Jewish Cultural and Legal Literacy in Medieval England

The Jews of medieval England lived in a multilingual world, within which they created their own multilingual culture. Although some aspects of that culture were accessible only to an elite, that elite was a varied group that included businessmen, poets and rabbis. The legal culture of Norman England placed great emphasis on written documents. Although Jews were major participants in the legal textuality that was dominating English culture, some of them remained skeptical about the trustworthiness of written documents. In my talk, I will suggest that the contours of Anglo-Jewish literacy reflect the complicated position of the Jewish community as a participant in and excluded from medieval English society.