THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA
Austria "Under the
Through
House
of Hapsburg- (1276-1420):
the treaty of Nov. 21, 1276, the Austrian
were ceded to Rudolph of Hapsburg as a vacant vassalage, which he later transferred, in his capacity as German emperor, to his sons Albrecht I. and Rudolph (Dec. 27, 1282). He at once asserted his rights by granting a new charter to the Jews, because in this respect, as in many others, he was anxious to emphasize the fact that Ottocar's dominion was not a legitimate one. This charter, dated March 4, 1277, was also, in its principal points, a reproduction of that issued by Frederick II. in 1244, although Rudolph issued it not as duke of Austria, but as German emperor. It was not until 1331 that the dukes of Austria received the right to keep Jews. Another important difference lies in (he fact that the charter of Rudolph was limited to the Austrian possessions, while in Bohemia the regulations of Ottocar remained in force. Rudolph, who naturally, like Ottocar, wished to attach the cities to his government, also confirmed to several of them the privilege of excluding Jews from public office however, he refused to confirm forged privileges of Wiener Neustadt dating from about 1270, and which were still more unfavorable to the Jews. Under his successor, Albrecht I. (duke of Austria from 1282; German emperor from 1298 assassinated 1308), the Jews
Jewish money-lender, the first instance of a usage that became frequent in later times (see Totto a
territories
were protected
in
Germany;
while,
in
his
own
dominions, Albrecht connived at the outrages committed upon them by mobs or by princes. The sentiment of the populace with regard to the Jews may be judged from the verses of the contemporary poet, Seyfried Helbling, who complains that there are too many Jews in the country, and that thirty Jews are enough to fill the largest city with "stench and unbelief." He therefore advises that all the Jews be burned, or sold at the rate of thirty for a penny (Haupt, "Zeitschrift fur Deutsche Alterthiimer, iv.). In 1293 the Jews of Krems were accused of having murdered a Christian; two were broken on the wheel, and the others had to pay heavy ransom for their lives.
The persecution
started in Franconia
fleisch also showed
its effects
by Rind-
in Austria,
and
in
various cities the accusation was made that the Jews had desecrated the host Persecutions. so that while Albrecht fined the cities in Franconia heavily for outrages committed against the Jews, the Jewish inhabitants of Korneuburg were killed or expelled (1306). There Is no report of any punishment of the participants in the massacre, although it had been proved by the bishop that the miracle of the host was a fraud perpetrated by a priest who, after dipping a host in blood, claimed that it bled because the Jews had pierced it. Only from St. Poelten is it reported that Albrecht threatened the city with destruction for an outrage committed against the Jews, and that the Under city had to pay a ransom of 3,500 talents. Albrecht's successor, Frederick (1308-30), the only event of importance is his assignment of the Jewish taxes to the archbishop of Salzburg for services rendered in the war against his rival, Ludwig of BaFrederick levied taxes on the Jews in Ausvaria. tria on the basis of his rights as German emperor; he also canceled the debt of Albert von Rauhenstein
324
beief).
The First Jew
Frederick's order, that no
should engage in tailoring or in
Gewand-Schneiden ") Wiener Neustadt, is a further evidence of the growing hostility of the municipalities toward the Jews and of the disposiTotbrief.
selling
cloth ("
in the city of
tion of the rulers to yield to them.
Under Albrecht II. (1330-58) and Otto (1330-39), brothers and successors of Frederick, the right to keep Jews was expressly granted by the emperor to the dukes of Austria by the treaty of Munich, May 4, 1331 (" Darzu sollen sie die Juden, die hinter in gesessen seindt, in alien den Rechten und Gewohnhciten haben und niessen, als sie oder ir Vordern herbracht haben"). It became the custom in those days for the emperor, in order to obtain the good-will of his powerful vassals, to transfer among other royal privileges the right to keep Jews that is, to tax them. In spite of the greater interest which the territorial rulers took in their Jews, when they became their taxable property, the persecutions, begun under Akmleder in Alsace in 1338, had their counter;
In Retz, Znaim, Horn, Eggenparts in Austria. burg, Neuburg, and Zwetl the Jews were massacred, and in the first-named city, where a desecrated host had performed the usual miracles, a church of the " Holy Blood " was erected in commemoration of it. Evidently because of their fear of similar massacres, the Jews of Vienna voluntarily reduced the rate of interest from 173.33 per cent, to which they were entitled under the charter of 1244, to 65 per cent on large and to 86 per cent on small loans. This document, written both in Hebrew and in German, is preserved in the municipal archives of Vienna (Wolf, " Studien zur Jubelfeier der Wiener Universitat," Vienna, 1865, p. 170). The desire of Duke Albrecht II. to protect the Jews against mob violence, for which the desecrated host furnished pretexts, is evident from the fact that he wrote to Pope Benedict XII. asking him to order an investigation of alleged miracles in connection with a desecrated host in Pulka, which, according to the opinion of some, were merely a pretext to pillage the Jews. The pope, in an ambiguous reply dated Aug. 29, 1338, directs that an investigation be made; but of the result nothing is known. New sufferings came upon the Jews of Austria with the appearance of the Black Death (1349), though not to so great an extent as elsewhere in
Germany.
In various cities the accusation was spread that the Jews had caused the plague by poisoning the wells and in Krems, Stein, Mautern, and other places the Jewish communities were massacred. For this infringement of the public peace and for the destruction of the duke's property the cities were fined, three of the mob leaders were executed, while
others
had
to
pay ransom
for their lives.
Contem-
porary chronographers call the duke for this act of justice a partizan of the Jews (" fautor Judaeorum " A report, first found in an old manuscript, " Wiener Geserah" (Steinsclmeider, "Cat. Bodl." col. 537; Gratz, "Gesch. der Juden," 3d ed., vii. 344, wrongly based on Pez, I.e. i. 541), according to which the ).
