The Collection

Languages

The Jewish presence in Hispania during the Roman and Visigothic periods has intrigued historians because records are so scarce — it is believed that many concealed their identity. Few Hebrew writings survive from this period, but Sephardic Jews are known to have kept Hebrew codices to support their arguments in legal and religious disputes.

History suggests that the languages and forms of communication of the Jews in the Iberian peninsula developed traits of their own, distinct from the communities of the Middle East. Besides Latin they also used Greek, reflecting their adaptability and their contribution to the region's cultural diversity — and their capacity to preserve their heritage under adverse circumstances.

Synagogues in Roman times

Until the 4th century there seems to have been little tension between Christianity and Judaism in the Iberian peninsula. Christians and Jews often debated religious questions and led an active life side by side. Jews occasionally appear in accounts of Christian martyrs in Roman Hispania, as in the case of Saint Eulalia of Mérida. A certain concern about Jewish influence on Christian practice can already be seen at the Council of Elvira.

After Bishop Gregory's warnings about the synagogues at the Council of Elvira, tensions between Jews and Christians in Hispania can be documented from the early 5th century, with the celebrated circular letter of Severus of Minorca, which describes the attack on and sacking of the synagogue of Mahón and the forced conversions of the Jews of that town. This episode would be the first record of Jews losing a synagogue in Hispania.

Synagogues in Visigothic times

By the end of the 7th century, under the reign of Egica, the synagogues seem to have been eradicated, as Jews gathered in secret to celebrate their religious rites and festivals. Even so, we know these measures against Judaism were not applied with success: communities continued to exist until the end of the Visigothic kingdom and the arrival of the Muslims.

There were also punishments concerning the ownership of Christian slaves by Jews, born of the constant fear that Jews might be masters of Christian souls. There was likewise the fear that Jews would convert Christians to Judaism and circumcise them. Visigothic law rested on deeply religious grounds — above all the laws of Sisebut and Erwig, based on the writings of Saint Isidore of Seville.

Relations between Muslims and Jews

According to Muslim sources, collaboration between Jews and Muslims allowed the former to remain in the peninsula and the two groups to stay in contact. Under Arab rule in al-Andalus, Jews were regarded as dhimmis — protected people allowed to practise their religion in exchange for special taxes, as were the Christians, since both were considered «people of the Book», in reference to the Bible.

Their age of greatest splendour came in the 10th and 11th centuries, when they held important offices and developed a rich Hebrew culture in many fields. In the days of the Taifa of Seville in the 11th century, Jews went on serving as counsellors and intermediaries. The arrival of the Almoravids and Almohads, however, put an end to this flourishing culture and to the literary and scientific coexistence of Jews and Muslims, forcing many Jews to flee to other lands.

The Repartimiento of Seville

From 1248, the date of the Christian conquest of the city of Seville, until 1253, when the event was formalised in writing, numerous groups of people kept arriving to live in the newly conquered city. Among the first measures taken, King Ferdinand III made numerous donations to Jewish families to promote peaceful coexistence.

After the death of Ferdinand III, his son Alfonso X carried on the work of repopulation and the official Repartimiento of the city. The Jewish population collaborated extensively with the Repartimiento. At first they were protected by the Crown under a favourable legal status that recognised them as equal in rights with the Christians.

The synagogue of Santa María la Blanca

King Alfonso X counted his Jewish officials among the principal beneficiaries of the Repartimiento, and so they were granted three mosques to be converted into synagogues in the present-day quarters of Santa Cruz and San Bartolomé. These donations are extensively documented in the Archive of Seville Cathedral. Later, under the reigns of Alfonso XI and his son Pedro I in the mid-14th century, Jews wielded an even stronger influence at court, and it was King Alfonso XI himself who ordered a fourth synagogue built in Seville, asking the Pope to authorise prayer in the new temple.

Today the church of Santa María la Blanca is the only one that preserves remains of the old synagogue: restorations in 2004 uncovered windows and the women's gallery of the former synagogue, and in 2024 the hekhal.

Read: Seville's three synagogues: from mosques to synagogues to churches

The Siete Partidas

Despite all these initial concessions, during his reign Alfonso X drew up a body of laws, the so-called Siete Partidas, intended to bring juridical uniformity to the territories of the kingdom. Partida 7 contains a title devoted specifically to the Jews, with eleven laws regulating their life, their synagogues, their conduct towards Christians and even their dress — they were to wear a mark upon their heads to identify them. These Partidas did not come into force at once.

At the end of the 14th century anti-Jewish feeling deepened, as Jews were blamed for the plagues striking certain cities. The spreading of this hatred was the work of an archdeacon of Écija named Ferrán Martínez, who preached against the Jews until, in 1391, Christians unleashed a massacre in the Jewish quarter of Seville. As a result, numerous families lost their lives, others emigrated, and many more chose to convert to Christianity.

The cemetery

The Jewish quarter also had a burial ground or cemetery located outside the walls. From 1485 to the present day, eight excavations have been carried out, revealing more than 400 individuals dated between the 13th and 15th centuries — proof of the intensive use of the cemetery and of the density of the population living in the quarter, although the full extent of the cemetery is not completely known.

The human remains found have been excavated and analysed by specialist anthropologists, and are kept in the storerooms of the Archaeological Museum of Seville. One brick tomb, without human remains, was removed and placed on public display on one side of the basement level of the car park on Calle Cano y Cueto, which can be visited today.

Read: The Jewish cemetery beneath the Murillo Gardens: archaeology and memory

Solomon ben Abraham

He was a prominent doctor, astronomer and exegete of the 14th century, born in Seville, where he died in 1345. His funerary inscription, engraved on a fragment of a Roman column, was found in 1580, when several men looted the old Jewish cemetery.

Kaula al-Yahudi

8th century. Jewish soldier.

At the end of the 7th century, the Visigoth king Egica declared at the Council of Toledo that he knew and had evidence of a conspiracy hatched by the Jews against the Christian Visigoth kingdom, militarily supporting the enemy of North Africa, the Muslims who had expanded the territory of their Umayyad caliphate from Damascus.

Although original documents from Sephardic sources on the matter have not survived to this day, the Arab chronicles describe that it was the Jewish soldier Kaula Al Yahudi who supported the Muslim general Tariq Ibn Ziyad with his troops, who entered the peninsula through Gibraltar and carried out the conquest of Granada and Córdoba in the year 711, and later Seville in 712, under the command of Musa Ibn Nusayr. It was then that the Visigothic repression against the Jews came to an end, the coexistence of the Jewish and Muslim communities in the peninsula began, and the Jews started to use the Arabic language.

Hasday ben Saprut

Córdoba, 10th century. Jewish doctor and diplomat.

Hasday is the first Jewish figure of great relevance in the history of al-Andalus, standing out both in the political and diplomatic spheres and in the cultural and intellectual ones. His education was especially solid in the fields of linguistics and medicine. According to Arab sources, he held important positions as director general of customs and minister, standing out particularly in the diplomatic field.

Thanks to his vast knowledge and personal skills, his mastery of Hebrew, Arabic and Latin, he became one of the main representatives of the Umayyad State abroad, especially at a time when the Umayyad State of Córdoba was one of the most important political powers in the Mediterranean.

In the field of medicine, his participation in the translation of the Arabic version of Dioscorides' work "De materia medica", sent to Córdoba by the Byzantine emperor Constantine VII, is noteworthy.

Qasmuna al-Yahudi

Al-Andalus, 12th century. Poet.

Qasmūna was a poetess from al-Andalus, coming from a prominent Jewish family. Information about her comes only from two late Arabic sources written in Egypt. The first is an anthology of poems written by free women, and the second is a political and literary history of al-Andalus. In the latter, Qasmūna appears in a general section on the improvisational capacity of Andalusian poets, rather than in the specific section dedicated to women's poetry.

Only two short poems by Qasmūna have been preserved: one expresses her lament for seclusion and solitude, and the other reveals her amorous longings and fear of the passing of time and the loss of youth. In addition, a verse is preserved as the result of a poetic test that her father proposed to her, in which she had to complete the meaning of a verse that he started. Neither Qasmūna nor her father are mentioned in Hebrew sources, probably due to the lack of interest in Arabic poetry written by Jews.

Qasmūna's most famous poem, widely anthologized, opens with the remark that one day she looked in the mirror and saw that she was beautiful and that the time for marriage had come. She then speaks this verse:

Ayā rawḍatan qad ḥāna min-ha qaṭāfu-ha wa-laisa yurâ ḥānin yamudda la-ha yadā; fa-wā asafī yamdī-shshabābu mudayyaʿan wa-yabqâ-lladhī mā lanʾusammī-hi mufradā.

I see an orchard where the time of harvest has come, yet I see no gardener reaching out his hand to gather the fruit. What a pity! Youth withers away, wasted, and there remains in me, alone, that which I dare not name.

Zag de la Maleha

13th century. Chief treasurer of the royal treasury.

Also known as Yisuaq ben Sadoq, he is said to have been the son of Solomon ben Sadoq, tax collector for the King of Granada and ambassador of King Alfonso X. Zag de la Maleha was entrusted with the collection of debts and taxes of the kingdom, and all tax rolls were handed over to him for examination. He was also in charge of claiming the return of wages from knights who had not fulfilled their military duties.

But the struggle that broke out at the end of Alfonso X's reign between him and his son Sancho brought Zag into disgrace. The prince Sancho diverted military budgets to himself, and suspicion fell on Zag de la Maleha, so he was arrested. As an exemplary punishment, Zag was sentenced to death by hanging, and on the first Saturday of January 1281 all the Jews who were in their synagogues were imprisoned. They regained their freedom after paying 4,380,000 gold maravedís to the royal treasury.

Samuel Leví

Toledo, 1320 – Seville, 1361. Financier, politician, chief treasurer of Castile.

Samuel Leví held important positions in the court of the King of Castile, Pedro I. His main responsibility was to resolve the financial and economic affairs of the kingdom, which led him to become the chief treasurer and, later, a member of the Royal Council.

Residing in Toledo, Samuel lived in a luxurious mansion known as the "Palace of the Jew." Samuel was responsible for the construction of the Synagogue of El Tránsito in Toledo, inaugurated in 1357 and which, over time, was converted into a Christian church. In the synagogue, there are inscriptions in Hebrew praising King Pedro I for authorizing its construction.

The difficult political situation of Pedro I, involved in a war with his half-brothers who accused him of being favorable to the Jews, ended up affecting Samuel. After moving to Seville, Samuel was defamed by his enemies, accused of embezzlement, imprisoned and finally executed. The reasons why Pedro I allowed the execution of Samuel, who had been his trusted man, remain a mystery.

Jusaph Pichón

Seville, 14th century. Treasurer of Seville and Old Judge of the Jewish Quarter.

Jusaph Pichón, also known as Zag Pichón, was a Sevillian Jew who had come to manage the royal taxes under the reign of the Castilian monarch Enrique II, which made him one of the richest people in Seville and the Kingdom of Castile.

His success generated envy even among his own Jewish coreligionists, leading to his imprisonment and subsequent execution in his own home at the hands of three members of Seville's Jewish community. This was possible thanks to a summary execution order that they requested from the king, who, trusting in them, granted it without requiring them to reveal the identity of the alleged traitor.

Although the king, furious at the death of his administrator, sentenced those responsible to death, this incident only fueled the prejudice of the Christian population about the supposed excessive greed of the Jews. In addition, it increased the popularity of archdeacon Ferrán Martínez's anti-Semitic messages, which would trigger the massacre of 1391.

The Zarzals

Granada-Seville, 14th-15th century. Physicians.

Pharez ibn Zarzal was one of the most prominent Jewish physicians practicing medical science during the height of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada in the 14th century. His medical skill made him a prominent figure in a time of great cultural and scientific splendor in Granada. His legacy continued with his son, Abraham ibn Zarzal, who also dedicated himself to medicine. However, after a coup d'état in Granada, Abraham was forced to flee and seek refuge in Castile, under the reign of Pedro I. There, Abraham also worked as an astrologer.

The Zarzal family's medical legacy extended to the next generation with Mosé ben Zarzal, Abraham's son. Born in Seville, Mosé achieved an even greater reputation than his father and distinguished himself as one of the most renowned physicians of his time. His fame even surpassed that of other contemporary physicians. Mosé ben Zarzal continued his career until his death in 1433, during the reign of Juan II.

Ysabel Hernandes

Seville, 16th century. Painter.

The measures taken against the conversos and the emigration of Jews during the reign of the Catholic Monarchs had a profound economic impact. The confiscations of property from the expelled Jews failed to compensate for the loss in royal revenues. This situation was aggravated because the confiscated income was mainly used to finance the expenses of the Inquisition courts and military campaigns. In response to this problem, certain measures were implemented.

One of the most detailed records of the Inquisition corresponds to Seville and documents the rehabilitations (habilitaciones) granted between 1494 and 1495, citing the various areas where these people resided, many of them outside the old Jewish quarter. In the list of some of the new converso families who, after paying, continued to live in Seville in 1510, the name of Ysabel Hernandes appears. This woman is credited with the profession of painter, although it is not clear whether she was an artist or a craftswoman.

The expulsion of 1492

In Seville, Cádiz and Córdoba a general rehearsal for the expulsion of the Jews towards Extremadura took place in 1483, under the influence of the inquisitor Tomás de Torquemada — a rehearsal that would finally take shape in the Expulsion Decree of 1492, in which the Catholic Monarchs ordered Jewish families to separate themselves definitively from the Christian kingdoms unless they converted within three months.

The number of exiles is not clear, but it is estimated at around one hundred thousand people from across the kingdom, who had to settle their debts and sell their possessions before leaving. Most fled to Portugal and North Africa.

Read: 1391: the year that changed Seville's Jewish quarter · 1492: the edict, the port of Seville and the birth of Ladino

A dictionary of the Inquisition

Auto-da-fé: A public ceremony held by the Inquisition at which the sentences of those accused of heresy and other offences against the Catholic faith were announced.

Convert: A person of Jewish origin who converted to Christianity, generally in the medieval period, whether of their own free will or under social, economic or political pressure.

Crypto-Jew: Jews who, after converting to Christianity, went on practising Judaism in secret. They appeared to be Christians in order to escape persecution, but privately kept up Jewish practices and beliefs.

Garrotte: An instrument of execution used in Spain: a chair to which the condemned was fastened by the neck with an iron loop or collar, tightened with a screw until death came by asphyxiation or the severing of the spinal cord.

The stake: A method of execution in which the condemned was burned alive. It was used by the Spanish Inquisition to punish heretics and others deemed enemies of the Catholic faith.

Marrano: A pejorative term used in medieval and Renaissance Spain for Jews who had converted to Christianity, often under duress, yet went on secretly practising Judaism.

Sambenito: A tunic and cone-shaped cap that those condemned by the Inquisition had to wear as a sign of penance. It is not a cap as such, but a kind of scapular worn during execution or public humiliation.

Ladino at risk of extinction

Ladino, also known as Judeo-Spanish, is a language rooted in the old Castilian spoken in the Iberian Peninsula during the Middle Ages. After the expulsion of 1492, the Sephardic community carried this language to different parts of the world, such as Turkey, Greece, Bulgaria and the Balkans. Over the centuries, Ladino evolved as it mingled with the local languages, taking in vocabulary and expressions from Turkish, Greek, Bulgarian and Serbo-Croatian, among others.

This linguistic fusion has produced a rich and unique variant of Spanish that reflects the history of the Sephardic diaspora. Ladino, however, has been fading over time, as the younger generations of Sephardim adapted to the languages of their countries of residence and stopped passing Ladino on to their descendants. Today, efforts are under way to preserve and revitalise this language, a precious cultural legacy.

Institutional relations

In 1986, Spain and Israel officially established diplomatic relations, opening a new stage in their institutional ties. Four years later, in 1990, the Sephardic communities around the world received the Prince of Asturias Award for Concord, in recognition of having preserved for centuries their cultural, linguistic and historical heritage of Hispanic origin.

In 1992, coinciding with the fifth centenary of the expulsion of the Jews from the Hispanic kingdoms, the Sefarad 92 programme was carried out, accompanied by numerous cultural and academic initiatives.

In 2015, Spain passed Law 12/2015, which created an extraordinary procedure allowing Sephardim of Spanish origin to apply for Spanish nationality by proving their Sephardic origin and a special connection with Spain, without needing to reside in the country beforehand. The law also allowed them to keep their previous nationality.

The deadline for filing new applications through this extraordinary channel closed on 1 October 2019. During 2020 and 2021 the review of the files already submitted intensified and the documentary requirements were applied more strictly, which led to a marked increase in refusals. This shift mainly affected how Sephardic ancestry was verified, the documentation provided and the connection with Spain.

At present, no new applications are accepted under the extraordinary procedure of Law 12/2015. The Civil Code, however, keeps a specific channel for Sephardim: they may apply for Spanish nationality after two years of legal residence in Spain, continuous and immediately prior to the application, as against the ten years required as a general rule.

At the local level Seville, which had belonged to the Red de Juderías de España–Caminos de Sefarad network between 2012 and 2016, began its readmission process in 2025. After passing the technical evaluation, its admission was approved in December 2025, and since 1 January 2026 Seville is once again a full member of the network, strengthening its commitment to the research, preservation and dissemination of its Jewish and Sephardic heritage.

Read: Seville returns to the Red de Juderías de España