Before the Fall

From 1066 to 1290, the Jews of medieval England built up a unique cultural 'mishmash' that included Norman, Jewish and English influences. Numerous poems written by Jewish authors have come down to us, in forms we know were (and often still are) performed vocally. With painstaking research, using historical and traditional musical sources, Lucidarium brings this important narrative back to life. Coupled with anti-Judaic texts from the era, as well as the dances and songs that Jew and Christian alike would have enjoyed, it aims to help a 21st-century audience learn about what living as a Jew in medieval England might have been like.

The first Jews in England came over from Normandy with William the Conqueror. As 'property of the king', they lived outside of the feudal system, under the King's protection as well as his power. Unable to own land, they were limited to providing the services prohibited to Christians, specifically banking and moneylending. Not only were they the King's vassals (and sometime tax collectors), but they were also seen as French-speaking foreigners and were a target for extortion and popular uprisings, exacerbated by the atmosphere of intolerance brought on by the Crusades. The situation gradually became worse until the acts of expulsion of 1290, which saw 224 years of Jewish presence in the British Isles come to a close.

Although these centuries were hardly incident-free for the Jewish community, they also saw long periods of peace, of great prosperity, of learning and of creativity, in which intercultural contact was far from rare. Hebrew poems by English Jews, like Rabbi Yom Tov of York, Meir of Norwich, Jacob ben Judah of London and others have survived, with some entering into the mainstream liturgy and still sung today. The problems of English Jews were also treated by several poets living on the Continent like Joseph of Chartres, Rav Menahem of Worms, and Ephraim of Bonn. While historically fraught, this was a period of rich cultural exchange and creation, a narrative that deserves to be heard again.

This concert is included in the Friday Festival Day Pass (£75, accompanied u18s free). For full details of all festival pass options, including accommodation options, click the Book Tickets link.