Contains text with maps and illustrations. Covers Jewish history from the 5th-17th centuries, including discussion of the Crusades, blood libels, expulsions, the Inquisition, and pogroms.

The Expulsion of the Jews from Spain is a detailed study of the events surrounding this infamous chapter in Spanish history. Based on hundreds of documents discovered, deciphered, and analyzed during decades of intensive archival research, this work focuses on the practical consequences of the expulsion both for those expelled and those remaining behind. It responds to basic questions such as: What became of property owned by Jewish individuals and communities? What became of outstanding debts between Jews and Christians? How was the edict of expulsion implemented? Who was in charge? How did they operate? What happened to those who converted to Christianity in order to remain in Spain or return to that country? The material summarized and analyzed in this study also sheds light on Jewish life in Spain preceding the expulsion. For example, Jews are shown to have been present in remote villages where they were not hitherto known to have lived, and documents detailing lawsuits between Christians related to debts left behind by Jews reveal much about business and financial relations between Jews and Christians. By focusing on the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in such detail - for example, by naming the magistrates who presided over the confiscation of Jewish communal property - Professor Beinart takes history out of the realm of abstraction and gives it concrete reality.

The first complete series of records of trials by the Spanish Inquisition of a specific local group, the Conversos of Ciudad Real. The verbatim testimonies recorded by the trial notaries furnish authentic evidence of the methods adopted by the Inquisition and of the relationships between the Conversos and their Christian neighbours in a city of fifteenth-sixteenth century Castile. The trials are presented in the original mediaeval Spanish, with introductions, genealogies, synopses of trials and notes in English.