Scepter of Judah

Polish-Lithuanian Jewry was the center of the early modern Jewish world, and the most outstanding symbol of its glory was the famous Jewish autonomy. In spite of the considerable attention that scholars have paid to the Council of the Four Lands, surprisingly little information was available from the Jewish autonomous institutions in the Polish-Lituanian Commonwealth. This changed, however, with the discovery of the complete corpus of Jewish poll-tax lists from 1717-1764. The present book is based upon the analysis of these new sources which supply a diachronic dimension, about half a century in duration, to systematic data about the Jewish population in Poland. It provides the full statistical information in the form of tables and is supplemented with a series of maps.