Skip to content
Zakhor
Back to catalogue

Early Middle Ages and Crusades

Massacre of refugees from Cologne; the cantor Samuel ben Yehiel and his son Yehiel drown themselves in the castle pond

Juin 1096·Wevelinghoven

Toll
inconnu

The toll is reproduced exactly as the source states it — never rounded, never added to another. Tolls overlap from one event to the next.

The refugees from Cologne hiding in Wevelinghoven were discovered by the crusaders. The cantor Samuel ben Yehiel, seeing the outcome, slaughtered his son Yehiel and then took his own life in the castle pond, along with those who followed them.

The account in the Rhenish chronicles dwells on the words exchanged between the father and the son before the act, and on the blessing pronounced over the sacrifice. It is one of the texts that gave form, in Ashkenazi Memory, to the notion of the sanctification of the Name: dying by one's own hand so as not to be compelled into baptism.

Period :
Early Middle Ages and Crusades
Type :
Massacre
Region :
Western Europe
Country :
Allemagne
Sources

Chronique de Salomon bar Siméon ; Chronique d'Éliézer bar Nathan ; piyyoutim des massacres de Rhénanie.

At the same place

The catalogue holds no other event at Wevelinghoven.

In the same country305

  1. 1012Expulsion of the community by Henri II; Gershom ben Juda, "light of the exile", loses his son there, forcibly convertedtoute la communauté
  2. 1096Massacres of the First Crusade in the Rhineland~800 à Worms, ~1 000 à Mayence ; total 5 000-12 000
  3. 18 et 25 mai 1096Two massacres~800
  4. Mai-juin 1096The archbishop disperses the community in seven neighboring towns; the crusaders massacre them one by one in Juneplusieurs centaines
  5. 3 mai 1096Sabbath attack by the crusaders of Emicho of Flonheim; Bishop Jean shelters the survivors in his castles and has murderers executed11
  6. 27 mai 1096Assault on the palace of Archbishop Ruthard~1 100
  7. Juin 1096The refugees of Cologne take their own lives in the refectory hall at the moment of the Sabbath mealinconnu
  8. Juin 1096Jews driven into the Danube and forcibly baptized en masse; Henry IV would later permit them to return to Judaismtoute la communauté baptisée

And 297 more in the catalogue.

Event 129 of 2483, in chronological order · Early Middle Ages and Crusades: 89 events in the catalogue