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Hello. Welcome to the new books in Jewish Studies podcast. I am your host, Ari Barvalat. Today, it is my blessing to be in dialogue with Dr.
Martina Mampieri. We will be discussing her newly published book, Living Under the Evil Pope. The Hebrew Chronicle of Pope Paul IV by Benjamin Néchimia Ben-El-Naton from Sivitanova Marché from the 16th century, published in Leiden-Neptherlins by Brill Publishers 2020. Martina Mampieri is a Martin Boober fellow at the Martin Boober Society of Fellows at Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
She is also a lecturer in the Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewelry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Martina, I am thrilled to be in dialogue with you today. Thank you very much, Ari. Thank you for the invitation to this wonderful podcast.
Thank you. I am humbled to be in your presence and I am honored to have the privilege of listening to you and learning from you in our dialogue today. Thank you so much. Thank you.
It is my pleasure. To begin, can you tell us about your scholarly and educational background? How have your intellectual experiences and international experiences abroad shaped your academic career and your publications? Yeah, so I was born in Nier-Rome.
Then I studied all my life in Italy until 25 when I did my PhD. And so first of all, I studied history of religions where the particular focus on Judaism at the Sivianza University in Rome. And then I did a double PhD at the University of Rome-Trey and the University of Hamburg where I wrote my dissertation. So after that, I tried it quite a lot.
So I left Germany. I got several post-doc positions. And first in Israel for six months in 2018, then I was collaborating on another project in Paris. And then I got two additional post-docs, one at Harvard at the Center for Jewish Studies in 2019.
And then in 1920, I was in the Lichtembert colleague in Göttingen in Germany. And then in 2020, I returned to Israel thanks to the Martin Pupod Fellowship where I'm currently at the Hebrew University. So yeah, my, I would say that this international background really helped me to learn many languages and to enhance my career as a scholar, as a historian, reading manuscripts in different languages, and also text secondary sources for archival for archival research and for writing. So comparing the sources and then writing the actual writing of scholarly articles and this book.
In what ways does your book build on previous scholarship on 16th century Jewish history? Which studies of this period have inspired you? Which historians were your primary influences? And which of them inspired you to prepare this book?
Well, I must say that I started when I was preparing my proposal for a PhD program in Rome. I was released by a note by Josef Jaime Ruschálmy, Záchor, Jewish History and Jewish Memory, which was published in 1982. Because he wrote in a note that there was, you know, I was very interested in historical writing. So in the writing of history and Jewish historiography in between the Middle Ages and the early modern period, because my master thesis was about the historical writing of the Zephyrio Chassin by a Branza Guto.
So I was really intrigued by the relations, the importance of history and for Jews and what kind of importance had historical writing for Jewish people in the era of exile. So during the diaspora and after this portion, in particular after the expulsion of 1492 from the Iberian Peninsula. So I was really looking at Yom Shálmy's note and I found just in a very brief footnote from this book published in 1982, which Yom Shálmy wrote note down that there was this certain chronicle that Yom Shálmy's meaning shall appear to be followed by the E. So this chronicle of Paul Paul IV that was investigated by Isaiah Zona in 1930.
But after that, no one really wrote about it. So I started the very first thing I did when I when I found this note was to look at Zona's work. And so I found out that so is that it was a Galician's color from was born in 1887. And then he wrote this, he published this this chronicle 1930 for the very first time in Tábiz.
And then in several parts, and then 1954, he republished the full manuscript and then form a sadhb alic as a book. So I was really trying to understand where Zona found this chronicle, why this chronicle was important and why the chronicle was never studied by anyone before Zona. So in his introduction Zona wrote that he had found this chronicle, this manuscript, and probably around August 1930. But he didn't say a word about how he found the chronicle, where he found the manuscript, if he tried to buy the manuscript, if someone else had give them, give him the permission to look at the manuscript, he only said that he had the manuscript in his hands for a couple of hours.
And then he decided to copy the manuscript very in a very quick way. And then he had the permission to publish the chronicle the manuscript as it was. So basically what Zona did was to provide an introduction to this manuscript, and then he published it in Hebrew with some footnotes, some historical footnotes about the content. So I would say that, yeah, Yungshan, me and Zona were the first two studies I look at to, you know, pose the, to build the the fundamental for my research, my PhD dissertation and then my first look.
Can you describe his contributions to Jewish studies? Yeah, so I was a scholar, as I said, was from Galicia, and it was immigrated to Italy in the 1910s to study at the rabbinical college of Italy, so in Florence, like many other Galician people, he got some funding to learn and obtain his rabbinical degree in Florence. Then for several times, for several years, he lived in Italy, and he, it was a very, it was an expert polyographer and bibliographer, much more expert than anyone else in Italy. So that's why it was charged by the Union of the Italian Jewish communities to prepare a catalog of the materials like bibliographical materials, manuscripts, early printed books, but also get bought and the bographical materials from the local, from the Jewish community of Italy.
So he had to prepare this catalog and to assess the situation of the, all the libraries in all over Italy, including the colonies, Italian colonies in the Aegean Sea, but this project never saw the light of the day. So this project in the end didn't go anywhere, but Zona was still a very important figure for Italian Jewish studies. And of course, because, so he, so let's say that for 20 years, he lived in Italy. And then in 1936, it was nominated director of the Italian rabbinical college on the island of Rhodes was a colony which was a colony of Italian kingdom back then.
So it was the director for this college for two years until 1938 when the race laws were enacted. So because it was Italian, it was not Italian, but he lived in Italy. And so he was forced to live also roads, which was a colony of Italy so technically was Italy. So he left and he went to Jerusalem for a very short time before he was then invited by the Hebrew and college and Cincinnati to join them to join the college as a refugees color problem in the refugees color program that was established by the Hebrew and college.
So it's only moved into to the US 1940 and it was the librarian who was the curator of the Jewish studies collection. And he was also a lecturer for a long time and then he died 1960. So I think it's impossible to describe now the importance of Zona and his contribution to the Jewish studies to Jewish studies. In some minutes, because I'm actually preparing a book about him and about his involvement and the development of the field of the history of Jewish printing and the history of the Jewish book and between Europe and Palestine as well and the US.
So yeah, but he was a very, it was a major scholar very neglected for many reasons that I will investigate in the book and the second book, but he was a major scholar and enjoy studies. So I really hope I will be able to shed new light and reappraise his contribution his figure and contribution to Jewish studies. Can you tell us about how you went about researching and writing this book? Can you tell us about your experiences conducting archival research?
Can you tell us about your historical methodology? Yeah. So, you know, when we, when I started, I first did a proposal and then the proposal was accepted. The very first thing I did was to look at Zona's work.
So I really look at the text of the this chronicle, and I wanted to make sure that this chronicle was not a forged manuscript, because basically it's only published. So in his edition from 1930, he published a manuscript that was that is today at the National Library of Israel. It's an only copy existing in the world, at least that we know. So, and it's a manuscript from the 19th century.
So this was a problem for me because, you know, we took the content of the chronicle is about Paul IV, and it's about it was written by some money lender in 1559 immediately after death of the pope. And the very first question I asked myself was, is this manuscript authentic? Is this a forged manuscript? So to understand that I really had to look at the text and check if the content was whether the content was reliable or not.
And to verify that I had to, of course, look for any, any relevant studies that were written about the pontificate of Paul IV and the Jews in the state of the church during this time during this pontificate, but I also need to do, I had to do archival research to verify the contents, because Zona didn't have access to the archives, and to the same materials I had to look at during my research. So basically my research was about the life of the Jews and the Chivitanamake and in the region of Makke. So at large in the state of the church, and then of course our covered research also entailed any kinds of sources about Paul IV, his life, his pontificate, his decrees, laws, all other cardinals and other people working for him in the papal court. And then of course the general situation of Italy and other things that are mentioned by the chronicler and his account.
So basically my main, so I travel a lot and I had lots of fun in the archives, both in Italy and also in the US and in Israel. So I would say to summarize I would say that in Israel I went to look at I went to the archives of the American Jewish archive and went to the American Jewish archives at the Hebrew and college to look at the Zona's archival correspondence. So Zona's archives and all the papers and private correspondence that is held in his papers to try and understand where Zona found the manuscript and the same in Israel because it's archives displayed, between Israel, national library of Israel and American Jewish archives. And then all my main archives initially were of course the idea, the local archives of Chivitanamake where the author of the Chronicle lived and the state archives around Chivitanamake, the most important cities around Chivitanamake and all the sources from Rome.
So the state archives of Rome and the capital archives, so the city hall archives of Rome and all the archives related to the Inquisition. So the Roman Inquisition archives and the archive, the secret Vatican archives today, they changed their name so they're called apostolic Vatican archives, but when I was doing my research they were called secret Vatican archives and the Vatican Library. Yeah, so that's, that was my, that was part of my trips. And of course, you know, when you do work, have a research and you want to also compare the sources with other edited volumes, edited volumes about other sources.
So I travel a lot, I visit lots of libraries and I have lots of fun during my PhD. Yeah. Can you summarize your book for us. What are the primary themes, what message does your research convey.
Yeah, so the book is divided into three main parts. So the first part is about pull the fourth and the historical context to understand the pontificate of all the fourth was Pope for four years and something, but it did lots of things, especially against the Jews. So the very first part is looking at the center and the periphery of the state of the church during this time. And also how the, you know, the Jewish community of chibit and all of the structured because we didn't have anything to look at before I started my PhD.
There were no studies about chibit and all and the Jewish community in chibit and all of us really had to look at the sources from the archives to have an idea of how the Jews were living who were the Jews were living there. What kind of relations that were between Jews and Christians in the city in the from the 15th century to the 16th century, when the Jewish community was active. And the first part was to look more specifically at the author. So Benjamin Benjamin or Benjamin, who in Italian is called a really young model yodato.
And so I was really looking at trying to figure out who was him, who was his, where was his family what kind of readings he had read in his life, what kind of sources he looked at to write this article. And then also I have some, I had a chapter about the historical, in analysis, let's say about the way he wrote history and the comparison with other sources from the same time from Jewish history, since the 6th century Jewish And also a close up on the genre of this text, why this text, I think needs to be asked to be read, you know, as a story of a miracle and a story of salvation. And as a story of Purim, because there are several elements in the book that really guide us in that direction to read the story called as a miracle and as, you know, as the performance of a miracle. And that's that many, many references to Purim and Aman and Esther Mordechai and in the chronicle.
The third part is the text itself. So, when I had when I started the PhD, again, I we only had the Hebrew text by zone by zone 9 1930. We didn't have any sources in English about that I found in the very beginning I found very, very short translations of one passage two passages of this chronicle in Italian. But there weren't many studies about it.
So I really had, I decided to translate the chronicle for the very first time into English to make the chronicle accessible understandable readable, not only by scholars, but also students, because I think this book has to be read and studied by people, students who try, I mean, we study, we learn, students who learn about the Renaissance, and the history of Jews and Christians in the state of the church, and in general by the state of the church in particular in the 16th century. So, yeah, so it's an at the end of the book with them. So I did a parallel translation of Hebrew and English. And at the end of the book, I also provided a facsimile edition of the manuscript with thanks to the National Library of Israel, because the manuscript is held there.
Yeah. Thank you. Can you explain the image on your books front cover? Yeah, so the images, you know, not only was engraving or popo de force, and you can see the pope with this finger going up.
And yeah, this engraving can be found in a biography of Paul de force, the divita pali guarti that was also by Antonio Caraccio, who was a biographer of the pope, and was also a 13 monk. And this this specific copy was printed in Coon, and then I think 1612, but in the early 17th century. And yeah, this specific image comes from the Notre Dame University Library in Indiana. And they had this amazing copy and they I'm really thankful for the permission to have you on my cover.
Yeah. What can you tell us about the life and biography of Benjamin Nhemya Ben El-Natan? What were the formative events in his life? What is known as his family, his childhood, and his early adulthood?
Yeah, so it's a very interesting person, I would say. I'm fortunate we don't have much information about his life and his childhood. And we have something about his family. So the archival research really helped me to have some information, very basic information about the family, and about his father was in Natan Ben El-Nhemya Ben El-Nhemya.
So he was probably a tailor, or he had a workshop where he was also a seller. Sometimes, you know, when you wear a money lender, you were often also a merchant, or you wear a tailor, or you did some other things in the city. So we have information about, we have evidence in the archives of his father, probably coming to the city was not a native of Chivitanova, but he relocated to, with his family to Chivitanova probably in 1541. And from the Kingdom of Naples, so imagine that Marque, so the region Marque is really a border, a very important, very important, very strategic, as a very important strategic position in between the state of the church and the Kingdom of Naples.
So many Jews in 1540 and 1541, they were expelled from the Kingdom of Naples, and they went north. So when they stopped in the north, they really stopped in the border, so the lower border of the state of the church. And then they were expelled from the Kingdom of Naples, which was essentially ruled by the King of Spain. So imagine that the expulsion from Spain, from Castile and Aragon in 1492, lots of Jews went to Italy.
And most of them, they settled in the Kingdom of Naples, or they went to North Africa, they went to the Ottoman Empire, they went to do all over the places, but I would say many of them settled in Italy, especially in Nancona, in Ferrara, where the where communities, where the Lord of the cities were very welcoming, and they were favorable conditions for trade. So we have also, as I said, lots of Jews were in the Kingdom of Naples. So these people 1541, 1540, 1541, they were expelled, because the Kingdom of Naples was pain, and they expelled all the Jews. So also from there they were forced to to relocate and they were located in the market.
So we have information that the family or the author was coming from the south. And we settled there probably 1541 42 because they bought a house and we have evidence of that from the archives, from the regional sources from Sri was doing his business and he was also merchant. And we also have evidence that he prepared, he created some windows with some linen and cotton for the city council of the city in the sixth century. It was very appreciated.
So we know that this person was someone that the city council Christian people trusted him to prepare the windows of the city council. And we have, I also found evidence of their mother was a certain as me, and I found the testament of her, where she was. Of course the testament follows lots of formulas standard formulas as being legal documents, and then there are several donations that the woman wanted to give to people and to the orphans to virgins and Jewish people, Jewish communities, so lots of money. And there's also mention of a girl who is was the daughter of some way so our granddaughter.
So we have some information also about Benjamin's wife, was also a certain woman named Stella, but we don't have it we don't know really exactly what she was doing. And so we live when they when they got married if they had any children, it is very difficult to track these people down in the Christian archives because there were several people named Guillermo. So we don't really know who this person was, and how many Guillermo wearing the city, there were probably several Guillermo Benjamin living in the inch of it on all during that time so it's quite difficult to understand about this again a childhood we don't know. And I did find some evidence of him reading books, and so I, as far as I remember, there were several documents about a possession of books and bibles and interest in several, in several kinds of books but I think no more than bibles or liturgical books.
So yeah, we don't we the most the only thing we know about him are in the Chronicle. So, you know, we know that this man was a money lender, and he was working for other money lenders it was also representative of the community as a partner. So he was one of the most important people in the Jewish community of Chivitana, because his name is everywhere in the notarial records of the city. And we know that at some point in 1559 he was arrested with several accusations that we will talk about it I think.
What was the relationship between the Roman Inquisition and the Spanish Inquisition. Can you explain this to listeners who may not have background to contextualize the events documented in your research. Yeah, so we mentioned that they were to the Roman Inquisition and the Spanish Inquisition were two distinct, you know, institutions. So the Spanish Inquisition was created at the end of the 15th century in Spain for so 1478 for a very specific purpose that was to verify the identity of Jews and so, so Jewish people who converted to Christianity and what is cause so that Muslim people who converted to Christianity and to understand whether these people were really Christians Catholics observing the Catholic faith, or whether they were just, they went back to their religion so the Spanish Inquisition looking at these people and make sure that these people were Catholic and they were following Catholicism.
And of course was punishing, you know, the people were not following Catholicism as hertics. So we, it is clear what is what was clear by back then to people who was an erratic and why was considered erratic. And the Roman Inquisition was of course also targeting hertics and it was established to combat heresy, but from a very different perspective. So we know that, you know, the the Roman Inquisition was first of all was establishing 1542 with the ball each at a minute so a bipolar third and pulled the fourth also so that the bad, the evil pope that I talk about the I wrote about in my book back then it was the head of the Inquisition it was a cardinal it was not pope yet.
It was the cardinal and it was the head of Inquisition and it was one of the most loyal consulars of the third. So it was really pushing for the establishment of the Roman Inquisition in Italy in Rome to persecute Lutheran ideas so the spread of the Protestant religion and to verify, you know, the correctness of ideas and beliefs in Italy. Of course, they had very different so spending the Spanish Inquisition and the Roman Inquisition had totally different mode of operation and targets because as I said, it's true that the Roman Inquisition was born to target heresy, the Protestant Lutheran heresy. And then he was also very involved into the search of converse and also in the control and persecution of Jewish beliefs that were not in line with the Catholic tradition.
So, for example, blasphemies against the name of Jesus Mary the saints that were not of course recognized by Judaism. And also despite the Catholic so they're running the Roman position targeted very, very soon books and starting with the Talmud. So Paul III, so Paul IV was back then jump here to the graph. So this cardinal headed in position was also in charge of the first public burning of the Talmud and I can't believe you're wrong in the marketplace, and which was a total disaster.
I think, yeah, I think maybe this can help to also contextualize why Paul IV when he became pope, it was a set of sessions really by the heresy and really had the inquisition at one of the various things in his life. So the very first thing it was really is battle against against conversos in an corner in 1556. Thank you for sharing. We're making every corner of Ontario safer to make all of Ontario safer.
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We've discussed many aspects of the events that you chronicle would it be okay to discuss with greater detail what happens to Benjamin you alluded to how the author, his brother and other Jews of Chivitanova were arrested by the Roman Inquisition and transferred to Rome to be imprisoned and judged there. But can you explain how this occurred? What were the events that led to their arrest? In particular, can you tell us about Giovanni Bhattista, Wona Michi and Achile Damontégio in relation to what befell Benjamin?
Yeah, so I will try to, you know, it's a very difficult story. I mean, what happened between the Jewish community, the Jews of Chivitanova against these Jews lenders. So, Giovanni Bhattista, Wona Michi, it was born, it was a Jewish nail fight, it converted to Christianity, probably in 1558. And it was previously known as Rohn Bemenahem.
And then Achile Damontégio was the tax collector of the city. So these two people were described by the author in the chronicle as the two slenders were behind all the plots against the Jews. So, let's think that when Paul the Fort became Pope in 1555, the very first thing he did was to issue the community subsoirdom, it was a document, restricting the Jews in many ways. So the very first thing was to create a ghetto in Rome.
So we had the first ghetto was establishing Venice in 151516, and then the Jewish ghetto in Rome was creating 1555, immediately two months, a month and a half after Paul the Fort became Pope. Among many other things in this document, the community subsoirdom, there were also the mention that all the Jews had to live in the Jewish neighborhood, so they had to live far away from Christians. And all the synagogues, all the places, all the cities were in the place that were more than one synagogue had to be destroyed, only one synagogue could stay in a city. So we don't know exactly in Chivinova how many synagogues there were.
I think there was only one synagogue because the community was pretty small. And I had evidence from the archives that only one synagogue was mentioned. So let's imagine that these people were living together, Christians and Jews, they were of course fights, because not because they were Jews and Christians, but because there were fights. And people were going to the market and they were talking and they had interests and things or that and another thing.
And they were fighting. So we have evidence from archival records that people were fighting for all kinds of things. And also Jews and Christians were fighting, but on the other side, these people were living together. They were speaking different languages, but because Italian Jews were also spoke to the Italian was a mix of Hebrew and Italian.
And it was written in Italian, in Hebrew characters, but it was Italian. But they also spoke the local dialect of the place where they lived in. And of course they spoke Hebrew because of the readings because of the Bible because of the prayers. Now, these people were living together and they believe in together for centuries in a more more or less peaceful way.
And so what happened in Chivitanova was that at some point in 1559, the Communist Absurdom started to become enacted. So, of course in Rome in 1555, the Communist Absurdom was issued and a month later there was also the ghetto were built in Chivitanova was not like that, because, you know, it was the periphery was 300 kilometers far away from Rome. And people, local, local border, North really didn't bother and the Jews were still living with the Christians. So it was fine.
People were, I mean, of course it was a pop like all the fourth in power, but things were still relatively fine. So in 1559, what happened is that these two people were hating the Jews in from the bottom of their heart. They decided to produce some accusations against the Jews. And this is something that happened all over Italy, or during the Middle Ages, during the early modern period, it was something that happened very, I mean, very many times.
So, again, I'm thinking, do you want to be informed that Jews that they were not welcome to stay in the place to live close to the Christians and they brought a letter to them. So the first of all, they managed to convince the city council, to push the Jews out of the city so close to the garbage, because around the very close to the walls of the city, there was also the collection of garbage. And of course it was not a good place because of, you know, any possible diseases and, you know, sickness is they were really spreading from garbage. So the city council voted in 1559 for the expulsion of the Jews.
And of course the Jews were not talking about that and they appealed to the pope himself and to the governor of the market, and they had some help from the governor. But these two people were this one but he's a one I mean, she started to produce more accusations so they wrote a letter to Karina Micali Gizieri was the head of the Inquisition back then. And they told him that the Jews were saying blasphemies and they were throwing store, they were throwing stones at some. Second images, maybe some images of Mary or some images of the saints we don't know what kind of images.
So, Michaeli Gizieri decided to bring the Jews to to arrest the Jews and have them brought from the Roman Inquisition from the light some soldiers operating for the Roman Inquisition and take the Jews to Rome to be tried to have a trial in Rome, the Inquisition, and then they were trying to get to Rome. So that's why they were arrested, but they didn't know that they didn't know in the chronicle the author wrote that he didn't know why he was arrested and know why this was happening. And they were notified about their charges only when they were transferred to Rome and they are riding Rome after a trip, very long trip of a week to get Rome. Thank you for sharing all of this.
It's something important I think that then so in the in the chronicle the author writes explicitly that there was a very violent quarrel between Akita Montequo and it's brother, Samo Ben-a-Nathan. And this particular this particular fight was very high was highlighted in the chronicle because this fight also became, you know, became very violent. They didn't really hit each other. I mean, as far as I remember in the chronicle it was a verbal fight, but it was very violent.
And this Christian person, this Akita Montequo called the Jewish guy, the Jewish brother of the author dog. So it was very violent and then he said as many other things, then the judge had to intervene and he had to say things, you know, so it was very it has a big role in the narrative. Can you comment on the epithet dog? What did it mean to insult somebody by labeling that person a dog?
Well, let's say that calling someone a dog is not nice. It's of course a derogatory term. It has a variety of negative connotations associated with impurity, low status, moral or ethical values. And of course, a dog is not keen.
So naming a Jewish person a dog is one of the most recurring insults. So there is also there are also studies about that. And also dogs were perceived as a metaphor for usury many times. So money lenders were associated with dogs.
And that's also what we find in Shakespeare in the Merchant of Venice when Antonio calls Shiloh dog. Well, fascinating. Thank you for sharing. Who is Miceh Leairi?
Can you contextualize him? Yeah, so Miceh Leairi that I mentioned before, it was the head of the Inquisition back then during called the fourth. It's papacy and it was also one of the most important consular advisors. So imagine that the Pope was the head of the church, but it was also a very, very close to the Inquisition.
So until the very last day, until this very last day, he convened the inquisition meetings in his room, in his private rooms. And so Miceh Leairi was also, was a Dominican friar. And this is something very important because the Dominican friars were in charge of inquisition. And they were also in charge of preaching against the Jews, many times.
And they were very close to the church and inquisition. So another very important thing is that Miceh Leairi became pope. And after all the fourth, we had pious the fourth. And then we had pious the fifth.
So Miceh Leairi became pope as pious the fifth in 1566 and he died in 1572. So why was important as a pope, at least for three things. So the first one is that he was a very important pope in the application of the decrease of this, the Council of Trent. So the Council of Trent was a general council of the Catholic Church to fight the Protestant heresy.
So in the end in 1563. So the Council of Trent produced lots of decreases laws to enact the decisions taken in Trent during the council. So it was very important for the Reformation of the Church, for the internal organizational liturgy, prayers and canonization of saints, and, you know, like internal policy, internal Catholic policy. And it was the pope who is communicated Elizabeth I, the queen of England.
And, you know, there was, of course, a very long fight with with the Anglican kings, and in particular with Elizabeth. And then it was, it was he continued there a very restrictive and repressive policy of all the third, or Paul the four sorry by expelling the Jews from the from the state of the church with the exception of Roman and corner in 1569. All the Jews, according to the fifth had to be expelled with from the state of the church with the exception of Roman and corner that were only two cities. So we imagine how a big population of Jews spread all over the state of the church, which were very big had to be confined in two single cities.
So that was why, you know, pie is the fifth in a way was a successor of Paul the fourth, and he continued this very restrictive, very strict policy against the Jews. So, in the notable prisoners held in the prison of the Inquisition in Rome, there was an individual named Guillaume Postele. Can you say more about him? Yeah, the impostel was one of them, one of the most important and eclectic.
It's hard to define because it was a philosopher was a theologian and was a capitalist, and it was my things cosmographer. And, you know, it is very important and very fascinating figure and the study of the Renaissance. So it was at some point he was imprisoned by the Roman Inquisition, I was taken to Rome in the prison of the data where the Inquisition prisons were. And the very fascinating thing is that it was one of the notable prisoners when our author Benjamin was was there.
So, it's a very nice, there's a very nice description of this encounter and the prison, because so Benjamin writes that the impostel was French, but he was talking Hebrew, and he was speaking Hebrew in the prison, and not just speaking Hebrew, but reciting the prayers, the Catholic prayers in Hebrew. So we imagine maybe was saying, Hey Mary or the Holy Father in Hebrew. And that's a very fascinating thing and then because in New Hebrew, they were also speaking with, imagine that these people were in the prison, they couldn't really see each other because it was very dark. There was no light in this prisons and they were very, you know, very dark rooms and very filthy, you know, people were according to the description we have from the Chronicle, people were saying in the cell of three or four prisoners.
And so they couldn't really see each other, but they know they could talk with someone and someone was saying, I am, you know, I am a female and the other person, you know, was replying. But this very important thing is that they were talking Hebrew in this prison. And so yeah, it wasn't one of the major encounters it did in the prison, but he also met other, I mean, met, they didn't really meet or maybe they didn't even talk, but he knew that back then when he was a prisoner, there were a certain number of people were imprisoned waiting for a trial, because many times people were not imprisoned for after the trial and say, it's not like today, people were imprisoned while waiting for the trial. And sometimes even the servants of certain noble people or witnesses were imprisoned with the person was charged with several accusations.
So that the witnesses and the people didn't escape the trial. So it gives the description of people of Cardinals and important people were there. And I found it very, very fascinating. This aspect was really exciting to work on, try to figure out who was in the prison, who was, why was there and have a list of the prisoners, because we don't know, we don't know many things about their Catholic, the Roman Inquisition archives.
Because they were burned in 1559 after the death of the pope, everything was destroyed. So we don't have evidence from the trials, because they were not trials, or because the documentation was lost. Thank you for sharing that. Thank you for providing that information.
You're welcome. How did Pope Paul IV die? What controversies surrounded his death? So Paul IV was very old.
So it was 83 when he died in 1559. And he already had some diseases, the previous, the past few years. So he had a disease that was involving an inflammation of the skin in his legs. And then there were several, several internal bleeding, several emorrhages that really led him to stay in bed for a long time.
And also to, we have very detailed information about that because physicians were writing about itself. And they were writing also about the desired, and they were writing about the things he did to recover from time. Sometimes it was recovering, some other time it was not recovering, it was in bed for months. But again, it was a very old man.
And it was quite impressive to die at the age of 83 in 1559 in the 16th century. And his death was very, I would say that it was problematic for his family because he didn't die as a saint. Many, many popes died and then, you know, other of sanity. And they were considered saints immediately after that.
And when he died, the Roman population was very happy because it was a very strict pope, not only towards the Jews, but also to the general population. So that's why when he died on the 18th of August 1559, the Roman population rebelled and they went to release all the prisoners from the prison to commit all kinds of crimes around the city and killings, murders and thefts. So it was a very, it was a very unstable period of a huge instability. And then the other thing is that, so the point the Roman people was very angry with the pope, because of the taxes, very heavy taxes that pope established race during the pontificate, also to finance the war against charge the fifth was the king of Spain, the emperor.
The pontificate of the pope was not an easy one from the point of foreign policy, and there were many wars and there was famine and there were, you know, all kinds of things happening. There was a flood of the river of the river river in Rome. So things were not easy for the Roman people. What happened is that in 1559 to, you know, express their anger, their best, the the Roman people decided to erase all the coat of arms of the family coat of arms of the pope.
And also to tear down the statue of the pope, any kinds of statues of the pope around Rome. So that was the clear sign of the people were not happy and this didn't happen so often in the history of the Catholic Church. It happened but not in this, in such a violent way. So, Paul the fourth died, and immediately after that we know that there were several ceremonies for the funeral of the pope, but because the, the, the papal court, so the people around the pope were very scared of what was happening in the city.
They decided to help to hold the funerals in a private place in secret so that you know the Roman people couldn't take the corpse of the pope and throw in the under river, for example. Yeah, and then of course, as I mentioned before, one of the most important thing and terrible things that the Roman people did was to to burn the building on the Inquisition with a tribunal the tribunal, but most especially the archives. So we don't know with exception of two books that were saved from the flames. We don't know anything about this time.
We don't know anything about the composition of organizational display the prisons we don't know any evidence about trials and things because everything went burned. So that's why the chronicle of Benjamin is so important for us today. Thank you so much. In what ways does Pope Paul the fourth compliments and challenge conventional assumptions of evil what manifestations of evil does he exemplify what paradigms of evil does he not exemplify what is and was specifically evil about him.
Why is he known as the evil pope? Where does this moniker come from? So the title of the book comes really from a sentence of Benjamin at some point he writes that, and even in these days we are forced to live under the rule of the evil pope and it says something like, I was saying that this particular pope is, is Belia, but he also associates with him with some figures, some biblical figures. So sometimes it's like to mention the very first enemy that Israelites found on the way into desert after that 40 year track in the desert, And many times there are associations with the man.
So that's why I was saying that there are certain recurring figures in the megalatistere and in this kind of narrative, not only in this particular one, not in only this particular chronicle, but also in other chronicles, from the same time, the same period. It was very common. It was very usual for Jews to compare the situation of exile or persecution with the situation experienced by the Jews under against the man. So there were several comparisons.
There are comparisons of this kind and what is called the genre of put-im scrolls. They're not really exactly put-im because we don't have mention of put-im at all. But there is always this comparison in the background. So many times it was compared, all the fouries compared to a man to a devil and sometimes also to a dog.
So when he says, so that was curious because we have this dog, the mention of the dog in the fight between the Jew and the Christian in Chiwitanova. And then the author talks about Paul IV as a dog when he's dying in his bed. So he says, really, is a dog casted in his candle? There are these kinds of things.
All over the chronicle, he says, is evil. And many times he says, we really need to erase completely the memory of Paul IV. So he curses him with Imartas and more physical know. And there are many different kinds of this sort to say that it was evil in many ways.
It was evil because it was evil toward the Roman population who was not happy with him. And it was complaining because of the wars and because of the very strict atmosphere that people experience in Rome and the state of the church because of his very strict nature. It was a monk and it was a very strict one. Then of course, there are several, there are explicit mentions of his being evil because he established a ghetto because he did many things against the Jews with the communion of sorghum and because especially the event of 1556, so the burning of the conversos to the Portuguese conversos in Encona.
As I said, Paul IV, the very first two things he did was the communion of sorghum and the burning of the conversos in Encona, which was a tragic one of the most tragic events happened in the history of Talon Jewry. Still today, I mean, after the Holocaust, of course, because these people were burned alive and 27 people, 28 people considered a woman, including a woman. Benjamin, so our author was present there. And experience is said, at least what he wrote is that he was an eyewitness of the tragic event.
And he saw people burning on the stake with his own eyes. So that's really the most impressive and most tragic thing he experienced during Paul IV's life, during Paul IV's pontificate. Thank you for providing that perspective for us. What does this book teach us about the history of Jewish-Christian relations?
Well, I hope. I mean, I don't know what it teaches, but I hope it teaches something. So first of all, that what we have, we cannot be just happy with what the kind of documents don't say, because as you said, we don't have these kind of documents, archival evidence from the Roman Inquisition, organization, modal operation, and trials. So we couldn't just be happy with what doesn't exist.
So we need to go beyond that. And I think the chronic wall of Paul IV, so this translation I provided and the commented edition I provided, is really showing that there is so much more about to learn and so much more to investigate, because sometimes we don't have the sources in the Christian archives, and sometimes we don't have the sources we need in the Jewish archives. So we don't need to integrate both perspectives, the Jewish one and the Christian one in this case, but because we're talking about Jewish-Christian relations. But the same is the same for Jewish-Muslim relations or Muslim-Christian relations or whatever.
So we really need to integrate the sources and compare and cross them. Of course, this particular chronicle teaches us that there are of course certain patterns that are repeating themselves, because we know that, for example, slanders or the Jews, Christian slanders were accusing Jews of throwing stones or doing certain things against the Jews, because they wanted to eliminate them, because maybe they were competitors in the market. They were both merchants or they had personal antipathy. But there are also other things that stands out, because for example, the Jewish population of Chiwitanaba was supporting the Jews.
It was not against the Jews. With the exception of these two slanders, who had connections in the city council, so they were able to maneuver the people in the council and then really have the law against the Jews, the decree of expulsion of the Jews in Chiwitanaba. But when he says the chronicle, so the chronicleer, the author, who writes his policy that the Jewish population, most of the Jewish population was in their favor, and they were standing with them against the Jews' lenders. So we don't have...
So what I think is that Jewish Christian relations need to be read at a macro level, like, you know, we need to learn what I hope did against the Jews and how Jews reacted, what was the general policy against the Jews in a certain year, in a certain decade, in a certain century. But then we also need to look at the micro level. So what really people were doing in their community, what people were really doing in their city, what were the relations in the city, neighbor to neighbor, local councilor, local city council to the local Jews, and priests against the Jews, lenders against the Jews. So I really think this very small, you know, we need to look at that at this event in a very close up way, with a zoom, with a focus on these very little stories to have a very different understanding of what was the general phenomenon.
What does your book contribute to the study of Jewish historiography? So, as I said, I was always interested in these kinds of chronicles, since my studies as a student. I think this particular chronicle can be, you know, seen, can be read in a historical way, let's say, that, for example, all the previous chronicles, including the Sefidou Hasim, but also including the Shachayetak-Bala by Gedelia Bignacia, and also the Divrayamim by Josefakoy, and all these kinds of chronicles that were produced after the experience of the Diaspora and the expulsion from Spain, and different kinds of expulsions that were experienced by these authors in the 15th century and 15th beginning of the 16th century. They still have some deep, let's say, very theological and ideological, you know, perspective.
I would say that, for example, there are many explanations. So many times these authors, these medieval early modern authors, were writing about the history of their own history, the history of the Jewish people, as a way to remember, you know, as a way not to forget what happened to the Jews, but in a very pessimistic way, many times, you know, in a very, what was being called by Yum Shani that I mentioned at the very beginning, what was being called by Yum Shani, the lucky most conception of history, you know, something that we need to cry upon, because we have been so miserable because of the kings, because of the Christians, and their Spanish inquisition doing this and that. Now, I mean, that's the same. I'm saying that many times it says in the Chronicle that they're only responsible people for the current state, the current situation in the state of the church, meaning the establishment of the ghetto, and the restrictions against the Jews, all kinds of accusations that were produced against the Jews, and in particular situations like a man, an innocent man, arrested by the Roman inquisition and brought to Rome are where products of, you know, which are the results of the sins of the same Jews.
So he says many times, we are in this situation because of our sins. And this is something that it's not a modern conception. This is really a medieval way of thinking about, you know, everything has a consequence, because the consequences that we were not good Jews, we sinned, and also we are in this state of slavery, exile, expulsion, and misery, because we are not good Jews. So this is still present in the background of this Chronicle, but there is a, there is, I would say, a different, you know, layer because Benjamin also says, we are in this situation, but I also want to remember everything.
And I will do that. I will also remember what happened to the Christians. I will also remember in detail the history of the papacy. This was something that was not really needed, I think.
This is something that he wants to do because he wants to produce an account the most reliable as possible for the future generations. We don't know exactly how this text really transmitted from a generation to another, because again, we don't have evidence of the original manuscript from the sixth century, but we know that this person had, you know, this feeling. So my specific contribution with this book was to, you know, have this book, I mean, to have the book accessible, to have the Chronicle accessible, to study a, the Jewish Christian, like how Jewish Christian relations were in this specific and very important period that was a pontificate of all the force. And B, the history of the Inquisition itself, because again, we don't have evidence, we don't have any sources from this time, like internal sources.
So is it possible to study the history of the Inquisition from Jewish sources? The answer is yes. So I think, I think yes. So my book was really, you know, about that study, the history of Judaism from a Christian perspective, but also study the history of Christianity from Catholic, the Catholic Church from a Jewish perspective.
Again, I really believe, and this is my, you know, my methodology at, you know, in a nutshell, you know, I really believe we need to interact and we need to evaluate all sources, all kinds of sources we have in different languages, if possible, and, you know, cross them and try to understand, try to figure out the big picture, because there is so much more that we can do as scholars, and, you know, to have the big picture. We cannot just be happy with what has been done by others in the past, and we cannot just be happy with very small details. We need to cross. We need to dialogue.
We need to compare. Thank you for the wisdom, eloquence, and erudition that you have shared with us in the course of this conversation. Thank you for your precious and beautiful insights during the course of our dialogue. Thank you so much.
Thank you. As we bring our dialogue to a close, can you tell us about your research on Isaiah Sonne? Can you describe what you've been learning about him? Yeah, so as I said in the beginning, I am working now on my second book, that is totally different from the first one, both because of the topic, and because of the century.
You know, I'm an early modern historian by training, now I'm working on the 20th century. So it was very unexpected. I didn't think about doing anything like that, but I found very interesting things about Sonne, and I really wish to produce something about him. And most specifically, it would be, I call it like an intellectual and cultural biography because I would like to picture Sonne as a student, scholar, a biographer, a biographer, librarian, lecturer, but librarian, but also a collector and dealer.
So he was a very important person in the history of the Jewish, in the development of the field of the history of Jewish printing and censorship, because as a historian and as a lover of Italy, it was really into lots of different topics, related to Italian Jewish history and culture. He published several articles and very important contributions on the history of the Jewish printing, and the history of censorship. And it was one of the first, I mean, very first pioneering scholars to open this field of Jewish studies, a Jewish printing minister that Jewish spoke in Jewish studies. But still again, I think it was very neglected person, very neglected scholar.
And still today I find his papers and his contributions very relevant to the field. I'm not the only person because also librarians, lots of librarians, Jewish librarians all over the world, working in Judeka and the break-up collections have the same feeling and they study his contributions. So yeah, what I discovered is massive archives. It was a very controversial person for some aspects, but it was an excellent scholar.
And I'm really trying to work on this monograph. Yeah, and I hope I'll be able really to give a clear and also just a picture of him. Yeah, as I said, in relation to the history of the Jewish book. And in a very particular moment and in an international perspective because it was really living all over the places in a very interesting and very hard time.
That was the Second World War. Thank you for the sacrifice and all you've invested. To bring this knowledge, this wisdom, and these precious, priceless, indispensable perspectives into fruition for all humanity, for all your readers, for all our listeners, and for all who will engage with your masterpiece of a book. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Thank you for your kind words and for welcoming me. And yeah, giving me this opportunity to talk about my research. Thank you.
I really appreciate that. Thank you. This has been my sincere and humble honor. And I can hardly thank you enough for being beyond brilliant in your scholarship.
Thank you. As we bring today's dialogue to a close, I am your host, Ari Barbalat, signing off on the new books in Jewish Studies podcast. I would like to end by conveying my heartfelt gratitude to Martina Mampieri for her time today, her generosity today, and her thorough and conscientious responses to all the questions we discussed, and to all the subject matter that came up in the course of today's conversation. Martina, I am beyond grateful for your kindness and for all the virtues that you shared and conveyed in today's conversation.
Thank you so much. It's really been my pleasure and honor. Thank you. As we end today's dialogue, I am Ari Barbalat, your host on the new books in Jewish Studies podcast.
Today I've been in dialogue with Dr. Martina Mampieri. We have been discussing her newly published book, Living Under the Evil Pope, The Hebrew Chronicle of Pope Paul IV by Benjamin Nefimya Ben El-Natan from Chivitanova, Marché, of the 16th century published in Leiden, Netherlands by Brill Publishers 2020. Martina is a Martin Boober fellow, part of the Martin Boober Society of Fellows at Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
She is also a lecturer in the Department of Jewish History and contemporary Jewry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Martina, I am unbelievably grateful. Thank you so much. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.