DRBR 10: In which Shabbetai Tzvi is reported to have died

[hatam_soferet]

Images copyright Jewish Theological Seminary of America. Used with permission. Click to see larger image.

This one’s an edition of the London Gazette, from April 1666. I love the line “Published by Authority”. I thought that was hubris, but then I learned that the London Gazette is “one of the official journals of record of the British government,” so it really is Published by Authority.

Genoa, March 6 It is written from Constantinople, That upon the arrival of the Jewish Prophet Sabadai, the Grand Signior consulted with his Mufti, and one of his Judges, what was to be done with him, who resolved that he was to be dealt with as a Traytor to the Ottoman Empire, and his skin to be taken off from him alive: after which sentence, the people fell very severely upon all the Jews they met with, killing a great number of them, the rest saving themselves by flight. The false Prophet was immediately delivered to the Guard, who set him upon an ugly horse, and carried him to the seven Towers. The people all the way insulting over him, and carrying before him halters, and the heads and arms of his slain followers. From the seven Towers, he was in a little while delivered to the Executioner, who first pulled out his Tongue, and then beheaded him, stripping off his skin, and hanging up the carcass by the heeles upon a Gibbet.

I adore the detail of the ugly horse. You couldn’t execute a criminal on a pretty horse, could you?

Anyway, this is a fine example of a newspaper Getting It Wrong; in Constantinople Shabetai was arrested and imprisoned, but not put to death. I expect Jews got killed; they usually do, especially when they turn up to places going “Our leader is going to take over!” and the local top dog has other ideas and imprisons the leader, who is safe behind bars but his followers aren’t.

Wikipedia is rather vague about how Shabetai actually did meet his end:

The death of Sabbatai Zevi is clouded in some mystery because of conflicting accounts about exactly how, when and where he died. There are those who maintain he died of natural causes and others that claim he was executed by hanging. Historians seem to agree that in 1673 Zevi was exiled by the Turkish sultan to the Albanian port of Ulcinj (now in Montenegro), dying there three years later.

Mirrored from hasoferet.com.

Comments

[jillt]

I was v interested in this, because it ties in with the Abudiente family you've been helping me research. The oldest son on the family tree on that beautiful gravestone that you deciphered was Moses Gideon Abudiente, poet and Hebrew grammarian, who dashed off a tome called Fin de los Dias in support of Shabbetai Zevi in 1666. This turned out to be a Big Mistake, but somehow it didn't destroy his reputation as a wise and learned man, since he was allowed to have the title 'rabbi' in his epitaph.

[hatam_soferet]

Well, LOADS of people bought into it, and they all had to retreat embarrassedly afterwards. If they'd de-rabbied all the people who'd followed the wrong guy, they'd've had no rabbis left!