Ariel Toaff - Blood Passover

Chronica Gestorum in partibus Lombardie et reliquis Italie , by G. Bonazzi, in Rerum Italicarum Scriptores , vol. XXII, tome III, Città del Castello, 1904, p. 106. In this regard, see also Cammarata and Rozzo, Il beato Giovannino patrono di Volpedo , cit., p. 18. The few Jews in Cortemaggiore were linked with the larger community in Piacenza, Dal Monte di Pietà alla Cassa di Risparmio: l'esempio piacentino , in G. Boschiero and B. Molina, authors, Politiche del credito. Investimento consumo solidarietà , Asti, 2004, p. 348).

On the facts of Arena del Po in 1479, see in particular C. Guidetti, Pro Judaeis. Riflessioni e documenti . Turin, 1884, pp. 280-294, and above all Simonson, The Jews in the Duchy of Milan , cit., vol. I, p. XXII, and vol. II, pp. 738-789, nos. 1794, 1868, 1877-1880, 1882-1884, 1888-1889, 1891-1892, 1895-1897.

Mosè da Bamberg, a German traveller staying in Angelo da Verona's dwelling, told the Trent judges hat he had been in the service of the Sacle, a money lender at Borgo San Giovanni, near Piacenza, and his wife, Potina. According to him, the Ashkenazi Jew had been accustomed to dissolve powdered blood, presumably that of a Christian child, in wine, during the Passover meal, pouring it from his silver chalice into the glasses of the guests. His wife Potina was said to have mixed the blood into the dough of the unleavened bread (cfr. G. Divina, Storia del beato Simone da Trento , Trent, 1902, vol. II, pp. 28-29). It should be noted that the name Sacle or Secle (Seckle), a rendering of the Hebrew Izchak (Isaac) was widespread among Jews from Frankfurt and Hessen (cfr. A. Beider, A Dictionary of Ashkenazi Given Names , Bergenfeld, N.J., 2001, p. 342).

Cfr. Simonsohn, The Jews in the Duchy of Milan , cit., vol. II, p. 784, no. 1888.

Cfr., Ibidem, vol. II, pp. 784-785, no. 1891.

The petition of the Jews to the Duke of Milan (19 May 1479), the original of which is still preserved in the archives of the Jewish community of Verona, was apparently published for the first time by the famous Marrano apologist Isac Cardoso at the end of the Seventeenth Century (D. De Castro Tartas, 1679), who occupies himself at length with the question of the ritual murders. In this regard, see the important analysis, although sometimes accompanied by inexact references, of Y.H. Yerushalmi, Dalla Corte di Spagna al Ghetto italiano , Milan, 1991. The document was published in extenso by Guidetti, Pro Judaeis , cit., pp. 289-294, and later by G.A. Zaviziano, Un raggio di luce. La Persecuzione degli ebrei nella storia. Riflessioni , Corfu, 1891, pp. 173-180 (doc. XVIIIbis). In this regard, as well as with regard to the identification of Corrado Guidetti with the Paduan Jew Giacomo Treves, believed to be pseudonym used by Guidetti, cfr. D. Nissim, La risposta di Isacco Vita Cantarini all'accusa di omicidio rituale di Trento (Padua 1670-1685), in "Studi Trentini di Scienze Storiche", LXXIX (2000), pp. 829-835. References to the Jewish petition of the Duchy of Milan in 1479 are also found in V. Manzini, La superstizione omicida e i sacrifici umani , Padua, 1930, pp. 237-239, and in Simonsohn, The Jews in the Duchy of Milan , cit. vol. II, pp. 788- 789.

Cfr. Guidetti, Pro Judaeis , cit. pp. 289-290; Zaviziano, Un raggio di luce , cit., p. 174.

Cfr. Guidetti, Pro Judaeis , p. 291; Zaviziano, Un raggio di luce , cit. p. 176.

Cfr. R. Po-Chia Hsia, Trent 1475 . A Ritual Murder Trial , New Haven (Conn.), 1992, pp. 92-93; "If we construct a cultural geography of blood libel in the region, the location of ritual murder trials coincided with the boundary of German settlements in the Alpine Highlands". Concerning himself with the geography of trials for desecration of the host, Rubin (Gentile Tales. The Narrative Assault on the Late Medieval Jews , New Haven, Conn., 1999, pp. 190-195) reaches the same conclusions, stating that "our story deals with German-speaking regions".

"Nec novum videatur hanc pessimam rem ac nefarium scelus in civitate nostra (sc. Tridenti) hoc anno per impios Judeos esse perpetratum; cum longe crudeliora et atrociora retroactis temporibus in plerisque civitatibus et locis Germaniae et aliarum regionum, utpote Sveviae, Bavariae, Austriae, Stiriae, Rhenique ac Saxoniae, nec non Poloniae et Hungariae" (cfr. [Bonnelli], Dissertazione apologetica , cit. pp. 65-66.

On the child murder of Lorenzino Sossio, later beatified, attributed to the Jews on the grounds of ritual murder, see, among others, Francesco Barbarano, Historia ecclestica della citta, territori e diocesei di Vicenza , Cristoforo Rosio, 1652, pp. 172-177; I. Scotton, Compendio della vita, martirio e miracoli del Beato Lorenzino da Valrovina , Venice, 1863; G. Chiuppani, Gli ebrei a Bassano , Bassano, 1907, pp. 73-76; G. Volli, Il beato Lorenzino da Marostica, presunta vittima d'un omicidio rituale , in "La Rassegna Mensile di Israel", XXXIV (1968), pp. 513-526, 564-569; M. Nardello, Il presunto martirio del beato Lorenzino da Marostica , in "Archivio Veneto" , CIII (1972), pp. 25-45; T. Caliò, Un omicidio rituale tra storia e leggenda. Il caso del beato Lorenzino da Marostica , in "Studi e Materiali di Storia delle Religione", n.s., I (1995), no. 19, pp. 55-82.

"Pueri cadaver, cuius abscisum fuisse videtur praeputium, quia a Judaeis occisu fuerit" [“The boy’s body was seen to have had the foreskin cut off, as if he had been killed by the Jews”.]

Cfr. [Bonnelli], Dissertazioni apologetica , cit., pp. 246-255.

The information is derived from Sanudo, ( I diarii , by R. Fulin et al, Venice, 1879-1903, columns 250-266, 283). In this regard, see also T. Calio, Il "puer a Judaeis necatus ". Il ruolo del racconto agiografico nella diffusione dello stereotipo dell'omicidio rituale , in Le inquisizioni cristiane e gli ebrei , "Atti dei Convegni Lincei", CXCI (2003), p. 475.

Marcuccio moved to the Cittadella in Bassano after 1467 (cfr. Carpi, L’individuo e la collettività , cit., p. 38).

We know that in April 1492, the Consiglio di Bassano had unsuccessfully asked Venice for authorization to expel Marcucio from the City, revoking his permit. On these events, see Chiuppani, Gli ebrei a Bassano , cit., pp. 100-104.

For a serious investigation into the real motives for the expulsion of the Jews from Vicenz in 1486, see Scuro, Alcune notizie sulla presenza ebraica a Vicenza , cit.

In the ample, although tardy, bibliography on the martyrdom of Andrea of Rinn, see Ippolito Guarinoni, Triumph Cron Marter und Grabschaft des Heilig-Unschuldigen , Innsbruck, Michael Wagner, 1642; G.R. Schroubeck, Zur Frage der Historizitat des Andreas von Rinn , in "Fenster", XXXVIII (1988), pp. 3766-3774; XXXIX (1986), pp. 3845-3855; G. Kofler, La leggenda dell'omicidio rituale di Andrea Oxner di Rinn , in "Materiali di lavori", 1988, nn. 1-4, pp. 143-149; B. Freschacher, Anderl von Rinn; Ritualmordkult und Neuorientierung in Judenstein 1945-1995 ; Innsbruck, 1996; G.R. Schroubek, The Question of the Historicity of Andreas of Rinn , in Buttaroni e Musial, Ritual Murder , cit., pp. 159-180.