Browse Items (234 total)

Agnesa testates while ill, naming her husband her universal heir and executor. She leaves donations to the synagogues in Palermo and Trapani, and to the burial society of Palermo. She leaves two silver Torah finials to the synagogue in Trapani…

Allegrezze dictated her will to Simone de Castelnuovo, a Jewish rabbi/notary, who recorded the will in Italian.

PARTIAL TRANSCRIPTION:

... per provedere ale cose e ocasione come conviene fare ali personi da bene e tementi de Dio et spressio…

The widow Altadonna makes her three sons, Merdoc, Sabet, and Benedetto, her universal heirs, but also leaves them particular real estate and other items. She leaves to her sons, Merdoc and Sabet, a home, with details about where the home is located…

The original will is written on 6 March 1454. She names her son Salomone as universal heir.

On 26 March, Altadonna adds a codicil which orders Lia (a son?) to be paid 7.15 ounces. Until the time that Lia is paid that amount, he should be allowed…

Altadonna's husband is a physician. She names him her universal heir. She also leaves a Torah scroll, silver finials, and other ornaments (worth 12 ounces) to the synagogue in Palermo. She leaves 3 tari to her sister Gimula, wife of Benedetto…

Anastassia is the wife of Judah (Iecudha) Balbo, a spicer (speciarius) in Candia. She names as her executors her husband as well as her brother Sambatheus Balbo. It seems that she married a relative. She testates while sick, and names her husband…

The widow Annella leaves money for her three children, two sons and a daughter. The daughter is already married, but the moneys are meant to fund her dowry, and are to be given to the daughter's husband. Her younger son is still a minor. Other money…

New Christian (conversa) testator. Although she testated in Galicia, Spain, she owned one of the houses in the old Jewish quarter of Porto, Portugal, that later remained in the hands of New Christians families. It is the set of 30 houses surrounding…

This is the codicil to the will of Antonia Saraiva. Around 1560, Antonia Saraiva married her relative, the doctor Antonio Dinis, both New Christians born in Barcelos (kingdom of Portugal) and living in Pontevedra (Galicia). She was the daughter of…

Archondisa, a widow, names as her executor her "beloved brother" Sambatheus (Shabbetai in Hebrew). She leaves to her brother-executor a home in the Jewish quarter of Candia (currently where a man named Samargias Cumani lives). Three years after…

Among the fascinating clauses in this will is an attempt by Astruga to prevent  her husband, Jucef, from remarrying -- or at least to disincentivize a second marriage. She first leaves to her mother, Fava, 600 Barcelonan sous. But then, she…