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JewishHistoryעברית

Massacre of the Jews of Erfurt

Date
1349
Location
ErfurtGermany
Then part of
Holy Roman Empire
Perpetrators
  • Erfurt aldermen and patricians (State)
Killed (estimate)
900 – 3,000[1]Jews killed. The municipal Jewish-heritage site states that up to 900 people died on 21 March 1349, so 900 is that page's ceiling, not a counted minimum. Jewish Encyclopedia states that the Jewish inhabitants of Erfurt, 3,000 in number, fell victim.
Locality

30% – 100% of the Jewish population of Erfurt[1]

Country

2.3% – 7.5% of the Jewish population of Holy Roman Empire (c. 1500)[34]

Worldwide

0.075% – 0.3% of the worldwide Jewish population (c. 1300)[14]

Category
Massacre, Pogrom
Confidence
DisputedThe municipal site dates the pogrom to 21 March 1349 and states that up to 900 people died. Jewish Encyclopedia records 3,000 victims and says some records give 21 March while others place the massacre in the same month as Cologne, late August. Cohn describes the burning and gives no headcount or day.

Summary

In 1349 the Jewish community of Erfurt was destroyed in the Black Death persecutions. Samuel K. Cohn, citing town evidence, writes that the city aldermen and sons of patricians, with only a few artisans, rounded up and burned the Jews. The city's Jewish-heritage site dates the pogrom to 21 March 1349 and states that up to 900 people died. Jewish Encyclopedia gives the Jewish inhabitants as 3,000 victims and notes that some records assign 21 March while others place the massacre in the same month as the Cologne massacre (late August).

Sources

  1. Richard Gottheil, Joseph Jacobs, Black Death. Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
  2. Samuel K. Cohn, Jr., The Black Death and the Burning of Jews. Past & Present 196 (2007)
  3. Jewish Community. Jüdisches Leben Erfurt

Jewish population (estimates)

  • Worldwide: 1,000,000 – 1,200,000[14]c. 1300DellaPergola's Fundamentals Table 2 gives 1.2 million in 1300. Botticini and Eckstein Table 9 give about 1–1.2 million for the early fourteenth century.
  • Holy Roman Empire: 40,000[34]c. 1500Botticini and Eckstein's Germany-Austria (GA) series, which they equate for 1500–1800 with the Holy Roman Empire area of their map, cites Guggenheim and Toch at about 40,000 Jews around 1500 (~0.25% of ~16 million). This is German lands / HRE as defined in that appendix, not a separately enumerated sum of every imperial estate.
  • Erfurt: 3,000[1]The Jewish Encyclopedia states that the Jewish inhabitants of Erfurt numbered 3,000 when they were killed in 1349, the year of this massacre. The municipal site's ceiling of 900 is a death toll, so it is not entered as a lower population figure.

Sources for population estimates

  1. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2025)
  2. Sergio DellaPergola, Notes toward a Demographic History of the Jews. Genealogy 8(1) (2024)
  3. Jewish Population of Europe in 1933. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  4. Jewish Population of the World. American Jewish Year Book 1948–1949, via Berman Jewish Policy Archive (1949)
  5. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Voluntary Conversions and Diaspora: A Human Capital Interpretation of Jewish History. American Economic Association annual meeting paper (2007)
  6. Jews in the USSR (1926–1959). Demographic Changes. JewishGen Belarus SIG (table compiled from the 1939 All-Union census)
  7. Mandate for Palestine. Report of the Mandatory to the League of Nations (Palestine Administration, 1922). United Nations UNISPAL (British mandatory report) (1922)
  8. José Hinojosa Montalvo, La sociedad y la economía de los judíos en Castilla y la Corona de Aragón durante la Baja Edad Media. Espacio, Tiempo y Forma, Serie III, Historia Medieval (1993)
  9. The Contagion of Violence. 1391 and the Jews of the Spanish Kingdoms. Palgrave / Springer chapter (preview) (2021)
  10. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Religious Norms, Human Capital, and Money Lending in Jewish European History. Handbook chapter PDF via zvi-eckstein.com
  11. Sergio DellaPergola, Some Fundamentals of Jewish Demographic History. Berman Jewish Policy Archive (PDF) (2001)
  12. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, THE CHOSEN FEW: HOW EDUCATION SHAPED JEWISH HISTORY, 70–1492 (book summary). Bar-Ilan University Economics seminar PDF (Princeton University Press forthcoming summary)
  13. Joseph Jacobs, Statistics. Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
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  17. Russia (Census Statistics). Jewish Encyclopedia (1901–1906)
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  19. Игорь Виленский, Оценка сокращения численности еврейского населения Российской Империи и СССР (1897–1926). Еврейская Старина (2024)
  20. Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2024. American Jewish Year Book 2024, via Berman Jewish DataBank / Israel CBS host (2025)
  21. Sergio DellaPergola, Demographic Trends in Israel and Palestine: Prospects and Policy Implications. American Jewish Year Book 2003, via Berman Jewish DataBank (2003)
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  31. Maristella Botticini and Zvi Eckstein, Appendix A: Sources and Methodology for Section 2 (Jewish and total population in Germany-Austria and Poland-Lithuania). Authors' appendix PDF (citing Weinryb, Stampfer, Kupovetsky, Guggenheim, Toch, Battenberg, Israel) (2018)
  32. Kirsten E. Schulze, The Jews of Lebanon between Coexistence and Conflict. Internet Archive full text
  33. Jews in Arab Countries. American Jewish Year Book excerpt, Berman Jewish Policy Archive (1978)
  34. Esther Meir-Glitzenstein, The Farhud. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  35. Joseph Rothschild (tabulated), Interwar East European Census Data. Lawrence University course materials
  36. Mark Tolts, Population since World War I. YIVO Encyclopedia of Jews in Eastern Europe
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  49. Denmark. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  50. Greece. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
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  52. German Jews during the Holocaust, 1939–1945. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Holocaust Encyclopedia
  53. Statistics of Jews (World and US Jewish Population). American Jewish Year Book 1946–1947, via Berman Jewish DataBank (1947)
  54. Jacqueline Shields, Jewish Refugees from Arab Countries. Jewish Virtual Library
  55. Lebanon Virtual Jewish History Tour. Jewish Virtual Library
  56. Jewish Populations in the Arab World. Jewish Virtual Library (citing Sergio DellaPergola, World Jewish Population, 2021 / AJYB 2023)
  57. Algeria (Vital Statistics). Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
  58. Archives juives n°45/2 — Les Juifs d'Algérie. Archives Juives / Les Belles Lettres (2012)
  59. EHRI Country Report — Tunisia. European Holocaust Research Infrastructure
  60. Leon Shapiro, World Jewish Population. American Jewish Year Book 1981 (estimates for 1979), via Berman Jewish DataBank (1981)
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  62. Sara Koplik, The Demise of the Jewish Community in Afghanistan, 1933–1952. SOAS University of London (PhD thesis abstract / deposit page) (2001)
  63. Argentina Virtual Jewish History Tour. Jewish Virtual Library
  64. All-Union 1959 census — ethnic composition of the USSR. Demoscope Weekly (РГАЭ РФ fond 1562)
  65. All-Union 1959 census — ethnic composition of the Uzbek SSR. Demoscope Weekly (РГАЭ РФ fond 1562)