1. Aleichem, Sholem, “The Red Jews,” in Radiant Days, Haunted Nights: Great Tales from the Treasury of Yiddish Folk Literature, trans. Neugroschel, Joachim (New York: Overlook Duckworth, 2005), 307Google Scholar.

2. Abramovitsh, Sholem Yankev, Tales of Mendele the Book Peddler: Fishke the Lame and Benjamin the Third, ed. Miron, Dan and Frieden, Ken, trans. Gorelick, Ted and Halkin, Hillel (New York: Schocken Books, 1996)Google Scholar. The main character's quest for the Ten Lost Tribes emulates the famous twelfth-century traveler Benjamin of Tudela as well as the mid-nineteenth-century Romanian explorer Israel Joseph Benjamin; hence his designation as “the third.”

3. The literature on the Ten Lost Tribes is vast. The classic work is still Neubauer, Adolph, “Kibuẓim ‘al ‘inyene aseret ha-shvatim u-vne Moshe,” Koveẓ ‘al Yad 4 (1888): 9–74Google Scholar; Neubauer, , “Where Are the Ten Tribes?” Jewish Quarterly Review 1 (1889): 14–28, 95–114, 185–201, 408–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a summary of the legend's development with an extensive bibliography, see Ben-Amos, Dan and Noy, Dov, eds., Folktales of the Jews, vol. 1, Tales from the Sephardic Dispersion (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2006), 450–72Google Scholar. The most recent study of the Ten Lost Tribes is Zvi Ben-Dor Benite's The Ten Lost Tribes: A World History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009)Google Scholar. Barmash, Pamela, “At the Nexus of History and Memory: The Ten Lost Tribes,” AJS Review 29, no. 2 (2005): 207–36CrossRefGoogle Scholar, discusses the historical fate of the northern tribes.

4. With the exception of a few translations from Yiddish; e.g., Mendele's Hebrew version of The Brief Travels of Benjamin the Third (1896) uses the term “Red Jews” (yehudim ’admonim).

5. Cf. the standard dictionaries of modern Yiddish, such as Weinreich, Uriel, Modern English-Yiddish Yiddish-English Dictionary (New York: Schocken Books, 1988)Google Scholar; Niborski, Yitskhok and Vaisbrot, Bernard, Dictionnaire Yiddish-Français (Paris: Bibliotheque Medem, 2002)Google Scholar. Over a century ago, Lazar, Simon Menahem, Ḥidot ha-hagadot ha-nifla'ot ‘al davar ‘aseret ha-shvatim u-pitronan (Drohobycz: Ha-miẓpe, 1908), 79Google Scholar, had already erroneously confined the term to Polish Jewry.

6. Yuval's, IsraelTwo Nations in Your Womb: Perceptions of Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2006)Google Scholar is a model of such argumentation. See esp. chap. 5 on the close relationship between Passover and Easter. See also Schäfer, Peter, Mirror of His Beauty: Feminine Images of God from the Bible to the Early Kabbalah (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002)Google Scholar; Boyarin, Daniel, Border Lines: The Partition of Judaeo-Christianity (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Biale, David, Blood and Belief: The Circulation of a Symbol between Jews and Christians (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 2007)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

7. The works of Israel Yuval and Ivan Marcus in the mid-1990s mark a turning point in the reading of Jewish history; Yuval, Two Nations (originally published in Hebrew in 2000, partially based on older articles from the preceding decade); Marcus, Ivan, Rituals of Childhood: Jewish Acculturation in Medieval Europe (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996)Google Scholar. The old notions of Jewish insularity and passive victimhood have been surpassed by a close, dynamic interaction of Jews with neighboring cultures. Scholars in different areas of Jewish history have adopted this new perspective; recent books are: Boyarin, Daniel, Dying for God: Martyrdom and the Making of Christianity and Judaism (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999)Google Scholar; Stow, Kenneth, Theater of Acculturation: The Roman Ghetto in the Sixteenth Century (Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 2001)Google Scholar; Baumgarten, Elisheva, Mothers and Children: Jewish Family Life in Medieval Europe (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004)Google Scholar; Perry, Micha, Masoret ve-shinui: Mesirat yeda be-kerev yehude ma'arav Eropa bi-yeme ha-benayim (Tel Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 2010)Google Scholar, among others. This new historiographic trend has been discussed by Berger, David, “A Generation of Scholarship on Jewish-Christian Interaction in the Medieval World,” Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 38, no. 2 (2004): 4–14Google Scholar, and Rosman, Moshe, How Jewish Is Jewish History? (Oxford: Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2007)Google Scholar.

8. Werner, Michael and Zimmermann, Bénédicte, “Beyond Comparison: Histoire Croisée and the Challenge of Reflexivity,” History and Theory 45 (2006): 30–50CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For an application of this method to Jewish history, see Perry, Micha, “The Imaginary War between Prester John and Eldad the Danite and Its Real Implications,” Viator: Medieval and Renaissance Studies 41, no. 1 (2010): 1–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Voß, Rebekka, Umstrittene Erlöser: Ideologie, Politik und jüdisch-christlicher Messianismus in Deutschland, 1500–1600 (Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2011)Google Scholar. A similar approach has been adopted by Schäfer, Mirror of His Beauty, 229–35; Myers, David N., Resisting History: Historicism and Its Discontents in German-Jewish Thought (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2003), 162–70Google Scholar. For an overview of the recent debate over the transnational concepts of histoire croisée, cultural transfer, and entangled history, see Kaelble, Hartmut, “Die Debatte über Vergleich und Transfer und was jetzt?” H-Soz-u-Kult, February 8, 2005Google Scholar, http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/forum/id=574&type=artikel (accessed January 27, 2011).

9. Funkenstein, Amos, “History, Counterhistory, and Narrative,” in Probing the Limits of Representation: Nazism and the “Final Solution,” ed. Friedländer, Saul, 3^rd ed. (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1996), 69Google Scholar.

10. von Scharfenberg, Albrecht, Der Jüngere Titurel, ed. Wolf, Werner (Bern: Francke, 1952), st. 6124–27Google Scholar.

11. Gow, Andrew, The Red Jews: Antisemitism in an Apocalyptic Age, 1200–1600 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1995), esp. chaps. 2–3Google Scholar.

12. The two names Gog and Magog first appear together in the book of Ezekiel, but with Magog as a geographical location (“Gog, of the land of Magog,” Ezekiel 38:2). However, in other noneschatological references in the Bible (Genesis 10:2) and later sources, Magog is referred to as a person, e.g., in the Book of Jubilees and the Dead Sea Scrolls. While the Greek translation of the Septuagint renders Ezekiel 38:2 as “Gog and the land of Magog” (my emphasis), the book of Revelation has arrived at the well-known identity of Gog and Magog as the peoples of the apocalypse, the last enemies of Christ: “And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison./And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle” (Revelation 20:7–8). Cf. Bøe, Sverre, Gog and Magog: Ezekiel 38–39 as Pre-Text for Revelation 19, 17–21 and 20, 7–10 (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2001)Google Scholar.

13. Gow, Red Jews, 25. In detail, Anderson, Andrew R., Alexander's Gate, Gog and Magog, and the Enclosed Nations (Cambridge: The Mediaeval Academy of America, 1932), chap. 2, esp. 49–50Google Scholar. See also Cary, George, The Medieval Alexander (1956; repr. New York: Garland Press, 1987)Google Scholar; Ross, David J. A., Alexander Historiatus: A Guide to Medieval Illustrated Alexander Literature, 2^nd ed. (Frankfurt: Athenäum, 1988)Google Scholar. The standard edition of Pseudo-Methodius is still Sackur, Ernst, Sibyllinische Texte und Forschungen: Pseudomethodius, Adso und die tiburtinische Sibylle (1898; repr. Turin: Bottega d'Erasmo, 1976), 72–75Google Scholar. A more recent critical edition is Aerts, Willem J. and Kortekaas, George A. A., eds. Die Apokalypse des Pseudo-Methodius: Die ältesten griechischen und lateinischen Übersetzungen, 2 vols. (Leuven: Peeters, 1998)Google Scholar.

14. Gow, Red Jews, 43–44. The relevant passage is from Comestor's Historia Scholastica, ibid., app. B, no. 13.

15. See ibid., esp. chap. 4 and app. A, for numerous examples.

16. Victor of Carben, De vita et moribus Judaeorum Victoris de Carben, olim Judaei nunc Christi miseratione christiani, libellus (Paris, 1511), fol. 78r (BnF, A-2963 [5]); cited according to Margolin, Jean-Claude, “Sur quelques ouvrages de la bibliothèque de Postel annotés de sa main,” in Guillaume Postel 1581–1981: Actes du Colloque International d'Avranches 5–9 septembre 1981 (Paris: Editions Guy Trédaniel, 1985), 128Google Scholar.

17. Victor of Carben, Hier inne wirt gelesen wie Her Victor von Carben. Welicher eyn Rabi der Juden gewest ist zu Cristlichem glawbn komen: Weiter vindet man dar Jn. eyn Costliche disputatz eynes gelerten Cristen. vnd eyns gelerten Juden. dar inne alle Jrthumb der Juden durch yr aygen schrifft aufgelost werden [Köln, 1508], 35: “Fragestu einen Juden er sy iung oder alt.… Antwurt der Jude wir haben noch einen konig vff gensyt Babilonien ist den gebirg Kaspion…. die selben iuden sint die Roten iuden vnd starcken.” The book is better known by its 2^nd edition title, Juden Büchlein (n.p., 1550). In contrast, Gow, Red Jews, 136, reads the use of this term in the convert writings merely as a reflection of Christian parlance. While this is plausible, the Yiddish texts presented below indicate that Victor of Carben and others drew the term from specifically Jewish sources and in fact reflect contemporary Jewish thought. For the use of convert sources to accurately illustrate Jewish thought and practice, despite a polemical bias, cf. methodologically, e.g., Carlebach, Elisheva, The Anti-Christian Element in Early Modern Yiddish Culture (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2003), 15Google Scholar; Deutsch, Yaacov, “Von der Iuden Ceremonien: Representations of Jews in Sixteenth-Century Germany,” in Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation in Sixteenth-Century Germany, ed. Bell, Dean P. and Burnett, Stephen G. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2006), 339Google Scholar; Maria Diemling, “Anthonius Margaritha and His ‘Der Gantz Jüdisch Glaub,’” in Bell and Burnett, Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation, 327.

18. Margaritha, Antonius, Der gantz Jüdisch glaub mit sampt ainer gründtlichen vnd warhafften anzaygunge/ Aller Satzungen/ Ceremonien/ Gebetten/ Haymliche vnd offentliche Gebreuch/ deren sich dye Juden halten/ durch das gantz Jar/ Mit schönen vnd gegründten Argumenten wyder jren Glauben (Augsburg, 1530)Google Scholar, fol. 98r: “Zum sechsten trösten sy sich gar vast der zehen geschlecht die der künig Assirios vertribe/…das nimptt mich aber groß wunder/ warumb man dise zehen geschlecht die rotten Juden haist/ vnnd also hoffen sy gar vast/ dise rotten Juden sollen kommen vnd sye erlösen/ sy haben auch klaine Hebreische vnd teutsche büchlin darinnen sy gar vil lugen vnd merlin von disen zehen geschlechten schreiben/ sie schreiben auch von einem bach Sabbathion genant.”

19. Margarita, e.g., uses the two terms side by side, without being aware of any difference in their meaning; ibid. Note that in Older Yiddish, the expression “Ten Tribes” was used alongside “Red Jews”; e.g., in the seventeenth-century travelogue by Gershon b. Eliezer ha-Levi Yiddls, , Gliles ’ereẓ Yisroel: ‘Im tirgum le-‘ivrit ba-shem ’igeret ha-kodesh, ed. ben Zvi, Yitzhak (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook, 1953)Google Scholar and the Yiddish adaption of Sefer ’Eldad ha-Dani, first printed in Constantinople, 1668, to name only a few.

20. See below on the textual history of the story. Margaritha was probably referring to these prayer books (“gepet vnd gesang büchlin”), which he claimed contained information about the Sambatyon; Margaritha, Gantz Jüdisch glaub, fol. 98r (note in the margin).

21. Cf. Zfatman, Sara, Nisu'e adam ve-sheda: Gilgulav be-motiv ba-siporet ha-‘amamit shel yehude Ashkenaz ba-me'ot ha-16–ha-17 (Jerusalem: Akademon Press, 1987), 24 n. 27Google Scholar.

22. Such a connection was already assumed by Zfatman, “’Igrot be-yidish mi-sof ha-me'a ha-16 be-‘inyan aseret ha-shvatim,” Koveẓ ‘al Yad n.s. 20 (1982): 249 n. 35Google Scholar.

23. Bereshit Rabba 99:2 (ed. Theodor-Albeck 1274); B. Baba Batra 123b. Cf. Yuval, Two Nations, 34–35. On the figure of the first Messiah, see Berger, David, “Three Typological Themes in Early Jewish Messianism: Messiah Son of Joseph, Rabbinic Calculations, and the Figure of Armilus,” AJS Review 10, no. 2 (1985): 143–48CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Fishbane, Michael, “Midrash and Messianism: Some Theologies of Suffering and Salvation,” Toward the Millennium: Messianic Expectations from the Bible to Waco, ed. Schäfer, Peter and Cohen, Marc (Leiden, E. J. Brill: 1998), 57–71Google Scholar.

24. The typology is discussed at length in Yuval, Two Nations, chap. 1. See also Cohen, Gerson D., “Esau as Symbol in Early Medieval Thought,” in Studies in the Variety of Rabbinic Cultures (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1991), 243–69Google Scholar; Stemberger, Günter, “Die Beurteilung Roms in der rabbinischen Literatur,” in Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt: Geschichte und Kultur Roms im Spiegel der neueren Forschung, ed. Temporini, Hildegard and Haase, Wolfgang vol. 19 [2] (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1979), 338–96Google Scholar; Hadas-Lebel, Mireille, “Jacob et Esau ou Israel et Rome dans le Talmud et le Midrash,” Revue de l'histoire des religions 201 (1984): 369–92CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Zeitlin, Solomon, “The Origin of the Term Edom for Rome and the Roman Church,” Jewish Quarterly Review n.s. 60, no. 3 (1970): 262–63CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25. Hermann Fabronius, Bekehrung der Jüden: Vnd Von Mancherley Abergläubischen Ceremonien/ vnnd seltzamen Sitten/so die zerstreweten Jüden haben: Vnd wie sie in der Christenheit zu dulden seyn (Erfurt, 1624), 47–48.

26. Cf. Kaufmann, David, “A Rumour about the Ten Tribes in Pope Martin V's Time,” Jewish Quarterly Review 4 (1892): 503Google Scholar. See also Perry, “Imaginary War,” 21. On the hopes that Jews pinned on the Mongol invasion of the thirteenth century, identifying the Mongols as the Ten Lost Tribes, see Israel Yuval, “Jewish Messianic Expectations towards 1240 and Christian Reactions,” in Schäfer, Toward the Millennium, 105–21; Yuval, Two Nations, 284–87; Menache, Sophia, “Tartars, Jews, Saracens and the Jewish-Mongol ‘Plot’ of 1241,” History: The Journal of the Historical Association 81 (1996): 319–24CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also the older work by Breslau, Harry, “Juden und Mongolen 1241,” Zeitschrift für die Geschichte der Juden in Deutschland 1, no. 1 (1887): 99–102Google Scholar.

27. Rivkind, Isaac, “The Historical Allegory of Rabbi Meir Shatz” [in Yiddish], Studies in Philology 3 (1929): 19Google Scholar. This quote is from one of the oldest extant Yiddish texts mentioning the Red Jews, dating from the late sixteenth century. For the textual transmission, see in detail below.

28. Victor of Carben, Hier inne wirt gelesen, 36. Cf. Margaritha, Gantz Jüdisch glaub, fol. 98r.

29. See the literature on the Ten Tribes above in note 3. The ninth-century account of the traveler Eldad ha-Dani, who claimed to be from the lost tribe of Dan, was instrumental for the consolidation of the heroic image of the Ten Tribes in the Middle Ages; Dan, Joseph, Ha-sipur ha-‘ivri bi-yeme ha-benayim: ‘iyunim be-toldotav (Jerusalem: Keter Publishing House, 1974), 54–55Google Scholar. The Hebrew text has been edited by Epstein, Abraham, “Eldad ha-Dani: Seine Berichte über die zehn Stämme und deren Ritus in verschiedenen Versionen nach Handschriften und alten Drucken mit Einleitung und Anmerkungen nebst einem Excurse über die Falascha und deren Gebräuche,” in Kitve Avraham Epstein, ed. Habermann, Abraham M., 2^nd ed. (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook, 1965), 1:1–211Google Scholar. English translation by Adler, Elkan N., Jewish Travellers in the Middle Ages: 19 Firsthand Accounts (1930; repr., New York: Dover, 1987), 4–21Google Scholar.

30. On the concept of “vengeful redemption,” see Yuval, Two Nations, chap. 3, esp. 93–109. Yuval contrasts it with the idea of a “proselytizing redemption” in the Sephardi world, which seems to have stressed the possibility of Gentiles acknowledging the God of Israel to avoid being annihilated at the end of time; ibid., 109–15. Both events, however, are inherent parts of traditional Jewish apocalypticism and are therefore found in the eschatology of both communities, albeit with differing emphases. Cf. Grossman, Abraham, “‘Ha-ge'ula ha-megayeret’ be-mishnatam shel hakhme Ashkenaz ha-rishonim,” Zion 59 (1994): 325–42Google Scholar. For an example of the concept of apocalyptic vengeance outside the German-speaking lands, see Perry, “Imaginary War,” 21–22. On the concept of translatio imperii, see Thomas, Heinz, “Translatio Imperii,” Lexikon des Mittelalters, ed. Angermann, Norbert (Munich: Artemis & Winkler, 1997), 8:944–46Google Scholar.

31. Victor of Carben, Hier inne wirt gelesen, 35.

32. “Berg caspij verschlossen gog magog.”

33. Gow, Andrew, “Gog and Magog on Mappaemundi and Early Printed World Maps: Orientalizing Ethnography in the Apocalyptic Tradition,” Journal of Early Modern History 2, no. 1 (1998): 68CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Gow, , “Kartenrand, Gesellschaftsrand, Geschichtsrand: Die legendären iudei clausi/inclusi auf mittelalterlichen und frühneuzeitlichen Weltkarten,” in Fördern und Bewahren: Studien zur europäischen Kulturgeschichte der frühen Neuzeit, ed. Schmidt-Glintzer, Helwig (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1996), 137–55Google Scholar.

34. In Spain, Meshullam de Piera composed the poem “On the Rumors of Our Enclosed Brothers” during the Mongol invasion; Shirman, Hayim, ed., Ha-shira ha-‘ivrit bi-Sefarad u-vi-Provans, vol. 2, Mi-Josef Kimchi ‘ad Saʾadja ibn Danan (1150–1492) (Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1956), 317 n. 350Google Scholar; Epstein, Jacob N., “La-tenu‘a ha-meshiḥit be-Sikiliya,” Tarbiz 11 (1940): 218Google Scholar. A letter in the Cairo Genizah (probably early fifteenth-century Sicily) also articulates hope for rescue by “the enclosed ones;” Mann, Jacob, Texts and Studies in Jewish History and Literature (1931–35; repr., New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1972), 1:43Google Scholar; also printed in Aescoly, Aaron Z., Ha-tenu‘ot ha-meshiḥiyot be-Yisra'el: Oẓar ha-mekorot veha-teʾudot le-toldot ha-meshiḥiyut be-Yisra'el, vol. 1, Mi-mered Bar-Kokhva ve-‘ad gerush Sefarad (1956; repr., Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1987), 308–11Google Scholar. On the controversial dating of the text, see ibid., 264; Aescoly, , “‘Al ha-tenu‘a ha-meshiḥit be-Sikiliya,” Tarbiz 11 (1940): 207–17Google Scholar; and recently Zeldes, Nadia, “Ma‘ase mufla be-Siziliya: Hosafot u-birurim le-‘inyan ha-tenu‘a ha-meshiḥit be-Siziliya,” Zion 58, no. 3 (1993): 347–63Google Scholar; Yuval, Two Nations, 286–87. On the expression “enclosed Jews,” cf. also Abraham Farissol, cited in Neher, André, Jewish Thought and the Scientific Revolution of the Sixteenth Century: David Gans (1541–1613) and His Times (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1986), 132Google Scholar.

35. The Ten Tribes have entered the Hebrew Alexander legend through later versions of Sefer Yosipon that contain Maʿase Aleksandros; edited in Flusser, David, ed., Sefer Yosipon (Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1980–1981), 1:461–91Google Scholar. On this text see Flusser, , “‘Ma‘ase Aleksandros’ le-fi ketav-yad Parma,” Tarbiz 26 (1956): 165–84Google Scholar. For a general discussion of the Hebrew Alexander legend, see also van Bekkum, Wout J., “Medieval Hebrew Versions of the Alexander Romance,” in Mediaeval Antiquity, ed. Welkenhuysen, Andries, Braet, Herman, and Verbeke, Werner (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1995), 293–302Google Scholar. It is the story of Alexander's journey to the “land of darkness” that here becomes “mountains of darkness;” cf. the 1480 Mantua print of Sefer Yosipon. This change was probably influenced by rabbinic views of Alexander connecting him with the mountains of darkness, like, e.g., Bereshit Rabba 33:1 (ed. Theodor-Albeck 301); Nikolsky, Ronit, “The Rechabites in Maʿaseh Alexandros and in the Medieval Ben Sira,” Zutot (2004): 38Google Scholar. In fact, already Bamidbar Rabba 16:25 (71b) places the Ten Tribes behind the mountains of darkness. For the early modern times, see Zfatman, “’Igrot,” 236; Victor of Carben, Hier inne wirt gelesen, 36; Gerson, Christian, Der Jüden Thalmud Fürnembster innhalt/ vnd Wider-legung/ In Zwey Bücher verfasset. Im Ersten Wird die gantze Jüdische Religion/ vnd falsche Gottesdienste beschrieben. Im Andern Werden dieselbe/ beydes durch die schrifft des Alten Testaments/ vnd des Thalmuds selbst/ gründlich widerlegt vnd vmbgestossen (Goslar, 1607), 390, 404Google Scholar.

36. “Das rot mer da die rotten iuden in.” By association with the color red, various German and Yiddish sources in fact link the Red Jews with the Red Sea. Cf. Victor of Carben (above n. 31) and Peter Schwarz (below n. 142). I will discuss this variant elsewhere in detail.

37. Besides Sefer ’Eldad ha-Dani, e.g., the twelfth-century Hebrew travelogues of Benjamin of Tudela and Pethahiah of Regensburg are well known. All of them appeared in print in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Benjamin's account is edited, including an English translation in Adler, Marcus N., ed., The Itinerary of Benjamin of Tudela: Critical Text, Translation and Commentary (London: H. Frowde, 1907Google Scholar; repr., [New York: P. Feldheim, 1966]). For the Hebrew text of Pethahiah, see Grünhut, Lazar, ed., Die Rundreise des Rabbi Petachjah aus Regensburg (1904/05; repr., Jerusalem: n.p., n.d.)Google Scholar; for an English translation, see Adler, Jewish Travellers, 64–91.

38. Aescoly, Ha-tenu‘ot ha-meshiḥiyot, 336–50; Gross, Avraham, “The Expulsion and the Search for the Ten Tribes,” Judaism 41, no. 2 (1992): 130–47Google Scholar; Gross, , “Aseret ha-shvatim u-malkhut Prester John: Shemu‘ot ve-ḥipusim lifne gerush Sefarad ve-aḥarav,” Pe'amim: Studies in Oriental Jewry 48 (1991): 5–41Google Scholar. For various places and peoples that have been identified with the Ten Lost Tribes and their land, see Ruderman, David B., The World of a Renaissance Jew: The Life and Thought of Abraham ben Mordecai Farissol (Cincinnati, OH: Hebrew Union College Press, 1981), chap. 11Google Scholar; Neher, Jewish Thought, 119–48; Greenberg, Gershon, “American Indians, Ten Lost Tribes and Christian Eschatology,” in Religion in the Age of Exploration: The Case of Spain and New Spain, ed. LeBeau, Bryan F. (Omaha, NE: Creighton University Press, 1996), 127–48Google Scholar; Katz, David S., Philosemitism and the Readmission of the Jews to England (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982)Google Scholar, chap. 4; Pollak, Michael, “The Revelation of a Jewish Presence in Seventeenth-Century China: Its Impact on Western Messianic Thought,” in The Jews of China, vol. 1, Historical and Comparative Perspectives, ed. Goldstein, Jonathan (Armonk, NY: Sharpe, 1999), 50–70Google Scholar. For similar discussions among Christians, cf. also Rogers, Francis M., The Quest for Eastern Christians: Travels and Rumor in the Age of Discovery (Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press, 1962), 185–93Google Scholar.

39. David, Abraham, ed., A Hebrew Chronicle from Prague, c. 1615 (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1993), 27 n. 19Google Scholar.

40. Included in Köhler, Hans-Joachim, ed., Flugschriften des frühen 16. Jahrhunderts (1501–1530) (Zug/Leiden: IDC Publishers, 1978–87)Google Scholar, text-fiche, no. 2636 (online available through Brill's database TEMPO: The Early Modern Pamphlets Online). The explicit term “Red Jews” is found on fol. 2r. Other versions may be found in the appendix to Gow, Red Jews, 266–69; Clemen, Otto, Flugschriften aus den ersten Jahren der Reformation (1906–11; repr., Nieuwkoop: Graaf, 1967), 1:342–44 (correct 442–44)Google Scholar; Scheiber, Alexander and Tardy, Louis, “L'echo de la premiere manifestation de David Reubeni dans les brochures de colportage allemande de l'epoque,” Revue des Études Juives 32 (1973): 599–601Google Scholar. On the various editions, see Gow, Red Jews, 148 n. 58; 266 n. 56; Kaufmann, Thomas, “Das Judentum in der frühreformatorischen Flugschriftenpublizistik,” Zeitschrift für Theologie und Kirche 95 (1998): 442 n. 81Google Scholar.

41. The Jewish convert Gerson indicates that Christian interest in the Red Jews added to the Jewish messianic hope “that the Messiah could in fact still be born from the tribe of Judah [!], among the Red Jews.” Gerson, Jüden Thalmud, 391. For Jewish-Christian discourse on the Red Jews and additional beliefs about them in detail, see Voß, Umstrittene Erlöser, chap. 3, 1–2.

42. Listed in Lazar, Ḥidot, 79–80.

43. Baron, Salo W., A Social and Religious History of the Jews: High Middle Ages, 500–1200, rev. ed. (New York: Columbia University Press, 1957), 3:44Google Scholar. Similarly Posselt, Alfred H., Geschichte des chazarisch-jüdischen Staates (Vienna: Verlag des Vereins zur Förderung und Pflege des Reformjudentums, 1982), 44Google Scholar. Cf. Brook, Kevin A., The Jews of Khazaria (1999; repr., Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2004), 11–12, 212Google Scholar.

44. Biale, David, “Counter-History and Jewish Polemics Against Christianity: The Sefer toldot yeshu and the Sefer zerubavel,” Jewish Social Studies 6, no. 1 (1999): 130–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

45. Gow, Red Jews, 66–69.

46. Mellinkoff, Ruth, “Judas's Red Hair and the Jews,” Journal of Jewish Art 9 (1982): 31–46Google Scholar; Mellinkoff, , Outcasts: Signs of Otherness in Northern European Art of the Late Middle Ages, 2 vols. (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1993), chap. 2 and 7.1Google Scholar. Cf. also Pfeifer, Wolfgang, Etymologisches Wörterbuch des Deutschen (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag 1989), 3:1442Google Scholar, s.v. “rot”; Jacob, and Grimm, Wilhelm, Deutsches Wörterbuch (1854–1971; repr., Munich: Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag, 1999), 14:1296Google Scholar. Especially instructive for the theory of colors, including further references to this extensive literature, are two articles by Gage, John, “Color in Western Art: An Issue?” Art Bulletin 72 (1990): 518–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Gage, , “Colour in History: Relative and Absolute,” Art History 1 (1978): 104–30CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

47. Cf. Mellinkoff, “Judas's Red Hair,” 32, on the fear of redheads as being dangerous and militant.

48. On this monumental artifact, see Knefelkamp, Ulrich and Martin, Frank, eds., Der Antichrist: Die Glasmalereien in der Marienkirche in Frankfurt (Oder) (Leipzig: Edition Leipzig, 2008)Google Scholar; and the edition by Mangelsdorf, Frank, ed., Der gläserne Schatz: Die Bilderbibel der St. Marienkirche in Frankfurt (Oder), 2^nd rev. and enlarged ed. (Berlin: Das Neue Berlin, 2007)Google Scholar.

49. Annette Weber, “Das Antichristfenster der Marienkirche in Frankfurt (Oder) im kulturhistorischen Kontext,” in Knefelkamp and Martin, Antichrist, 87. On the legendary Sons of Moses, see Ginzberg, Louis, ed., The Legends of the Jews (1909–55; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 2000), 4:316–18Google Scholar; Lazar, Simon Menahem, “‘Aseret ha-shvatim,” Ha-shilo'aḥ 9 (1902): 46–56, 205–21, 352–63, 431–47, 520–28; 10 (1902): 42–56, 156–64, 226–35Google Scholar; Lazar, Ḥidot, 13–16, 74–77; Rubin, Uri, Between Bible and Qur'an: The Children of Israel and Islamic Self-Image (Princeton, NJ: Darwin Press, 1999), 26–30Google Scholar, 46–48, 50–52. Cf. Amos and Noy, Folktales, 455–56.

50. The Latin and German versions of Prester John's famous letter are edited in Zarncke, Friedrich, Der Priester Johannes, 2 vols. (1876–79; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1980)Google Scholar; Wagner, Bettina, Die “Epistola presbiteri Johannis” lateinisch und deutsch: Überlieferung, Textgeschichte, Rezeption und Übertragungen im Mittelalter. Mit bisher unedierten Texten (Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 2000)Google Scholar. For the translations into Hebrew, see Ullendorf, Edward and Beckingham, Charles F., The Hebrew Letters of Prester John (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1982)Google Scholar. Among the extensive literature on Prester John, see esp. Ramos, Manuel J., Essays in Christian Mythology: The Metamorphosis of Prester John (Lanham, MD: University Press of America, 2006)Google Scholar; Bejczy, Istvan, La lettre du Prêtre Jean: Une utopie médiévale (Paris: Imago, 2001)Google Scholar; Beckingham, Charles F. and Hamilton, Bernard, eds., Prester John, the Mongols and the Ten Lost Tribes (Aldershot: Variorum, 1996)Google Scholar; Knefel-kamp, Ulrich, “Der Priesterkönig Johannes und sein Reich: Legende oder Realität,” Journal of Medieval History 14 (1988): 337–55CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Perry, “Imaginary War,” discusses the textual relationship between the Eldad and the Prester John traditions. In contrast, David Wasserstein argues against the dependence of the Christian legend on the Jewish one; David J. Wasserstein, “Eldad ha-Dani and Prester John,” in Beckingham and Hamilton, Prester John, 213–36.

51. Jonas, Justus, Das siebend Capitel Danielis von des Türcken Gotteslesterung vnd schrecklich morderey (Wittenberg, 1529), fol. 15rGoogle Scholar. For the author, see Delius, Walter, Lehre und Leben: Justus Jonas 1493–1555 (Gütersloh: Bertelsmann, 1952)Google Scholar.

52. For a discussion of Christian exegesis, see Simon, Marcel, Verus Israel: A Study of the Relations between Christians and Jews in the Roman Empire (AD 135–425), trans. McKeating, Henry (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986)Google Scholar. See also Cohen, “Esau as Symbol,” 251–55.

53. Genesis 25:30: “And Esau said to Jacob: ‘Let me swallow, I pray thee, some of this red, red pottage; for I am faint.’ Therefore was his name called Edom.”

54. Cf. Schorsch, Ismar, “A Meditation on Maoz Ẓur,” Judaism: A Quarterly Journal of Jewish Life and Thought 37, no. 4 (1988): 462Google Scholar. Midrash ha-gadol, a late medieval midrashic collection, paraphrases Esau's ruddiness as “bloody” because “he hates the blood of circumcision;” MHG Ber 25:25 (ed. Margulies, 439). A different association for Christians and the color red is found in Sefer Niẓẓaḥon yashan, which originated in Germany around the same time as the Christian idea of the Red Jews. It identifies the Christians with red, as the color of the menstruation, i.e., impurity; Berger, David, ed., The Jewish-Christian Debate in the High Middle Ages: A Critical Edition of the Nizzahon Vetus (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1979), no. 238Google Scholar. I owe this reference to Yaacov Deutsch.

55. Cf. Cohen, “Esau as Symbol,” 264 n. 43.

56. Ibid., 255.

57. Also in Brenz, Johannes, Türcken Büchlein: Wie sich Prediger vnd Leien halten sollen/ so der Türck das Deudsche Land vberfallen würde. Christliche vnd nottürfftige vnterrichtung (Wittenberg, 1531)Google Scholar, fol. 10r: “Red Jews, that is, bloodhounds and murderers.”

58. Nigrinus, Georg, Jüden Feind: Von den Edlen Früchten der Thalmudischen Jüden/ so jetziger zeit in Teutschelande wonen/ ein ernste/ wol gegründte Schrifft (Straßburg, 1570), 88–89Google Scholar.

59. See above, note 23. Cf. Yuval, Two Nations, 275, with this implicitly counterhistorical explanation of the term “Red Jews.”

60. 1 Samuel 16:12. The meaning of the Hebrew word ’admoni, which is in fact used only three times in the Bible, referring to either Esau or David (Genesis 25:25, 1 Samuel 16:12, 1 Samuel 17:42), is not entirely clear. With regard to David, see below.

61. 1 Samuel 17:42.

62. First in Rivkind, Isaac, “Megilat R. Me'ir Shaẓ (He‘arot le-Ma‘ase ’Akdamut),” Ha-do'ar 9, no. 30 (1930): 207–9Google Scholar. Accordingly, in Dan, Joseph, “An Early Hebrew Source of the Yiddish ‘Aqdamoth’ Story,” Hebrew University Studies in Literature 1 (1973): 39–46Google Scholar; Dan, , “Toldotav shel ‘Ma‘ase ’Akdamut’ ba-sifrut ha-‘ivrit,” Criticism and Interpretation 9/10 (1976): 197–213Google Scholar.

63. Davidson, Israel, Thesaurus of Mediaeval Hebrew Poetry (1924–33; repr., [New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1970]), 1:332, no. 7314Google Scholar; Elbogen, Ismar, Jewish Liturgy: A Comprehensive History, trans. Scheindlin, Raymond P. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1993), 258Google Scholar. Text with English translation in Salamon, Avrohom Yaakov, ed. and trans., Akdamus Millin: With a New Translation and Commentary Anthologized from the Traditional Rabbinic Literature, 2 ^nd ed. (Brooklyn, NY: Mesorah Publications, 1996)Google Scholar. On Meir Shatz, see Elbogen, Jewish Liturgy, 257–58; Grossman, Avraham, Ḥakhme Ashkenaz ha-rishonim: Korotehem, darkam be-hanhagat ha-ẓibur, yeẓiratam ha-ruḥanit me-reshit yishuvam ve-‘ad le-gezerot 1096, 2^nd rev. ed. (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1988), 292–96Google Scholar; Zunz, Leopold, Literaturgeschichte der synagogalen Poesie (1865; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1966), 145–52Google Scholar. Raspe, Lucia, “Vom Rhein nach Galiläa: Rabbi Meir Schatz von Worms als Held hagiographischer Überlieferung,” Aschkenas 17, no. 2 (2007): 431–55Google Scholar, studies Meir Shatz as hagiographic hero.

64. Raspe, , Jüdische Hagiographie im mittelalterlichen Aschkenas (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006), 192, 195Google Scholar, shows that linking a story to a piyyut granted it greater legitimacy and thus a stronger motive for telling it. Cf. Raspe, “Vom Rhein nach Galiläa,” 437–38.

65. Baruchson, Shifra, Sefarim ve-kor'im: Tarbut ha-kri'a shel yehude Italya be-shilhe ha-Renesans (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 1993), 156Google Scholar. On the lists, see Simonsohn, Shlomo, “Sefarim ve-sifriyot shel yehude Mantova, 1595,” Kiryat Sefer 37, no. 1 (1961): 103–22Google Scholar.

66. The manuscript that contains the story has been edited by Yassif, Eli, “Tirgum kadmon ve-nusaḥ ‘ivri shel ‘Ma‘ase ’Akdamut’,” Criticism and Interpretation 9/10 (1976): 218Google Scholar. A transmission in three steps is typical for legends of saints, like Ma‘ase ’Akdamut: oral traditions made their way into written form in liturgical commentaries before being circulated independently; Raspe, Jüdische Hagiographie, 192–96. On Ashkenazi piyyut commentary, see Hollender, Elisabeth, Piyyut Commentary in Medieval Ashkenaz (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2008)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

67. Cf. Zfatman, Sara, Ha-siporet be-yidish me-reshitah ‘ad “Shivḥe ha-Besht” (1504–1814): Bibliografiya mu‘eret (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, 1985), 30, no. 9Google Scholar; Romer-Segal, Agnes, “Sifrut yidish ve-kahal kor'eha ba-me'a ha-17: Yeẓirot be-yidish be-reshimot ha-‘zikuk' mi-Mantova, 1595,” Kiryat Sefer 53, no. 4 (1978): 783, 788 n. 25Google Scholar.

68. Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Opp. 714 (= Institute for Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts, Jerusalem, F 20496); cf. Zfatman, Ha-siporet be-yidish, 19, no. 8.2. Ma‘ase ’Akdamut is edited synoptically with a later printing from 1694 Fürth (see following note) in Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 11–33. Unless otherwise noted, all quotations are according to Rivkind's edition of the manuscript version. An incorrect date is mentioned in Zinberg, Israel, A History of Jewish Literature, vol. 7, Old Yiddish Literature from Its Origins to the Haskalah Period (Cleveland, OH: The Press of Case Western Reserve University, 1975)Google Scholar, 177 n. 16.

69. Ayn sheyn vunderlikh mayse…fun ayn glik rad (Fürth, 1694)Google Scholar. Mayse dos da heyst Megiles Rebe Meyer (Amsterdam, 1660)Google Scholar, apparently a reprint of the Cremona editio princeps, also lost; cf. Zfatman, Ha-siporet be-yidish, 44–45, no. 23; Rivkind, Megilat, 508. Ayn sheyn mayse dos iz dos geshikhtnis fun Rebe Meyer Shats un fun den rotn yudlayn un fun den shvarzen minkh (Amsterdam, 1704)Google Scholar. Di geshikhtnis fun den rotn yudlayn un fun den shvarzen minkh (Amsterdam, n.d.). All these editions are listed in Zfatman, Ha-siporet be-yidish, s.v. “Megiles Reb Meyer.” Cf. also Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 9.

70. Printed synoptically with Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Opp. 714 (= Institute for Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts, Jerusalem, F 20496) in Zfatman, “’Igrot,” 228–47.

71. For a detailed summary of the plot, see Zinberg, Jewish Literature, 178–80.

72. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 21 und 25.

73. Ibid., 19.

74. Ibid., 21 and 24 (the latter according to the edition Amsterdam 1694). Cf. Jeremiah 31:7, where “the blind and the lame” are explicitly counted among the remnant of Israel who will be gathered from the ends of the earth.

75. Zfatman, “’Igrot,” 240.

76. 1 Samuel 17:42. Cf. 1 Samuel 16:12: “Now he was ruddy, and withal of beautiful eyes, and goodly to look upon.”

77. David Kimḥi on 1 Samuel 17:42. In the nineteenth century, Meir Loeb (Malbim) explains David's redness explicitly as “non militant.”

78. Rashi's commentary on Song of Solomon 5:10 and Lamentations 4:7–8. I am grateful to Bernard Septimus for pointing this out to me.

79. A sorcery competition between an enemy of the Jews and a Jew who then saves a Jewish community from calamity and disaster is a popular theme in Hebrew literature, known in many variations. Joseph Dan has shown that the motif first occurs in Judah he-Ḥasid; Dan, Joseph, “Sipurim demonologiyim mi-kitve R. Yehuda he-Ḥasid,” Tarbiz 30 (1960/61): 288–89, no. 29Google Scholar. Grözinger, Karl E., “Jüdische Wundermänner in Deutschland,” in Judentum im deutschen Sprachraum (Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, 1991), 202–3Google Scholar, lists sixteen versions within six hundred years. Cf. also Dan, “Hebrew Source”; Dan, “Toldotav shel ‘Ma‘ase ’Akdamut’.”

80. 1 Samuel 17:8–9.

81. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 15.

82. Ginzberg, Louis, “Haggadot ketu‘ot,” Ha-goren: Me'assef le-ḥokhmat Yisra'el 9 (1922): 44Google Scholar.

83. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 21, 23. Cf. 1 Samuel 17:33.

84. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 23.

85. 1 Samuel 17:44.

86. Yassif, “Tirgum kadmon,” 223. Cf. 1 Samuel 17:46.

87. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 31. Cf. 1 Samuel 17:50. For the magical contest in detail, see Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 23–31. The supernatural powers of the saviors across the Sambatyon is a popular motif; cf. Yaniv, Shlomo, “Ha-moshi‘a me-ereẓ aseret ha-shvatim,” Ale-siaḥ 7/8 (1980): 128Google Scholar. A prototype may be found in the biblical Exodus narrative: according to Shemot Rabba 1:29 (7b), Moses kills an Egyptian with the help of the name of God.

88. 1 Samuel 17:25.

89. Another motif that the Yiddish legend seems to borrow from the biblical story is the scholar's dream in Worms, which redirects the search for a suitable candidate in the magical contest toward the Red Jews. His metaphoric dream tells about a deep darkness bringing much misery into the world. One day, however, a bright star penetrates the darkness, and a big bear, symbolizing the black magician, appears together with a little goat—the little Red Jew. The two animals fight against each other, leaving the bear dead in the end; Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 15, 17. The choice of a bear and a goat might be grounded in 1 Samuel 17:34–36, where it is written that David killed Goliath as he had previously fended off a bear that had gone after sheep in his flock.

90. References in Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 6:247 n. 13.

91. 2 Samuel 8:14.

92. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 19, citing Obadiah 1:21. For this expression for the Red Jews, cf. David, Chronicle, 27 no. 19.

93. In Shirat ha-Yam (Exodus 15:1–18), Moses and the Israelites praise God after they have successfully crossed the Red Sea. The hymn describes the destruction of the Egyptian pursuers at length. Referring to the deep fear that befell Edom and the other peoples upon hearing of the great power of the God of Israel, it foretells apocalyptic revenge against the Christians in the future messianic context. The song concludes with the confidence that the people of Israel will return to its land and build the Temple. See Elbogen, Jewish Liturgy, s.v. “Song of the Sea.”

94. Bereshit Rabba 75:4 (ed. Theodor/Albeck 882). Lazar, Ḥidot, 80, has also offered this midrash as a source for the Yiddish expression “Red Jews.” He is not familiar with the rival Christian interpretation of the term, however. Lazar identifies the red avenger with the Ten Tribes because B. Baba Batra 123b equates them with the fire: “that Esau's seed would be delivered only into the hands of Joseph's seed for it is said, ‘And the house of Jacob shall be a fire and the house of Joseph a flame, and the house of Esau for stubble, etc.’” Cf. Bereshit Rabba 73:7 (ed. Theodor/Albeck 851).

95. Leqaḥ Tov 36:21–22 (ed. Buber 185) with a quote from 1 Samuel 16:12.

96. Yalkut Mekhiri on Psalm 118:24 (ed. Buber 214). See Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, 6:247 n. 13.

97. 1 Samuel 16:12.

98. Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 21.

99. Bereshit Rabba 97 (shita ḥadasha) (ed. Theodor/Albeck 1218).

100. Cf. Dan, Ha-sipur ha-‘ivri, 55–57. See also Bin-Gorion, Micha J., Der Born Judas: Legenden, Märchen und Erzählungen (1919–21; repr., Frankfurt: Jüdischer Verlag, 1993), 5:29–31Google Scholar.

101. Hill, Charles E., “Antichrist from the Tribe of Dan,” Journal of Theological Studies, n.s., 46, no. 1 (1995): 99–117CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Bousset, Wilhelm, The Antichrist Legend: A Chapter in Jewish and Christian Folklore (London: Hutchinson, 1896), 26, 171–74Google Scholar; Emmerson, Richard K., Antichrist in the Middle Ages: A Study of Medieval Apocalypticism, Art and Literature (Seattle, WA: University of Washington Press, 1981), 79–80Google Scholar; Jenks, Gregory C., The Origins and Early Development of the Anti-christ Myth (Berlin: De Gruyter, 1991), 77–79, 83–86, 183–84Google Scholar.

102. Cf. Bousset, Antichrist Legend, 175–83.

103. Krauss, Samuel, Das Leben Jesu nach jüdischen Quellen (1902; repr., Hildesheim: Georg Olms, 1977), 54–55Google Scholar. Cf. ibid., 223–24. Both tales even employ the motif of a millstone used by both Jesus and the black sorcerer, respectively, in their tricks; ibid., 54; and Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 25, 27. For the reception of Toldot Yeshu in Ashkenaz, see Carlebach, Anti-Christian Element, 13; as an example of a classic counterhistory, Biale, “Counter-History.”

104. On Jewish-Christian debate about the interpretation of Genesis 49:10, see Posnanski, Adolf, Schiloh: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Messiaslehre, vol. 1, Die Auslegung von Genesis 49,10 im Altertume bis zu Ende des Mittelalters (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1904)Google Scholar.

105. Joseph, Paul, Gründlicher beweiß/ auß dem alten Testament/ vnd zum theil auß dem Jüdischen Talmud/ Wie daß Christus Jesus der Jungfrau Marie Son/ sey der wahre verheissene Messias vnd Heyland der Welt/ vnd die ander Person inn der heiligen Dreyfaltigkeit (Altdorf, 1612)Google Scholar, fol. 21v.

106. Augusti, Friedrich Albrecht, Geheimnisse der Jüden von dem Wunder-Fluß Sambathjon, wie auch von denen rothen Juden, in einem Brief-Wechsel mit denen heutigen Jüden, zur Erläuterung 2 Reg. 17,6 abgehandelt, und dem Druck überlassen (Erfurt, 1748), 27–29Google Scholar. I am indebted to Andrew Gow for providing me with his reproduction of the only extant copy of this book, from the Duchess Anna Amalia Library in Weimar. The original volume in Weimar was damaged in the great fire of 2004.

107. Elisheva Carlebach, “Between History and Hope: Jewish Messianism between Ashkenaz and Sepharad” (Annual Lecture of the Selmanowitz Chair of Jewish History, Touro College, New York, NY, May 17, 1998); Carlebach, , “The Sabbatian Posture of German Jewry,” in Ha-ḥalom ve-shivro: Ha-tenu‘a ha-Shabta'it u-shluḥoteha: Meshiḥiyut, Shabta'ut u-Frankism, ed. Elior, Rachel (Jerusalem: Hebrew University, Institute of Jewish Studies, 2001), 2:1–30Google Scholar; Yuval, Two Nations, 275. This approach underlies my book about the interpenetration of Jewish messianism and Christian apocalypticism in sixteenth-century Germany; Voß, Umstrittene Erlöser.

108. Carlebach, Elisheva, “Jews, Christians and the Endtime in Early Modern Germany,” Jewish History 14, no. 3 (2000): 339Google Scholar. See also Carlebach, , “The Last Deception: Failed Messiahs and Jewish Conversion in Early Modern German Lands,” in Millenarianism and Messianism in Early Modern European Culture, vol. 1, Jewish Messianism in the Early Modern World, ed. Goldish, Matt D. and Popkin, Richard H. (Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic, 2001), 125–38CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Carlebach, , Divided Souls: Converts from Judaism in Germany, 1500–1750 (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, chap. 4. For the German Adversus Judaeos literature of the fourteenth century, cf. Manuela Niesner, ‘Wer mit juden well disputiren’: Deutschsprachige Adversus-Judaeos-Literatur des 14. Jahrhunderts (Tübingen: Max Niemeyer, 2005).

109. Cf. Edith Wenzel, “The Representation of Jews and Judaism in Sixteenth-Century German Literature,” in Bell and Burnett, Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation, 395, 399–400.

110. On the beginnings of printing and its resulting impact, cf. Hirsch, Rudolf, Printing, Selling and Reading 1450–1550, 2^nd ed. (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1974)Google Scholar; Febvre, Lucien and Martin, Henri-Jean, The Coming of the Book: The Impact of Printing 1450–1800, trans. Gerard, David, Verso edition (London: Verso, 2010)Google Scholar. For the German pamphlets as medium, see Köhler, Hans-Joachim, Flugschriften als Massenmedium der Reformationszeit: Beiträge zum Tübinger Symposion 1980 (Stuttgart: Klett-Cotta, 1981)Google Scholar, esp. the article by Richard G. Cole, “The Reformation Pamphlet and Communication Processes,” 139–61. See also Ozment, Steven, “Pamphlet Literature of the German Reformation,” in Reformation Europe: A Guide to Research (St. Louis, MO: Center for Reformation Research, 1982), 85–106Google Scholar. Edwards, Mark U. Jr., Printing, Propaganda, and Martin Luther (Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1994)Google Scholar, e.g., shows how the printing press and especially pamphlets turned the Reformation into a mass movement. On the visual propaganda of the Reformation, see Scribner, Robert W., For the Sake of Simple Folk: Popular Propaganda for the German Reformation, 2^nd ed. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994)Google Scholar. Chartier, Roger, “Reading Matter and ‘Popular’ Reading: From the Renaissance to the Seventeenth Century,” in A History of Reading in the West, ed. Cavallo, Guglielmo and Chartier, Roger, trans. Cochrane, Lydia G. (Oxford: Polity Press, 1999), 269–83Google Scholar, allows a glimpse into the reading culture of the masses.

111. This ethnographic genre has been studied by Maria Diemling and Yaacov Deutsch. See esp. Deutsch, Yaacov, “‘A View of the Jewish Religion’: Conceptions of Jewish Practice and Ritual in Early Modern Europe,” in Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 3 (2001): 273–95Google Scholar; Deutsch, , “Polemical Ethnographies: Descriptions of Yom Kippur in the Writings of Christian Hebraists and Jewish Converts to Christianity in Early Modern Europe,” in Hebraica Veritas? Christian Hebraists and the Study of Judaism in Early Modern Europe, ed. Coudert, Allison P. and Shoulson, Jeffrey S. (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2004), 202–33Google Scholar; Deutsch, “Von der Iuden Ceremonien,” 335–56; Diemling, “Anthonius Margaritha.”

112. During antiquity, Christian theologians had already identified the Antichrist as the Jewish Messiah. See Gow, Andrew C., “The Jewish Antichrist in Medieval and Early Modern Germany,” in Medieval Encounters 2, no. 3 (1996): 249–85CrossRefGoogle Scholar; also Cohen, Jeremy, “Be-‘ikvot ha-Anti-Kristos u-kesharav ha-yehudiyim,” in Rishonim ve-aḥaronim: Meḥkarim be-toldot Yisra'el mugashim le-Avraham Grossman, ed. Hacker, Joseph R., Kaplan, Yosef, and Kedar, Benjamin Z. (Jerusalem: Merkaz Zalman Shazar, 2010), 29–45Google Scholar. A brief overview also in Trachtenberg, Joshua, The Devil and the Jews: The Medieval Conception of the Jew and Its Relation to Modern Anti-Semitism, 2^nd paperback ed. (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1983), 32–43Google Scholar. Aichele, Klaus, Das Antichristdrama des Mittelalters, der Reformation und Gegenreformation (Den Haag: Nijhoff, 1974)Google Scholar, discusses the Jews' role in plays that depict the Antichrist. For references from the vast literature pertaining to the Antichrist, cf. note 100 above. See also McGinn, Bernard, Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination with Evil, (New York: Columbia University Press, 2000)Google Scholar.

113. Carlebach, “Endtime,” 333–35. On the generally increasing anti-Judaism in fifteenth-century folklore, cf. Rubin, Miri, Gentile Tales: The Narrative Assault on Late Medieval Jews (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1999)Google Scholar; Ocker, Christopher, “Contempt for Friars and Contempt for Jews in Late Medieval Germany,” in Friars and Jews in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, ed. McMichael, Stephen J. and Myers, Susan E. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2004), 133–39Google Scholar; Bell, Dean P., Sacred Communities: Jewish and Christian Identities in Fifteenth-Century Germany (Boston: E. J. Brill, 2001), 99–113Google Scholar.

114. Cf. Carlebach, “Endtime,” 337.

115. Yuval, Two Nations, chap. 3. Cf. above, note 30.

116. E.g., Pfefferkorn, Johannes, Handt Spiegel. Johannis Pfefferkorn/ wider und gegen die Jüden/ vnd Judischen Thalmudischen schrifftenn So/ sie vber das Cristenlich Regiment/ singen vnd lesen. … Solliche artickel zu widerlegen Dargegen ich antwurdt vnd mit bescheidene reden vffgelöst hab (Mainz, 1511)Google Scholar, fol. 4r. For additional references, see Voß, Umstrittene Erlöser, 32–39.

117. Cf. Yuval, Two Nations, esp. chap. 6. Yuval (ibid., chap. 4) argues that the impression of the Jewish concept of “vengeful redemption” had a great impact on Christian public opinion and influenced the emergence of the accusation of blood libel in the twelfth century. See also Carlebach, “Sabbatian Posture,” 21.

118. For additional cases, see Voß, Rebekka, “Propter seditionis hebraicae: Judenfeindliche Apokalyptik und ihre Auswirkungen auf den jüdischen Messianismus,” in Antichrist: Konstruktionen von Feindbildern, ed. Brandes, Wolfram and Schmieder, Felicitas (Berlin: Akademie Verlag, 2010), 197–217Google Scholar.

119. Cf., e.g., B. Sanhedrin 97b; B. Ketubbot 110a. See Schäfer, Peter, “Die messianischen Hoffnungen des rabbinischen Judentums zwischen Naherwartung und religiösem Pragmatismus,” in Studien zur Geschichte und Theologie des rabbinischen Judentums (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1978), 225, 228, 230, 234Google Scholar.

120. Similar considerations were not alien to Jewish leaders elsewhere in Europe and the Muslim world. Cf., e.g., Maimonides', MosesLetter to Yemen (1172)Google Scholar. Maimonides warns the Yemenite Jewish community of anger from the Gentiles if they learned of the messianic pretender who had appeared in Yemen; Halkin, Abraham and Hartman, David, eds., Epistles of Maimonides: Crisis and Leadership (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1985), 126–30Google Scholar. For the Sabbatean movement, cf. Scholem, Gershom, Sabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah, 1626–1676 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1973), 496–98, 763Google Scholar.

121. This is the thesis of Gerson Cohen, which remains greatly influential today. To Cohen, the indirect transmission of messianic calculations in Ashkenaz seemed to establish proof for his grand typology of alleged Ashkenazi messianic passivity and Sephardi messianic activism, which he advanced in an article that has been reprinted many times since its first appearance in 1967; Cohen, Gerson, “Messianic Postures of Ashkenazim and Sephardim,” in Essential Papers on Messianic Movements and Personalities in Jewish History, ed. Saperstein, Marc (New York: New York University Press, 1992), 209Google Scholar. Cohen's view has been criticized, most severely by Carlebach (cf. the reference above in note 106). On the controversy between Cohen and Carlebach, see the critical assessment by David Berger, “Ha-meshiḥiyut ha-sefaradit veha-meshiḥiut ha-'ashkenazit bi-yeme ha-benayim: Beḥinat ha-maḥloket ha-historiografit,” in Hacker, Kaplan, and Kedar, Rishonim ve-aḥaronim, 11–28.

122. Carlebach mainly bases her argument on a comparison of various Jewish and Christian accounts, from Germany vs. other countries, of the sixteenth-century messianic movements of Asher Lemlein and David Reubeni and Shlomo Molkho, respectively; Carlebach, Between History and Hope; Carlebach, “Sabbatian Posture,” 9–20. Where Carlebach emphasizes Christian polemics as the driving factor for a restrained public expression of Jewish messianic hopes, Yuval factors the danger of persecution into his studies on the Middle Ages; Yuval, Two Nations, chap. 6, esp. 275. Scholem already indicated Jewish self-censorship with regard to negative Christian attitudes toward Sabbateanism; cf. above, note 119.

123. Generally for the Jewish self-censorship of anti-Christian material, see Popper, William, The Censorship of Hebrew Books (1899; repr., New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1969)Google Scholar, s.v. “self-censorship”; Benayahu, Meir, Haskama u-reshut bi-defuse Venezi'a: Ha-sefer ha-‘ivri me-’et hava’ato li-defus ve-‘ad ẓeto le-‘or (Jerusalem: n.p., 1971), 81, 195Google Scholar. Raz-Krakotzkin, Amnon, The Censor, the Editor, and the Text: The Catholic Church and the Shaping of the Jewish Canon in the Sixteenth Century, trans. Feldman, Jackie (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2007)Google Scholar, has recently discussed how internal and external censors worked together in creating the modern Jewish canon. For the (self-)censorship of newly printed Hebrew books in sixteenth-century Germany in particular, see Stephen G. Burnett, “German Jewish Printing in the Reformation Era (1530–1633),” in Bell and Burnett, Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation, 518, 526–27; Burnett, , “The Regulation of Hebrew Printing in Germany, 1555–1630: Confessional Politics and the Limits of Jewish Toleration,” in Infinite Boundaries: Order, Disorder, and Reorder in Early Modern German Culture, ed. Reinhart, Max (Kirksville, MO: Sixteenth Century Journal Publishers, 1998), 329–48Google Scholar; Künast, Hans-Jörg, “Hebräisch-jüdischer Buchdruck in Schwaben in der ersten Hälfte des 16. Jahrhunderts,” in Landjudentum im deutschen Südwesten während der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Kießling, Rolf and Ullmann, Sabine (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1999), 286, 289Google Scholar.

124. Printed in David, Abraham, “Sipure ma‘asiyot ‘al ha-gezerot be-Germaniya bi-yeme ha-benayim,” in Shai le-Heman: Meḥkarim ba-sifrut ha-‘ivrit shel yeme ha-benayim mugashim le-A. M. Haberman (Heman ha-Yerushalmi) bi-mele'ot lo shiv‘im ve-ḥamesh shana, ed. Malachi, Zvi (Jerusalem: Rubin Mass, 1977)Google Scholar, 81. In fact, the pogroms harmed the Worms community too; Reuter, Fritz, “Warmaisa—das jüdische Worms: Von den Anfängen bis zum jüdischen Museum des Isidor Kiefer,” in Geschichte der Stadt Worms, ed. Bönnen, Gerold (Stuttgart: Theiss, 2005), 670Google Scholar.

125. Pfefferkorn, Johannes, In Lob und eer dem Allerdurchleuchtigsten Großmechtigsten Fursten vnd heren hern Maximilian…Romschen kayser (Cologne, 1509)Google Scholar, fol. 12r–v. Pfefferkorn claims that Jews from Germany and throughout Europe made pilgrimages to the Worms cemetery because of the messianic stele. They probably prayed there—both for deliverance from the acute afflictions in daily life and for future messianic redemption. On Jewish processions in the Middle Ages and early modern times, see Raspe, Lucia, “Sacred Space, Local History, and Diasporic Identity: The Graves of the Righteous in Medieval and Early Modern Ashkenaz,” in Jewish Studies at the Crossroads of Anthropology and History: Authority, Diaspora, Tradition, ed. Boustan, Ra'anan, Kosansky, Oren and Rustow, Marina (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011), 147–63Google Scholar. See also Horowitz, Elliott, “Speaking to the Dead: Cemetery Prayer in Medieval and Early Modern Jewry,” The Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 8 (1999): 303–17Google Scholar.

126. Abraham Jagel, Be'er sheva, chap. 22, Bodleian Library, Oxford, MS Reggio 11 (= Institute for Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts, Jerusalem, F 22120). Published by Neubauer, “Kibuẓim,” 37–44, with the wrong title. Cf. Neubauer, “Where Are the Ten Tribes?” 411.

127. Shammes, Juspa, Seyfer Mayse nisim (Amsterdam, 1696)Google Scholar, fol. 31r: “A story of ’Akdamut that is recited on Shavuot has been printed.” Cf. the Hebrew edition, including an English translation by Eidelberg, Shlomo, R. Juzpa Shamash di-kehilat Warmaisa: Olam yehudeha ba-me'a ha-17 (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1991)Google Scholar, 86 [Hebrew page number], no. 22. The passage is omitted in Eidelberg's English translation; ibid., 89, no. 22.

128. Shammes, Juspa, Minhagim de-k“k Warmaisa le-Rabbi Yuspa Shamash z“l, ed. Hamburger, Benjamin S. and Zimmer, Eric (Jerusalem: Machon Yerushalayim, 1988–92), 2:174Google Scholar.

129. Kirchheim, Juda Loew, Minhagot Warmaisa, ed. Peles, Israel M. (Jerusalem: Machon Yerushalayim, 1987)Google Scholar, 258 n. 8. Juspa Shammes, in his minhag book, does not give a reason; Juspa Shammes, Minhagim, 1:112. Cf. Eidelberg, Juzpa Shamash, 25–26.

130. Raspe, “Vom Rhein nach Galiläa,” 447. Cf. Fleischer, Ezra, “Prayer and Piyyut in the Worms Mahzor,” in The Worms Mahzor: The Jewish National and University Library, MS Heb. 4° 781/1, introductory vol., ed. Beit-Arié, Malachi (Vaduz: Cyelar Establishment, 1985), 75Google Scholar; Fraenkel, Jonah, ed., Maḥzor shavu‘ot le-fi minhage bne Ashkenaz le-khol anfehem (Jerusalem: Koren, 2000)Google Scholar, 28 n. 167; Zunz, Leopold, Die Ritus des synagogalen Gottesdienstes, geschichtlich entwickelt, 2^nd ed. (Berlin: Louis Lamm, 1919), 69Google Scholar. On the Worms Mahzor generally, see Malachi Beit-Arié, “The Worms Mahzor: Its History and Its Palaeographic and Codicological Characteristics,” in Worms Maḥzor, introductory vol., 13–35; Beit-Arié, , “The Worms Mahzor: MS Jerusalem, Jewish National and University Library Heb. 4° 781/1: Würzburg? (Germany), 1272,” in The Makings of the Medieval Hebrew Book: Studies in Palaeography and Codicology (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 1993), 152–80Google Scholar. Facsimile edition, Worms Mahzor.

131. In contrast, Lucia Raspe attributes the absence of the ’Akdamut in Worms to the overall abolition of Aramaic piyyutim. Without its liturgical premise, Ma‘ase ’Akdamut, too, lost its legitimacy; Raspe, “Vom Rhein nach Galiläa,” 448; cf. Fleischer, “Prayer and Piyyut,” 75.

132. See Carlebach, Anti-Christian Element. For the Middle Ages, cf. Stow, Kenneth, “Medieval Jews on Christianity,” Rivista di storia del Cristianesimo 4, no. 1 (2007): 73–100Google Scholar.

133. Wetzlar complained that most scholars refused to recite Shir ha-Yiḥud and in some communities it had been abolished entirely; Wetzlar, Isaak, The Libes Briv of Isaac Wetzlar, ed. and trans. Faierstein, Morris M. (Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press, 1996), 64–65Google Scholar (Yiddish), 111–13 (English). While this Hymn of Unity had concluded the daily service in many communities that followed the German-Polish rite, in the mid-sixteenth century, following an earlier controversy over its placement in the liturgy, diverse local practices emerged, restricting Shir ha-Yiḥud to Sabbaths and festivals or even to Yom Kippur only. See Berliner, Abraham, Der Einheitsgesang: Eine literar-historische Studie (Berlin: Itzkowski, 1910), 14–16Google Scholar; Elbogen, Jewish Liturgy, 72; Davidson, Thesaurus, 3:485, no. 1676. On Wetzlar and his critique of society in Yiddish, see Faierstein, Morris M., “The ‘Liebes Brief’: A Critique of Jewish Society in Germany (1749),” Leo Baeck Institute Year Book 27 (1982): 219–42Google Scholar; Rohrbacher, Stefan, “Isaak Wetzlar in Celle: Ein jüdischer Reformer vor der Aufklärung,” in Juden in Celle: Biographische Skizzen aus drei Jahrhunderten (Celle: Stadtarchiv, 1996), 33–66Google Scholar.

134. Quoted in Neubauer, “Kibuẓim,” 39. Cf. above, note 125. The copy that Jagel refers to was owned by Gershon b. Abraham of Porto. The Mantuan censor's records in fact list several copies of the Cremona imprint of Megiles Reb Meyer in the possession of members of the family Port (Katz); Romer-Segal, “Sifrut yidish,” 788 no. 25. David Ruderman, in his biography of Jagel, dates Jagel's contact with the family of Gershon to around 1576; Ruderman, David B., Kabbalah, Magic, and Science: The Cultural Universe of a Sixteenth-Century Jewish Physician (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988)Google Scholar, 13. Cf. on the megillah, “welche man in Deutschland am Pfingsten recitire,” Steinschneider, Moritz, Die Geschichtsliteratur der Juden in Druckwerken und Handschriften (1905; repr., New York: Arno Press, 1980)Google Scholar, 80, no. 91a.

135. Yerushalmi, Yosef H., Zakhor: Jewish History and Jewish Memory (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1982), 46–48Google Scholar.

136. Turniansky, Chava, “The Events in Frankfurt am Main (1612–1616) in Megillas Vints and in an Unknown Yiddish ‘Historical’ Song,” in Schöpferische Momente des europäischen Judentums in der frühen Neuzeit, ed. Graetz, Michael (Heidelberg: Winter, 2000), 126Google Scholar. This text has been edited and translated into English by Ulmer, Rivka, Turmoil, Trauma and Triumph: The Fettmilch Uprising in Frankfurt am Main (1612–1616) according to Megillas Vintz. A Critical Edition of the Yiddish and Hebrew Text Including an English Translation (Frankfurt: Lang, 2001)Google Scholar. For the place of Yiddish in domestic liturgy, see Baumgarten, Jean, Introduction to Old Yiddish Literature, trans. Frakes, Jerold C. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, chap. 9. Max Weinreich, “Internal Bilingualism in Ashkenaz up to the Enlightenment Period” [in Yiddish], Di goldene keyt 35 (1959): 80–88, deals with the reluctance to introduce Yiddish liturgy into synagogue prayer services. See also Fishman, David E., “To Pray in Yiddish: A Couple of Methodological Remarks and Some New Sources” [in Yiddish], in YIVO Bleter, n.s. 1 (1991): 69–92Google Scholar.

137. Against this Rivkind, “Historical Allegory.”

138. For Yuval's thesis on remembrance as a form of active messianism, see Yuval, Two Nations, 135–59. Yuval argues that the blood of martyrs served as evidence of Christian guilt that must atoned for when the messiah of revenge arrives. On the Rhenish fast days, see Zimmer, Eric, “Gezerot 1096 be-sifre ha-minhagim bi-yeme ha-benayim u-va‘et ha-ḥadasha: Yeẓira ve-hitpashtut shel tikse ha-avelut,” in Yehudim mul ha-ẓelav: Gezerot 1096 ba-historiya uva-historiografiya, ed. Assis, Yom Tov et al. (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2000), 157–70Google Scholar. The question of how the liturgical recitation of Ma‘ase ’Akdamut related to local fast days in the Rhineland was first raised by Lucia Raspe; Raspe, “Vom Rhein nach Galiläa,” 440–41; Raspe, Jüdische Hagiographie, 196 n. 226. Recently, Hoffman, Jeffrey, “Akdamut: History, Folklore, and Meaning,” Jewish Quarterly Review 99, no. 2 (2009): 171–73Google Scholar, has also put the history of ’Akdamut milin in the context of the crusade massacres. Hoffman correctly points out that the importance of commemorating the events of 1096 accounts for the long life of this piyyut in the Ashkenazi rite, because the catastrophe of the First Crusade added new meaning and thus strengthened the poem's comforting effect on later generations, especially in light of its mythic origin.

139. Scott, James C., Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1990)Google Scholar.

140. On curses, see Yuval, Two Nations, 115–30; and recently, on invectives, Deutsch, Yaacov, “Jewish Anti-Christian Invectives and Christian Awareness: An Unstudied Form of Interaction in the Early Modern Period,” Leo Baeck Institute Year Book 55 (2010): 41–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

141. Cf. Carlebach, Anti-Christian Element, 18–19. For the Hebraist study of Yiddish in early modern Germany, see Frakes, Jerold C., The Cultural Study of Yiddish in Early Modern Europe (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007)CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Aya Elyada, “Protestant Scholars and Yiddish Studies in Early Modern Europe,” Past and Present 203, no. 1 (2009): 69–98.

142. Schwarz, Peter, Stern des Meschiah (Esslingen, 1477)Google Scholar, fol. 48v. On the author, see Christopher Ocker, “German Theologians and the Jews in the Fifteenth Century,” in Bell and Burnett, Jews, Judaism, and the Reformation, 46–59; Walde, Bernhard, Christliche Hebraisten Deutschlands am Ausgang des Mittelalters (Münster: Aschendorffsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1916), chap. 4Google Scholar.

143. This was mainly due to the fact that the Christian image of the Red Jews changed over the course of the sixteenth century, such that they were stripped of their long-standing role and with it their relevance for Christian apocalyptic imagery. Variable concepts of Jewish participation in the drama of the last days emerged instead, allowing for a changing historical situation. With the emergence of the Turkish threat, the Ten Tribes, originally the archenemies of Christendom, proved to be more and more successful to the extent that they could be perceived as allies against the infidel; see Voß, Umstrittene Erlöser, chap. 3.2. For another case of the reassessment of a people in relation to the apocalypse, namely the Mongols, see Schmieder, Felicitas, “Christians, Jews, Muslims—and Mongols: Fitting a Foreign People into the Western Christian Apocalyptic Scenario,” in Medieval Encounters 12, no. 1 (2006): 274–95CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Cf. also Gow, Red Jews, chap. 6.5. As a further explanation, Gow suggests that the biblical criticism of the Reformers may have contributed to the diminishing currency of the myth of the Red Jews.

144. At that time, the legend of the Red Jews still seems to have been a vital part of Jewish popular culture in Germany, as the work of Augusti suggests; cf. above, note 105.

145. Cf. Zfatman, Ha-siporet be-yidish, 166, no. 173 and 174; Rivkind, “Historical Allegory,” 9–10, and above, note 68. The edition Lemberg (1839) seems to have been reprinted in the 1850s; Jewish National and University Library, SO = 23V14384. Two additional editions from Lemberg—neither having been listed by Zfatman nor Rivkind—date from 1902 and 1916; Ayn sheyne und vinderlikhe geshikhte fun die royte yudilekh (Lemberg, 1902)Google Scholar, JNUL, RO = 2003A5634; Seyfer mayse gvures hashem (Lemberg, [1916])Google Scholar, JNUL, R 4 = 51 A 693. Lemberg also issued at least one Hebrew edition; Sefer ma‘ase gvurot ha-shem (Lemberg, [1916])Google Scholar, YIVO, 3/15637, that appeared in concise form as Sefer ’Akdamut (Warschau, 1902); cf. Rivkind, Megilat, 508. The title of the 1839 edition suggests that it is based on a lost Hebrew print.

146. Cf. also Hoffman, “Akdamut,” 169 n. 18. The Israel Folktale Archives in Haifa records two different versions of Ma‘ase ’Akdamut that Efraim Tzoref, who immigrated to Israel from Poland, recalled in 1958 and 1960; IFA 286 and 2208. I plan to publish my findings on the modern versions of Ma'ase ‘Akdamut elsewhere.

147. In a few cases, this phrase is translated literally as yehudim ’admonim, e.g., in the Hebrew rendering of Ma‘ase ’Akdamut, Lemberg (1916). Cf. also above, note 4. For the few exceptions in Latin translations, cf. Gow, Red Jews, 69–70.

148. Israel, Menasseh ben, The Hope of Israel: The English Translation by Moses Wall, 1652, ed. Méchoulan, Henry and Nahon, Gérard (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987)Google Scholar.

149. Cf. Yassif, “Tirgum kadmon.” See also, e.g., the versions in a collection of exempla from the seventeenth century that are written in Sephardi script, printed in Gaster, Moses, The Exempla of the Rabbis: Being a Collection of Exempla, Apologues and Tales Culled from Hebrew Manuscripts and Rare Hebrew Books (1924; repr., New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1968), no. 369Google Scholar; an Oriental manuscript from the eighteenth century, ibid., no. 445; a collection from Italy dating from 1775, printed in Ginzberg, “Haggadot ketu‘ot,” 43–45, no. 4. I thank Elisheva Schönfeld for directing me to this Gaster reference.

150. Cf., e.g., the Hebrew version from the Israel Folktale Archives, recounted by Moshe Attias in 1943 (IFA 10103); published under the title “The Miracle of Tu b'Shevat” in Ben-Amos and Noy, Folktales, 446–49.

151. Abramovitsh, S. Y., Tales of Mendele the Book Peddler: Fishke the Lame and Benjamin the Third, ed. Miron, Dan and Frieden, Ken (New York: Schocken Books, 1996), 333Google Scholar.