Aguilar (Called Also Aguilar De Campo)

A district in the Spanish province of Valencia, which sheltered a considerable Jewish congregation in the Middle Ages. In consequence of the persecution by the Almohades, many of the Jews resident there pretended for a time to embrace Islam. In the year 1290 the Jews of the community paid 8,600 maravedis ($29,240 = £5,848) in taxes. In the civil war between Don Pedro the Cruel and his brother, Don Henry, the Jews of Aguilar suffered severely, and many of them were slain. A tombstone, with a Hebrew inscription dating from the fourteenth century, is to be found above the gate of Reinosa. The beautiful brass lamp, which toward the end of the sixteenth century still hung in the church of San Miguel in Aguilar, belonged originally to the synagogue there. It bears on its rim a Hebrew inscription, stating that it was made by Samuel ben Pinḥas Caro of Paredes. Many Spanish families have taken their name from this district.

Bibliography:

  * Samuel Zarza, in MeḲor Ḥayyim, reprinted in Wiener's ed. of Shebeṭ Yehudah, p. 132;
  * Boletin de la Real Academia de la Historia, xxxvi. 340.



M. K.