Legend · České Budějovice
The expulsion of the Jews from Budějovice
In Jewish Street, today’s U Černé věže street in České Budějovice, a Jewish community with a synagogue and its own rabbi had lived since the 14th century. In 1505 it was accused of something that never happened. By March 1506 it had ceased to exist. This is not a legend.
The street we know today in České Budějovice as U Černé věže was in the Middle Ages called Jewish Street. It was not a closed ghetto. Jews and Christians lived in the street and a synagogue stood there. Around the turn of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries the local Jewish community had roughly a hundred members and its own rabbi.
At the end of June 1505 an accusation arrived from Pleising in Lower Austria that also struck Budějovice Jews. They were said to have taken part in an alleged ritual murder of a Christian boy. It was a false antisemitic charge based on the blood myth, not a real Jewish religious practice.
Interrogations, torture and executions followed. Twenty people were put to death. On 16 March 1506 King Vladislav II issued a charter that allowed the town to expel the remaining Jews. By that spring the medieval community had ceased to exist.
Nothing on U Černé věže street marks the synagogue today. The street keeps only a later name — and this chapter, which is history, not legend.
How it really was
The medieval Jewish community in České Budějovice perished after a false accusation in 1505; twenty people were executed, and a charter of Vladislav II of 16 March 1506 allowed the town to expel the remaining Jews.
This chapter is not a legend. It is documented history, and an audit confirmed all its dates and figures.
Jewish settlement in České Budějovice is attested at least from the fourteenth century and concentrated in Jewish Street, today’s U Černé věže street. It was not a closed ghetto; Christians lived there too. Around 1500 the community had roughly a hundred members and its own rabbi.
In late June 1505 an accusation from Pleising in Lower Austria struck Budějovice Jews as well — an alleged ritual murder of a Christian boy. It was a false antisemitic blood libel, not a real Jewish religious practice. Twenty people were executed; the rest were expelled under a royal charter of 16 March 1506.
Where to follow the legend
U Černé věže street, České Budějovice. It was once called Jewish Street and a synagogue stood there. Nothing of it remains.
Where we know it from
- PODLEŠÁK, Jan. Encyklopedie Českých Budějovic, heslo Židé
- PLETZER, Karel. Zánik židovské obce v Českých Budějovicích roku 1505. Jihočeský sborník historický 44, 1975, s. 8–21
- URBÁNKOVÁ, Milena. Židé a Židovská ulice v Českých Budějovicích koncem 14. a počátkem 15. století. Jihočeský sborník historický 55, 1986
- Encyklopedie Českých Budějovic, heslo synagogy