Legal Strategy and Legal Culture in Medieval Jewish Courts of Southern France

Abstract

From the mid-thirteenth century onwards, the rabbinic courts of southern France (Provence and Languedoc) found themselves dealing with an increasing number of cases in which plaintiffs were using the court as leverage in a struggle that was taking place outside the court. This period also saw the first legal advocates appearing in Jewish courts. These two related phenomena point to a shift in Jewish legal culture, part of a move throughout thirteenth-century Mediterranean Europe towards what Daniel Lord Smail has called “consumption of justice.”