1096 | Participants in the First Crusade massacre Jews in several Central European cities, beginning centuries of pogroms linked to the Crusades. |
1096 | More than 5,000 Jews were murdered in Germany in several different attacks. |
May 3, 1096 | Count Emico of Leiningen, on his way to join a Crusade, attacked the synagogue at Speyers and killed all the defenders. |
May 27, 1096 | 1,200 Jews commit suicide in Mayence to escape Count Emico, who tried to forcibly convert them. |
1085-1140 | Judah Halevi (Jewish author). |
1099 | Crusaders (European Christians) capture Jerusalem and massacre tens of thousands of the city's Jews. |
1100 | Germans, including German Jews, migrate to Poland. It is seen as “the land of opportunity.” |
1107 | Moroccan Almoravid ruler Yoseph Ibn Tashfin orders all Moroccan Jews to convert or leave. |
1109 | Tiberias falls to the Crusaders. |
1115 | After reconquering Toledo, Spain from the Muslims, Alphonso I invited all Jews to return. |
1120 | Jews from Muslim countries begin to settle in Byzantium. |
1124 | Records of a Jewish gate in Kiev attest to the presence of a Jewish community there. |
1135-1204 | Maimonides (Rabbi Moses ben Maimon; Jewish scholar). |
1139 | Judah Halevi completes his influential philosophy of Judaism known as The Kuzari. He is a friend of commentator Abraham Ibn Ezra, who also left Spain for the life of a wandering Jewish scholar. |
1143 | 150 Jews killed in Ham, France. |
1144 | Jews in Norwich, England, are accused of murdering a Christian child in what is believed to be the first ritual murder charge. The blood libel, as well as others in England that follow in the 12th century, incites anti-Jewish violence. |
1160-1173 | Benjamin of Toledo, The Itinerary of Benjamin of Toledo. |
1163 | Benjamin of Toledo writes of 40,000 Jews living in Baghdad, complete with 28 synagogues and 10 Torah academies. |
1171 | Saladin (1138-1193) overthrows Fatimid dynasty in Egypt. |
1187 | Saladin recaptures Jerusalem from Crusaders grants Jews permission to re-enter. |
March 16, 1190 | Jews attacked, over 150 die after a six day standoff in York, England. |
1190 | Approximately 2,500 Jews live in England, enjoing more rights than Jews on the continent. |
1191 | French King Phillip starts the Third Crusade, cancels debts to Jews, drives many Jews out of France, confiscates their property. |
1194-1270 | Scholar and Jewish leader Moses Ben Nachman (Nachmanides). |
1195 | Moses Maimonides completes The Guide to the Perplexed, considered the most important work of medieval Jewish thought. |
1211 | A group of 300 rabbis from France and England settle in Palestine (Eretz Yisrael), beginning what might be interpreted as Zionist aliyah. |
1198-1216 | Pope Innocent III (Christian). |
1204 | First synagogue built in Vienna, a city where Jews enjoyed more freedom than in other areas of Austria. |
1215 | Fourth Lateran Council expands anti-Jewish decrees in Europe, forces Jews to wear the Yellow Patch, the "Badge of Shame. |
1222 | Deacon Robert of Reading, England, was burned for converting to Judaism, setting a precedent for the burning of "heretics". |
1222 | Stephen Langton, Archbishop of Canterbury and a prime mover of the Lateran Council, forbids Jews from building new synagogues, owning slaves or mixing with Christians. |
ca. 13th cen. | The Zohar (a Jewish kabbalistic book): . |
1227 | Death of Genghis Khan (roving Mongol conqueror). |
ca. 1230 | Inquisition by Christians in Spain. |
1232 | The Jewish community of Marrakech, Morocco, is reestablished, leading to massacres of Jews caused by Islamic political revolt and grassroots hatred. |
1239 | Pope Gregory IX orders the kings of France, England, Spain and Portugal to confiscate Hebrew books, Following this edict, the Talmud is condemned and burned in France and Rome. |
1225-1274 | Thomas Aquinas (Christian scholar). |
1240-1292 | Spanish Kabbalist Abraham Abulafia. |
1243 | First accusation of desecration of the Host (the wafers used is Christian Mass) - the blood libel - in Berlitz, Germany. |
1244-1517 | Rule by Tartars, Mongols, Ayybids, and Mamelukes. |
1247 | Pope Innocent IV issued a Bull refuting blood libels and sent it throughout Germany and France. |
1254-1517 | Mamluk Islamic rule (new dynasty) in Egypt. |
1258 | Fall of Islamic Abbasid dynasty to Hulagu (Mongol). |