Glückel of Hameln
Encyclopedia
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
– September 19, 1724, Metz
Metz
Metz is a city in the northeast of France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers.Metz is the capital of the Lorraine region and prefecture of the Moselle department. Located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, Metz forms a central place...
) was a Jewish businesswoman and diarist, whose account of life provides scholars with an intimate picture of German
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
Jewish communal life in the late-17th-early eighteenth century Jewish ghetto. It was a time of transition from the authority and autonomy of the Medieval kehilla
Kehilla
The Qahal was a theocratic organisational structure in ancient Israelite society, according to the Masoretic Text of the Bible. In later centuries, Qahal was the name of the autonomous governments of Jewish communities in Eastern Europe....
, toward a more modern ethos in which membership in the community was voluntary and Jewish identity far more personal and existential; a time historian Jacob Katz
Jacob Katz
Jacob Katz was a Jewish historian and educator. He established the history curriculum used in Israel's High Schools....
has defined as 'tradition and crisis',in his 1961 book by that name.. Written in Yiddish
Yiddish language
Yiddish is a High German language of Ashkenazi Jewish origin, spoken throughout the world. It developed as a fusion of German dialects with Hebrew, Aramaic, Slavic languages and traces of Romance languages...
, her diaries were originally intended for her descendants. The first part is actually a living will
Living will
An advance health care directive, also known as living will, personal directive, advance directive, or advance decision, are instructions given by individuals specifying what actions should be taken for their health in the event that they are no longer able to make decisions due to illness or...
urging them to live ethical
Ethics
Ethics, also known as moral philosophy, is a branch of philosophy that addresses questions about morality—that is, concepts such as good and evil, right and wrong, virtue and vice, justice and crime, etc.Major branches of ethics include:...
lives. It was only much later that historians discovered the diaries and began to appreciate her account of life at that time.
Glückel grew up in the city of Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
. When she was twelve years old, her parents betrothed her to Hayyim of Hamelin
Hamelin
Hamelin is a town on the river Weser in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Hamelin-Pyrmont and has a population of 58,696 ....
, whom she married 1660. After the marriage, the couple lived in his parents’ home in Hamelin. A year after their marriage, the couple moved in with Glückel’s parents in Hamburg, where Hayyim became an affluent businessman. Already involved in his business during his lifetime, when he died in 1689, she took over the business, conducting trade with markets as far as Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
, Leipzig
Leipzig
Leipzig Leipzig has always been a trade city, situated during the time of the Holy Roman Empire at the intersection of the Via Regia and Via Imperii, two important trade routes. At one time, Leipzig was one of the major European centres of learning and culture in fields such as music and publishing...
, Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
, Vienna
Vienna
Vienna is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Austria and one of the nine states of Austria. Vienna is Austria's primary city, with a population of about 1.723 million , and is by far the largest city in Austria, as well as its cultural, economic, and political centre...
, Metz
Metz
Metz is a city in the northeast of France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers.Metz is the capital of the Lorraine region and prefecture of the Moselle department. Located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, Metz forms a central place...
and Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
.
In 1700 she remarried, to a banker from Metz
Metz
Metz is a city in the northeast of France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers.Metz is the capital of the Lorraine region and prefecture of the Moselle department. Located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, Metz forms a central place...
in Lorraine
Lorraine (province)
The Duchy of Upper Lorraine was an historical duchy roughly corresponding with the present-day northeastern Lorraine region of France, including parts of modern Luxembourg and Germany. The main cities were Metz, Verdun, and the historic capital Nancy....
, and relocated there. Two years later, her husband Cerf Levy failed financially, losing not only his own fortune but hers as well. He died in 1712, leaving her a widow for a second time. [Liptzin, 1972, 14]
In her diaries, begun after her first husband's death in 1689, she describes key events in both Jewish and world history, such as the messianic fervor surrounding Sabbatai Zevi
Sabbatai Zevi
Sabbatai Zevi, , was a Sephardic Rabbi and kabbalist who claimed to be the long-awaited Jewish Messiah. He was the founder of the Jewish Sabbatean movement...
or the impact of the Swedish
Sweden
Sweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
wars waged by King Charles XII
Charles XII of Sweden
Charles XII also Carl of Sweden, , Latinized to Carolus Rex, Turkish: Demirbaş Şarl, also known as Charles the Habitué was the King of the Swedish Empire from 1697 to 1718...
. At the same time, she also describes day-to-day life among the Jewish inhabitants of the Rhine valley. Other scholars point to the fact that they constitute an early document in Yiddish, predating the rise of modern Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature
Yiddish literature encompasses all belles lettres written in Yiddish, the language of Ashkenazic Jewry which is related to Middle High German. The history of Yiddish, with its roots in central Europe and locus for centuries in Eastern Europe, is evident in its literature.It is generally described...
, while still others note that they were written by a woman, a rarity for Jewish texts from that period.
Her diaries were left off in 1699, shortly before her second marriage, and resumed 1715–1719, after her second husband's death. [Liptzin, 1972, 15]
Glückel's twelve children by her first husband married into the most prominent Jewish families of Europe. [Liptzin, 1972, 14]
The handwritten manuscript of Glückel's diaries was kept by Glückel's children and grandchildren. It was created by Glückel's son Moshe Hamel who copied her original manuscript, and the copy was inherited first by Moshe's son Chayim Hamel (d. 1788) and then by members of the next generation, Yosef Hamel and Chayim Hamel Segal of Königsberg (now Kaliningrad
Kaliningrad
Kaliningrad is a seaport and the administrative center of Kaliningrad Oblast, the Russian exclave between Poland and Lithuania on the Baltic Sea...
). The manuscript was deposited in the Bavarian State Library
Bavarian State Library
The Bavarian State Library in Munich is the central "Landesbibliothek", i. e. the state library of the Free State of Bavaria and one of Europe's most important universal libraries. With its collections currently comprising around 9.39 million books, it ranks among the best research libraries...
in the second half of the nineteenth century. [Comments by David Kauffman, quoted by Rabinovitz 1929]
The Bavarian State Library manuscript was published as a book in 1892 by David Kauffman in Pressburg (Bratislava
Bratislava
Bratislava is the capital of Slovakia and, with a population of about 431,000, also the country's largest city. Bratislava is in southwestern Slovakia on both banks of the Danube River. Bordering Austria and Hungary, it is the only national capital that borders two independent countries.Bratislava...
) under the name "Zikhroynes Glikl Hamel" (Yiddish: the Memoirs of Glikl Hamel). Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim was an Austrian-Jewish feminist, a social pioneer, and the founder of the Jüdischer Frauenbund .- Youth :...
, a descendant of hers, translated the Memoirs into German and published them in Vienna in 1910. An abridged translation into German with commentary by Alfred Feilchenfeld appeared in 1913, and went through four print runs by 1922/23. The first Hebrew translation was published in 1929 by Rabinovitz, who had also added detailed references for the many quotes often used by Glückel.
The Jewish Museum
Jewish Museum Berlin
The Jewish Museum Berlin , in Berlin, Germany, covers two millennia of German Jewish history. It consists of two buildings. One is the old Kollegienhaus, a former courthouse, built in the 18th century. The other, a new addition specifically built for the museum, designed by world-renowned architect...
in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
has devoted an entire exhibit to Glückel of Hamelin, intended to provide a sense of what life was like for the Jews of Germany before their emancipation.
Sol Liptzin
Sol Liptzin
Sol Liptzin was a scholar, author, and educator in Yiddish and German literature.- Life :Liptzin was born in Sataniv, Ukraine, and moved to New York at the age of nine. He graduated from City College of New York and did postgraduate work at the University of Berlin. He earned a master's degree and...
describes Glückel as "well versed in the legendary lore of the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
", familiar with the popular, ethically oriented Musar tracts
Musar literature
Musar literature is the term used for didactic Jewish ethical literature which describes virtues and vices and the path towards perfection in a methodical way.- Definition of Musar literature :...
, and "profoundly influenced by Tkhine
Tkhine
Tkhines were Yiddish-language prayer books, first compiled in the 17th century, for use by Ashkenazic Jewish women who, unlike the men of the time, typically could not read Hebrew, the language of the established synagogue prayer book...
s, devotional prayers for women". "Her style," he writes, "had the charm of simplicity and intimacy and the qualities of sincerity, vividness and picturesqueness." [Liptzin, 1972, 15]
Among Gluckel's descendants have been Heinrich Heine
Heinrich Heine
Christian Johann Heinrich Heine was one of the most significant German poets of the 19th century. He was also a journalist, essayist, and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of Lieder by composers such as Robert Schumann...
, Samson Raphael Hirsch
Samson Raphael Hirsch
Samson Raphael Hirsch was a German rabbi best known as the intellectual founder of the Torah im Derech Eretz school of contemporary Orthodox Judaism...
, and Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim
Bertha Pappenheim was an Austrian-Jewish feminist, a social pioneer, and the founder of the Jüdischer Frauenbund .- Youth :...
(also known as Anna O.
Anna O.
Anna O. was the pseudonym of a patient of Josef Breuer, who published her case study in his book Studies on Hysteria, written in collaboration with Sigmund Freud. Her real name was Bertha Pappenheim , an Austrian-Jewish feminist and the founder of the Jüdischer Frauenbund .Anna O...
).
External links
- Turniansky, Chava. "Glueckel of Hameln.", Jewish Women: A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia. 1 March 2009. Jewish Women's Archive. January 4, 2010
- Glückel von Hameln at "Other Women's Voices"
- Natalie Zemon DavisNatalie Zemon DavisNatalie Zemon Davis is a Canadian and American historian of the early modern period. She is currently a professor of history at the University of Toronto in Canada. Her work originally focused on France, but has since broadened to include other parts of Europe, North America, and the Caribbean...
, "Glückel of Hameln: Businesswoman," Jewish Heritage Online Magazine - Glikl bas Judah Leib (Gluckel of Hameln), excerpt from her memoirs on "Early Modern Notes"