Présence juive et sociabilité dans l'Italie du bas Moyen Age

ewish Presence and Sociability in Late Medieval Italy This contribution aims to shed light on some of the issues surrounding the contractualisation of the Jewish presence in the centre-north during the last centuries of the Middle Ages. In particular, using normative texts as a starting point, we attempt to analyze the discrepancy between theoretical aspects and the reality of the Jewish presence. The Jews of central and northern Italy, unlike those of Rome and southern Italy, whose presence was long- standing, represented a substantial novelty. Their arrival therefore had to be negotiated on relatively new terms, which gave rise to some unprecedented situations. The documents presented here are intended to offer a few examples of how the Jews managed to integrate into the Christian world, not only in economic terms, but also through social relations that the authorities almost never managed to interrupt completely, at least until the first decades of the sixteenth century.