Eugene M. (Associate Professor of History and Tobor Family Scholar in the Program in Jewish Culture and Society Avrutin Associate Professor of History and Tobor Family Scholar in the Program in Jewish
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The ritual murder accusation is one of a series of myths that fall under the label blood libel, and describes the medieval legend that Jews require Christian blood for obscure religious purposes and a
At the doorstep of the twenty-first century, one would expect that medieval concepts such as blood libel—the accusation that Jews kill children to use their blood in religious ritual—would have been d
On April 22, 1823, a three-year-old boy named Fedor finished his lunch and went to play outside. Fedor never returned home from his walk. Several days later, a neighbor found his mutilated body draine
Alan Dundes, in this casebook of an anti-Semitic legend, demonstrates the power of folklore to influence thought and history.? According to the blood libel legend, Jews murdered Christian infants to o
On 22 September 1928, four-year-old Barbara Griffith strayed into the woods surrounding Massena in New York. Hundreds of people looked for the child but could not find her; then someone suggested that
A dramatic account of the wrongful 1911 arrest of a Jewish factory worker for the murders of two Christian victims, a case that inspired The Fixer, offers insight into period anti-Semitism in Russia w
In 1144, the mutilated body of William of Norwich, a young apprentice leatherworker, was found abandoned outside the city's walls. The boy bore disturbing signs of torture, and a story spread that it
In 1144, the mutilated body of William of Norwich, a young apprentice leatherworker, was found abandoned outside the city's walls. The boy bore disturbing signs of torture, and a story soon spread tha
On Sunday, March 20, 1911, children playing in a cave near Kiev made a gruesome discovery: the blood-soaked body of a partially clad boy. After right-wing groups asserted that the killing was a ritual
On Sunday, March 20, 1911, children playing in a cave near Kiev made a gruesome discovery: the blood-soaked body of a partially clad boy. After right-wing groups asserted that the killing was a ritual