RAMERUPT

RAMERUPT, village in the Aube department, N.E. central France. No single extant non-Jewish source confirms the existence of a Jewish community in Ramerupt during the Middle Ages, but Jewish sources mention a community which existed from at least around 1100 until the latter half of the 12th century. It was renowned for its yeshivah, headed by meir b. samuel , Rashi's son-in-law, who was succeeded by his sons, jacob tam and samuel b. meir . The chronicle of ephraim b. jacob of Bonn records an attack made by crusaders on the community of Ramerupt on the second day of Shavuot, 1147, but only describes in detail the ill-treatment of R. Jacob Tam. His house was looted, a Torah Scroll was desecrated, and he would have been murdered in the fields had not a passing nobleman tricked the crusaders into releasing him. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Gross, Gal Jud, 634–8; A.M. Habermann, Sefer Gezerot Ashkenaz ve-Ẓarefat (1946), 121. (Bernhard Blumenkranz)