A new interpretation of the final days of the Jewish Community of Pamiers

This article examines, and publishes in an annex, a letter written by Yom Tov ben Hannah of Montalban. This letter describes how the seventy Jews of Pamiers were forced to raise money to ransom their lives. Henri Gross presumed that it was count Gaston III of Foix (d. 1391), who had tried to extort money from the Jewish community. A re-examination suggests that the imprisonment of the Jews of Pamiers occurred after the promulgation of the edict of expulsion from France (1394), and represented a final attempt by count Mathieu of Foix, to extort money before the Jews' departure.