Linguistic and Formal Aspects of Jewish Record Keeping in Italy—A Comparative Investigation

There is ample evidence for a flourishing Jewish documentary consciousness in 16th-century Italy. This is clear at many different levels—from the notarial to the constitutional, from the judicial to the legislative, from the personal and mercantile to the criminal and diplomatic. Maintaining documentary archives clearly became common, indeed normative, in a wide range of communities, apparently partly in response to pressure from the outside, partly because of an increasing level of institutionalization in the growing communities themselves. What were the models and norms for Jewish documentary and archival practice? How did existing traditions of terminological, conceptual, and linguistic practices among Jews interact with those imported from the outside? Can we see a difference between Jewish documents that might have to be presented to the outside authorities and those for purely internal use? Can we trace the emergence of a Jewish bureaucratic personnel? Included are documents preserved from two ethnically and geographically quite different communities—Rome and Pisa/Livorno.