Dr Dean Irwin is currently working with Joshua Outhwaite, Tash Jenman and Luka Liu on a new research initiative to reconstruct the lives of Lincoln’s Jews, employing the extant records. Regular updates from the group can be found on ‘X’ by clicking here
The Lincoln Jewry was one of the oldest Jewish communities in medieval England. Established during the so-called ‘Anarchy’ of King Stephen’s reign (1135-54), it quickly became a leading centre of Jewish communal, business, and intellectual life in England. In seeking to identify the personnel of the community, and reconstruct biographies of them, we have chosen to take the end of the community’s history as our starting point. On 18 July 1290, Edward I promulgated the Edict of Expulsion, which required that all Jews leave the England by All Saints Day (1 November). Although they were given safe conducts to the ports, and affordable passage out of the country (for themselves and their possessions) anything which remained defaulted to the Crown. The Valor Judaismusdocuments, as Robin Mundill termed them, detail the nature and extent of Jewish debts and property holdings. A scrutiny roll, summarising the particulars of all the debts which were held in the Lincoln archa, a has been preserved (TNA E 101/250/12). Equally, details of those properties which were held by Jews in Lincoln at the time of the Expulsion. It is this latter evidence that we have taken as out starting point. Inevitably, this provides an incomplete list of Jewish property holdings 1290. Some Jews will have obtained a licence to sell their property during the Summer of 1290, while others will be omitted for various reasons. Even so, this provides a fixed point at which we can establish the identities of at least some Jews who held property in Lincoln at the time of the Expulsion. These are also the most likely individuals to appear in other records series which be explored in the future to reconstruct the lives (or, at least, careers) of the individuals.