The Greater Jewish Quarter
This place to the west of the city has been known as the main Jewish quarter since the time of Chancellor Pedro López de Ayala. Nevertheless, there are earlier records from the time of the Muslim governor Muchair ibn al-Qatil (9th century) when it was called: Madinat al Yahud, or city of the Jews, and was surrounded by a fence. In this place, there were different neighbourhoods such as Alacava, Caleros, Hamanzeite, Cosperos, Postigo del Fierro, Arriaza… known by the preserved documentation and located by some of its streets whose layout survives. Opposite this synagogue, the old Jewish castle stood, and further on towards the bridge of San Martín the butcher’s shops, the slaughterhouse of animals according to the laws of purity. And all around it, different ritual baths or mikvé, of which material remains have survived, rabbinical schools or yeshivas, shops, souks, ovens… and all the buildings of a prosperous Jewish quarter that once reached more than five thousand of inhabitants. The life of the Jews in Toledo and Sepharad was interrupted by the Edict of Expulsion issued by the Catholic Monarchs in 1492. This Edict was motivated by their interest in achieving the conversion to Christianity of all their subjects and natives of the kingdom, especially after the conquest of the kingdom of Granada, and by their desire to protect those who had already converted. With the establishment of the Holy Office in 1478, they had tried to put an end to the problem of false converts, however, given the apostasy of many Christian converts instigated by Jews, considering that they could not became into good Christians as long as Jews lived alongside them, they agreed: “…having had much deliberation about it, we agree to order all the said Jews and Jewesses to leave our kingdoms”.
Toledo had ten or twelve synagogues
In Yaaqob Albeneh’s poem dedicated to the serious events of 1391, nine synagogues are mentioned in Toledo’s Jewish quarter: the main synagogue (probably that of Santa María la Blanca), the old temple, the new temple or new synagogue, the synagogue of Prince Semuel Leví (now the Sephardic museum), the synagogue of Cordobés, the synagogue of Benzizá, that of Ben Abidarham, that of Suloquia and that of Algiada. Recently, the architect Jean Passini has identified the building of the Sofer synagogue.
Testimony about the Jewish quarter of Toledo
“I came to the vast city of Toledo, the capital of the kingdom, which is clothed with the charm of dominion and adorned with sciences, showing to the peoples and princes its beauty. Because the tribes, the tribes of the Lord, migrated thither. How many palaces there are within it, making the luminaries run with the magnificence of their beauty and splendour; how many synagogues there are in it of incomparable beauty! There, every soul praises the Lord. In its heart, a congregation of holy seed whose ornament is righteousness, numerous as the plants of the field, dwells.”
Judah ben Shelomo al Haziri. 12th-13th century, Sefer Tahkhemoni – The Assemblies of the Sages.
