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Makhir ben Yehudah Zakkai of Narbonne or Makhir ben Habibaiof Narbonne or Natronai ben Habibi [1] (725 - 765 CE or 793 CE) was a Babylonian-Jewish scholar and later, the supposed leader of the Jewish community of Narbonne in a region which at that time was called Septimania at the end of the eighth century.
According to a tradition preserved by Abraham ibn Daud in his Sefer ha-Qabbalah , written about 1161, Makhir was a descendant of the house of David. Ibn Daud wrote:
Whatever Makhir's Babylon origins claimed by his descendants, the relation between Makhir and Charlemagne is legendary, the more famous king substituting for his father Pepin, king of the Franks, who in order to enlist the Jews of Narbonne in his efforts to keep the Umayyad Saracens at bay, granted wide-ranging powers in return for the surrender of Moorish Narbonne to him in 759. The Annals of Aniane and the Chronicle of Moissac both attribute this action to the Gothic leaders of Narbonne, rising up and massacring the Saracen garrison. Pepin with his sons Carloman and Charles redeemed this pledge in 768, granting to Makhir and his heirs extensive lands, an act that called forth an unavailing protest from Pope Stephen III. [2] In 791 Charlemagne confirmed the status of the Jewish Principate and made the title of Nasi permanent. [3]
The Makhir family enjoyed for centuries many privileges and that its members bore the title of "nasi" (prince). Benjamin of Tudela, who visited Narbonne in 1165, speaks of the exalted position occupied by the descendants of Makhir, and the "Royal Letters" of 1364 [4] also record the existence of a rex Iudaeorum (King of the Jews) at Narbonne. The place of residence of the Makhir family at Narbonne was designated in official documents as "Cortada Regis Judæorum". [5]
Arthur Zuckerman maintains that Makhir was actually identical with Natronai ben Habibi, an exilarch deposed and exiled in a dispute between two branches of the family of Bostanai in the late eighth century. [1] Zuckerman further identified Makhir (Natronai) with a Maghario, Count of Narbonne (actually Viscount), and in turn with an Aymeri de Narbonne, who lived in the 12th century but whom heroic poetry makes father of William of Gellone (died 813). This William was subject of at least six major epic poems composed before the era of the Crusades, including Willehalm by Wolfram von Eschenbach, (who also, in another work, was a chronicler of the search of the Grail).
The historical William, i. e. William I, Count of Toulouse led Frankish forces at the fall of Barcelona in 803. The account of the campaign in Ermold Niger's Latin poem dates the events, as Zuckerman says, according to the Jewish calendar and portrays William, again according to Zuckerman's interpretation, as an observant Jew. [3] Count William was actually the son of the Frankish Count Theoderic and in 806 became a monk. In another identification, Zuckerman concludes that Theoderic was none other than Makhir, and that the well-documented descendants of Theoderic embodied a dynasty of Franco-Judeic kings of Narbonne, representing the union of the lineage of the exilarchs with Carolingians.
However, this underlying chain of identifications has been shown to be flawed, [6] a negative opinion shared by other scholars, [7] while the broader suggestions of a Jewish principality in Southern France have likewise been disputed. [8] Zuckerman's use of sources and analytical approach have also been criticized. [9]
Narbonne is a commune in Southern France in the Occitanie region. It lies 849 km (528 mi) from Paris in the Aude department, of which it is a sub-prefecture. It is located about 15 km (9 mi) from the shores of the Mediterranean Sea and was historically a prosperous port.
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Septimania is a historical region in modern-day southern France. It referred to the western part of the Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis that passed to the control of the Visigoths in 462, when Septimania was ceded to their king, Theodoric II. During the Early Middle Ages, the region was variously known as Gallia Narbonensis, Gallia, or Narbonensis. The territory of Septimania roughly corresponds with the modern French former administrative region of Languedoc-Roussillon that merged into the new administrative region of Occitanie. In the Visigothic Kingdom, which became centred on Toledo by the end of the reign of Leovigild, Septimania was both an administrative province of the central royal government and an ecclesiastical province whose metropolitan was the Archbishop of Narbonne. Originally, the Goths may have maintained their hold on the Albigeois, but if so it was conquered by the time of Chilperic I. There is archaeological evidence that some enclaves of Visigothic population remained in Frankish Gaul, near the Septimanian border, after 507.
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Pumbedita Academy or Pumbedita Yeshiva was a yeshiva in present-day Iraq, called Babylon, during the era of the Amoraim and Geonim sages. It was founded by Judah bar Ezekiel and, with the Sura Academy founded in 225 by Abba Arika, was an influential and dominant yeshiva for about 800 years.
Sura Academy was a Jewish yeshiva located in Sura in what is now southern Iraq, a region known in Jewish texts as "Babylonia". With Pumbedita Academy, it was one of the two major Jewish academies from the year 225 CE at the beginning of the era of the Amora sages until 1033 CE at the end of the era of the Gaonim. Sura Academy was founded by the Amora Abba Arikha ("Rav"), a disciple of Judah ha-Nasi. Among the well-known sages that headed the yeshiva were Rav Huna, Rav Chisda, Rav Ashi, Yehudai ben Nahman, Natronai ben Hilai, Saadia Gaon, and others.
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