Ephraim of Bonn

Ephraim of Bonn (1132–1200 or 1221?), also known as Ephraim ben Jacob, was a rabbi and writer, known for documenting the 1190 massacre of the Jews in the English city of York.

Biography Ephraim belonged to a prominent family of scholars, which included Eliezer ben Nathan, to whom he addressed questions, and Leontin ben Jacob. He had two brothers, Hillel and Kalonymus, both of whom he outlived. As a boy of thirteen he witnessed the bloody persecutions to which the Jews on the Rhine were subjected, and, with many other Jews, found refuge from the fury of the mob in the castle of Wolkenburg, near Königswinter, in the archbishopric of Cologne. Later he lived at Neuss, and left there for Cologne only a few days before the massacre of 1187. He lost, however, on this occasion, a large part of his fortune. He seems to have resided usually at Worms. He later studied in Bonn under Joel ben Isaac ha-Levi.

Works Halacha Ephraim was one of the important German Talmudists of his time, although comparatively little is known of his work in the field of halakhah. He frequently wrote responsa in conjunction with Judah ben Kalonymus, Moses ben Mordechai, and Baruch ben Samuel; several of them are quoted in the Mordechai; but the "Ḥibbur" mentioned in the Mordechai is not by him, but by Ephraim ben Nathan.

History Ephraim's account of the persecutions of the Jews in Germany, France, and England, between 1146 and 1196, is of great historical value. It is in a great measure the record of his own experiences, which are related impartially, and is among the most valuable of the documents used by medieval chronographers in their history of the persecutions during the period of the Crusades. It was printed for the first time as an appendix to Wiener's German translation of Joseph ha-Kohen's "Emeḳ ha-Bacha" (Leipzig, 1858), and translated into German by S. Baer in "Hebräische Berichte über die Judenverfolgungen Während der Kreuzzüge," (Berlin, 1892). Scattered notices by contemporaneous Christian writers testify to the accuracy of Ephraim's descriptions.