Christina Augusta

Queen of Sweden; born at Stockholm Dec. 7, 1626; died at Rome April 19, 1689. She was a daughter of Gustavus Adolphus and Mary Eleanora of Brandenburg, and reigned from 1632 to 1654. Her attitude toward the Jews was most benevolent. Acquainted with Hebrew literature, which she eagerly studied in her youth, she welcomed eminent Hebrew scholars at her court. Thus Menasseh ben Israel, recommended to her by Vossius, was kindly received; and his pleadings for the Jews and their literature met with great sympathy.

Christina was, furthermore, interested, together with England, in permitting Jews to settle in the West Indies, and especially favored a Portuguese Marano, Isaac Manoel Texeira, whom she appointed financial agent and resident minister at Hamburg, and on account of whom she more than once remonstrated with the Senate of Hamburg, demanding for her Jewish minister the honors enjoyed by other ministers resident. During her sojourn at Hamburg she resided at the home of Manoel Texeira, regardless of the severe censures pronounced upon her from the Protestant pulpits. She appointed as her physician Benedito de Castro (Baruch Nehemiah).

Christina contrived by every possible means to prevent the banishment of the Jews of Vienna, decreed by Emperor Leopold in 1670; but unfortunate circumstances rendered her efforts futile.

Bibliography:

  * Archenholz, Memoiren der Konigin Christine, i. 99 et seq., Berlin, 1751-64;
  * Zeitschrift des Vereins für Hamburgische Gesch. ii. 409 et seq.;
  * Grätz, Gesch, der Juden, x. 80, 206, 238;
  * Kayserling, in Wertheimer's Jahrbücher der Israeliten, 1860, pp. 1-13.



G. I. Br.