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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 November 2019
Yosef Ha-Kohen (1496–ca. 1575) was a Jewish Italian physician and intellectual who in 1554 published a chronicle in Hebrew titled Sefer Divrei Hayamim lemalkei Tzarfat ulemalkei Beit Otoman haTogar, or The Book of Histories of the Kings of France and of the Kings of Ottoman Turkey. It was, as its name suggests, a history told from the perspective of two nations, the French and the Turks. Ha-Kohen begins his narrative with a discussion of the legendary origins of the Franks and the history of their first royal dynasty, the Merovingians. This composition is unique among late medieval and early modern Jewish works of historiography for its universal scope, and even more so for its treatment of early medieval history. For this part of the work, Ha-Kohen relied extensively on non-Jewish works, which themselves relied on still earlier chronicles composed throughout the early Middle Ages. Ha-Kohen thus became a unique link in a long chain of chroniclers who worked and adopted Merovingian material to suit their authorial agendas. This article considers how the telling of Merovingian history was transformed in the process, especially as it was adapted for a sixteenth-century Jewish audience.
This research was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (Grant 1417/18). My sincere thanks to Yitzhak Hen, Myriam Greilsammer, Thomas J. MacMaster, and the anonymous readers for their valuable comments. All remaining errors are, of course, my own.
1 Chronicarum quae dicuntur Fredegarii scholastici, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 2 (Hanover, 1888), 3.12, pp. 97–98. An English translation of the third book may be found in Jane Ellen Woodruff, “The Historia Epitomata (Third Book) of the Chronicle of Fredegar: An Annotated Translation and Historical Analysis of Interpolated Material” (PhD diss., University of Nebraska, 1987). An English translation of the fourth book may be found in The Fourth Book of the Chronicle of Fredegar with Its Continuations, ed. and trans. J. M. Wallace–Hadrill (London, 1960). Literature on the chronicle itself is immense, although a good point of entry is Collins, Roger, Die Fredegar-Chroniken, MGH Studien und Texte 44 (Hanover, 2007)Google Scholar; Reimitz, H., History, Frankish Identity and the Framing of Western Ethnicity, 550–850 (Cambridge, 2015), 166–239CrossRefGoogle Scholar; I. N. Wood, “Fredegar's Fables,” in Historiographie im frühen Mittelalter, ed. Anton Scharer and Georg Scheibelreiter, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für österreichische Geschichtsforschung 32 (Vienna, 1994), 359–66.
2 Colette Beaune, “La rêve du roi fondateur dans l'histoire de France,” in Genèse de l'État moderne en Méditerranée: Approches historique et anthropologique des pratiques et des représentations; Actes des tables rondes internationales tenues à Paris (24–26 septembre 1987 et 18–19 mars 1988), Publications de l'École française de Rome 168 (Rome, 1993), 27–44 at 31.
3 Tours, Gregory of, Libri historiarum X, ed. Krusch, Bruno and Levison, Wilhelm, MGH SRM 1,1 (Hanover, 1951), 193–94Google Scholar [hereafter, Gregory of Tours, LH].
4 Liber historiae Francorum, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 2 (Hanover, 1888), 215–328 [hereafter, LHF]. An English translation is available in Bernard S. Bachrach, ed. and trans., Liber historiae Francorum (Lawrence, KA, 1973).
5 On this, see Richard Christopher Broome, “Approaches to Community and Otherness in the Late Merovingian and Early Carolingian Periods” (PhD diss., University of Leeds, 2014); Philipp Dörler, “The Liber historiae Francorum –– a Model for a New Frankish Self-Confidence,” Networks and Neighbours 1 (2013): 23–43; Paul Fouracre and Richard A. Gerberding, ed. and trans., Late Merovingian France: History and Historiography, 640–720 (Manchester, 1996), 79–87; Richard A. Gerberding, The Rise of the Carolingians and the Liber historiae Francorum (Oxford, 1987). Later, the LHF was conveniently appropriated by the Carolingians and used to further their own narrative ends. On this, see Yitzhak Hen, “Canvassing for Charles: The Annals of Metz in Late Carolingian Francia,” in Zwischen Niederschrift und Wiederschrift: Hagiographie und Historiographie im Spannungsfeld von Kompendienüberlieferung und Editionstechnik, ed. Richard Corradini (Vienna, 2010), 139–46.
6 See Reimitz, History.
7 See Scott G. Bruce, “The Dark Age of Herodotus: Shards of a Fugitive History in Early Medieval Europe,” Speculum 94 (2019): 47–67, which introduces the useful concept of “shards” for discussing a similar practice of repurposing elements of Herodotus in Roman and medieval historiography.
8 Einhard, Vita Karoli Magni, ed. Oswald Holder-Egger, MGH SRG 25 (Hanover, 1911), chap. 1, pp. 2–3.
9 See Yitzhak Hen, Culture and Religion in Merovingian Gaul, AD 481–751 (Leiden, 1995), 198–206.
10 Aimoin of Fleury, Gesta Francorum, ed. André Duchesne, Historiae Francorum scriptores coaetanei 3 (Paris, 1641), 1–120; repr. in PL 139, cols. 627–796.
11 Les Grandes chroniques de France, ed. Jules Viard (Paris, 1920) [hereafter, GCh].
12 Vittorio Sabino, Le vite di tutti gli Re di Francia fino alla presa del Re Francesco primo & le ragioni quali sua Maiestà pretendeva in Milano, Napoli, & Sicilia (Rome, 1525) [hereafter, Sabino, Vite].
13 For the notion of “chronicle chains” see the discussion in Ian N. Wood, “‘Chain of Chronicles’ in London BL 16974,” in Zwischen Niederschrift und Wiederschrift: Historiographie und Hagiographie im Spannungsfeld von Edition und Kompendienüberlieferung (Vienna, 2010), 76–78.
14 Flacius based his edition on Heidelberg Univ. Palat. lat. 864. On this, see Luka Ilić, “What Has Flacius to Do with Erasmus? The Biblical Humanism of Matthias Flacius Illyricus,” Colloquia Maruliana 24 (2015): 207–20.
15 Robert Bonfil, “Esiste una storiografia ebraica medioevale?,” Associazione Italiana per lo Studio del Giudaismo: Atti del Congresso IV (1987): 227–47. Robert Bonfil, “How Golden Was the Age of the Renaissance in Jewish Historiography?,” History and Theory 27 (1988): 78–102. Robert Bonfil, “Jewish Attitudes toward History and Historical Writing in Pre-Modern Times,” Jewish History 11 (1997): 7–40. For a thorough response to this approach, see Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi, “Clio and the Jews: Reflections on Jewish Historiography in the Sixteenth Century,” Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research 46–47 (1979–80), 607–38.
16 For Ha-Kohen, see Martin Jacobs, “Joseph ha-Kohen, Paolo Giovio, and Sixteenth-Century Historiography,” in Cultural Intermediaries: Jewish Intellectuals in Early-Modern Italy, ed. David B. Ruderman and Giuseppe Veltri (Philadelphia, 2004), 67–85; Martin Jacobs, “Sephardic Migration and Cultural Transfer: The Ottoman and Spanish Expansion through a Cinquecento Jewish Lens,” Journal of Early Modern History 21 (2017): 516–42; Idan Sherer, “Joseph ha-Kohen, Humanist Historiography and Military History,” Journal of Jewish Studies 69 (2018): 86–108. My thanks to Idan Sherer for allowing me an early look at this paper.
17 Yosef Ha-Kohen, Sefer Divrei Hayamim lemalkei Tzarfat ulemalkei Beit Otoman haTogar (Amsterdam, 1758) [hereafter, DH]. On Ha-Kohen in context, see the introduction in David Gross, ed., Sefer Divrei Hayamim lemalkei Tzarfat ulemalkei Beit Otoman haTogar (Jerusalem, 1955) [Hebrew]. Robert Bonfil is currently working on a new annotated edition of Divrei Hayamim. See also Moses Avigdor Shulvass, “To Which of Rabbi Joseph Hacohen's Works Had the Proof-Reader Written his ‘Continuation’?,” Zion 10 (1945): 78–79 [Hebrew]; Shlomo Simonsohn, “Joseph HaCohen in Genoa,” Italia: Studi e ricerche sulla cultura e sulla letteratura degli Ebrei d'Italia 13–15 (2001): 119–30.
18 Joseph Ha-Kohen, Sefer ‘Emek Ha-Bakha (The Vale of Tears) with the Chronicle of the Anonymous Corrector, ed. Karin Almbadh (Uppsala, 1981) [hereafter, Almbaldh, ed., Vale].
19 For an excellent treatment of Ha-Kohen's approach to his geographical works, see Limor Mintz-Manor, “The Discourse on the New World in Early Modern Jewish Culture,” (PhD diss., Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2011) [in Hebrew]. Many thanks to Limor Mintz-Manor for sending me the dissertation and for her insights.
20 On the letters, see especially David Avraham, Historion be'Searot Rucho (Beit David, 2004) [Hebrew].
21 Yosef Ha-Kohen, ep. 3, in Avraham, ed., Historion be'Searot Rucho, 33: …ובסתרי תורתנו הקדושה ידך רמה וחכמות נכריות צדוניות חתיות היו לנפשך לשפחות לרקחות ולטבחות ולאופות. ומהוד ההגיון לבשתה כובע ושריון, להקים דברי חכמים באמת ובתמים ולהלחם עם בעלי ההטעה ולגלות דופם, יעטו על שפם בבושה וכלימה, תחזירם מעורכי מלחמה, הן אלה קצות תאריך על כל אויתיך מכל החי ומכל הבשר.
22 Gross, ed., Sefer Divrei Hayamim, 3, 75–76 n. 6.
23 If indeed Ha-Kohen used Alphonso de Spina's Fortalitium fidei as a source for the Vale, as argued by Gross, ed., Sefer Divrei Hayamim, 22, it is reasonable to assume that he encountered it in Latin, although it was composed to be used by preachers, and sections of it undoubtedly would have been translated into a vernacular. My gratitude to Yosi Yisraeli for his insight on this.
24 Gross, ed., Sefer Divrei Hayamim, 93 n. 8.
25 On Ha-Kohen's “slavish” adherence to his sources, see Almbaldh, ed., Vale, 13.
26 On this passage, see The Josippon (Josephus Gorionides), ed. and trans. David Flusser, 2 vols. (Jerusalem, 2009) [Hebrew], 3–4; David Flusser, “Josippon, a Medieval Hebrew Version of Josephus,” in Josephus, Judaism, and Christianity, ed. Louis H. Feldman and Gohei Hata (Detroit, 1987), 386–97. See also the work of Saskia Dönitz in such essays as “Historiography among Byzantine Jews –– the Case of Sefer Yosippon,” in Jews in Byzantium: Dialectics of Minority and Majority Cultures, ed. Robert Bonfil et al. (Leiden, 2012), 953–70; “Sefer Yosippon (Josippon),” in A Companion to Yosefus, ed. Honora Howell Chapman and Zuleika Rodgers (Oxford, 2016), 382–89.
27 Almbaldh, ed., Vale, 23.
28 See for instance the genealogy found in the Excerpta Latina Barbari. See An Alexandrian World Chronicle, ed. and trans. Benjamin Garstad, Dumbarton Oaks Medieval Library 14 (Cambridge, MA, 2012), c. 2, pp. 148–66. For an alternative vision of Frankish kingship, see Catalogi regum Francorum praetermissi, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 7 (Hanover, 1920), 850–55. On both documents, see Helmut Reimitz, “Pax inter utramque gentem: The Merovingians, Byzantium and the History of Frankish Identity,” in East and West in the Early Middle Ages: The Merovingian Kingdoms in Mediterranean Perspective, ed. Stefan Esders et al. (Cambridge, 2019), 45–63. On geography as a tool of Christian historiography, see A. H. Merrills, History and Geography in Late Antiquity (Cambridge, 2005).
29 The foundational work on Fredegar and the Trojans is František Graus, “Troja und trojanische Herkunftssage im Mittelalter” in Kontinuität und Transformation der Antike im Mittelalter, ed. Willi Erzgräber (Sigmaringen, 1989), 25–43. See also N. Kıvılcım Yavuz, “Transmission and Adaptation of the Trojan Narrative in Frankish History between the Sixth and Tenth Centuries,” (PhD diss., University of Leeds, 2015); Thomas J. MacMaster, “The Origin of Origins: Trojans, Turks, and the Birth of the Myth of Trojan Origins in the Medieval World,” Atlantide 2 (2014): 1–12. On usage in late medieval historiography, see Colette Beaune, “L'utilisation politique du mythe des origines troyennes en France à la fin du Moyen Âge,” in Lectures médiévales de Virgile: Actes du colloque de Rome (25–28 octobre 1982) (Rome, 1985), 331–55. On Jewish usage, see Ram Ben-Shalom, “The Myths of Troy and Hercules as Reflected in the Writings of Some Jewish Exiles from Spain,” in Jews, Muslims and Christians in and around the Crown of Aragon: Essays in Honour of Professor Elena Lurie, ed. Harvey J. Hames (Leiden, 2004), 229–54. For exhaustive literature on the Trojan myth, see Hen, “Canvassing for Charles,” 125 n. 31.
30 Gross, ed., Sefer Divrei Hayamim, 100 n. 61.
31 While much of the work was indeed done by Primat in the late thirteenth century, the version of the Grandes chroniques Ha-Kohen used would likely have been based on fifteenth-century manuscripts, which is why I refer to it as the Grandes chroniques and not the Roman des rois.
32 For the relationship between the Grandes chroniques and the Gesta Francorum, see Karl Ferdinand Werner, “Die literarischen Vorbilder des Aimoin von Fleury,” in Medium Aevum Vivum: Festschrift für Walther Bulst, ed. Hans Robert Jauss and Dieter Schaller (Heidelberg, 1960), 69–103; Gabrielle M. Spiegel, The Chronicle Tradition of Saint-Denis: A Survey (Brookline, 1978).
33 Anne D. Hedeman, The Royal Image: Illustrations of the Grandes Chroniques de France, 1274–1422 (Berkeley, 1991), 2–3. See also Bernard Guenée, Comment on écrit l'histoire au XIIIe siècle: Primat et le Roman des roys (Paris, 2016).
34 DH 1: ומארקומירו איש גיבור חיל ויתנוהו עליהם כרועה, ויכבדוהו מאד וימליכוהו עליהם כי אמרו לו נאה למלוך כי מזרע פריאמו מלך טרויא הוא.
35 The duces Marcomir, Sunno, and Genobaudes are already mentioned in Gregory of Tours, LH II.9, pp. 52–58, himself quoting Sulpicius Alexander.
36 LHF 4, p. 244.
37 As indeed does Gregory, LH II.9, p. 58: “De huius stirpe quidam Merovechum regem fuisse adserunt, cuius fuit filius Childericus.”
38 See Ian N. Wood, “Deconstructing the Merovingian Family,” in The Construction of Communities in the Early Middle Ages: Texts, Resources and Artefacts, ed. Richard Corradini, Maximilian Diesenberger, and Helmut Reimitz (Leiden, 2003), 149–71; Ian N. Wood, “Defining the Franks: Frankish Origins in Early Medieval Historiography,” in From Roman Provinces to Medieval Kingdoms, ed. Thomas F. X. Noble (New York, 2006), 110–19; Alexander Callander Murray, “Post vocantur Merohingii: Fredegar, Merovech, and ‘Sacral Kingship,’” in After Rome's Fall: Narrators and Sources of Early Medieval History (Toronto, 1998), 121–52.
39 Only in the LHF’s A-class of manuscripts. The B-class ignores the matter altogether. LHF A, chap. 5: “Chlodione rege defuncto, Merovechus de genere eius regnum eius accepit”; LHF B: “Meroveus regnum sublimatus est.”
40 GCh 1.4: “Quand li roi Chlodio out regné XX anz, il paia le treü de nature. Après lui regna Merovées. Cil Merovées ne fu pas ses fiuz, mais il fu de son lignage. De cetui eissi la premiere generation des rois de France….” Note that the editor (26 n.4) remarks that this was not information gleaned from Aimoin and was therefore an addition made by the author of the GCh. On this, see Justin Lake, “Rewriting Merovingian History in the Tenth Century: Aimoin of Fleury's Gesta Francorum,” Early Medieval History 25 (2017): 489–525, at 503. According to Lake, affinis is meant here not as son-in-law, but more generally as kinsman.
41 Robert Bonfil, “Riflessioni sulla storiografia ebraica in Italia nel cinquecento,” in Italia Judaica 2 (Rome, 1986), 56–66 at 58.
42 Eric W. Cochrane, Historians and Historiography in the Italian Renaissance (Chicago, 1981), 342.
43 Sabino, Vite, p. 1: “Volendo scrivere come & sotto quali Re sia venuto in tanta riputatione el grande & richissimo Regno di Francia, par quasi necessario prima raccontare, donde havessi origine, della quale ne referiro quello che dicono per la magior parte gli antichi scrittori.”
44 Martin Jacobs, Islamische Geschichte in jüdischen Chroniken: Hebräische Historiographie des 16. und 17. Jahrhunderts, Texts and Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Judaism 18 (Tübingen, 2004), 99. See also D. Abulafia, ed., The French Descent into Renaissance Italy, 1494–95: Antecedents and Effects (London, 1995).
45 Philippe Desan, “Nationalism and History in France during the Renaissance,” Rinascimento 24 (1984): 261–88.
46 Sabino, Vite, p. 2: “Clodio … mori senza lasciare di se alchun figliuolo legittimo, hauendo regnato uenti anni. In luogo suo fu fatto re, Meroveo, della medesima famiglia. …” For the wording of the GCh, see above.
47 DH 1, ובנים לא היו לו. וימלוך עשרים שנה וימות. וימלוך תחתיו מירוביאו ממשפחתו. All translations from Hebrew are my own.
48 Jacky Kessous, “La ‘Chronique’ de Joseph Ha-Cohen,” Archives Juives 13 (1977): 45–53; Bonfil, “Riflessioni,” 58.
49 DH 1: וישכב מירוביאו עם אבותיו וימלוך קילדריקו בנו תחתיו. ויגבה לבו מאד ובכל אשר פנה הרשיע ויגרשוהו העמים מאנו שמוע אליו. ויהי לימים עוד וישוב אל ערי מלכותו.
50 DH 1: … וישכב עם אבותיו וימלוך קלודוביאו בנו תחתיו. הוא קלודוביאו אשר כבש את הרימי ואת האישבישי. ויתנם למס עובד. וגם עם האשכנזים נלחם קלודוביאו ויפלו תחת רגליו. ותהי איתו רוח אחרת ויעזוב את אלוהיו. ויטבלהו רימיניו רימינשי ההגמון. ויאסוף אנשי חיל וילחם עם הבורגוניוני ועם האיקואיוטאני ועם הגו״טי וימחצם ויפלו תחת רגליו.
51 Vita Genovefae virginis Parisiensis, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 3 (Hanover, 1894), 204–38, at chap. 26, 226. On Genovefa, see Martin Heinzelmann and Joseph-Claude Poulin, eds., Les vies anciennes de Saints Geneviève de Paris (Paris, 1986); Lisa M. Bitel, Landscape with Two Saints: How Genovefa of Paris and Brigit of Kildare Built Christianity in Barbarian Europe (Oxford, 2009), 51–71.
52 Guy Halsall, “Childeric's Grave, Clovis’ Succession, and the Origins of the Merovingian Kingdom,” Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul, ed. Ralph W. Mathisen and Danuta Shanzer (New York, 2001), 130–47.
53 Here he again follows Sabino closely. Sabino, Vite, 2: “successo a Meroveo Childerico suo figlioulo, e quale per la superbia fu scacciato da populi, & e poi restituto nel regno….”
54 On Childeric and his tomb, see Dieter Quast, ed., Das Grab des fränkischen Königs Childerich in Tournai und die Anastasis Childerici von Jean-Jacques Chifflet aus dem Jahre 1655, Monographien des römisch-germanischen Zentralmuseums 129 (Mainz, 2015).
55 For the treatment of Clovis in late medieval French historiography, see Colette Beaune, The Birth of An Ideology: Myths and Symbols of Nation in Late-Medieval France, trans. Susan Ross Huston (Berkeley, 1991), 70-89.
56 ׳ותהי איתו רוח אחרת ויעזוב את אלוהיו׳. For the rationale behind this translation, see below. The hermeneutical space afforded by this phrase is quite large. It was likely influenced by Numbers 14:24, although its meaning is far from obvious. Though rabbinical thought has often seen it as a positive phrase, this was hardly unanimous. Or Hakhayim Hakadosh, an eighteenth-century Moroccan exegete, regarded רוח אחרת as an evil urge or temptation, a reading likely shared by Ha-Kohen. My thanks to Ari Geiger for this insight.
57 Sabino, Vite, 2–3: “Clodoveo …, auendo uinto i Todeschi in una dubiosa battaglia, si fece batezare da Remigio uescouo Remense, & fu unto con olio portato di cielo da una columba, si come alchuni scriuono. Donde e nata la solennita che li Re di Francia, quando pigliono li ornamenti reali, si ungino con quello medemiso olio. Cosi essendo unto Clodoveo & fatto Christiano domo li Borgognioni, li Aquitani, & li Gotti.”
58 Hincmar of Reims, Vita Remigii episcopi Remensis, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 3 (Hanover, 1896), 239–341; GCh I. 20, pp. 72–73.
59 See, for instance, BT Pesachim, 66 b.
60 Chlodio: ויכבוש את הטורינגי, ואת הטוראסינשי, ואת הקאמבראסינשי, וישימם למס עובד; Merovech: וילחום בעד הרומיים עם האונגארי ועם הגוטי ימים רבים; Childeric: וילחם עם גילוני רומיי רועה האשוישיאוני וינגפו אנשי דרומיי וינוסו מפניו: וגם את האוריליאנשי ואת האגדיגאבי כבש קילדריקו ויתנם למס עובד; Clovis: כבש את הרימי ואת האישבישי ויתנם למס עובד: וגם עם האשכנזים נלחם קלודוביאו ויפלו תחת רגליו … ויאסוף אנשי חיל וילחם עם הבורגוניוני ועם האיקויטאני ועם הגוטי וימחצם ויפלו תחת רגליו. The name of Childeric's enemy Aegidius is corrupted in the GCh as Gilon and in Sabino as Gillone, providing further evidence of influence.
61 DH 2: ויחלק מלכותו לארבעת בניו וילחמו ביניהם: וימותו מהם במלחמה ומהם כלה הזמן, לא נשאר מהם כי אם אחד.
62 Ian N. Wood, The Merovingian Kingdoms, 450–751 (London, 1994), 149.
63 Sabino, Vite, 3: “Successegli [Chariberto] Dagoberto fratello da parte di madre, el quale edificio il tempoi di Santo Dionysio, dove il primo Re di Francia fu sepulto.”
64 Stefan Esders, “The Prophesied Rule of a ‘Circumcised People’: A Travelling Tradition from the Seventh-Century Mediterranean,” in Barbarians and Jews: Jews and Judaism in the Early Medieval West, ed. Yitzhak Hen and Thomas F. X. Noble (Turnhout, 2018), 119–54.
65 Doctrina Iacobi nuper baptizati, ed. and trans. Vincent Déroche, Travaux et Mémoires 11 (Paris, 1991), 69–219.
66 The Life of Muhammad: A Translation of Isḥāq's Sīrat Rasūl Allāh, ed. and trans. Alfred Guillaume (Oxford, 1955), 1561, p. 654. See also mentions in Continuatio Byzantia Arabica a. DCCLXI 12 and Continuatio Hispana a. DCCLIV 6, both in MGH AA 11, ed. Theodor Mommsen (Berlin, 1894), 336–37. See treatment in Esders, “Prophesied Rule.”
67 See also Thomas J. MacMaster, “The Pogrom that Time Forgot: The Ecumenical anti-Jewish Campaign of 632 and Its Impact,” in Inclusion and Exclusion in Mediterranean Christianities, 400–800, ed. Yaniv Fox and Erica Buchberger (Turnhout, 2019), pp. 217–235.
68 Diesenberger, Maximilian, “Hair, Sacrality and Symbolic Capital in the Frankish Kingdoms,” in The Construction of Communities in the Early Middle Ages: Texts, Resources and Artefacts, ed. Corradini, Richard, Diesenberger, Maximilian, and Reimitz, Helmut (Leiden and Boston, 2003), 173–212Google Scholar at 202.
69 Gesta Dagoberti I. regis Francorum, ed. Bruno Krusch, MGH SRM 2 (Hanover, 1888), at chap. 24, 409: “Cum autem esset Eraclius imperator litteris nimium eruditus, peritissimus ad ultimum astrologus efficitur. Qui cognoscens in siderum signis, quod a circumcisis gentibus divino nutu eius imperium esset vastandum, ad Dagobertum regem Francorum dirigit, petens, ut omnes Iudaeos regni sui secundum fidem catholicam baptizari praeciperet. Rex vero Dagobertus hac occasione nactus et Dei zelo ductus, cum consilio pontificum atque sapientium virorum omnes Iudaeos, qui regenerationem sacri baptismatis suscipere noluerunt, protinus a finibus regni sui pellere iussit.”
70 The other humanist source identified by Bonfil –– Paolo Emilio's De rebus gestis Francorum –– contains the Heraclius-Dagobert story and all of its major components, but its syntax and structure are very different from the one found in either the Grandes chroniques or Divrei Hayamim: “Sunt qui ferant eosdem legatos verbis Heraclii retulisse metum ingentem impendere Christianis imperiis a gente circuncisa: quicquid eorum hominum in Gallia esset, cogendos effici Christianos. In Gallia, & cæteris ab Asia magno intervallo disiunctis regionibus, Iudæorum vetus mos cognoscebatur: Mahumetis vero Saracenorumque gliscens circumcisio ignorabatur: cuius vim Christianis formidandam, fortes, an magicae vanitates, an Mathematici per ambages Heraclio cecinisse feruntur: qui sibi etiam a Saracenis, sed alio, reor, consilio caverat.” On Paolo Emilio's work, see Katharine Davies, “Late XVth Century French Historiography, as Exemplified in the Compendium of Robert Gaguin and the De Rebus Gestis of Paulus Aemilius,” (PhD diss., University of Edinburgh, 1954), esp. 159–255. On Emilio's use of Gregory of Tours, see Maike Priesterjahn, “Zurück zu den Quellen: Gregor von Tours als Autorität für die französische Historiographie um 1500,” Acta Conventus Neo-Latini Vindobonensis 16 (2018): 549–58.
71 Fredegar IV.65, p. 153: “Cum esset litteris nimius aeruditus, astralogus effecetur; per quod cernens a circumcisis gentibus divino noto emperium esse vastandum, legationem ad Dagobertum regem Francorum dirigens, petens ut omnes Iudeos regni sui ad fidem catolecam baptizandum preciperit. Quod protenus Dagobertus emplevit. Aeraglius per omnes provincias emperiae talem idemque facere decrevit….”
72 Aimoin, Gesta Francorum IV.22, col. 783: “Cumque litteraris abunde esset instructus, ad ultimum astrologus efficitur. Agnoscens itaque in signis siderum, imperium suum a circumcisa gente vastandum, et autumans id de Judaeis fuisse praemonstratum, per inter nuntios Dagobertum rogavit regem Francorum, et cunctos Judaiae stirpis, qui in provinciis illi subjectis manebant, Christianos fieri praeciperet; eos vero qui nollent aut exsilio aut morte damnari. Quod Dagobertus volens effecit, omnes qui noluerunt baptisma suscipere procul a finibus eliminans Franciae.”
73 GCh X: “Et pour ce que il estoit granz clercs et de parfonde lettreure, devint-il au derannier astronomiens. Bien cognut par les signes des estoiles que ses empire devoit estre essilliez par un pople circoncis, et pour ce que il cuida que ce deust estre par les Juis, proia-il par ses messages Dagobert, le roi de France, que il feist baptizier les Juis de touts les provinces de son royaume, et que tuit cil qui ce refuseroient fussent dampné par essil. Ensi le fist li roi Dagoberz, car tuit cil qui baptesme ne vorent recevoir furent essillié et chacié dou roiyaume de France.”
74 On Heraclius as a scoundrel in Jewish writings, see below.
75 DH 2: ויתחכם איראקליאו בחכמת המזלות מאד וירא בחכמתו את מלכות רומי נופל בימיו תחת כפות רגלי הנימולים: ויאמר הבליעל בלבבו לא יחפוץ האלוהים לעשות היקר הזה כי אם אל היהודים כי מולים הם: ויחר אפו עליהם ויצו בכל ערי מלכותו להמית את כל היהודים אשר ימאנו להמיר את כבודם לשוב מאחרי ה׳: ומלאכים שלח אל דאגובירטו מלך צרפת לעשות גם הוא כדבר הרע הזה וישמע אליו דאגובירטו ורבים המירו את כבודם. ורבים הוכו לפי חרב בצרפת בימים ההם.
76 For the text of Sefer Zerubbabel, see Lévi, Israel, “L'apocalypse de Zorobabel et le roi de Perse Siroès,” Revue des études juives 68 (1914): 129–60Google Scholar.
77 Lévi, “L'apocalypse,” 136, n. 8: והיא תהיה ראש לכל עבודה זרה, although this phrase appears only in the D recension (Bodleian MS Heb. fol. 27 [formerly 2642], edited by Wertheimer). See Wout Jac van Bekkum, “Jewish Messianic Expectations in the Age of Heraclius,” in The Reign of Heraclius (610–641): Crisis and Confrontation, ed. Gerrit J. Reinink and Bernard H. Stolte (Leuven, 2002), 95–112, at 109, which echoes the arguments of Lévi, and (albeit in a more reserved manner), Speck, Paul, “The Apocalypse of Zerubbabel and Christian Icons,” Jewish Studies Quarterly 4 (1997): 183–90Google Scholar. Armilos also makes an appearance in the Doctrina Iacobi nuper baptizati. On this, see Reeves, John C., Trajectories in Near Eastern Apocalyptic: A Postrabbinic Jewish Apocalypse Reader (Atlanta, 2005), 19Google Scholar, 59.
78 See Yerushalmi, Yosef Hayim, “Messianic Impulses in Joseph Ha-Kohen,” in Jewish Thought in the Sixteenth Century, ed. Dov Cooperman, Bernard (Cambridge, MA, 1983), 460–87Google Scholar.
79 DH 2: ויגבה לב טיאודוריקו מאד ויאמרו הצרפתים מה זאת עשינו כי משחנו למלך את הנבל הזה עלינו ויקשרו עליו קשר ויגרשוהו מאתם.
80 On the treatment of this event in early medieval hagiography and chronicle, see Kreiner, Jamie, The Social Life of Hagiography in the Merovingian Kingdom (Cambridge, 2014), 77–79CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
81 On the monastic incarceration of Theuderic III see Jong, M. de, “Monastic Prisoners or Opting Out? Political Coercion and Honour in the Frankish Kingdoms,” in Topographies of Power in the Early Middle Ages, ed. de Jong, Mayke and Theuws, Frans (Leiden, 2001), 291–328Google Scholar at 318–22.
82 DH 2: וימלוך קלודוביאו בנו הבכור תחתיו: ושלוש שנים מלך קלודוביאו ובנים לא היו לא וישכב עם אבותיו וימלוך תחתיו אחיו קידילבירטו ימים אחדים: וישכב קידילבירטו בראשית מלכותו עם אבותיו וימלוך דגוברטו בנו תחתיו והוא נער קטן בעת ההיא: וימות הנער הזה מבלי חפץ: ולא הניח אחריו מכלים בארץ דבר יורש עצר.
83 LHF chap. 49–50, p. 324.
84 LHF chap. 50, p. 325: “Cedendum enim tempore, egrotante Pippino principe, genitorem eius, dum ad eum visitandum accessisset, nec mora in basilica sancti Landeberti martyris Leudico peremptus est a Rantgario gentile, filio Belial.”
85 Sabino, Vite, 3: “Manchando dunque la stirpe Regale fu eletto Re un Daniele che era Sacerdote, el quale si fece chiamare Chilperico.” The DH is a verbatim translation: ויהי כי אפס זרע המלוכה, ויבחרו השרים בדניאל, והוא כומר לאלוהיו בעת ההיא: וימליכהו עליהם למלך ויקראו שמו קילפריקו עד היום הזה.
86 DH 2: ויבחרו שרי צרפת ומארטילו הקונדישטאבלי בטיאודוריקו אשר היה בעיניהם כקדש.
87 Sabino, Vite, 3: “massime per opera di Martello fu creato Re Theodorico, quale era in grande opinione di Santita, e dicevasi essere stato allevato da certe monache appresso a Calese.”
88 DH 3: ויהי טיאודוריקו לעצלותו לנבזה בעיני העמים: וימשוך האפיפאור זאקריאה את פיפינו למלך וישוב טיאודוריקו לעבוד פסלו, כאשר בהיותו שם.
89 Jacobs, “Sephardic Migration” (n. 16 above), 523.
90 Jacobs, “Joseph ha-Kohen, Paolo Giovio” (n. 16 above), 78.