Antique Precursors

Juan de Quiñones, whoseMemorialwas already discussed at length in the chapter on “Jewish male”

menstruation, links the accusation of menstruation to the motif of thefoetor judaicusas follows:

“Very prominent authors say that the body of many Jews smells to a great extent, perhaps because of the disgusting source [Quiñones is probably alluding here to the blood flow he

668 Joshua TRACHTENBERG: The Devil and the Jews, Philadelphia and Jerusalem 1993 (first edition 1943), 48.

669 In this regard, see also Jonathan REINARZ: Past Scents: Historical Perspectives and Smell, Urbana 2014, 45 –49.

670 Ibidem, 19.

671 See Richard PALMER: In Bad Odour: Smell and its Significance in Medicine from Antiquity to the Seventeenth Century, in: William F. BYNUM/Roy PORTER (eds.): Medicine and the Five Senses: Based on a Symposium on Medicine and the Five Senses, held at the Wellcome Institute for the History of Medicine on 11-12 June 1987, Cambridge 1993, 61 – 68, here 63.

672 Michael R. MCVAUGH: Smells and the Medieval Surgeon, in: I cinque sensi/ The Five Senses, Micrologus X (2002), 113– 132, here 115.

673 Jennifer EVANS: Female Barreness, Bodily Access and Aromatic Treatments in Seventeenth-Century England, in:

Historical Research 87 (2014), 423–443, here 431.

analyzed beforehand]. Although there are also ones who say that those who brought about the death of Christ bear the stench, and those who called out ‘May his blood be on us, etc.’

bear the blood; and so Martial and Marcellinus said they were stinky and had a bad smell […].”⁶⁷⁴

For Quiñones, the assumed stench could thus be a consequence of “Jewish male” menstruation.

Here, he explicitly brings into play the factor of disgust, which Alexandra Cuffel also identifies as an essential characteristic for the religious polemics in the three revealed religions during the Middle Ages. According to her, certain themes, which are additionally linked to the female body, have been in the foreground since Antiquity:

“The stench, excrement, generative fluids (especially menstruation), matter, poison, disfigur-ing disease, lack of emotional control, and decay were all intertwined in late antique scientific and religious literature and closely connected to the woman’s body.”⁶⁷⁵

With the motifs of menstruation and stench, Quiñones thus taps into a long tradition of reli-gious polemics, although he pursues the approach of transferring these to the New Christian body, especially to the Converso body. In addition to his assumption that the stench is a consequence of menstruation, he also refers to a second theory in which the stigmata of stench and menstruation are each assigned to different groups involved in the crucifixion of Christ. Accordingly, the blood flow is the characteristic feature of those who accepted the blood curse (Matt. 27.25), as already discussed at length in the previous chapter. But the stench is assigned to those who promoted the condemnation of Christ. These attributions can thus be classified in the tradition of the anti-Jewish legends of curses to which the various Jewish tribes who witnessed the crucifixion of Christ were to fall victim. They are mentioned by Francisco de Torejoncillo and Jaime Pérez de Valencia, among others, whereby the former also refers to the motif of thefoetor judaicusin this context.⁶⁷⁶

The two ancient sources, passages from Martial (40 – 104 CE) and from Ammianus Marcellinus (c. 330 – c. 395), which Quiñones also cites, are classic quotations that have been repeatedly used in

the debate about thefoetor judaicus, so it is worth taking a closer look at them.

One is an epigram (IV. 4) by the Roman poet Martial, who wants to describe the stench of a woman named Bassa by listing various bad smells to conclude the poem with the comment that he would rather stink than smell like her. A Bassa also appears in another epigram by Martial (I.90), in which he criticizes her sexuality and accuses her of adultery with women and raises this accusation as a question.

674 “Autores muy graues dizen, que à muchos Iudios les hiede el cuerpo en grande estremo, acaso deste manantial asqueroso, si bien ay quien diga, que el hedor le tienen los que procuraron la muerte a Christo: y la sangre los que clamaron, su sangre sobre nosotros, &c. y assi los llamaron hediondos, y de mal olor Marcial, y Marcelino […].”

QUIÑONES: Memorial de Juan de Quiñones dirigido a F. Antonio de Sotomayor, Inquisidor General (see n. 85), 7v-8r.

675 Alexandra CUFFEL: Gendering Disgust in Medieval Religious Polemic, Notre Dame 2007, 32.

676 TORREJONCILLO: Centinela contra judíos, puesta en la torre de la Iglesia de Dios (see n. 18), 169; PÉREZ DE VALENCIA:

Iacobus de Valentia in Psal. Davidicos (see n. 519), 279v – 281r.

In research, there are two theories on Bassa’s sexuality. On the one hand, it is assumed that Martial accuses Bassa because of her lesbian tendencies.⁶⁷⁷On the other, it is assumed that Martial alludes to Bassa’s intersexuality in his epigram.⁶⁷⁸ If both of Martial’s epigrams are directed at the same Bassa, it can be presumed that the stench the poet ascribed to her is used to discredit her sexuality, a bad smell, so to speak, as an expression of a false sexuality. Rosario Moreno Soldevila’s interpretation also tends in this direction, when she refers, in her commentary on the fourth book, to the link between oral sex and bad breath in Martial: “Bassa is afellatrix. Halitosis, especially as a result of oral sex, is a common theme in Martial’s epigrams.”⁶⁷⁹Incidentally, other body odors are also attributed to a Bassa. Accordingly, epigram IV.87⁶⁸⁰involves Bassa’s flatulence.

Among the bad smells that Martial includes, he also lists the smell of fasting Jews, a “quod ieiunia sabbatariorum […] oles,”⁶⁸¹ in his epigram that is composed in the context of the foetor judaicus motif. Today’s source editions, by contrast, speak of the smell of fasting Jewish women, that is, “quod ieiunia sabbatariarum.”⁶⁸²Moreno Soldevila suspects that Martial originally used the female form because the entire epigram is characterized by a misogynistic tone. She also refers to Menahem Stern, who suspects women’s special attraction to Judaism as a background for the use of the feminine.⁶⁸³ Here it appears questionable what the basis was for women’s greater attraction to Judaism in Antiquity or what sources could be used to prove such an attraction. The idea that women were more drawn to Judaism than men could certainly have been widespread in Antiquity, however. Since it was a common idea in the Early Modern Period that women cling more strongly to Judaism than men, one could consider whether such thoughts were already circulating in Antiquity.

The passage inDiscurso contra los judíos, for example, states that Judaism exerts a special fascination on women precisely because of its ceremonies.⁶⁸⁴It would also be conceivable that Martial explicitly speaks of Jewish women since bad breath probably represented a greater taboo for women. Ovid (43 BCE– 17 CE), for example, provides an indication of the correctness of this assumption in his educational poem titledArs amatoria, in which he gives women tips on how to hide their external blemishes from men and recommends the following with regard to bad breath:

“She whose breath is tainted should never speak before eating, and she should always stand

677 Judith P. HALLETT: Female Homoeroticism and the Denial of Roman Reality in Latin Literature, in: Judith P.

HALLETT/Marilyn B. SKINNER (eds.): Roman Sexualities, Princeton 1997, 255 – 273, here 262–263.

678 Diana M. SWANCUTT: Still before Sexuality: “Greek” Androgyny, the Roman Imperial Politics of Masculinity and the Roman Invention of the Tribas, in: Todd PENNER/Caroline VANDER STICHELE (eds.): Mapping Gender in Ancient Religious Discourses, Leiden 2007, 11 – 61, here 43–44.

679 Rosario MORENO SOLDEVILA: Martial, Book IV: A commentary, Leiden and Boston 2006.

680 Marcus Valerius MARTIALIS: Epigramme: Lateinisch-Deutsch, Düsseldorf and Zürich 1999, 318 –319.

681 Marcus Valerius MARTIALIS: M. Valerii Martialis Epigrammatum libri XV: Laurentii Ramirez de Prado hispani, novis commentariis illustrati, Paris: Apud Michaelem Sonnium, 1607, 92; Marcus Valerius MARTIALIS: M. Val. Martialis Epigrammaton Libri XII, Dilinga [Dillingen] 1660, 104.

682 MARTIALIS: Epigramme (see n. 680), 254.

683 “The readingsabbatariarum, implying women fasting on the Shabbat, seems justified in view of the special attraction that the Jewish religion had for women […].” Menahem STERN: Greek and Latin Authors of Jews and Judaism I:

From Herodotus to Plutarch, Jerusalem 1976, 524.

684 COSTA MATOS: Discurso contra los judíos (see n. 67), 221.

at a distance from her lover’s face.”⁶⁸⁵

The connection to fasting or the sober stomach can also be found in this Roman poet, which inspired Lorenzo Ramirez de Prado († 1658), an early modern commentator on Martial, to explicitly refer to this Ovid quotation. The female formsabbatariarumdoes not play a role for him. Here we find the termsabbatariorum, by which the male Jews, i.e.Iudæi, are understood.⁶⁸⁶Bassa could also appear as a man in the Early Modern Era. This is how Isaac Cardoso talks about the man Basso, who Martial made fun of because of his “dirty sin”: “Martial scorns a man named Basso in his epigrams because of his dirty and awkward sin […].”⁶⁸⁷By dirty and awkward sin,pecado sucio y torpe, Cardoso generally refers to a violation of sexual morality. With regard to the common interpretation of the passage, it can be assumed that he is referring to adultery.

Another point of discussion in today’s interpretation was not relevant for the early modern com-mentators on Martial: the connection between fasting and the Shabbat in the verse. Since the Shabbat is not a day of fasting, this connection in today’s research is interpreted as an expression of ignorance or as a misinterpretation of Jewish religious practice.⁶⁸⁸ Besides, one tries to find ex-planations, such as, for example, that the alleged fasting on the Shabbat refers to the abstention from work.⁶⁸⁹ Since Martial connects fasting and smell in particular with each other here, this ex-planation seems less sensible. Moreover, in my opinion, Martial makes no statement that Jews fast on the Shabbat. He uses the Shabbat celebration to describe Jews, and it has no direct connection with fasting. This is also what Ramirez de Prado writes in his commentary: “The term Shabbaters is understood to mean Jews who followed fasting more piously than other peoples, and because they observe the Shabbat, they are called Shabbaters.”⁶⁹⁰

In contrast to discussions in today’s research on the question of the feminine and the connection between fasting and the Shabbat, the early modern commentator concentrated on the motif of the foetor judaicus, which he sees as the subject here: “And the Ancients were convinced that Jews smelled bad by nature, so they were called stinky.”⁶⁹¹To support his assertion, he relies on passages from Ammianus Marcellinus and Venantius Fortunatus (before 540 – c. 600). So here the statement that Jews smell bad by nature is interpreted as a statement already known in Antiquity. In the case of Martial’s verse, however, this assertion must be viewed critically since the smell he mentions is not a genuinely Jewish phenomenon. The cause of the smell can be found in the practice of fasting,

685 “Cui gravis oris odor numquam ieiunia loquatur Et semper spatio distet ab ore viri” (III.277 – 278).

OVID: Ars Amatoria, trans. by J. H. MOZLEY/G. P. GOOLD, vol. 232, Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge 1929, 136 – 137.

686 MARTIALIS: M. Valerii Martialis Epigrammatum libri XV (see n. 681), 298.

687 “Martial en sus agudos Epigramas pica à un hombre llamado Basso del pecado suzio, y torpe […].” CARDOSO: Las Excelencias de los Hebreos (see n. 619), 339.

688 See STERN: Greek and Latin Authors of Jews and Judaism I (see n. 683), 521 and MORENO SOLDEVILA: Martial, Book IV (see n. 679), 118.

689 Ibidem, 118.

690 “Sabbatariorumnomine, Iudæos intelligit, qui religiosius quàm reliquæ gentes ieiunia obseruabant, & quod Sab-bathum colerent Sabbatarij dicti sunt.” MARTIALIS: M. Valerii Martialis Epigrammatum libri XV (see n. 681), 298.

691 “Eratque persuasum antiquis Iudæos sua natura malè olere, ideò fœtentes appellabantur.” Ibidem, 298.

which leads to bad breath.⁶⁹² Martial, in turn, assigns fasting to Jews since he apparently sees in this a practice typical for the Jewish faith.

In Ammianus Marcellinus, by contrast, it can be seen that he wants Marcus Aurelius to be con-sidered hostile towards Jews in his Roman history. The Roman historiographer starts by describing Emperor Julian’s tactics in negotiations with Christians. The latter, who went down in history with the epithet the Apostate, had at first converted to Christianity, but then returned to the pagan faith and strongly criticized Christians. By contrast, he was positively disposed towards Judaism, while Christians were soon regarded as lost dissidents of the Jewish faith. Ammianus Marcellinus describes, in the 22nd book, how Julian preached freedom of religion and mutual tolerance to Chris-tians in order to make sure that there were disagreements among ChrisChris-tians so that he did not have to fear the unanimity of the whole population, “non timeret unanimantem postea plebem.”⁶⁹³ In his address to the Christians, he often quoted his role model Marcus Aurelius. Ammianus now ar-gues that the words of Marcus Aurelius are not necessarily compatible with Julian’s religious beliefs and politics. He probably aims at Julian’s Jew-friendly attitude. To prove this incompatibility, he cites another statement by Marcus Aurelius, in which Aurelius denounces the rebellious underlying attitude of Jews:

“[…] thinking that in this he was imitating a saying of the earlier emperor Marcus. But he did not observe that the two cases were very different. For Marcus, as he was passing through Palestine on his way to Egypt, being often disgusted with the malodorous and rebellious Jews, is reported to have cried: ‘O Marcomanni, O Quadi, O Sarmatians, at last I have found a people more unruly than you’” (XXII.5,5).⁶⁹⁴

Causing unrest or the noisy behavior which Jews were accused of seems to be closely linked to the motif of the stench, although Wolfgang Seyfarth refrains from including the motif of the stench in the German translation.⁶⁹⁵ However, it is also not certain whether the text of the original was actually speaking offoetentiumor rather ofpetentium, i.e. the soliciting Jews. But this question is irrelevant for the further history of reception because the medieval and early modern commentators used the quotation as an argument for thefoetor judaicus. Although Ammianus Marcellinus uses the statement by Marcus Aurelius to denounce his anti-Semitic attitude and to contrast it with Julian’s, the quotation, removed from its original context, was used instead in reception as evidence that the motif of thefoetor judaicuswas already common in Antiquity.

Cornelius Motschmann, who addresses the religious policy of Marcus Aurelius in his dissertation, emphasizes that the statement about the “malodorous and rebellious Jews” does not appear in direct

692 In this regard, see also Cornelius MOTSCHMANN: Die Religionspolitik Marc Aurels, Stuttgart 2002, 209.

693 AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS: Römische Geschichte: Lateinisch-Deutsch, trans. by Wolfgang SEYFARTH, vol. 3, Berlin 1970, 16.

694 “[…] imitari putans Marci principis ueteris dictum. sed parum aduertit hoc ab eo nimium discrepare. ille enim cum Palaestinam transiret / Aegyptum petens, Iudaeorum fetentium et tumultuantium saepe taedio percitus do-lenter dicitur exclamasse: ‘O Marcomanni, o Quadi, o Sarmatae, tandem alios vobis inquietiores inveni’” (XXII.5,5).

Ammianus MARCELLINUS: History II, vol. 315, Loeb Classical Library, Cambridge 1939, 204 –205.

695 AMMIANUS MARCELLINUS: Römische Geschichte (see n. 693), 16 –17.

discourse. He concludes that this passage is to be attributed more to the author Ammianus than to Marcus Aurelius.⁶⁹⁶From the perspective of content, however, this seems less plausible. Ammianus wants to highlight the contrast between Julian and Marcus Aurelius here and discredit the latter with his anti-Semitic attitude. If he himself were to approve of a defamation of Jews, his criticism of Marcus Aurelius and his juxtaposing him to Julian would be moot. It seems more likely to me that Ammianus, when he speaks of “malodorous and rebellious Jews,” wants to reflect the perspective of Marcus Aurelius in this way. It is difficult to make a statement about Marcus Aurelius’s actual attitude towards Jews on the basis of this passage because Ammianus merely uses Marcus Aurelius as a contrast foil for Julian’s position and politics. That Marcus Aurelius might have considered Jews to be rebellious, as Motschmann argues, could, however, be traced back to his memories of the Bar Kokhba revolt, which he experienced at the age of fourteen, and his experiences gained from Cassius’s uprising.⁶⁹⁷Against this background, Marcus Aurelius’s critical view of Jews would be quite conceivable.

How the motif was interpreted on the Christian side can be seen in the third, often quoted passage, which comes from the pen of Venantius Fortunatus, the Bishop of Poitiers (before 540 – c.

600). His poem is based on the event of the forced conversion of over 500 Jews in the Auvergne by Bishop Avitus of Clermont in 576. In solemn commemoration of this incident, Gregory of Tours commissioned Venantius Fortunatus to write the poem.⁶⁹⁸ The Bishop of Poitiers describes the effectiveness of the sacrament of baptism in the poem as follows:

“The Jewish smell is washed away by divine baptism and a new lineage emerges from the water.

The victorious smell exudes ambrosial scents in a lovely spiritual breath, when the Chrism is poured over one’s head.”⁶⁹⁹

Here it is possible to clearly see the motif offoetor judaicus, which is set in contrast to baptism and ointment oil. Thus the power and meaning of the sacrament of baptism is skillfully staged by the author through its ability to eradicate the “Jewish smell.” The 1603 edition shows that the attention of the Jesuit editor Christopher Brouwer (1559 – 1617)⁷⁰⁰concentrated on this contrast since he considered this passage worthy of a gloss and used the termfoetor judaicusin it. Thus, the motif, in all its meaning and according to its Christian interpretation, can be found for the first time on the threshold from Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages.

696 MOTSCHMANN: Die Religionspolitik Marc Aurels (see n. 692), 208.

697 Ibidem, 205, 210 –212.

698 See Isabel MOREIRA: Dreams, Visions, and Spiritual Authority in Merovingian Gaul, Ithaca 2000, 101.

699 “[A]bluitur Iudaeus odor baptismate divo et nova progenies reddita surgit aquis.

vincens ambrosios suavi spiramine rores vertice perfuso chrismatis efflat odor.”

Venantius FORTUNATUS: Opera Poetica. MGH Auct. ant. 4.1, Berlin 1881, 111.

700 Venantius FORTUNATUS: Venantii Honorii Clementiani Fortunati… Carminum, epistolarum & expositionum: Libri XI, Moguntiae [Mainz]: Balthasarus Lippius, 1603, 125.

Juan de Quiñones also refers to this passage from Fortunatus and emphasizes the importance of the sacrament of baptism as an eradicating force for the stigma of smell. However, he points out afterwards: “And when they return to the vomit like dogs, it [the smell] accompanies them again and appears as it did before.”⁷⁰¹It is not the power of baptism itself that is called into question, but the firmness of faith in the person to be baptized, whose risk of relapse is not very flatteringly illustrated by the comparison with a dog. The picture of the return to vomit is, by the way, already found in the canons⁷⁰²of the Visigoth Synod of Agde (506), which took place under the leadership of Caesarius of Arles.⁷⁰³ Canon 34 stipulated that Jews who wanted to convert to Christianity should first go through an eight-month catechumenate before being admitted for baptism. Exceptions should only be granted in the case of serious illness. The reason given for the duration of the preparation period, which was longer than in the case of pagans, was the great risk of a relapse into the old faith.

Accordingly, the canon begins with the words: “Jews, whose perfidiousness often leads them back

Accordingly, the canon begins with the words: “Jews, whose perfidiousness often leads them back

Im Dokument (Foreign) Bodies Stigmatizing New Christians in Early Modern Spain Julia Gebke (Seite 193-200)