- 著者
-
宮武 志郎
- 出版者
- 学術雑誌目次速報データベース由来
- 雑誌
- オリエント (ISSN:00305219)
- 巻号頁・発行日
- vol.39, no.1, pp.149-165, 1996
The Nasi family of Marranos (crypt-Jews) expanded its commercial activities not only in the Ottoman Empire but also in the Mediterranean world and Eastern and Western Europe during and after the Christian persecution. The Nasi family was led by Donna Gracia and her nephew and son-in-law, Don Joseph Nasi: the former claimed to have returned to Judaism during her refuge in Ferrara, but the latter returned to Judaism after his immigration to the Ottoman Empire.<br>Joseph took advantage of various ways to develop his economic, political and communal activities. For example, the Nasi family set up its close relationship with the Ottoman court through the Jewish court physicians, especially Moshe Hamon, when they immigrated to Istanbul in the first half of the 1550s. Their economic success owed to commercial and intelligence networks, and to many other factors and agents, that they had inherited from the Mendes family.<br>The Ottoman archives and Rabbinical Responsa show evidence of Joseph's aggressive attitude and of his commercial and intelligence networks at three points.<br>The first was the Ancona Boycott, when Joseph attempted to take advantage of his Jewish faith and use Sephardic Rabbis as his propagandists. His ends were to spread his leadership over many independent Jewish communities, to improve the heretic status of Marranos, and to monopolize Mediterranean trades.<br>The second point was the rebuilding of Tiberias. Gracia rebuilt the old Palestinian city mainly for her own pious motives, but Joseph seized on her plan as a good opportunity to extensively develop his economic activities. At the same time, this plan involved Jewish court physicians as Joseph's messengers to the Ottoman court.<br>The last point was Joseph's friendship with Selim II, the eleventh Ottoman Sultan. The Sultan awarded him the "Dukalik: similar to the authorities of Sancakbeyi" of Naxos and Cyclades which gave him a uinque political status as well as commercial privileges in domestic and foreign trade.<br>The conclusion must be drawn that Joseph Nasi was not a Jewish hero who had the character of a proto-Zionist, but a realistic businessman who gave precedence to his profits over his Jewish faith.