O, Beastly Jew!: Allegorical Anti-Judaism in Thirteenth Century English Bestiaries
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Abstract
This thesis outlines the traditional anti-Judaic allegories found in the medieval bestiary genre, demonstrates the transformations of these allegories within the English scriptoria, and examines how these allegories reflect contemporary suspicions of the Anglo Jewish population. In the thirteenth century, the bestiary experienced a final flourish during which the imagery and text of certain entries, which allegorized Jews, Judaism, and the Old Testament, were amended and amplified. During the first quarter of the century, a previous focus on obstinacy and blindness evolved into an obsessive fear of conspiracy and cannibalism. I argue that these changes were created at the local level and in contradiction with the contemporary canonical consensus regarding the presence of Jews in Christendom. As a result, this explicitly anti-Judaic trend was short lived among clerically produced texts. However, even a brief period of clerical approval at the local level, gave new and lasting strength to a common conception of Jews as inherently deceitful, deviant, and diabolic.
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Introduction -- Selected manuscripts -- Ant-Jewish iconography -- Conclusion -- Appendix : Manuscript table
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M.A. (Master of Arts)