BLOIS

BLOIS, capital of the department of Loir-et-Cher, north-central France. The earliest information concerning Jews in Blois dates from 992. The community is known in medieval Jewish annals for the tragic consequences of a blood libel in 1171, the first ritual murder accusation to be made in France. Thirty-three members of the community including men, women and children, were burned at the stake on May 26, on the orders of Count Theobald. jacob b. meir tam established the 20th of Sivan, the date of the martyrdom, as a fast day for the Jewsin France, England, and the Rhineland. ephraim b. jacob of bonn , his brother Hillel, and others composed elegies on the martyrs. The tragedy was the subject of a Hebrew drama by S.D. Goitein , Pulẓelinah (1927). Jews possibly settled in Blois again, for in 1345 a quarter known as la Juiverie is reported. The present-day rue des Juifs near the cathedral is probably located on the same site. During World War II a few Jews from Alsace settled in Blois. In 1968 there were 60 Jews living in Blois, mainly from North Africa. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: S. Spiegel, in: Sefer ha-Yovel le-M.M. Kaplan (1953), 267–87; A.M. Habermann, Sefer Gezerot Ashkenaz ve-Ẓarefat (1945); M. Steinschneider, Die Geschichtsliteratur der Juden (1905), 34; Zunz, Lit Poesie, 279, 283, 286, 290, 293, 308; Salfeld, Martyrol; Gross, Gal Jud, S.V.; R. Chazan, in: PAAJR, 36 (1968), 13–31. (Zvi Avneri)