Documents on Jewish History in Austria, vol. 5

Compared to other territories of the Holy Roman Empire, a remarkably high number of medieval sources on the history of Jews can be found in today`s Austria. The Institute for Jewish History in Austria has engaged in preparatory work to publish t hese sources in order to make the material accessible. Charters as well as historiographic and literary sources containing references to both Jews and Austria are being collected and processed according to scientific criteria. This material includes a considerable number of texts which have not been published at all or treated with regard to the Jewish aspect yet; this applies particularly to material from the second half of the 14 th century onwards. In the course of the FWF-projects P 15638, P 18453-G08, P 21236-G18, and P 21237-G18, the first three volumes of these sources (up to the year 1386) were published by Eveline Brugger and Birgit Wiedl. In the course of the projects P 24404-G18 and P 24405-G18, the publication of volume 4 was prepared. Now, volume 5 is being published as a result of the follow-up projects P28609-G28 and P28610-G28 ("Documents on Jewish History in Eastern Austria / Southern and Western Austria 1405-1418") The documents that were collected in archives and libraries in Austria and abroad are being presented in the form of a chronological series of summaries. The scientific apparatus that is added to each document includes information about the form the text was preserved in, former publications in printing and/or online as well as academic literature relevant to the respective document. The source texts were made accessible to the reader by means of commentaries and an extensive index. Given the volume`s topic, the Jewish persons and/or Jewish subject matters mentioned in the source texts are the main focus of these commentaries. Albrecht V (1405-1439), who was duke of Austria during the timeframe covered by this volume (although he did not come of age until 1411), later initiated the "Vienna Gesera", a persecution which brought about the violent end of Jewish settlement in the duchy of Au stria in 1420/21. However, the situation of Albrecht`s Jewish subjects during the years of his minority and his early autonomous rule has not been researched in detail until now. Likewise, little is known so far about the impact of the power struggle between Albrecht`s adult Habsburg relatives during the time of his minority, and of the politics of Duke Ernst of Inner Austria on the Jewish population. The same is true for the aftereffects of the persecution of Jews in the archbishopric of Salzburg in 1404. The sources collected in this volume will allow for a more detailed analysis of the legal, social and economic situation of the Jewish population of these territories and their interaction with their Christian surroundings during this timeframe.

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