• 1 Bosnia as a denomination will be used to refer to the country as a whole and will include the geogr (...)
• 2 Pinto Avram, Jevreji Sarajeva i Bosne i Hercegovine [The Jews of Sarajevo and Bosnia and Herzegovin (...)

2Through complicated routes and successive migrations, the Sephardic presence in former Yugoslav territories spans five centuries, from the late fifteenth century until the start of the Second World War. At first, there were primary communities established along the Dalmatian Coast, in North Macedonia, Bulgaria, Serbia, and most notably in Bosnia.1 The Ottomans welcomed the Sephardim with open arms, as did the ruling vizier of Sarajevo at the time, Sijavuš Pasha Atik (the Elder). He even founded a Jewish quarter known as El Kortijo [the Great Courtyard], in the sixteenth century, that included a synagogue and housing for the poor.2 Sarajevo, a melting pot of cultures from both East and West, was one of the first homes away from home for Sephardic Jews following their exile from the Iberian Peninsula in 1492.

• 3 Aščerić-Todd Ines, Dervish and Islam in Bosnia. Sufi Dimensions to the Formation of Bosnian Muslim (...)

3By the middle of the sixteenth century, Sarajevo had become the main crafts centre and an important trading post in the region. The city quickly grew as an entrepôt and intermediary between the prominent Adriatic coastal ports of Venice, Dubrovnik and Split; the Balkan inland cities of Belgrade and Sofia; and the eastern municipalities of Istanbul, Aleppo and Damascus where other trading diasporas were based.3 Enterprising merchants were presented with exciting opportunities to open new trade routes and expand old ones. Rather quickly, Sephardim broadened their trading skills throughout the interior of Bosnia, engaging in the export of both livestock and raw materials (such as leather, wool, dairy products, ore), and in the import of fabrics and other manufactured and luxury goods from the West (such as salt, oil, silks, ceramics). The nexus between all these communities was primarily economic and based on trade influx. Therefore, it was not driven solely by religious or cultural interests.

• 4 According to Marie-Christine Bornes Varol, a linguist and specialist in Judeo-Spanish, the language (...)
• 5 Šamić Jasna, “Qu’est-ce que ‘notre héritage’ plus particulièrement sur un manuscrit conservé au siè (...)

4There are many fascinating historical documents and records to rediscover in relation to Sephardic merchants in Ottoman Bosnia. For those wishing to study the subject matter, what new methodologies, tools and disciplines could be applied to successfully navigate fact versus fiction, historical actuality versus legend, and to expand our knowledge of past events? Innovative research on the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries is essential in dispelling common myths and highlighting the Judeo-Balkan legacy, which tends to dissolve into the realm of the nearly forgotten. It is crucial to point out that many historical documents emanating from the Ottoman rule of Bosnia, which are housed in many Bosnian libraries and institutions, are not always thoroughly studied. It could be perceived that more importance is given to manuscripts of literary works written in Turkish, Arabic or Persian, and that in comparison, Hebrew, Ladino and Judeo-Spanish documents remain largely ignored.4 There is an urgent need to bridge different languages and mediums of sources, whether in Italian, Latin, Judeo-Spanish, Hebrew, Ottoman Turkish, Arabic, or Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian.5 Recent Balkan historians’ efforts, combined with newly uncovered sources in the archives of Sarajevo and Dubrovnik, could shed further light on the Sephardic presence in the former Yugoslav territories. Material documents comprising of letters, travel memoirs, bills of exchange, sidjills (court documents), pinakes (Jewish chronicles), defters (tax registers), tombstone excavations and genealogical research should prove to be extremely useful for the study of Sephardic daily life, and – in turn – offer a bigger picture of overall conditions and circumstances.

• 6 Zhelyazkova Antonina, “Islamization in the Balkans as an Historiographical Problem: The Southeast-E (...)

5The battle for representation in history is a long and arduous one. Integrating Jews into the Balkan context deserves further reflection and recognition. With respect to Bosnian historiography, the attention of Bosnian and international historians has been focused mainly on the aftermath of the Civil War of 1992-1995 and the Dayton Peace Accords, and their effects on the Bosnian people. Historiography has become important in the search for national identity and for nations to legitimize themselves historically, especially in the context of post-Ottoman societies. Ever since the 1950s, Islamization and its ensuing demographic changes has constituted a favourite topic for historians on Bosnia.6 Yet recent tendencies in scholarship in Bosnia and the Balkans at large is promising a new trend that pays greater attention to the internal life of Bosnia’s various ethnic communities, with the main objective of increasing the diversity of historical representation.

• 7 Faroqhi Suraiya, İnalcık Halil, Quataert Donald, An Economic and Social History of the Ottoman Empi (...)

6Thanks to the internationalization of the research environment, the last few decades have witnessed better access to archives in addition to a growing emphasis on social and economic history. With new academic literature produced in English, German, Spanish and French, interest has risen in fundamental topics relating to cultural aspects of minority groups as grounds for confrontation, interaction, integration or segregation. For example, previous focus on commerce between the Ottoman Empire and Europe has tended to glamourize long distance trade, whereas recent studies are now broken up into provincial histories of inter-regional and local trade. Countries which have seldom been in the spotlight before – Jordan, Bosnia, Palestine and Romania – are suddenly being emphasized as necessary links in trade accords.7

• 8 Tauber Eli, “Historiografija o Jevrejima u Bosni i Hercegovini” [Historiography on the Jews of Bosn (...)
• 9 Ibid., p. 205.

7Significant progress has been made in the past decades thanks to the heightened interest in the works of earlier Ottomanists and historians who wrote on the topic of early Sephardic Jews. Perhaps the most famous and oldest study on Jews in Bosnia is La historia de los judiós de Bosna [The History of Bosnian Jews], published in 1901 by Moshe ben Rafael Attias, better known as Zeki Effendi, a writer and poet who spent his free time collecting and copying Sephardic romances and proverbs in his native language of Judeo-Spanish.8 Sefardi u Bosni [Sephardim in Bosnia], by Moritz Levy, was first published in German in 1911 under the title Die Sephardim in Bosnien, and is another important work. Levy expanded on material which had already been gathered and elaborated by Zeki Effendi, with a new and improved Sephardic meaning encircled to the Ottoman period. In the realm of the press, the early years of the twentieth century saw La Alborada [Dawn] published in numerous issues in Judeo-Spanish from 1900 to 1901, edited and mostly written by Abraham Kapon. This marked the beginning of research of Jewish history in Bosnia according to Eli Tauber, a Jewish Bosnian historian. One can highlight the appearance of La Alborada as Jewish people taking matter into their own hands and actively educating and preparing other Sephardim for participation in the political, economic and social life of the municipality.9

• 10 Ibid., p. 211.
• 11 Ibid., p. 214.

8Benevolent societies were and still are the most vital sources of preservation efforts that keep Sephardim culture alive and thriving. By the end of the First World War, about thirty different Jewish societies had been founded in Sarajevo, with charitable platforms centred around humanitarian and cultural work.10 Among all Jewish societies, La Benevolencija (Good-will) is certainly the most significant and most respected. Established in 1892, La Benevolencija marked a period of rich social activity and development of Jewish cultural, educational and humanitarian activities in Sarajevo, Tuzla, Mostar and Banja Luka; and in Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole; and beyond. Thanks to the joint effort between La Benevolencija and the Federation of Jewish Communities in Yugoslavia, Jevrejski almanah [Jewish Almanac] has been published since 1954. This was the first journal dedicated to publishing scientific works and investigative studies related to the culture and history of the Jews in the Balkans, and also the first to publish the history of the Federation of Jewish Communities itself. It was a successful attempt to push forward the Jewish intellectual world of Yugoslavia, or what was left of it after the Shoah, to explore and to reminisce. Jevrejski almanah was published annually from 1954 to 1970 and experienced a hiatus until its last publication in 2000. This final print issue is significant because it contains a compilation of prize-winning works which date from 1971 to 1996 as well as the bibliography of all titles that have been published since its beginnings.11

• 12 Ben-Naeh Yaron, Jews in the Realm of the Sultans: Ottoman Jewish Society in the Seventeenth Century (...)
• 13 Kamhi Samuel et al., Spomenica: 400 godina od dolaska Jevreja u Bosnu i Hercegovinu 1566-1966, Sara (...)
• 14 Bahar, Jewish Historiography on the Ottoman Empire, op. cit., p. 13; Tauber, “Historiografija o Jev (...)
• 15 Bakaršić Kemal, Fragmenti kulturne historije Bosne i Hercegovine [Fragments of the Cultural History (...)

9From the second half of the twentieth century, scientific and objective historical writings on Ottoman Jewry gained popularity. Jewish historian Yaron Ben-Naeh highlights a new stage in Ottoman historiography on Sephardim that began in the 1970s, an international movement, with pioneering dissertations and articles written by Joseph R. Hacker, Jacob Barnai, Leah Bornstein-Makovetsky and Minna Rozen.12 The movement was largely shaped by the Yugoslav representatives who provided leadership to foreign authors. This renewed interest in Sephardic history was sparked by the publishing of Spomenica: 400 godina od dolaska Jevreja u Bosnu i Hercegovinu 1566-1966 [Commemorative Volume of the Four Hundredth Anniversary of the Arrival of Jews in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 1566-1966]. This was a pioneering work and arguably one of the most substantial historical records on Bosnian Jews; it features more than thirty contributions.13 The four hundredth anniversary gave rise to an outburst of publications of a scholarly calibre after the great Jewish exhibition on the territory of Yugoslavia that was held in Zagreb in 1988.14 In 1992, a significant conference commemorating the five hundredth anniversary of the expulsion of Jews from the Iberian Peninsula was organized on 11 September, the date which is officially taken as the first arrival of Sephardim in Sarajevo. The conference, “Sefarad ’92,” saw twenty-six papers submitted with special references to the Ottoman period. The conference was held in a war-torn and besieged Sarajevo under artillery fire, which only further proves the resilience and commitment of historians in showcasing Sarajevo’s rich cultural heritage.15

• 16 The Sarajevo Haggadah is one of the oldest Sephardic Passover literary and illuminated works in exi (...)

10With relentless passion, interest for Jewish themes in Bosnia today mainly focuses on art history (with a special emphasis on the Sarajevo Haggadah), religious life, medical knowledge, charitable organizations, famous families, marriage practices, cuisine, language, music, poetry, literature, and especially the atrocities of the Second World War.16 Notable scholars who have written on the literature, the language and the arrival of Bosnian Sephardim who deserve special mention are Kalmi Baruh, Muhamed Nezirović, Avram Pinto, Behija Zlatar, Krinka Vidaković-Petrov, Samuel Elazar, Avdo Sućeska, Kemal Bakaršić, Alija Bejtić, Eli Tauber, Bogumil Hrabak, Vladislav Skarić, Zdenko Zlatar, Hamdija Kreševljaković and Boris Nivelić. One common theme emerges, all of them wrote about Bosnia under Ottoman rule on the basis of original archival material, primarily of Arabic and Turkish provenance. These works still provide historians with indispensable information on Jewish social, cultural, linguistic and economic history.

• 17 A separate monograph penned by Vesna Miović and Ivan Čerešnješ entitled Research, Inventory and Cat (...)
• 18 Husić Aladin, “Razvitak jevrejske zajednice u Sarajevu do kraja 17. stoljeća” [The Development of t (...)
• 19 For more on Jewish historiography in Bosnia, refer to Tauber, “Historiografija o Jevrejima u Bosni (...)

11Earlier in the twentieth century, Jorjo Tadić gave meaningful contribution to the field of Jewish research concerning the scope of the mercantile class in Bosnia with his book Jevreji u Dubrovniku do polovine XVII stoljeća [Jews in Dubrovnik up to the Middle of the 17^th Century] first published in 1937. Tadić’s study is still useful for contemporary historians and encompasses several significant areas from the history of the Jews: their trade activity, their intermediary role in trade on the Mediterranean, their social position and composition and, finally, their significance for Dubrovnik, Dalmatia and the wider Balkan hinterland. Following in his footsteps, Vesna Miović compiled a genealogical list of Jewish families residing in Dubrovnik from 1546 to 1940, who in fact came in large part from Sarajevo and engaged in many activities of trade, diplomacy and marriage. Miović’s monograph, Židovski rodovi u Dubrovniku (1546-1940) [Jewish Families in Dubrovnik (1546-1940)], was published as the twenty-seventh book in the series “Contributions to the History of Population of Dubrovnik and its Surroundings” and is based on over twenty years of dedicated research in the rich State Archives of Dubrovnik, on hundreds of volumes of Dubrovnik’s notary and criminal court.17 On the other hand, Židovi u Splitu [Jews in Split] by Grga Novak, first printed in 1920, is a historical book that explores the connection between Jewish communities in Split and Sarajevo. It centres mainly on the protagonist Daniel Rodriga and his devotion to making Split a stopover complex (or scala) with the aim of redirecting trade between the Balkans and Venice. The book also serves as an important resource for a complete study on the history of the Jews of Bosnia. More recently, in 2021, Francine Friedman contributed to knowledge on Jewish history with her comprehensive monograph entitled Like Salt for Bread: The Jews of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Her chapter, “The Jews in the Ottoman Empire,” is based heavily on rich Bosnian and overall Balkan historiography and published sources translated into English. Currently, there is an expanded monograph in the works based on a 2016 preparatory study by Aladin Husić. The project entitled Sarajevski Jevreji u izvorima osmanske provenijencije 1463-1878 [Sarajevo Jews in Sources of Ottoman Provenance 1463-1878], which serves as the basis for a more in-depth research study spanning the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, is being prepared for publication. This historical work will put emphasis on the growth and development of the Sarajevo community as evidenced from census and tax registers found in Sarajevo and Istanbul.18 However, there still remains much to be done to complete the existing historiography.19

• 20 Bakaršić, Fragmenti kulturne, op. cit., p. 109.
• 21 Ramović Arifa, Koller Markus, “Ottoman Archival Documents in Sarajevo. A Post-War Survey of the Arc (...)

14It must be pointed out that because of the unfavourable historical circumstances surrounding the Sephardic and overall Jewish population in the Balkans, mostly attributed to antisemitism, primary source documents, whether handwritten or printed, are very rare and fragmented. In particular, one of the ways of silencing this cultural heritage was the deliberate destruction or removal of documentation of Jewish origin. During the Second World War, many documents disappeared or were displaced entirely from their territory of creation. For instance, in autumn 1941, several German university professors from Leipzig, accompanied by Gestapo officers, came to Sarajevo and took away the famous pinakes – the annals of the Sarajevo Jewish community – and they have never been seen again.20 In addition, the Civil War of 1992-1995, which followed the fragmentation of Yugoslavia, also left its ugly mark upon the many libraries, Jewish institutions and Bosnian archives. As made clear by the intentional bombing of the Oriental Institute and the national and university libraries of Bosnia, this was a war on culture and heritage overall, a mindless, wanton attempt to cause confusion and despair. It resulted in the most unfortunate destruction not only in the physical damage of the buildings but, more importantly, the loss of valuable and irreplaceable contents. An extensive amount of material is still neither catalogued nor even recorded, no less digitally.21 In addition, the celebrity status of sources such as the famous Sarajevo Haggadah, which has been time and again exploited, has made other minor scripts from archives less visible.

• 22 Pelidija Enes, “Doprinos saradnika Orijentalnog instituta iz Sarajeva u izučavanju historije Bosne (...)
• 23 Bajrić Berin, “Orijentalni institut u Sarajevu kao čuvar kulturnog pamćenja – od ustanove baštine d (...)

15In Sarajevo, there are a few institutions that can help to concretize the Jewish presence in the early Ottoman period. Since the founding of the Oriental Institute in Sarajevo in 1950, its mission has been to collect, catalogue, translate and publish archival material of all kinds for the Ottoman period.22 With the bombing of the institute on 17 May 1992, 5,263 manuscript codices in Arabic, Turkish and Persian disappeared in the fire, reduced to ash.23 Despite the loss, the Oriental Institute is most vital in its contribution to published primary sources, including those that deal with early Sephardic merchants in Bosnia. Besides professional literature and archival research, many orientalists and historians have contributed to the translation and publication of such sources as firmans (written decrees), defters (tax registers) and other documents, written in many different languages. Undoubtedly, the greatest contribution made by the associates of the Oriental Institute was the published Monumenta turcica historiam slavorum meridionalium illustrantia [Turkish documents illustrating the history of the southern Slavic peoples], which contains material from the sixteenth through nineteenth centuries, and the Prilozi za orientalnu filologiju [Contributions to Oriental Philology] which includes Aladin Husić, a scholar on Ottoman Bosnia and a regular contributor. Most importantly, the Oriental Institute translated and printed the Census of the Bosnian Sanjak from 1604.

• 24 On the basis of a quoted note from vol. I, folio 357, the register was completed between 18 Rajab 1 (...)
• 25 For the construction of the synagogue and inn, 1581 is the most widely credited date, but there is (...)

16According to Aladin Husić, Sarajevo’s residential population list of the Bosnian Sanjak from 1604 (Defter-i mufassal-i liva-i Bosna) is the first one to record resident Jews.24 The defter of 10,871 households (hâne) lists taxpayers by neighbourhood. Only three Jewish household heads are recorded: Moshiko, Jew (yahūdi), Solomon and Aslan. Husić further notes that no synagogue is mentioned nor documented, as it should have been of all sacred buildings in Sarajevo.25 The low number of households and the absence of mention of a synagogue suggest that Jews were present but not in large enough number to be considered a community.

• 26 Aside from the sidjills, the Gazi Husrev-Beg Library holds thousands of other manuscripts donated b (...)
• 27 Dž Spaho Fehim, “The Archives of the Institute of Oriental Studies of Sarajevo,” Prilozi za orijent (...)

17When studying early Sephardic merchants, sources of Ottoman provenance prove to be most useful. The collection of sidjills – records of the Shariat Court in Sarajevo – at the Gazi Husrev-Beg Library are first-class resources for research into local history.26 They include municipal regulations, deeds of sale, inheritance matters, lawsuits and trials, and even marriage certificates. Jewish presence was also recorded in the sidjills, thus affirming that they became one of the components and elements of richness of Bosnia’s heritage and the city of Sarajevo. The Oriental Institute houses 66 sidjills from the sixteenth to the nineteenth centuries, including copies from the Archives of the Presidency of the Government in Istanbul.27 Largely uncatalogued and not yet translated, the majority of sidjills may elucidate scholars on the early Jewish communities in times to come.

• 28 Husić, “Razvitak jevrejske zajednice u Sarajevu do kraja 17. stoljeća,” art. cit., p. 107; Spomenic (...)
• 29 Moritz Levy quoted these sidjills on pages 2-3 of his valuable study, see Levy Moritz, Sefardi u Bo (...)
• 30 Husić, “Razvitak jevrejske zajednice u Sarajevu do kraja 17. stoljeća,” art. cit., p. 105.
• 31 For more on hans, inns and their occupants, see Kreševljaković Hamdija, Hanovi i karavansaraji u Bo (...)

18Writing a history of the Jews of the Ottoman Empire from judicial and fiscal sources is a perfectly feasible task. Recordings from 1557 constitute some of the earliest known and officially documented data on the presence and activities of Jews in Sarajevo. A court dispute over the legacy of a deceased scribe (katib) provides evidence of trade and partnership, in which the name of the Jewish merchant is not mentioned, but only identified as “one Jew” (bir yahūd).28 Later in 1565, three court decisions relate to litigations between Jews and Muslims. According to sidjills dated to 973 (1565), about ten to fifteen Jewish families or households that hailed from Salonika lived in Sarajevo in one of the Muslim districts.29 Most historians claim this as sufficient proof for the beginning of the existence of Sarajevo’s Jewish community. However, some of the first Sephardic immigrants came to Sarajevo only temporarily for the purpose of trade and would return to Salonika for family affairs and big holidays. They did not settle and establish families in Sarajevo, but instead were travelling for business from other cities such as Istanbul or Belgrade.30 These first Sephardim lodged in Sarajevo’s inns, caravansaries and similar institutions, and were therefore exempt from the taxes and levies that were imposed on settled families during the sixteenth century.31 This can somewhat explain the “invisibility” of Jews in the early censuses of Sarajevo, and there arises an interesting idea of temporary status and mobility of its Sephardic residents.

• 32 Ibid., p. 107. According to the statement of historian Vladislav Skarić, the 1565 record of a Jew a (...)
• 33 Husić, “Razvitak jevrejske zajednice u Sarajevu do kraja 17. stoljeća,” art. cit., p. 108. Accordin (...)

19Despite the small number of documented Jews in Sarajevo, their presence in trade was never in question. In 1557, we can find an unnamed Jewish merchant in court records engaged in a business partnership with a deceased katib. Later evidence from 1565 and 1566, while still limited, offers more insights. For example, it is mostly through commercial activities or debt-creditor notes and receivables based on trade and services that Jewish names appear: Isaak, son of Abraham, in September 1565 and January 1566, and then Raphael Solomon with Isaak Abraham in May of the same year.32 There is also an important mention of the living accommodations for Isaak, son of Abraham, who inhabited the Sagrakči neighbourhood of Haji Mahmud. Husić, who has thoroughly analysed these documents, came to the conclusion that those merchants were mostly engaged in textile chokh and sahtijan trade.33

• 34 Bejtić Alija, “Sijavuš pašina daira u Sarajevu” [Sijavuš-Pasha’s Daira], Prilozi za proučavanje ist (...)
• 35 Levy, Sefardi u Bosni, op. cit., p. 13.
• 36 Pinto, Jevreji Sarajeva i Bosne i Hercegovine, op. cit., p. 23 ; Levy, Sefardi u Bosni, op. cit., p (...)
• 37 Pinto, Jevreji Sarajeva i Bosne i Hercegovine, op. cit., p. 54.

20By the late sixteenth century, Jews lived in Sarajevo in a few mahalles (residential quarters). In 1580, those places of residence, according to a sidjill found by Moritz Levy at the Gazi Husrev-Beg Library, were described as a fire hazard: dirty (ehl-i mulevves sahipleri) and unruly (ademi tekayyud). These were congested neighbourhoods with high population density, misery, promiscuity, and a lack of cleanliness according to Ottoman Turkish standards.34 For these reasons, Sijavuš Pasha the Elder, a former beylerbey of Rumelia (1580-1581), conditioned the residence of the Jews by settling their families elsewhere.35 According to one account, the Muslim residents complained to the pasha that the Jews were disturbing their peace with loud noises, and especially that they were careless with fire. Because of those complaints, the pasha built a special large inn with his own funds, in which he bequeathed it as a waqf tied to their offspring. The place was called El Kortijo and it was not a typical European Jewish enclave as the doors were never closed and movement was voluntary.36 At the same time, Sijavuš Pasha gave permission for the construction of a synagogue which proved significant for the growth of the Jewish community.37

• 38 Tauber Eli, “Kako su Jevreji-Sefardi donijeli u Bosnu proizvodnju sira Kačkavalja” [How the Sephard (...)
• 39 Ibid., p. 220.

21A further point of interest to be found in the sidjills is evidence of the Sephardic merchants’ intimate ties to cheese production. In the sixteenth century, Spanish Jews brought to Bosnia the technology for making kaškaval cheese, similar to kačkavalj. Eli Tauber proposes an interesting theory for the arrival of Sephardim in Sarajevo using sidjills; one can find records on the production of kaškaval cheese in Bosnia. After their expulsion, Iberian Jews brought with them a type of yellow cheese called cache yallo, which over time became very popular in Bulgaria, where it was known as kaškaval. According to the data published by the Foundation for the Advancement of Sephardic Studies and Culture, Tauber is certain that among the Bulgarian Jews, the same surnames appear as found in Bosnia during the Ottoman period. According to the records in the sidjills of the Papo, Maestro and Levi families, which engaged in the production of cheese in Sarajevo, they went to Bosnia via Bulgaria and Albania probably as early as the sixteenth century.38 Given that Jews were allowed to culture, make and sell cheese, as repeated several times in numerous sidjills (with more evidence in the eighteenth century onwards), it is without doubt that the Jews in Bosnia were serious about cheese production and commerce. Tauber argues that this exceptional activity solely dealt by the Jews can provide insight into the early origins of Sephardic diaspora.39

• 40 Tadić Jorjo, Jevreji u Dubrovniku do polovine XVII stoljeća, Sarajevo, La Benevolencija, 1937, p. 2 (...)

22The lack of internal documentation such as communal tax registers or communal ledger books makes cross-checking available statistics almost impossible, and further showcases the poor visibility of the Sephardic community of Sarajevo in contrast to the Muslim majority. Only a facsimile of a 1622 statute from the pinakes collection of the Sarajevo Jewish Community and a 1649 mention of Jewish administration with judges (sagaces Judaeorum de Seraio) in the State Archives of Dubrovnik, point to a community growing in size in the seventeenth century and can help fill in the gaps of communal organization.40 Nonetheless, it is in the last decade of the seventeenth century that census data begins to shed some light on Jewish population numbers and organization.

• 41 Husić, “Razvitak jevrejske zajednice u Sarajevu do kraja 17. stoljeća,” art. cit., p. 118, 123-126.
• 42 Ibid., p. 126.
• 43 Ibid., p. 121.

23The population census (jizya defteri) of 1690/91 provides the first more concrete news of this nature found in the Archives of the Presidency of the Government in Istanbul and translated by Aladin Husić.41 It depicts seventy adult Jews who paid jizya and lived in Sarajevo according to the names of the male family bearers’ households. This document is interesting not only as evidence of an increasing Jewish presence, but also because it provides their personal description such as “white beard, medium height, black eyebrows, short.” These features constituted a sufficient portrait for the authorities to make a distinction between Jews because many shared the same names. The tax register does not provide information concerning occupations, however, there is a mention of two merchants in the highest category of jizya: Moshe, son of Abraham, and Abraham, son of Moshe. With certainty, this is a father and son relation because of a common use and practice of giving names according to the father’s name.42 Most often, the grandson bears the name of the grandfather. A few years later in another unnamed jizya defteri from 1694/95, there are fifty-six Jewish men listed as household heads. We cannot claim that this is a complete list, but what is clearer in this case is that every one of the fifty-six persons resided in the “Jewish Home” (Beytü’l-Yahūd), or the Great Courtyard, as it was later called.43 Together with the earliest census dating to 1604, these documents can help to follow the growth and development of the Sephardic community through the number of household heads.

• 44 Blount Sir Henry, A Voyage into the Levant: London, 1636, Amsterdam, Theatrum Orbis Terrarum, 1650, (...)
• 45 Quiclet M., Les voyages de M. Quiclet à Constantinople par terre : enrichis d’annotations, Paris, C (...)
• 46 Pinto, Jevreji Sarajeva i Bosne i Hercegovine, op. cit., p. 12 ; Husić, “Razvitak jevrejske zajedni (...)
• 47 Evliya’s description of Bosnia in volumes V-VI of the Seyahatname was originally translated and pub (...)
• 48 According to Alija Bejtić, one of these mahalles was in any case Sijavuš Pasha’s han, and the other (...)

24Ottoman information can also be supplemented with accounts from Western and Eastern travellers’ journals. From the sixteenth century onwards, an increasing number of Europeans visited the empire as merchants, missionaries, diplomats or tourists and recorded their impressions in print. A most interesting travelogue was penned in 1632 by Henry Blount as he travelled with a caravan of Turkish and Jewish merchants from Split through the Balkan hinterland and passed through Sarajevo.44 During the latter half of the seventeenth century, two Frenchmen by the names of M. Quiclet and A. Poullet voyaged through Sarajevo with a very picturesque description of Sarajevo’s trading quarter as well as describing the different tombs and funerary rites of Jews respectively.45 In a report from Bishop Marijan Maravić to the Pope in 1655, Jews in Bosnia are mentioned vaguely and Bishop Nikola Olovčić in his report from September 1672 during a visit to Sarajevo, stated that there were some 100 Jewish houses present.46 Within the Muslim world, Evliya Çelebi wrote the epic book of travel called Seyahatname that achieved great popularity and has been subject to numerous studies.47 In 1659 he noted that the Jews were the inhabitants of two mahalles and had an appropriate place of prayer, a synagogue.48 These travel memoirs can be used to correlate on the religious, urban and economic aspects of Jewry and merchant quarters within Sarajevo at the time, but cautiously, as they were often subject to exaggeration, exoticism and/or idolization.

• 49 Elazar Samuel, “Prilozi istoriji Jevreja u Bosni i Hercegovini” [Contributions to the History of Je (...)
• 50 Ibid., p. 42-43.
• 51 Stećak or stećci are monolithic medieval tombstones found throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina, and th (...)
• 52 See Hrabak Bogumil, “Trgovina Jevreja u Bosni i Hercegovini do sredine XVII stoleća” [Trade of Jews (...)

26Earlier archaeological and other (archival) discoveries and findings propose a different idea on the presence of Jews in Bosnia that could be moved earlier in time. For instance, historian Samuel Elazar provides interesting archaeological evidence of Jewish existence during the Roman period, from the first to fourth centuries c.e., in the proof of tombstones and oil lamps with menorah imprints found in the areas of Solin (old Salona), Sarajevo, Mogorjelo near Capljina and elsewhere.49 More recently, archaeologist Đuro Basler hypothesized that a gravestone found buried in Prnjavor with the name Tungeloso was probably a Jew from Venice who came to this area as a merchant or travelling doctor in the twelfth to thirteenth centuries. In another exemplary archaeological finding, Bosnian medievalist Desanka Kovačević found a list of citizens of the mining town of Srebrenica in Bosnia, which dates from the fifteenth century and is written in Old Bosnian. Among others, Rajko de Isak is mentioned, most likely coming from Dubrovnik, as it is known that the people of Dubrovnik had their trading colonies in all Bosnian mines, where they bought metals and other precious ores, and sold textiles and other goods from overseas.50 Famed Yugoslav historian Bogumil Hrabak who wrote on the economic history of the late Middle Ages, Turkish-Venetian relations, and the Serbian national uprising, stated that at the end of the sixteenth century some Jews came from Split to Banja Luka and that in the mentioned period one Jewish doctor was sent from Dubrovnik to the city on the river Vrbas where he later died. The discovery of the Jewish tombstone from the seventeenth century in Derventa’s Plehan and the stećak tombstone in Prnjavor Veliki also indicate the presence of Venetian Jewish merchants.51 All this evidence of Jewish merchants’ existence in the wider Banja Luka area from the 1580s prompts Hrabak to argue for permanently settled Jewish merchants and doctors as well.52 In relation to this, many historians have divergent opinions about the arrival, stay and direction of movement for Sephardic Jews in the inland of Bosnia. The recovery of archaeological findings can perhaps yield more concrete evidence about this argument.

• 53 Mutapčić Snježana, “Staro sarajevsko groblje u Kovačićima” [Old Sarajevo Cemetery in Kovačići], Zbo (...)
• 54 “Jevrejsko groblje u Sarajevu” [Jewish cemetery in Sarajevo], Općina Centar Sarajevo, https://centa (...)
• 55 Pinto, Jevreji Sarajeva i Bosne i Hercegovine, op. cit., p. 58. For more on this, see Levy, Sefardi (...)

27The Jewish cemetery in Sarajevo can also provide insight into the lives of early Jews, whether merchants, bankers, or congregational and spiritual leaders. Art historian Snježana Mutapčić has dedicated much research to the Old Jewish cemetery of Sarajevo. Her investigations and historiographical data have elaborated that Sephardim immigrated to Sarajevo in stages during the sixteenth century, around 1550 when the first Jewish community (municipality) was formed, and shortly afterwards with the funeral society “Hevra kadiša” in 1558. Basic sources for the study of the cemetery were looted and destroyed, especially in the fire of 1941. The Book of the Dead, a historical funerary text, diligently written over a period of forty years by Moše Altarac (who was better known as Moše di la kancelarija, secretary of the Sephardic municipality and “Hevra kadiša” for over forty years), burned in the ruins of the Great Sephardic Temple.53 On the occasion of the events “Shalom Sarajevo” and “Sefarad ‘92,” a photo exhibition entitled “Old Jewish Cemetery in Kovačići” was set up in the New Temple Gallery from 15 March to 1 April 1992 and again in the Đuro Đaković Centre for Education in September 1992. Those events were organized by the City Institute for the Protection of Monuments in Sarajevo in cooperation with the Jewish Community and La Benevolencija. Snježana Mutapčić, a professional associate of La Benevolencija, recorded the damage to the cemetery complex in photographs. The exceptional value of the tombstones is their epigraphy made in relief and engraved letters in traditional square Hebrew.54 As the oldest intact burial ground of any religious group in Sarajevo, tradition maintains that the Jewish cemetery was founded in 1630 by Rabbi Samuel Baruh, who rented the land on Mount Trebević from the Muslim community. It is widely believed that Samuel Baruh is the first rabbi of the municipality and that his grave is marked as the oldest in the cemetery, however other names of Sarajevo rabbis such as Asher Zevulun and Macliah Muchachon appear even before Baruh’s. A single tomb is said to date to 1551, yet additional research is still outstanding.55

• 56 Miović Vesna, Židovski rodovi u Dubrovniku: (1546-1940) [Jewish Families of Dubrovnik: (1546-1940)] (...)
• 57 Ibid., p. 49, 214.
• 58 Ibid., p. 31.

30Many caravans of Jewish merchants travelled between Dubrovnik and Sarajevo, and many households tied their relationships in marriage and established families between the two cities. Some leading merchant names stand out in the genealogical records compiled by Miović. One of the first names is Solomon/Shlomo, son of Moshe Cabiglio, who came from Sarajevo to Dubrovnik, and appears in archival records dating from 1575 to the mid-1610s. He was a prominent trade intermediary between the Jewish traders in the Balkans (Sarajevo) and the Apennine Peninsula (Ancona, Venice). Solomon’s name is also mentioned in marine insurance documents of 1591/97 and 1599. Likewise, Solomon’s brother Samson also came from Sarajevo and worked as a trade intermediary in Dubrovnik in 1591/92.56 There are the names of David Pinto and Jakob Arut, who both came from Sarajevo and established themselves in Dubrovnik and were engaged in trade through 1592.57 Also, there was Sarajevo merchant David Abudente who did business in the late sixteenth century through Dubrovnik and occasionally resided there. Accordingly, his brother Judah, who was also a Sarajevo merchant, traded in Dubrovnik with many others following in his footsteps.58

• 59 Ligorio Benedetto, Le reti economiche e sociali degli ebrei nella Repubblica di Ragusa e la diaspor (...)
• 60 Ibid., p. 202.
• 61 Ibid., p. 278.
• 62 Miović Vesna, “Prijevodi sefardskih ketuba Državnog arhiva u Dubrovniku” [The Translations of the S (...)
• 63 Ligorio, Le reti economiche, op. cit., p. 236.

31Though minimal, the archival collections of the Diversa de Foris, Diversa notariae, Libri dotium notariae, and the Diversa chancelleria from Dubrovnik offer the best information on marriage bonds.59 In these sources, 18 unions are found to be celebrated before the earthquake of 1667, with three celebrated in Ancona, one in Sofia, one in Sarajevo and one in Salonika.60 These marriages were between families that shared ties with Dubrovnik, linked by ancestry and common economic interest, thus preserving integrity of their community and religion. The Dubrovnik Sephardim built a family network that connected the Republic of Ragusa with Belgrade, Ancona, Skopje, Sofia, Sarajevo, Salonika and Split. Italian historian Benedetto Ligorio calls this the “marriage market” of Ragusa Jews.61 The Diversa de Foris and Diversa notariae contain complete Italian translations of ketubah (marriage contracts). In Miović’s investigations, she has found twenty-six contracts which are registered from 1593 to 1804. Two of these were assembled in Sarajevo, two in Belgrade and two in Split; one each in Sofia and Salonika; and the rest of the ketubah in Dubrovnik.62 One of the earliest such records took place in Sarajevo on 25 November 1578 and was included in the registers of the republic on 2 July 1592 as a translation conforming to the original certified by Josef Tobi, father of the groom. This ketubah was the marriage contract between Jacob Tobi and Mira Cavaliero, daughter of Angelo Cavaliero. Among the witnesses were Raphael Levi, Moses Cusi, Caleb Elazier and Isac Saba, all Sephardim.63 This is not to say that all of these marriages were founded primarily on business models, but the mobility between families of Sarajevo and Dubrovnik is undeniable. Wedding contracts registered in Dubrovnik between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries reveal much of the strategies of the marriage market elites.

• 64 Šabanović Hazim, “Turski dokumenti Državnog arhiva u Dubrovniku” [Turkish Documents at the State Ar (...)

32One should not only study the relations between communities and the state, but also the forms of interaction within the communities themselves and within different states. In the most interesting yet least studied aspect, the State Archives of Dubrovnik contain almost 12,000 original charters and letters written in Ottoman-Turkish, Italian, Latin, Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian, Arabic, Greek, Armenian and most importantly in Hebrew and Judeo-Spanish, all dating from the time of the most established diplomatic connections between the Republic of Ragusa and the Ottoman central government and its satellites in the Balkan provinces. First-hand experience in exploring documentation from the archives in Dubrovnik will provide a better understanding of the inter-regional relations between Sarajevo and Adriatic ports. A rich collection of Turkish-Ragusan correspondence emerged from these relations, regardless of language or alphabet, and it was kept in the Turkish Secretariat, which was led by chancellors or dragomans for the Turkish language. Most of that correspondence has been preserved to this day and was sent to the State Archives of Dubrovnik.64

• 65 State Archives of Dubrovnik (S.A.D.), Acta Turcarum, sv. E 18b, br. 2.

34For instance, a letter found in the archives of Dubrovnik, written in Judeo-Spanish, is a good example of the family connections between Sarajevo and Dubrovnik. It is a letter written between Jacob Jizrael Montilla/Montiglio of Sarajevo to his brother-in-law Yehiel Vitali in Dubrovnik.65 The letter speaks of Jacob Montilla finding an apartment for his brother-in-law in El Kortijo in anticipation of the latter’s arrival in Sarajevo. In tender affections that sign off the letter, Jacob Montilla mentions a daughter named Palomba and a son named Izak. The letter likely dates to around the seventeenth century as relations between Dubrovnik and Sarajevo were strongest and most mobile during this period. Rather colloquial in nature, the letter is one of the very few to showcase the private lives of Sephardic Jews.

• 66 Miović Vesna, “Beylerbey of Bosnia and Sancakbey of Herzegovina in the Diplomacy of the Dubrovnik R (...)
• 67 S.A.D., Diplomata et Acta, 17^th century, vol. 1984a, n^o 53. To help with dating the letter, a speci (...)
• 68 Minervini Laura, “Tres cartas en judeoespañol: edición crítica y comentario lingüístico” [Three Let (...)
• 69 Famed French historian and politician, Esther Benbassa, argues that Judeo-Spanish remained an every (...)

35Moments of love and affection also give way to moments of tension and high stakes. In times of friction, Dubrovnik’s relations with the Ottoman representatives in Bosnia not only relied largely on gifts, money and favours, but were also the subject of intricate negotiations with an individual’s personal approach to each matter.66 In such circumstances, Jewish merchants played an integral role in the process. One letter dated to the late seventeenth to early eighteenth century, was found in the State Archives of Dubrovnik among the Miscellanea-Privata section and was the only one in that collection that was written in Judeo-Spanish with solitreo characters.67 The letter concerns Sarajevo-based merchant Yehuda Halevi and it casts interesting insight on his commercial and diplomatic techniques as well as his general frame of mind. The content of the letter is very professional in nature and addresses a respectable institution, the government of the Ragusan Republic itself. No names and surnames are mentioned, but the anonymous attributes in the form of superlatives are found in this letter: “Al serenisimo principe i los serenisimos konsejeros dela Republika de Raguza.” It is important to note the remarkable address in the Italian language to the receiver of the letter (such as al serenisimo and al molto illustrissimo), since it confirms the diffusion of Italian as a diplomatic and commercial language of Dubrovnik and the Ottoman Empire.68 The language used by the author of the letter is essentially Spanish jargon interwoven with Italianisms and Italian forms, as well as Hebrew. It can be surmised that the letter was written by a semi-educated person with knowledge of multiple languages who could be a good connoisseur of local opportunity. It is also interesting that Halevi chose to use Judeo-Spanish as a means of communicating with government officials.69 The clear identification of Yehuda Halevi is uncertain, because the name and surname are fairly common, but it is reasonably logical that this Jew was based in Sarajevo and was very close to the court of the Bosnian governor (vali, beylerbey). According to Miović, he was possibly even a “merchant” (bezirgân) of the governor, meaning that his duty was to supply the vali, his family and the members of his court (for example, Yusuf, Kâhya, and Sali Aga) with various necessities ranging from food products to precious Italian cloths. In any case, Halevi appears to have acted as a link between the Ragusans and the governor’s court, which means that the successful upkeep of good will and relations between Ragusans and Bosnian officials was in the hands of a Sephardic Jew.

• 70 Šamić, “Qu’est-ce que ‘notre héritage’,” art. cit., p. 91, 96.
• 71 Cohen Amnon, “Ottoman Sources for the History of the Ottoman Jews: How Important?,” in Studies on O (...)

37The long legacy of the Ottoman Empire in Bosnia is very often interwoven with religious aspects of conflict between the Muslim majority and Christian communities. For this reason, the small but very present population of Jewish origin came to be overlooked or, unfortunately, stereotyped in the dominant historical narratives. For those interested in the study of the integral history of Bosnia, a critical issue arises, as Bosnian-French historian and author Jasna Šamić points out: Is there room for manuscripts and many other documents written in Hebrew, Judeo-Spanish or even Ladino to relate to “our heritage”? In other words: Can the study of a document written in a language other than Turkish, Persian, Arabic or Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian, be the subject of further study for Bosnians? The expression naša bastina or “our heritage” in Bosnian, most often connotes research on Muslims of Bosnia who have written in Arabic, Persian, Turkish or Bosnian, whereas Jewish academics who are devoted to the past of Hebrew, Judeo-Spanish and Bosnian Jews conversely did not study Arabic, Turkish or Persian, which are deemed necessary for understanding the Bosnian past.70 Like Jasna Šamić, Hebrew historian Amnon Cohen calls for the interdisciplinary and joint effort between Ottoman and Hebrew scholars of all languages and sources of documents to unite their efforts as there is still treasure waiting to be found and a shroud of secrecy to be removed.71