something new from Women Techmakers
By Francis Reddy: Citizen scientists find new world with NASA telescope
The Rural Blogspot: Paradise Post to publish profiles of 86 killed in Camp Fire and more ->
“Normally in that case we would try to reach out to neighbors or, if the person belonged to a club or organization, fellow members,” the Post staff write. “That’s almost impossible to do when neighborhoods are wiped out, clubs and organizations are displaced and land lines no longer work. In some cases we can piece together stories based on social media profiles and messages, or internet research, but we are still searching for information on some people. If you have memories to share about someone who died in the fire, email us at campfirelives@chicoer.com.”
The profiles will be published on a dedicated website; click here to visit it.
Open Culture Colin Marshall: Watch Four Daring Films by Lois Weber, “the Most Important Female Director the American Film Industry Has Known” (1913-1921)
By Christine Schmidt: Fewer nosy neighbors and data overlords: This German publisher is trying to build a hyperlocal social network
“We need to create a product of what local communities love and what provides value to them,” Alexander Drößler, a product manager at Neue Westfälische’s online service and Lokalportal liaison, said.
Yes, there are Facebook groups for this — if you don’t mind Facebook controlling your potential for interactions and your data security online. Yes, there is Nextdoor — if you don’t mind nosy neighbors sometimes racial profiling. Yes, there are comments on individual articles within a news site — if you don’t care about having a centralized conversation that’s supplemented by, not tethered to, reporting. So in 2016, Neue Westfälische decided to invest in Lokalportal, starting the process to bring the community information tool to two pilot newsrooms, with a goal to expand to the rest of Neue Westfälische’s target area — covering the 2 million residents — by the end of this year.
“We’re trying to build a hybrid between a local newspaper and a local social network,” Penthin said. “We learned hyperlocal life is more than just the exchange; it’s ‘I want to know what’s going on and perhaps I can participate in it’…We said we need a partner, we need journalists, a hyperlocal newsroom which is the driver of the community.”
Joni Deutsch, Cole Del Charco, Ju-Don Marshall and Greg Collard, WFAE, January 2019: How Charlotte’s NPR station, WFAE, fought news fatigue (and found a hit) with a music podcast
Q: What advice would you give to others who try to do this?
A: Four things:
Find gaps: Know what’s there, but more importantly what’s missing and what’s missed by other media outlets.
Talk to your community innovators: Go to lunch or coffee with them, brainstorm with them over common goals, find ways to collaborate with them.
Find ways to energize the team: What are meaningful things that can be done with this project? What are light lifts — and energizing efforts — for the individuals on your team?
Celebrate your wins: Keep track of the numbers, the audience engagements, the emails and tweets and comments and event/collaboration moments you’ve received. These moments (on their own or even on a huge list) act as a beautiful reassurance that you’re on the right track and your work means the world to your community.
Q: Anything else you want to share about this initiative?
A: Steal this idea! Seriously. This idea was sparked in West Virginia with Joni Deutsch’s award-winning 30 Days of #WVmusic podcast and continued to Charlotte as Amplifier. There is a music scene in every city, each with stories and audiences that deserve each other.
Gary Price: New Video: Watch the Film Digitization Process of the MDPI (Media Digitization and Preservation Initiative/Indiana University), New Journal Article: “Of Modems and Pixie Dust – Blockchain Demystified”, Authors Alliance Publishes 2018 Annual Report and more ->
Science News: Canadian telescope finds mysterious radio flashes from deep space, Ancient Mongolia was a good place to live-if you could survive the horse falls, Bipartisan bill on sexual harassment signals strong interest by Congress and more ->
Ideas
By Hometalk Highlights: 16 Brilliant Ways to Squeeze (Much) More Into Your Closet There’s always space for more, if you’re clever about it!
Chas’ Crazy Creations: To Grandma’s House We Go Link Party 121
wikimedia
- Wikimedia Commons picture of the day for January 13 January 13, 2025Picture of the day Heavy snowfall brought by Storm Filomena hit Spain in January 2021, and persisted on the ground for many days across much of the country, as this Copernicus Sentinel-3 satellite image shows.
- Wikimedia Commons picture of the day for January 12 January 12, 2025Picture of the day Olive-bellied sunbird (Cinnyris chloropygius) starting to fly at Kibale National Park
Recipes
Widget not in any sidebars
Widget not in any sidebars
Widget not in any sidebars