Preface Vol 26

<plain_text><page sequence="1">Preface Volume XXVI of the Transactions of the Jewish His? torical Society of England, including Miscellanies Part XI, is presented with pleasure by the Publications Committee of the Society approximately two years after Volume XXV. This, it must be added, is the result of a conscious effort to try to maintain the rhythm of publication established in recent years but which is endangered simply because of financial strin? gency. In common with other learned and literary societies nowadays, the JHSE feels the strain of meet? ing higher printing, publishing, and postal costs, which all help to push further away the cherished goal of a volume of Transactions every year. Gratitude must therefore be expressed warmly to all those members who, understanding the circumstances, last year loyally accepted the imperative need for a higher annual subscription after many years without an in? crease. A number of kind donors have indeed attracted our further grateful thanks for subsidies (from which of course the whole membership benefits) to the Society's Publications Fund. Among them are Mr. J. Barnett, Mr. Alfred Rubens, Dr. Leonard Simons, and Mr. Mesod Benady; and a further grant has been kindly made by the British Academy towards the preparation of the next volume of the Exchequer of the Jews. We make no apology, however?in fact, we might even be introducing a much-needed neologism into the language by asking for more generous 'fairy godpersons' to come forward with donations to the Publications Fund. PUBLICATIONS There are in the pipeline a number of publications which are of great significance to Anglo-Jewish and general Jewish history, but which languish for lack of the financial 'oil' to ease their way: for example, two further volumes in the series of Plea Rolls of the Exche? quer of the Jews, one a completed thesis and translation, with introduction, by the late Dr. Sarah Cohen, and the other a transcription from manuscripts in the Pub? lic Records office now completed by Mr. Paul Brand. Scholarly research of this kind is unexpectedly reveal? ing how much more important in English and Jewish history was the part played in affairs by medieval English Jewry, a group which at one time tended to be popularly written off as of little account. A work whose appearance we have long looked forward to and encouraged is Dr. Gedalia Yogev's Diamonds and Coral: Anglo-Dutch Jews and 18th-century h trade. It has now, through the intervention of Dr. Aubrey Newman, President of theJHSE, been pub? lished by the Leicester University Press, and the Society can offer it at a discount to members. Copy is already being considered for Transactions XXVII?Miscellanies XII. The long-hoped-for Cumulative Index to Transac? tions I-XX?Miscellanies I-VI is nearer publication because entries for Part VI of Miscellanies have now been added to the work, and a generous offer of a subsidy towards production was made just as this Preface was being written. PERSONALIA Dr. Aubrey Newman, M.A., D.Phil., F.R.Hist.S., succeeded Mr. Raphael Loewe, M.C., M.A., as President of the Society for the session 1977-78 and was re-elected for a second term, 1978-79. Dr. New? man edits Book Notes for these volumes. Mr. Loewe has been elected a Vice-President of the Society. Sincere congratulations are offered to Dr. Vivian Lipman on the award to him of the C.V.O. in the Honours List. Dr. Lipman is a Vice-President of the Society, a past President, and a former Chairman of the Publications Committee and a former Hon. Editor of Publications. Other Vice-Presidents have warmly merited the Society's congratulations this past session: Sir Alan Mocatta, O.B.E. (a past President), on his 70th birth? day, Dr. Richard Barnett, C.B.E. (a past President and the present Chairman of the Publications Commit? tee), on his 70th birthday, and Mr. J. M. Rich, honor? ary member (a former Editor of the Jewish Chronicle), on his 80th birthday. We offer, too, sincere congratulations and good wishes to Mr. Alfred W. Mabbs, who was Deputy Keeper of Public Records and was promoted to the position of Keeper of the Public Records Office in 1978. Mr. Mabbs has always been generous in his assistance to our contributors in their researches and directly helped in the publication of the Exchequer of the Jews Vol. IV (1972) by transcribing a good part of the text and by compiling the index. Mr. C. R. Fincken, Librarian at the Society's Mocatta Library, which is housed at University Col? lege London under the general care of the College Librarian, Mr. Joseph Scott, has retired after 41 years' service to the College, and the Society thanks him for his work and offers its good wishes in his retirement.</page><page sequence="2">x Preface He is succeeded as Librarian at the Mocatta Library by Mrs. Emilie Steinhouse. Obituary: This volume is dedicated to the memory of one of the Society's most distinguished Vice-Presi dents, Dr. Arthur Sigismund Diamond, a past Presi? dent, who died shortly after his 80th birthday in 1978, and to whom a tribute delivered by Judge I. Finestein is printed in this volume; another most distinguished Vice-President, the Emeritus Chief Rabbi, Sir Israel Brodie, died in February 1979, and a tribute delivered by Dr. Vivian Lipman is also printed in these pages; further much regretted losses by death are those of Mr. Leslie L. Paisner, for many years a valued member of the Council, in March 1979, and Mr. Gerald Reit? linger, author of many books, including the classic description of the Nazi anti-Jewish scheme, The Final Solution, and a contributor to our programmes and Transactions, in March 1978. BRANCHES The branches of the Society founded in Birming? ham, Manchester, and Liverpool, reported on in Volume XXV, continue to function actively, and they have now been joined, in 1978, by two other branches. One we now welcome in Leeds, whose programme opened with a lecture by Dr. Aubrey Newman. The Officers are Chairman, Mr. H. Gothelf; Vice-Chair man, Mr. B. Silver; Treasurer, Mr. R. Goodwin; Hon. Secretary, Mr. Joseph Lewis; Hon. Vice-Presidents, Professor R. B. Dobson and Professor A. J. P. Taylor. The second, equally to be welcomed, has been founded in Israel, through the enterprise of Professor Lloyd Gartner (formerly of the U.S.A. and a contri? butor to Transactions), Mrs. Ruth Lehmann-Gold schmidt and Professor Siegfried Stein (both formerly very active members of the Council of the Society in London), and Dr. Benjamin Jaffe (who has addressed the Society in London), all now living in Jerusalem. The opening meeting, attended by a large audience, in August 1978, was addressed by Dr. Vivian D. Lipman, C.V.O., on 'Medieval Anglo-Jewry and the Tower of London'. MEETINGS Since the last list, detailed in Vol. XXV, the follow? ing meetings have been held by the Society: 1976 20 October (annual general meeting). Raphael Loewe, M.C., M.A.?David Lopez Laguna's Psalter and its literary and scholarly background. 17 November. Mrs. Beth-Zion Lask Abrahams? George Eliot and her Jewish associations?a centenary tribute. 15 December. Robert S. Wistrich, M.A., Ph.D.? Zionism: a Jewish revolution? 1977 12 January. Geoffrey Alderman, M.A., D.PhiL, F.R.Hist.S.?The Jew as scapegoat? The settlement and reception in South Wales before 1914. 9 February. Jonathan Israel, M.A., D.Phil.?Jewish communities in Spanish North Africa in the 17th century: 1600-1669. 16 March. Harold Pollins, B.Sc.(Econ.)?Anglo Jewish trade unions, 1870-1914. 20 April. Abel Phillips?The origins of the first Jewish community in Scotland?Edinburgh 1816. 11 May. Mrs. Patricia F. D. Allin?Richard of Devizes and the alleged martyrdom of a boy at Winchester. 15 June. Ada Rapaport-Albert, B.A., Ph.D.?Chas sidism?image and self-image. 27 July. Sharon Rothstein, B.A.? The evolution of the Birmingham Hebrew National School, 1841-1870. 19 October (annual general meeting). Aubrey Newman, M.A., D.Phil., F.R.Hist.S.?The historian in two worlds. 16 November. David Katz?'The calling of the Jews': Millenarianism and readmission in 17th-century England. 14 December. Bill Williams, M.A.?Oral history and Anglo-Jewish history. 1978 11 January. Amital Spitzer?Jewish life in Southern Italy during the Middle Ages. 15 March. Tudor V. Parfitt, M.A., D.Phil.? The Father Thomas dossier in the French Foreign Ministry archives. 12 April. M. C. N. Salbstein, B.A., Ph.D.?David Salomons and the campaign for Jewish emancipation. 10 May. Kenneth D. Rubens?The origins and his? tory of the 4% Industrial Dwellings Company Limited. 7 June. Mesod Benady?The Jews of Gibraltar after the Great Siege. 19 July. David Abulafia, M.A., Ph.D.?Jews and finance in the Middle Ages: a comparative approach. 25 October (annual general meeting). Aubrey Newman, M.A., D.Phil., F.R.Hist.S.?Anglo-Jewry in the eighteenth century. 22 November. Richard D. Barnett, C.B.E., Litt.D., F.S.A., F.B.A.? Dr. de Castro Sarmento and the history of the Beth Holim Hospital. 13 December. David Spector?Serving with the Jew? ish Brigade.</page><page sequence="3">Preface XI 1979 17 January. Bernard M. J. Wasserstein, D.Phil.? The assassination of Lord Moyne (November 1944). 7 March. Edgar R. Samuel, B.A., M.Phil.?Manuel Levy Duarte (1630-1714): an Amsterdam merchant jew? eller and his trade with London. In addition, on 21 November 1977, Judge Israel Finestein, M.A., Q.C., delivered a Jubilee Lecture, Victoria to Elizabeth: major Anglo-Jewish trends through six reigns; the lecture was sponsored jointly by the Anglo-Jewish Association, the Board of Deputies, and theJ.H.S.E. Under the joint auspices of the Friends of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and this Society, Professor Jacob Milgrom, of the University of Cali? fornia at Berkeley, delivered a lecture on The Temple Scrolls, on 3 January 1979. The 70th anniversary of the Mocatta Library's becoming part of University College London was duly celebrated on 17 December 1976, and the oppor? tunity was taken to hold a small exhibition of material on the'Jew Bill' of 1753. At the suggestion of the Society and the Mocatta Library Committee, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, put on a successful exhibition of eighteenth and nineteenth century Anglo-Jewish silver, both ritual and secular pieces, from May to July 1978. Distinctive Anglo-Jewish historical remembrances were conveyed in another event, in which the Society took a prominent part, the erection of a plaque in York to commemorate the tragic mass suicide of over one hundred Jews in March 1190 at Clifford's Tower, rather than fall into the hands of the anti-Jewish mob. On 31 October 1978, the plaque was unveiled by the Chief Rabbi, Dr. Immanuel Jakobovits, the Arch? bishop of York, Dr. Stuart Blanch, Rabbi J. Kokotek, and Dr. Aubrey Newman, President of the Society, assisted by Professor R. B. Dobson, York University, Mr. Raphael Loewe, past President of the Society, and Dr. Jonathan Israel, Hon. Secretary, in the presence of Church and civic dignitaries, members of the local Jewish community, and members of this Society. March 1979. John M. Shaftesley, Editor.</page></plain_text>