Anti-Jewish Greek Texts in Late Medieval Crete

The present study explores Greek anti-Jewish writings in Venetian Crete within a framework of Christian-Jewish coexistence. Although Jews were economically and socially integrated, they encountered stereotypes and episodic violence grounded in inherited religious prejudice. Unlike Byzantium, Crete produced no systematic anti-Jewish polemic; hostile views surfaced sporadically in vernacular and didactic texts. Ecclesiastical conflicts among Orthodox, Catholics, and unionists eclipsed Jewish participation. In such a limited circulation of manuscripts of anti-Jewish content in late Venetian Crete, the texts of Manouel Savios and Angelos Gregorios constitute an exception.

The present study explores Greek anti-Jewish writings in Venetian Crete within a framework of Christian-Jewish coexistence. Although Jews were economically and socially integrated, they encountered stereotypes and episodic violence grounded in inherited religious prejudice. Unlike Byzantium, Crete produced no systematic anti-Jewish polemic; hostile views surfaced sporadically in vernacular and didactic texts. Ecclesiastical conflicts among Orthodox, Catholics, and unionists eclipsed Jewish participation. In such a limited circulation of manuscripts of anti-Jewish content in late Venetian Crete, the texts of Manouel Savios and Angelos Gregorios constitute an exception.