Page 88 - The Track Of The Jew Through The Ages - Alfred Rosenberg

The Track of the Jew through the Ages

money for a war against Castile, the citizens of Lisbon donated to
him as a gift 1,000,000 ducats, but the Jews just 70 marks in silver
and 6000 reis, as a loan!
Thus were the Jews the lords of the land still, kept horses
with silver harnesses, went about in the finest hoods and gilded
daggers, occupied the most important offices, collected the tithes
from churches and cloisters and had the insolence to do this even
during the mass. A later king made complaints to a Jew whom he
trusted about the provocative conduct of his fellow tribesmen since
the people must be of the view that the Jews wading in gold and
precious stones acquired this luxury through the robbery that they
had committed on the Christians. "However I do not want you to
answer me", he said, "for I know very well that only plunder and
death will better you, then you will regret your deeds".
A new uprising that broke out in the absence of the king
(1449) was again suppressed, but the arousal of the Portuguese
people had already risen to such an extent that it was directed even
at the king and could be quelled only through ruthless intervention.
And so it went on for another half a century. The popular
representatives continued to demand that church taxes should not
be exempted to the Jews, that, in cases of dispute between Jews and
Christians, a Christianjudge should be called upon, that the sermons
insulting Christianity in the synagogues be prosecuted, etc., all
without any result. Then it may be right that, as it is reported, "the
glowing hatred of the Portuguese people against the Jewish race no
141
longer knew any bounds and now blazed in open flames".
At the beginning of the 16 th century, on the occasion of a
clash between Jews and Christians, the displeasure that had been
suppressed for so long then broke out devastatingly. The persecutions
of the Jews began in Evora and then spread wider over Portugal. It
had its greatest scope naturally in Lisbon. First of all, they tried to
catch the richest Jew and tax-collector, Joao Mascerenhas, who had
enforced the harshest laws against the people. He thought that he
could even now posture like a lord, barricaded himself in his palace,
and berated the crowd from his balcony. He was finally caught in

141
Kayserling, op.cit., p. 145.
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