18th century
Letters patent of Louis XVI
1784·Alsace
The toll is reproduced exactly as the source states it — never rounded, never added to another. Tolls overlap from one event to the next.
expulsion of Jews without a letter of tolerance, marriage subject to royal authorization
The letters patent of Louis XVI concerning the Jews of Alsace were a double-edged document. They abolished the body toll — that tax which required a Jew entering a town to pay the same tariff as livestock, and whose abolition Cerf Berr had obtained from the king — yet at the same time they ordered a general census, prescribed the expulsion of all those unable to produce a letter of tolerance, and subjected marriage to royal authorization. The intention was to fix and reduce a population whose growth was feared. The Alsatian communities lived through the following years under the regime of the census, until the National Assembly decided otherwise.
- Period :
- 18th century
- Type :
- Expulsion
- Region :
- Western Europe
- Country :
- France
Robert Badinter, *Libres et égaux* ; Zosa Szajkowski, *The Economic Status of the Jews in Alsace, Metz and Lorraine* ; Ronald Schechter, *Obstinate Hebrews*.