Gifts from Jerusalem Jews to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchs: Identities, Otherness, and Belonging 9783110767612, 9783110767551

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Lily Arad Gifts from Jerusalem Jews to the Austro-Hungarian Monarchs

Lily Arad

Gifts from Jerusalem Jews to the AustroHungarian Monarchs Identities, Otherness, and Belonging

With kind support by the Abraham and Rachel Bornstein Endowment Fund for the Department of History of Art, the Faculty of Humanities, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

ISBN 978-3-11-076755-1 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-3-11-076761-2 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-3-11-076765-0 Library of Congress Control Number: 2021951156 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2022 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover illustration: Jerusalem, Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96. Typesetting: jürgen ullrich typosatz, Nördlingen Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

Table of Contents Acknowledgements Illustrations XIII Introduction 1

IX

PART I Historical Context 1 1.1 1.2 1.3

2 2.1 2.2 2.3

Three Distinct Scenarios 15 The Habsburg Realms at the Time of Franz Joseph I and Karl I/IV 15 Jerusalem in the Late Ottoman Period 31 The Old Yishuv: The Creation of Local Identities and National Sentiments 40 Giving and Giving in Return 53 Why Do We Give Gifts and to Whom Do We Give Them? Perceptions of Gifts by Franz Joseph’s and Karl’s Courts Presentation Celebrations and Ceremonies 60

54 58

PART II The Gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg Subjects 3 3.1 3.2 3.3 3.4 3.5

4 4.1 4.2 4.3 4.4

Jerusalem in the Gifts of the Old Yishuv 75 The Symbolism of Jerusalem 77 Jerusalem: A Jewel in the Crown of Franz Joseph I and Karl I/IV 83 Jerusalem as the Site of Encounter between the Old Yishuv and the Monarchs 93 The Holy Places as Identity Markers of the Old Yishuv 94 Old Yishuv Icons of Jerusalem: Identities and Space Constructions 95 Historical Perspective: A Chronology of the Gifts to Franz Joseph 108 Early Gifts — Franz Joseph King of Jerusalem 111 1879 — A New Concept of Homage and Gift Presentations 118 1898 — The Golden Jubilee: A Religious Celebration 122 1908 — The Diamond Jubilee: Winds of Change, Complex Identities, and New Trends 138

VI

4.4.1 4.4.2

Table of Contents

The Austro-Galician Gift: Jerusalem as a Historical and Real Place 140 The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian Gift: Prophesying the Land of Israel as a National Space?

5 5.1 5.2

1916 – Gifts to Karl I/IV: Embracing Modernity 170 The Austro-Galician Gift: Victory, Peace, and Prosperity The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian Gift: A Unified Ideal Kingdom 189

6 6.1 6.2

6.4

The Uniqueness of Old Yishuv Gifts 275 Gifts from Jerusalem’s Christians 276 Gifts by Habsburg Jews in the Diaspora: Jewish and Local Iconography and Style 280 Gifts by Austrian Jewish Philanthropic Foundations in Jerusalem 294 The Gift of the Lämel School 297 The Gift of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital: A Singular Identity 299 Singularity, Tradition, and Innovation in Old Yishuv Gifts

7

The Receipt of Gifts from the Old Yishuv

6.3 6.3.1 6.3.2

152

176

314

324

PART III Between History and Story: The Austro-Hungarian Monarchs in Jewish Tradition 8 8.1 8.2

A Mutual Promise and Commitment 331 Franz Joseph: The Biblical Hero of a Jewish Holy War 331 Death of Franz Joseph: A New Sun Rises in the Firmament?

9

Narratives and Homages: The Construction of Identities, Belonging, and Otherness 344

PART IV Discussion: The Old Yishuv Gifts as Venues of Identity Construction 10 10.1

Constructions and Reconstructions of Identities Identity and Belonging 360

359

336

VII

Table of Contents

10.2 10.3 10.4 10.5

Kings by the Grace of God 361 The Claim to the Crown of Jerusalem 365 The Old Yishuv Habsburg Subjects’ Self-Enhancement Redefinitions and Identifications 376

11

Between Nostalgia and Irony: Franz Joseph in Modern Hebrew Literature 386

12

Place, Memories, and Identities: Closing Remarks

Bibliography 397 Index of Persons 423 Index of Subjects 426 Index of Sites and Monuments

427

392

368

Acknowledgements It was lying alone, forgotten on a shelf in a cabinet with glass-paneled doors in the Imperial Furniture Collection in Vienna (Hofmobiliendepot, Möbel Museum Wien): a book with a beautiful plated cover that I was certain had been created at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts in Jerusalem. The cover was decorated with original iconography, drawing together the Austro-Hungarian Kingdom and the ideal biblical kingdoms of David and Solomon. It was not labeled, and no one was authorized to open the cabinet. This puzzling object, which was not the subject of my research at the time, bewitched me. A year later, in 2007, curiosity led me to visit an exhibition of offerings presented on various occasions to Franz Joseph I, held at the Austrian National Library in Vienna (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek), and I was surprised to see among them a few items from Habsburg’s Orthodox Jews living in Jerusalem. I entered a realm of memories and oblivion, history and stories, love, faith, and hopes, leading from the Orthodox Jerusalemite community to royals in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Might the book that I held in my memory be related to these objects? I could not but take on an exhaustive search in museums and archives in Jerusalem, Vienna, and Budapest, as well as in stories, memories and myths published in diaries, chronicles, and newspapers. I thank the many generous people who helped me along my long but rewarding road, and especially those who left an indelible and precious mark on my work and my heart. I was blessed to meet many wonderful people along the way. My sincere appreciation and gratitude go to Prof. Gili S. Drori, director of the European Forum and its various institutes, including the Center for Austrian Studies and the DAAD Center for German Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, for her valuable faith in me. No less significant were Elisheva Moatti, administrative director of the European Forum and the Center for Austrian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, and Ateret Zer-Cavod, the senior secretary, who encouraged me and made every effort to help me conduct and publish this fascinating study. My heartfelt thanks are extended to all of them. The Art History Department at the Hebrew University, my second home for many years, has been a great source of support and joy. I wish to extend my sincere thanks to my colleagues and students, and especially to Prof. Galit Noga-Banai, chair of the Art History Department. Prof. Noga-Banai and Prof. Daniel R. Schwartz, of the Department of Jewish History and Contemporary Jewry and academic head of the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel School for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, have been central figures in the process of publishing this book. I wish to express heartfelt thanks to the Abraham and Rachel Bornstein Endowment Fund for the Art History Department, the Center for Austrian Studies of https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-203

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the European Forum at the Hebrew University, The City of Vienna, and the Aron Menczer Fund. Very special thanks are also extended to the curators, directors of archives, librarians, and scholars in Austria, Hungary, and Jerusalem who took a keen interest in my challenging quest for offerings and other homages tendered by Jewish Habsburg subjects in the Holy City to their monarchs, as well as for the illuminating narratives related to the givers, the recipients, the artists and the writers. Among them are: Dr. Eva Ottillinger, art historian and chief curator of the Imperial Furniture Collection in Vienna, who allowed me to examine the wonderful book that had captivated me and also provided me with excellent photographs by Harald Frantes, and Dr. Claudia Karolyi of the Picture Archives and Graphics Department at the Austrian National Library, who with unfailing patience and amiability allowed me to examine the offerings sent from Jerusalem. My gratitude is also extended to the archive’s staff, who kindly showed me the objects and the many volumes of the catalog of objects sent by other peoples and nations. I am also indebted to the following museum directors, curators, and researchers: Dr. Gabriele Kohlbauer and Dr. Marcus G. Patka of the Jewish Museum in Vienna (Jüdisches Museum Wien), who shared their publications with me and facilitated my first steps on this untrodden path; Dr. Zsuzanna Toronyi, director of the Hungarian Jewish Museum and Archives in Budapest, who introduced me to Jewish life in the Hungarian Kingdom by giving me access to the museum’s catalog and picture database; Dr. Axel Steinmann, of the Weltmuseum Wien (formerly the Museum of Ethnology), who showed me an ostensibly lost offering, which I was arduously searching for, and generously allowed me to obtain high-quality images; Mag. Peter Steiner, then at the Austrian National Library and now curator at the Museum of Military History (Heeresgeschichtliches Museum) in Vienna, who provided me with expert advice regarding Austrian military issues; and Dr. Ludovic Ferrière, curator at the Natural History Museum (Naturhistorisches Museum Wien), who showed me one of the Jerusalemite offerings and its documentation. I also wish to express my great appreciation and very special thanks to Dr. Elana Shapira, researcher and art and design historian at the University of Vienna, who eagerly urged me to continue my research and kept my enthusiasm and determination alive. Her important work on style and identity in relation to the Jewish Habsburg subjects’ contribution to the blossoming of Vienna in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries enriched my study on their brethren in Jerusalem, and strengthened my conclusions from multiple perspectives. I am also deeply indebted to Prof. Shalom Sabar of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for sharing his relevant publications on Jewish art and folklore; his gracious support and enthusiasm upon seeing some of the objects nurtured mine. These two out-

Acknowledgements

XI

standing scholars and researchers of Jewish visual culture have been an invaluable source of inspiration and motivation for me. Both have also read a draft of this book and offered many crucial comments. My sincere acknowledgement also goes to two researchers who contributed to my interpretation of the offerings of Jerusalemite Habsburg Jews to their monarchs: Dr. Lavi Shay, then at the Ben-Zvi Institute in Jerusalem, joined me along Karl I/IV’s virtual tour of Jerusalem through the photograph album sent to him by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian Jews in Jerusalem; and Dr. Yochai Ben-Ghedalia, also at the Ben-Zvi Institute in Jerusalem at the time, whose important research on Habsburg Jewish philanthropists in Jerusalem clarified many aspects of my own. I am indebted to Dr. Norbert Glässer, of the University of Szeged, who provided me with his learned studies on Jewish culture in Hungary as well as other important visual and written materials, and introduced me to researchers studying various topics in literature and the arts, which illuminated other facets of my own research. Similarly, stimulating discussions with Prof. Karl Vocelka, of the Cultural Historical Studies at the University of Vienna, and Prof. András Gerő, director of the Institute of Habsburg History, Central European University, contributed greatly to my thoughts on this book’s complex topic. My thanks go out to the staff at De Gruyter: Dr. Julia Brauch, acquisitions editor in contemporary history and Jewish studies; Verena Deutsch, content editor, who made the manuscript readable; and the graphics staff. Thanks also to Sara Henna Dahan, who helped perfect the manuscript for publication in the eleventh hour. Lastly, I thank my dear niece Dr. Michal Molcho for her thoughtful reading and comments, and my son Ilan Arad for his insightful suggestions regarding the definition of the topics to be addressed and their classification during the formative phases of this book; I benefited from their critical thinking and fascinating talks. The other member of my family to whom I am deeply indebted is Gabriela Yudelevich, whose ongoing, wholehearted care and encouragement have kept the spark of life burning within me. This was also the most precious contribution of my dear friends, the Horenstein-Cooper family, whose support has made it possible for me to keep going. My loving thanks go to all of them. This book and the research behind it would not have been possible without the support of an exceptional woman, whose unique encouragement and cherished friendship I have been fortunate to enjoy for many years – Rina Talgam, who serves as the Alice and Edward Winant Family Professor of Art History, among the many central roles she holds at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Her immense kindness, reassuring confidence, willingness to help, broad knowledge, and keen insight have been an unending source of inspiration along the

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way. Perpetually standing by me, Prof. Rina Talgam is the vital spirit behind this volume. This book – which presents so many heartfelt prayers to God, recited by widely different peoples and nations – is dedicated to her.

Illustrations 1.

2. 3.

4.

5. 6. 7.

8. 9. 10.

11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. 19. 20. 21.

Palestine, coffee set. Dead Sea stone. Gift of the Austro-Galician and Austro-Hungarian kolelim to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. KHMMuseumsverband, Weltmuseum, VO 12740. Palestine, goblet, Dead Sea stone. Detail of the coffee set in fig.1. Franz Joseph’s peoples celebrate his Golden Jubilee. Postcard, 1898. Tel Aviv, ANU – Museum of the Jewish People, The Oster Visual Documentation Center. Courtesy of The Gross Family Collection, no. 40339. Yehosef Schwartz, “Jerusalem.” Lithograph, 1837. Jerusalem, The Israel Museum, The Feuchtwanger Collection, purchased and donated by Baruch and Ruth Rappaport, Geneva, HF 0492, 177/102. Photo © The Israel Museum, Jerusalem, by Yair Hovav. William H. Bartlett, “Rachel’s Tomb,” 1844 (Bartlett, Walks About the City and Environs of Jerusalem, fig. between pp. 204–205). Public domain. Mordechai Schnitzer, for the Old Yishuv Perushim. Epistle to Franz Joseph, 1854, the version in German. Jerusalem, The Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, AU-90-1. Mordechai Schnitzer, plate and vase. Dead Sea stone, 1852. Presented to Franz Joseph by the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem, in 1853. Vienna, Museum of Natural History, AY 948. © NHM Vienna, Alice Schumacher. Mordechai Schnitzer, vase lid with the inscription “König von Jerusalem etc….” Detail of fig. 7. Mordechai Schnitzer, plate. Detail of fig. 7. Note by Yehosef Schwartz in his book Sefer Divrei Yosef, on the Imperial Gold Medal for Arts and Sciences awarded him by Franz Joseph. Winners-auctions.com, public auction 096, 29 November 2016, item 227. Moshe Kreutz, for Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem. Congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. Vienna, ÖNB 34447/755. Commerce and Industry Chamber of Austria. Gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Book cover. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./60-A. Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll presented to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./55. Abraham Keller (?) for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll case of Esther’s Book, olivewood, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./55. Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./95. Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Receptacle for the congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./95. Detail of fig. 16. Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. Jub. II./40. Abraham Keller for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll case of Esther’s Book, olivewood, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. Jub. II./40. Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6. Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Silver scroll-case, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6.

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-204

XIV

Illustrations

22. Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Receptacle for Esther Scroll, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6. 23. Loyalty badge, Austro-Hungarian Jews, 1914. Vienna, Jewish Museum. Inv. No. 3898. Photograph by Peter Weiss. 24. Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts artists for Austro-Galician kolel. Receptacle of gift to Karl I/ IV on his coronation, 1916/17. Front. Olivewood and mother-of-pearl. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737. 25. Site of the Temple. Detail of fig. 24. 26. Bezalel artists for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll-case of Book of Esther presented to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Silver and precious stones. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737. 27. “From People to People.” Detail of fig. 26. 28. Shmuel Davidov (Ben-David) for the Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737. 29. Ephraim Moses Lilien, “The Jewish Nation,” 1901. Title page for the magazine “Ost und West,” 1904 (Stefan Zweig: E.M. Lilien: Sein Werk. [Verlag J. Jäger und Sohn, Goslar 1903]). Wikimedia commons. 30. Bezalel artists, “Photographs of the Holy City of Jerusalem,” silver-plated book cover. Gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Hofmobiliendepot, Möbel Museum Wien MD H 01187. 31. Shmuel Davidov (Ben-David) for the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Dedication of the photograph album presented to Karl I/IV, first page. 32. Shmuel Davidov (Ben-David). Dedication of the photograph album, double page. 33. I. Della Rocca and Rudolf Stobbe, Alexandria, for the Jewish Community of Egypt. Esther Scroll presented to Franz Joseph in 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./56. 34. Jerusalem, Sultan al-Malik al Ashraf Qaytbay, Madrasa Al-Ashrafiya, 1482. Photograph Lily Arad. 35. Shmuel Ben-David’s tombstone, produced by the Studio for Industrial Art according to his own design, 1928. Photograph, The Israel Museum, Jerusalem collection. 36–60. “Photographs of the Holy City of Jerusalem”. 36. Jerusalem from Herod’s Fortress. 37. General View of Jerusalem. 38. Umar Mosque (on top). Entrance to Umar Mosque (bottom). 39. Umar Mosque. 40. Solomon’s Temple. 41. Moriah Stone. 42. View of Umar’s Mosque (the Temple Mount). 43. Golden Gate. 44. Yaacov Ben-Dov, Wailing Wall (worshipers on top and bottom, the latter at the Sukkot Festival), c. 1910. 45. Yaacov Ben-Dov, untitled (women praying at the Western Wall). 46. David’s Tower. 47. Herod’s Fortress (courtyard) (top); Gateway to Herod’s Fortress (bottom). 48. Damascus Gate. 49. Tombs of the Kings. 50. Street in the Old City. 51. Absalom’s Monument. 52. Leper’s House (Bnei Hezir’s Tomb). 53. Zechariah’s Tomb.

Illustrations

54. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59. 60. 61. 62. 63. 64. 65.

66. 67. 68. 69. 70. 71. 72. 73. 74. 75.

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Rachel’s Tomb from the Outside. Jordan River (top); Solomon’s Pools (bottom). Untitled (Street of the Armenian Patriarchate, Old City). The New Jerusalem. Chatam Sofer Yeshiva. Houses for the Needy (Hungarians’ Houses). Great Israel Synagogue (Ohel Itzhak or Hungarians’ Synagogue). Jewish Community of Bohemia, gift to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. Vienna, ÖNB 34447/399. Jewish Community of Bohemia, gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./59. Jewish Community of Czernowitz (Bukovina), gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./62. Jewish Community of Vienna, gift to Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria and Princess Stephanie of Belgium on their wedding, 1881. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Dep./32. Salamon Seelenfreund, for the Israelite Association of Holiday Resorts for Needy Children, Budapest, gift to Karl I/IV on his accession to the throne of Hungary, 1916. Vienna, ÖNB K. Karl/25. Page 1. Jerusalem, Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96. Abraham Keller, receptacle of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital epistle (detail: façade of the hospital looking to Rav Kook St.). Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96. Abraham Keller, receptacle of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital epistle (detail: façade of the hospital looking to Nevi’im St.). Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96. Postcard produced by the Schneller Institute, showing a view of Lake Gennesaret. c. 1900. Public domain. Austrian Galicia, Yablonov Synagogue, eastern wall painting, 1688. Restored between 1727–1734, 1891 drawing (Wierzbicki, “Bożnica w miasteczku Jabłonowie,” pl. 20). Worms Mahzor, 1278. Jerusalem, National Library of Israel Collection, MS. Heb. 4” 781. C, II, f. 73a. Public domain. Jerusalem, Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, photograph, 1910. Jerusalem, Central Zionist Archives PHG\1003727. Moses encourages the army of the Dual Monarchy. Jewish New Year greeting postcard. Private collection. Jewish soldier performing the Atonement ritual. Jewish New Year greeting card. Private collection. Karl I/IV addresses a group of Jews. Postcard, 1916–1918. Vienna, Jewish Museum, object 4812.

Introduction Choosing or creating a gift often requires givers to engage in an imaginative process that empathizes with the recipients and their preferences while conveying their own particular identity and a favorable impression. A thirty-eight piece black-stone coffee set presented by Austro-Hungarian and Austro-Galician Jews living in Jerusalem to Emperor Franz Joseph I and his consort Empress Elisabeth in 1879, on the occasion of their Silver Wedding Anniversary (fig. 1),1 draws attention owing to its simple design and ordinary material—a black bituminous matter known as the Dead Sea, Bethlehem, or Moses stone. Count Bernhard Caboga-Cerva, the Austro-Hungarian Consul in Jerusalem at the time, recommended that the Imperial and Royal Foreign Ministry accept this modest offering2 simply because of the symbolic value of the material—a highly appreciated natural stone considered unique to the Holy Land. Moreover, as Caboga-Cerva added, it was carefully made in the Oriental style. However, another look reveals a surprising feature that rendered it an even more significant gift: a goblet-shaped vessel with a lid, one of the larger pieces in the set (fig. 2),3 was decorated with an iconic Jewish image of Jerusalem—the Western Wall with cypresses rising behind it, flanked by the Dome of the Rock representing the Temple and the Al-Aqsa Mosque representing “Solomon’s School,” or “King Solomon’s [House of] Study (Midrash Shlomo Hamelekh)”—a connection that had already been made by the Crusaders.4 Moreover,

1 All the translations are mine, unless otherwise indicated. Now in the Weltmuseum (Museum of Ethnology) in Vienna, inventory no. 12.740. The Bildarchiv (Pictures Archive and Graphics Collections) at the National Library of Austria in Vienna (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek) holds 760 Jubilee gifts sent to the imperial couple on that occasion. 2 The letter was addressed to Count Gyula Andrássy. The gift included a vase with the dedicatory inscription: “Franz Joseph I and the graceful Empress Elizabeth be [them] exalted—an eternal memento to our lord the powerful and benevolent emperor, from the Ashkenazi collectives in Jerusalem, protected by his distinguished government,” and a tray with the inscription: “The Holy City may it be soon rebuilt, on the twenty-fifth anniversary of his wedding to his noble consort. The blessed year 5639, 24.4.1879.” These inscriptions and a congratulatory letter in Hebrew were translated into German and presented in an appropriate box; see Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection: A Selection of Documents from the Archives of the Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem (1849–1917) (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1985), 166–167 (Hebrew), document no. 61 (Jer. II/ 59, no. 94). See also below, chap. 7, on Franz Joseph’s receipt of the gifts. 3 The goblet-shaped vessel is 316 mm high x 160 mm in diameter. 4 Pamela Berger (The Crescent on the Temple: The Dome of the Rock as Image of the Ancient Jewish Sanctuary, Studies in Religion and the Arts, 5 [Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2012], 229–232) notes that numerous works of Jewish arts and crafts label the Al-Aqsa Mosque, in front of the Dome of the Rock that represents the Temple, as the School of Solomon. According to Berger, the writings of Jewish pilgrims seem to indicate that it was imagined by Jews as having been Solomon’s study https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-001

2

Introduction

this icon was located in the center of the image of the Habsburg double-headed eagle, where the heraldic shield of the Austrian Empire normally appears, as indeed it does on the opposite side of the vessel; for lack of space, the Austrian crown is placed between the eagle’s heads instead of resting on those of the imperial bird. Above this heraldic image, the name of the Holy City, Jerusalem, was carved in large Hebrew letters in an arched frame on the neck of the vessel. A dedication, also in Hebrew, beside this inscription, around the neck of the vessel, reads: “Eternal memento to our lord the powerful and merciful emperor.” The names of the imperial couple, highlighted in rectangular frames, appear at the sides of the heraldic emblem of the Austrian Empire. More than the exotic material and careful work of the coffee set,5 it is the surprising and unique image of the Habsburg eagle with the iconic symbol of Jerusalem at its heart that makes this gift more than fitting for the Habsburg-Lothringen monarch, whose House claimed title to the crown of Jerusalem.6 Over three thousand gifts to the emperors of Austria and the kings of Hungary, Franz Joseph I (r. 1848–1916) and his heir Karl I/IV (r. 1916–1918), are kept in the Austrian National Library, the Imperial Treasury in Vienna, and in museums and private collections.7 Presented as a gesture of congratulations for dynastic

center, like the study centers that existed in Jerusalem wherever there was a large enough Jewish population. 5 Indeed, the coffee set is kept at the Weltmuseum (Museum of Ethnology) in Vienna, and another gift from Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, made of the same material, is kept at the Natural History Museum in that city. 6 The Austrian branch of the Habsburg House ended with the death of Holy Roman Emperor Charles VI in 1740. It was succeeded by the descendants of his eldest daughter Maria Theresa’s marriage to Francis III, Duke of Lorraine (Lothringen in German). The successor’s house styled itself formally as the House of Habsburg-Lothringen but is commonly referred to as the House of Habsburg. On the Habsburg-Lothringen’s title to the crown Jerusalem, see Wolfgang J. Bandion, “King of Jerusalem – On the Genesis of a Title,” in At Home in the Orient: The Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem, ed. Markus St. Bugnyar and Helmut Wohnout (Vienna: Verlag Geschichte & Kunst, 2015), 75–99. 7 Important collections are kept in the Fideikommissbibliothek (FKB), in the care of the Bildarchiv (Pictures Archive and Graphics Collections) at the Austrian National Library (Österreichische Nationalbibliothek) in Vienna and in the Imperial Treasure at the Hofburg (Kaiserliche Schatzkammer of the Kunsthistorisches Museum). Additional collections are found in the Manuscripts and Rare Books Collection (Handschriftensammlung) of the Austrian National Library, the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK) in Vienna, the Vienna Museum, the Imperial Furniture Museum (Hofmobiliendepot, Möbel Museum Wien) in Vienna, and various other museums and private collections. Some of these objects were exhibited in the Prunksaal of the Austrian National Library in 2007, accompanied by a richly illustrated catalog: Ulla Fischer-Westhauser, ed., Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter, 2007). See Fischer-Westhauser’s contribution

Introduction

3

and national events and as signs of appreciation and gratitude, gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl were expected to demonstrate their subjects’ loyalty to the monarch as well as to promote national pride, an ideal image of national identity and common purpose, and solidarity. The gifts were perceived and presented by the court as acknowledgments of the monarch’s legitimacy, power and authority as kings by the Grace of God (Dei gratia), a status that would ensure absolute loyalty at a time they were struggling to mollify liberal political demands and nationalist aspirations of their disparate peoples, with the aim of keeping the empire from disintegrating.

Fig. 1: Palestine, coffee set. Dead Sea stone. Gift of the Austro-Galician and Austro-Hungarian kolelim to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. Vienna, KHMMuseumsverband, Weltmuseum, VO 12740.

to that catalog, titled “Allergnädigster Kaiser und Herr! Allergnädigste Kaiserin!: über die Huldigungaddressen in der Österreichischen Nationalbibliothek,” 10–37, esp. 22), noting around 3500 holdings in the National Library, yet the archive’s catalog lists only 2475. For a few of the objects presented by Franz Joseph’s Jewish subjects that were exhibited on that occasion, see Gabriele Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser: ‘ein wahrhafter Messias seiner Zeit’. Jüdische Grußadressen ans österreichische Kaiserhaus,” in Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, ed. Ulla Fischer-Westhauser, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien (Vienna: Brandstätter, 2007), 116–141. A list at the archive notes 88 objects sent by Jews, but most probably there were more.

4

Introduction

Fig. 2: Palestine, goblet, Dead Sea stone. Detail of the coffee set in fig. 1.

This book examines gifts presented to Franz Joseph and Karl by Habsburg communities in the Old Yishuv—the Orthodox Jewish community established in the Holy Land in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.8 Only twelve of these gifts have been preserved in the institutions noted above—nine were presented to Franz Joseph on various occasions, one to Crown Prince Rudolf on his wedding day (which was also perceived as an homage to the imperial parents), and two to Karl on his accession to the throne. The whereabouts of additional objects mentioned in Jerusalemite chronicles and periodicals are unknown. Judging by the gifts and narratives that have been preserved, a review of documents from the Austrian, British, and German consulates in Jerusalem, as well as articles found in

8 The term “Old Yishuv” in this book was adopted because it has been in common use until now to characterize the deeply Orthodox Ashkenazi communities that settled in the Land of Israel/Palestine since the early eighteenth century. It is not meant as a dichotomy between those communities and the post-1882 Zionist immigrants, usually called collectively “New Yishuv”—a dichotomy no longer accepted.

Introduction

5

Jewish periodicals, chronicles, and memoirs that mention the accolades and gifts offered to European monarchs, Franz Joseph received the most. Except for the basic information on a few of the gifts in the catalog of the Austrian National Museum and my own earlier papers,9 they have never been studied. The book addresses the disparity between these sources of information and provides a new framework for discussion and further research. The design of the gifts and the congratulatory texts (which were an integral part of these presents) may be compared to artifacts created by other collectives in the Habsburg realms, in Jerusalem and in related diasporas. Upon their examination, the artifacts from the Old Yishuv cannot be considered masterpieces in the sense of the artistic canons set by the royal, ecclesiastical, and aristocratic elites. Therefore, they are not discussed as objets d’art but as products of visual culture straddling between artwork and a special kind of folk art created by the very societies that were largely marginalized by the same elites to whom they presented them, while, nevertheless, recognizing the oft-successful efforts of gift-givers and artists to meet their recipients’ expectations. Moreover, the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects are to be read together with the narratives that were woven around the addressees, gift-givers, and artists, while also considering the socio-political situation in Jerusalem and the Habsburg realms in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—a period of great political, social, and cultural change that ended with the demise of the Austrian, German, and Russian empires, as well as the Ottoman Sultanate, following the First World War. A careful examination of all these factors in the presentation of the gifts is the cornerstone of the new approach and main contribution of this study—the use of these artifacts by the Old Yishuv as a means to reconstruct its members’ identities, enhancing their self-perceptions, as well as how they were perceived by the dominant societies in which they lived. Moreover, like monuments, foundations, and celebrations, these objects also served the interests of the monarchs, to boost their personality cult.

9 Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser: ‘ein wahrhafter Messias seiner Zeit,’“ and my “Gifts Fit for a King — Jerusalem, the Old Yishuv and the Austro-Hungarian Monarchs,” Römische Historische Mitteilungen 61 (2019), 135–162; “‘For King of Jerusalem is your name.’ Offerings to Franz Joseph from the Old Yishuv,” in: Religion, Culture, Society 4, ed. by Gábor Barna and Orsolya Gyöngyössy (Yearbook of the MTA-SZTE Research Group for the Study of Religious Culture, Szeged, 2017), 44–56, and “‘His Beauty Your Eyes Shall See:’ Greetings with Landscapes of Israel from the Jews of Jerusalem to Franz Joseph I),” in High Above All: The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue and the Hasidic Community in Jerusalem, ed. by Reuven Gafni, Yochai Ben-Ghedalia and Uriel Gellman (Jerusalem: Yad Itzhak Ben-Zvi, 2016), 133–166 (Hebrew). Available documents in the Austrian Consulate Archive note only a few offerings and epistles presented to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs by the Old Yishuv.

6

Introduction

Religious and socio-cultural identities influence, inspire, and give shape to art; in turn, art influences and consolidates identities at the collective and individual levels. Therefore, these gifts reflect historical and socio-cultural processes in which they participated. Elaborate iconographic programs were developed to establish specific meanings as essential elements of identity; yet, meanings can be multilayered, contradictory, and unstable. The gifts, the protagonists, and the narratives woven around them may be considered cultural texts, products of intertwining cultural and ideological codes, ethos, values, norms, and myths of different societies and communities; they are examined from an interdisciplinary perspective not only as works of art, folk art, or part of the history of a material culture and literature, but also as contextual and intertextual functions in an ongoing construction of identities reflecting a certain time in the history of complex political and socio-cultural entities. Representative objects match the ideologies of the collectives that created them at a certain time and with a specific purpose, and when created as gifts they are expected to conform to the ideologies of the recipients as well. Our analysis accounts for the fact that the visual and literary imagery in the objects represents an idea that has a history and tradition of thought and language that then, as now, have different and highly nuanced meanings for the royal house and various Christian collectives, for deeply Orthodox Jerusalemite Jews, for the various artists, and for the heterogeneous Jewish communities in Europe. These multiple perspectives show that the visual and literary imagery should not be considered ornamental, but rather a powerful ideological construct rooted in the political and socio-cultural discourses in the rapidly changing milieu of the time. Visual media became increasingly important for monarchies during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. As effective instruments of propaganda, visual media served dynastic needs of legitimization and expressions of power and greatness in policy at home and abroad. Outstanding among them were the architecture and public monuments designed and decorated to be perennial or ephemeral constructions, and events. Gifts, illustrated publications, popular souvenirs, and narratives also played an important role in the elaboration of a monarch’s ideal identity and the creation of loyalty to them, as well as a common Habsburg consciousness—not a simple issue in a multilingual and multiethnic kingdom whose disparate peoples aspired to national definition and rights. In a very different political, social, ideological, and cultural milieu, Old Yishuv members, many of whom arrived in the Holy City from Habsburg lands, devoted themselves to the study of the Hebrew Bible and Talmud (biblical exegesis, Jewish moral and religious precepts, and civil laws) and Kabbala (Jewish mysticism), as well as to preserving the holy places and praying in the city. A pious life in Jerusalem was its raison d’être: “Zion shall be redeemed with judgment, and her con-

Introduction

7

verts with righteousness,” said Isaiah (1:27). These Orthodox Jews highlighted the spiritual benefits that their virtuous life in the Land of Israel brought to all Jewry. Moreover, their sacrifices in life were a valuable source of saving grace not only for themselves, but also for Jews in the Diaspora who supported them economically and, significantly, for the gentile monarchs who allowed the essential transfer of alms (haluka)10 and gave them legal protection. The gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl by their Jewish subjects heartily expressed their gratitude, resulting from the emperor’s benevolent attitude toward them, especially in comparison to that of other monarchs at the time, and gave rise to the veneration of him by those living in Jerusalem. Two main Habsburg Jewish communities came into play in the nineteenthcentury Old Yishuv—the Hungarian and the Galician—the latter comprising Jews from a region spanning southeastern Poland and western Ukraine. In time, they became the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel on the one hand, and the Austro-Galician kolel on the other.11 Their gifts to the monarchs exhibited feelings of positive Otherness and Belonging to these two worlds, which in and of themselves were ethnically, socio-culturally, politically, and religiously heterogeneous. The gifts served multiple and not-always-compatible political agendas. Through their intellectual and material culture, well-to-do acculturated Jews living in the Habsburg realms—a main source of income for the Old Yishuv—were interested in conveying their ability to come to terms with the surrounding gentile culture and being part of it, without relinquishing their particular religio-cultural identities. In contrast, Old Yishuv Jews wished to avoid acculturation; in addition to the fulfillment of the religious precepts of life in the Land of Israel, keeping their strictly Orthodox lifestyle was their main reason for leaving Europe for the Old Yishuv. They believed that the study of the Scriptures, preserving the sites long sacred to Jews, and praying at those sites made them deserving of their brethren’s material assistance. Nevertheless, as emancipated Jews integrated into

10 Haluka is the system of distribution of donations that Ashkenazi communities in the Land of Israel/Palestine received from abroad. The system was criticized by emancipated Jews in the Diaspora and Palestine, local Sephardi Jews, and the new Zionist immigrants who called for productiveness and self-sufficiency. On the haluka system, see Arie Morgenstern, The Return to Jerusalem: The Jewish Resettlement of Israel, 1800–1860 (Jerusalem: Shalem Center, 2007), 147–180 (Hebrew), and on the distribution of donations according to the original homelands – 345–352. See also Cecil Bloom, “The Institution of Halukkah: A Historical Review,” Jewish Historical Studies 36 (1999–2001), 1–30; and below. 11 Kolel was an Orthodox community organized according to ideology and original European homeland. The aim of this split was to motivate their brethren in Europe to give more charity.

8

Introduction

the society at large, the Old Yishuv’s way of life became perceived as inappropriate, and tension built between the collectives. When read together with relevant Jewish folklore and other literary genres, the objects may be seen from the perspectives of both the givers and the recipients according to their individual backgrounds, ideologies, needs, and expectations, allowing for a clearer understanding of the main protagonists’ ideologies, aspirations, and practices, as well as the constructions of their identities and multilayered identifications. Their study sheds light on the monarchs’ constructed identities, and on the ways they perceived their subjects, who belonged to different nations and peoples and also held different religious beliefs and socio-political positions. Moreover, once these artifacts and their reception by the addressees are taken into consideration together with the motivation of the gift-givers to create and present them, we obtain a broader understanding of the ways in which marginalized minority groups acted to empower and define themselves in a specific time and space. In the case of the Habsburg subjects in the Old Yishuv, this unique space is Jerusalem and its holy places. This methodology further illustrates the creation of the idealized image of Franz Joseph by his Jerusalemite subjects, and also elucidates the use of this image by his Old Yishuv subjects in asserting their collective cultural values and in constructing their multiple self-identities. Furthermore, by exploring the idealization of Franz Joseph we consider a problematic issue that became an inherent part of the collective identity of many Jews and may have influenced the visual and literary imagery of their gifts, i.e., the manner in which the dominant society perceived Jewish Habsburg subjects as “the Other” and their own self-perception as such or, contrarily, its rejection. Traditionally, Jews regarded themselves as a nation in exile; therefore, the restoration of Israel and the ingathering of the exiles lie at the heart of Jewish prayers for redemption. For emancipated Jews, this emotional and spiritual attitude conveys a constant sense of foreignness and estrangement, a tension and need to prove that they belong to the gentile society in which they live while keeping their individuality. For strictly Orthodox Jews, both in the Diaspora and in the Land of Israel/Palestine, this was a much more complex issue: as noted, they opposed acculturation yet needed the assistance of all Jewry as well as the recognition of their needs by the gentile monarchs. How would their gifts and homages creatively and effectively transcend such political, religious, and socio-cultural boundaries? This book comprises four parts. Part I opens with an overview of the historical context in which the protagonists lived in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—the Austrian Empire that in 1867 became a dual monarchy with Hungary, resulting in two equal parts under Franz Joseph’s scepter, and Jerusalem, especially since the early 1840s, which was transformed from a backward city in the

Introduction

9

periphery of the Ottoman Sultanate into the arena of colonialist Western empires competing for greater presence and influence in the Holy City.12 Moreover, the rediscovery of the Land of the Bible by the European powers, facilitated by political changes in the Ottoman Sultanate and by a new sense of security and means of transportation to Jerusalem, caused pilgrimage and tourism to this land as part of the exotic Orient to blossom and thrive. A third area to be considered is the Jerusalem Old Yishuv, a socio-cultural space that was also influenced by the growing mobility of peoples and ideas. Chapter 2 traces the problematic aspects of gift-giving. Considering the aim to transform the homage into a cherished memento that would be kept in the recipient’s memory and create reciprocal commitments, it addresses essential societal behaviors, such as the need to please the recipient and meet his expectations as well as conform to traditions, rituals, and rules related to social hierarchy. This chapter includes a discussion of how the Habsburg Court perceived the gifts presented to the two Austro-Hungarian monarchs, the importance of presentation ceremonies, and the publicizing of these highly political events that, at the end of the nineteenth century, the Habsburg Court and the Church turned into religious celebrations in order to maximize the desired effects. The need for gift-givers to convey a clear message regarding their distinct identity is also discussed; in the case of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, this was also a means to redefine and enhance their message and to keep alive their silent hope to enjoy the monarchs’ reciprocal sympathetic attitude and assistance. Part II is devoted to the gifts of the Habsburg Jewish communities in Jerusalem. Its opening chapter (3) discusses the symbolism of Jerusalem for Jews and Christians, and then focuses on the meaning of the Holy City for Franz Joseph and Karl in light of its special significance for the House of Habsburg-Lothringen, which perceived itself as heir to the crown of Jerusalem. This discussion goes on to elucidate the particularities of the traditional icons of venerated sites in Jerusalem that are representative of the Old Yishuv, by comparing them to Oriental and romantic schemes and images in the Diaspora. The discussion in chapters 4 and 5 offers an extensive and thorough reading of the gifts that the Jews in Jerusalem presented to Franz Joseph and to Karl. A most meaningful feature of these objects is the careful coordination of iconic images of sites sacred to Jews with biblical texts and later Jewish pearls of wisdom. The visual images and texts convey norms, meanings, values, needs, and wants of those

12 Jerusalem had become the major administrative and political center in southern Syria, replacing Acre before it and Nablus, which had acquired a temporary primacy in the eighteenth century.

10

Introduction

who created them as well as of those to whom they were designated. Aware that images appeal more easily to emotional perception, and that words more easily induce logical argumentation, the artists and writers of the gifts offered by the Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs made the best of both media to convey their messages. Moreover, artists integrated traditional Jewish art forms and new practices that allowed them to link their ancient culture with the present and the eschatological future, in an effort to convert the widely held negative perception of Jews as alien into an expression of positive Otherness. Furthermore, in order to reclaim a historical perspective drawn from an idealized biblical past, the gift-givers compared the Austro-Hungarian monarchs to idealized biblical figures, in the hope of making a strong and long-lasting emotional impact that would ensure sympathy to their needs in the future. The visual and literary imagery in the gifts presented to Karl I/IV by his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem sheds light upon life in the city at the time of the Great War, when the Jewish population was apprehensive about its future. Their gifts, in image and word, encouraged the emperor-king to trust in God and wield his sword with no fear, while demanding from his subjects to respect his authority as he painted an ideal future of peace and prosperity for the Habsburg realms and peoples. Lastly, this chapter shows that the gifts to Karl I/IV may also explain various cultural processes that took place in the Jewish milieu of Jerusalem—for example, negotiations and transformations of identity and new forms of contact and accommodation between Orthodox communities and other models of Jewishness, first and foremost the New Yishuv.13 The uniqueness of the Old Yishuv’s gifts is highlighted in chapter 6 by comparing them to those presented by Jerusalem Christians, Jews in the Habsburg realms and other relevant diasporas, and Habsburg Jewish philanthropists who founded institutions to aid the poverty-ridden Old Yishuv. Chapter 7 closes the second part of the book by raising the question as to how the monarchs received the gifts presented to them by their Jerusalemite subjects. In the absence of official imperial and royal documentation, this important topic is addressed through chronicles and anecdotes of Jerusalemite Jews and are reinforced by examples from the Jewish press in Vienna. Part III examines how the Austro-Hungarian monarchs were perceived in Jewish tradition. Chapter 8 reviews the perception and idealization of Franz Joseph by his Jewish subjects in the Habsburg realms as well as in Jerusalem, and is fol13 The New Yishuv came into being with the “First Aliya,” a proto-Zionist immigration wave that began in 1882. The “Second Aliya,” consisting of Zionist groups that arrived in the Land of Israel in 1904 to settle the countryside, was motivated by a common ideology and a program that included funding.

Introduction

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lowed in chapter 9 by local narratives that idealized the Austro-Hungarian monarchs as comparable to the ideal biblical kings and heroes. Anchored in folk culture, this chapter presents a more clear-eyed perception of the idealized image of Franz Joseph created by his Jewish subjects. Moreover, it elaborates upon the contribution of gifts and narratives for the shaping and enhancement of the ideal selfimage by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, by telling about the monarch’s extraordinary appreciation for the many honors that they bestowed upon him, including the presentation of “precious offerings,” and inventing a reciprocal affection of the monarch for them. The fourth and last part of this book is an integrative discussion of the gifts and narratives created by Jerusalemite Habsburg Jews. It opens with a selection of the many questions that arose throughout the study of the gifts, and sharpens the reconstruction and redefinition of the self-identities and perceptions of proud Otherness and Belonging to the heterogeneous Yishuv and the Habsburg monarchy. Special attention is given to the gifts created by artists of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts and given to Karl I/IV on his accession to the throne. This school, which was established in Jerusalem in 1906, strived to create a new Hebrew visual culture by integrating traditional Jewish values, norms of modern Western society, and a Zionist national ideology that crystalized from the early 1880s until a few years prior to the Great War; its works of art are an amalgamation of reinterpreted Jewish motifs, East and West, the art of ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia with Oriental trends, and the Secessionist style fashionable in Central and Eastern Europe at the time. In view of their different and often contradictory ideologies, why were the Bezalel artists called on by the Habsburg kolelim to commission these works? What was the particular role of the gift-givers and the artists in planning the iconography, selecting which cultural indicators to include in the objects, and how to represent them? To what extent did the artists carry out the guidelines of the client, who had clear norms and rules regarding right and wrong, desirable and undesirable? Chapter 11 calls forth expressions of nostalgia as well as ironic recollections of Franz Joseph in Hebrew literature sometime after his death, further shedding light on the main theme of this book—the construction of identities. The last chapter (12), the closing remarks of this study, widens the discussion of gifts and narratives to cover broader contexts. The relationship between place, memory, and identity is discussed here as a cultural choice. This approach allows us to examine how groups interact with each other and how perceptions and strategies of social integration and exclusion work in various milieux. The issues discussed in this book are presented as paths for further research on topics such as identity construction, cultural pluralism, cultural colonialism, center and periphery, migration, transculturation, and translation—in addition to the obvious fields

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Introduction

of Jewish and Christian relations, the chronologies of modern Jerusalem, and Austrian studies. This is not a conclusive but an open-ended study, suggesting novel paths to uncover rich insights into these and related topics.

PART I Historical Context

1 Three Distinct Scenarios The gifts presented by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to their monarchs were more than congratulatory objects. They enabled the gift-givers to carefully shape their identity and multiple identifications as a worthy and respected religious and cultural community, to defend themselves against deep-rooted antisemitic prejudices and accusations of negative otherness. These aims involved the creation of cultural difference by defining and redefining Jewish history, memories, and traditions. The complex processes continually developed and took new shapes in three very different nineteenth- and early twentieth-century scenarios: (1) the Austrian Empire, which in 1867 became a dual monarchy with Hungary, resulting in two equal parts under Franz Joseph’s reign as Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. Confronting inner political conflicts, this monarchy collapsed at the end of World War I under the rule of his successor, Karl I/IV, of the same titles; (2) Jerusalem, which since the early 1840s was transformed from a backward city in the periphery of the Ottoman Sultanate into the arena of colonialist Western empires, competing for greater presence and influence in the Holy City; and (3) the Jerusalemite Old Yishuv, whose population, especially its Habsburg kolelim, greatly increased during this period and became a main and influential collective while, at the same time, experienced the challenge of liberal ideologies among Western Jewry and the arrival to Palestine of secular immigrants with an ideology largely opposed to their own. This complex historical setting, succinctly outlined here, will be explored through this study.

1.1 The Habsburg Realms at the Time of Franz Joseph I and Karl I/IV Franz Joseph I ruled as Emperor of Austria from 2 December, 1848, and as Apostolic King of Hungary in a Dual Monarchy from 8 June, 1867, until his death on 21 November, 1916. In his first official announcement on the day of his accession to the throne of Austria, he styled himself as “Emperor by the Grace of God.”14 His long list of titles included the crown of Jerusalem in a prominent place.”15 At the time, the Habsburg-Lothringen empire was the second largest in size in Europe and the third largest in population, which was composed of eleven main national14 “We, Franz Joseph the First, by the Grace of God….” See Imperial Patent of 2 December 1848, Allgemeines Reichs-Gesetz- und Regierungsblatt für das Kaiserthum Oesterreich Nr. 1/1849; Anatol Murad, Franz Joseph I of Austria and His Empire (New York: Twayne, 1968), 10. 15 See above, note 6. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-002

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PART I – Historical Context

ities and, in addition to the dominant Catholic faith, various religious minorities. Only eighteen years old at his accession, at the height of the Springtime of the Peoples’ Revolutions that shook the European monarchies, he had to cope with the aspirations of the disparate peoples and nations of his multiethnic and multinational empire to achieve various measures of cultural and political rights or advantages, such as hegemony over other nationalities. Most of the kingdoms and nations under the Habsburg House had no organic ethnic or geopolitical borders, since they typically comprised a multiethnic and multilingual population having no common history or traditions and, more often than not, pursuing opposite interests and goals. The political struggle to achieve the submission of these fundamentally different peoples and nations to the authority of the Habsburg House was no easy task, and marked Franz Joseph’s long reign.16 Upon his accession to the imperial throne, Franz Joseph aimed to put an end to liberalism, which, owing to his very conservative ideas, was a dangerous menace to his absolute authority and power. However, painful military defeats and growing unrest—the Hungarian 1848–1849 revolution, Austrian policy during the Crimean War, loss of its claim to Lombardy and Venice in the Second and Third Italian Wars of Independence in 1859 and 1866 (respectively), and defeat in the Austro-Prussian War in 1866 that put an end to his hopes to revive a German kingdom under the Habsburg House—forced the emperor to acquiesce to new reforms and liberal constitutional experiments. Having been placed in a weakened position, in 1867 he accepted a compromise of an equal-rights unity with the Kingdom of Hungary—a Dual Monarchy with a common head of state, the emperor-king. With the establishment of this new entity, Hungary achieved full sovereignty, its 16 Sources concerning the political situation in the Austrian Empire at the time are extensive. See, e.g., Steven Beller, Francis Joseph (London: Longman, 1996), chaps. 4 and 5; Jeremy King, “The Nationalization of East Central Europe: Ethnicism, Ethnicity, and Beyond,” in Staging the Past: The Politics of Commemoration in Habsburg Central Europe, 1848 to the Present, ed. Maria Bucur and Nancy M. Wingfield (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2001), 112–152; the illuminating papers by Gary B. Cohen: “Neither Absolutism nor Anarchy: New Narratives on Society and Government in Late Imperial Austria,” Austrian History Yearbook 29/1 (1998), 37–61; idem, “Nationalist Politics and the Dynamics of State and Civil Society in the Habsburg Monarchy, 1867–1914,” Central European History 40/2 (2007), 241–278. For a Hungarian point of view, see the classic work by Oscar Jászi, The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1929; reprint 1961); and András Gerö, Emperor Francis Joseph, King of the Hungarians, CHSP Hungarian Studies, 1; East European Monographs, 566 (Boulder, CO: Social Science Monographs; Wayne, NJ: Center for Hungarian Studies and Publications, Inc.; New York: Distributed by Columbia University Press, 2001). Also relevant in our context: Alexandra Smetana, “Viribus Unitis. Das Buch vom Kaiser: Ein Prachtband zum Kaiserjubiläum 1898,” in Der Ewige Kaiser: Franz Joseph I. 1830–1916, ed. Hans Petschar (Vienna: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek and Amalthea, 2016), 111–118. Additional sources are noted thorughout this book.

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

17

own parliament, constitution, and prime minister with authority in matters of domestic policy, but there was a common army, foreign policy, and currency. Franz Joseph kept his title as Emperor of Austria, and on 8 June, 1867, was crowned in Budapest as Apostolic King of Hungary. Whereas the proclamation of a new emperor of Austria required no coronation, the acknowledgment of a new king of Hungary and the right to exert authority did require that official recognition. This process was an important, imperative, act of public law, as it bound the monarch to meet the requirements enshrined in Hungarian law and tradition, respect the rights of his subjects, and maintain the territorial integrity of the kingdom.17 The Austrian political half included Galicia (the Polish Crownland of Austria-Hungary), Bukovina, Bohemia, Moravia, Austrian Silesia, a slice of northern Italy, and the predominantly German-speaking provinces that form today’s Austria; it was known as Cisleithania or simply Austria. The Hungarian half included parts of Transylvania and the kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia, and was known as Transleithania or simply Hungary. The new entity adopted a new official name: “The Kingdoms and Lands Represented in the Imperial Council and the Lands of the Crown of Saint Stephen,” reflecting the complicated political situation. A joint coat-of-arms with Hungary, which combined the coat-of-arms of the distinct halves of the indivisible Dual Monarchy linked not by the double-eagled emblem of Austria but by the insignia of the Habsburg-Lothringen dynasty, as well as the name Austria for the non-Hungarian territories, were agreed upon only in 1915.18 The 1867 Compromise brought about a measure of democratization to the Austrian half: it introduced a more liberal constitution that allowed the recognized nationalities of the empire a limited degree of political emancipation while repressing the more radical aspirations. Although, in principle, the 1867 Austrian constitution granted and guaranteed national parity, this was, in practice, a matter of negotiation. Austria was a multinational state that was becoming increasingly complex, as it sought to accommodate the national ambitions of the various

17 See the enlightening paper by Zoltán Szente, “The Doctrine of the Holy Crown in the Hungarian Historical Constitution,” Journal on European History of Law 1 (2013), 109–115 (esp. 110–114 and notes 5, 31, 39, 41, 43). The Hungarian elite kept the sad memories of the suppressed War of Independence and the political ambitions to reach a better agreement with the emperor-king, whereas the imperial court expected complete cooperation and loyalty in accordance with the 1867 Compromise. See also László Péter, “The Holy Crown of Hungary, Visible and Invisible,” Slavonic and East European Review 81/3 (2003), 421–510, esp. 437–438, 456–460, 466, 477–496; Graham Gendall Norton, “The Budapest Habsburg Coronation of 1916,” The Court Historian 9/1 (2004), 61–68; Daniel L. Unowsky, The Pomp and Politics of Patriotism: Imperial Celebrations in Habsburg Austria, 1848–1916 (West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2005), 7. 18 Pieter M. Judson, “L’Autriche-Hongrie était-elle un empire?” Annales. Histoire, Sciences Sociales 63/3 (2008), 563, note 2.

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18

peoples and nations; it became a rare example of institutionalized pluralism, whereas Hungary was becoming a nation-state.19 However, despite constitutional assertions in both halves of the Dual Monarchy that supposedly guaranteed equality, the dual system may have resulted in a de facto second-class status for all cultures other than that of the Germans in Austria and the Magyars in Hungary. The vast majority of key positions in the diplomatic corps, the army, and the central and regional governments in Cisleithania were occupied by Germans in Austria, and by Magyars in the Hungarian half of the monarchy.20 This, and Franz Joseph’s failure to be crowned king of Bohemia, leaving it incorporated into Cisleithania instead of becoming an autonomous kingdom in a trial monarchy, remained a burdensome problem until the fall of the empire.21 The Jews of Austria,

19 However, Jonathan Kwan notes that Franz Joseph never seriously considered a constitutional convention where all parties could reach an agreement and preferred to retain as much power as possible, keeping the old tactic of “divide and rule.” His most important considerations were the monarchy’s status as a “great power” and the well-being of the military. See his “Austro-German Liberalism and the Coming of the 1867 Compromise: ‘Politics Again in Flux’,” Austrian History Yearbook 44 (2013), 87; see also Judson, “L’Autriche-Hongrie,” 589–593, 596. Gary B. Cohen (“Nationalist Politics,” 244) remarks that the Austrian half was an evolving modern civil society, where national loyalties found expression alongside strong class and interest group allegiances as well as continuing loyalties to the state. 20 Germans in Austria and Magyars in Hungary were not a majority. In the 1910 imperial census, the empire’s subjects were registered according to the following ethnic categories: German (24 %), Magyar (20 %), Czech (12.5 %), Polish (10 %), Ruthenian (Ukrainian, 8 %), Romanian (6.4 %), Croat (5.3 %), Slovak (3.8 %), Serb (3.8 %), Slovene (2.6 %), as well as a number of smaller ethnic groups. The census also showed that in Cisleithania, the Austrian half of the Dual Monarchy, Germans comprised 35.6 % of the population, Czechs 23 %, Poles 17.8 %, and Ruthenians 12.6 %, while Slovenes, Serbs, Croats, and Italians made up less than 5 %. In Transleithania, the Hungarian half, Magyars number less than half of the population (48 %), followed by Romanians (14 %), Germans (10 %), Slovaks (9.5 %), Croats (8.8 %), Serbs (5.3 %), and Ruthenians (2.3 %). See Marsha L. Rozenblit (Reconstructing a National Identity: The Jews of Habsburg Austria during World War I [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001], 17–18), and Konstantinos Raptis (“Discord or Achievement? Reflections on the Habsburg Empire, 1848–1918,” Historein 5 [2005]: 121–123), who note that, as with all such historical data, these numbers should be treated with some caution because people were counted on the basis of their “daily language,” a system that allowed many artful exploits and manipulations by the local administrations who conducted the census. See also Judson, “L’Autriche-Hongrie,” 585–586; Ian Reifowitz, “Otto Bauer and Karl Renner on Nationalism, Ethnicity & Jews,” Journal of Jewish Identities 2/2 (2009), 1–19, esp. 3–6; and below. 21 The Crown of Bohemia included the Margraviate of Moravia and Czech Silesia. On the problem of the coronation that never took place, see Hugh LeCaine Agnew, “The Flyspecks on Palivec’s Portrait: Franz Joseph, the Symbols of Monarchy, and Czech Popular Loyalty,” in The Limits of Loyalty: Imperial Symbolism, Popular Allegiances, and State Patriotism in the Late Habsburg Monarchy, ed. Laurence Cole and Daniel L. Unowsky (New York: Berghahn Books, 2007), 86–112; Raptis, “Discord or Achievement?” 121–122. Judson (“L’Autriche-Hongrie,” 585–586) reaffirms the  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

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representing no less than 4.5 percent of the population, received in 1867 full civil emancipation. However, as their daily language, Yiddish, was not officially recognized, they had not been accorded the status of a nationality and were considered only an ethno-religious group. Consequently, Jews were classified with Germans, Czechs, Poles, etc., but were not granted even the limited rights given to the recognized nationalities. Moreover, in an atmosphere of antisemitism, many considered the Jews to be a diaspora-ethnic group or even pariahs.22 One strategy pursued by the court of Franz Joseph, in its aim to achieve the much needed “unity in diversity” of the Habsburg realms, was to focus on commitment to the carefully constructed image of the sovereign as the heart and soul of his House and peoples, rather than on the idea of empire. A traditional way to enhance the monarch’s position was to highlight his role as heir to a glorious longstanding dynastic line.23 However, above all, the Imperial and Royal House

common knowledge that Germans continued to dominate in Austria, but in the decades after 1867 they saw that position challenged by the monarchy’s Slavic peoples, demanding equality for their languages and cultures with Czechs, the most successful. James Shedel (“Emperor, Church, and People: Religion and Dynastic Loyalty during the Golden Jubilee of Franz Joseph,” The Catholic Historical Review 76/1 [1990]: 73) adds that the 1867 Compromise with Hungary was seen as at least a partial recognition of the principle of nationality and stirred the ambitions of non-Germans in the Austrian half of the Dual Monarchy for similar arrangements. The situation was complicated by the de facto autonomy won by Galicia in 1868, where the Polish nobility attempted to govern that land much like Magyars were doing in Hungary. 22 Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, chap. 1, esp. 15, 17, 20–23; eadem, “Sustaining Austrian ‘National’ Identity in Crisis: The Dilemma of the Jews in Habsburg Austria, 1914–1919,” in Constructing Nationalities in East Central Europe, ed. Pieter M. Judson and Marsha L. Rozenblit (New York and Oxford: Berghahn, 2005), 178–191, esp. 185. On the virulent antisemitism following Karl Lueger’s election as mayor of Vienna, see Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, esp. chap. 6; Menachem Z. Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites in Austria at the End of the Nineteenth Century,” The Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook 21/1 (1976), 57–86; Robert Nemes, “Hungary’s Antisemitic Provinces: Violence and Ritual Murder in the 1880s,” Slavic Review 66/1 (2007), 20–44; Thomas Stoppacher, “A Time of Upheaval in an anti-Semitic Environment – The Representation of the Jewish Population in Austria in the Parliamentary Debates from 1917–1919,” Jewish Culture and History 17/3 (2016), 218–220; Malachi Hacohen, “Nation and Empire in Modern Jewish European History,” Leo Baeck Institute Year Book 62 (2017), 56. 23 Jean-Paul Bled, Franz Joseph (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992), 260–261; Daniel L. Unowsky, “Creating Patriotism: Imperial Celebrations and the Cult of Franz Joseph,” Österreichsche Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaften 9/2 (1998), 287–290; Peter Urbanitsch, “Pluralist Myth and Nationalist Realities: The Dynastic Myth of the Habsburg Monarchy—a Futile Exercise in the Creation of Identity?” Austrian History Yearbook 35 (2004), 135; Ernst Bruckmüller, “Patriotic and National Myths: National Consciousness and Elementary School Education in Imperial Austria,” in The Limits of Loyalty: Imperial Symbolism, Popular Allegiances, and State Patriotism in the Late Habsburg Monarchy, ed. Laurence Cole and Daniel Unowsky (New York and Oxford: Berghahn Books, 2007), 15–18; Werner Telesko, Geschichtsraum Österreich: Die Habsburger und ihre Geschichte in der bil-

20

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zealously defended and preserved the principle of sanctified legitimacy to rule and to exercise power, declaring that the emperor and his people were bound by a hierarchical social order established in heaven. Nevertheless, as is often the case in official portrayals of a ruler, the projected ideal image of Franz Joseph was not attuned to what was perceived by various sectors of his heterogeneous and disparate subjects. Certain fabricated elements, such as representations of Franz Joseph and his reign as glorious and powerful, reveal awkward discrepancies between the idealized image of the monarch and reality as understood even by sympathetic contemporaries, and there was tension between national and supranational identities, with large regional, social, and ethnic factions rejecting the official position.24 In retrospect, the unity of the disparate peoples and nations may not have been achieved, but in his old age Franz Joseph enjoyed the respect and affection of most of his subjects, and certainly of most Jews, including those in the Old Yishuv of Jerusalem. Thus, the idealized figure of Franz Joseph in image and word, art, literature, and other media may have somewhat postponed his inevitable demise, yet could not prevent it. Franz Joseph was well aware of that fate when he

denden Kunst des 19. Jahrhunderts (Vienna: Böhlau, 2006), esp. 207–254. Additional sources will be provided as this issue arises throughout the present book. 24 As Steven Beller remarks, the parade on occasion of Franz Joseph’s Diamond Jubilee did not celebrate events from the sixty years of Franz Joseph’s reign, and for good reason; see his “Kraus’s Firework: State Consciousness Raising in the 1908 Jubilee Parade in Vienna and the Problem of Austrian Identity,” in Staging the Past: The Politics of Commemoration in Habsburg Central Europe, 1848 to the Present, ed. Maria Bucur and Nancy M. Wingfield (West Lafayette, IND: Purdue University Press, 2001), 60–64, 67–68; see also Judson, “L’Autriche-Hongrie,” 566–568. In a romantic mode, historians’ narratives and memoirs of the monarchic elite described him as a benevolent tragic figure, a monarch who cared for his peoples and was deeply devoted to them. Nevertheless, later historians characterized Franz Joseph with a critical eye as an absolutist monarch unable to cope with political and social changes, whose harsh policies to keep his empire from disintegrating engendered antagonism instead of cooperation and loyalty from his subjects. Franz Joseph was criticized as having a rigidly conservative mind incapable of understanding the importance of the many scientific, technological, and military developments at the time, thus leading to the empire’s demise. Nationalist historians viewed the Habsburg Monarchy as despotic and obsolete, while others, usually associated with the old regime, became apologists and defended the traditional rule. See Gergely Romsics, Myth and Remembrance: The Dissolution of the Habsburg Empire in the Memoir Literature of the Austro-Hungarian Political Elite, CHSP Hungarian Studies Series, 8 (Wayne, NJ: Centre for Hungarian Studies and Publications, 2006), esp. 19–21, 43–45, 51–52, 143, 145; for the opinion that the Habsburgs “were willing to be progressive, but not at the cost of [the monarchy’s] existence,” see James Shedel, “Fin de siècle or Jahrhundertwende: The Question of an Austrian Sonderweg,” in Steven Beller, ed., Rethinking Vienna 1900 (New York: Berghahn, 2001), 94; see also Urbanitsch, “Pluralist Myth,” 138–139; and below.

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

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said “God allows me to live this long in order to delay the end of the old empire for a while. After my death the end will inevitably come.”25 On Franz Joseph’s death, on 21 November, 1916, at the peak of the Great War, his great-nephew and heir presumptive was immediately hailed and ascended the throne of Austria as Emperor Karl I;26 on 2 December he assumed the title of Supreme Commander of the whole army, and on 30 December he was crowned in Budapest as Karl IV, Apostolic King of Hungary, as required by the Hungarian constitution. In the self-image of his House, Karl pronounced that he holds his titles by the grace of God. Karl was unknown to his peoples, whose attitudes ranged from loyalty and hope that the young monarch would soon bring the much-needed peace, to one of despair. At that time, at a critical point in World War I, heavy losses and hunger brought about growing confusion and demoralization, lack of hope and alienation.27 Although formally loyal to the emperor-king and the Dual Monarchy until the end of the war, peoples and nations that had unsuccessfully asked Franz Joseph for a more progressive form of self-government began to voice farsighted demands, which meant breaking from the rule of the Habsburg House. Karl hoped to solve all these problems by peaceful negotiations, but on 11 November, 1918, he was forced to agree to an armistice. Exactly eleven months earlier, relief and hope for a new day had come for Jerusalemites with General Edmund Allenby’s entrance into the city. In fact, when the war ended, the Dual Monarchy had already fallen apart and Karl was forced to step down.

25 Ibid., 141, n. 184. Also, Romsics, Myth and Remembrance, 19–20, 144–146, for this perception in memoirs of the imperial elite. 26 Franz Joseph’s son, Crown Prince Rudolf, committed suicide on 30 January, 1889, and his heir presumptive, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, was assassinated on 28 June, 1914. 27 See John Deak, “The Great War and the Forgotten Realm: The Habsburg Monarchy and the First World War,” The Journal of Modern History 86/2 (2014), 336–380, for a critical review of historiography and an integration of the narratives; Alan Sked, “Austria-Hungary and the First World War,” Histoire@Politique 22/1 (2014), 1–33. ; Mark Cornwall, “The Spirit of 1914 in Austria-Hungary,” in Prispevki za novejšo zgodovino 55/2 (2015), 7–21, esp. 8–10, 12, 18–19. The patriotic spirit of 1914 waned as awareness of the growing number of casualties reached towns and villages across the monarchy; allegiance to the empire moved toward a national-regional loyalty. By 1915, formerly hidden aspirations to end the war spread publicly. Propaganda to boost the morale was organized, exhibitions of photographs and paintings were carefully selected, and gradually also films circulated in the monarchy, but as the situation worsened, it became obsolete. See Mark Cornwall, “Propaganda at Home (Austria-Hungary),” in 1914–1918–online: International Encyclopedia of the First World War, ed. Ute Daniel et al. https://encyclopedia.1914-1918-online.net/article/propaganda_at_ home_austria-hungary, esp. 5–7.

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Scholarship in recent decades notes that the Habsburg monarchy functioned as a great power, enjoying a vibrant constitutional polity and an expanding economy in the years before the outbreak of the Great War; it was committed to the rule of law and retained the loyalty of its subjects. It also maintains that the support of the army, the nobility, and well-off assimilated and acculturated Jews, as well as the wish of European powers to prevent a power vacuum in East-Central Europe (which could lead to a war among the Great Powers wishing to fill it), were the main reasons for the survival of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. The myth of the pax austriaca, imposed more or less successfully by the ancient House of Austria over several centuries, may have also played a role.28 From a different perspective, Konstantinos Raptis, quoting Alan Sked, István Deák, and other scholars, notes two factors as the main catalysts for the empire’s collapse, both a consequence of the war: (1) growing discontent rooted in privations ranging from persistent and severe food shortages to a lack of consumer goods, enormous human losses and wounded in a persistent war that discredited the monarchy; (2) the intervention of the army in civic matters, which placed the bureaucracy, as the face of the government, against its own citizens and under the command of the military.29 Christopher Brennan draws a bleak view: Everything rapidly went wrong. The expected localized war became global, the predicted victories turned into embarrassing routs, the initial enthusiasm waned, the country’s organisation and preparedness were found wanting at most levels and, by the end of 1914, the conflict had, in the words of the last Chief of the General Staff [Arthur Baron Arz of Straussenburg], done the army out of the largest part of active officers, of men and of well-trained reservists.30

28 Raptis, “Discord or Achievement?” 123–124, 126. 29 Ibid., 125, quoting Alan Sked, “The European Empires: A Case of Fall without Decline?” in The Decline of Empires, edited by Emil Brix, Klaus Koch, and Elisabeth Vyslonzil (Vienna: Verlag für Geschichte und Politik, 2001), 149–151; István Deák. “The Habsburg Empire,” in After Empire: Multiethnic Societies and Nation-Building: The Soviet Union and the Russian, Ottoman, and Habsburg Empires, ed. Karen Barkey and Mark von Hagen (New York and London: Routledge, 2018, 129–141). Christopher Brennan (“Reforming Austria-Hungary: Beyond His Control or Beyond His Capacity? The Domestic Policies of Emperor Karl I – November 1916–May 1917,” PhD diss. [London School of Economics, 2012], 143–144) notes that when Karl assumed the supreme command of the armed forces on 2 December 1916, he effectively ended the army’s political ambitions. See also John Deak and Jonathan E. Gumz, “How to Break a State: The Habsburg Monarchy’s Internal War, 1914–1918,” in The American Historical Review 122/4 (2017), 1105–1136, esp. 1106–1110, 1118– 1119, 1122, 1132); John Deak, “The Great War and the Forgotten Realm”; Gary B. Cohen, “Neither Absolutism nor Anarchy”; Sked, “Austria-Hungary and the First World War,” esp. 19–21, 24, on the reasons for Austria-Hungary’s fall. 30 Christopher Brennan, “The Memory of the First World War in the Former Lands of AustriaHungary,” Comillas Journal of International Relations 3 (2015), 141. See also the expert studies of Mark Cornwall, and his summary in “Propaganda at Home (Austria-Hungary).”

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

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Aware of the need for significant reforms that would change the structure of his reign, Karl’s accession manifesto emphasized the strength of the empire and his keen wish to achieve peace, and promised: “I will be a just and loving prince to my peoples. I will maintain their constitutional liberties and other rights, and will carefully guard the equity of rights for all.”31 Karl really may have wished to make peace with the Entente,32 but scholars note that he proved unable or unwilling to appoint the right men to carry out the necessary steps, was indecisive, and lacked experience, talent, or both, and did too little too late.33 Brennan remarks that Karl kept the strictly conservative tradition of his family and held fast to the view that all old rights and customs had to be maintained. His ideas could not appease the aspirations of the nations and peoples: the national autonomy that he was willing to concede was cultural, economic, and linguistic rather than political. Far from a devolution of centralized power, it represented an attempt to strengthen the dynasty and the unitary state by defusing national tensions and frustrating nationalist and irredentist tendencies.34 It is generally agreed that by the time Karl came to the throne, the states comprised in the Austrian Empire—although more ambitious in their political demands and united in the hope for a rapid peace—still accepted the idea of that entity.35 Yet, unity in diversity was never achieved, and as noted, if there ever existed an attitude of keen loyalty to the Habsburg monarchy, it was to the old Emperor Franz Joseph personally and not part of a larger loyalty to a Habsburg or Austrian Empire. The Jewish communities in Austria-Hungary and the Old Yishuv, for whom Franz Joseph’s reign was a golden age, had no choice but to put their hopes in Karl’s promises to maintain constitutional liberties and other rights, and to guard the equity of rights for all.

31 Brennan, “Reforming Austria-Hungary,” 106–107. 32 Ibid., 144–145, 155–157, 169–172, 181–186, 195–198, 244–252; Christopher Brennan, “‘Hesitant Heir and Reluctant Ruler’: Karl I/IV of Austria-Hungary During the Great War,” in Monarchies and the Great War, ed. Matthew Glencross and Judith Rowbotham, Palgrave Studies in Modern Monarchy (Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), 101–109; Sked, “Austria-Hungary and the First World War,” 4–8, 24. 33 Deak and Gumz, “How to Break a State,” 1131–1132; Brennan, “Reforming Austria-Hungary,” 105; idem, “Hesitant Heir,” esp. 102–104. 34 Brennan, “Reforming Austria-Hungary,” 39–40; idem, “Hesitant Heir,” 94. 35 Gary B. Cohen, “Nationalist Politics,” esp. 242–244, 275–276; Brennan, “Reforming AustriaHungary,” 97–100, 105; idem, “Hesitant Heir,” 97–98. For opinions on the responsibility and role of the Habsburg monarchy in the preservation as well as the final dismembering of Austria-Hungary, see Niels Jasper Bakhuis, “Franz Joseph utilised? Why the concept of Kaisertreue in the Austro-Hungarian Empire should be reinterpreted from an anational and national perspective based on two Kaiserreisen to Galicia in 1880 and 1894,” MA thesis (Leiden University, 2018), 11–22.

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PART I – Historical Context

The Austro-Hungarian Monarchs and the Habsburg Jews As early as 1849, only one year after taking the throne, the conservative Franz Joseph took his first steps toward alleviating the harsh discrimination against Jews; for political and economic reasons, he provided for their emancipation, forgoing the fact that a proportionally large number of leading and outspoken Jews stood out in the 1848/9 revolution and in political circles that demanded deep changes in the social order, as set out in democratic and socialist movements. However, this initial period of near equality was short-lived: in 1851, with the cancellation of the 1849 constitution drafted by Count Philipp Stadion, Jews were once again relegated to an inferior status.36 Nevertheless, they were soon allowed to organize within the community and manage internal and religious matters; moreover, Franz Joseph withdrew the prohibition to collect donations in his empire for Jewish subjects in the Holy Land. More significant changes in the policy of the Habsburg Court toward Jewish subjects were slower to come. In January 1860, Franz Joseph issued an edict that permitted Jews to own land and engage in any profession they chose, yet they were legally granted equal civil rights only in 1867, when the emperor was forced to accept a compromise with Hungary and create a dual monarchy. As noted, this was a full civil emancipation only as individual citizens of a religious group, and Jews had to find their place among the recognized nationalities and act according to the laws of the nations in which they lived.37 The first liberalizing steps already attracted many Jews to Vienna. They joined thousands of people from all over the empire and Central Europe who benefited from the new immigration policy and economic opportunities opened by the pulling down of the Old City walls in 1857. The subsequent enlargement of Vienna and the construction of the fabled Ringstrasse between the 1860s and late 1890s, which articulated the main royal and public buildings, the palaces of the nobility and the wealthy, and the inner and outer quarters, were both a factor and an expression of the fashioning of the city as an effervescent European center. The extraordinary development and appeal of the city were achieved, in great measure, by the efforts of assimilated and acculturated Jews who wished to demonstrate their patriotism and successful contribution to trade, industry, the sciences, the liberal arts, art and architecture, and the blossoming of the city’s cultural elite.38

36 Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites,” 60. 37 See above, chap. 1.1; and Steven Beller, “Patriotism and the National identity of Habsburg Jewry, 1860–1914,” The Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook 41/1 (1996), 215–238. 38 See Gabriele Kohlbauer-Fritz, ed., Ringstrasse: Ein jüdischer Boulevard = A Jewish Boulevard (Vienna: Amalthea and Jüdisches Museum Wien, 2015); Angelina Pötschner, “In welchem Styl sollen wir bauen? Eine Wiener Baufrage für das jüdische Bürgertum der Ringstraßenzeit” (In

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

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Well-off Jews climbing the social ladder sought ways to publicly convey their loyalty to the Habsburg monarch and Austria and, at the same time, the great heritage of the Jewish people and its contribution to human culture. One outstanding example was the adoption of architectural styles and design for the residential palaces and humanitarian institutions identified with royal circles and the upper classes, and their decoration with biblical figures and Classical heroes.39 Their contribution to Viennese culture reinforced the Jews’ self-pride in their achievements and sense of belonging to the city, and became a central topic in the construction of self-identities and self-defense strategies.40 Vienna’s multicultural intellectual, artistic, and political atmosphere was complex and self-contradictory. The blossoming and exciting city that attracted upwardly-mobile, acculturated, and assimilated Jews, as well as poor emigrants from peripheral regions who hoped for better opportunities to earn a living, eventually housed one of the largest urban Jewish communities in Europe. It also experienced the social effects of industrialization and massive immigration that raised the suspicion and subsequent rejection of newcomers, the Others. The emergence of organized radical politics and the flare-up of virulent antisemitism were more pervasive and biting in this city than in other Habsburg and German centers.41 Populist-nationalist Karl Lueger’s oratorical skills and antisemitism created a sense of unity and common identity for the masses, and despite the overt efforts of Franz Joseph to prevent his election for various political reasons, Lueger became mayor of Vienna in 1897. Despite this failure, Franz Joseph should be acknowledged for condemning the ever-more-frequent and harsher

What Style Should We Build? A Viennese Building Matter for the Jewish Bourgeoisie of the Ringstraße Era), in Design Dialogue: Jews, Culture and Viennese Modernism, ed. Elana Shapira (Vienna: Böhlau, 2018), 77–95. Shapira remarks that relations between Jewish patrons and their artists and architects created a new cultural situation that firmly embedded the Jewish micronarrative in the macronarrative of European history, so that Jews and the aspects of Jewish culture that they chose to retain would become a fundamental part of Viennese high culture; see Elana Shapira, Style and Seduction: Jewish Patrons, Architecture, and Design in Fin de Siècle Vienna (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2016), 5–9; and her learned and illuminating introduction in her Design Dialogue: Jews, Culture and Viennese Modernism (Vienna: Böhlau, 2018), 11–37, esp. 11–22. 39 Eadem, Style and Seduction, chap. 1, and see discussion below. 40 Eadem, Design Dialogue, 12. 41 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 142. Rosensaft (“Jews and Antisemites,” esp. 68) notes that the Roman Catholic clergy remained one of Austria’s most influential institutions even after the Liberals’ accession to power and intensive anti-Jewish teachings continued. The Jews were labeled as the killers of Christ, and evil inventions on the contents of the Talmud constantly reappeared in one form or another. Furthermore, by the early 1880s the German nationalist movement in Austria, under Georg von Schonerer’s leadership, was becoming fiercely antisemitic and spread rapidly, especially among university students. See also Hacohen, “Nation and Empire,” esp. 56.

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PART I – Historical Context

outbursts of antisemitism in his realms at the turn of the century. On the day of Lueger’s official confirmation as mayor, 8 April, 1897, the emperor made a point of reassuring the city’s Jewish population by awarding the Franz Joseph Order to Chief Rabbi Moritz Güdemann.42 One year later, on the occasion of the emperor’s Golden Jubilee, a laudatory address in a commemorative publication, produced under the auspices of his heir presumptive Franz Ferdinand, said: “‘Like the hatred based on difference of race, confessional intolerance is also against his temperament (Sinn)’. Franz Joseph attended church on holidays, surrounded by the whole overwhelming splendor that his court is able to display. He does not, however, disdain to admit the most modest clergy of a Jewish community to the audience chamber, [the clergyman’s] head covered according to the rules of his religion, in order to plea for the blessing of heaven on his beloved ruler.”43 Such acts and declarations reinforced Vienna’s Jewish leaders’ appreciation of Franz Joseph, whose belief in God gave him strength and, because he recognized the image of God in every person, protected the human rights of all citizens.44 Yet, the Viennese Golden Age of intellectual and liberal progress was coming to an end. From 1867 until the fall of the Habsburg monarchy in 1918, many Jews in Austria-Hungary came to identify themselves with the state as a supranational, almost cosmopolitan political home that could provide refuge from ethnic, religious and social conflicts, and various kinds of discrimination.45 Ever-growing Jewish circles that wished to integrate into Austrian society greatly improved their socio-economic status despite the fact that, in effect, equal rights were achieved only at the baptismal font.46 This generalization is probably correct, although, as 42 Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites,” 71. Shapira, Style and Seduction, 4. 43 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 96–97. Rosensaft (“Jews and Antisemites,” 57) notes that Franz Ferdinand was known to be no friend of the Jews. 44 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 141, quoting J. Schnitzer, ed., Franz Joseph I und seine Zeit: Kulturhistorischer Rückblick auf die Francisco-Josephinische Epoche, I (Vienna: Lechner, 1898), 8. 45 Constitutional institutions, particularly those of the Austrian half of the Dual Monarchy, accorded equal civil rights and legal access to administrative institutions, as specified by the law, to peoples from different regions, religions, and languages; see Judson, “L’Autriche-Hongrie,” 564. 46 On Jewish assimilation, see Steven Beller (“The World of Yesterday Revisited: Nostalgia, Memory, and the Jews of Fin-de-siècle Vienna,” Jewish Social Studies 2/2 [1996]: 45–46), who notes that “the higher echelons of the bureaucracy were, by informal practice, almost completely closed to Jews, despite what the constitution might say about equal rights regardless of religious affiliation. If a Jew was prepared to cease being Jewish—in other words, to convert—then he could go very far within the state apparatus.” Erika Weinzierl (“The Jewish Middle Class in Vienna in the Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries,” Working Paper 01-1 [University of Minnesota, Center for Austrian Studies, 2003], 1–18, esp. 11–12 ) notes that unconverted Jews were not to be found in ministerial posi-

27

1 Three Distinct Scenarios

Marsha Rozenblit points out, just as the Dual Monarchy was a complicated mosaic of disparate national, ethnic, religious, linguistic, economic, and social groups, so the Jews of the monarchy embraced a whole range of radically different identities. These identities took Jewish tradition as a starting point, but developed differently depending on the region of the monarchy in which Jews resided, on the degree to which they had experienced socio-economic modernization, and on the dynamics of Jewish involvement in the contentious nationalist politics of AustriaHungary; changing historical conditions, political agendas, and personalities should be considered.47 Many of the Jews that moved to Vienna in the second half of the nineteenth century, after the government renounced the long-enforced restrictions on Jewish residence in that city, came from Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, and Galicia. Whereas Eastern Galicia’s Jews were by and large humble and poor Hasidic Jews who kept to old norms and traditions and shunned any element of modernity, immigrants from Central European territories, such as western Galicia, Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia, were more receptive to a modern lifestyle and often looked down upon Eastern Jews.48 Hasidic Jews highly differed from those of the equally

tions under the Habsburgs; see also Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites,” esp. 68; Hacohen, “Nation and Empire,” 56. 47 Between two thirds and three quarters of the Habsburg Jews lived in the northeastern provinces of Galicia and Bukovina; the remaining minority lived for the most part in Hungary, Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia. In 1900, Galician Jews comprised 66.9 % of all the Jews in the Habsburg monarchy, excluding Hungary. By comparison, the Jews of Lower Austria (including Vienna) comprised 12.9 %, those of Bukovina 7.9 %, those of Bohemia 7.6 %, those of Moravia 3.6 %, and those of Silesia 1 %. Jews in other provinces of Austria constituted only 0.9 % of all Austrian Jews. See Piotr Wróbel, “The Jews of Galicia under Austrian-Polish Rule, 1867–1918,” Austrian History Yearbook 25 (1994), 97–138 , 1–35, esp. 4 and note 26. 48 Jews were almost equally divided between the two halves of the Dual Monarchy, constituting about 4.5 % of the population in 1910. Most Jews were from Galicia, which was the largest, poorest, and most backward province of the Austrian Empire. See Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 15. In 1815, following the Napoleonic Wars, parts of Galicia were ceded by the Austrian Empire to the Kingdom of Poland, which was ruled by the tsar. With the reorganization of the empire as the Dual Monarchy, a broad autonomy was granted to Galicia, administered by an oligarchy of Polish nobles. Polish became the official language and Galicia was reshaped into a center of Polish culture. Besides most of them being poor, shtetl Jews were strictly conservative Hasidim, who shut themselves off as much as possible from outside influences. In the hope to escape hunger and harassment, many of these eastern Jews reached Vienna and, as noted, were often regarded with hostility by acculturated Jews. Others, including many of the refugees from the pogroms in the 1880s in Russia and Ukraine, left for America, despite the fact that the Haredi leadership advised them to settle in Palestine; see Wróbel, “Jews of Galicia,” 97–138  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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devout but much more liberal Orthodox Jewish community of Vienna; Sephardi Jews had their particular set of practices; Zionists and Jewish circles calling for a national revival had a modern understanding of Jewish identity and were not interested in integration but in the creation of a new Hebrew society and culture in the ancient homeland;49 moreover, there were many acculturated Jews who integrated into the general society with different degrees of closeness and distance from Judaism, including those whose religious sentiments were weak, as in the case of those involved in the Socialist movement, or non-existent, in which case they had no interest in Jewish ethnicity at all; lastly, there were also Jews who tried to fully assimilate by converting to Christianity or to the neutral category “without religion.”50 By the end of the nineteenth century, most emancipated and acculturated Jews perceived their Jewish identity as a solely religious dimension, a personal matter that had no national significance. Most Austrian Jews generally did not want to constitute a separate nation. As far as they were concerned, most of them considered themselves Austrians, Czechs, Hungarians, or Poles whose absolute loyalty was to the state in which they lived and to the emperor-king. The Jews’ struggle for emancipation had been waged in order to achieve equality as Habsburg subjects, but in practice they needed equality as citizens of a particular state.51 The large and successful Viennese Jewish community struggled with conflicting notions of Jewish identity as citizens with merely a different religion, secular members of a separate nation and race, or assimilated citizens with only a different ancestry.52 Despite the significant differences, Rozenblit notes, Jews formed

,1–35, esp. 3–17. 49 Isaiah Friedman (“The Austro-Hungarian Government and Zionism: 1897–1918,” Jewish Social Studies 27/3 [1965]: 153–154) remarks that “the Austro-Hungarian government suspected them [the Zionists] of pro-Entente sympathies… The Zionists felt slighted, for in the fulfilment of their patriotic duties they did not lag behind other citizens. Although inherently pacifist, they considered the war, as did other Jews, to be directed primarily against tsarist Russia—as a ‘revenge for Kishinev’” but emotionally they “were opposed to a concept that the Central Powers suffer a defeat… tantamount to a victory for tsarist Russia.” The evacuation of Jews from Jaffa, at the beginning of April 1917, eventually shook Austrian indifference (p. 157); Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 34–38. 50 Ibid., 14, 36–38; Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites,” 67. 51 Ibid., 67. 52 Rozenblit characterizes Austrian Jews as having a tripartite identity—politically Austrian, culturally German, Czech, or Polish, and ethnically Jewish—unlike Jews in nation-states like Germany and France who had to embrace a German or French national identity and felt constraints against revealing Jewish ethnicity. See her Reconstructing a National Identity, esp. 18–26, 27–29, 30–33. Regarding Jews in Vienna, Weinzierl (“Jewish Middle Class in Vienna,” 5) notes that 11 %  

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a distinct group in Austro-Hungarian society that was bound by a common history, common problems, and a sense of belonging to the same people.53 Most emancipated Jews continued to feel solidarity with other Jews and kept a collective Jewish identity that transcended interpretations of religion; traditional and modern Jewish cultural practices continued to inform and enrich one another.54 In Hungary, ever since its 1848–1849 war for independence from the Austrian Empire, Jews, like other minorities, found themselves trying to comply with the Habsburg court’s required loyalty to the emperor (after 1867 the emperor-king), on the one hand, and the Hungarian kingdom’s pressure for complete identification with its nationalist aspirations, on the other.55 Acculturated Jews adapted to these competing requirements, whereas deeply Orthodox Jews, although respecting Magyar nationalism, kept a traditional Jewish identity as a nation in exile awaiting redemption. The latter was also the case regarding most Jews in Galicia and Bukovina:56 their devoted allegiance to the emperor was maximized by their un-

of Jews marrying between 1870 and 1910 were already jurists, doctors, and journalists, and their numbers did not begin to rise significantly before the twentieth century. In the public sector, there was not yet a single Jewish civil servant in 1880, but by 1910 already 4 % of those marrying belonged to this category. Among them, the highest ranking were university professors, while the majority held positions in the postal or railroad services. Jews did not have access to ministeriallevel positions. 53 Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 14. 54 Shapira (Design Dialogue, 12) further explains why the rise of antisemitism did not necessarily undermine the Jews’ sense of belonging, but rather encouraged them to reinvent the Viennese cultural and design languages that would allow them to thrive in the city. 55 What ethnic politicians of the late nineteenth century were demanding of Jews in their midst amounted to a reduction of perspective, a shift from the imperial to the local and from state to nation. Many Jews, not only in Hungary but also in the Bohemian lands, acquiesced to the need to meet the demands to articulate individual and collective identity in national terms. See Hillel J. Kieval, “Imperial Embraces and Ethnic Challenges: The Politics of Jewish Identity in the Bohemian Lands,” Shofar 30/4 (2012), 1–17. 56 Ultra‐Orthodox Jews were interested in Hungarian politics only inasmuch as government policy affected their traditional way of life. They were certainly indifferent to the major political issues of the day, such as support of or opposition to the Austro‐Hungarian Compromise. In contrast, more acculturated Orthodox Jews were committed to the ideal of the Hungarian state, i.e., loyalty to the Hungarian state as against the nationalities, and gave unfailing political support to the government in power. Neolog Jews were assimilationists in the sense that in political life, in accordance with the official doctrine, they did not want to appear as “Jews” but rather as “Hungarians of the Jewish persuasion”; see Miklós Konrád “Jews and Politics in Hungary in the Dualist Era, 1867–1914,” East European Jewish Affairs 39/2 (2009), 167–186, esp. 169–172, 174, 180. A similar attitude was adopted by Jews in Bohemia; see Kieval, “Imperial Embraces and Ethnic Challenges,” esp. 10–17; Menachem Keren-Kratz, “The Politics of Jewish Orthodoxy: The Case of Hungary 1868–1918,” Modern Judaism 36/3 (2016), 217–248, esp. 218–220. As the examination of the  

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derstanding that their legal status as emancipated Jews with equal legal and civil rights surpassed by far the status of fellow Jews across the borders in the Russian empire and Romania.57 Emancipated Jews of Bohemia and Moravia retained their Jewish way of life and expressed loyalty to the emperor-king and Austria while, at the same time, identified themselves culturally as Germans; a Czech national identity, required by nationalist circles, presented more difficulties because of the antisemitic stance of those circles.58 Lastly, Socialism and Zionism caught the imaginations of younger people at the turn of the century, but despite the spread of those movements in Galicia, most Jews remained true Habsburg loyalists devoted to the emperor and his House. The Jews’ loyalty to Franz Joseph grew into a veritable cult.59 Imperial patriotism was nourished by sermons in synagogues, publications in the Jewish press, addresses at public meetings, and commemorative occasions. Jewish communities in Jerusalem, as in the Habsburg realms, named institutions and foundations after the emperor, dedicated Torah scrolls and the ornaments enhancing them to his name, and blessed him and his family, as they were aware that the court expected laudations and homages as essential acts of citizenship and belonging. In the spirit of the ongoing and wide-ranging promotion of Franz Joseph by his court as a heavenly blessed monarch reigning by the Grace of God, as the integrative focus, symbol of just rule and unity of all his peoples, and defender of peace among them as well as among confessional groups, the emperor-king called his Jewish subjects “his people” and, accordingly, many Jews in his realms and in Jerusalem used the most respectful Hebrew expression kireh, an acronym for kayzer yerom hodo, which means “Glory be to the Emperor,” when referring to him.60 Moreover, in a blend of naiveté and pride for the imaginary affection that

gifts of the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to Franz Joseph and Karl suggests, these positions may have influenced the Jerusalem Habsburg communities. See below. 57 Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 28–29; and see our discussion on the perception of the Great War, below. 58 Ibid., 26–28; Kieval, “Imperial Embraces and Ethnic Challenges.” 59 Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 29; eadem, “A Holy War and Revenge for Kishinev: Austrian Rabbis Justify the First World War,” European Judaism 48/1 (2015), 74–82, esp. 79– 80; Robert S. Wistrich, The Jews of Vienna in the Age of Franz Joseph (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1990), 175–181; Michael Klein, “The Myth Lives On: The Legacy of the Monarchy and of the Emperor in the Non-German Language Literature of the Successor States,” in Franz Joseph 1830– 1916, ed. Karl Vocelka and Martin Mutschlechner (Vienna: Schloss Schönbrunn Kultur- und BetriebsgesmbH Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien and Brandstätter, 2016), 120–123. 60 Norbert Glässer, “‘Bless Our King Who You Sent Like Moses’: Jewish Religious Interpretations of Loyalty to Hungarian King Francis Joseph,” in Religion, Culture, Society, 3: Yearbook of the

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Franz Joseph had for them, many Hasidic Jews called him by his Hebrew name, Ephraim Yosef, or Froyim Yosl in Yiddish.61 Respect, obedience, and blessings for the crowned head arose from political and religious traditions of Judaism. Leo Singer, the Orthodox Chief Rabbi of Rimaszombat—a town in southern Slovakia that was then part of the kingdom of Hungary—wrote in 1907 about the urgent need and moral duty to respect and be loyal to the king, based on the Scriptures and sayings of Jewish sages such as the Ethics of the Fathers, which advises: “Pray for the peace of the kingdom, because if it were not feared, one would swallow the other alive” (Mishnah, Avot 3:2)—the saying highlighted on the cover of the book presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel in Jerusalem to Karl upon his accession to the throne. In another earnest call in the same booklet, Rabbi Singer said, based on Proverbs 24:21: “Fear the Lord and the king and do not join with the rebellious,”62 a call that fulfilled an essential expectation of the Habsburg court. Jewish Habsburg subjects expressed keen gratitude and loyalty to the monarch, in response to declarations that aimed to avoid discrimination and persecution built on ethnic and religious prejudices. This attitude stands out in homages, dedications of gifts, and documents submitted in both Austria-Hungary and Jerusalem. Habsburg Jews in the Dual Monarchy, as in Jerusalem, hoped that Karl would follow in his predecessor’s footsteps.

1.2 Jerusalem in the Late Ottoman Period The gifts presented to Franz Joseph and Karl by Jewish Habsburg subjects living in Jerusalem, as well as the narratives that they created around the objects and the monarchs, are fascinating historical testimonies that shed light on the development of Jerusalem in the late Ottoman period and on the transformation of its topography and identity, serving as a unique testament to a new perspective of the

MTA-SZTE Research Group for the Study of Religious Culture, ed. Gábor Barna and Orsolya Gyöngyössy (Szeged: University of Szeged, 2016), 86; idem, “‘This Crown Came Down to Us from Heaven, God Sent it to You Through Us’: Neolog Jewish Discourse Traditions on the Coronation of Charles IV,” in Religion, Culture, Society, 4: Yearbook of the MTA-SZTE Research Group for the Study of Religious Culture, ed. Gábor Barna and Orsolya Gyöngyössy (Szeged: University of Szeged, 2017), 10. For examples in Jerusalem periodicals and in epistles sent by Austro-Hungarian kolelim of the Old Yishuv, see Nurit Govrin, “The Mourning in Jerusalem over the Death of Emperor Franz Joseph,” Mahut 8–9 (1991), 123 (Hebrew); and below. 61 Haim Be’er, Feathers (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2004), 90; see also Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 28–29, and below. 62 Glässer, “‘Bless Our King’,” 79–80; and below, chap. 5.2.

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Jewish communities in the city. This period saw dramatic political crises, as well as demographic and socio-cultural changes. The main collectives were the Arabs, who were the more influential group, the Ottomans, who were sovereigns, and the Jews—a small native minority with growing numbers of immigrants—who in the late nineteenth century became the largest part of the population.63 The series of wars, revolutions and counter-revolutions in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, that shook the Ottoman empire until its fall, affected Palestine and caused serious crises, especially among those living in the contested Holy City. With the outbreak of the Great War, the rise of self-awareness among the various ethnic, national, and religious collectives, and a process of constant repositioning and reconstructing of identities, engendered severe difficulties and conflicts.64 When Franz Joseph acceded to the throne in Austria, the Ottoman empire was undergoing a series of reforms and reorganization in what is known as the Tanzimat period. This period began in 1839, just before the Pasha of Egypt, Muhammad

63 On the population of Palestine in the nineteenth century and the eve of World War I, see Ruth Kark and Joseph B. Glass, “The Jews in Eretz‐Israel/Palestine: From Traditional Peripherality to Modern Centrality,” Israel Affairs 5/4 (1999), 77–78, 82. Among the many relevant publications, see also Maurus Reinkowski, “Late Ottoman Rule over Palestine: Its Evaluation in Arab, Turkish and Israeli Histories, 1970-90,” Middle Eastern Studies 35/1 (1999), 66–97, and Yasemin Avci, Vincent Lemire, and Falestin Naïli, “Publishing Jerusalem’s Ottoman Municipal Archives (1892– 1917): A Turning Point for the City’s Historiography,” Jerusalem Quarterly 60 (2014), 110–119, reminding that narratives are in constant competition, as they isolate the history of different communities from the overall history of the city (111–112). In this context, see also Issam Nassar, “Jerusalem in the Late Ottoman Period: Historical Writing and the Native Voice,” in Jerusalem: Idea and Reality, ed. Tamar Mayer and Suleiman A. Mourad (Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon; New York: Routledge, 2008), 205–223 ; and idem, European Portrayals of Jerusalem: Religious Fascinations and Colonialist Imaginations (Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen, 2006); Yeshayahu Nir, “Cultural Predispositions in Early Photography: The Case of the Holy Land (2),” in Jerusalem in the Mind of the Western World, 1800–1948, ed. Yehoshua Ben-Arieh and Moshe Davis, With Eyes toward Zion, 5 (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1997), 197–206. 64 Abigail Jacobson notes that the war is remembered by locals and described by historians as a dark period in the history of Palestine, one in which people starved to death, were forced to migrate from their homes, and lost control over their lives and destiny; see her “A City Living through Crisis: Jerusalem during World War I,” British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 36/1 (2009), 73; and Sked, “Austria-Hungary and the First World War,” with a review of studies and opinions. In Palestine, following the second wave of Jewish immigration between 1904 and 1914, also the tension between Jews and Arabs increased; see Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 339–345, documents 154, 155, and 156; Arieh Bruce Saposnik, “Europe and Its Orients in Zionist Culture before the First World War,” The Historical Journal 49/4 (2006), 1119–1121. The revolution also caused serious changes in the dynamics of power within the local Jewish, Armenian, and Greek Orthodox collectives; see Bedross Der Matossian, “The Young Turk Revolution: Its Impact on Religious Politics of Jerusalem (1908–1912),” Jerusalem Quarterly 40 (2009–2010), 19–36.

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Ali, withdrew from Greater Syria (today’s Lebanon, Jordan, Syria, Palestine, and Israel) in 1841, which he had occupied ten years earlier. The direct cause of the reforms was the restoration of the area to the Ottomans, owing to the intervention of Britain with the co-operation of Austria and in accord with Prussia and Russia. One consequence was the institution of Jerusalem as capital of the southern sanjaks (administrative districts) in that same year—a step that changed the history of the city, which at the time was a marginal small town with a relatively small population of approximately twelve thousand inhabitants, about half of which were non-Muslims. In the summer of 1872, as a result of the growing European interest in the Holy City, the sanjak of Jerusalem was separated from the province of Syria and attached directly to the Ottoman Ministry of the Interior, and became an important political and administrative center.65 The reforms included various concessions and privileges to European powers and non-Muslims, including an expansion of the Capitulations Treaty that endowed the European consulates with complete legal, financial, and religious autonomy.66 Under the capitulations agreements, the European powers’ citizens

65 Butrus Abu-Manneh, “Jerusalem in the Tanzimat Period: The New Ottoman Administration and the Notables,” Die Welt des Islams 30 (1990), 43–44. 66 The Capitulation Treaties date back to the seventeenth century. In time, the Ottoman government considered the capitulations as an infringement upon its sovereignty and pride, harmful to its economy, and a main instrument in the hands of the powers to expand their interests; see Jeff Halper, “On the Way: The Transition of Jerusalem From a Ritual to Colonial City (1800-1917),” Urban Anthropology 13: 1 (1984), 1–32 (13, 15–16); Kushner, “The District of Jerusalem,” 85. Kark and Glass (“Jews in Eretz‐Israel/Palestine,” 76–77) note four political sub-periods in the Ottoman rule over Jerusalem: (1) the period of Pashas – strong local rulers (1799–1831), i.e., a continuation of the eighteenth century and the common forms of government at the time; (2) the conquest of Syria and Palestine by Egyptian ruler Muhammad Ali, headed by his son, Ibrahim Pasha (1831–1840); (3) the period of reforms (1841–1876), when Ottomans returned to power; and (4) the end of the Ottoman period (1877–1917). The first and larger part of the latter was marked by the centralized rule of Sultan Abdulhamid II; the second saw the rise of the Young Turks, who staged a revolution in 1908 and remained in power until the British occupation of Palestine in 1917–1918. The status and security of Jews, Christians, and foreign subjects improved, but from 1897, the year the Zionist movement was founded, until the First World War, laws and orders restricting Jewish immigration and land purchase in Palestine were issued; moreover, as noted, Palestinian nationalist sentiments emerged. See also Mahmoud Haddad, “From Muslim Privilege to Christian and Foreign Privilege: Observations on the Tanzimat and their Impact on Syria,” in 1860, Histoires et mémoires d’un conflit, ed. Dima de Clerck, Naila Kaidbey, and Carla Eddé, Collection Institut Français du Proche-Orient, 40 (Beirut: L’Institut Français du Proche-Orient, 2015), 49–68, esp. 50–51. Moshe Ma‘oz, “Changing Relations between Jews, Muslims, and Christians during the Nineteenth Century, with Special Reference to Ottoman Syria and Palestine,” in Jews, Turks, Ottomans: A Shared History, Fifteenth through the Twentieth Century, ed. Avigdor Levy (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 2002), 108–118, esp. 108–114.

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were exempt from Ottoman taxes and were placed outside Ottoman law; they were liable for their actions to the consuls of their respective nations, in whose courts they would be tried according to the laws of their original homelands or the monarchy that accepted them as protégés, and had rights to their legal protection. As Isaiah Friedman remarked regarding Britain, the protection of Jews was not without reward: the higher the number of subjects and protégés, the greater the influence of the protecting monarchy. Disinterested idealism and political expediency were mutually interwoven.67 This was true regarding the other powers as well. The reforms peaked in 1876, at the beginning of the Constitutional Era, with a decree of Abdulhamid II (r. 1876–1909). However, as soon as he secured his position in Istanbul, the sultan abrogated the reforms, and in February 1878 he suspended the constitution. On 24 July, 1908, in light of the Young Turks Revolution, Abdulhamid capitulated and announced the restoration of the constitution, which he pledged to respect.68 Yet, the Young Turks Revolution ultimately brought about the deposition of the sultan and the accession of his brother Mehmed V—a figurehead with no real political power—in 1909. The Young Turks’ success awakened hopes for an amelioration of conditions in the empire, including Jerusalem.69 However, new problems arose in the relations with the Orthodox Old Yishuv. Jerusalem gained political importance throughout this period,70 primarily because of the Church’s great interest in the biblical holy places. This rediscovery of

67 Isaiah Friedman (“Lord Palmerston and the Protection of Jews in Palestine, 1839–1851,” Jewish Social Studies 30/1 (1968), 25) notes that, under the circumstances, other ethnic groups in Ottoman dominions had to be solicited, and so it was that in due course England was successful in winning the reputation of being “a friend of all the oppressed races and creeds, whether Moslem or Jews, Samaritan or Druse...”; see Mordechai Eliav, “The Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” Cathedra 18 (1981), 82, notes 29, 33; 90–91, 100–101 (Hebrew), also referring to the Jews’ problem with missionary activities among the Jews. 68 Abu-Manneh, “Jerusalem in the Tanzimat Period,” 42. Austria took advantage of the events to annex the region of Bosnia-Herzegovina in October 1908. This step created much tension between the Habsburg and Ottoman empires and awakened the concern of the Jewish communities; see Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 106. 69 Der Matossian, “Young Turk Revolution,” 19–36; see also Yair Wallach (“Rethinking the Yishuv: Late-Ottoman Palestine’s Jewish Communities Revisited,” Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 16/2 [2017]: 288), who notes that with the reinstatement of the parliamentary constitution, the Ottoman empire was celebrated as a civic “family of nations,” a fraternity of diverse religious, ethnic, and linguistic groups, and thus awakened the hope among circles of Armenians, Arabs, and Jews that they would be able to establish their national identity within a democratic and pluralistic Ottoman nation. 70 David Kushner, “The District of Jerusalem in the Eyes of Three Ottoman Governors at the End of the Hamidian Period,” Middle Eastern Studies 35/2 (1999), 84–88.

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the Holy Land led to the establishment of new religious and charitable institutions by various Christian denominations and monastic orders, and was supported by the monarchs of their respective homelands who sought political gains. Within a single decade, no less than six foreign consulates opened, starting with the establishment of the British Consulate in 1839, Prussia in 1842, France and Sardinia in 1843, the United States in 1844, and Austria as a Vice-Consulate in Jerusalem in 1849, followed by Spain in 1856 and Russia in 1858. The nomination of an Austrian Vice-Consulate had been approved by Ferdinand I in 1847, but the revolutionary events of 1848 caused a delay. Relying on Franz Joseph’s title as King of Jerusalem, statesman Prince Felix von Schwarzenberg recommended in 1851 the upgrading of the Austrian Vice-Consulate in Jerusalem to the rank of full consulate, which took effect in 1852.71 At the same time, research campaigns usually backed by European powers attracted biblical scholars, geographers, archaeologists, and ethnographers, followed by writers and artists.72 Motivated by religious faith, the wish to intensify the spiritual experience and add to the unique value of their work, scholars, missioners, and writers often used biblical names of sites and monuments instead of the names used in Palestine at the time. The Land of the Bible was read as a text that, following the narratives of the Scriptures, testified to the truth of their

71 See Yochai Ben-Ghedalia, “The Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy in Jerusalem during the Crimean War (1853-6),” Working Paper, 76 (Jerusalem: European Forum at the Hebrew University, Center for Austrian Studies, 2009), 4–5; Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 73, 77–84, 84, note 35, quoting file HM 42817/ 1851. On the Austrian Consulate, see Rudolf Agstner, “Österreichs Konsulate im Heiligen Land,” in Mit Szepter und Pilgerstab: österreichische Präsenz im Heiligen Land seit den Tagen Kaiser Franz Josephs, ed. Bernhard A. Böhler, Erzbischöfliches Dom- und Diözesanmuseum Wien, 5.Juli bis 2.September 2000 (Vienna: Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag, 2000), 25–39. Austrian representation in Palestine dates from the early eighteenth century: Chap. 5 in the Peace Treaty of Passarowitz (1718) bestowed Austria with the right to establish consulates in any city in the Ottoman empire where a foreign consular agency already existed; see Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 4. 72 Kushner (“District of Jerusalem,” 87–89) notes that the European interest in the holy places and the conflicts around them between the Christian denominations were another constant preoccupation for the Ottoman government that may have kept in mind that a conflict between Christian Orthodox and Catholic communities served as a pretext for the oubreak of the Crimean War; see Nora Libertun de Duren, “Jerusalem at the Beginning of the Twentieth Century: Spatial Continuity and Social Fragmentation,” 11–12 and ; Naomi Shepherd, The Zealous Intruders: The Western Rediscovery of Palestine (San Francisco: Harper and Row, 1987), 117.

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faith.73 Attracted by travel facilities, growing waves of pilgrims, tourists, and adventurers—in addition to Christian and Jewish settlers—arrived in Jerusalem.74 Christian denominations, followed by Jewish philanthropists, founded hospices, humanitarian institutions, hospitals, schools, small industries, and workshops, including ateliers for souvenirs that competed with private entrepeneurs. These institutions and enterprises contributed to the development of the city and, at the same time, reinforced political aspirations and rivalry between the European powers for predominance in the Holy City, and added to their prestige and influence not only in Jerusalem but also in Europe. This was the purpose of the socalled Peaceful Crusades—the “reconquest” of the Holy Land for Christianity through religious, cultural, and philanthropic penetration.75 The cornerstone of this ideology—the conviction that the Holy Land belongs to Christianity—was supported by political interests.76 Aware of its limited military power and disadvantaged political position in Europe, the Habsburg Monarchy aimed to act outwards mainly as a universal Catholic power with a strong presence and influence in the cradle of Christianity,

73 Whereas Protestants sought to confirm the topographical truths of the Scriptures, Catholic believers perceived these sites as intrinsically holy. 74 On tourism and pilgrimage, see the illuminating paper by Doron Bar and Kobi Cohen-Hattab, “A New Kind of Pilgrimage: The Modern Tourist Pilgrim of Nineteenth Century and Early Twentieth Century Palestine,” Middle Eastern Studies 39/2 (2003), 131–148; see also Kobi Cohen-Hattab and Yossi Katz, “The Attraction of Palestine: Tourism in the Years 1850–1948,” Journal of Historical Geography 27/2 (2001), 166–177. 75 Shepherd, The Zealous Intruders; Elizabeth Siberry, The New Crusaders: Images of the Crusades in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries (Aldershot, UK and Burlington, VT: Dartmouth, 2000); Lily Arad, The Crown of Jerusalem: Franz Joseph’s Dream of an Ideal Empire (Jerusalem: Spectrum, 2012), esp. 67–96, 98–99, and 123–145, with special attention to the AustroHungarian perspectives; Eitan Bar-Yosef, “The Last Crusade?: British Propaganda and the Palestine Campaign, 1917–1918,” Journal of Contemporary History 36/1 (2001), 87–109. Kushner (“District of Jerusalem,” 84) notes that the contest between the major powers required the close attention of the Ottoman government, lest these aspirations translate into territorial claims and major conflicts with the interested powers. Moreover, Kushner notes, the proximity of Egypt, which under Muhammad Ali and his successors developed into a semi-independent province, turned the district into a sensitive border area. With the occupation of Egypt by the British in 1882, this security problem became even more serious for the Ottoman government; see the broad-scoped paper by Barbara Haider-Wilson, “Jerusalem’s Place in the Relationship between the Orient and the Occident,” Römische Historische Mitteilungen 61 (2019), 61–87, esp. 65–69, 74–75. 76 Jutta Faehndrich, “A Map, the Beauty, and the Beast: The Three Palestines of Lieutenant van de Velde,” Römische Historische Mitteilungen 61 (2019) 51–54, 56–58; Paolo Maggiolini, “Images, Views, and Landscapes of the Holy Land: Catholic and Protestant Travels to Ottoman Palestine during the 19th Century,” Quest. Issues in Contemporary Jewish History 6 (2013), 19–47, esp. 21– 25, 38–41. .

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a position long held by France.77 Russia supported Orthodox Christians and saw itself as heir to the Byzantine empire,78 and Britain had political, commercial, and religious pursuits: in the self-perception of wide British circles, God had chosen England as the New Jerusalem. One endeavor was to return the Jews to the Land of Israel under its protection, as a means to bring forth redemption.79 Moreover, England hoped that its support of Jews would prompt their conversion and play in its favor at the expense of the other powers, in the event of either the survival or the fall of the Ottoman empire. In 1841, Prussia united with Britain to establish a joint Protestant bishopry and advance their religio-political interests. According to Jeff Halper, from the time of the Turkish return in 1840 until the British conquest in 1917, Jerusalem became a quasi-colonial city: the Turks unofficially shared the administration with a loosely coordinated group of European consuls.80 The British, French, Russian, Prussian, and Austrian consuls became the most influential.81 The years between 1912 and 1914 were challenging. At this time, the Ottoman empire experienced many domestic and foreign hardships.82 On 30 October, 1914, it officially joined the Great War as allies of Germany and Austria-Hungary, and on 7 November, 1914, the government declared the war a jihad, or holy war. In effect, Ottoman involvement in the war began earlier. On 2 August, the empire had

77 See my Crown of Jerusalem, 67–69, 77–83; Bernhard Kronegger, “Imperial Pilgrimage to Jerusalem. The Journeys of Franz Joseph I and Wilhelm II: Between Religious Tradition and Political Calculation,” Römische Historische Mitteilungen 61 (2019), 117–133, esp. 124–125; Dominique Trimbur, “Les Croisades dans la perception catholique française du levant, 1880–1940: entre mémoire et actualité,” Cristianismo nella storia 27/3 (2006), 897–921, esp. 898–899; idem, “‘Our Country’s Prestige’: The Status of France’s Representation in Jerusalem from the Late Nineteenth Century to the 1930s,” Jerusalem Quarterly 71 (2017), 43–58. 78 Kronegger, “Imperial Pilgrimage,” 123–124; Alex Carmel, “Russian Activity in Palestine in the Nineteenth Century,” in Vision and Conflict in the Holy Land, ed. Richard I. Cohen (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi; New York: St. Martin’s, 1985), 45–77; Isaiah Friedman, “Lord Palmerston,” 28, regarding Russian ambitions. 79 Ibid., 24–25, 28–29, note 18, quoting British Vice-Consul William Young who, as a devout evangelist, believed that “Great Britain was destined to be ‘the natural Guardian’ both of the ‘Jew—unto whom God originally gave this land for [a] possession, and… [of] the Protestant Christian, his legitimate offspring’.” 80 Halper, “On the Way,” 13–14; Robert-Tarek Fischer, “‘Die einzige Kolonie unserer Monarchie’: Das Schicksal der jüdischen Schutzgemeinde in Palästina,” in Weltuntergang: Jüdisches Leben und Sterben im Ersten Weltkrieg, ed. Marcus G. Patka (Vienna: Styria Premium, 2014), 111–112. 81 Halper, “On the Way,” 13–14. 82 Including the devastating Balkan wars and the emergence of national movements, such as Arab nationalism in Syria and Palestine, which presented it with new challenges. The Jewish immigration and national movement, Zionism, was a concern, too.

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signed a secret treaty of alliance with Germany stipulating reciprocal military support against Russia, and general mobilization was promptly announced. The war was soon felt in Jerusalem and in Palestine as a whole. The cancellation of the capitulations on 1 October, 1914, i.e., even before officially joining the war, limited trade and affected daily life. Food prices escalated steeply, a problem that worsened when plagues almost completely destroyed the 1915 harvest yields.83 In December, 1916, when Karl I/IV took the throne and the two Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem were to present him with gifts, a well-educated Jerusalemite Muslim Arab serving in the Ottoman army described in his diary the population’s difficult situation during the war: All [supply] of flour and bread stopped. When I walked to the headquarters [manzil] this morning, I saw many men, women, and children in Bab al-‘Amud [the Damascus Gate— L. A.] [looking] for some flour…. I see that the enemy gets stronger than the fellahin.... How poor these people are... but all of us are miserable these days.84

The writer of the diary, whom Abigail Jacobson characterizes as dislocated and alienated from his Muslim Ottoman collective, laments the ways Jews and Christians were humiliated in their service in Ottoman-army labor battalions.85 Austrian interest in the Holy Land reached a peak during the years around the Great War. Turkey’s alliance with the Central Powers turned France and Italy into enemies of the Ottoman empire; consequently, following the expulsion of the French and Italian missionaries, the Austrian Roman Catholic Church and Imperial Court elites felt that the time had come to assume their role as the leading Catholic power in the region,86 realizing an old aspiration that awoke when politi83 Jacobson, “A City Living through Crisis,” 76–78. 84 Eadem, “Negotiating Ottomanism in Times of War: Jerusalem during World War I through the Eyes of a Local Muslim Resident,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 40/1 (2008), 70, 72– 74. 85 The cover of the diary identifies the writer as “Muhammad ‘Adil al-Salih, from Jerusalem,” but according to Jacobson, he actually may be Ihsan Tourjman; see her “Negotiating Ottomanism,” 71, 83, noting that people’s affiliation to the Ottoman collective allowed for multilayered, blurry, and flexible foci of identity to exist side by side, and remarks that nevertheless, for some people wartime trauma and the empire’s treatment of its subjects created a deep, personal “identity crisis,” during which they began questioning their affiliation and loyalty to the empire. See also Wallach, “Rethinking the Yishuv,” 288, 290; Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 108–110; and below. 86 Yehoshua Ben-Arieh and Haim Goren, “Catholic Austria and Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century: The Beginnings,” in Austrian Presence in the Holy Land in the 19th and Early 20th Century: Proceedings of the Symposium in the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem, March 1–2, 1995, ed. Marian Wrba (Tel Aviv: Austrian Embassy, 1996), 8–9, 14–18; Dorothea McEwan, “The Hapsburg Church Protectorate in the Holy Land,” in Austrian Presence in the Holy Land in the 19th and Early 20th

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cal conditions seemed favorable. They believed that the accession of Karl I/IV to the throne opened new opportunities. Based on the military alliance with Turkey, Karl secretly revived Austria’s plans. At the same time, Karl got involved in another secret plan that could save his empire and positively change the life of his subjects, including those living in Jerusalem. This plan would be pursued either in cooperation with or in opposition to Austria’s ally, the German Empire. Seeing Austria’s unpromising military situation at the front and the desperate situation of his subjects behind the front lines, the new emperor-king—assisted by his consort Zita of Bourbon-Parma— decided to embark on peace discussions with France through the mediation of the empress-queen’s brother, Prince Sixtus of Bourbon-Parma, who was an officer in the Belgian army, and with the assistance of other close members of her family and Count Tamás Erdődy, a close friend of Karl.87 In February 1917, Prince Sixtus sent a message to Karl that “in order to save the Monarchy” Karl should promulgate an imperial ordinance that confronts Germany with a fait accompli. Yet, the whole process of the peace attempt was marked by a fear of the Germans, and the personal meeting between the two emperors in Germany on 2 April, 1917, marked a defeat for the Austro-Hungarian monarch and his personal diplomacy. As noted, Karl could neither carry out his plans and achieve the much-needed peace treaty nor bring about necessary reforms in the political structure of the Dual Monarchy.88 Furthermore, the possibility of gaining the protectorate of the Catholic communities was lost. The Austrian inspection trip lasted from early September to early November 1917,89 yet, one month later the situation dramatically changed: on 11 December, 1917, General Edmund Allenby entered Jerusalem. Recognizing Muslim sensibilities and the danger of rebellion, the British government avoided official references to the conquest of Jerusalem as the realization of a crusade. Nevertheless, Allenby was hailed in Britain as a Crusader hero.90

Century, Proceedings of the Symposium in the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem, March 1–2, 1995, ed. Marian Wrba (Tel Aviv: Austrian Embassy, 1996), 54, 62–63. 87 Tibor Frank, “‘C’est la paix!’ – The Sixtus Letters and the Peace Initiative of Emperor Karl I,” Hungarian Review 5 (2015), 64–68. Barbara Haider-Wilson, “Palestine in the Context of a Failed Imperial Undertaking: The Concerted Action of the Habsburg Monarchy in the Orient 1915– 1917,” in Römische Historische Mitteilungen 54 (2012), 451, 454. 88 Frank, “‘C’est la paix!’,” 69–71. 89 Haider-Wilson, “Palestine in the Context,” esp. 471–474. 90 Bar-Yosef, “The Last Crusade?,” 87–89. See also the famous cartoons in Punch, 19 December, 1917, p. 415, titled “The Last Crusade,” and 17 September, 1919, p. 251, titled “The Return of the Crusade.” On calls for a peaceful crusade, see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 67–87; and on the wish of the European nobility to demonstrate their ancestors’ contribution to the medieval Crusades,

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While Karl’s secret plans were certainly unknown to the Jerusalemite public, the already long-standing Austrian support of Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem must have been present in the mind of their kolelim when deciding to send impressive gifts to Karl upon accession of the throne, and influenced their design and accompanying texts.

1.3 The Old Yishuv: The Creation of Local Identities and National Sentiments In the rapidly changing period under discussion, how do the Jewish visual culture and narratives from Jerusalem demonstrate the creation of a geographical and cultural frame for the Jewish population of the city, its continuous search for particular and positive local identities and legitimation, and the rise of national sentiments? How do the gifts presented to Franz Joseph and Karl by his Jerusalemite subjects exhibit ideological and political positions and aims? The Jewish collective in Palestine, or, as the Jews perceived it, the Land of Israel, comprised small communities of indigenous members who had continuously resided in this land or had come in earlier centuries, such as the Sephardim who arrived after their expulsion from Spain and Portugal in 1492 and had already settled in Ottoman cities in the sixteenth century; Mediterranean and Oriental (Mizrachi) Jews, who arrived around the same time;91 and smaller communities who were neither Sephardim nor Ashkenazim, such as the Persianspeaking Jews of Bukhara and the Arabic-speaking Jews of Iraq and Yemen, who arrived in the second half of the nineteenth century. All were included in a sociopolitical class of non-Muslim subjects of the Ottoman empire,92 except for the

see sub-chap. 6.1. Allusions as well as overt references also appeared in written and visual media in Austria. 91 Abraham David, To Come to the Land: Immigration and Settlement in 16th-Century Eretz-Israel (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 1999), esp. chap. 1. 92 Claude R. Conder and Horatio H. Kitchener, Survey of Western Palestine, III: Judea (London: Palestine Exploration Fund, 1883), 163; Abigail Jacobson, “The Sephardi Jewish Community in Pre-World War I Jerusalem: Debates in the Hebrew Press,” Jerusalem Quarterly File 14 (2001), 24–34 . Jacobson, inter alia, examines the relations that Sephardi Jews wished to establish with Palestine’s Arabs and their loyalty to the Ottoman empire; see also Matthias B. Lehmann, “Rethinking Sephardi Identity: Jews and Other Jews in Ottoman Palestine,” Jewish Social Studies (New Series) 15/1 (2008), 81–109; Louis Fishman, “The Limitations of Citadinité in Late Ottoman Jerusalem,” in Ordinary Jerusalem 1840–1940: Opening New Archives, Revisiting a Global City, ed. Angelos Dalachanis and Vincent Lemire, Open Jerusalem, 1 (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 510–529.

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Ashkenazim, who were considered subjects of the monarchs of their European homelands. The origins of what is commonly known as the Old Yishuv go back to the early eighteenth century. At the time, small groups of ultra-Orthodox Ashkenazi Jews left their homelands to fulfill the biblical tenet of leading a virtuous life in the Land of Israel. Large groups came from regions belonging to Russia, Poland, Romania, the Habsburg realms and, in small measure, from the German kingdoms in the 1830s, when Muhammad Ali opened the gates of Jerusalem to Europeans. In the early 1880s, if not earlier, immigration rendered the Jewish community the largest in Jerusalem and Ashkenazi outnumbered the Sephardi and Oriental Jews.93 Orthodox Jews who joined the Old Yishuv sought to remove themselves from what they saw as the impurities of the society around them in their original homelands; they comprised two ideological branches—the Perushim and the Hasidim. The Perushim (“the Separated”) were disciples of Rabbi Eliyahu Ben Shlomo Zalman Kramer (1720–1797), better known as the Vilna Gaon. Because of their opposition to Hasidic Jews, they were also known as Misnagdim (“Opponents”). They settled mainly in Safed to avoid an outstanding debt from the eighteenth century to Jerusalem authorities. However, after the earthquake that devastated Safed in 1837, they began to move to Jerusalem, where many of them became Austrian protégés. The Hasidic immigration of the late eighteenth century and the Perushim of the early nineteenth century were ideologically motivated. Both came from Eastern Europe; however, while the Perushim remained bound to their communities in Vilna, the Hasidim who arrived after the first decades of immigration belonged mostly to centers in Vohlin (Volhynia), Podolia, and Galicia under the Austrian Empire, and later also Novorossiya (New Russia, now part of Ukraine), Bessarabia, and Romania.94 While making some necessary adaptations, the Ashkenazi communities maintained the patterns of organization, ways of life, language, and customs that they brought from their countries of origin, kept close relationships with their mother communities and followed the rules of their rabbis, who also presided over the Jerusalemite kolelim. In the words of Israel Bartal and Haim Goren, they were a sort of remote branches of

93 Halper (“On the Way,” 14–19) notes a majority of Jews already in the 1840s (p. 15)—albeit the data is unprovable; Yehoshua Ben-Arieh (“The Growth of Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century,” Annals of the Association of American Geographers 65/2 [1975]: 252–269 [262, table 1]) sets the turning point in the 1850s, with a clear majority of Jews in 1860. 94 On these immigrations, see Israel Bartal, “The Immigration and Structure of the Ashkenazi Yishuv, 1777–1881,” Cathedra 16 (1980), 3–12 (esp. 3–10) (Hebrew).

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these communities95 who made no effort to adapt to the local Ottoman, Arab, or Sephardi lifestyles.96 In 1830, Jerusalem Galician Jews broke away from the Perushim community and were organized in the Kolel Hibas Yerushalayim (“Love of Jerusalem”), that initially included the entire Jewry of the Austrian Empire.97 Since the 1850s, both ideological branches further divided themselves, mostly according to their origins in Central and Eastern Europe.98 Unlike the fragmentation of Jews in the Diaspora, which was related to religious rituals and socio-cultural issues—as in the case of the split between Perushim and Hasidic Jews at the beginning of the nineteenth century, and between Neologs and traditional Orthodox Jews in Hungary in 187199—the fragmentation of Old Yishuv Jews into kolelim was guided primarily

95 Israel Bartal and Haim Goren (eds.), “Introduction,” in The History of Jerusalem: The Late Ottoman Period, 1800–1917 (Jerusalem: Yad Itzhak Ben Zvi, 2010), vii–x (Hebrew). For poetical remembrances and narratives on the Old Yishuv, see Haim Be’er, “Praises of the Old Yishuv,” in This is the Place – People, Places and Stories of Jerusalem (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 2017), 59–69 (Hebrew). 96 Mordechai Eliav, Eretz-Israel and Its Yishuv in the Nineteenth Century, 1777–1917 (Jerusalem: Keter, 1978), 156–161 (Hebrew). Wallach (“Rethinking the Yishuv,” 279–280), quoting the Jerusalemite periodical Hamagid, 7 July 1880, remarks that Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews differed in ethnic origins, culture, customs, and even in the perceptions of their life in Jerusalem. Whereas Ashkenazi or North African congregations saw themselves in relation to their communities of origin, the Sephardi communities had a strong sense of local Ottoman identity. Only in the 1870s did more open-minded circles from the Old Yishuv establish some interaction with the Sephardi community and look positively upon Ottomanism. See also Halper, “On the Way,” 15, 18–19. 97 It was established by Jews from Galicia Poland, then part of the Austrian Empire, and was also known as the Rabbi Meyer Baal Ha’nes Charity. See Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation: The Ashkenazi Old Yishuv, 1900–1917 (Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 2001), 3 (Hebrew). 98 The first group to leave the Kolel Perushim comprised Jews originally from Germany and Holland, who organized into a kolel in 1830. The first Hasidic kolel was Kolel Wohlin, established in 1841, from which a kolel of immigrants from Austria and Galicia was created around 1851; this kolel rejoined the Kolel Wohlin in 1854 but left it again in 1858; see Yehoshua Ben-Arieh, A City Reflected in Its Times: Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century – The Old City (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1977), 333–335 (Hebrew). 99 The division in Hungary was influenced by the fragmentation between Reform and Orthodox Jewry in Germany; see Michael K. Silber, “The Historical Experience of German Jewry and Its Impact on Haskalah and Reform in Hungary,” in Toward Modernity: The European Jewish Model, ed. Jacob Katz (New Brunswick and Oxford: Transaction, 1987), 107–157; Keren-Kratz, “Politics of Jewish Orthodoxy.” One of the leading Orthodox rabbis of European Jewry at the time was Moshe Sofer/Schreiber (1762–1839), known as Chasam Sofer (Hebrew, Chatam Sofer), which means “the Seal of the Scribe”—an acronym for “original Torah insights by Moshe,” in honor of his main work. Chasam Sofer founded a yeshiva (an Orthodox institution that focuses on the study of traditional religious texts) in Pressburg, Hungary, which was considered the “Mother of Hungarian Yeshivot.” Chasam Sofer, rabbi of Pressburg, justified his fierce opposition to the Reform movement promoted by German liberals by stating the inviolability of age-old tradition even in its min-

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by economic interests, which were expected to increase the motivation of their brethren there to send alms. Nevertheless, the kolelim did not relinquish other potential sources of beneficence. Consequently, two opposing systems of external support developed: one, the traditional collection of money for the Old Yishuv communities as a whole, and the other, according to the original homeland or, specifically, according to the spiritual leaders of a particular region, town, or yeshiva.100 In 1850, Kolel Warsaw was formed out of the Kolel Perushim, which included both Perushim and Hasidim. Eight years later, the Hungarian kolel was created out of Perushim; it was called Kolel Shomrei Ha’homos (Guardians of the Walls), in celebration of the great piety and strict religious orthodoxy of its members, as well as their care for the continuity of a Jewish community in the Holy City.101 A historic epistle to the Jews of Pest, explaining the necessity to create this kolel despite the opposition of Old Yishuv rabbis, is illuminating. It was sent on the 24th of the month Tammuz, 1862, notifying them that a special kolel had been founded for Hungarian immigrants, so that they would no longer be scattered throughout the Jerusalem kolelim. The senders detail the manner in which donations would be collected and allude to expected difficulties “to distance all those agitators whose utest and seemingly most trivial forms (“the new is forbidden by the Torah.”) The “Sofers” became a dynasty of learned rabbis. Chasam Sofer’s son, Avraham Shmuel Binyamin Sofer/Schreiber, known by his main work, Ksav/Ktav Sofer (Writ of the Scribe), became head of the Hungarian kolel in Jerusalem. See also https://yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Orthodoxy; and below. On the heterogenous nature and fragmentation of the Ashkenazi community in the Old Yishuv, see Wallach (“Rethinking the Yishuv,” esp. 279, 285–289), who examines this process following the organization of its members in kolelim by their European homelands, and notes that even after the 1908 Young Turks Revolution, and although Jewish intellectuals promoted the idea of Jews as a unified national group in Palestine, in practice Jewish communities remained splintered. A collective leadership of all Jewish communities in Palestine was not established before the British Mandate period. See Israel Bartal, “The ‘Old’ and the ‘New’ Yishuv – Image and Reality,” Cathedra 2 (1976), 3–19 (Hebrew). 100 Around 1860, there were nineteen kolelim, including the Galician or Love of Jerusalem Kolel (Hibat Jerusalem), Kolel Reisin, most of whose members came from Belorussia, the kolel of the Hungarians, Kolel Volhyn, and the Georgian kolel. Around 1900, there were about thirty kolelim. See Kark and Glass, “Jews in Eretz‐Israel/Palestine,” 86; Yochai Ben-Ghedalia, “European Jewish Philanthropy in Jerusalem during the Crimean War,” doctoral dissertation (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2013), esp. 31–38 (Hebrew). 101 Ben-Arieh, City Reflected in Its Times, esp. 333–335. Other authors give a date in 1856 and 1863. The splintering into additional kolelim increased in the 1870s. A main leader of the Jerusalemite Perushim and later chief rabbi of Jerusalem (1864–1909) was Rabbi Shmuel Salant, who in 1860 founded the Rabbi Meir Baal Ha’nes Charity to provide for all of Israel’s poor and impoverished, Sefardi and Ashkenazi alike. As we shall see, he signed most of the gifts from the AustroHungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel.

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hearts want to interfere,” which is what indeed happened in the fierce contests between the kolelim. The epistle is signed by seven elders of the city, prominent disciples of the Chasam Sofer.102 The kolel included immigrants from Austria, Hungary, Moravia, and Bohemia in Jerusalem, Safed, and Tiberias. This kolel had become the best-organized and more affluent one, and it was also the first to establish its own quarter in Jerusalem, Batei Ungarin (“the Houses of the Hungarians”), which was built in 1891 with the assistance of the Austrian Consul. It was located nearby the Orthodox quarter of Mea Shearim, outside the city walls—a neighborhood sought only by extremely Orthodox Jews.103 Besides being a healthier and less crowded environment, the dwellers of Batei Ungarin enjoyed the legal support of the Austrian Consulate, a status that considerably improved the quality of life of its residents, among others by discouraging Arab violence. Old Yishuv Jews cultivated an ideal self-image as observers of religious commandments and traditions, as a community that lived a life of sacrifice devoted exclusively to study the Bible, Jewish ethics, and later rabbinic literature as well as ritual and cultic practices. In their self-perception, theirs was a life of religious and heavenly rapture as well as material suffering in spiritual and earthly tension. This pious life, which included the preservation of the holy places, would be a source of blessing not just for the sake of the Old Yishuv, but also for that of their brethren. What is more, the blessing would also reach the monarchs of their original homelands who granted them legal protection. In all these respects, the Old Yishuv considered itself an elite group, deserving of the alms sent by the Diaspora for their subsistence. In effect, the Old Yishuv presented its relationship with the Diaspora as one of mutual dependency. This principle was formulated in the late seventeenth century,104 taking much further the precept delineated in the Bible (Deuteronomy 15:1–11) that commands every Jew to “open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land”—the Land of Israel. As an established religious precept in the Jewish community since the times of the Mishnah and the Talmud,105 money from the Diaspora became a main source of sup-

102 Rabbi Shimon Deutsch, his son-in-law Rabbi Moshe Nachum Wallenstein, Rabbi Yitzchak Prag-Prager, Rabbi Yonah Leib Mendelsohn, Rabbi Shmaya Yosef Gintzler, and two others: – Public auction 106, Item 51, March 6, 2018. I am indebted to Shalom Sabar for this information. 103 Aharon Yaffe, “The Exit from the Old City of the Kolel Shomrei Ha’chomot,” Uma 51/191 (2013), 129–133 (Hebrew); Ben Arieh, “Growth of Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century,” 266–267. 104 Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation 3–4. 105 The Mishnah was compiled in the early third century CE and is the first written collection of Jewish oral traditions from the Second Temple period; it was followed by the addition and com-

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port for the Orthodox Jews from Europe who settled in Palestine since the early eigthteenth century. Old Yishuv Jews considered alms and donations as a just return for their endeavor, in the spirit of a famous saying: “Where there is no bread there is no Torah; where there is no Torah, there is no bread” (Mishnah, Avot 3:17). Because of its early date, 1854, only two years after the official recognition of the Jewish community in Vienna and close to the very beginning of the Old Yishuv tradition of presenting gifts to Franz Joseph—an official epistle presented to the emperor by the Perushim in Jerusalem is of great importance: a petition to him to appoint the Viennese Jew Ignaz Deutsch as collector and administrator of alms from Jews in the Austrian Empire.106 This document sheds light on how the gifts offered to Franz Joseph dealt with the intricate balance between imperial expectations and their own. Firstly, in a historical context, the petition documents the requirement by law to obtain the authorization of the monarch to collect the indispensable alms for the subsistence of the Orthodox Jewish communities in Jerusalem and the three other holy cities in the Land of Israel—Safed, Tiberias, and Hebron. Secondly, the signature of the Austrian Consul in Jerusalem, Count Joseph von Pizzamano, who authenticated the document, points to the importance accorded to this plea and to the consul’s support of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects; Pizzamano was instrumental in obtaining the official authorization essential to address the emperor. Thirdly, the epistle reveals the Old Yishuv’s initiative to assert its raison d’être and advance its aims. Lastly, it confirms the expectation of reciprocity in the form of legal protection from the emperor and his authorization to assist the Jewish subjects in his realms, that stood behind the gifts and other forms of homage—expectations that were carefully suggested in the laudatory texts accompanying the objects. Moreover, the text and visual design of the petition also confirm the value of the Jewish communities’ gifts as a means to enhance their identity and evoke the empathy needed for achieving the delicate, if not controversial, aims in the historical, political, and socio-cultural context of the time. Decorated by the Jerusalemite master artist Mordechai Schnitzer (?–1865), the telling iconography of the Deutsch epistle will be analyzed below.

mentaries of the Tosefta, Jerusalem (Yerushalmi) and Babylonian (Bavli) Talmuds, which were compiled and edited between the third and the sixth centuries. 106 The epistles are kept in the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, Jerusalem, catalog number AU-90-1. Ignaz Deutsch (1808–1881) was the Kaiser’s moneychanger. UltraOrthodox, he supported the Jerusalem Perushim. In 1854, they appointed him “President of the Holy Land” and director of fundraising in the Habsburg empire. His appointment as collector was approved by Emperor Franz Joseph; see Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 9–10, 25–26.

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Alms and donations were essential for allowing Old Yishuv members to devote themselves to religious pursuits without having to worry about productive work. However, it was not easy to demonstrate the value of the spiritual benefits that it contended to be providing to its brethren in the diaspora vis-à-vis the material support that the kolelim expected to receive. The crisis of legitimization that shook the Old Yishuv since the second half of the nineteenth century became exacerbated toward the end of Ottoman rule in Palestine.107 According to Menachem Friedman, a main reason was the Old Yishuv’s inability to become a significant center of study, guidance, and inspiration for the Diaspora that could justify the material support;108 on the contrary, it was notorious for its financial irregularities and internal disputes. At the same time, profound changes eroded the old religious, cultural, social, and economic order in the Diaspora. One factor of change in the assistance from the Diaspora was the aggravated discrimination, persecution, and pogroms in Eastern Europe, mainly in Russia, that brought about increasing suffering and poverty to Jews, making the collection of money for the Old Yishuv even more difficult.109 Another significant factor was the initiative of well-off acculturated Jews

107 Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation, 1–48, 51–59. 108 Ibid., 3. Wallach (“Rethinking the Yishuv,” 277) notes that except for sixteenth-century Safed, Ottoman Palestine was not an important center of Jewish learning and thought, and the small communities were dependent on Jews abroad in terms of material support and spiritual guidance. The same conclusion may be drawn from Bartal and Goren, “Introduction,” vii–x. 109 Pogroms in Galicia in the summer of 1898 and the unrest in Bohemia the following year, during the Hilsner ritual-murder false accusations. See Heinz-Dietrich Löwe, “Pogroms in Russia: Explanations, Comparisons, Suggestions,” Jewish Social Studies 11/1 (2004), 16–23, esp. 18–20, 22– 23; Nemes, “Hungary’s Antisemitic Provinces,” 20–44; Yaroslav Hrytsak, “The Jewish Question in Austrian Galicia: Assimilation, Anti-Semitism, and Attempts at Coexistence,” Ukrainian Jewish Encounter (24 January, 2019), noting that “despite the tensions in the relationship between Jews, Poles, and Ruthenians (at certain moments it could be defined as mutual hatred), which persisted until the First World War, they never spilled out in large-scale pogroms, as they did in the neighboring lands of the Russian Empire and the Hungarian part of the Habsburg monarchy.” See also Irena Grosfeld, Seyhun Orcan Sakalli, and Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, “Middleman Minorities and Ethnic Violence: Anti-Jewish Pogroms in the Russian Empire,” The Review of Economic Studies 87/1 (2020), esp. 290–294, note 2. Quoting various researchers, the authors note the combination of economic and political crises that led to violence against Jews, in particular violence against Jewish moneylenders. Thus, violence against Jewish creditors in Germany, Austria, and French Alsace was brought about by political turmoil arising from the 1848 revolutions in combination with the harvest failures of 1845 and 1846; the first wave of pogroms in the Russian empire, in 1881, would have been brought by the accession of an unknown tsar after the assassination of Alexander II, the “Tsar liberator,” and crop failures in 1881 and 1882; the authors explain the second wave of pogroms in Russia as the result of a poor harvest in 1902–1903 and worsening political conditions.

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to create a positive public image that would counter the antisemitic discourse on ethnic characteristics and practices of everyday life; this image was essential for achieving the freedom to practice all professions and trades, as officially proclaimed by law in 1867, and their integration into the general society as loyal and worthy subjects, who contributed greatly to its prosperity while also preserving their ancient heritage and recognizing their religious duties toward their needy brethren. Growing circles saw no conflict between religion and integration into modern dominant societies and culture, interpreting the saying “Where there is no bread there is no Torah; where there is no Torah, there is no bread” (Mishnah Avot 3:17) in an opposite sense—not as mutually exclusive, but as two inextricably intertwined concepts, i.e., that a person should engage in a profession to financially sustain himself while also fulfilling his religious aspiration to study Torah.110 The Orthodox idea of the kolel members to provide the spiritual values and rewards to their European brethren, while the latter support all their needs, became perceived as an unbalanced, unjustified, and even damaging relationship. Consequently, from the mid-nineteenth century, considerable assistance arrived to the Old Yishuv via the foundation of humanitarian institutions such as hospitals and hospices to assist the sick and needy, vocational schools that provided general education and skills, in addition to aid in religious matters; moreover, Jewish philanthropists assisted in the establishment of small industries and workshops, Hebrew printing presses and periodicals. All these would allow Old Yishuv members to become self-sufficient instead of being dependent on alms.111 Another important field of philanthrophy was the building of new neighborhoods outside the walls of the Old City. These changes in Jewish assistance meant concern for the future of the Old Yishuv; they were welcomed by liberal circles that since the 1870s overtly criticized the custom of living off donations and opted for self-sustainment.112 The new institutions played the roles of cause and effect at the same time, becoming the source of heated polemics between more openminded circles and the strictly Orthodox communities that strongly opposed them. Leading Orthodox figures feared that any change would diminish their influence on the Old Yishuv population; therefore they mistrusted hospitals and

110 Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation, 7. 111 Wallach (“Rethinking the Yishuv,” 285–287) notes that in the second half of the nineteenth century, new kinds of Jewish diaspora organizations emerged with a clear modernizing mission, and established philanthropic institutions that transcended ethnic boundaries, such as the French organization Alliance Israélite Universelle and the Austrian-German Ezra Foundation that operated global networks of modern educational institutions; Halper, “On the Way,” 18–19; see also below. 112 See discussion below, esp. chap. 6.3, on Jewish philanthropy.

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other charitable institutions that could improve living conditions, as well as schools that combined religious studies with training in various crafts. In view of the fact that the establishment of these institutions required the diplomatic support of Austria, conservative Orthodox circles requested the intervention of the Austrian Consulate to oppose the initiatives of liberal circles and even asked the consul to deliver to Franz Joseph their petitions to forbid such initiatives.113 In many cases, the Austrian Consulate was hard pressed to intervene and present its recommendations to authorities in Vienna in favor of one of the contending parties. Neither side would succumb. On one side of this problematic issue were the donors, who opposed the strictly Orthodox collectives. As will be illustrated below, in the discussion of gifts from Jewish philanthropic foundations in Jerusalem, these institutions promoted the construction of a positive image in the context of the donors’ relationship with the Austro-Hungarian monarch. Franz Joseph appreciated donations to projects that advanced national interests and had a real and easily perceived presence in the landscape: they expressed the loyalty of his subjects and promoted his image as a benefactor of all his peoples. In effect, the Jewish philanthropic institutions in Jerusalem would doubly enhance the monarch’s prestige: in light of the importance of the city in the European contest for hegemony in Europe, Jewish philanthropists in Austria, Germany, France, and England even competed amongst themselves in their initiatives to establish such institutions and funds for their brethren, using their humanitarian acts to boost the esteem for the monarch in whose kingdom they lived. These institutions also enhanced the donors’ own prestige as centers of power—a most meaningful reason for the importance of this practice. The monarch was subsequently acknowledged for his acceptance of the dedication of such foundations by all the beneficiaries in various ways, including through the presentation of decorated epistles and other objects. On the other side of this ideological conflict were the Old Yishuv ultra-Orthodox leaders, who were no longer an absolute authority: contrary to what was thought earlier, the Old Yishuv was far from being a homogeneous society and there were different opinions on central issues within its collectives. Tensions and even hostility arose between the strictly conservative nucleus of the Old Yishuv and the emerging culture that appealed to more open-minded members, which was closer to the ideology of the emancipated Jewish Diaspora that called for ac-

113 Israel Bartal, “A Center in the Margins: Changing Jewish Attitudes toward Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century,” in The History of Jerusalem: The Late Ottoman Period, 1800–1917, ed. Israel Bartal and Haim Goren (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2010), 67–69 (Hebrew).

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quiring a general education and engaging in productive occupations, in addition to religious studies. Indeed, some key members of the Old Yishuv deeply and earnestly identified themselves with the historical past of the Land of Israel and the biblical national experience, and wished to revive it in accordance with modern life; they became involved in the establishment of workshops and small industries, and took to settle and work the land.114 The gifts examined below offer new evidence from a new perspective to this heterogeneity and the construction of new ideologies, practices, and identities.

Austrian Political Interests and the Old Yishuv The relationship between Franz Joseph’s Court and the Old Yishuv was part of a perspective that incorporated both the domestic and foreign political interests of the Austrian Empire. The latter affairs should be seen in the context of a new stake in the Orient, and political and cultural colonialism. The rivalry for a strong presence and influence in the Holy City was part of this contest, and in this context Western patronage and legal protection of religious minorities unentitled to apply for Ottoman citizenship became an important political arena.115 Although in the early 1880s the Ottoman government prohibited Jewish immigration to Palestine, allowing Jewish pilgrims and visitors only a short stay, most Jews wishing to immigrate found a way to settle in the land, benefiting from their rights to free entry as foreign nationals and from the active support they received from their consuls. The consuls not only insisted on the full application of the capitulations as a matter of principle, but were naturally interested in increasing the number of their own nationals in the region. The Russian court’s implementation of new discriminatory policies against the Jewish population in the mid-nineteenth century, including Jews who settled in Jerusalem, opened an opportunity for Britain, Prussia, and Austria to fill this void. Many, if not most Russian Jews

114 Halper (“On the Way,” 18–19) remarks that since the 1870s, many of the young generation members began to aspire to a higher standard of living and to look upon haluka not as a support for religious endeavors, but as an embarrassing charity. In their efforts to establish educational and vocational institutions, businesses, workshops, self-help associations, and neighborhoods, they won the support of many European Jewish philanthropists, who also sought to help the local Jewish community by making it self-sufficient rather than by simply giving alms. Michael K. Silber (“Alliance of the Hebrews, 1863–1875: The Diaspora Roots of an Ultra-Orthodox Proto-Zionist Utopia in Palestine,” Journal of Israeli History 27/2 [2008]: 119–147 esp. 120–129) calls attention to Rabbi Akiva Yosef Schlesinger, who first wrote down his ideas in the 1860s; he tirelessly called to combine religious studies with work, and was involved in the establishment of agricultural settlements despite the harsh opposition of Orthodox institutions and menaces to ban him. 115 Kushner, “ District of Jerusalem,” 85, 90–92; Isaiah Friedman, “Lord Palmerston,” 25.

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who found themselves with no legal protection from the Tsardom, applied to become Austrian protégés.116 Their choice was due to the benevolent attitude of Franz Joseph to the Jewish community and, not the least important, to the fact that in contrast to the activities of the British Consulate and agencies of other European powers, the Austrian Consulate was not involved in missionary work. Austrian Vice-Consul Joseph von Pizzamano (1849–1852, and consul 1852–1860) recommended to higher ranks in Constantinople and Vienna to accept the request of East-European Jews for legal protection lest they ask Britain for such assistance, a step that would strengthen the leverage of that kingdom in the Holy City and would also increase Protestant influence.117 Following Pizzamano’s success in extending Austrian legal protection to a large number of non-Habsburg Jews, the Austrian Empire numbered between 1500 and 1800 subjects and protégés in the mid-nineteenth century, about 5000 at the end of the century, and 9000 at the time the war broke out.118 Political reasons also stood behind Franz Joseph’s visit to the Holy City en route to the inauguration of the Suez Canal. For political reasons, too, his visit to Jerusalem included a tour of the Jewish Quarter and its main synagogues, the Lämel School, the Rothschild Hospital, and other institutions related to AustriaHungary. At all these sites, the emperor-king came into contact with local Jews, many of whom were his subjects. Franz Joseph’s visits and interaction with local communities were of high priority; naturally, first and foremost on his agenda were Christian sites and Christian dignitaries, yet he did not forgo visiting also the Muslim holy places, and listening to accounts on the various peoples. This gesture of good-will and his affable attitude gave birth to a veritable myth in the Old Yishuv, which finds expression in the epistles and dedications of gifts presented to

116 See Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 8–9, 25–27. Also Isaiah Friedman, “Lord Palmerston,” 38–39, for British considerations. 117 Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 7–8. 118 Mordechai Eliav, Österreich und das Heilige Land. Ausgewählte Konsulatsdokumente aus Jerusalem 1849–1917 (Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2000), 33, 53–62, 144–146; Robert-Tarek Fischer, “Die einzige Kolonie,” 112. See also different data in Isaiah Friedman, “Lord Palmerston,” 38–39; Nikolaus Vielmetti, “Das Wirken des österreichisch-ungarischen Konsulats in Jerusalem zugunsten der jüdischen Bewohner,” in Mit Szepter und Pilgerstab: österreichische Präsenz im Heiligen Land seit den Tagen Kaiser Franz Josephs, ed. Bernhard A. Böhler, Erzbischöfliches Dom- und Diözesanmuseum Wien, 5.Juli bis 2.September 2000 (Vienna: Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag, 2000), 41–53. In 1890, the Russian government reversed its policy, claiming the right to protect their own Jewish subjects in Palestine. However, the continued hostility and pogroms in Russia weighed more in the Jews’ reasoning. See also Mark Tennenbaum, “The British Consulate in Jerusalem 1858–1890,” Cathedra 5 (1977), 83–108, esp. 102–108 (Hebrew).

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him, as well as in local anecdotes. Various accounts tell of the emperor’s appreciation for his Jerusalemite Jewish subjects because of their loyalty and the honors they bestowed upon him, as well as of the monarch’s promises to protect them forever.119 An examination of documents from the Austrian, British, and German consulates in Jerusalem, as well as of local chronicles, reveals that of all the European royalty who visited the city, Franz Joseph was especially appreciated. As a whole, the Austrian Consulate dealt with myriad problems that troubled Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects and in one way or another also benefited the empire. One such important field was the presentation of requests to the Ottoman authorities to allow the renovation of buildings and the more difficult objective —to build new ones or acquire a piece of land. Skillfully, Pizzamano obtained permits to reconstruct the Hurva Synagogue and to build a new one, Tiferet Israel; he succeeded in saving the Jews living in Hebron from Sheikh Abd al-Rahman in 1852, and he assisted Austrian Jewish philanthropists in the difficult process of establishing humanitarian institutions in Jerusalem.120 The consulate also extended diplomatic protection to Habsburg subjects and protégés and to their institutions, and played an active role in the collection and distribution of alms from Jewish communities in the empire, which were essential to alleviate hardships in the local Orthodox communities.121 The epistle sent in 1854 by the Perushim to Franz Joseph, with the assistance of Consul Pizzamano, asking the emperor to authorize the nomination of Ignaz Deutsch as alms collector, documents this policy.122 Emissaries of the Jewish communities in the Austrian lands brought the monies to the consul in Jerusalem, who supervised their distribution together with delegates from the local kolelim. Naturally, preference was given to communities and projects that advanced Austrian interests.123 Documents in the consulate’s archives disclose a complex relationship between the Habsburg Court and the Old Yishuv. Other consuls were less sympathetic than Count Pizzamano, limiting or opposing assistance, or helping the Jews

119 Moshe David Gros, “Kaiser Franz Joseph and His Attitude toward the Jews,” Lefi Sha‘a: Kovetz Ara‘i Le’inyanei Hasha‘a (= Current Matters) 8 (1916), 5 (Hebrew). 120 Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 89–92. 121 Idem, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, esp. 17–18, 24–25, 28, 30, 33–38, 42–44. 122 Nonetheless, Jewish immigrants who traveled to the Holy Land as pilgrims often carried illegal money for the kolelim; see Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 8–9. In Galicia and Bukovina, the money was gathered in Lemberg (Lviv) and sent directly to Beirut. From there it was transferred to the consulate in Jerusalem and distributed to the Hasidic Jews (Kolel Vohlin), headed at the time by Israel (Abrahmovitz) Beck (1797–1874) and his son Nissan (1815– 1889)—two influential figures in the Jerusalem Old Yishuv. The iconography of the Deutsch epistle will be examined below, esp. 108–111. 123 Ibid.

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of the Old Yishuv while strongly and overtly criticizing their way of life. For example, writing to the authorities in Vienna, Consul Bernhard Count Caboga-Cerva (1867–1882) expressed a common unflattering opinion: Most of this people came and come here with no money, some of them sincerely motivated by religious belief but also, in no small measure, so as not to work in their homeland; they prefer to live here reciting prayers in return for haluka money that, thanks to the generous donations of their brethren in Europe and various Jewish funds there, all Jews, even the well-off, can receive. These Jews do not serve in the army, do not pay taxes, and do not contribute in any way to the prosperity and prestige of their homeland. On the contrary, they constantly trouble the consulate with complaints and suspicious business activities that give much to think about.124

With the entry of the Ottoman empire into the Great War, the harsh conditions of living in Jerusalem—hunger, disease, epidemics, and a high death rate—required new solutions to alleviate the suffering, which was especially intense in the Old Yishuv. Donations from the original homelands shrank due to the difficult conditions in Europe and to difficulties imposed by the local Ottoman government. The Jewish communities of Jerusalem tried to organize self-support, but were soon in need of outside help. As in the monarchy, Jewish Habsburg subjects living in Jerusalem could only hope that Karl would keep Franz Joseph’s promise to assist them. The Austrian Consulate, especially under Consul Friedrich Kraus, did its best, yet its means were limited.125 Help arrived mainly from the American Jewish community that nurtured close ties with the alliance of Zionist circles and the Sephardi elite in the city.126 Processes of identity transformation in Jewish Jerusalem during the war were not just a reaction to changing conditions, but active attempts by elite circles to redefine ideologies and social boundaries.127

124 Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 97, 99, memorandum Jerusalem I/61. The distribution of alms and the establishment of progressive institutions were a main reason for the disputes between the Hungarian and the Galician kolelim, and between the Ultra-Orthodox and more moderate Jews, which the consulate was asked by all sides to solve. 125 His efforts will be reviewed below, pp. 170–172. 126 Jacobson (“A City Living Through Crisis,” 75, 80, 91) argues that throughout the war the Zionist movement, which was not firmly established in Jerusalem at that time, gained power and support in the Jewish community, a process that paved the way for its central and influential role in future political developments in Palestine. 127 Anat Kidron, “Constructing the Boundaries of Social Consciousness under Conditions of War: The Urban Jewish Society in Eretz Yisrael/Palestine during World War I,” Journal of Levantine Studies 7/1 (2017), 9–34 and 7/2 (2017), 33–56.

2 Giving and Giving in Return “I hope my Jewish subjects will always remember me.”128

An important local chronicler, the Jerusalem-born linguist and journalist Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin (1885–1964), wrote in 1916/17 about a moving event that took place on 12 November, 1869, on the eve of Franz Joseph’s departure from Jerusalem, which he visited as a pilgrim en route to the inauguration of the Suez Canal.129 The Old Yishuv presented a magnificent bowl, delicately carved in a local stone some years earlier by the prestigious master artist Mordechai Schnitzer, as a parting gift to the emperor-king. A dedicatory inscription was added to the bowl, and it was set in a beautiful olivewood box with mother-of-pearl and black wooden inlays, made by the well-known craftsman Yaakov Dov Jacob.130 Its whereabouts are unknown. The naive account tells us that on that evening, a delegation from the Old Yishuv, led by Rabbi Nissan Beck,131 reached the Austro-Hungarian Hospice where the emperor was staying132 and asked to present him with the precious memento. Yellin notes that the representatives of the Old Yishuv, unaware of the monarch’s tight schedule, came to the hospice time and again and only at the last moment succeeded in meeting him. The event was made possible by the Austrian consul who, upon seeing the beautiful object, contacted Franz Joseph’s adjutant and, consequently, the high ministers Count Friedrich Ferdinand von Beust and Count Gyula Andrássy graciously agreed to receive the delegation. At the meeting, Count Ferdi-

128 Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” Lefi Sha‘a: Kovetz Ara‘i Le’inyanei Hasha‘a 8 (1916), 8–17 (Hebrew); idem, Avoteinu: Pirkei Historia ve’Havai (Jerusalem: Mosad ha’Rav Kook, 1966), 111–112 (Hebrew). 129 On Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem, see Böhler, “Kaiser Franz Joseph im Heiligen Land,” 179–184; Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 90–99; and below, chap. 9. 130 The information on Yaakov Dov Jacob comes from his family and is also brought by Be’er, “Self-made King of Art, Mordechai the Carver Schnitzer,” in This Is the Place – People, Places and Stories of Jerusalem (Tel-Aviv: Am Oved, 2017), 83 (Hebrew). 131 Nissan Beck was the son of Rabbi Israel Beck from the Sadigura Hasidic dynasty in Bukovina, at the time a crownland of the Austrian Empire. In the early 1840s, the father and son established the first Hasidic community in Jerusalem. They were instrumental in the foundation of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue and other institutions in Jerusalem, and they figure in many narratives on the emperor-king and the Old Yishuv. See further discussion below. 132 The hospice was founded in 1857 and opened in 1863. On its building, see Dagmar Redl, “Das österreichische Hospiz in Jerusalem. Ein “Kunstexport” des Historismus,” in Mit Szepter und Pilgerstab: österreichische Präsenz im Heiligen Land seit den Tagen Kaiser Franz Josephs, ed. Bernhard A. Böhler, Erzbischöfliches Dom- und Diözesanmuseum Wien, 5.Juli bis 2.September 2000 (Vienna: Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag, 2000), 89–127; Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, chap. 2, referring also to its political significance. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-003

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nand held the bowl in his hands, examined it in admiration, and jovially exclaimed: “But you know that His Majesty cannot take presents!” Not taken aback, Rabbi Beck replied: “Yes, Your Highness, but what is all this about? This would be true if I had given him gold and silver and precious stones as a gift, but this is just a stone, a stone from the Holy Land which means so much to His Majesty that he made a great effort and incurred many expenses to come and see!” The impressed personages applauded, and the Count asked Beck whether he would like to come again in the evening or leave the gift for him to present to the monarch. The rabbi did not hesitate and answered immediately that he would return. However, because Franz Joseph arrived very late from a trip, once again he could not receive him, and Beck was invited to return the next morning. Mindful of the importance of his mission, the rabbi arrived a third time. Deeply moved and with tear-filled eyes, Franz Joseph received the precious bowl and thanked Beck and the representatives of the Old Yishuv for the honor and attention that the community showered upon him. Moreover, acknowledging his need to be recognized as an ideal king justly demanding loyalty, he expressed a wish: “I hope my Jewish subjects will always remember me.”133 This local anecdote is the ultimate evidence of the meaning and importance of offering gifts in the process of constructing identities.

2.1 Why Do We Give Gifts and to Whom Do We Give Them? Choosing or creating a gift that may please the recipient requires gift-givers to engage in an imaginative process of empathizing with the recipients and their preferences while also conveying their own identity. The well-wisher who presents a gift expects to make a favorable impression that will be retained in the recipient’s memory and reciprocated with recognition and goodwill. Therefore gifts, considered as cultural texts, provide insight into the values, ideologies, and social norms of those involved and the socio-political structure of their milieu. The offering and exchange of gifts seem to be a fundamental aspect of societies. Gifts as expressions of generosity, gratitude, and obligation in Western cul-

133 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 16–17. The late Nurit Govrin remarked that Yellin interviewed and collected memories of witnesses to the emperor’s visit and consulted their memoirs; see her “Mourning in Jerusalem,” 126. Indeed, apart from much “scent and color,” Yellin notes names and dates. We should note that, according to Yellin, on that same occasion Dr. Albert Cohen presented to Franz Joseph a blessing from the Alliance Israelite Universelle, and Beck presented a petition from the Hungarian Orthodox Jews to reject the policies of the Neologs—events that really happened; therefore, only the amiable conversation between Beck and the ministers may be a local story.

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ture go back to the Old Testament and have become a special vehicle of modern diplomacy. Scholars of anthropology, sociology, philosophy, ethics, and economy, to mention but a few fields of research, ask questions such as: why do we give gifts? To whom do we give them? How do we present them? The main aims behind these questions are to find out: how does the recipient receive and interpret the gift? Is it possible to give without some implicit expectation of reward? And, referring to the seminal work by Marcel Mauss on gift-giving, what power resides in a gift that causes its recipient to return the gesture?134 In our context, we ask what role gift-giving played in the positioning of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. There are several different and contradictory opinions on the nature of gifts and the motives for gift-giving, ranging from narrow interests to sincerity and spontaneity. Spontaneity would oppose gifts revolving around economic and political interests, which are based on calculated recompense. Marcel Mauss’s widely accepted argument notes that a gift creates commitment and a moral bond.135 In essence, adds Mary Douglas, “a gift that does nothing to enhance solidarity is a contradiction.”136 Mauss perceives the gift as a common core of social practice in all known cultures, a relational and universal principle of exchange leading to the peaceful association of human beings through mutual obligations to give, receive, and give in return.137 Gifts may seem to be voluntary and are presented as such, yet, in reality, both the giving and the reciprocity are required. It may be posed that gifts act as bonds in a chain of human relations, be it among private persons as an expression of commitment and affection, or in the context of secular and religious power. Christian Papilloud summarizes Mauss’s position and affirms that the exchange of gifts does not lead to an accumulation of material resources or profits, but to obligations and further exchanges with additional parties; gifts are not part of commer-

134 Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies (London: Routledge, 2002), 4. The following discussion does not pretend to cover the many theories and interpretations of gift-giving; it focuses on the most relevant to my topic. 135 Ibid. 136 Mary Douglas, “Foreword: No Free Gifts,” in Marcel Mauss, The Gift: The Form and Reason for Exchange in Archaic Societies (London: Routledge, 2002), x. 137 Christian Papilloud, “Marcel Mauss, the Gift and Relational Sociology,” in The Palgrave Handbook of Relational Sociology, ed. François Dépelteau (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), 664. Papilloud reinforces Mauss’s opinion, that the recipient poses a challenge to the gift-giver, who must give in such a way that his gift can be accepted by the recipient, and, in turn, the gift-giver poses a challenge to the recipient, who must consider what, how, and when the present should be returned, as well as the kind of object or service to add to it (pp. 665–666). On the acceptance of Mauss’s theory, including critique of his basic arguments, see ibid., 667–673.

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cial economy, nor are they entirely a donation.138 If so, gifts are an integral part in the creation of social relations and the character of those relations. Some scholars differentiate between three general categories of gifts, according to the status of the persons involved. One category refers to gifts presented to personalities such as monarchs, political, and religious leaders with the aim of sealing treaties, affirming alliances, and displaying greatness, in which case the objects are usually made of precious materials of the best craftsmanship and are more politically thought out; a second category refers to more personal and intimate gifts presented by family members and close friends; a third category comprises gifts presented by lower instances in the social hierarchy, in which case the objects may be less expensive and showy in scale but are still politically worthy and thus acceptable (and even desirable) to the recipient. It follows that gifts may also reveal the relative distance or accessibility of a sovereign to his subjects. In addition, as we shall see in the case of gifts from the Holy Land, materials can acquire symbolic, ideological, and political dimensions, each having specific ontological implications. Therefore, the meanings attributed to objects are much more than a matter of monetary value. A related and special trait of homages and gifts is their nature, which makes it difficult to assess their value in the eyes of recipients and gift-givers: some may be works with an intrinsic artistic value that would make them eternal, but others are ephemeral, made of simpler materials that have a symbolic value, or they may be performative acts. It follows that the basic act of gift-giving is a form of symbolic communication where opposite values, such as free will and obligation, generosity and self-interest, intermingle.139 Gifts may hide self-interest or may be an expression of generosity with no expectation of reciprocity; they may be the result of a sense of freedom; a social, legal, or moral requirement; a sign of gratitude, appreciation, friendship, commitment, or many other motives and intentions.140 Therefore, gifts—in our context, those presented to Franz Joseph I and to Karl I/IV by Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem—shed light not only on economic capability and artistic achievements, but most importantly, on the history, political and social structure, material culture, customs, beliefs and traditions of a society, as well as the art of diplomacy, the ruler’s personality, and the gift-giver’s identity and purposes. Gift-giving also has a competitive aspect. Giving more than one’s competitors may create greater respect. Therefore, certain gifts may enhance the prestige of

138 Ibid., 666, and 670–671 for a critique of this position. 139 Douglas, “Foreword,” and Mauss’s conclusion in The Gift, esp. 83, 86. 140 Mark Osteen, “Introduction: Questions of the Gift,” in The Question of the Gift: Essays across Disciplines, ed. Mark Osteen, Routledge Studies in Anthropology, 2 (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 1–41, esp. 1–6, 14, 18, 22–26.

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the gift-giver and serve as a means for self-promotion. Helmuth Berking notes: “to give means to acquire a power, to carry out a symbolic exchange, to initiate relationships and alliances, to attribute rights and duties, to objectify subjective meanings and to systematically classify alter egos… to knit forms of mutual recognition, to become equal and intimate.”141 Gift-giving can establish reciprocity and express social estimation;142 it is a “ritual practice through which the current value of a relationship may be communicated and maintained.”143 It shows the generosity of the gift-giver and his deserving of respect, while receiving the gift shows respect for the gift-giver, and giving in return shows one’s own honor. Mark Osteen notes that gift exchanges not only promote reciprocity but also protect hierarchies.144 Moreover, gift-giving as a social contract implies careful consideration of the moral implications of how much is given and why. Giving too much may be as offensive as giving less than expected. Furthermore, reciprocity, when considered solely as a material factor, is not always balanced and may acquire different meanings. Could it be that the gifts given to Franz Joseph were meant to literally write the Old Yishuv into the chronicles of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy and, as in the case of the story of the gift presented through Rabbi Beck, to preserve the Jewish Habsburg identity and identification with their brethren there? Another meaningful aspect of gifts, in our context, is Berking’s opinion that “they are in a sense feelings and also, temporally speaking, memories to be grasped and held because they are structurally associated with particular histories and bound up with particular individuals.”145 In this book, the examination of gifts with regard to Jewish identity follows Berking’s observation, based on Mauss, that gifts “possess a personality” because they continue to be identified with the giver or, in some cases, with the recipient. Osteen hypothesizes on this notion in primitive societies and adds that we should show some respect for the immaterial qualities of gifts—spirituality and sociality.146 Also pertinent to our discussion is Lee Anne Fennell’s remark that when choosing a suitable gift, the gift-giver tries to determine what the recipient would most want to receive from him, and, in turn, the recipient imaginatively recreates the gift-giver’s empathetic

141 Helmuth Berking, Sociology of Giving (London: Sage, 1999), viii–ix. 142 Ibid., 7–8. 143 Ibid., 4–5; and see Osteen, “Introduction,” 2. 144 Ibid., 18. 145 Berking, Sociology of Giving, 5. 146 Osteen, “Introduction,” 4; idem, “Gift or Commodity?,” in The Question of the Gift: Essays across Disciplines, ed. Mark Osteen, Routledge Studies in Anthropology, 2 (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 244.

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efforts in choosing the gift; therefore, through this sensitive dialogue, a gift can gain “sentimental value” above and beyond its market value.147 As Berking remarks, successful gifts give mutual satisfaction.148 Berking’s analysis of a gift considers four components: the object; the sequence of giving and receiving; the parties’ understanding of their acts and motives; and the rules or principles governing their behavior.149 It is said that Franz Joseph stated his hope that his Jewish subjects remember him. Such a statement would certainly suggest that he recognized the principle of mutuality in receiving the Old Yishuv’s present. The Old Yishuv communities, the gift-giver, expressed their expectations that the recipient, the emperor, would fulfill his role as benefactor and protector, a role that the monarch could reciprocate by granting recognition of his subjects’ special value and needs. In other words, it was not always necessary for the gift to be materially reciprocated: an empathic attitude or act toward the gift-giver may also be a welcome form of reciprocation. This facet of gift-giving seems to be especially significant in order to properly understand the gifts given to Franz Joseph and Karl by their Old Yishuv subjects, and from their Jewish subjects in general.

2.2 Perceptions of Gifts by Franz Joseph’s and Karl’s Courts How did the gift presented by Rabbi Beck, as other gifts to be discussed in detail, fit into the political ideology of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy? As expressions of ideologies and societal norms, the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to their emperor-kings raise essential and complex questions on the ways Franz Joseph, Karl, and their courts interpreted the presentation of gifts, and on how could the gift-givers convey their particular identity so as to be easily recognized, accepted as different but belonging, and motivate reciprocity. Franz Joseph and his court perceived gifts that he received from his subjects not only as signs of appreciation and gratitude for benefits that he granted, but, most importantly, as an acknowledgment of his status and authority by the will of God. This status was critical also to his successor, since the emperor-kings were struggling to keep their multinational empire from disintegrating. The main reasons for the unrest were ethno-national loyalties that competed more and more

147 Lee Anne Fennell, “Unpacking the Gift: Illiquid Goods and Empathetic Dialogue,” in The Question of the Gift: Essays Across Disciplines, ed. Mark Osteen, Routledge Studies in Anthropology, 2 (London and New York: Routledge, 2002), 86. 148 Berking, Sociology of Giving, 5. 149 Ibid., 4.

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with loyalty to the dynastic state, which subdued the aspirations of the diverse nations and peoples under its dominion to achieve various measures of national identity and autonomy. Emil Brix mentions competing group loyalties and group differentiations, such as social strata, profession, gender, identification with a nation, political party, and/or dynasty.150 To this we may add at least two essential criteria in the context of our topic—ethnicity and religion—age-old prejudices of the dominant societies. Often marginalized and discriminated either overtly or covertly, Jewish Habsburg subjects nevertheless felt a special need to show their loyalty to the emperor and to the specific nation where they lived—an attitude also disclosed by the gifts from the Old Yishuv. Against this background, the strategists of Franz Joseph’s court perceived the gifts and other homages as instruments in the imperial media campaign to promote the emperor-king as a symbol of pluralism in unity, supranational common purpose, and order. It was hoped that the gifts would create an ideal image of collective identity based on pride, solidarity, and loyalty to the dynasty by means of national myths constructed around the monarch: he was a unifying figure blessed by God, and the beloved sovereign of each and everyone in his vast array of subjects.151 Unowsky notes that the exact same decades that witnessed an increase in national conflicts were also marked by an outpour of public expressions of dynastic loyalty, in his words: “dynastic patriotism and national belonging were presented as mutually reinforcing rather than mutually exclusive.”152 Because of the strict formal order, the presentation of gifts expanded the scope of the event on behalf of the court. The court opted for clearly defined roles that did not express equality, but hierarchy in all respects. For the emperor, the “gifts” to his peoples were represented by acts of mercy, titles, medals, authoriza-

150 Emil Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos. Kaiser Franz Joseph I. als übernationale Integrationsfigur,” in Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, ed. Ulla Fischer-Westhauser, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien (Vienna: Brandstätter, 2007), 48, 50. 151 On the extensive use of the media to promote the emperor, in our context, see Rainer Valenta, “Vom konservativen Herrscher zum Medienstar: Jubiläen, Festzuge, Audienzen,” in Der Ewige Kaiser: Franz Joseph I. 1830–1916, ed. Hans Petschar (Vienna: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek and Amalthea, 2016), 119–123. Also Sigrid Schmid-Bortenschlager and Georg Schmid, “Mythos Franz Joseph: sein Bild in der Literatur,” in the same catalog, 57–61; and Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos.” The gifts were overwhelmingly directed to Emperor Franz Joseph, although other members of the imperial family were also addressed; ibid., 53; and Claudia Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen – Huldigungsadressen für Kaiser Franz Joseph I,” in Der Ewige Kaiser: Franz Joseph I. 1830–1916, ed. Hans Petschar (Vienna: Österreichische Nationalbibliothek and Amalthea, 2016), 101–103. 152 See his Pomp and Politics, 2–3, 138–144.

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tion to use his name in dedicating hospitals, schools, bridges, railway stations, and the like—acts that symbolized protection and special status. For his subjects, precisely because the gifts and their presentation followed certain simple linguistic and visual patterns, their acceptance was easily comprehensible and greatly appreciated. Common to all gifts are dedicatory texts in literary formulas that magnify the majesty of the emperor and the loyal and humble submission of his subjects to his scepter, as well as the decoration of the objects and backdrops of performances bearing imperial emblems and symbols of power, strength, and victory. Therefore, gifts became part of an imperially conceived program that contributed to the idealization of the crowned head, that aimed to preserve the identity and integrity of the monarchy.153 As with gifts, the rituals that transpired in the presentation ceremonies had not only an aesthetic value but, more importantly, a symbolic meaning that had to be perceptible, visible, and expressive.154

2.3 Presentation Celebrations and Ceremonies For Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, being positively perceived as part of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy was critical to the construction of a new and proud identity. This study suggests that it was done in connection with the personality cult of the emperor. Thus, it is important to understand the different aspects and orchestration of this leader cult, and how Franz Joseph was promoted in celebrations and royal ceremonies, particularly in the presentation of gifts. Moreover, how much is the presentation of the gift part of the object itself and its aims? How does receiving the gift affect its meaning and aims? How does the experience of receiving and seeing the object affect its perception by the emperor-king? Also important is to find out how the origins and transfer from Jerusalem to the imperial court affected this perception. Ceremonies and pageantry have a main function in the perception of monarchs and their status and role. A celebration brings the past into the present, and a common perception of the past shapes and crystallizes the development of a common identity in the celebrating society, thereby anchoring the sense of be-

153 The literature on the myth of Franz Joseph is extensive. For a review, see Schmid-Bortenschlager and Schmid, “Mythos Kaiser Franz Joseph,“ 57–61. His idealization in Jewish circles did not receive the deserved attention, and by Jerusalemite Jews—even less; see discussion below, Part III. 154 On these rituals, see Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” 102–103; Jan Andres, “Auf Poesie ist die Sicherheit der Throne gegründet,” Huldigungsrituale und Gelegenheitslyrik im 19. Jahrhundert (Frankfurt/Main: Campus, 2005), 17.

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longing. With political aims in mind, Franz Joseph’s imperial court organized special ceremonies for the presentation of gifts and their display in exhibitions, as well as public performances of homages on dynastic events, national commemorations and anniversaries of the imperial family’s birthdays, name days, and weddings. Ceremonial practices were steadily revived since the success of the counter-revolution in 1848/9, as the imperial court sought ways to restore absolute power to the ruler by rooting the principle of his legitimation by the grace of God. The myth of the divinely chosen monarch, spread by all media, was considered a most effective means to this end; indeed, for most of his subjects, his identity as divinely chosen ultimately stood above his identity as an individual.155 The myths woven around the figure of the emperor were an integral part of the design of all official events, in an endeavor to present an image of unity around him. In the face of national, ethnic, cultural, and religious fragmentation, the challenges of creating and maintaining collective identities centered around the monarch required the preparation and dissemination of narratives that could influence the heterogeneous public. This aim also demanded the continuous and steady repetition of rituals and ceremonies with the participation of the populace. In this way, a perception of structure, stability, and continuity could be achieved. Therefore, additional occasions such as anniversaries of the foundation of associations, or thank-you rallies for benefits granted, or just expressions of gratitude and loyalty, were created. In a significant innovation, Franz Joseph’s court also instituted official events and the presentation of homages in celebration of jubilees for the monarch’s accession to the throne. The first widely publicized event may have been the Silver Jubilee of Franz Joseph, which was solemnly celebrated in 1873; it brought about a new policy of holding greater public celebrations, such as the Silver Wedding Anniversary of Franz Joseph to Elisabeth on 24 April, 1879. At first, Franz Joseph favored keeping to tradition and was hesitant about staging major events on milestone jubilees. Thus, on the fortieth anniversary of his accession, he prevented grand celebrations, apart from the unveiling of Maria Theresa’s monument in an impressive square located between the new museums of Art History and Natural History, facing the Hofburg—the imperial palace on the other side of the Ringstrasse. Nevertheless, the serious political and social crisis in the last decades of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries led the court to orga-

155 Werner Telesko, “Franz Joseph as the ‘Media Emperor’: The Ruler Myth and Its Legacy,” in Franz Joseph 1830–1916, ed. Karl Vocelka and Martin Mutschlechner (Vienna: Schloss Schönbrunn Kultur- und BetriebsgesmbH Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien and Brandstätter, 2016), 131, 133; Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos”; Valenta, “Vom konservativen Herrscher zum Medienstar.”

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nize sumptuous festivities on his Golden and Diamond Jubilees, in 1898 and 1908, respectively. These celebrations, which were influenced by the successful public events on the occasion of the jubilee celebrations of Queen Victoria of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland,156 contributed much more to Franz Joseph’s idealized image than the traditional celebrations of birthdays and saints’ days in 1900 and 1910.157 The jubilee celebrations, which were meticulously planned grandiose productions of laudatory mass events involving all Habsburg peoples from all social strata, reached the far corners of the empire and were widely publicized.158 The Golden Jubilee signaled a turn in the scale and scope of celebrations and, above all, in the construction of Franz Joseph’s image in all media and mass events; accordingly, the court’s expectations for a positive response from the Habsburg peoples also reached a peak.159 The imperial court and Church characterized Franz Joseph as a Prince of Peace, merciful, gentle, beloved, tireless in seeking the good of his people, a rock in adversity, and no stranger to sorrow and suffering; the latter characterization awakened much empathy: his brother, Emperor Maximilian of Mexico, was executed in 1867 by Mexican forces that restored the Mexican Republic; his son, Crown Prince Rudolf, committed suicide in 1889 in a pact with his mistress, and the emperor-king’s consort, Elisabeth, was assassinated by an anarchist a few months before the Jubilee—tragic events that he endured with great humility and self-restraint, thereby serving as a stellar model of morality.160 In the words of James Shedel and Daniel Unowsky, Franz Joseph was marketed as the living embodiment of humble Christian pi-

156 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, esp. 114–115; idem, “Creating Patriotism,” 287–288. 157 Rainer Valenta, “Staging and Mystification: Jubilees–Processions–Audiences,” in Franz Joseph 1830–1916, ed. Karl Vocelka and Martin Mutschlechner (Vienna: Schloss Schönbrunn Kulturund BetriebsgesmbH Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien and Brandstätter, 2016), 89. Valenta notes that the celebrations included religious services, special homages, the acceptance of deputations, the support of charitable foundations, the striking of medals, and the ceremonial lighting of the city, as well as modern practices such as processions, exhibitions, and publications. Gabriele Praschl-Bichler (“Eine Zeremonie und ihr Wandel: Zur Geschichte der Huldigung,“ in Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien [Vienna: Christian Brandstätter, 2007], 204–209 [207, 208]) remarks that Franz Joseph readily accepted this royal obligation. For a comprehensive discussion, see Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, chaps. 4–6; and see also my discussion below, in Part IV. 158 Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” 101–104. 159 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 101–112, 127–138; Telesko, “Franz Joseph as the ‘Media Emperor’,” 130; Beller, “Kraus’s Firework,” 46–71, esp. 48–52. 160 Another brother, Karl Ludwig, died in 1896, purportedly after drinking infected water during a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. After Crown Prince Rudolph’s suicide, and Karl Ludwig’s death, his eldest son, Franz Ferdinand, became heir presumptive to the throne.

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ety and goodness, of duty and perseverance—a model for all his subjects.161 As these scholars observe, these traits could as easily describe Christ as they do Franz Joseph, and all that was lacking was the explicit suggestion that they should. This finally happened in November 1898, they note, when two publications on the occasion of the Golden Jubilee presented Franz Joseph as Christlike: one, secular, was sponsored by Franz Joseph’s court, and the other, religious, was spread by the Austrian Church as a pastoral letter to all corners of the empire.162 The widespread characterization of the emperor as Christ-like began by first designating the Jubilee as a spiritual event. The bishops declared that prayers for God’s continued protection of the emperor and the imperial house were appropriate because God has shown his people all that was good through the emperor.163 The emperor was proclaimed to rule by divine right and his person was declared “sanctified and inviolable.”164 These statements presented Franz Joseph as a divinely chosen carrier of God’s blessings and made it clear that he was no ordinary ruler:165 it was God’s will that he enjoy the absolute loyalty of his peoples. The Jubilee was declared a Church celebration. Consequently, laudatory events were sacralized and held in church ceremonies and processions, clearly conveying that also non-Catholics were expected to hold special services in their own temples, among them Jews in their synagogues. All these elements steadily appear in the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects in accordance with the Habsburg court’s expectations, thereby constructing a positive dual identity of the gift-givers as pious Jerusalemite Jews and loyal Habs-

161 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” esp. 81–84, 87–89; see also Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 94–97, 103–104, 112. 162 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 81, 85–89. The pastoral letter, written by Cardinal Schönborn of Prague and signed by every member of the episcopate of Cisleithania, was read in every church on 27 November, 1898 as part of the celebrations. It called upon all Habsburg subjects to respect the monarchy for the welfare and happiness of every individual and for the glory of the emperor; ibid., 86–88, based on “Gemeinsamer Hirtenbrief der Hochwurdigen Erzbischofe und Bischofe Osterreichs,” in Wiener Diözesanblatt 22 (1898), 253–259. 163 Ibid., 81, 87. 164 Ibid., 74–81, 84–89, which notes that since its origin in the Counter-Reformation, the idea of a specially sanctified dynasty served the interests of Church and monarchy alike. For the legal definition of Franz Joseph’s sacral status, Shedel refers to Friedrich Tezner, Der Kaiser. Österreichisches Staatsrecht in Einzeldarstellungen (Vienna: Manz, 1909), 10, 108. We should note that the concept of political and theological divine right was the basis of many monarchies throughout the medieval period until the dissolution of the great empires at the end of World War I—Russia (Tsar Nicholas II), Germany (Wilhelm II, who was also King of Prussia), and Austria-Hungary (Karl I/IV); see George V. Strong, “The Austrian Idea: An Idea of Nationhood in the Kingdom and Realms of the Emperor Franz Joseph I,” History of European Ideas 5/3 (1984), 293–305, esp. 303. 165 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 85–88.

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burg subjects, and resisting negative cultural stereotypes that were projected on them by European societies. The driving forces and manifestations in festivals, pageants, parades, and gift-giving, organized by different bodies, varied.166 Whereas traditional rituals, such as celebrations in the main churches, homage presentations, and the reception of delegations, were under the responsibility of the imperial and royal court and the Church, the large parades and comparable mass events that took place during the Jubilees were initiatives of the city of Vienna and private parties, motivating other cities to publicly celebrate in the same spirit.167 Festive parades and performances took place along the main arteries and centrally located squares of Vienna, and at suitable communal sites in other cities. Viribus unitis (“with united forces”), Franz Joseph’s motto as emperor of Austria, was aptly chosen as the motto for the Golden Jubilee. Adopted in February 1849, this dictum was at first connected with the policies of neo-absolutism, but from the late nineteenth century onward it gained new currency as nations struggled for various measures of autonomy.168 The festivities were meant to increase and consolidate supranational loyalty and ensure unity and order while providing an opportunity for diverse peoples and nations to present their loyalty to the emperor together with their distinct identities. Nevertheless, even the carefully planned and spectacular celebrations could not hide the national crisis affecting the Habsburg monarchy.169 With this crisis in mind, the official celebrations of the Diamond Jubilee were designed to outdo those planned for 1898, parts of which had been cancelled because of the murder of Empress Elisabeth a few months earlier. This political murder and the growing nationalist demands led to thoughtful political planning of these performative events, such as the decision that the great majority of pledges of loyalty should come from areas outside Cislethania.170 The gifts accepted for official ceremonies were presented by delegations that arrived from all Habsburg lands, from the far corners of the monarchy in Galicia in the north to Dalmatia in the south, and from Bukovina in the east to Italy in the west, as well as from Habsburg communities residing outside the empire. Gifts were also publicized as being

166 Valenta, “Vom konservativen Herrscher,” 119. 167 Ibid.; Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 138–142. 168 Urbanitsch, “Pluralist Myth and Nationalist Realities,” 120, note 88; Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 82; Andrea Blöchl, “Der Kaisermythos. Die Erzeugung des Mythos ‘Kaiser Franz Joseph.’ Eine Untersuchung auf der Basis von Texten und Bildmaterial aus der Zeit Franz Josephs” (MA thesis, University of Salzburg, 1993), 19. 169 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 179–182, 184. 170 Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 49–50.

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presented by all social strata—high-status representatives of the Habsburg realms, the most prestigious official and private institutions, the army, religious communities, business corporations and entrepreneurs, scientific and cultural institutions and organizations, schools, and even delegations from small and far from well-off towns.171 In view of this endeavor, artifacts sent by the Old Yishuv may have been exhibited at official events, yet, apart from accounts by Jerusalemite Jewish chroniclers, there is no clear evidence for this; in contrast, placards announcing special prayers in honor of the monarch indicate that such events took place in Jerusalem.172 Despite all the limitations on the presentation of gifts, the court successfully created an impression that the emperor reigning from the Hofburg palace was not far away from his subjects and was accessible to all.173 Nevertheless, unlike the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, militant nationalists minimized the elements that could bond their people and nations to the Austrian Empire and highlighted their different origins, history, and culture to advance their political aims. For example, whereas the court meant for the historical tableaux vivants mounted for the Vienna parade to represent high points in the history of the dynasty, nationalists presented them as symbolizing the achievements of their particular nations. Given the large number of gifts presented on each occasion, the personal presentation of all of them in an audience or a special ceremony was impossible; consequently, most offerings—possibly including those from the Old Yishuv—reached the emperor through the Cabinet Office (Kabinettskanzlei).174 In addition, given the endless lists of petitions showing the required support for the emperor, audiences lasted only a few minutes.175 This arrangement influenced the design of the gifts because artists were compelled to quickly attract attention and clearly convey the distinct identity of the gift-giver and his message, with the aim of meeting the expectations of the monarch; as we will see, this need was strongly present in the minds of the designers of gifts from Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem, too. The presentation of homages, ephemeral mass events, exclusive events held in nobility circles, and glorified stories about the life and deeds of the emperor

171 Fischer-Westhauser, “Allergnädigster Kaiser und Herr!,” 10; Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 51–52, 54; Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” 106. 172 A few placards may still be found in auction houses. 173 Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 52, quoting Andrea Blöchl, “Die Kaisergedenktage: Die Feste und Feiern zu den Regierungsjubiläen und runden Geburtstagen Kaiser Franz Josephs,” in Der Kampf um das Gedächtnis. Öffentliche Gedenktage in Mitteleuropa, ed. Emil Brix and Hannes Stek (Vienna: Böhlau, 1997), 118. 174 Fischer-Westhauser, “Allergnädigster Kaiser und Herr!,” 12. 175 Praschl-Bichler, “Eine Zeremonie,” 207–208.

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were publicized in written and visual media in order to create collective memories and influence the perception of the present. Impressive and expensive books published on Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee stand out in these promotional campaigns, including the lavish official album Viribus unitis – The Book of the Emperor, edited by Max Herzig under the protection of Franz Joseph’s daughter Marie Valerie and designed by prestigious artists such as Koloman Moser and Josef Hoffmann;176 the impressive Franz Joseph and His Times: A Cultural-Historical Look at the Francisco-Josephine Epoch, edited by J. Schnitzer under the auspices of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne until his assassination in 1914, with the co-operation of the artists Heinrich Lefler and Alphonse Mucha; and Johannes Emmer’s A Memorial Book of the Fifty-Year Reign and a Picture of the Life and Character of Emperor Franz Joseph I (Vienna, n.d.). Outstanding books published ten years later were Sixty Years on the Habsburg Throne – A Commemoration of the Diamond Jubilee of His Majesty Emperor Franz Joseph I (Vienna, 1908) by Carl Eduard Klopfer, and a reissue of Viribus unitis in 1908, with additional illustrations, authorized by Franz Joseph himself.177 Besides such expensive and luxurious books and albums, the court authorized popular editions, booklets, a variety of printed materials in various languages, and memorabilia available to all social classes—all the result of both official and private initiatives that accommodated different tastes and budgets.178 The question arises as to how did the gifts from the Old Yishuv fit into this extensive multimedia promotion of the emperor’s cult? An illuminating example in our context is a colorful postcard created in Vienna for the Golden Jubilee showing representative figures of Franz Joseph’s subjects, including a Jew, in typical national garments (fig. 3). The figures proudly stand in front of the emperorking’s portrait, which is enclosed in a wreath of oak branches—an ancient royal symbol that frequently appears in Habsburg-Lothringen heraldry; the Habsburg double-headed eagle appears below the portrait and banners of the Dual Monarchy appear prominently in the background.179 In the Old Yishuv, imagery based

176 Max Herzig, ed., Viribus Unitis. Das Buch vom Kaiser (Vienna: Herzig, 1898). 177 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 105–111; Smetana, “Viribus unitis,” esp. 111–116, quoting Unowsky and with references to other publications and events. 178 See Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, esp. 105–111, 127–137; Telesko, “Franz Joseph as the ‘Media Emperor’”; Joachim Bürgschwentner, “War Relief, Patriotism and Art: The State-Run Production of Picture Postcards in Austria 1914–1918,” Austrian Studies 21 (2013), 99–120. 179 The postcard (ID Number: 162774) is part of the Gross Family Collection, “Postcard printed for the 50th Anniversary of Emperor Franz Joseph, 1898” (Tel Aviv: ANU – Museum of the Jewish People) . Beller (“Kraus’s Firework,” 57) notes that in the 1908 parade, a

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Fig. 3: Franz Joseph’s peoples celebrate his Golden Jubilee. Postcard, 1898. Tel Aviv, ANU – Museum of the Jewish People, The Oster Visual Documentation Center. Courtesy of The Gross Family Collection no. 40339.

on a variety of identity markers—landscapes, monuments, ethnic types, and garments—was critical to show the reciprocal relationship between the gift-givers and the monarch. The presentation of gifts became highly publicized not only by the court but also by the institutions that presented them. On the occasion of the presentation of homages celebrating the Silver Jubilee of Franz Joseph, the Silver Anniversary of his wedding to Elisabeth, and, as noted, on a much higher scale and sophistication on the Golden and Diamond Jubilees of his accession to the Austrian throne, gift-givers promoted in the press extensive reports and praises of these events and the precious gifts, which were meticulously described. For example, the Jewish weekly newspaper Die Neuzeit published on 9 December, 1898, an extensive account of the gift presented by the Jewish community of Vienna and Lower-Austria to Franz Joseph, through the Kabinettskanzlei, on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee, describing and praising the object and the accompanying epistle in great detail.180 Similarly, Jerusalemite Jewish chroniclers celebrated the Old Yishuv gifts

Jew in a kaftan with a velvet kippah on his head appeared here and there, representing this religious faith. 180 This object is kept at the ÖNB Bildarchiv as Reg. J./49; its description appears in volume 49, p. 515. The newspaper reported that the address was delivered on 30 November, 1898; see http:// anno.onb.ac.at/cgi-content/anno?aid=neu&datum=18981209&query=%22J%c3 %bcdische +Gemeinde%22+%22Huldigungsadresse%22&ref=anno-search. I am indebted to Mag. Alexandra  

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and their ceremonious reception but, unfortunately, did not describe them. Moreover, documents on the main exhibition of gifts in Vienna and other cities, which were widely publicized both by the court and the gift-givers, do not mention gifts from the Old Yishuv.181 The exhibitions attracted many people even when only photographs and drawings of the objects were displayed. For example, from 25–28 November, 1908, the city of Vienna exhibited in the City Hall material on its gift to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee. After the presentation of the “most gracefully crafted” congratulations and commemorative medal, Mayor Dr. Karl Lueger respectfully requested the permission of the emperor “to immediately share with the public the happy event, a request that was graciously accepted.” As soon as the delegation returned to the City Hall, relevant posters, designed by experts, were printed, and on the afternoon of the same day they were proudly displayed with detailed descriptions of the ceremony.182 These actions should be considered in the context of the conflict between Franz Joseph and Karl Lueger, since the latter contradicted the monarch’s multinational political view. Lueger exposed the political weakness of Franz Joseph in 1897, when the monarch was left with no choice but to sanction the popular politician, who had won the mayoral elections in Vienna five times. The emperor could only take symbolic steps that might state his unique status and power, such as promoting homages from his subjects and making them widely known, and, at the same time, publicizing reciprocal actions such as granting favors. As noted, one illuminating example in our context is the conferring of the Franz Joseph Order on Chief Rabbi Moritz Güdemann with the aim of reassuring the city’s Jewish population of the monarch’s appreciation.183 In this context, the gifts presented by Jews in the Habsburg realms, in other diasporas, and the Old Yishuv since 1898 may point to an anachronistic attempt to hold on to a personality cult that was actually being challenged in the capital of the monarchy—romantic sentiments detached from the harsh reality: the rise of

Smetana of the Pictures and Graphics Archive at the Austrian National Library in Vienna for calling my attention to this publication. Die Neuzeit – Wochenschrift für politische, religiöse und Kultur-Interessen was a liberal Jewish weekly in German for “political, religious, and cultural interests,” published in Vienna from 30 August, 1861, to 25 December, 1903. 181 I owe also this information to Mag. Alexandra Smetana. See also Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” 101. 182 Ibid., 105, 109. On some occasions, city councils, institutions, societies, and corporations publicized their gifts even before sending them to the imperial officers and before their solemn presentation to the recipient. 183 See chap. 1.1, p. 26; and Rosensaft, “Jews and Antisemites,” 71.

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German nationalism and growing antisemitism, which Lueger turned into a widely accepted and respected attitude. As in the case of the Vienna City Council, all exhibitions were carefully planned, and the producers took care to widely report and applaud them in the media.184 Skillfully designed brochures highlighted the excellent quality of the gifted objects as an expression of the high achievements of the local arts, and also cited the names of the designers, artists, craftsmen, and writers of the dedications. The publication of this information and the rich materials, which included valuable metals, leather, silk, velvet, precious stones, ivory, mother-of-pearl, glass, and enamel, qualified the gifts as admirable objets d’art. These qualities were highlighted also by Jerusalemite writers regarding the gifts presented by the Old Yishuv. As all the examples show, the artifacts functioned in both milieux as a propagandist venue for the recipient as well as for the gift-giver, since they conveyed an image of the monarchy and its peoples’ success and prosperity owing to the extraordinary commitment of the monarch.185 As noted, the imperial court planned the presentation ceremonies so that they would reflect the commonalities as well as the diversity and differences between nations, peoples, regions, and domains that became part of the Habsburg House over hundreds of years. With this aim in mind, application forms were meticulously checked and authorization to present a gift was exclusively granted at the highest levels and under strict regulations. Court officers checked the identities of the donors, their motives, and the character and quality of their homages. In addition, citizens attending these events had to follow strict rules containing even the smallest of details, such as dress codes that conveyed national origins and social status: members of the army wore uniforms, gentlemen wore frock-coats, ladies donned high-necked dresses, and people from rural areas appeared in their festive national costumes whose colorful variety reflected the diversity of the nations and lands united in the person of the monarch.186 As Emil Brix notes, the highly ritualized programs and mise-en-scènes of the ceremonies, in which the visual design had an ultimate effect on the content, and the custom of writing praises, thanks, and blessings in all official languages and in multilingual texts, allowed

184 Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” esp. 102, 105. 185 Fischer-Westhauser, “Allergnädigster Kaiser und Herr!,” 12, 20; and especially Ulrike Scholda, “Niello, Email und Kobrahaut – Dank- und Huldigungsadressen als Denkmäler des Kunsthandwerks,” in Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, ed. Ulla Fischer-Westhauser, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter, 2007), 78–107. 186 Sonja Schmöckel, “Face to Face – An Audience with Franz Joseph,” The World of the Habsburgs .

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for a high degree of particularity as an expression of pluralism.187 No doubt, the gifts of the Jerusalemite Jewish communities fit perfectly into the official policy of promoting pluralism. Moreover, the use of various artistic styles in both milieux, from the conventional historicism—an eclectic composition of different historical styles such as Neo-Classical, Neo-Gothic, Renaissance Revival, and Neo-Baroque —to the innovative Secessionist style,188 to which Jerusalemites added images of ancient holy places and landscapes, testifies to this plurality. Such highly visible expressions of national and ethnic idiosyncrasy had always been far less practicable in neat political frames such as the parliament and the army, and even in institutions such as schools, where they were perceived as being related to demands for political rights—all the more so following the steep rise of German nationalism since the 1880s. Designers and writers who specialized in the creation of epistles, gifts, and other representative objects, including those working for the Old Yishuv, were aware that Austrian royal myths and rituals were highly mediated and actually invented Franz Joseph as the instrument of the traditional dynastic and hierarchical order, that would guarantee the unity of the empire for the benefit of all his peoples. Most importantly, the propagandist machine reminded everyone that this was, as noted, the will of God—a vital issue for the Habsburg House.189 The careful creation and performance of homages and public exhibitions follow what Claudia Karolyi calls “the semantics of aesthetics,” noting that the “ceremonial is aesthetic and, at the same time, always symbolic.”190 The rituals performed at ceremonies aimed to create and uphold political power;191 this performative language presented a paternalist personal bond and commitment that bound the peoples and their sovereign, and reminded the peoples of the need to respect and obey him in return for his good-will and responsibility to protect them. The amusing anecdote retold at the beginning of this chapter—on the precious gift presented to Franz Joseph by Rabbi Beck on behalf of the Old Yishuv on

187 Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 51–52. 188 Historicist architecture, architectural decoration, and design blossomed in Vienna in the second half of the nineteenth century. As noted, the Ringstrasse had become the central construction project, beginning in December 1857, after Franz Joseph ordered that the walls separating the city center from the suburbs be torn down. For the contribution of Jewish Habsburg subjects to art, architecture, and design at the time of Franz Joseph, see Kohlbauer-Fritz, Ringstrasse; Shapira, Design Dialogue; eadem, Style and Seduction, esp. chap. 1. 189 On the importance of this strategy—the invention of traditions at the time—see Eric Hobsbawm, “Mass-Producing Traditions: Europe, 1870–1914,” in The Invention of Tradition, ed. Eric Hobsbawm and Terence Ranger (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983), 263–308. 190 Karolyi, “Semantiken des Ästhetischen,” 102–103. 191 Andres, “Auf Poesie,” 18.

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the eve of the monarch’s departure from Jerusalem, and the gratitude of the latter as well as his wish that his Jewish subjects would always remember him—is a relevant illustration of Brix’s and the already noted remarks, that expressions of gratitude and recognition contributed to the construction of traditions of reciprocity. Homages referenced historical events and influenced history at one and the same time; moreover, because of their highly ritualized form and content, the ceremonies tended to act as an extended arm of state representation, in which the clearly delimited roles expressed hierarchy—and not equality. The gifts and their presentation were a component and medium for the mythification of the emperor,192 construction and projection of an idealized identity. The safeguarding and stability of relationships required steady repetition and continuity; however, in the case of the Dual Monarchy, continuity of the narrative is not self-evident in this period of fundamental political, social, and economic upheaval in the Habsburg realms. Indeed, despite the careful preparations for the emperor’s Jubilee, it was not only Hungary’s refusal to acknowledge these events that disturbed the celebrations. For example, Beller remarks that the Diamond Jubilee was ignored by the Czechs, whose historical state rights were set aside and found their land subsumed into the Cislethanian half of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy; the final straw may have been the decision of Vienna’s mayor, Karl Lueger, not to allow theater performances in the Czech language at the celebrations. In addition, the Italians from the Tyrol, a weak link in the system because of the high percentage of irredentists among them, refused to participate.193 Given the fact that the rise of German nationalism and the populist mayorship of Lueger supported attacks on ethnic and religious minorities, and therefore created a rise in tension, it is even more relevant to take note of the role of the gifts presented by the Old Yishuv.

192 Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 53. 193 Beller, “Kraus’s Firework,” 53–54, 60–63.

PART II The Gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg Subjects

3 Jerusalem in the Gifts of the Old Yishuv Since the Western tradition of offering gifts was an expression of personal obligation and social bonds, and in the Ottoman empire gifts were perceived as a duty and honor of office,194 how are we to evaluate the position of offering gifts by the Old Yishuv in Jerusalem, under the rule of the Ottoman empire, to the “Western” Habsburgs? Analyzing the gifts of the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects sheds new light on topics such as West-East-West cultural transfers, material objects serving as instruments of encounter between them, and the ways creators and users negotiate in and between societies, collectives, ranks in hierarchies, central and marginal groups, ideologies, and religious faiths. Adopting practices of broader cultures and Jewish traditions in their European homelands, and adapting them to their own aims and means, the Habsburg Jewish communities in the Holy Land presented various skillfully designed and decorated gifts and epistles to Franz Joseph and his consort, to their son Crown Prince Rudolf, and to Karl I/IV on different occasions and events. As noted, twelve of these objects have been preserved, and Jewish sources indicate that there were more.195 This extensive research reviews documents from the archives in Jerusalem and Vienna, as well as documentation on the archives of Britain and Germany in Jerusalem, Jewish periodicals, chronicles, and memoirs that mention greetings and gifts to European monarchs. Although references to gifts presented to other European sovereigns are scarce, these above archival sources suggest that Franz Joseph received more gifts from his Jerusalemite Jewish subjects than any other sovereign had received from his own subjects and protégés in the Land of Israel/Palestine.196

194 On the Ottoman empire’s concept of gift-giving, see Peter Burschel (“A Clock for the Sultan: Diplomatic Gift-giving from an Intercultural Perspective,” The Medieval History Journal 16/2 [2013]: 556, 558), who notes that the Ottoman elite viewed expensive and outstanding gifts not as a sign of the strength of the donor, but as a sign of its own strength and the honor of the office, a position that naturally influenced both the giving and the receipt of gifts. 195 We should note that not only objects were presented to Franz Joseph by the Old Yishuv, but institutions such as hospitals, hospices, and dwellings for the poor were also founded and dedicated to him; in addition, the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian, and the Austro-Galician kolelim established a fund for needy brides in celebration of the emperor’s Golden Jubilee; see Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 279–282, document no. 123 (Jer. I/19). 196 For Britain, see Albert M. Hyamson, The British Consulate in Jerusalem in Relation to the Jews of Palestine, 1838–1914, Part I: 1838–1861 (London: Jewish Historical Society of England, 1939), 30–33, 166–167; and Mordechai Eliav, Britain and the Holy Land, 1838–1914: Selected Documents from the British Consulate in Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi and Magnes, 1997). For Germany, see idem, The Jews of Palestine in the German Policy: Selected Documents from the German https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-004

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Even though the names of most of the artists and writers as well as the whereabouts of several of the objects mentioned in documents, chronicles, and memoirs are unknown, much can be learned from the extant texts and objects about identity formation in a community divided between East and West. Several questions arise, including: How did the Old Yishuv, especially leading individuals in this community, interpret their own cultural patterns in order to formulate new identity narratives? And how did Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects convey their uniqueness in a way that gave an expression of belonging both to a distinct and worthy religio-cultural collective that returned to its ancient homeland and, at the same time, to the Habsburg monarchy? This was a proudly built self-Otherness that became evident in the gifts through various means, such as the use of the ancient Hebrew language and traditional Jewish art-forms integrated into those favored by the Habsburg Court; the integration of inscriptions that identify and add meaning to images,197 together with sophisticated ambivalent expres-

Consulate in Jerusalem, 1842–1914 (Tel-Aviv: Hakibbutz Hameuchad, 1973) (Hebrew)—the latter two attest to the scarcity of documents. To mention but one relevant example, on the occasion of Wilhelm II’s “peaceful crusade” to Jerusalem in 1898, the Jewish community presented him with a blessing on a parchment scroll housed in an olivewood case created by an artist from the Alliance Israélite Universelle School. In addition, his consort received a poem written especially by one of the most influential personalities in the Old Yishuv, Rabbi Yoel Moshe Salomon, set in a silver filigree case; see Rene Sivan and Ruth Peled, eds., HaMigdal – Special Edition: Kaiser Wilhelm Arrives in Jerusalem (Jerusalem: The Tower of David Museum of the History of Jerusalem, October 2012), 2. Furthermore, a Zionist delegation headed by Theodor Herzl, who came to Jerusalem with the hope of gaining the support of the German emperor, presented him with an album of photographs of the Jewish settlements; see Esco Foundation for Palestine, Inc., Palestine: A Study of Jewish, Arab, and British Policies Policies, I (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1947), 43. Other presents were presented to him by non-Jews; see, for example, Alex Carmel, “Das ‘Kaiseralbum’ von 1898,” Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins 100 (1984), 160–174, and a Bible with a cover depicting the Redeemer’s Church, in Sivan and Peled, eds., HaMigdal – Special Edition, 5. Lastly, Pinhas ben Zvi Grayevsky (The Craftsman and the Locksmith in Jerusalem: Memorial Volume for Artisans, Workshops and Early Industry in Jerusalem from the Inception of the Ashkenazic Community [2nd ed.; Jerusalem: Eretz-Israel, 1930], 1) praises a splendid stone desk made by the master artist Mordechai Schnitzer and presented by the Old Yishuv to the Prince of Wales, the future Edward VII of England, on his visit to Jerusalem in 1862. 197 Shalom Sabar (“The Binding of Isaac in the Work of Moshe Shah Mizraḥi: A Persian-Jewish Folk Artist in Early Twentieth-Century Jerusalem,” in Iran, Israel, and the Jews: Symbiosis and Conflict from the Achaemenids to the Islamic Republic, ed. Aaron Koller and Daniel Tsadik, Yeshiva University Center for Israel Studies, 1 [Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2019], 260) remarks that such inscriptions are typical of folk art, in the artists’ endeavor to leave very little to the imagination of the beholder, and adds that Jewish Eastern European folk art enjoyed great popularity in nineteenth-century Jerusalem (p. 268); idem, “Jewish Folk Art in Late Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Century Jerusalem and its European Sources,” in Jerozolima w kulturze europejskiej (Proceedings

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sions; and last but not least, the prominent place of images of long-venerated, romanticized biblical holy places claimed by Jews and gentiles. Moreover, the image-bearing objects created by artists at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts for the Habsburg kolelim as gifts to Karl I/IV on his coronation, reveal an awareness of the Orientalist outlook and its modern transformation from a Jewish perspective, as in the eclectic integration of Oriental figures dressed in a broad and diverse range of local garments, local practices, and sites—all of which fit into the Viennese cultural ambience of the time. Such elements were also common in popular local art, as in a lithograph created in the early 1910s by the Jerusalemite artist Moshe Shah Mizrachi,198 depicting scenes from the Sacrifice of Isaac together with holy tombs and shrines in and around Jerusalem, yet also integrating East European traditions, a naïve local style, and Oriental elements from the art of his native city, Teheran. Images and texts show that Jerusalem had a central role in the formation of local Jewish identities. The gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects suggest that the gift-givers were aware that the Church saw Jerusalem as the spiritual homeland of Christians, and that the Habsburg House saw its religio-political importance, the more so because that monarchy perceived itself as the legitimate heir to the crown of Jerusalem. Therefore, the Habsburg Jewish communities of Jerusalem wisely set the Holy City as the common binding space of commitment and symbolic encounter with the emperor-kings, no doubt in the hope of more effectively touching their hearts. The construction of psychological and emotional bonds to the monarchs may also explain why—unlike Jewish itineraries, cultic objects, and souvenirs—the visual imagery in the gifts focuses on biblical sites and does not refer to venerated tombs of sages and revered rabbis, which were popular among the Jews of Palestine.

3.1 The Symbolism of Jerusalem How was Jerusalem historically and religiously perceived by members of the Old Yishuv and their royal benefactors, the recipients of their gifts?

of the Conference “Jerusalem in European Culture,” May, 1996), ed. P. Paszkiewicz and T. Żadrozny (Warsaw: Institute of Art, Polish Academy of Sciences, 1997), 481–488. 198 The lithograph was discovered and published by Shalom Sabar, “Binding of Isaac,” 273, fig. 9. Moshe ben Yitzhak Mizrachi was born in the late 1860s, immigrated and settled in the Old City of Jerusalem around 1890, and opened a workshop for religious and applied artwork. In the mid-1920s, Mizrachi added Zionist symbols; idem, “Binding of Isaac,” 274–276, figs. 10, 11.

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The Holy City, held by Jews, Christians, and Muslims as a jewel in their heart, had remained inaccessible to non-Muslims for a long time; therefore, when the peripheral and abandoned city in the Ottoman empire finally opened up to the West, Jews and Christians gave full expression to their memories, longings, and hopes. Despite its location on the periphery of the Ottoman empire, Jerusalem was not just any other city raising the imperialist and colonialist ambitions of European powers and the imagination of Orientalists attracted by its exotic landscapes and unknown “mysterious” peoples. In the eyes of Jews, Christians, and Muslims, Jerusalem carried, as it does today, a rich symbolic meaning rooted in its longstanding perception as the Holy City, although each faith understands its holiness in different ways: some places are venerated by the three religions whereas other sites are sacred to one or two of them, interpreted by each nation and culture in its particular way to a degree that we may ask whether it is one or many holy cities. Nations coveting Jerusalem and cultures venerating it, at all times contend for a political and religious hegemony necessary for the construction of their identities not only in the context of the earthly and heavenly city, but also in the context of their native homeland’s domestic and international politics. In Judaism, the whole earth is full of the glory of God (Isaiah 6:3), yet Jerusalem is the place chosen by God for extraordinary events in the history of mankind and the world. It is the source and longed-for destination of the faithful. The Temple Mount—the heart of Jerusalem—is the navel of the world; its holiness expands to the whole Land of Israel and from it to the rest of the world. Midrash, an ancient genre of commentaries on the biblical text, elaborates on the words of God as spoken by Ezekiel 5:5: “This is Jerusalem: I have set it in the midst of the nations and countries that are round about her”; and Midrash Tanhuma (Kedoshim, 10) explains: “The Land of Israel is located in the center of the world, Jerusalem in the center of the Land of Israel, the Temple in the center of Jerusalem, the Holy of Holies in the center of the Temple, the Holy Ark in the center of the Holy of Holies, and in front of the Holy of Holies is the Foundation Stone from which the world was started.”199 Jewish tradition identifies Mount Moriah with the site where David built an altar unto the Lord and offered burnt and peace offerings (1 Chronicles 21:26). When David sinned, God did not allow him to erect the Temple as the great king wished, and graced his righteous son and heir, Solomon, with the privilege of building the

199 For legends on the Foundation Stone and the Temple, see Zev Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, I: The Sacred Land (Philadelphia: The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1973), 6–16; Richard Livingston, “The Jewish Connection: Judaism, Jerusalem, and the Temple,” Sigma 19 (2001), 7–19; Isaac Kalimi, “The Land of Moriah, Mount Moriah, and the Site of Solomon’s Temple in Biblical Historiography,” Harvard Theological Review 83/4 (1990), 345–362.

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magnificent House on that site (2 Chronicles 3). According to various Jewish traditions, God had gathered the earth on Mount Moriah to create Adam;200 moreover, a rabbinic tradition recounts that “Adam was created from the dust of the place where the sanctuary was to rise for the atonement of all human sin, so that sin should never be a permanent or inherent part of man’s nature.”201 Accordingly, Adam, Cain, Abel, and Noah placed their offerings there;202 Abraham, the ultimate model of one’s faith in God, followed God’s command and reached Mount Moriah to offer his son Isaac (Genesis 22:2; Genesis Rabbah 55:7).203 Later, Jacob, setting a stone as his pillow, slept there and dreamed about angels ascending and descending a ladder between heaven and earth; realizing that the site is the very Gate of Heaven, Jacob set up the stone as a pillar, consecrated it, and called the site Bethel, the House of God—interpreted as the site where the Temple would be built (Genesis 28:11–22).204 From this biblical story developed the tradition that whoever prays in Jerusalem prays as if he were praying before the Throne of God: there the Gate of Heaven is open to allow the prayers to reach him (Midrash Tehillim 91:7).205 An old saying attributed to Saadia Gaon, an outstanding sage of the tenth century, proclaims: “Whoever desires to be certain of complete forgiveness and wishes his supplications to be heard, let him dwell in Jerusalem and pray there.”206 Moreover, prayers in holy places, such as the remnants of the walls of the Temple Mount and the Gate of Mercy, were believed to bring forth the coming of the Messiah. In Judaism, the city of Jerusalem has been the center of the faith ever since the reigns of David and Solomon, when it achieved prominence as the City of God and the site of His Temple. “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning; if I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; 200 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 69–70, quoting Genesis 2:7; Targum Yerushalmi 1 to Genesis 2:7; Midrash Tehillim 92:6; Pirkei de Rabbi Eliezer 20:1; for a compilation of legends on Mount Moriah, see his chaps. 5, 6. 201 Livingston (“Jewish Connection,” 11), quoting the The Jewish Encyclopedia . For references to the Rambam on this topic, see ibid., 12–13. 202 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 70. Jewish tradition relates that after the flood, Noah’s altar sealed up the waters of the abyss and became the foundation stone of a new creation, thereby linking Noah’s altar with the Foundation Stone in the Holy of Holies supporting the Ark of the Covenant. According to these legends, the Temple sits upon the wellspring of the earth, i.e., the center and source of creation. 203 Genesis 22:1–4; Exodus Rabbah 80:15; see Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 71–72. 204 Ibid., 10–11; Livingston, “Jewish Connection,” 13. 205 Solomon Buber, ed. Midrash Tehillim (New York: Om, 1948) (Hebrew). Midrash Tehillim is a biblical exegesis on Psalms. Also, Ariella Amar, “Knock Knock, on Heaven’s Doors,” Eretz-Israel 28 (2007), 299–311 (Hebrew). 206 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 183–184.

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if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy,” proclaims the poet in Psalm 137:5–6, and “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee,” he says in Psalm 122:6, a Song of Ascents. In addition, biblical and later Jewish texts describe Jerusalem as the most beautiful city in the world. The talmudic sages remarked: “Ten measures of beauty descended to the world, nine were taken by Jerusalem” (Bavli, Kiddushin 49b), and “Whoever has not seen Jerusalem in all its splendor has never seen a beautiful city in his life” (Bavli, Sukkah 51b). This mental image of Jerusalem, the eternal city, remains alive in Judaism and is the basis of the heavenly city in Christianity. After Rome destroyed Jerusalem in 70 CE, the Temple became the main object of yearning for Jews, the symbol of future redemption (geula) and of the end of the Diaspora and life in exile. Over time, the city—especially the Western Wall as the most important remnant of the destroyed Temple—gained a central mythical importance. Midrashim from the fourth century attest to the Western Wall’s sanctity, and for Jews who continued to come on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, the journey culminated with a visit to the venerated remnants, as noted in diaries since the tenth century. In the mid-sixteenth century, the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent recognized the Western Wall as a holy place for Jews as well as their right to pray there.207 Thus, historical processes rooted in biblical times continued throughout the Second Temple period and beyond the Roman destruction of the city; these processes transformed the nature of Jerusalem and its Temple from material evidence of Jewish presence in the Land of Israel into metaphysical symbols at the core of Jewish prayers for redemption.208 Moreover, especially since the mid-nineteenth century, Jerusalem, and the Land of Israel as a whole, became for Jews not only a sacred space, but also a physical homeland for their scattered people, viewing the city as an actual site rooted in geographical and urban reality; religious circles maintained that its physical restoration would mark both the

207 Dan Bahat, “When Did Jews Begin to Pray at the Western Wall?,” Eretz-Israel 28 (2007), 235– 238 (Hebrew); Kobi Cohen-Hattab and Ayelet Kohn, “The Nationalization of Holy Sites: YishuvEra Visual Representations of the Western Wall and Rachel’s Tomb,” Jewish Quarterly Review 107/1 (2017), 72–73. Suleiman the Magnificent not only recognized the Western Wall as a Jewish holy place, he also directed the court architect to design a special place for Jews to pray at this site, surrounded on three sides by walls in order to separate it from the adjacent Mughrabi neighborhood. These events established the Western Wall’s centrality as a holy site in the modern period; see Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 255–256; F. Meir Loewenberg, “Is the Western Wall Judaism’s Holiest Site?,” Middle East Quarterly 24/4 (Fall 2017), 1–9 . 208 Nimrod Luz and Noga Collins-Kreiner, “Exploring Jewish Pilgrimage in Israel,” in International Perspectives on Pilgrimage Studies: Itineraries, Gaps and Obstacles, ed. John Eade and Albera Dionigi (New York: Routledge, 2015), 137.

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coming of the Messiah and Jerusalem’s restoration as Israel’s temporal capital,209 whereas emancipated and secular circles set their eyes on rebuilding the ancient homeland by settling and working the land. Both ideologies aimed to realize God’s promise: “I… will plant them, that they may dwell in a place of their own, and move no more; neither shall the children of wickedness afflict them any more, as beforetime” (2 Samuel 7:10). Naturally, both the means and, most importantly, the character of the city differed completely, a fact that, as we shall see, found visual expression in the dedication of the gifts of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee and to Karl on his accession to the throne of Hungary. Unlike the Jewish faith, Christianity does not perceive the Temple and its Holy of Holies as the center, but rather Christ, whose body is the Temple of God (1 Corinthians 3:16), and every Christian is a member of Christ’s body (1 Corinthians 12:12–14); for them, the Holy Land is first and foremost the cradle of Christianity, and therefore the heart of the faithful was embodied in the sites sanctified by events in the life of Jesus, the apostles, and other saints. The Temple was but one of these sites,210 and the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, which Christianized the Muslim Dome of the Rock as the Templum Domini in the twelfth century, placed many events there. This shrine would later represent the site of the Jerusalem Temple in Jewish art. This does not mean that sites believed to have witnessed events narrated in the Hebrew Bible were not considered important. Relevant sites venerated by Jews were often appropriated by Christianity and endowed with Christian symbolism, just as Jews would later adopt Christian and Muslim traditions and adapt them to conform with theirs. Europe’s rediscovery and zealous recreation of Jerusalem in the nineteenth century painted it as a city of faith, focusing on the great city of the Old Testament that, according to the New Testament, witnessed central events in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, events that were part of the divine plan for redemption

209 Halper (“On the Way,” 9) notes, quoting R. J. Zwi Werblowsky, The Meaning of Jerusalem to Jews, Christians and Muslims (Jerusalem: Israel Universities Study Group for Middle Eastern Affairs, 1972; revised 1978), 11–12, that the ideal, restored Jerusalem of Jeremiah’s vision (31:38– 39), is a real city bursting with life. 210 There he was redeemed as the firstborn, taught the doctors, performed miracles, and protected its sanctity. The Temple is a paradigmatic example of the different perception of holy sites in Judaism and Christianity. For example, Jesus called it “my Father’s house” (John 2:16) and “My house” (Matthew 21:13; Mark 11:17; Luke 19:46); Peter W. L. Walker remarks, that in Christianity “the Jerusalem Temple should rather be seen in two ways: as the ‘Father’s house’ which typifies ‘heaven’, and the place of God’s ‘dwelling’ on earth, which then typifies Jesus.” See his Jesus and the Holy City: New Testament Perspectives on Jerusalem (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996), 171, note 39.

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and the final beatitude—the Christian.211 A veritable religious passion overtook scholars and other learned figures to locate biblical sites, identify flora and fauna, and “discover” the customs of the local populace in biblical times. Jewish and Christian believers regard their pilgrimage to Jerusalem as a journey from the periphery to the center. For most, reaching Jerusalem, their spiritual homeland, has been not only the pinnacle of their pilgrimage but also the high point of their lives. They sought not the geographical, earthly, center, but the spiritual, religious, and emotive—the Holy City. Biblical stories and Jewish traditions document the intrinsic sanctity of Jerusalem for Jews. In effect, in the eyes of believers of the three Abrahamic faiths, Jerusalem is a living relic of biblical times. It encapsulates the history of peoples and their heroes in their relationships among themselves and between themselves and God. These beliefs are rooted in the experiences, feelings, and memories of diverse socio-cultural groups that created particular perceptions independent of reality.212 The exceptional symbolism with which Jerusalem has been endowed is the product of a conflation of memory and history, of constantly interacting religious, cultural, and political processes and practices that shape perceptions. Its symbolism, as that of the land in whose heart it is set, is permeated by repeatedly constructed and reconstructed memories and myths. The venerated sites were imagined, mythicized, and remembered in a variety of ways, such as sites of memory, spaces of healing, and places imbued with historical, didactic, and moral power—a perception that created tension between the imagined and real Jerusalem. This tension may have led Westerners to consider its inhabitants mysterious, holders of obscure knowledge, both fascinating and despicable, serving as a mirror to define their superior self, in contrast to the locals’ inferior Otherness. The various outcomes of these cultural processes brought about innumerable contradictions within and among societies throughout time. The visual and literary imagery of the gifts from Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects reveals the subtle means by which artists and writers assert the Jewish identity of Jerusalem throughout its troubled history. Their works show that in Jerusalem the past is present. It can be seen, touched, and felt. Believers feel that they are in direct contact with it. This perception indeed corroborates the variety of iconographical schemes and styles in the design of the myriad objects created by or for the Old Yishuv, including the gifts to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs whose special sentiment for Jerusalem comprised a blend of religious and political motivations. 211 Yaakov Ariel, “Expecting the Messiah: Christian and Jewish Messianic Expectations in the Late Ottoman Period,” in The History of Jerusalem: The Late Ottoman Period, 1800–1917, ed. Israel Bartal and Haim Goren (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2010), 83–93 (Hebrew). 212 See the illuminating conclusions of Haider-Wilson, “Jerusalem’s Place,” 85–87.

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The related but different meanings of the city for the gift-givers and the recipient is revealed, inter alia, by the photograph album of Jerusalem offered by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV: while it was probably perceived by the gift-givers as a virtual tour of the city, stopping at Jewish holy sites, historical monuments, and contemporary Austro-Hungarian Jewish institutions for which they held a source of pride, the deeply religious Christian monarch might have perceived it as a means of walking in the footsteps of Jesus and his biblical predecessors, enjoying the blessings of a virtual pilgrimage, as well as pointing to the monarch’s presence and influence in the city; the local figures, including the Habsburg subjects appearing in some of the photographs, would be a further link between them.

3.2 Jerusalem: A Jewel in the Crown of Franz Joseph I and Karl I/IV In order to understand the ways in which Franz Joseph, Karl, and their closest circles may have evaluated the gifts from the Old Yishuv, it is necessary to pay further attention to their perceptions and interpretations of the Holy Land and its venerated sites. As deduced from documents, including the diaries of Franz Joseph, Crown Prince Rudolf, clerical and court officials, and pilgrims,213 these perceptions and interpretations were conditioned by religious and political factors, mainly the ideal image of Jerusalem in the Roman Catholic Church and the Oriental-colonialist image of the land, especially Jerusalem. The posture of the Habsburg House toward the venerated sites may have been influenced by its traditional religio-political self-image as the most Christian royal house of all. The Habsburg House cultivated the myth of pietas austriaca—the unique piety of the virtuous Habsburg sovereigns, who took on themselves the religious mission to protect and promote the work of the Catholic Church. This duty lies at the root of the Habsburg’s (self-) sanctification as an eternal empire mandated and protected by God.214 The Habsburgs were staunch supporters of Catho-

213 See my Crown of Jerusalem, esp. 109–121, and 147–166. 214 See Anna Coreth (Pietas Austriaca: Austrian Religious Practices in the Baroque Era, Central European Studies Series [West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press, 2004], xxii, 13 ff., 23 ff.; first published in German in 1959), who shows how seventeenth-century Austrian Habsburg sovereigns succeeded in changing what was initially presented as dynastic and personal devotion into theological politics. This understanding is reinforced by Marie-Elizabeth Ducreux (“Emperors, Kingdoms, Territories: Multiple Versions of the Pietas Austriaca?,” The Catholic Historical Review 97/2 [2011]: 276–304), who, referring to the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, reasserts that  

 

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licism already before the Council of Trent, and even more so after it. As such, they fought Protestantism and Islam in Central Europe, and with the active help of the Catholic Church promoted the legends of Rudolf I and the Holy Cross, and of the revelation of the Eucharist to the same king, which characterize their House as being endowed with a divine mission by the Grace of God.215 The legend of the Holy Cross tells us that in 1273, Rudolf I, the first king of the Habsburg House (r. 1273–1291), held and kissed a wooden crucifix as his scepter while tribute was paid to him as the newly elected Roman-German king, and he also used it to have the princes pledge their oath of allegiance to him;216 moreover, a legend tells that a remnant of the True Cross protected the Habsburg monarchs, relating them to a privileged line of Christian monarchs beginning with Constantine the Great, the first Christian emperor, who transformed Jerusalem into the Holy City of Christianity. The legend of the Eucharist asserts the miraculous revelation of the transubstantiation to Rudolf I. The legend, which became widely spread, authenticated the legitimacy of the God-given rule over the Christian peoples of all the lands gained by his House. The legend also strengthened the power of the Church to a point that Crown and Church became interdependent. Aware of the importance of this alliance already with their accession to the throne, Franz Joseph and later Karl reinstated the expression “Emperor by the Grace of God’’ in order to emphasize the monarchical principle that their crown came from God and not from mere mortals. Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects took care to convey that they re-

more than a set of shared beliefs, pietas austriaca was a system for sacralizing and sanctifying the legitimacy of the dynasty through representations; Ducreaux further examines the concept of pietas austriaca and differentiates the dynastic path, which can be called “Pietas Habsburgica,” from a “Pietas Bohemica” or “Hungarica,” and thus concludes that there was no centralized vision of the Habsburg monarchy (279–280). See also Werner Telesko, “The Pietas Austriaca: A Political Myth? On the Instrumentalisation of Piety towards the Cross at the Viennese Court in the Seventeenth Century,” in The Habsburgs and Their Courts in Europe, 1400–1700: Between Cosmopolitism and Regionalism, ed. Herbert Karner, Ingrid Ciulisová, and Bernardo J. García García (Palatium e-Publication, 2014), 159–180; Franz Mathis, “1,000 Years of Austria and Austrian Identity: Founding Myths,” in Austrian Historical Memory & National Identity, ed. Günther Bischof and Anton Pelinka, Contemporary Austrian Studies, 5 (New York: Routledge, 1997), 21–31; Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 26–32, figs. 6, 7; idem, “Reasserting Empire: Habsburg Imperial Celebrations after the Revolutions of 1848–1849,” in Staging the Past: The Politics of Commemoration in Habsburg Central Europe, 1848 to the Present, ed. Maria Bucur and Nancy M. Wingfield (West Lafayette: Purdue University Press, 2001), 13–45, esp. 23–26; Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 75–81. 215 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 12–15; Coreth, Pietas Austriaca, xii; Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” esp. 75–78; Telesko, “Pietas Austriaca,” 160; Ducreux, “Emperors,” esp. 276–279. 216 Telesko, “Pietas Austriaca,” esp. 159–160, 166.

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spected this principle, for example, by proclaiming in the dedications of their gifts: “Thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head” (Psalm 21:3). Franz Joseph also gave renewed importance to the public manifestation of his devoutness and special relationship with God and the Church by participating annually in Catholic rituals such as the Corpus Christi procession, which celebrates the continuous miracle of the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist; in an imperial context, it also recalled the revelation to Rudolf I, adding political value to the event.217 Furthermore, in a gesture of imitatio Christi, Franz Joseph washed the feet of twelve poor men, however carefully selected, on Holy Thursday. Both rituals were an important opportunity for the emperor to show himself in public as a pious, just and benevolent monarch,218 who possessed the right to rule first and foremost by the grace of God, by the historic tradition of the special virtue of the Imperial House, and by his own humility and concern for his subjects. These rituals highlighted the close bond between the Catholic Church and the Habsburg House through fundamental events that took place in Jerusalem.219 To nurture the ideology of pietas austriaca, Franz Joseph also took another, clearly important step related to Jerusalem—a pilgrimage to the Holy Land. The pilgrimage, which took place from 8–13 November, 1869, was an expression of Franz Joseph’s devoutness as well as of the religio-political importance of Jerusalem in the eyes of the Austrian Crown and the Austrian Church.220 Notably, the

217 Moreover, Franz Joseph also attended the International Eucharistic Congress in Vienna in 1912; see Julie Thorpe, “The Pilgrim Church in Vienna: Mobile Memories at the 1912 International Eucharistic Congress,” in Pilgrimage in the Age of Globalisation: Constructions of the Sacred and Secular in Late Modernity, ed. Nelia Hyndman-Rizk (Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars, 2012), 38–55; Karl Vocelka, “Ruler–Soldier–Civil Servant–Catholic Family Man–Hunter: The Personality of Franz Joseph I,” in Franz Joseph 1830–1916, ed. Karl Vocelka and Martin Mutschlechner (Vienna: Schloss Schönbrunn Kultur- und BetriebsgesmbH Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien and Brandstätter, 2016), 26–33, fig. 6; Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 75–78, 80– 81, 85. 218 Unowsky, “Reasserting Empire,” 13–45, esp. 23–26. 219 The mutual dependence of the Austrian Empire and the Church is well known. In addition to the sources just mentioned, see Unowsky (Pomp and Politics, chap. 1, esp. 19, 26–32), who remarks that in the first days of his reign, Franz Joseph, who eschewed luxury and pomp in his personal life, broke with the recent past and restored much of the formality, if not most of the public self-presentation associated with the Habsburg Courts of the seventeenth century. 220 The immediate cause was an invitation of the Khedive Ismail of Egypt to attend the opening of the Suez Canal. The visit was an event of great importance in the context of the contest between the European powers for influence in the continent. For political reasons, Franz Joseph also visited Constantinople on this occasion, and for religio-political reasons—he paid honor to Jerusalem; see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 90–99; Bernhard A. Böhler, “Kaiser Franz Joseph im Heiligen Land,” in Mit Szepter und Pilgerstab: österreichische Präsenz im Heiligen Land seit den Tagen Kai-

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emperor and his retinue befittingly stayed in the Austro-Hungarian Hospice. Thousands followed in his footsteps.221 Austrian royalty asserted the presence of the Habsburg House in the Holy City through pilgrimages and donations. These acts were a source of prestige that had a special significance against the background of the Peaceful Crusades.222 Moreover, pilgrims “transferred” the blessedness of the Holy Land to their homelands. One means was the translation of relics, which were considered by many to have apotropaic powers not only for the carrier, but also for his family, community, and beyond. However, the meaning and importance of Jerusalem for Franz Joseph’s House by far exceeded the religious blessings gained from pilgrimages, the benefits attributed to relics, the indulgences acquired by supporting Catholic institutions, or the acquisition of “knowledge” provided by archaeological and scientific expeditions motivated by the will to prove the truth of the Christian faith: the special blessings that he obtained by praying in the unique holy places, many of which were sacralized by the presence of Jesus, heightened the aura of a monarch’s holiness by the grace of God. This religio-political status held tremendous value, since the concept of divine support was a basic tool in the construction of his legitimacy, invincibility, and absolute power. The Habsburg dynasty needed a source of traditional legitimacy that carried with it a claim to greater transcendence than secular nationalism could: as repeatedly noted by the imperial court, God’s will–and not the will of men or plain historical right– was the source of the Habsburg crowns. Thus, the Vatican’s religio-political declaration regarding the monarch’s journey to Jerusalem was most appropriate: it stated that the pilgrimage to the Holy City would endow Franz Joseph with “the light and the essential inspiration needed to rule a Catholic empire according to the Catholic way of life.”223 It underscored the monarch’s status on this occasion not as a private person, but as an official religio-political instrument: the spiritual regeneration effected by Franz Joseph’s encounter with the holy places, and by the rituals celebrated there, would have both personal and national significance. Moreover, Franz Joseph’s Court called attention to the fact that he was the first European king to visit Jerusalem since the medieval Cru-

ser Franz Josephs, ed. Bernhard A. Böhler, Erzbischöfliches Dom- und Diözesanmuseum Wien, 5. Juli bis 2. September 2000 (Vienna: Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag, 2000), 161–202. 221 Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, esp. 84–90, 99–107. 222 Ibid., esp. 77–78, 80–84. 223 Apostolic Nuntius to Austria Mariano Falcinelli Antoniacci on 18 October, 1869, quoted by Barbara Haider-Wilson, “Die Habsburgermonarchie und das Heilige Land 1842–1917: Schutzmachtproblematik, katholisches ‘Jerusalem-Milieu’ und Volksfrömmigkeit,” doctoral dissertation (University of Vienna, 2007), 346.

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sades, and clearly reasserted this point in publications and on the memorial medal issued in honor of his pilgrimage.224 Regarding the timing and significance of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim and the idealization of Franz Joseph, it should be noted that his visit to the Jewish Quarter was part of the political agenda of his journey, only two years after he had granted equal rights to the Jewish subjects in his monarchy—a status that Jews had longed-for for so many years; in this context, after receiving the community’s present delivered by Rabbi Beck, Franz Joseph is said to have expressed his hopes that his Jewish subjects would always remember him. This is but another example of how the monarch considered them in relation to his own political expectations and how he would like to be remembered in the annals of history: as a devout religious person and a benevolent and just king to all his subjects, including those who dedicated their lives to study and prayer in Jerusalem. Most importantly, how did Franz Joseph and his retinue confront and interpret the actual reality of Jerusalem in relation to history and tradition? An enthralling entry in the diary of the Czech-Austrian historian and spiritual counselor of Franz Joseph, Dr. Beda Dudík (1815–1890), who accompanied him on his journey, hints at hidden wishes, hopes, and fantasies of people close to the monarch, which also may have been among Franz Joseph’s innermost dreams. Dudík wrote that on the day of the emperor’s arrival in Jerusalem, 9 November, 1869, after the emotional welcome and first prayer in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Franz Joseph and his close entourage rode up for a view of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. After describing the beautiful landscape and the historical sites that they identified, Dudík elaborated on his description of the double gate in the eastern wall of the Temple Mount whose history especially impressed him. Recalling ancient legends and historical events, he disclosed the wholehearted desire that took hold of him:

224 The medal was created by the leading sculptor and medal designer Joseph Tautenheyn; see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 97, 137–139, fig. 19, and chap. 6 there: “Jerusalem and the Nineteenthand Early Twentieth-Century Myth of the Crusades.” On the German Emperor Wilhelm II’s desire to extend his protection over Jerusalem, claiming to be the heir to the last king of the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, see my “By the Grace of God and Historical Right: The German Emperor as Patron of Christian Jerusalem,” in Image and Sound: Art, Music and History, ed. Richard I. Cohen (Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Center, 2007), 253–284 (Hebrew); and my “Theater – eine kaiserliche Waffe. Ein himmlischer Segen für den Kreuzzug-Kaiser Wilhelm II. in Jerusalem,” in Deutschland und Deutsche in Jerusalem, eine Konferenz in Mishkenot Sha’ananim, März 2007, ed. Haim Goren and Jakob Eisler (Jerusalem: Mishkenot Sha’ananim, 2011), 46–62; as well as “The Augusta Victoria Hospice on the Mount of Olives and Kaiser Wilhelm II’s Peaceful Crusade,” Jahrbuch des Deutschen Evangelischen Instituts für Altertumswissenschaft des Heiligen Landes 9/10 (2005), 126–147.

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This is the Golden Gate, which the Arabs call the Eternal Gate, or Bab el-Dahariyeh, and whose opening from the outside is forever blocked up; thus, because a legend spread among the Muslims that once a crowned king opens this gate, he will take Jerusalem and all Turkey’s possessions on the whole earth. For the first time in my life I fervently wished for the strength of Samson, so that I could break through the gate. An appreciated and dearly beloved emperor and king was standing here!225

The Austrian press did not forgo the occasion to mention the prestigious title to the crown of Jerusalem. The influential newspaper Neue Wiener Tagblatt wrote on 11 November, 1869, that the title King of Jerusalem, to which the monarchs of Austria are entitled, is certainly not meaningless. Franz Joseph was in the ancient city, to which many more religious beliefs and traditions have probably been attached than to any other place on earth, and was received with such enthusiasm and admiration that made him, if not de jure, then certainly de facto King of Jerusalem.226 This indeed might have been the case, at least for the days he spent in Jerusalem. A realistic approach maintains that the politically minded Franz Joseph made the best of the festive and warm welcome to Jerusalem that he received from the representatives of the local ethnic and religious communities. He paid polite visits, accompanied by his closest retinue, not only to the Catholic sanctuaries and authorities of the Holy City and its surroundings, but also to the Greek Orthodox Patriarch, the Armenian monastery, the Anglican Church, the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount, and the Jewish Quarter. At the latter site, he participated in a ceremony in a synagogue and visited institutions under Austrian protection.227 Franz Joseph’s perception of the various sites that he visited and people he met in Jerusalem, as well as his feelings, are clearly reflected in his daily letters to his consort, Empress Elisabeth. Franz Joseph elaborated on the description of unknown and exotic landscapes and peoples: small, whitewashed domed houses enclosed by cactus hedges the height of a man, date palms heavy with fruit, banana and orange groves. He described the natives as very dark-skinned, wrote in detail about their garments—men wore turbans and wide white- and-brown-striped

225 Beda Dudík, Kaiser-Reise nach dem Oriente (Vienna: Kaiswelich-königlichen Hof- und Staatsdruckerei, 1870), 213. 226 Haider-Wilson, “Die Habsburgermonarchie,” 345–346, 348–349, quoting p. 1f.; Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 98–99. 227 See Ruth Hummel, “Imperial Pilgrim: Franz Joseph’s Journey to the Holy Land in 1869,” in Austrian Presence in the Holy Land in the 19th and Early 20th Century: Proceedings of the Symposium in the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem on March 1–2, 1995, ed. Marian Wrba (Tel Aviv: Austrian Embassy, 1996), 170–172; Böhler, “Kaiser Franz Joseph im Heiligen Land,” 179–184; see also below.

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coats, and women adorned themselves in bright-colored dresses while hiding their faces behind large veils—and noted their strange manners. Moreover, in a scornful Orientalist stance, he unflatteringly detailed sights that surely would not have been described in images and narratives of the idealized Holy Land or in the romantic literature exalting the beauty and pleasures of the exotic Orient; he noted that behind walls, mashrabiyas, and veils, lurked incredible poverty, misery, filth, and backwardness.228 This description of the Land of Israel/Palestine and its peoples conforms with the colonialist perspective common in the West at the time, which nevertheless was neither absolute nor static, and often comprised contradictory and shifting narratives between exaltation and disillusion.229 In an antithetical view of his colonialist stance, which demeaned the local inhabitants in comparison to biblical times and present-day Europe, Franz Joseph disclosed to Elisabeth the “mixture of piety and emotions [that he felt] in the expectation of the sights and blessedness which awaited [him].”230 Despite the renowned importance that he attached to imperial protocol, he stressed neither the lively homage of his local entourage on the way to Jerusalem, nor the ceremonies performed by delegations that paid him honor in Colonia (today’s Motza): it was the long-expected first glimpse of the Holy City spreading across a hill in the far distance, that took his heart. In deep emotion, he recounted to Elisabeth that at the entrance to Jerusalem, by the first gate erected in his honor and the first close sight of the city, “We dismounted, and I knelt on the road and kissed the earth.”231 Highly moved, Franz Joseph experi-

228 Georg Nostitz-Rieneck, ed., Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs an Kaiserin Elisabeth 1859–1898. I (Vienna and Munich: Herold, 1966), 103–106, letter of November 8, describing the way from Jaffa through Ramla to Abu-Gosh. For a concise account of Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem, see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 90–99. 229 On the colonialist point of view, see Yehoshua Ben-Arieh, “Perceptions and Images of the Holy Land,” in The Land That Became Israel: Studies in Historical Geography, ed. Ruth Kark (New Haven: Yale University Press; Jerusalem: Magnes, 1989), 37–53; Edward W. Said, Orientalism (New York: Pantheon Books, 1978); Edmund Bosworth, “The Land of Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period as Mirrored in Western Guide Books,” Bulletin (British Society for Middle Eastern Studies) 13/1 (1986), 36–44; Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 115–120, noting the deeply religious perception intermingled with an Orientalist perspective, as in the accounts of Crown Prince Rudolf, Father Angelus Stummer (who led a mass pilgrimage from Tyrol), Mark Twain, and the painter Edward Lear; see Faehndrich, “A Map,” 51–54, 56–58, on Charles William Meredith van de Velde’s views; Issam Nassar, Photographing Jerusalem: The Image of the City in Nineteenth Century Photography, East European Monographs 482 (Boulder, CO: East European Monographs, 1997); Bar and Cohen-Hattab, “A New Kind of Pilgrimage,” 131–148. 230 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, I, 108, letter of 9 November. 231 Ibid., 108; see also below, chap. 9, Narratives and Homages, esp. pp. 349–358.

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enced this liminal ritual that marked the passage from the mundane, material, world of daily life to a sacred space. Awe of the sacred, expectancy of heavenly blessings, and at last the view of the longed-for Holy City that had only been imagined till then all blended to evoke intense feelings, turning the moment into an ecstatic experience. “I shall never forget this moment,”232 he confided to his consort. This emotional account stands in contrast to the emperor’s well-known selfrestraint, which was a main characteristic of his personality. The press did not forgo the political aspect of this pious ceremony: in the retelling of the events, Austrian newspapers had to rely on information from the official reporter, which led many of them to use the same wording to describe the event itself, including a reference to the medieval Crusades and, from the Christian perspective, the liberation of the Holy City: “His Majesty got off his horse and kissed the ground devoutly, like Godfrey of Bouillon once did, to serve the highest Lord in reverence. Nobody could witness this simple and yet so poignant gesture without being deeply moved by it.”233 Already in Jerusalem, Franz Joseph added that “it struck us all how everything, especially the Mount of Olives and the Jehoshaphat Valley, seemed to be just like one imagined them from one’s childhood stories and lessons on the Bible.”234 Franz Joseph’s account testifies that such perceptions were shaped already in childhood when listening to biblical narratives, legends, stories, and songs, and although he does not mention them—most probably also when looking at visual images.235 Unlike his repeated emotional accounts at the sight of Christian holy places, his wonderment at the sight of exotic landscapes and peoples, and his pleasure at the many honors he received, the monarch referred to Jewish sites only briefly. This nearly total absence was “amended” later on by Yellin, regarding the affable and vivid interaction between Franz Joseph and his Jewish guide during his visit to the Jewish Quarter.236 The differences in approach are not accidental and will be discussed below.

232 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, I, 108. 233 Kronegger, “Imperial Pilgrimage,” 128–129, with references to periodicals in note 42. 234 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, I, 111–112. 235 It is interesting to read Franz Joseph’s and contemporary pilgrims’ perceptions and feelings when reaching Jerusalemite holy places, considering Simon Schama’s Landscape and Memory (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995), 6, for example, on the highly embellished frame through which a child, all the more so an adult, could perceive a venerated landscape. 236 See Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 8–17; see also below, esp. pp. 349–358.

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In his memoirs, Beda Dudík provided historical, geographic, and ethnographic information, as well as a sensitive description of the life of the local peoples, that might shed light on Franz Joseph’s attitude toward Jerusalem and his Old Yishuv subjects. For example, on the Western Wall, which he visited as part of Franz Joseph’s close entourage, he wrote: Every Friday the Jews of both sexes gather here to lament the fate of Zion. I recognize that the great pain shown here has deeply affected me. We reached this space through a very narrow and sloping alley; it is quite small and closed by a walled path. The two thousand-year-old stones, which the sun has painted with a yellow hue, bear Hebrew inscriptions. I saw a blind Jew, who was led by a young boy, passionately stretching his hands to the wall, pressing his face upon the stones, and imploring Jehovah with a mighty voice. Others sat on the ground dressed in a tallit, their black-striped prayer-coat. A number of women, leaning against the wall, wept bitterly; the women covered their heads with veils and wore head-bands with pearls, as in Galicia. It was a shattering scene! And the Jews must pay an annual tax to the Pasha of Jerusalem! Since the year 70 AD, the year of the destruction of their temple by Titus, the Jews weep and pray at this site for the restoration of the ancient temple and the ancient kingdom. This hopeless perseverance is as touching as it is tragic.237

Was Dudík’s sensitive perception of the members of the Old Yishuv common among Christian pilgrims and other visitors? A review of Christians’ depictions and photographs of Jews at the Western Wall reveals that they often emphasized wretchedness as the essential characteristic.238 This attitude was based on the Christian perception of the Jewish people as cursed because of Jesus’s death, and for not recognizing him as the Messiah and incarnate God. Accordingly, many Christian visitors reacted satisfactorily to sad situations while others, like Dudík, felt empathy and compassion. Following another path of interpretation, some Christian pilgrims and Orientalists viewed the Orthodox and Sephardi Jews in the Holy Land as genuine descendants of biblical figures, as testified, inter alia, by the account by Franz Joseph’s son, Crown Prince Rudolf, of his visit to the Holy Land as part of his journey to the Orient in 1881. On his visit to Bethlehem, Rudolf wrote: The people whom you can see on the roofs of their houses, on the narrow streets, and at the windows of the small houses are old biblical Jews; fantasy could not imagine them more real: big turbans, cloaks falling in many folds and colorful tops —the rich Jews in the clothes of the Pharisees, and the poor just as the people who listened to the message of the Savior on

237 Dudík, Kaiser-Reise, 220–221. 238 Lavi Shay, “Historical-Cultural Geography and Photography: Jerusalem’s Development as a Case Study, 1839–1948,” doctoral dissertation, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2011 (Hebrew), chap. 3, with a comprehensive study of photography of the Western Wall.

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the streets and in the squares. The facial type is also Hebrew: long, crooked nose, pale tan, black, or red curly beards ending in two tips, as is familiar from the pictures of Jesus Christ and the Apostles.239

Rudolf also noted that the women are especially remarkable: Clothed in wide, colorful garments and white veils draped to the heads falling in soft folds… pale skin and the most beautiful eyes, facial features and hair which can be imagined. I have never seen so many beautiful women as in Bethlehem... one beauty follows the other, the most lovely Mother-of-God types, just as you might imagine the most impressive women of the New Testament... these women walk here in flesh and blood.240

In the imperial milieu, the romantic perception of the Orient and colonialism went hand in hand with religious thought and imagination, as well as political interests. Franz Joseph’s expectations and emotions at the sight of Jerusalem, the surrounding landscapes and holy places, including also those venerated by Jews, as well as Crown Prince Rudolf’s thoughts and feelings, strongly suggest that the images decorating the objects presented to the emperor-king by his Jerusalemite Jewish subjects would certainly be meaningful to him, his court, and his deeply religious peoples. Being devout himself, Franz Joseph saw the holy places of Jerusalem not only with his physical eyes but through his heart and soul. This was a spiritual landscape saturated with testimonies to the truth of the Bible and Christian traditions, and the monarch focused on what he expected to see—the “real Jerusalem” encoded in memories built on descriptions in the Bible, sermons, legends, and the visual arts, rather than the real city in the hands of “heretics,” decaying for hundreds of years: the biblical past and the present merged, and the imagined Jerusalem was perceived as real. Karl, his heir, did not visit Jerusalem. Evidence of his attitude toward the city is scarce, and refers mainly to his wish to strengthen the presence and influence of his House in the cradle of Christianity: he aimed to institute a Habsburg protectorate of Catholics in the Near East in the context of the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century Peaceful Crusades and the opportunities provided by the military alliance with Turkey.

239 Kronprinz Rudolf von Österreich, Eine Orientreise vom Jahre 1881, ed. Leo Leitner (Salzburg: Residenz, 1994), 96; see also the differentiation between local Arabs and Jews as representatives of the Jews of biblical times, influenced by prejudices and antisemitism, in Maggiolini, “Images, Views, and Landscapes,” esp. 33–37. 240 Kronprinz Rudolf von Österreich, Eine Orientreise vom Jahre 1881, 96.

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3.3 Jerusalem as the Site of Encounter between the Old Yishuv and the Monarchs Religious memory is built upon traditions going back to events often said to have happened in a specific location in the far past. Familiarity with a site facilitates the reconstruction of an event. However, since in most cases a long time separates the present believer and the event, familiarity with an event and site may be achieved through the testimony of earlier witnesses. From the moment that memories are attached to sites, notes Maurice Halbwachs, these sites are transformed, the more so when the memories refer not to ordinary historical events but to supernatural phenomena. The pilgrim who arrives at a site feels a tangible certainty that places part of the past in the present: it can be seen and touched; he is in direct contact with it.241 In the ongoing process of consolidating a collective identity, nations, groups, and communities look to the past and bring forth memories of their history, culture, and traditions; they treasure some of them and construct, reconstruct, or deconstruct others; in the aim of creating new memories, they appropriate sites, monuments, images, and traditions, and push unwanted ones into oblivion.242 Representations and stereotypes of the landscape, despite often demonstrably false and superficial, have considerable power to mobilize political passions. Therefore, William J. T. Mitchell remarks, it is essential to ask “Whose myths? Whose memories? What was erased, rendered invisible in order that this landscape might present the face it does? How does this face betray the signs of contestation and struggle between rival myths, disparate memories?”243 Moreover, Gérôme Truc, based on Halbwachs, notes that what memory does to places and what places do to memory are two inseparable facets of the same discourse.244 Collective remembrances endure when they are connected to a place in space and

241 See Maurice Halbwachs, La topographie légendaire des évangiles en Terre Sainte–étude de mémoire collective (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 1941; revised 1971), 1–2; and below, the closing remarks in this study. 242 On the relationship between memory and history, see Pierre Nora, “Entre mémoire et histoire: La probématique des lieux,” in Les lieux de mémoire, I: La république, ed. Pierre Nora (Paris: Gallimard, 1984) 25–42, esp. 24–25; idem, “Between Memory and History: Les Lieux de Mémoire,” Representations 26 (1989), 7–24, esp. 8–13. I extend my examination to relationships between memory, history, narratives, identity, and power. 243 William J. T. Mitchell, “Holy Landscape: Israel, Palestine, and the American Wilderness,” Critical Inquiry 26/2 (2000), 196. 244 Gérôme Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory: For a Halbwachsian Socio-Ethnography of Collective Memory,” International Social Science Journal 62/203–204 (2011), 148, referring to Maurice Halbwachs, La topographie légendaire.

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to a symbol of spiritual significance that is imposed on the physical reality.245 Building on such posits, Truc adds that “while our memory might be pure invention… if it can be precisely located and commemorated in a place, the place itself is real…. Contrarily, if the memory is not related to a place, it may be thought of as untrue and even forgotten.”246 Sites necessarily change with time, thus, the memory of those who remain nearby can persist only if it evolves following the changes to the place. Conversely, “those who are not aware of these changes and retain a fixed image of the place they remember, make a symbolic representation of it…. It is almost certainly the stability of the image that explains the persistence of the beliefs.”247 As will be shown, these insights are clearly proved by the decoration of the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to Franz Joseph and Karl. Taking care of the holy places in the Land of Israel, and praying there, keep alive historical and religious memories and traditions essential for the construction of a collective memory of the Old Yishuv. Traditions and rituals transform a real or imagined past by endowing it with a dimension of eternity. It seems that deeply religious people who chose to live in Jerusalem were intuitively aware that memories based either on real or constructed events, but with no place to anchor them, would sooner or later be lost. As may be seen from the many religious and political appropriations of sacralized spaces in Jerusalem by competing cultures and societies, the idea of permanence and unity of space is illusory. The imagery of these gifts, as mental representations of venerated sites, played an important role in memory and ways of thinking, and the gifts (as a whole) evoke the issue of the colonialist view vs. the dual self-perception of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects as representing both Central and Eastern European Jews in the Levant and selfchosen othering.

3.4 The Holy Places as Identity Markers of the Old Yishuv The heads of the Old Yishuv and artists in its service were aware of the potential of visual imagery of venerated sites to maximize one’s emotional bond to them and to the events and ideologies that they embody. Indeed, images of holy places in Jerusalem rooted in the biblical past were, and still are, widely used as identity markers by diverse local religious, political, and social entities in different contexts; the sites and their images contribute toward shaping identities, and anchor245 Idem, On Collective Memory, ed., trans. and introduced by Lewis A. Coser (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 203–205; Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 148–149. 246 Ibid., 148. 247 Ibid., 149, explaining Halbwachs, La topographie légendaire, 129.

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ing memories and one’s sense of belonging. Consequently, these images became prominent in the decoration of myriad cultic and everyday objects, books, itineraries, and souvenirs representative of the Old Yishuv. The images on representative objects also functioned as a reminder to Diaspora Jews to support those who, despite all the hardships, chose a pious life in the Holy Land to take care of the holy places, and to pray and study the Hebrew Scriptures and Jewish laws for the benefit of all Israel. Their endeavor would be perceived, inter alia, in the spirit of the already noted Psalm 122:6: “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee” or “If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning,” as stated in Psalm 137:5. Therefore, in an attempt to give tangible expression to the spiritual gains provided to the Jewish collective by their pious deeds, and appreciation to their brethren in the Diaspora for the material support, Old Yishuv emissaries in charge of collecting donations often sold or presented gifts of books and cultic objects such as Hannukah lamps, Passover bowls, Shiviti plaques, Shabbat candle holders, wine cups, and bread covers decorated with images of venerated sites.248 These highly appreciated objects became part of the implements of a traditional Jewish household. Naturally, the Jerusalem kolelim adopted these images as markers of their unique identity as well as for the decoration of epistles, congratulatory addresses, and gifts presented to the monarchs of their native homelands and other benefactors.

3.5 Old Yishuv Icons of Jerusalem: Identities and Space Constructions What role did the visual culture play in the creation of the identity of the space and people of Jerusalem? How does the artist’s perspective of the space, whether real or imagined, allow us to understand this process? And how did artists integrate real elements and exotic fantasies into the religious, political, and national narratives?

248 A Shiviti is a decorative plaque inscribed with the biblical verse “I have set the Lord always before me” (Psalm 16:8), generally placed on the eastern wall of synagogues as a reminder of God’s presence and as a means to induce a meditative frame of mind. On the variety of objects manufactured by Old Yishuv craftsmen, see Itzhak Einhorn, “Sacred and Secular Objects: Their Motifs, Sources, and Purpose,” in Arts and Crafts in Eretz-Israel in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Yona Fischer (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1979), 17–71 (Hebrew); Dov Genachowski, “Pictures of Holy Places as a Fundraising Aid,” in Offerings from Jerusalem: Portrayals of Holy Places by Jewish Artists, ed. Rachel Sarfati (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 2002), 35–36. See also Bartal (“A Center in the Margins,” 64–65), who remarks that these practices were a means to refute the perceptions of the Old Yishuv emissaries as beggars.

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The holy places of Jerusalem and their images are perceived, constructed, and reconstructed based on narratives of sacredness and profanity, ancient past and eschatological future, myths and a variety of perceptions of reality. Significantly, as the reminiscences of Franz Joseph and of Crown Prince Rudolf exemplify, the images of the “real Holy Land,” and particularly those of the “real Holy City,” were those described in texts and visual representations rather than the land, sites, towns, and peoples that an artless beholder could witness through his own eyes. Moreover, it can be said that when confronted with discrepancies between myth and reality, many tried to impose their religious, political, or cultural frameworks of narratives on the dissonant experiences.249 Not every believer can make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and contemplate the holy places with his own eyes, but visual images can effectively construct memories and illusions that the ancient sites continue to exist.250 When achieving a relative stability and continuity in time and space, the spatial image gives an illusion that the site has not changed through time and may bring the past into the present.251 Moreover, the mental vision may depend on how the individual experienced it. The question is, what accounts for the relative stability and endurance of such images, even if illusionary, and what is their power? By a well thought-out or intuitive process, the Old Yishuv represented biblical sites as existing in silent perfection, as if no time had passed at all. As a site of eternal holiness, the Holy Land was ascribed a unique fundamental and timeless essence. Events that took place in the biblical past were thought of as constantly present, despite the passage of at least three thousand years; moreover, in the minds and hearts of believers, the landscape, monuments, people, traditions, and customs had miraculously remained unchanged, detached from history and time. In the images created by Old Yishuv artists, no unseemly element mars the spiritual beauty of the site or disrupts the emotive stillness of the moment; in these imagined spaces holiness is immanent, and the absence of figures may allude to the presence of God. Thus, the timeless images link the biblical past, the present, and the long-awaited ideal future, and stand out as a means of creating a collective religious and cultural memory that could be enriched over time. When recalling their experiences and feelings, believers leave out details and, with the passage of time, these feelings can be invoked by schematic images of these extraordinary sites. Moreover, the endless repetition of the images in a concise and schematic visual language transforms them into icons that can be im249 Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, chap. 5, 109–121. 250 Maurice Halbwachs, The Collective Memory (New York: Harper & Row, 1980), 13–15 (“Space and the Collective Memory”). 251 Ibid., 15.

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printed more easily in the faithful’s memory. Icons of places of Jerusalem venerated by Jews awaken in the Jewish faithful a longing and yearning for the Promised Land, which they believe will be rebuilt in the imminent redemption. Therefore, these icons played an active role in the creation and diffusion of the Old Yishuv’s ideology, which naturally involved the construction of a self-image bound to them. Our examples demonstrate that cultural structures and emotional states should be considered essential factors in the experience and contextualization of sites and their images. The character of these factors is particular to the individual beholder as well as to a collective, and, as noted, is also subject to change. Based on Erik Cohen, who examined the ways in which a site is perceived as part of one’s journey of self-exploration, Kobi Cohen-Hattab and Ayelet Kohn posit that, much like the experience at particular sites, the embodiment of these sites in artifacts is part of the experience of self-discovery. Cohen-Hattab and Kohn show that “when we interpret souvenirs or objects as products of human activity, and not as static bearers of fixed meaning, we have a more subtle paradigm—souvenirs preserve, evoke, and engage with a site’s unique ideological dimensions with each new glance.”252 To better appreciate the singularity and role of icons of holy places in the visual culture of the Old Yishuv, we may compare them to images created by Western artists at the time. Romantic aesthetics of Western pilgrims, tourists and Orientalist painters described small towns with crowded houses, domes, minarets, bell towers, sparse vegetation, unpaved roads and scattered ancient ruins, small figures in colorful Oriental garments, camels, and date palms, bathed in a bright light. These images elicited a sense of awe and wonderment as reflections of a magnificent but long-lost past—a theme so prevalent at the time that it engendered distinct genres of art, design, literature, music, theater, and dance.253 Moreover, the exotic elements in the illusionistic images confirmed the authenticity of the biblical stories in a romantic spirit as evidenced, inter alia, in Crown Prince Rudolf’s memoirs. In another early strategy, artists depicted Jerusalem in the image of their own surroundings and local styles.254 In contrast, works created in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by Jerusalemite Jewish artists and craftsmen, or by other artists for Jewish clients, de-

252 Cohen-Hattab and Kohn, “Nationalization of Holy Sites,” 67–68, note 4, referring to Erik Cohen, “Who Is a Tourist? A Conceptual Clarification,” Sociological Review 22/4 (1974), 527–555. Significantly, their conclusions remain aligned with those of my first study of these gifts; see Arad, “His Beauty Your Eyes Shall See,” 133–166. 253 To refer to but one source related to the Holy Land, see Siberry, New Crusaders, chaps. 7–11. 254 In our context, see discussion below, chap. 6.

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pict venerated sites as simple, flat images, or as a combination of elevations set at angles to one another that suggest some depth and three-dimensionality, or as a combination of simple plans seen from above (a bird’s eye view) and elevations of the monuments. The images may intend to represent an actual holy place by showing some elements that call the site to mind, or they may just evoke a generic scheme of a sacred building. Among the most important sources for images of the Jewish holy places are the schematic, flat, decorative illustrations in Yihus ha’Avot (Genealogy of the Patriarchs), a work treating the tombs of the righteous in the Land of Israel that was probably written in the late fifteenth century and illustrated in the sixteenth. Another influential source is itineraries from Italy that since the sixteenth century reached the Ottoman empire, including Jerusalem; from that time on, these itineraries were also produced in the Land of Israel/Palestine, and exhibit venerated sites in this land and in neighboring countries that both Jewish and Christian pilgrims should visit.255 More important in our context are the mid-nineteenth-century lithographs by the Jerusalemite geographer Rabbi Yehosef Schwarz (1804–1865), that spread the traditional Jewish schemes within the Old Yishuv milieu and abroad.256 The earliest lithograph, dated to 1836/37, depicts the Temple Mount, a view of the Holy City from the north and another from the south, and David’s Tower from inside the Old City and from outside the city wall (fig. 4).257 This lithograph appeared in Schwarz’s book Tevuot Ha’aretz (The Harvests of the Land), which is the second part of his Sefer Divrei Yosef—the first Jewish study on the geography, geology,

255 Rachel Sarfati, “The Illustrations of Yihus ha’Avot: Folk Art from the Holy Land,” in Offerings from Jerusalem: Portrayals of Holy Places by Jewish Artists, ed. Rachel Sarfati (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 2002), 19–22; for two sixteenth century pilgrimage scrolls from Palestine kept in the National Library of Israel, Ms. Heb. 8° 1187 and Heb. 8° 6947 from Safed, and the Benayahu sheet dated 1549/50, now in the Meir Benayahu Library in Jerusalem, see Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 229–233, 238–241, 248–250; for several nineteenth-century examples of such images, see ibid., chap. 14. 256 The German-born Rabbi Schwarz immigrated to Palestine/Land of Israel in 1833, became a main researcher of its geography and history, and was one of the heads of the Holland and Germany kolel. 257 The lithograph was made in Hürben, Germany, 1836/37. See Jerusalem, The Israel Museum 177/102, Feuchtwanger Collection, purchased and donated by Baruch and Ruth Rappaport, Geneva; and Sarfati, “Illustrations of Yihus ha’Avot,” fig. 5. A corrected version of this lithograph appears in the English translation of Schwarz’s book: Joseph Schwarz, A Descriptive Geography and Brief Historical Sketch of Palestine (New York: Hermon, 1969). See Haviva Peled, “Seven Artists,” in Arts and Crafts in Eretz-Israel in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Yona Fischer (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1979), 111–116, with a few errors. For a clear example of its influence in Austro-Galicia and Romania, see Ilia Rodov, “‘With Eyes toward Zion:’ Visions of the Holy Land in Romanian Synagogues,” Quest 6 (December 2013), 147, fig. 8.

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Fig. 4: Yehosef Schwartz, “Jerusalem.” Lithograph, 1837. Jerusalem, The Israel Museum, The Feuchtwanger Collection, purchased and donated by Baruch and Ruth Rappaport, Geneva, HF 0492, 177/102.

and chronology of the Land of Israel, which was first published in Jerusalem in 1845. The book includes maps and schematic drawings of holy places in the Land of Israel—images that became icons of the sites and the commemorative monuments that honor them. The book had three more revised editions, and was translated into English in 1850 and into German in 1852.258 A second lithograph by Schwarz, dated to 1842, depicts the Temple Mount and other holy places.259 The inscription at the top of this lithograph asserts the meaning of these sites for Jews:

258 The Hebrew original was printed by Israel Beck and the early 1900 editions by Abraham Moshe Lunz. The English version, A Descriptive Geography and Brief Historical Sketch of Palestine, was translated by Isaac Leeser and published in Philadelphia by A. Hart in 1850, and the German version, translated by Israel Schwarz, appeared under the title Das Heilige Land: Nach seiner ehemaligen und jetzigen geographischen Beschaffenheit (Frankfurt am Main: I. Kaufmann, 1852). 259 For the 1842 lithograph, see National Library of Israel, Jerusalem (former Jewish National and University Library), Prints and Drawings Collection V 1090/1. For a detailed analysis of the images of the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque as the Temple and Solomon’s School/

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“Drawings of the Holy Land and all its holy places for the lovers and seekers of Zion and Jerusalem, and whoever mourns its destruction will be rewarded and see it rebuilt.”260 Schwarz incorporated into his drawings his observations as well as traditional concepts and sources and, as a result, greatly influenced artists and craftsmen of the Old Yishuv, including those who created the objects presented to Franz Joseph and Karl I/IV. The contrasting iconographic guidelines of local Jewish craftsmen, on the one hand, and Western Orientalist and romantic artists, on the other, may be illustrated by comparing the depiction of Rachel’s Tomb in the 1842 lithograph by Yehosef Schwarz to the lithograph of this monument created by William H. Bartlett around the same time, in 1844 (fig. 5):261 unlike Schwarz, who created a very schematic image, Bartlett sought to portray the picturesque and the sublime, and included small Oriental figures of a veiled woman riding on a camel led by a man, and other local figures. In a similar fashion, Johann Friedrich Perlberg (1848– 1921), a German painter known for his depictions of Middle Eastern sites and cities, who in 1898 was part of the entourage of Kaiser Wilhelm II’s Peaceful Crusade to Jerusalem, created a series of postcards especially for that occasion. In his scene of Rachel’s Tomb, he highlights architectural elements of the monument and stages small local figures in various typical garments, some sitting on the ground in the Oriental manner, one standing beside his donkey, and others in leisure conversation.262 Perlberg’s drawings, rich in Oriental motifs, attest to the popularity of the Orientalist perception in the West at the turn of the century and later. Another contrast to fashionable Western visual interpretations may be exemplified by comparing the composite image of the Dome of the Rock as the

Midrash Shlomo in Jewish art, and specifically in the Land of Israel from the sixteenth to the eighteenth century, see Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, esp. chaps. 12 and 13. 260 See “Whoever mourns Jerusalem merits and sees her joy, and whoever does not mourn Jerusalem does not see her joy,” in Tanna d’Bei Eliyahu Rabba, 18; Bavli, Ta‘anit 30b; Bava Bathra 60b. 261 Rachel’s Tomb was venerated by Jews since the Middle Ages. It underwent several reconstructions and renovations until the early 1840s, when Sir Moses Montefiore acquired a permit from the Turkish authorities to repair and expand it, and to build an antechamber in the east with a mihrab for Muslim prayer—the monument known until today. See Cohen-Hattab and Kohn, “Nationalization of Holy Sites,” 73–74; and below. Yehosef Schwarz depicted Rachel’s Tomb before the restoration and the addition of the anteroom by Montefiore, whereas Bartlett depicted the renovated and enlarged monument. For Bartlett’s engraving see his Walks About the City and Environs of Jerusalem [2nd ed.] (London: Hall, Virtue & Co, 1846), between pp. 204–205. For the artist, see Yehoshua Ben-Arieh, Painting the Holy Land in the Nineteenth Century (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1997), 78–95. 262 Yoel Amir, The Orientalists – Postcards of the Holy Land, 1880–1935: From the Collection of Yoel Amir, ed. Gail Aricha (Tel Aviv: Eretz-Israel Museum, 2008), fig. on p. 77.

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Fig. 5: William H. Bartlett, “Rachel’s Tomb,” 1844 (Bartlett, Walks About the City and Environs of Jerusalem, fig. between pp. 204–205).

Temple, the Western Wall, and the Al-Aqsa Mosque as Solomon’s School (Midrash Shlomo)263 in the same lithograph by Schwarz, to the “View of Jerusalem with the Dome of the Holy Rock” painted by Carl Friedrich Werner in 1864, who introduced Oriental elements into the academic Classicist style.264 Our last example is an 1847 engraving titled “Tombs in the Valley of Jehoshaphat” by Edward Brandard,

263 In the late fifteenth century, Jewish art adopted the Dome of the Rock as an image of the Jewish Temple or of the Site of the Temple, and the Al-Aqsa Mosque as Solomon’s School, following the appropriation and Christianization of these shrines by the Crusaders, who associated them with King Solomon and gave them new roles and names, such as Templum Domini and Templum Solomonis, respectively. See Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 257. A symbolic image of the sacred sites of the Temple Mount—Bet Ha’mikdash (The Temple) to the left and Midrash Shlomo (Solomon’s School) to the right, with the Kotel Ha’maaravi (the Western Wall) in the span between them, became very popular in Jewish art in the nineteenth century. See Yona Fischer, “The Art of the Nineteenth Century: Its Creation and Characteristics,” in Arts and Crafts in Eretz-Israel in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Yona Fischer (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1979), 98–100; and below. These identifications of the monuments appear in the Land of Israel/Palestine in the second half of the sixteenth century, in a text written by the influential Safed rabbi Ha’Radbaz as well as in a pilgrimage scroll from Safed; see Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 232, 238–239. 264 Ben-Arieh, Painting the Holy Land, 182–183, fig. 94.

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based on a drawing by Bartlett that presents similar romantic Oriental features— proportions that enhance the monuments and the landscape, the same slightly ruined look of the monuments, the bright light falling on them, stereotypical Oriental figures, etc.265 Bartlett, Werner, and Perlberg visited the Holy Land and created their works from drawings made in situ, but they reworked them to suit current interests and trends in the West. As our examples show, these trends differed greatly from the rationale behind the perceptions of local space in the Old Yishuv and the symbolic and simplified visual language that it favored. The objects decorated with images of holy places created by or for Old Yishuv communities express values and ideas about an ideal past, whose revival and flourishing anew would be realized by a life of prayer and religious study in the Holy Land. This is certainly true regarding the representative objects offered by the Austro-Galician and the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolelim, who placed great hope in their reception by the two Austro-Hungarian monarchs. At the same time, the special design and meaning of the gifts expressed socio-cultural values and norms, and reinforced a cohesive collective identity of the Habsburg kolelim that shared many common interests and aims.

The Pictorial Space and Imagery The semiotic system behind representative artifacts, presented by Habsburg Jerusalemite Jews, is based on the subtleties in the symbolic meaning of the visual and literary imagery that intensify their intellectual and emotional impact. All but one of the extant epistles and dedications to Franz Joseph and Karl, enhanced by figurative decoration, are organized in a gate of honor or a gate-like frame. Since antiquity, the gate has celebrated a triumphant king and also symbolized the Gate of Heaven, creating a bridge between man and God in His abode. The text layout, and not only its contents, is carefully planned: key words, including the name and title of the monarch, appear in larger characters usually enhanced in royal colors—gold, silver, or purple—placed on compositional axes that are often related to the visual imagery; in addition, traditional Hebrew calligraphy has a special place, in the belief that it endows the text with an aura of authority when compared with Western styles, such as the Secessionist typography that was fashionable in Vienna at the time. Venerated sites decorate not only most Old Yishuv representative objects, be they cultic objects or souvenirs: they also endow meaning to the seals of Jewish

265 See Ora Limor, “Placing an Idea: The Valley of Jehoshaphat in Religious Imagination,” in Between Jerusalem and Europe: Essays in Honour of Bianca Kühnel (Leiden: Brill, 2015), 282, fig. 14.1.

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institutions. The holy place most often represented is the Western Wall, usually flanked by the Dome of the Rock representing the Site of the Temple, and the AlAqsa Mosque as Solomon’s School—an image that has been attributed an eschatological meaning, especially when cypresses rise behind the wall. Cypress trees not only grew on the Temple Mount, but in Jewish tradition they are identified with the cedars of Lebanon, which were used by Solomon to build the Temple (1 Kings 5:6–10), and with the shittim (possibly acacia) used by Bezalel Ben-Uri to build the Tabernacle and its most sacred furniture—the Ark of the Covenant (Exodus 25:10, 13; 37:1, 4), the incense altar (Exodus 27:1, 6; 37:10, 25, 28), and the shewbread table (Exodus 25:23–30), all of which were overlaid with pure gold. The symbolic image of the Western Wall with cypresses behind it, flanked by the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School, conveyed the hope that the Temple would be rebuilt and re-established in the beholders’ lifetime. Moreover, as noted, it was attributed protective powers.266 When we reflect on how Jewish symbolism could serve as a shared cultural platform, it is important to consider the historical background of the Jewish tradition that allowed for the depiction of the Dome of the Rock as the Site of the Temple, and the Temple itself. Already in the Crusader period, the Jerusalemite prelate and chronicler William of Tyre (and other writers) wrote in his Historia (a chronicle of the Crusades written between 1170 and 1184) that King Solomon built the Temple and Umar ibn Al-Khattāb rebuilt it.267 The appropriation of the Umayyad monument as the Temple is visually attested, inter alia, by medieval maps of Crusader Jerusalem that identify it as the Templum Domini.268 As for the builder of the Muslim monument, historians confused the Rashidun Caliph Umar ibn Al-Khattāb, who conquered Jerusalem for Islam in the year 637/8 and probably built a mosque on the south of the Temple Mount,269 with the Umayyad Caliph Abd alMalik ibn Marwan, who built the Dome of the Rock in 691/2. Consequently, these writers mistakenly called it the Mosque of Umar. Not only was the monument wrongly attributed to Umar, it is not a mosque but a memorial shrine. What is more, some medieval Jewish writers transformed the Muslim tradition, according

266 On this perception of the Muslim monuments, see Yona Fischer, “Art of the Nineteenth Century,” 98–100. 267 William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea [Historia rerum in partibus transmarinis gestarum], II, transl. Emily Atwater Babcock and August C. Krey (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), Book XX, Part 3; see also Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, esp. chap. 5 and pp. 174–175. 268 Milka Levy-Rubin, “The Crusader Maps of Jerusalem,” in Knights of the Holy Land. The Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, ed. Silvia Rozenberg (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1999), 230–237. 269 Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 31–32.

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to which an old Jew revealed to Umar the Site of the Temple, by adding that the “Muslim king” built there a beautiful temple, meaning the Dome of the Rock, where only Jews would pray.270 Collective memories may have allowed this to happen; influenced by Christian traditions that saw in the Dome of the Rock the Templum Domini, already in the mid-fifteenth century, and mainly from the sixteenth century on, this monument represented the Temple in Jewish visual arts.271 In addition, in the sixteenth century the Al-Aqsa Mosque, considered in Christian tradition to be the Templum Solomonis, was labeled in Jewish tradition Midrash Shlomo, Solomon’s School. In the eighteenth century, the image of these two monuments and the Western Wall in the space between them became a Jewish icon, and in the nineteenth century the venerated wall in this icon was labeled in Jewish art Ha’kotel Ha’maaravi, i.e., The Western Wall—a late holy place. The composite image became a pictorial synonym of the Temple Mount and a quintessential symbol of Jerusalem. Not surprisingly, it was chosen by many Jewish insti-

270 Ibid., 202–203, quotes Petachia (Pethahiah) of Regensburg (pseudonym), Travels of Rabbi Petachia (London: Trubner & Co., 1856), 61. Petachia visited Jerusalem a short time before Saladin recaptured it for the Muslims in 1187. The rabbi tells us the now-familiar story that was passed down to him while he was in Jerusalem, that in earlier times an old man had said he knew the location of the Temple and the court: “Then the [Muslim] king urged him [the old man] until he pointed it out. The king was a friend of the Jews, and said, ‘I will build here a Temple and none but Jews shall pray therein.’ He built the temple of marble stones, a beautiful structure consisting of red, green, and variegated marble.” See also Ben-Zion Dinburg (Dinur), “Bet Tefillah and Bet Midrash for Jews on the Temple Mount in the Arab Period,” Zion 3 (1928), 54–87, especially conclusions in p. 87 (Hebrew). Dinburg cites various narratives by medieval rabbis on the existence of a prayerhouse and school (Beth midrash) on the Temple Mount that were built in the early Muslim period and destroyed by the Crusaders. During the period of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, and from the late thirteenth to mid-nineteenth centuries, the Temple Mount was, for the most part, offlimits to Jews. For Jewish legends on the Temple and the Temple Mount, see Livingston, “Jewish Connection,” 7–19; Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, esp. chaps. 2, 7, 9–11. For the site of the Temple, see Kalimi, “Land of Moriah,” 345–362. 271 According to Shalom Sabar, its first-known appearance in Jewish art is in the Frankfurt Mishneh Torah; see his “Messianic Aspirations and Renaissance Urban Ideals: The Image of Jerusalem in the Venice Haggadah, 1609,” in The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian and Islamic Art: Studies in Honor of Bezalel Narkiss on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, ed. Bianca Kühnel (Jerusalem: Journal of the Center for Jewish Art, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1998), 301–303; Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 207–212, fig. 11.1. In the sixteenth century it appeared in a commentary on the Book of Esther printed in Safed, as well as in Jewish pilgrimage guides, adds Berger (ibid., 215–216, 225, 231). Sabar notes that Jewish artists used the image of the Dome of the Rock up to the late 1920s as a symbolic representation of the messianic Temple at the End of Days; Sabar, “Messianic Aspirations,” 303, 306–312, and Pamela Berger, ibid., 217–222, 317.

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tutions, including the Habsburg kolelim, to add meaning to their identifying seal.272 Other sacred sites that often appear in the visual arts of the Old Yishuv, including the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim to Franz Joseph and Karl, are Zion in the image of the citadel that commands the Old City of Jerusalem from the west and highlights the iconic minaret called the Tower of David; David’s Tomb (a row of domes and a minaret rising behind the city wall);273 Rachel’s Tomb (a small domed cubic room with an anteroom added in the early 1840s by Sir Moses Montefiore); and three of the monumental rock-cut tombs from the Second Temple period in the Kidron Valley, which is also known as the Valley of Jehoshaphat. The latter toponym conveys its significance, “God will judge,” based on the prophecy of Joel (3:1–2, 12), in which God will gather all nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat. There He will enter into judgment with them. These beliefs are supported by the prophecies of Zechariah (14:3–4) and Ezekiel (43:2), that from the Mount of Olives the Divine Presence would return to the Temple Mount to judge His people. The geographical proximity between the Valley of Jehoshaphat and the Valley of Hinnom (in Hebrew Gei Hinnom, a name related to Gehenna or Gehinnom) that was deemed to be cursed as the abode of condemned souls (Jeremiah 7:31, 19:2–6, 14), allowed the tradition in exegetical texts to relate the place of the resurrection, judgment, and punishment of the wicked to move between the two valleys, with the Valley of Hinnom considered to be the entrance to Hell.274 The three tombs depicted in the gifts are traditionally identified as the Tomb of Zechariah, Absalom’s Tomb, and “Beth Ha’hofshit” (House of the Free), the latter known since 1865 as the Tomb of Bnei Hezir (the Sons of Hezir), following the discovery of an inscription on its architrave.275 Therefore, the importance

272 An interesting example is the seal of the Kolel Ha’Ivrim, led by the Ultra-Orthodox proto-Zionist Yosef Schlesinger, who immigrated to Palestine from Hungary. The seal, designed ca. 1875– 76, visually expresses the community’s ideology. It includes brief references to numerous biblical and rabbinical citations, in addition to a unique element that does not appear in contemporary seals—against the background of the Western Wall, to the left, is a rampant lion holding a Star of David in his raised right paw. The lion represents Ariel, a poetic name for Jerusalem; see Silber, “Alliance of the Hebrews,” 119–147, fig. 1. 273 See Ora Limor, “The Origins of a Tradition: King David’s Tomb on Mount Zion,” Traditio 44 (1988), 453–462. 274 The Jews of Jerusalem fell into idolatry and built altars to the Canaanite god there, and because of the sins committed in that site, it became known as the place of punishment of the wicked; see Limor (“Placing an Idea,” 283–287), quoting, inter alia, Bavli, Eruvin 19a. 275 The Kidron, or Jehoshaphat Valley, with its monuments from the Second Temple period, was part of the Jewish cemetery of Jerusalem in the nineteenth century. Many of the tombs were used for generations, and it was considered a great privilege by Jews from both Palestine and the Dia-

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of the holy places in the construction of the overall collective identity of a community was essential, as it still is, in religious societies; significantly, these constructions were dynamic and changed with the tides of history. The simplified depiction of monuments in Jewish material culture reflects the religious perception of the holy places as preserving an inherent sanctity up to the present; this is the singular quality that stands behind their traditional function as sites of pilgrimage and prayer. However, judging by artifacts made by the only craftsman who signed more than one of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim, iconic images slightly vary even in works created by the same artist, meaning that there was more than one model.276 Moreover, since the late nineteenth century, some Jewish artists also depicted the monuments in more naturalistic landscapes. In these images, the sites kept their religious significance but acquired additional meanings that reflect the transformations of the collective identity of Jews between 1850 and 1918, including Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects and, most clearly, artists and students at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts who created the gifts presented by the two Habsburg kolelim to Karl I/IV on his coronation. Aware of the rich symbolism of the holy places, these artists recognized the religious and political value of the sites and their images in the formation of a modern Jewish national culture and a solid national identity, as well as their value as a tool for raising funds for their cause.277 Lastly, it should be noted that only two prominent

spora to be buried near them. We should note that the Tomb of Zechariah is not a tomb containing the bones of the dead, but a memorial; see Amos Kloner and Boaz Zissu, The Necropolis of Jerusalem in the Second Temple Period (Leuven and Dudley, MA: Peeters, 2007), with references to Jewish sources and a catalog in Part V, including the monuments discussed here. Also, Rachel Hachlili, Jewish Funerary Customs, Practices and Rites in the Second Temple Period, Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism, 94 (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 1–2, 30–36; Orit Peleg, “Artists and Their Works at the Necropolis of Second Temple Period Jerusalem,” Eretz-Israel 28 (2007), 184– 192 (Hebrew). For religious traditions on this valley, an examination of the architectural design of the tombs, their identification with Jewish and Christian personages, and the many legends woven around them, see discussion below, esp. the sub-chapter on the gifts to Franz Joseph on his Golden and Diamond Jubilees and that on the photograph album presented to Karl in 1916/17 by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel. 276 For example, Abraham Keller designed the scroll-cases for two, if not three, of the gifts presented to Franz Joseph—the 1898 olivewood case for the epistle presented by the Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem, the 1908 scroll-case for the Book of Esther sent by the Austro-Galician kolel, and most probably the scroll case for the Book of Esther sent by the same kolel in 1898, which I attribute to him (see discussion below). 277 On the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts and its founder, Boris Schatz, see Nurit Shilo-Cohen, “The ‘Hebrew Style’ of Bezalel, 1906–1929,” Journal of Decorative and Propaganda Arts 20 (1994), 140–163; eadem, ed., Bezalel 1906–1929 (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1983); Yigal Zalmona, A Century of Israeli Art, Israel Museum Catalogue, 592 (Farnham: Lund Humphries, 2013), chap. 2; Arieh

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sites, the Western Wall and Rachel’s Tomb, were recognized as Jewish holy places by the Ottoman authorities and, later, the British Mandate (1917–1948); these sites, in contrast to others such as the Cave of the Patriarchs and David’s Tomb, were placed in Jewish custody, a status that gave Jews the legal right to pray there.278

Bruce Saposnik, Becoming Hebrew: The Creation of a Jewish National Culture in Ottoman Palestine (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 2008), esp. 125–144, 161–163; Natalia Berger, The Jewish Museum: History and Memory, Identity and Art from Vienna to the Bezalel National Museum, Jerusalem, Jewish Identities in a Changing World, 29 (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2018), chaps. 10– 12; Margaret Olin, The Nation without Art: Examining Modern Discourses on Jewish Art (Lincoln, NE: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 127–156; see also below, esp. chaps. 5 and 10.5. 278 Cohen-Hattab and Kohn, “Nationalization of Holy Sites,” 66.

4 Historical Perspective: A Chronology of the Gifts to Franz Joseph Although not a gift but a petition, it is pertinent to discuss here the decoration of the epistles sent to Franz Joseph in 1854 by the Jerusalemite Perushim, asking to nominate Ignaz Deutsch collector and administrator of alms from Jews in the Austrian Empire. This early document, sent only two years after the authorization for the Viennese Jews to organize into a community, and only one year after the earliest-known gift sent to Franz Joseph by the Old Yishuv, contains the typical visual and textual features that will be seen in other decorated objects sent by Jerusalemite Habsburg subjects and may represent the beginnings of a tradition. The epistles, written and decorated by the prestigious artist Mordechai Schnitzer on two separate parchments, one in Hebrew and the other in German, were housed in a luxurious silver case whose whereabouts are unknown. The petition opens with the traditional Jewish prayer for the welfare of the king and his kingdom,279 and closes with the signatures of the heads of the kolel and the words of the pious and proud artist who wrote on the bottom margin: “This is the day for which we have longed, the work which we began we have completed, we have praised him for [our] glory. A painting executed by a craftsman, the maker of gifts received by His Highness the Emperor, Mordechai Schnitzer of Jerusalem.” As is well known, religious artists considered their work as a pious act facilitating the memory of their name and the redemption of their soul. The epistle written in Hebrew is decorated with an ornamental frame and written in various blocks and types of traditional calligraphy, whereas the epistle in German, the one the emperor would read (fig. 6), is organized in a delicate arched frame, drawn as if built and richly decorated in fine metal-work techniques—an artistic field in which Schnitzer excelled, as he did in stone and wood-

279 With a few differences in wording, the prayer for Franz Joseph reads: “Almighty God and Lord of the World! You who have chosen and called kings and princes, and have equipped them with all the gifts of your grace and gentleness, that they rule their people in wisdom and righteousness, practice law and justice, protect the peace of God on earth, and bring all mild gifts, each to his people and country—bestow your divine protection and assistance on our prince and lord, your anointed, the Emperor Franz Joseph the First, for whom we pray to you as loyal subjects for their master, as children pray for their father. Increase his days and crown him with victory, fame and glory. Bless all who are closest to his throne and heart, the Empress Elisabeth and all members of the sublime, glorious Habsburg dynasty. Amen!” See Tobias Kühn, “Kaiser Franz Joseph von Österreich: Wohltäter und Schutzpatron der Juden” (9 November, 2016). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-005

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Fig. 6: Mordechai Schnitzer, for the Old Yishuv Perushim. Epistle to Franz Joseph, 1854, the version in German. Jerusalem, The Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, AU-90-1.

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work as well. Iconic images of four holy places and Jewish symbols appear in the gate-like frame, whose design recalls Islamic art and architecture and into which Western elements are successfully integrated. The upper corners of the epistle, in the spandrels of the arched gate, feature the Western Wall and Mount Zion, and in the bottom corners, at the base of the columns—Rachel’s Tomb on the road to Bethlehem and the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, labeled with those precise words. The Tables of the Law appear in the upper part of the arch, which opened onto a background of golden rays of light.280 The Ten Commandments, represented by numbers, as well as the verses in the arched frame enclosing the tables, appear in gold: “Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined” (Psalm 50:2) and “Moses commanded us a law” (Deuteronomy 33:4). The delicate blackand-white linear drawing of the gate and the holy places in the corners of the gate-like frame binds the text and images into a whole; moreover, it highlights the image of the Tables of the Law, which, together with Franz Joseph’s name and title written in large letters, are the only elements painted in gold. The eclectic combination of Western and Oriental styles and motifs is prominent in the design of the gate, which stands on very slender columns and opens in a multilobed arch reminiscent of Islamic art; in contrast, the vine climbing around the columns creates the illusion of a twisted column and is reminiscent of Baroque “Solomonic columns,” often found in Torah shrines in Galicia and East-Central Europe, as well as in Palestine in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; indeed, the inscriptions on the abacus of the columns identify them as Jachin and Boaz, like the bronze columns on the façade of the Temple (1 Kings 7:21). Unlike his eclectic design of the gate, Schnitzer kept to the traditional local iconography for the depiction of the holy places, which, inter alia, featured the pictorial representations and topographic mapping of the Land of Israel by the geographer Rabbi Yehosef Schwarz. For example, the images of Mount Zion and the Temple Mount in the epistle closely recall those in Schwarz’s 1837 lithograph (fig. 4), and that of the Tomb of the Patriarchs is very close to the image in Schwarz’s 1842 lithograph. As noted, the complete monuments, their concise and schematic rendering, and multifocal perspective that makes it possible to depict angles of a view that otherwise would not be seen, as well as the absence of living creatures, are common to most of these images in cultic objects, amulets, household artifacts, and traditional souvenirs from the Old Yishuv. In the Deutsch epistle, all these features, as well as the black-and-white rendering and the location of 280 This motif is adopted from Torah Ark decoration; see Bracha Yaniv, “The Sun Rays on Top of the Torah Ark: A Dialogue with the Aureole, the Christian Symbol of the Divinity on Top of the Altarpiece,” in Interaction between Judaism and Christianity in History, Religion, Art and Literature, ed. Marcel Poorthuis, Joshua Schwartz, and Joseph Turner (Leiden: Brill, 2009), 477–494.

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the images of the holy places in the four corners of the pictorial space, distance them from the physical world. The Tables of the Law rendered in gold and their location in the composition further contribute to the spirituality of the whole. Thus, the iconography and style, as well as the message of this early epistle, provide a clear and meaningful anchor for comparison that will enable us to point to traditions and innovations in the decoration of dedications and epistles, which are an integral part of the gifts presented to Franz Joseph and Karl.

4.1 Early Gifts—Franz Joseph King of Jerusalem Among the earliest extant gifts that were presented to Franz Joseph by his Old Yishuv subjects, we should note a Dead Sea stone vase and plate admirably detailed in openwork by the master artist Mordechai Schnitzer in 1852 (fig. 7), which were sent by the Perushim in celebration of the monarch’s escape from an attempt on his life on 18 February, 1853.281 The gift-givers did their best to please the emperor. According to the Bohemian-German Rabbi Zacharias Frankel (1801—1875) and Pinhas ben Zvi Grayevsky (1873–1941)—the notable Jerusalem-born writer and chronicler of Jewish life in the city—the Perushim chose the best artist. In Grayevsky’s opinion, an unsigned “artistic vase,” which was on display in London in 1851 at the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations, was certainly made by Schnitzer.282 Moreover, Rabbi Frankel wrote that the master artist was awarded a medal for that object, which had been dedicated to Sir Moses Montefiore.283 In addition, Grayevsky notes that Schnitzer also created the skill-

281 The artist inscribed his name and the year on the bottom of the plate. The plate and vase are kept in the Natural History Museum in Vienna (inventory number AY 948); see also KohlbauerFritz, Ringstrasse, 22, fig. on p. 17, and with an error regarding the type of material. On Schnitzer, see Haim Be’er, “Most Skillful Engravings Revived,” Dvar Ha’shavua 20 (May 17, 1985), 4–7 (Hebrew); “The Artist of Most Skillful Engravings,” Et-mol 5/1 (27) (1979), 16–17 (Hebrew), and “Selfmade King of Art,” 70–85. Because of his excellent craftsmanship, he was called Schnitzer, which in Yiddish means woodcarver–an epithet that he adopted as his family name. See Yellin, Avoteinu, 111–112. 282 See Haim Be’er, “The King of His Own Art: The First Artist of Eretz-Israel,” in The Great Periods in the History of Eretz-Israel, II: A Province in a Declining Empire, ed. Yoel Rappel (Tel Aviv: Revivim, 1981), 79–80 (Hebrew), quoting Rabbi Zacharias Frankel [“Briefe aus London”] Monatsschrift für die Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judenthums 1/1 (October 1851), 23, of which he was the editor. See also Grayevsky, The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 23, with additions and pictures (Hebrew). 283 Frankel, “Briefe aus London,” 23. We should note that Grayevsky (The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 23) does not mention such an important award.

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Fig. 7: Mordechai Schnitzer, plate and vase. Dead Sea stone, 1852. Presented to Franz Joseph by the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem, in 1853. Vienna, Museum of Natural History, AY 948.

Fig. 8: Mordechai Schnitzer, vase lid with the inscription Fig. 9: Mordechai Schnitzer, plate. Part of fig. 7. “König von Jerusalem etc….” Detail of fig. 7.

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fully crafted stone desk presented to the Prince of Wales on his visit to Jerusalem in 1862,284 to which we should add the Old Yishuv’s parting gift presented to Franz Joseph in 1869, on the last day of the monarch’s visit to the Holy City, as well as the 1854 thoughtfully decorated Deutsch epistle. The gift sent to Franz Joseph by his Old Yishuv subjects in 1853, to celebrate his survival of the attempt on his life, was “dedicated by [his] servants, the Austrian Perushim community in Jerusalem,” as inscribed in German on the upper edge of the vase, and specified in the inscription carved on the edge of the vase lid—“[To] His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria King of Jerusalem etc….” (fig. 8). Verses from the Book of Psalms, in German, meticulously carved on the plate (fig. 9), imbue the gift with a royal meaning appropriated from the Bible to exalt the Austrian emperor. The verse “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee” and its source, “Psalm 122, v. 6,” carved in beautiful calligraphy, encircle the ornamental flower engraved in the center of the plate. The other verses, all of which come from Psalm 72, appear in three framed fields on the openwork border: “Give the king thy judgments, O God, and thy righteousness unto the king’s son” (v. 1) and “In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace” (v. 7) are inscribed in the first field; praises to the biblical king appear in the second: “His enemies shall lick the dust” (v. 9), “The kings of Arabia shall bring presents” (adapted from v. 10), and “All nations shall serve him” (v. 11); lastly, these verses are complemented in the third field by the blessings “He shall save the poor from the mighty, and redeem their souls from wrong” (adapted from v. 4), followed by “His name shall be continued as long as the sun: all nations shall praise him” (taken from v. 15). The date on the underside of the plate, 1852, attests that this work was done by Schnitzer before the attempt on Franz Joseph’s life and was later chosen by the Perushim community as its representative gift. The verses—praises to God and blessings to the righteous biblical king—are most appropriate in a laudatory address to a monarch and may have been chosen and inscribed at that time. Also the dedication on the vase and its lid, as well as the Austrian heraldic shield and the small flag with the initials of the emperor’s name set on top of the lid, may have been added when this object was chosen to accompany the plate.285 The elaborately crafted plate and vase by Schnitzer, as well as the decoration with thoughtfully chosen and carefully inscribed texts based on a psalm bespeaking royalty, are paradigmatic of the type and quality of objects made in 284 Ibid., 1. 285 The vase is composed of various parts—the leg and the vase itself, and the lid to which the heraldic shield and the flag can be attached and dismantled. Numbers were added to the plate and legs of the vase to indicate the correct position of the vessel.

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the Old Yishuv at the time for presentation to personalities or for sale to wealthy customers. In our context, the most significant element in this object is the central place of the title “King of Jerusalem”—the only one mentioned besides Franz Joseph’s main title as Emperor of Austria—in a representative gift from a Jewish community in Jerusalem. This is not the only flattering reference to Franz Joseph as King of Jerusalem in gifts and epistles presented by the Old Yishuv; we already saw the unique visual allusion to the desired title in the Dead Sea stone coffee set presented to the imperial couple on their Silver Wedding Anniversary by the Austro-Hungarian and Galician kolelim: in the coffee set’s goblet, his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem subtly acclaim Franz Joseph as King of Jerusalem by placing the Jewish icon of the city—the Western Wall and cypresses behind it set between the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School—in the center of the heraldic double-headed Habsburg eagle that decorates the vessel. The royal title appears again in the 1908 gift of the Austro-Galician kolel kolel that will be examined below. We should note that this title was often recalled by Franz Joseph’s court as having a very significant identity value. In one contemporary official example, Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Prince Felix von Schwarzenberg highlighted the title “King of Jerusalem” in a letter to the Ministry of Commerce, dated 5 April, 1851, in support of the promotion of the Austrian Vice-Consulate in Jerusalem to the rank of full consulate.286 The Jerusalem Perushim offering should be seen in the context of a series of highly publicized events that were organized throughout the empire, mainly by the imperial court and the Church, to construct and promote commitment and loyalty of the Habsburg subjects to their emperor. These events complemented the strict state of emergency following the assassination attempt. Precious offerings, poems, and letters conveying the peoples’ good wishes to Franz Joseph were presented by delegations from his realms, and masses and candle-lighting ceremonies were held in churches. Sermons and poems by Jewish writers were read alongside psalms and prayers in services of thanksgiving in synagogues, spontaneously as well as in accordance with the Habsburg Court’s request to hold special services in every religion’s house of prayer. Laudatory texts were published for the same reason.287 The ultimate expression of celebration was the foundation

286 See Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 84, note 35, quoting file HM 42817/1851. We have already noted the article in the Neue Wiener Tagblatt and the allusion in Beda Dudík’s diary, both regarding the emperor’s visit to Jerusalem. More examples in image and word in Old Yishuv gifts, epistles, and other addresses, are discussed below. 287 Viktória Bányai, “‘The Emperor’s Deliverance’ – János Libényi’s Assassination Attempt against Franz Joseph’s Life Commemorated in Contemporary Hebrew Poems,” in Religion, Culture,

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of the Votive Church located near the prestigious Ringstrasse in Vienna, which was achieved by donations from all Habsburg peoples, including the Jewish communities, as a token of their loyalty.288 The decision of the Jewish communities in the Austrian Empire and Old Yishuv to comply with the court’s requests may have been influenced by their hopes of rectifying their unstable status in the empire in the early reign of Franz Joseph: as noted, as early as 1849, the new emperor provided for the emancipation of Jews, but most of the gains were lost when the constitution was cancelled two years later. Although the right to organize as a community was preserved and officially recognized in 1852, their concern for the future could not be dismissed. Sixteen years later, at the time of his visit to Jerusalem from 8–13 November, 1869, the situation of Jews in Franz Joseph’s realms had greatly improved. The emperor was presented three gifts; however, their whereabouts are unknown and they are not documented in Austrian archives: as in the case of the above-noted anecdote of the parting gift delivered to Franz Joseph by Rabbi Beck on behalf of the Old Yishuv, such reports appear in Jerusalemite chronicles. As on other occasions, no doubt in an expression of local patriotism, the Jerusalemite writers highly praised the talent and craftsmanship of the artists, the beauty of the artifacts, and their high quality and value; they also gave a brief account of the variety of materials and techniques used in their manufacture but, unfortunately, they did not describe them. The authors emphasized, probably exaggeratedly, how much these objects pleased the monarch and his House. The now-lost impressive stone bowl given to the monarch by Old Yishuv communities as a parting gift was reported in 1916 by the Jerusalem chronicler Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin. As noted, a dedicatory inscription was added to the bowl, which had been skillfully carved some years earlier by the master artist Mordechai Schnitzer, and it was set in a beautiful olivewood box whose whereabouts are unknown to this day.289 The rather fantastic story on the presentation of the gift, and the deep emotion that it aroused in the heart of the monarch, as reported by Yell-

Society 4 (Yearbook of the MTA-SZTE Research Group for the Study of Religious Culture), ed. Gábor Barna and Orsolya Gyöngyössy (Szeged: University of Szeged, 2017), 32 and note 9 for more examples; see also below, pp. 375–376. 288 The construction of the impressive church was an initiative of Franz Joseph’s brother, Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian, and was dedicated on Franz Joseph’s Silver Wedding Anniversary. For a brief account on the link between the Votive Church and Jerusalem—a specially carved stone from the Mount of Olives that was brought to Vienna to serve as a cornerstone—see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, esp. 151–155. 289 Yellin,“Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 13; see above, pp. 53–54.

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in, are typical of narratives of self-praise and self-enhancement created by the Old Yishuv Habsburg kolelim, in their aim to construct a proud identity and sense of belonging both for the pious Jerusalem community and the Habsburg monarchy (see discussion below). A second gift presented to Franz Joseph while in Jerusalem was reported by Grayevsky, who in 1920 wrote about a prestigious artisan, Simcha Shlomo Diskin, also known as Janewer or Yanover, whose decorated stoneware was in great demand at the time and also pleased Franz Joseph.290 Janewer may have crafted a gift presented to him by the Orthodox Jewish community; modern art historians Shalom Sabar and Richard Barnett provide some details about this gift,291 which they describe as a set of twelve Dead Sea stone cups engraved with the symbols of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, presented to “the God-blessed Emperor and King” together with a jar and a tray. As Sabar remarks, the selection of the motif of the Twelve Tribes of Israel was not accidental: it would call the emperor’s attention to the ingathering of the Jews in their ancient homeland. I could add another symbolic meaning that may have been no less apt to arise in the monarch’s imagination: the perception of the twelve tribes may have served as a metaphor for the ideal Habsburg monarchy that Franz Joseph was striving to keep unified, which, in fact, was his most important political endeavor throughout his long reign. Indeed, the Jerusalem Habsburg kolelim also referred to this central issue in their epistles and blessings to the monarch when wishing him a peaceful and flourishing kingdom blessed by God’s grace, like the ideal biblical kingdom of David and Solomon. Moreover, I should note already at this point in our discussion, that symbols of the Twelve Tribes of Israel, together with those of the Kingdoms and Lands of Austria and Hungary, decorate the gift presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV on his coronation with the Crown of St. Stephen in 1916, thereby leaving no doubt about the political meaning of this motif. A third gift that may have been presented to Franz Joseph during his pilgrimage to Jerusalem would also serve the aim of the Old Yishuv to construct an ideal collective identity—Rabbi Yehosef Schwarz’s well-known book Tevuot Ha’aretz, in its translation into German. According to Arieh Leib Frumkin (1845–1916), tea-

290 The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 1. 291 Shalom Sabar, “Remember Zion: Jewish Folk and Souvenir Art of the Nineteenth Century,” in From Jerusalem with Love: A Fascinating Journey through the Holy Land with Art, Photographs and Souvenirs (Exhibition Catalogue, Bijbels Museum,), ed. Willy Lindwer and Hermine Pool (Amsterdam: Uitgeverij Waanders, 2010), 166; Richard David Barnett (“A Group of Embroidered Cloths from Jerusalem,” Journal of Jewish Art 2 [1975]: 32) received this information from members of the artist’s family, but found no traces of the objects themselves.

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cher and researcher of the history of the Land of Israel, Yehosef Schwarz personally presented the book to Franz Joseph, who was greatly impressed and ordered that its contents be taught in Jewish high schools throughout his reign.292 This part of the story, however, is certainly an invention because Rabbi Schwarz died in 1865, four years before the emperor’s visit. Its origin may have been Frumkin’s error regarding the date of Franz Joseph’s visit, which he recorded as having taken place in 1858. Moreover, there is no official or primary documentation regarding the second part of Frumkin’s assertion, that the emperor ordered that this book be taught in Jewish schools. In fact, this may also be an invention—an appropriation and reconstruction of another story. In 1859, an abridged version of Tevuot Ha’aretz, in German, Das heilige Land, was published in Köln by Salomon Hirschinger, a member of the Schwarz family; this book was used in the higher grades in Jewish schools, especially for the study of the geography of the Land of Israel in early times.293 Another relevant anecdote may be true in this regard, although it is Schwarz himself who notes the event: in the introduction to his book Divrei Yosef, the author wrote that Franz Joseph awarded him with the Imperial Gold Medal for Arts and Sciences (Litteris et Artibus) to mark his important contribution to culture and literature (fig. 10).294

292 Aryeh Leib Frumkin. The History of Jerusalem’s Sages (= Toldot Hachmei Yerushalayim), IV/3, ed. Eliezer Rivlin (Jerusalem: Solomon, 1927), 234–235 (Hebrew). Frumkin also was one of the founders of the Jewish town of Petah Tikva (1878). 293 On the use of Schwarz’s book in Jewish high schools in Germany, see Avi Sasson,“The Life of Rabbi Yehosef Schwarz” (2003) (Hebrew), quoting Baruh Zvi Ofir, Pinkas Hakehillot: Encyclopaedia of Jewish Communities from their Foundation Till after the Holocaust: Germany (Bavaria) (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 1972), 171 (Hebrew). The first chapters deal with the borders of the country and are followed by a description of the lands of the twelve tribes. The next chapters describe the peoples and areas around the Land of Israel. Special chapters are devoted to Jerusalem and its important sites, as well as to the flora and fauna. 294 See note at https://winners-auctions.com/en/content/divrei-yosef-rabbi-yehosef-schwartzunique-copy-inscribed-author– Public auction 096, Item 227, 29 November, 2016. Also Peled, “Seven Artists,” 111, although without sources.

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Fig. 10: Note by Yehosef Schwartz in his book Divrei Yosef, on the Imperial Gold Medal for Arts and Sciences awarded him by Franz Joseph. Winners-auctions.com, public auction 096, 29 November 2016, item 227.

Whereas the earliest-preserved gift to Franz Joseph, presented in 1853, does not display a decoration indicative of the Jerusalemite Jewish identity of the gift-givers (only the texts mention it), two of the lost artifacts certainly do, and it is quite possible that the third one did as well. Therefore, the absence of figurative decoration in the 1853 gift should not mislead us. As may be well remembered, the Jewish holy places as markers of Jerusalemite identity stand out prominently in Deutsch’s epistle dated 1854. Moreover, as in other cases, such decoration may have enhanced the receptacle that held the gift.

4.2 1879—A New Concept of Homage and Gift Presentations Twenty-six years separate the Old Yishuv’s earliest gift to Franz Joseph that has been preserved—the Dead Sea stone vase and plate presented in 1853, on occasion of the emperor’s escape from the attempt on his life—and the next extant gifts: two objects presented to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary in 1879. As already noted, this event marked a considerable increase in the presentation of homages at official ceremonies and festivals. One of the Old Yishuv gifts presented on that occasion is the Dead Sea stone coffee set with the exceptional visual allusion to the title “King of Jerusalem,” presented by the Aus-

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tro-Hungarian and Austro-Galician kolelim, discussed above (figs. 1–2). The other is a congratulatory epistle presented by a group of Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem, including Perushim, Austrian Jews from Galicia, Hungarian and Lithuanian Jews (fig. 11).295

Fig. 11: Moshe Kreutz, for Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem. Congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. Vienna, ÖNB 34447/755.

295 ÖNB 34447/755.

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It is drawn in micrography—a traditional Jewish art form that, according to a widely held historiographic position at the time, expressed religious piety and the wish to observe the Second Commandment, which restricted the use of images for fear of idolatry and gave priority to the written word over any other form of expression. We should recall, however, that since early times word and image have often been closely bound in Jewish culture, and written culture had a marked decorative character.296 The micrographic dedication is signed by Moshe Kreutz, a scribe from the Austro-Hungarian kolel.297 Skillfully crafted in tiny black, gold, and crimson letters, it creates the shape of an arched gate that highlights a Torah crown drawn in that same art form in its upper part. The text that shapes the gate is taken from Psalm 21:1–7. The psalmist thanks God who protects the ideal biblical king: “For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head. He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever.” The king shall rejoice in the strength of God, who will provide for his salvation, and also trusts in the King of Kings. In the same spirit, thanking God and asking for His guidance and protection, while noting the virtues of the king, the writer adopts and adapts verses from psalms such as 72, 61, and 89 to praise Franz Joseph. Two years later, in 1881, the festive wedding of Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and Princess Stephanie of Belgium brought with it expectations of homages from Habsburg subjects. An extant congratulatory epistle to the young couple and the imperial and royal parents of the bridegroom, from the Austro-Hungarian kolel in Safed, one of the Four Holy Cities of Israel,298 was written by an unknown scribe in colorful calligraphy. Two biblical verses create an arch above the rectangular body of the rest of the text, and additional verses are set around and inside three Stars of David—one in the arched space and two in the spandrels. The verses creating the arch refer to the joyful event by adapting a metaphor for God’s revelation in nature and in all His works and doings by describing the beauty of a strong tree with large branches rich in fruit “sweeter than the honey and the honeycomb” (Psalm 19:10), as well as that of a large eagle with outspread wings shelter-

296 On the use of micrography, see Leila Avrin, Scribes, Script and Books: The Book Arts from Antiquity to the Renaissance (Chicago: American Library Association, 1991; reprint 2010), 136– 137. On the attitude toward visual images in Judaism, see Steven Fine, “Lernen To See: ‘Modernity’, Torah and the Study of Jewish ‘Art’,” Milin Havivin 7 (2013–14), 27–34. 297 Kreutz identifies himself as “scribe of the Austro-Hungarian kolel.” The epistle is signed in Hebrew by Shmuel Salant, Nathan Joseph Goldberger, and other representatives whom unfortunately I could not identify. The case or portfolio that held this epistle is lost. 298 See ÖNB Bildarchiv, Verm. Rud. 74.

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ing all those who come to God.299 In the Stars of David on the spandrels, the writer created variations on the verse “The voice of joy and the voice of gladness, the voice of the bridegroom, and the voice of the bride” (Jeremiah 33:11), which is cheerfully sung at weddings. The Safed congratulatory address includes a text written in beautiful Arabic calligraphy and was presented in an ornamented tin box that seems to have been lost and, unfortunately, its decoration was not described. We do have a brief and very limited description of part of another lost gift, the box enclosing the gift sent to Franz Joseph by the Austro-Hungarian kolel in 1888, on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the emperor’s accession. Grayevsky writes that it was created in olivewood decorated with inlays of black wood and mother-of-pearl by the celebrated craftsman Yaakov Dov Jacob.300 Unfortunately, and typically, Grayevsky does not describe the iconography and style; nevertheless, it is important to note that his brief description of the materials and techniques wholly coincides with that of the lost box that housed the parting gift presented to Franz Joseph by his Jerusalemite subjects at the end of his visit to the Holy City. The description also corresponds to the material characteristic of the boxes that housed the gifts from that kolel on the Golden and Diamond Jubilees of the emperor-king and are kept in the Austrian National Library in Vienna. The congruence of this information may qualify at least this part of Grayevsky’s account as a reliable source. Grayevsky adds that the Austro-Hungarian Consul who, like other court officials, was very impressed by the beautiful chest, told that it was placed on display in the monarch’s private treasury in Vienna along with other priceless objects presented to him by his subjects;301 yet, in the absence of any record in the consulate’s archives, there is no way of confirming the veracity of this part of the account. No doubt, such honor would have been much appreciated in the Jerusalem Jewish milieu, as it would be a great source of pride and satisfaction to know that their efforts paid off. We would expect there to be a note in the archives of the Austro-Hungarian Consulate in Jerusalem regarding another gift to Franz Joseph that the consul is said to have highly praised; however, as in other cases, no official evidence has been found yet. Grayevsky tells us that on the occasion of Franz Joseph’s seventieth birthday, in 1900, the Austro-Hungarian kolel commissioned a very special olivewood box from the well-known Jerusalem craftsman Rabbi Yehiel Zvi Zimir-

299 For example, Psalms 17:8; 36:7; 57:1; 61:4; 63:7. As we will see, this metaphor appears in many of the gifts’ dedications and in other texts addressed to Franz Joseph. 300 Grayevsky, The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 7–8. 301 Ibid., 7. Haim Be’er repeats this story in his historical novel Feathers (p. 103); however, there is no record of this significant act in Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection.

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inski. Grayevsky notes that the monarch was very pleased and grateful for the skillfully made box and all that was inside it, and Viennese journals highly applauded it. Moreover, he adds, the imperial court and Austrian Consul in Jerusalem reported that a special committee chose this work from among the thousands of gifts presented to Franz Joseph at that event, to be kept in the emperor’s private treasury. According to Grayevsky, the consul personally thanked the representatives of the kolel, saying to Zimirinski, who was also present, “What a pity! If you had signed your name, you certainly would have received a medal of honor!”302

4.3 1898—The Golden Jubilee: A Religious Celebration The celebrations of Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee were overshadowed by serious political and social conflicts. Hungarian political circles, including Jewish subjects, could not conceal their doubts regarding the complex concept of Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary in a Dual Monarchy. Except for formal expressions of congratulations, Hungary did not celebrate the Jubilee of the Austrian emperor;303 this event was celebrated only in the Austrian half of the empire. The incongruity of the dates and celebrations of the Hungarian coronation and Austrian jubilee is historically and legally correct, yet from a Hungarian nationalist point of view, it meant more than a historical and legal formality: it emphasized the meaning of the 1867 Compromise as severing the Hungarian kingdom from the Austrian Empire. Hungarian political leaders saw Hungary and Austria as foreign nations placed in the same political status under the same monarch.304 The celebrations were also affected by the assassination of Empress Elisabeth in Geneva on 10 September, 1898—a tragic consequence of the complex political situation. Franz Joseph and his advisors were aware of the need to ease the crisis and project normalcy. One means was to go on with the celebration of Franz Joseph’s reign. Taking into account that the mourning for the empressconsort required a measure of moderation, only part of the spectacular planned events were held, and elements of traditional Habsburg self-presentation were adapted to promote and strengthen the essential dynastic and state patriotism in a way that would not compromise ethnic or national identities.305 The court had

302 Grayevsky, The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 22. 303 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 71, note 1. 304 Nevertheless, as noted, Hungarian Jewish institutions, as did the Austro-Hungarian kolel in Jerusalem, sent gifts on the occasion of the emperor’s jubilees. 305 For a detailed analysis, see Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, esp. 78, 82–88. Shedel (“Emperor, Church, and People”) offers a concise but comprehensive discussion of this topic.

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to rely on political skill and the effectiveness of a traditional source of legitimacy, with a claim to greater transcendence and attractiveness than secular nationalism. For the Habsburg monarchy, the primary source of legitimacy was religion: despite the definitive acceptance of constitutionalism in 1867, the emperor was still defined and promoted by his court and the Church as ruling by divine right, chosen and anointed by God.306 Accordingly, personal and national myths were constructed around this religio-political ideology: Franz Joseph was idealized as a just and benevolent ruler beloved by all his peoples, the father of his peoples, a Prince of Peace through whom God bestows “all that is good” on his loving peoples, an ideal human being dedicated to working for the good of his subjects, and “a model of patience that confronted personal tragedy with dignity.”307 Imperial celebrations in the Austrian half of the Dual Monarchy presented Franz Joseph as the supranational symbol uniting all the nations and peoples of the monarchy. In this context, Unowsky notes that while commemorative publications and school textbooks immortalized the personal piety and dedication of the emperor to the religious obligations of the king of the most Christian kingdom, Franz Joseph never hesitated to attend religious rituals of other faiths. The emperor participated in important ceremonies of the Eastern Orthodox, Greek Catholic, Armenian Catholic, and Jewish faiths, and after the occupation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, also in Muslim religious celebrations.308 Suggestive iconographic schemes that could be interpreted as supporting these constructions were chosen carefully in the many events and publications celebrating the Jubilee. One illuminating example is a book presented to Franz Joseph on this occasion by the Austrian Commerce and Industry Chamber (fig. 12)309 that, when compared to gifts by the Old Yishuv Habsburg kolelim, also attests to the knowledge that Jerusalem artists had of the visual language developed in imperial media, as well as to their ability to adopt and creatively adapt some of its elements. The front cover of the Austrian Commerce and Industry Chamber book is crafted on silver-plated metal richly decorated with silver and gilded castings, enamel, and gemstones, and is organized in a central field highlighted by its frame. The central field displays a portrait of Franz Joseph as a divinely chosen agent for the transmission of God’s blessings and, in the spirit of the

306 Ibid., 74. 307 Ibid., 87, based on the official pastoral letter of Austria’s Catholic hierarchy, issued to the clergy on 1 November, 1898. 308 Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 30. See also pronouncement of Franz Ferdinand above, p. 26. 309 ÖNB, Reg. J./ 60 – A.

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Golden Jubilee proclaimed by the imperial court and the Austrian church, makes it clear that he was no ordinary ruler. Franz Joseph appears as an augustus wearing a laurel wreath, a symbol of victory and honor that royal houses widely adopted from the Greco-Roman culture over time; moreover, the portrait was enclosed in a laurel clipeus, another traditional symbol of victory, and was topped by the Austrian imperial crown. In a significant religio-political strategy, this imperial imagery is framed in a large mandorla—the almond-shaped aureole of light surrounding the figure of the transcendental Christ in Christian art. Binding Church and Empire, the coats-of-arms of seventeen Austrian crownlands and regions appear in the mandorla, which is drawn on oak branches, a well-known symbol of strength and endurance. This scheme could also be interpreted in the spirit of Franz Joseph’s motto as emperor of Austria, viribus unitis, which appeared everywhere as the official motto of the Golden Jubilee. It is noteworthy that the only allusion to the difficult political situation at the time was the emphasis placed on the theme of unity in the Golden Jubilee’s motto, chosen by Franz Joseph himself. The frame of the front cover presents a winged putto with the caduceus of Hermes as a symbol of commerce, another putto with a hammer as a symbol of industry, appropriately representing the gift-givers, and two putti holding signs with the years of Franz Joseph’s accession to the throne and his Golden Jubilee. Also meaningful, within the context of our interpretation of the gifts, are the congratulations written in eight official languages as a means of highlighting the variety of nations united in the person of the God-graced monarch. We should note that two important motifs in the iconography of this gift found their way into the gifts presented by the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem: one, the ancient motif of an emperor honored with a laurel crown, his portrait set in a clipeus, appears in the center of the double-headed Habsburg eagle in the 1908 gift from the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel; the other, the coats-of-arms of Habsburg crownlands unified under his crown, appears in the gift presented by the same kolel to Karl I/IV on his accession to the throne of Hungary, in an innovative and sophisticated juxtaposition with the Tribes of Israel, to be examined below. These similarities point to the wish of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to assert their identity as loyal Jewish citizens worthy of the emperor’s protection and as participants in the royal culture and practices.

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Fig. 12: Commerce and Industry Chamber of Austria. Gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Book cover. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./60-A.

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The efforts to present ever-more impressive gifts to Franz Joseph at his Golden Jubilee can also be seen in both the visual design and well-thought out texts of the gifts created for the two Habsburg kolelim. The Habsburg kolelim sent their gifts separately, in skillfully carved olivewood cases. The Austro-Galician kolel sent a scroll of the Book of Esther (figs. 13, 14),310 and the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel sent two epistles with a translation into German, handwritten in an ornamented calligraphy—a dedication and a prayer begging God to protect and guide the monarch, written in gold letters; in addition, this kolel sent a highquality copy, in gold letters, of a poster calling Jews to participate in a service in his honor that was hung on walls in the streets of the Jewish Quarter (figs. 15– 17).311 As usual, the dedication on both gifts was signed by the heads of each community: the Austro-Galician gift was signed by Lasar Spira Cohn, head of the community, and [Pinkas] Mendel Rubin, highlighted with the name and title of Ignatz L. Schreiber, president of the kolel and a resident of Drohobycz in Galicia; the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian gift was signed by the ultra-Orthodox leader Rabbi Chayim Sonenfeld [Joseph Chayim Sonnenfeld], Tobias Goldberger, Moses Wallenstein, and Josef Benjamin Schön. Both communities framed the dedicatory text and visual imagery in a gate of honor, but in different styles. The Austro-Galician community chose the eclectic Neo-Baroque style, following the aesthetic preferences of the Austrian imperial court and contemporary conservative circles;312 the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian community chose micrography which, as noted, was widely considered a traditional and most appropriate Jewish art-form; we examined a delicate example of micrography decoration in the 1879 congratulatory text sent by Perushim, Jews from Austrian Galicia, Hungary and Lithuania in Jerusalem (fig. 11), as well as the very simple design of the text sent by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel in Safed in 1881, on the occasion of the wedding of Crown Prince Rudolf and Princess Stephanie. The continued use of traditional Jewish art-forms in the gifts to Franz Joseph, the constant references to Jewish texts in all the objects and, notably, the integration of text and image, are expressions of mature Jewish introspection and identity. This position can be sup-

310 ÖNB BA Adr. Reg. J./55. 311 ÖNB BA Adr. Reg. J./95. 312 For example, the façades of the Volkstheater were built in 1889 according to designs by Ferdinand Fellner and Hermann Helmer, and the St. Michael Wing at the imperial Hofburg was built by Ferdinand Kirschner between 1889 and 1893, slightly altering a plan by Joseph Emanuel Fischer von Erlach.

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ported by comparing the two gifts in their very different iconographies and styles, to another Jerusalemite gift presented to the monarch on the same occasion—a beautiful and sophisticated congratulatory epistle presented by the Rothschild Hospital, skillfully decorated with Oriental architectural elements, and other variously designed gifts, discussed below. The 1898 gift from the Austro-Galician kolel (figs. 13, 14), like those of the same kolel in 1908 to Franz Joseph and in 1916 to Karl, as well as the 1908 gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph, is a scroll of the Book of Esther—a biblical text that tells about the salvation of the Jewish people menaced by court officials. At this point in our discussion, we propose that the recurrent choice of this book as the present to Franz Joseph and Karl may have been prompted by the rise of antisemitism in Vienna following the election of Karl Lueger as mayor in 1897—a proposal that will be borne out below in examples of the use of this story in other media in Vienna.313 Painted on a parchment scroll (fig. 13), the dedication of the gift of the AustroGalician kolel to Franz Joseph on occasion of his Golden Jubilee is framed by a theatrical gate of honor characterized by a dynamic play of contrasts—projecting and receding planes, convex and concave surfaces, rounded and angular lines, and a rich ornamentation typical of the Neo-Baroque style. Moreover, the gate of honor does not highlight a Torah crown, as in the congratulory epistle drawn in micrography, which was sent by the Perushim, Jews from Austro-Galician, Hungarian and Lithuanian kolelim on the occasion of Franz Joseph’s Silver Wedding Anniversary (fig. 11), and the dedication, in that same art form, of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel gift to Franz Joseph on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee (fig. 15; see discussion below): instead, the gate of honor highlights a Habsburg imperial emblem, topped by the Austrian crown and flanked by heraldic lions and the gold and black Habsburg banner. Therefore, only the Hebrew characters and the seal of their community disclose the Jewish identity of the gift-givers. Nevertheless, the text, quoting and paraphrasing Jewish sources, is written in a notable literary form, highly cherished in Jewish literature, that also has a visual expression—a double-acrostic that spells the name of Franz Joseph at the beginning and end of each line. Obviously, only Hebrew readers could appreciate this special feature because the accompanying epistle in German, like any translation, hardly succeeds in preserving it.314

313 See discussion below, esp. pages 318–320. 314 A typical example of acrostics is an elegy in honor of Franz Joseph written by a notable Old Yishuv rabbi, Shlomo Rohald, whose family was originally from the Habsburg realms; see Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 98.

Fig. 13: Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll presented to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./55.

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Fig. 14: Abraham Keller (?) for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll case of Esther’s Book, olivewood, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./55.

As usual, the Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem skillfully adopted and adapted verses and beautiful idioms taken from the Hebrew Scriptures and the Jewish bookshelf to praise the monarch, out of sincere appreciation as well as in the hope of finding his favor. Typical examples in the Austro-Galician dedication are the quotations of biblical verses that link praises with gratitude to God, and Kings David and Solomon with Franz Joseph, frequently blurring the distinction between them. Blessings like “His name shall endure for ever: his name shall be continued as long as the sun” (Psalm 72:17) on the Habsburg banners flanking the shield; the prayer to God “Thou wilt prolong the king’s life: and his years as many generations” (Psalm 61:7) on the arch of the gate of honor; as well as the heartfelt wish that “The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul” (Psalm 121:7) and “Peace be within thy walls and prosperity within thy palaces” (Psalm 122:7, a Songs of Ascents), on the columns of the gate, can refer to either king. In this context, the opening verse above the Habsburg shield, “In the light of the king’s countenance is life” (Proverbs 16:15), promises well-being to the Habsburg king and his realms. A lyrical example of the transformation of biblical verses is the gift-givers’ blessing to Franz Joseph, that his candle will illuminate like the shining sun at noon—taken from the psalmist who thanks God, saying “Thou wilt light my candle: [the Lord my God will enlighten my darkness]” (Psalm 18:28). Lastly, the gift-givers typically beseech God that Judah will be saved and Israel will dwell safely in their own days, realizing the prophecy of Jeremiah 23:6, and close their congratulatory message by presenting themselves as the king’s loyal servants who bow and kiss his feet and the earth beneath them, and pray that God bless the monarch forever. Franz Joseph’s subjects in the Old Yishuv

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not only respected him and were grateful to him, but venerated him to a point that they created a romanticized person. For them, the frequent expression stating that Franz Joseph was their lord and they were his servants,315 which appears in various versions in the gifts and epistles sent to him by their kolelim, did not mean servitude by enforcement but obedience by free will. In contrast to the aesthetic decision of the artist of the Austro-Galician dedication, the artist of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian dedication may have kept to a traditional Jewish art form, micrography, in the thought that it might be less familiar to the monarch and thus draw his attention more effectively.316 As already noted, the dedication is drawn in tiny black, gold, and crimson letters that delicately shape an arched gate that frames a Torah crown in its upper part; the main body of the blessing is carefully written below it (fig. 15). A meaningful opening verse from Leviticus 25:10 creates the arch, a place of honor that further highlights the religio-political significance of the blessing for the biblical jubilee: “And ye shall hallow the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof: it shall be a jubilee unto you.” This remarkable biblical institution—a uniquely blessed year of peace, liberty, and vitality for all beings that shows the presence and providential power of God —was invoked to celebrate Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee. This would not be a mere numerical parallel between two jubilees, but a reference to the king as a just and loving ruler. These values, that would benefit even the less privileged of the monarch’s subjects, had a special meaning to the long-discriminated and largely needy Jewish communities.

315 Nurit Govrin, “From Figure to Image: Emperor Franz Joseph I in Hebrew Literature,” Mahut 2/7 (1990), 57, 65 (Hebrew). 316 Micrography was common in Jewish art also in the Dual Monarchy. An outstanding example is the portrait of Franz Joseph, printed in gold on golden paper, by Sámuel Hirschler, now kept in the Hungarian Jewish Museum and Archives in Budapest. The text used to create the portrait is a paraphrase of Numbers 8:24, thanking the monarch for his dedicated work for the well-being of his peoples. The painting was donated to the museum by Samuel Adler on the emperor’s death; see Sámuel Hirschler, “38 Portrait of Franz Joseph Made from Hebrew Characters” .

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Fig. 15: Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./95.

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As noted, the prayers and blessings in the dedications and epistles of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects are similar in character. Verses in praise of God in the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian congratulatory text were adapted to refer to the emperor-king, as, for example, “Justice and judgment are the habitation of thy throne: mercy and truth shall go before thy face” (Psalm 89:14). Most appropriately, the verses forming the columns of the gate of honor, written in royal colors, tell us that God encouraged the king not to fear because He will protect him. As in the 1879 congratulatory epistle of the Austro-Galician, Hungarian and Lithuanian Perushim in Jerusalem to Franz Joseph, the writer thanks God: “For thou preventest him with the blessings of goodness: thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head. He asked life of thee, and thou gavest it him, even length of days for ever and ever” (Psalm 21:3–4). Thus, the writers of the Habsburg kolelim placed Franz Joseph on the same plane as the ideal biblical kings, including their faith and gratitude to God.

The Essentiality of Holy Places as Identity Markers Two questions arise: could one of the contrasting styles in the design of the dedications draw the attention of the emperor more effectively and win his heart? And, how could the gift-givers convey their ideal self-image as pious Jews who dedicate their lives to prayer, study, and good deeds in Jerusalem, for the wellbeing of their brethren as well as of their emperor, his peoples and lands? It seems that no matter which style was chosen, images of the Jewish holy places in Jerusalem and its surroundings were considered essential. Therefore, although neither of the dedications of these two gifts was decorated with images of such sites, they stand out prominently in the decoration of the carved receptacles housing them— the olivewood scroll-case housing the Book of Esther, sent by the Austro-Galician kolel (fig. 14), and the olivewood mother-of-pearl and intarsia box, in which the epistles of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel were presented (figs. 16, 17).

Fig. 16: Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Receptacle for the congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./95.

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Fig. 17: Detail of fig. 16.

The Austro-Galician scroll-case displays on its upper part iconic images of two monuments: Zion, the City of David, in the image of the so-called David’s Tower, and the Cave of Machpelah (Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron), each enclosed in a symmetrical frame of two stylized branches joined by a leaf. Rachel’s Tomb appears slightly below them, and two compounds appear on the bottom—the Western Wall flanked by the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School, and three of the iconic tombs dated to the Second Temple period in the Kidron Valley; as noted, this valley is also known as Valley of Jehoshaphat, the site where God would judge the people at the End of Days. The three monuments, seen from north to south, are traditionally known as Absalom’s Tomb, the House of the Free (the Tomb of Bnei Hezir), and Zechariah’s Tomb. Like the monuments on top, also the images of the two compounds on the bottom are framed by stylized branches that articulate the entire decoration. All the monuments are identified by their names in Hebrew; in addition, a caption below the Kidron Valley identifies the site as the Mount of Olives, which overlooks the eschatological landscape, and another caption identifies the mountainous landscape of scattered trees and small Oriental buildings above it as the Way of the Jordan. Between the two registers of holy sites, the artist of the Austro-Galician scroll-case carved rich vines and a bird pecking at grapes—a visual allegory of Paradise that adds to the aesthetic and emotional impact of this gift.317 Lastly, carved acanthus-like leaves decorate both ends of the scroll-case, and an olivewood crown is set on its top.

317 Grapes and grapevines are very important symbols in Jewish tradition and ritual. Many biblical parables and allegories of the people and the Land of Israel are based on the vine and other flora. For example, the poet of Psalm 80:8 thanks God: “Thou hast brought a vine out of Egypt: thou hast cast out the heathen, and planted it,” and Deuteronomy 8:7–8 reads: “For the Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land… a land of wheat, and barley, and vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates; a land of olive oil, and honey.” The grapevine is one of the Seven Species with which the Land of Israel was blessed. The verse “Every man under his vine and under his fig tree” (1 Kings 4:25; Micah 4:4) symbolizes both the ideal past and hope for future peace; consequently, threats of national disaster were couched in terms of laying waste to the vines (Isaiah 5). The vines

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The identification of one of the tombs in the Kidron Valley as Absalom’s Tomb is based on 2 Samuel 18:18: “Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and reared up for himself a pillar, which is in the king’s dale: for he said, I have no son to keep my name in remembrance: and he called the pillar after his own name: and it is called unto this day, Absalom’s place.”318 A very different tradition, based on another biblical story, attributes the building of the pillar not to Absalom, but to the people who denied him a royal burial because he disobeyed his father, King David; according to this version, the people threw Absalom into a pit in the forest of Ephraim and piled a big heap of stones over his body (2 Samuel 18:17). We will return to this story below, in our discussion of local customs that may have influenced artists. Regarding the so-called Zechariah’s Tomb, since the Middle Ages it was commonly identified as that of Zechariah Ben Jehoiada, who, according to 2 Chronicles 24:20– 21, was stoned by the people because he disapproved of their false beliefs (Bavli, Gittin 57b).319 The third tomb, known since 1865 as the Tomb of Bnei Hezir (Sons of Hezir), is labeled “Beth Ha’hofshit” (House of the Free), following an ancient local tradition: according to 2 Kings 15:1–5, King Azariah, who reigned in Judah in the eighth century BC, was smitten with leprosy; consequently, he renounced the throne and left for a “house of the free,” a special place for people suffering from that illness, where he was free of the burden of rule. The same story appears in 2 Chronicles 26:19–21, but refers to King Uziah.320 The old custom to isolate lepers, many of whom went to live in caves outside the city walls, may lie behind the tradi-

in blossom also symbolize the passing of winter (Song of Songs 2:13), and the ripening of the fruit represents a fulfilled state of being (Joel 2:22); see Reba Wulkan, “The Grape and the Vine: A Motif in Contemporary Jewish Textiles,” Textile Society of America Symposium Proceedings, Paper 217 (1998), 369 . 318 Flavius Josephus identified it based on that biblical verse; see his The Antiquities of the Jews 7.10.243, transl. William Whiston, The Works of Josephus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1987), 199. 319 Denys Pringle, The Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem. III: The City of Jerusalem (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007), no. 320 (pp. 185–189, esp. 186). As noted, this monument is not a tomb but a memorial; it does not contain the bones of the dead. 320 The King James version of the Bible translates it as Several House, and other versions as Separate House. See Menashe Har-el, Golden Jerusalem (Jerusalem and New York: Gefen, 2004), 118–119; Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 254–256, 335, quoting 2 Kings 15:5 which refers to King Azariah, and 2 Chronicles 26:19–21 which refers to King Uziah; see also the commentaries to these verses by Rabbi David Ben-Josef Kimhi (known as Radak) and Rashi. Interesting, too, is the theory regarding Uziah’s tomb in light of the archaeological excavations at Ramat Rachel. For a brief reference, see Irit Yaacov, “King Uzziah of Judah’s ‘House of the Free’,” November 6, 2017 (Hebrew). For a discussion of eschatological interpretations of Jehoshaphat Valley, see below, our examination of the photograph album presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV.

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tion identifying the Tomb of Bnei Hezir with the House of the Free of King Azariah or King Uziah. In fact, however, the tomb was built about 600 years after Azariah’s reign and more than 750 years after Uziah’s. Ancient traditions were collected and disseminated by Jews as a means of confirming the authenticity of the Hebrew Bible,321 and by Christian clerics, scholars, and writers who wished to confirm the truth of the New Testament; these traditions were further disseminated by local popular stories and folk art in Palestine. One example of Christian traditions relates to the tombs in the Valley of Kidron/Jehoshaphat; since the Middle Ages, the Tomb of Zechariah was identified as that of St. Zecharia and St. Symeon, and the Tomb of Bnei Hezir as the tomb of James the Less.322 Different names have been attached to these monuments at different times,323 reflecting the character of Jerusalem as a palimpsest of cultures, a singular mosaic of peoples and traditions that draws pilgrims from diverse nations and religious beliefs. Lastly, we should note the dedicatory inscription in Hebrew engraved along the metal bar supporting the handle that pulls the scroll out of its case; it is representative of the laudatory language used by the Old Yishuv when addressing dignitaries, and reads: “In honor of His Majesty our lord and merciful King and Emperor Franz Joseph I, may his glory be great. A memento of his Golden Jubilee presented by his faithful servants, the Austro-Galician Israelite residents of the Holy City of Jerusalem, may it be rebuilt and re-established in our days, Amen! The year 5659” (which corresponds to 1898 CE).324

321 On the Kidron Valley tombs, see Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, esp. 254–256, 335; Ermete Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored: Being a Description of the Ancient and Modern City, with Numerous Illustrations Consisting of Views, Ground Plans and Sections, I: Text (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1864), 168–170, 180–184 (chap. 6) . Many examples appear on souvenirs, amulets, and household objects; see Yona Fischer, “The Art of the Nineteenth Century: Its Creation and Characteristics,” in Arts and Crafts in Eretz-Israel in the Nineteenth Century, ed. Yona Fischer (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1979), 88–109. One typical work is a colorful 1903/4 embroidery by an unknown craftsman, showing images of the Temple Mount seen from the Mount of Olives and the Tombs in the Kidron Valley; Sabar, “Remember Zion,” 150–151, fig. 178. 322 Pringle, Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, 186–187. 323 Ibid., 186. 324 On the back of the scroll-case handle is engraved “Jerusalem KN 84,” possibly the professional cachet or signature of the artist or the workshop; the number 84 indicates the quality of the silver alloy. Shalom Sabar has generously informed me that cachets were rare on Judaica objects from the Jewish communities in Palestine. The plea to God to rebuild Jerusalem, so common in Jewish tradition, appears in the fourteenth benediction of the Amidah prayer, which is recited three times a day. The blessing is called “Blessing of the Builder of Jerusalem,” or “Prayer for the Rebuilding of Jerusalem,” and reads: “And to Jerusalem, thy city, return in mercy, and dwell therein as thou hast spoken; rebuild it soon in our days as an everlasting kingdom, and speedily

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I identify the artist that created the scroll-case for the 1898 Austro-Galician Book of Esther as Abraham Keller, based on stylistic and iconographic similarities with the scroll-case for the 1908 gift from the same kolel and the 1898 olivewood case for the congratulatory epistle sent to Franz Joseph by the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem discussed below—both of which were signed and dated by the artist.325 Both scroll-cases bear the same iconographic motif of rich vines and a bird pecking at grapes, the same scheme for Zion, the City of David, and similar schemes for other venerated sites. As for similarities with the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital case, the schematic image of Rachel’s Tomb is the same in both works, but for a few small differences in details and proportions that may be the result of the different shape of the frame and pictorial space, which is narrower in the Rothschild case. The ornamental motifs are similar. Not only the laudatory character of the text is common to all the communities of the Old Yishuv. Most of the holy places chosen by the Austro-Galician community to proclaim the Jerusalemite dimension in their identity and purpose in life, and to engage the monarch’s good will on their behalf, were chosen by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel as well. Nevertheless, the iconographic schemes and the style of the artist who created the box for the gift of the latter kolel are somewhat different (fig. 16); no doubt, there was more than one iconographic scheme for the representation of sacred sites, but variations between them are minor and all are clearly identifiable. Another difference lies in the language chosen for the identification of sites and monuments. Whereas the Austro-Galician kolel used Hebrew in all its gifts, the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel chose German. The monuments appearing in the 1898 gifts of the latter are labeled Klage Mauer (Wailing Wall), which is canonically depicted in the space between the two Muslim shrines representing the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School; Absaloms Denkmal (Absalom’s Monument), although there are actually three representative Kidron Valley monuments; Zion, and the Dome of the Rock (more often named Site of the Temple, as in the Austro-Galician scroll-case, or simply the Temple)—yet here it is mistakenly called by the common Muslim name Omar Moschee (Mosque of Umar).326 Obviously, the

set up therein the throne of David. Blessed art thou, O Lord, who rebuildest Jerusalem”; see W. Sibley Towner, “A Crisis of the Imagination: The Real Jerusalem Confronts the Ideal Jerusalem,” Interpretation 54/1 (2000), 18. 325 Unfortunately, until now I have not found any information on this woodcarver. 326 The labeling of the monument as the Mosque of Umar recurs in the gifts of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph in 1898 and 1908 and to Karl I/ IV in 1916, as well as in the gift of the Rothschild Hospital to the monarch in 1898. In Jewish art, the image is infrequently labeled Site of the Temple, as in the offerings of the Austro-Galician kolel.

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captions in German would more easily remind the recipient of the sites and holy places in Jerusalem where he experienced a personal emotional tie. The reference to the so called “Absalom’s Tomb” only, instead of the three funerary monuments represented in the illustration, is probably accidental. These, the most visible monuments in that area, are depicted a short distance from each other on the slope of the Mount of Olives near the Kidron Valley: Absalom’s Tomb to the left, the monument known as Zechariah’s Tomb to the right, and the Tomb of Bnei Hezir recessed between them—a sequence that corresponds to their geographical positions. The artist might not have paid attention to the incomplete naming; however, in light of the references to local traditions in other gifts to the monarch—for example, the label “Beth Ha’hofshit” (House of the Free) for the image of the Tomb of Bnei Hezir in the scroll-case presented by the Austro-Galician kolel in 1898 and in other objects—it might be possible that someone wished to highlight this specific tomb. Such a choice would reflect a curious ancient custom in Jerusalem at the time, that called the visitors’ attention to it, as attested in various sources since medieval times: Jews and Arabs threw stones at the monument in the presence of their sons, to remind them of the punishment meted out to Absalom when he disobeyed his father, King David.327 Visitors at the time saw or heard about such peculiar customs and, consequently, souvenir makers may have chosen to refer to this local particularity. As expected, the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel highlighted also the imperial and royal symbols of the recipient. In the 1898 box, two delicately-carved mother-of-pearl medallions with the coats-of-arms of the House of Habsburg-Lothringen of Austria and Hungary are set on the lid, flanking the inscription “Jerusalem—2 December 1898” (fig. 17). The reference to Austria and Hungary as two equal parts was very important after the 1867 Compromise, but, as we will see, in one way or another the two Jerusalem Habsburg kolelim highlighted the half to which each belonged—a significant detail that characterizes other objects and narratives. Another notable detail appears in the Hungarian

327 The custom of throwing stones, as noted, may be based on 2 Samuel 18:17, and was noted already in 1481 by the Jewish pilgrim Meshulam of Volterra and, at about the same time, by the Dominican theologian and pilgrim Felix Fabri. Fabri, who vividly wrote that Jews, Christians, and Muslims take their stubborn children to Absalom’s Tomb, tell them his story, and order them to throw stones at it, adding that there were so many stones that if from time to time people did not remove them, the tomb would have been completely covered long ago. See Elka Weber, “Sharing the Sites: Medieval Jewish Travellers to the Land of Israel,” in Eastward Bound: Travel and Travellers, 1050–1550, ed. Rosamund Allen (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 2004), 47; Michael Ish-Shalom, Christian Travels in the Holy Land: Descriptions and Sources on the History of the Jews in Palestine (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 1965), 249 (Hebrew). See also Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 249, 252–254; idem, The Guide to Israel (Jerusalem: Hamakor, 1970), 157–158.

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coat-of-arms: whereas the House of Habsburg-Lothringen canonically represents the emperor and king,328 the Hungarian heraldic symbol presents a unique feature: instead of the winged angels flanking the canonic coat-of-arms at the time, two human figures appear—the left one holding a scroll and the right one, a sword.329 Who are these two figures, who conceived them, and why? It is tempting to ascribe them a symbolical meaning according to their attributes, yet the Old Yishuv artist may have misunderstood a model. Consequently, lacking documentation and other corroborative visual examples, this question remains moot.

4.4 1908—The Diamond Jubilee: Winds of Change, Complex Identities, and New Trends The exaltation of the emperor reached a new pinnacle at the Sixtieth Jubilee of Franz Joseph. The number of private initiatives to celebrate it was impressive. It seems that every institution and association felt the need to mark the occasion, even if a minority might have complied because it was expected to organize an exceptional homage, establish a foundation in honor of the monarch, or build a glorifying monument. The particular motives and interests behind these initiatives are difficult to determine: the wish to gain prestige or profit from public attention, economical, political, and social considerations, or genuine patriotism and loyalty may have been among the driving forces.330 The motivations were as varied as the forms that these private initiatives took. The iconography and style of the dedications’ decoration in the gifts presented to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee by the Old Yishuv Habsburg kole-

328 In the center of the shield, Austria is represented by its banner, flanked on the left by the Habsburg lion and on the right—by the Lothringen three eagles. The double-headed eagle, each of its heads appropriately crowned, represents Cisleithania and Transleithania, and the Austrian imperial crown on top links the whole. 329 Even if the craftsman intended to depict angels, such figures with swords and other attributes are unknown in Hungarian armorial bearings. I am indebted to Dr. Iván Bertényi, Jr. of the Institute of History at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences for this information (e-mail correspondence from 8 January, 2017). 330 For a comprehensive study of the political, ideological, and visual aspects of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations, see Elisabeth Grossegger, Der Kaiser-Huldigungs-Festzug, Wien 1908, Sitzungsberichte, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, 585 (Vienna: Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1992); a concise account is provided by Beller, “Kraus’s Firework,” esp. 53–70; see also Andrea Blöchl-Köstner, “Das 60-jährige Regierungsjubiläum Kaiser Franz Josephs I. 1908. Letztes Abendrot vor dem Untergang,” doctoral dissertation (University of Salzburg, 2004), esp. 210–212.

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lim differ not only from one to the other, but, most significantly, also depending on what they gave him ten years earlier. Their iconography and style reflect new perceptions of the Land of Israel, its peoples, space, sights, and sites, following ideological and socio-cultural changes that affected Jewish society in Palestine and the Diaspora. At the turn of the century, the Old Yishuv had to cope with new winds brought by liberal and Zionist waves of immigration. The more openminded circles adopted more modern lifestyles, and their ideologies and cultural identities changed. The traditional perceptions, values, and imagery of the holy places came to share the physical, psychological, and emotional space with new ideologies, practices, and sites.331 Seeking optimal results, late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century artists and craftsmen in Jerusalem sought the answer to more diversified and complex identities of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, ranging from the strictly Orthodox circles to those that adopted norms of a productive and self-sufficient society and whose representatives might have been involved in the commission or selection of the objects. The artists of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim presented to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee combined local Jewish traditions with the conservative as well as new visual languages in vogue in the royal and imperial court, sometimes in innovative ways. As was the case with other Jerusalemite artists and craftsmen, they

331 Holy places in the Land of Israel, appearing more often than not on an imaginary landscape, in local styles, and of a limited repertoire, have been well known in Eastern European synagogues since the eighteenth century and became common in the nineteenth; see a variety of examples in Rodov’s concise but illuminating “With Eyes toward Zion,” where he notes Eliezer Sussman’s influential paintings of Jerusalem in German synagogues (1732–1742) and a similar view by Hayim ben Isaac Segal of Slutzk in the Kaltershul in Mogilev on the Dnieper (1740), which contrapose Jerusalem and Babylon-like Worms (see images at: ). On the contraposition Jerusalem–Babylon, see idem, 141–144; see also Iris Fishof, “Depictions of Jerusalem by Eliezer Sussmann of Brody,” Israel Museum Journal 14 (1996), 67–80. Realistic and iconic images of the Holy Land were also known and circulated in albums of drawings, prints, and postcards all over nineteenth-century Europe in both Christian and Jewish milieux; see, inter alia, Rodov, “With Eyes toward Zion,” 145–149; Măriuca Stanciu, “The Mural Paintings of Moldavian Synagogues: A Surprising Documentary Source,” Studia Hebraica 9–10 (2009), 112–122. Representative examples appearing in East European synagogues include images of the Rivers of Babylon (Psalm 137) adjacent to the Temple, represented by a schematic Dome of the Rock (meaning exile and redemption), both set in an imaginary green landscape, as in the 1737 Târgu Neamţ Synagogue (ibid., 116, fig. 8); late nineteenth century scenes of the Holy Land, as in the Merchants’ Synagogue of Galaţi (ibid., 116–117, fig. 11), where only two of the six sites are holy places—the Western Wall and Rachel’s Tomb (the others are realistic landscapes of contemporary Palestine, including Zichron Ya‘acov, a new settlement that Romanian Zionist Jews made their home). See also Amar, “Tradition and Innovation in Moldavian Synagogues: Structure and Decoration,” Studia Hebraica 9–10 (2009), 71–72.

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created a singular material culture built on the meeting of cultures, appropriations, and the fusion of elements from the Jewish heritage with various European and local influences over a long period of time. As a result, these artists preserved well-rooted traditions and, at the same time, gave them a new context and look.

4.4.1 The Austro-Galician Gift: Jerusalem as a Historical and Real Place In celebration of Franz Joseph’s Diamond Jubilee, the Austro-Galician kolel in Jerusalem presented the emperor with another scroll of the Book of Esther, in a striking olivewood case created by Abraham Keller.332 Both the dedication and the scroll case present icons of sites in Jerusalem venerated by Jews and, in addition, the case presents an Oriental motif that would certainly catch the eye of the Western audience (figs. 18, 19). The use of an extravagant Neo-Baroque style for the gate of honor, which lacks any architectural logic, and the prominence of the Austrian crown and coat-of-arms were common to both the 1898 and 1908 dedications; however, the 1908 painting is heavier and excessively ornamented, to a point that the contemporary beholder may have felt uncomfortable (fig. 18). The religio-political flattery in the text reinforces this impression. The iconography of the 1908 dedication significantly differs from the 1898 one: it includes four iconic images of Jerusalem and other local symbolic imagery, carefully correlated with the text and the imperial imagery. It is noteworthy that the dedication sophisticatedly celebrates Franz Joseph as King of Jerusalem, no doubt in the hope to please him and touch his heart. Franz Joseph’s coat-of-arms and imperial crown dominate the tympanum of the painted gate of honor, highlighted by the emperor’s motto—viribus unitis—and the banners of the Dual Monarchy that flank it. Oak and laurel branches—ancient symbols of victory and glory common in imperial imagery at the time, and an integral part of Franz Joseph’s coat-of-arms—further underscore the meaning of this iconographic unit as a symbol of authority and power. These victory symbols stand out, among many others, in the gifts presented to Franz Joseph by the city of Brody, where Jews comprised over 70 % of the population, on the occasion of his Silver Jubilee, and by the Imperial and Royal Academy of Art in Vienna in 1898, on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee;333 they also appear in merit and cour 

332 ÖNB Reg. Jub. II./40. 333 On the Brody gift, see Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 55; on the Academy of Art’s gift, see Scholda, “Niello, Email und Kobrahaut,” 79.

Fig. 18: Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. Jub. II./40. Fig. 19: Abraham Keller for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll case of Esther’s Book, olivewood, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. Jub. II./40.

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age medals and badges instituted by Franz Joseph in 1890, known as signum laudis or signum memoriae, following the caption engraved on the reverse of the medals; their obverse was graced with a portrait of the emperor-king as an augustus.334 Right below the large heraldic symbol of Franz Joseph’s position and power, the gift-givers proclaim: “A gift from Judaea and Jerusalem”—written in large golden letters on parchment painted on the lintel of the gate of honor. This sign is an appropriate introduction to the pictorial and literary hymn of praise beneath the lintel, in-between the columns of the gate, where an eagle spreads its wings and holds in its beak the large painted parchment with the congratulatory text. The eagle is a lyrical metaphor for God, who protects His people under the shadow of His wings; it is often evoked in psalms and was appropriated by Old Yishuv writers to exalt the emperor-king. Franz Joseph is thanked for his lovingkindness, for sheltering his Jewish servants, and for giving them “the rights of his lands.” Representative examples of lyrical praises and pleas using this metaphor may be found in the verses: “How excellent is thy lovingkindness, O God! Therefore the children of men put their trust under the shadow of thy wings” (Psalm 36:7); “Be merciful unto me, O God, be merciful unto me; for my soul trusteth in thee: yea, in the shadow of thy wings will I make my refuge, until these calamities be overpast” (Psalm 57:1); “I will abide in thy tabernacle for ever; I will trust in the covert of thy wings. Selah” (Psalm 61:4), “Keep me as the apple of the eye, hide me under the shadow of thy wings” (Psalm 17:8), and also “Because thou hast been my help, therefore in the shadow of thy wings will I rejoice” (Psalm 63:7).335 Such poetic verses of praise to God are variously paraphrased in the Austro-Galician blessing and in the blessings of other Jewish communities to refer to the righteous Austrian monarch. In addition, in the plea written as a poem on the left columns of the gate of honor framing and decorating the Austro-Galician congratulatory text, the wri-

334 On the medals, see ; see also Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 99–100, fig. 18. In Greek mythology, oak trees are associated with themes of strength, longevity, wisdom, and royalty in relation to Zeus, who was often identified by oak wreaths. This could indicate why, since Roman times, many rulers were portrayed wearing a crown of oak leaves; see Maciej Wacławik, “The Symbolic Meaning of the Acorn – A Possible Interpretation,” Studies in Ancient Art and Civilization 19 (2015), 261. It is well known that the laurel tree is a widespread symbol of nobility, spirituality, victory, and virtue, based on myths and traditions from ancient Greece and Rome, and were used to acclaim people who used their spiritual and physical gifts of higher knowledge in beneficial ways. 335 Also relevant in our context are the biblical verses “As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings” (Deuteronomy 32:11) and “Ye have seen what I did unto the Egyptians, and how I bare you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto myself” (Exodus 19:4).

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ter paraphrases psalms and incorporates them into other poetical biblical verses to reinforce his message: Feed thy people with thy rod [Micah 7:14] In the path of the just [based on Proverbs 4:14 and 18 and Psalm 23:3] Protect them in the shadow of your wings [based on psalms such as those just quoted] Lead them beside quiet waters [based on Psalm 23:2].

The metaphor of the protecting eagle was often used by Jewish communities to express their appreciation of Franz Joseph as being beloved by God, and their gratitude for his protection, not only in dedications of offerings and literary texts. For example, an official document presented by representatives of the Jewish communities in Jerusalem to the Austrian Consul, Bernhard Count Caboga Cerva, on 27 October, 1869, asking for his authorization to organize a welcome ceremony in honor of Franz Joseph on his arrival to Jerusalem in early November of that year, respectfully opens with the words “Notices that our merciful and glorious lord will soon and unexpectedly arrive to Jerusalem, on eagles’ wings, reach us from everywhere.”336 Given the proto-national feelings that penetrated some circles of the Old Yishuv at the time, including Jews from Galicia, we may wonder whether the biblical metaphor in this gift and other texts from those circles would also refer to the midrash stating that future redemption will occur when the gentiles will no longer govern the Jews: “As an eagle watches over its nest... This is for the Days to Come... akin to the People of Israel who lived alone in [the exile] this world and did not enjoy it. I [the Lord] will rule and no other foreign ruler will govern you....”337 In the creation of congratulations, prayers, and blessings to Franz Joseph, writers and artists had to comply with religious precepts and traditions. Thus, the visual and literary imagery appropriately converge to express first and foremost the Jews’ heartfelt gratitude to the King of Kings, who set a royal crown on this monarch’s head and made him king of a vast kingdom; consequently, the writer of the dedication for the 1908 gift from the Austro-Galician kolel beseeches God to bless the righteous king to whom the gift-givers are obliged, as well as to pledge their loyalty. Additional remarkable expressions of exaltation in this ded-

336 Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 149–151, document no. 51 (Jer. I/16). This expression, which often appears in visual and literary images of Old Yishuv gifts to Franz Joseph, derives from the biblical metaphor “As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings: So the Lord alone did lead him [his people]…” (Deuteronomy 32:11–12). These words refer to God’s compassion and mercy for the people of Israel, in this world and in the world to come. 337 On this verse, see Amar, “Tradition and Innovation,” 68, quoting Yalkut Shim‘oni, Ha’azinu, 944, which may date to the early thirteenth century.

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ication establish a parallel between Franz Joseph and the ideal biblical kings, as in the verse “Your throne, our king, is for ever and ever, the sceptre of thy kingdom is a right sceptre… therefore God anointed you forever” (based on Psalm 45:6–7);338 another example of this parallel is the recurrent blessing to the emperor that his realms may grow stronger and larger owing to his victories: “He [God] will subdue nations under his [the emperor’s] feet” (based on Psalm 47:3).339 Moreover, by wishing the monarch the prosperity and glory of Solomon’s kingdom “for as long as the moon endures” (based on Psalm 72:7),340 together with the reference to Psalm 45:6–7 just noted, the writer adds to the message a messianic layer of meaning. Significantly, Franz Joseph’s name, as the recipient, is highlighted in the axis of symmetry in large golden letters and, below it, his title, “King of Jerusalem,” is written in silver letters in a witty paraphrase: “A blessing from the city after which you are named, for King of Jerusalem is your name.” This blessing plays to Franz Joseph’s self-image as an emperor and king reigning by the grace of God and as the legitimate holder of the prestigious crown of Jerusalem. The evocation of this title is contemporaneous with the suggestive image of Franz Joseph leading his peoples to the Holy City in the allegorical wall-mosaic titled “The Military and Peaceful Pilgrimages from Austria-Hungary to the Holy Land since Ancient Times,” in the chapel of the Austro-Hungarian Hospice in Jerusalem.341 In the invented, anachronistic, scene inside the chapel, Franz Joseph stands, as it were, at the gates of Jerusalem, which is seen crowning the high hill in the far distance. The white light of the rising sun bathes the Holy City and also plays as a huge halo for Franz Joseph—signifying his God-graced kingship. The emperor-king leads two groups of pilgrims: “Military Pilgrims”— medieval Crusader kings, knights, and saints from the areas that at some point in time became part of the Habsburg realms; and “Peaceful Pilgrims”—representative figures of the Austrian lands who participated in mass pilgrimages to the Holy Land in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, dressed in their national costumes to highlight the multinational character of Austria as well as their particular identity, all the more so since they donated the mosaic. The two groups refer to Franz Joseph as King of Jerusalem, which, as our examples show, was a

338 “Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: the sceptre of thy kingdom is a right sceptre. Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wickedness: therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.” 339 “He shall subdue the people under us, and the nations under our feet.” 340 “In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace as long as the moon endureth.” 341 Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, esp. 49–62.

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well-known topos in Vienna at the time. Another important instance is the religiopolitical declaration of the Vatican on the monarch’s pilgrimage to Jerusalem, that such pilgrimage would endow the monarch with “the light and the essential inspiration needed to rule a Catholic empire according to the Catholic way of life,” which, as noted, was widely publicized in Vienna. Beda Dudík also referred emotionally to the claimed title to Jerusalem in his account of Franz Joseph’s peaceful pilgrimage to the Holy City in 1869, and so did the widespread newspaper Neue Wiener Tagblatt of 11 November, 1869, reporting on the visit to the Holy City which aroused such a great enthusiasm in the population, that the monarch could certainly feel as King of Jerusalem.342 These expressions, in words and images, of Franz Joseph’s right to the crown of Jerusalem by the grace of God, became evermore relevant not only in view of the emperor-king’s need for a status as chosen and especially beloved by God, but also in view of the claim to the title by German Emperor Wilhelm II and other members of royalty. Wilhelm II constructed an identity for himself as a Crusader king, heir to the medieval Crusader monarchs, specifically to Friedrich II Hohenstaufen, who was the last Crusader king who reigned over Jerusalem. Wilhelm depicted himself as such in the ceiling painting decorating the Ascension Church in the fortress-like compound of the Augusta Victoria Hospice on the Mount of Olives, which he built between 1898 and the early 1910s, and in a monumental statue in the courtyard of that institution.343 The German emperor’s images as heir to the Crusader kings, as well as to the ideal biblical kings of Jerusalem, were installed in the Ascension Church about two years after the depiction of Franz Joseph as such in the chapel of the Austro-Hungarian Hospice in Jerusalem. All these examples assert my interpretation of the importance to Franz Joseph’s court of the references to him as King of Jerusalem in the Austro-Hungarian Hospice, in the gifts presented by his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem, and in documents and various media in his actual realms. To end, as usual in Old Yishuv congratulatory epistles, and obviously referring to Franz Joseph, the writer of the dedication of the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel turns to psalms to thank God for setting a crown of gold on the head of kings, gracing them with virtues, giving them a vast and prosperous kingdom, and guiding and protecting them. Typically, the heads of the kolel close the congratulatory text as “your servants, who surrender at your feet,” and sign in humility and submission in Hebrew and German.344 The stamp of the Austro-Galician kolel, placed

342 See above, p. 88. 343 See my “Theater”; “By the Grace of God and Historical Right”; and “Augusta Victoria Hospice.” 344 Lasar Spira, who was head of the community since 5614 (1853), Meyer Brochfeld and Pinkas K. Spira.

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on the axis of symmetry together with the main components of the congratulations, authenticates the entire message.345 As meaningful as the visual design and text that we have examined thus far can be, the cornerstone upon which the Old Yishuv builds its identity and expresses its raison d’être is the Jewish holy places. Their images also reinforce the messianic meaning of the message. Two of these images are set on the axis of symmetry that articulates text and images, together with the imperial symbols, the metaphorical eagle, the dedication’s verses, the name of the monarch and his title to the crown of Jerusalem, and the stamp of the kolel. One, the iconic frontal view of the Western Wall with cypresses rising behind it, and the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School flanking it, appears on the stamp. As noted, not by chance was this iconic image chosen as the symbol used by many Old Yishuv institutions. This iconographic type of the Temple Mount, the dominant one in Jewish art since the eighteenth century, came to symbolize a variety of ideas and beliefs, first and foremost the Site of the Temple as well as the messianic Temple of the End of Days, and the Holy City of Jerusalem as a whole. Moreover, this icon was also believed to have apotropaic powers that would guard the just against all evil and danger; therefore, in a gift to a much-appreciated sovereign, it would mean that he, his House, and his empire were also protected.346 The venerated wall was depicted again at the base of the axis, this time detached from its surroundings and set in a paradisiacal landscape of disproportionally large, spreading, vines bearing heavy clusters of grapes, from a diagonal perspective. The vines may symbolize the people of Israel and the Land of Israel as the vineyard of the Lord—a fertile, prosperous, and peaceful land (Isaiah 5:1–7). Recalling the biblical past, when “Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beersheba, all the days of Solomon” (1 Kings 4:25), the visual image also makes the future tangible, in the spirit of Micah 4:4: “they shall sit every man under his vine and under his fig tree; and none shall make them afraid.” Moreover, whereas the frontal and static view of the Western Wall creates a ceremonial atmosphere that conveys the tension between a glorious past, a sorrowful present, and a long-anticipated redemption, the diagonal perspective used in this vignette opens the illusionary space and invites the beholder to enter the Promised Land in his imagination. It may be assumed that the

345 The stamp is highlighted by an ornamental ribbon, on which the name of Rabbi David Schreiber, president of the Austro-Galician Jewish community, resident of Drohobycz, Galicia (Überreicht durch unseren Herrn Präsidenten David Schreiber Drohobycz, Galizien) was written in elaborate German characters. 346 On the icon’s apotropaic powers, see Einhorn, “Sacred and Secular Objects,” 21–29; Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, chap. 16.

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artist expected the visual imagery to work together with the text to suggest the ideal, prosperous, and peaceful future in the visions and dreams of Franz Joseph too. The use of Jewish eschatological symbolism to suggest an ideal future for the people of Israel, as well as for Franz Joseph and his realms, is lyrically concretized by the images and the text on the columns of the painted gate of honor. The images, two views of Jerusalem, are set in a heart-shaped space formed by a heraldic pair of long-necked imaginary birds that, perhaps not by chance, recall the head and neck of the hybrid animal with a bird-like upper body and lion-like rear and legs that appears in Franz Joseph’s imperial coat-of-arms. The two images of Jerusalem illustrate an appropriate verse from Psalm 128:5, a Song of Ascent, the first part of which was written on the lintel above the columns to the right and its second part on the lintel above the columns to the left: “The Lord shall bless thee out of Zion” is illustrated by an image of Mount Zion and David’s Tower, “and thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem all the days of thy life”—by an image of the Temple Mount and the city spread out behind it, as would be seen from the Mount of Olives. The artists and writers made sophisticated use of Jerusalem’s legendary and historical past to give visual expression to the hopes of the Austro-Galician kolel, which certainly corresponded to those of Franz Joseph, that God may grant peace and prosperity to his realms; this wish of the kolel includes its hopes that the monarch may protect them and their brethren in his realms. Franz Joseph’s subjects in Jerusalem obviously intended to motivate the monarch to extend them his protection in the days to come, too. The three images of the Temple Mount in this gift raise some questions. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, most Old Yishuv artists chose to represent Jerusalem by the iconic frontal image of the Western Wall in the span between the Site of the Temple (in the image of the Dome of the Rock) and Solomon’s School (in the image of the Al-Aqsa Mosque), as depicted on the stamp of the Austro-Galician kolel; the diagonal view painted below it was often chosen as well. The artist that decorated this gift chose a third scheme of the Holy City for the image of Jerusalem on the left column of the gate of honor—a view from the Mount of Olives highlighting the eastern wall of the Temple Mount and the Gate of Mercy— that lie on the same axis as the Site of the Temple represented by the Dome of the Rock. Although less frequent, this view of the Temple Mount, with the Gate of Mercy in the center of the first plane, had a long tradition in Jewish art. The Gate of Mercy appears in Jewish works created in the Holy Land already in the sixteenth century; for example, the Yihus ha’Avot, created in Safed in 1564, displays an image of the Temple Mount seen from the Mount of Olives that clearly shows the Gate of Mercy, the azarah (Temple Court), the Temple (in the image of the Dome of the Rock), and Solomon’s School (a basilical structure like the Al-Aqsa Mosque), all of

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which are identified in Hebrew.347 Moreover, writings from the time of the Geonim, the spiritual leaders of the Jewish community from the late sixth to early eleventh century,348 reveal that although the Western Wall was where reverent petitions to God converged, prayers at the Gate of Mercy were also considered an effective venue to obtain blessings, based on the prophecy of the New Jerusalem of the End of Time pronounced by the prophet Ezekiel (43:1–2).349 Periodicals and chronicles at the time tell us that on festive days, especially during the Three Pilgrimage Festivals—Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot—Jews would go up to the Mount of Olives to look at the Temple Mount as a symbolic way of fulfilling the biblical precept to pray in the Temple and bring offerings on those special days; moreover, they went up the mount to look at the most sacred site on the Ninth of Av, the day of commemoration of the destruction of the Temple, and mourn its loss.350 From that site, they would see the Gate of Mercy on the first plane. However, why did the artist of the dedication for the Austro-Galician kolel’s gift choose this place, which at the time was less popular in the visual culture of the Old Yishuv? This question deserves consideration because in the nineteenth century, the view of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives seems to have been more widespread among Christians. This view would be a visual expression of the Christian eschatological hopes akin to the Jewish symbolism embedded in the schematic frontal

347 National Library of Israel, Ms. Heb. 8° 6947. The scribe was Uri son of Simon of Biella. See Sarfati, “Illustrations of Yihus ha’Avot,” 40–41, plate 16. 348 Based in Babylon, the Geonim interpreted and taught the biblical precepts, and rendered religio-legal decisions in accordance with the Talmud. 349 Ezekiel 43:1–2: “Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east: and, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory,” and Ezekiel 44:1–3. See also, below, chap. 5.2, on the photograph album offered by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV. 350 See Exodus 23:14–17, 34:18–23; Deuteronomy 16:1, 9–10, 13, 16–17. On this practice of mourning the destruction of the Temple, see Lamentations Rabbah, Petichta 25, ed. Solomon Buber (Vilna: Romm, 1899), 29–30 (Hebrew). For various biblical sources of this tradition, see Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 287–288; Ora Limor, “The Place of the End of Days: Eschatological Geography in Jerusalem,” in The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian and Islamic Art: Studies in Honor of Bezalel Narkiss on the Occasion of His Seventieth Birthday, ed. Bianca Kühnel (Jerusalem: Journal of the Center for Jewish Art, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1998), 16–17; Menashe Harel and Rechavam Zeevy, This is Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Canaan, 1977), 120–123. On this local custom in the period under discussion, see Dotan Goren, “The Jewish Presence on the Temple Mount before the State of Israel (1840–1948),” Journal for Judea and Samaria Research Studies 23 (2013), 240 (Hebrew), quoting the Jerusalemite Rabbi Yoel Moshe Salomon and the periodical Ha’havatzelet 25, 18 April, 1890, 195–196; idem, “The Longing for the Temple Mount in the Late Ottoman Period,” Ariel 176 (2006), 39, 46–47 (Hebrew).

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image of the Western Wall, in between the Dome of the Rock/Site of the Temple and the Al-Aqsa Mosque/School of Solomon. In Christian tradition, the Gate of Mercy is the Golden Gate, which became a sacred site following the ancient interpretation of Ezekiel’s prophecy, that a prince that would enter through the closed gate (44:1–3) referred to Jesus: through this gate, Christians believe, Jesus entered into the city as king and messiah.351 Therefore, this view suited the Christian perception of Jerusalem perfectly and also met the requirements of the romantic Orientalist aesthetics: it allowed artists to depict Jerusalem as a distant, unreachable, and unattainable city, a mirror of Heavenly Jerusalem. Looking at the city from a distance, beholders would be more inclined to remember it in all its beauty as described in the Bible and in idealized visual images of its holy places or of the imagined Land of Israel in biblical times. As clearly shown by our examples, visitors, especially believers, frequently perceived these landscapes with a sense of recognition rather than discovery, creating in their mind images compatible with their spiritual concept of the Holy Land. In typical works of romantic and Orientalist artists, a dreamy atmosphere dominates the landscape, the city is usually depicted from afar, on hills much higher than in reality, and small figures in the foreground who seemingly invite the viewers of the painting to look with wonderment at the impressive view.352 Did the painter of the dedication in the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel choose to paint the city from the Mount of Olives because of the beauty of the landscape from that vantage point? Or was he influenced by works of Christian artists, prints, postcards, and photographs of the Holy City that were in much demand in the growing travel industry at the time? Both possibilities lead us to ask whether the artist and his Orthodox clients were aware of the symbolic meanings attributed by Christianity to the view of Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives that highlights the Gate of Mercy/Golden Gate.353 After all, a main aim of Jewish religious leaders was to affirm the Jewish identity of the Holy City. Yet, even if there

351 Iris Shagrir, “Adventus in Jerusalem: The Palm Sunday Celebration in Latin Jerusalem,” Journal of Medieval History 41/1 (2015), 1–20. On the Golden Gate, see Pringle, Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, 103–109. no. 293. 352 Among the most famous examples of this aesthetic perception are the paintings by artists who visited Jerusalem and drew sketches of its landscape, like the Scottish David Roberts, who worked in Egypt and the Holy Land from 1838 to 1840; see Uzi Baram, “Images of the Holy Land: The David Roberts Paintings as Artifacts of 1830s Palestine,” Historical Archaeology 41/1 (2007), 106–117. On Edward Lear, who came from England and painted views of Jerusalem in 1858 and 1859, and the American painter Frederic Edwin Church, who created a monumental painting in 1870 as seen from the Mount of Olives, with the Gate of Mercy in the center of the first plane and the Dome of the Rock behind it, see Ben-Arieh, Painting the Holy Land, 131–141 and 217–222, respectively.

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was a Christian influence, since ancient times cultural groups have been adopting and adapting images and motifs developed by other cultures to meet their own needs. Sometimes artists adopted only the visual image with no relation to the symbolic meanings attributed to it in the original context or a later source, and in other cases image and meanings were adapted to better serve the borrowers’ interests and aims. Therefore, it is difficult to ascertain the motives for the choice of this scene. It is noteworthy that in the view of Jerusalem in this gift, the Holy Sepulchre is not discernible among the schematic domed buildings in the backdrop of the Temple Mount, but the Hasidic Tiferet Israel Synagogue is, as are secondary monuments, such as the eastern kanatir, or honor gate, appearing on the esplanade. In closing, the painter of the various Jerusalem landscapes in the dedication of the Austro-Galician kolel’s gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee departs in yet another way from Jewish visual traditions. Although he kept to traditional schemes for the four venerated monuments, all, except for the Western Wall on the stamp of the Austro-Galician kolel, are set in a relatively naturalistic landscape of plants and trees, clouded sky, and elements of light and shadow that, although inconsistent and unproportional in size, pretend to be closer to styles prevalent in the West at the time. In contrast to traditional icons that convey a timeless, eternal, presence, the rather naturalistic landscapes suggest the real physical world.354 This is important since it seems that the perception of Jerusalem in the early twentieth century had also changed from an essentially “holy place” to a historical, real, place. Since the 1860s, growing numbers of Orthodox Jews were living not only in their crowded complexes in the Old City, but also in new quarters outside the city walls—a fact that may have contributed to a reconceptualization of Jerusalem. As we will see, this change is clearly reflected in the decoration of the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift to Franz Joseph on this same occasion, the Diamond Jubilee, on which secular sites and new settlements, some closely related to the New Yishuv, are depicted together with holy places, exhibiting no hierarchical differences between them.

353 The Jewish population at the time may have been aware of its symbolism in Islam, wherein the Muslim Mahdi is expected to enter these gates. The importance of the gate for the three faiths undoubtedly increased its religio-political meanings for each of them; see discussion below. 354 The spread of naturalistically rendered images in prints, such as lithographs and postcards, in the nineteenth century also influenced Old Yishuv artists and craftsmen who, although lacking academic training, succeeded in varying degrees to copy images from those media and were proud of their achievements.

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Nevertheless, symbolic aspects are not forgone in the imaginary landscape decorating the Austro-Galician dedication. In addition to the vine climbing up the Western Wall, the two trees springing up by the columns of the gate of honor deserve attention: the date palm and laurel nobilis, are both common in the area, but are also imbued with symbolic meaning since ancient times. The symbolism of nobility, victory, glory, and virtue attributed to the laurel in ancient Rome, and still widespread in the nineteenth century in the West, Palestine, and the Ottoman empire as a whole,355 may have motivated the iconographers of the Austro-Galician blessing to pair it with a date palm—one of the Seven Species that blessed the Land of Israel (Deuteronomy 8:8) and one of the Four Species that Jews are asked to bind together and wave during the Sukkot (Feast of the Tabernacles) celebrations (Leviticus 23:40); moreover, the palm tree is a metaphor for the just—“The righteous shall flourish like the palm tree” (Psalm 92:12), symbolizing the people of Israel. The placing of trees by a gate and of intertwining plants and ferns around its columns was a common decorative motif; we will see it, for example, in the gift of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee. No doubt, the choice of trees, whose symbolic value was especially relevant to the historical, religious, and cultural context in which the Austro-Galician community’s gift was created, contributes to the spiritual and political significance of the image. No less interesting is the impressive 993 mm-high olivewood scroll case made by Abraham Keller, who signed it in Hebrew and noted the Hebrew year, 5669 (fig. 19).356 The artist combined local Jewish imagery with an unmistakable Oriental element of three camels kneeling to support the scroll-case, whose shape recalls a column. The shaft of the “column” is decorated with icons of holy places and the paradisiacal allegory of a bird pecking at grapes on a rich vine, and

355 Based on its dark trunk and alternating leaves, I identify the tree as a laurel nobilis. Obviously the artist was not well acquainted with botanical details, a fact that also explains errors in the description of the oak leaves enhancing the heraldic Austrian symbol in this same painting. The laurel nobilis was attributed symbolical meanings of nobility (hence its name), royalty, and spirituality in the Hellenistic culture. Wreaths of laurel stems also signified eternity since their leaves do not lose their color. This rich symbolism was widely used by royalty in the period under discussion, and not only in the West. Laurel branches appear, for example, on coins of Mehmet V, accompanying the inscription “May he be victorious” . This symbol was used in the Jewish royal milieu since antiquity, as shown by a coin decorated with the name and status of the Hasmonean king John Hyrcanus I (135–104 BC): “Yehohanan the High Priest and the Council of the Jews,” which is enclosed in a laurel wreath; see Israel Museum Collections and (Hendin 457 and Hendin 459). 356 It measures 993 x 325 x 325 mm.

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topped by a “capital” in the shape of a crown adorned with pearls. The camels, skillfully carved in a naturalistic style, are saddled and harnessed; much attention was paid to naturalistic details such as the shape of the head, ears, heavy eyelids, and closed nostrils, as well as to the reins, tassels, small hanging bells, and decorated saddles that look like a comfortable padded, leather-covered seat. The camel as a decorative motif is a local motif with an Oriental touch that is not self-evident in a scroll-case, for this is a cultic object that was meant to represent an Orthodox community.357 In the Old Yishuv visual culture of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, this motif may recall stories from biblical times, and may also reflect the impact of the Western penetration of Jerusalem that brought about a flourishing local craftsmanship with an eye set on the pilgrimage and tourist industry; this trend was further developed by the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, which blended trends from East and West to enhance the market’s appeal in the West. The naturalistic rendering of the camel highlights the schematization of the holy places’ images. Except for the camel motif, the scroll-case is similar to that sent to Franz Joseph in 1898 by the same kolel. Keller kept to the traditional schemes for the holy places. The venerated sites appear in two sets on the column’s shaft, where each monument is framed by stylized branches. The upper set comprises the Site of the Temple in the usual image of the Dome of the Rock in one frame, and the Western Wall in a diagonal perspective in the other; the narrow space in front of the Wall, which is seen from the south, as well as the walls in the background and the trees rising between them, accentuate its majestic height and the large size of its old stones. The lower set comprises David’s Tower and Zion, the City of David, each similarly framed by branches. As noted, the paradisiacal vines and bird appear too, as well as acanthus-like leaves that decorate the upper and lower ends of the column and its base, enclosing and visually binding the entire decorative program.

4.4.2 The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian Gift: Prophesying the Land of Israel as a National Space? In that same year, 1908, and in celebration of the same event, the Diamond Jubilee, the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian community offered Franz Jo357 Camels were domesticated by the local population whom they served for human transport and bearing loads, but they were not routinely used in the Old Yishuv. Figures of camels and other animals are interwoven in marginal masorah and are a common motif in late antique and medieval floor mosaics in the Land of Israel/Palestine.

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seph a scroll of the Book of Esther in a magnificent silver filigree scroll-case, presented in the typical carved olivewood box decorated with mother-of-pearl and wood intarsia,358 common in this kolel (figs. 20–22). The design and iconographic program of the dedication preceding the text of the biblical story are most interesting (fig. 20). They point to significant changes in Old Yishuv society and its complex relationship with the growing New Yishuv, which was based on a liberal and progressive ideology of self-sustaining and productive work, and was also influenced by Zionist ideology, whose aim was to build a national home for the people of Israel.359 Not a gate of honor, but a delicate frame reminiscent of the Secessionist style in Vienna and that of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts in Jerusalem, highlights the visual and literary imagery of the dedication. A large Habsburg double-headed eagle presides at the upper part of the framed pictorial space, the traditional location of religious and royal symbols, set against a bright clouded sky and radiating golden rays of light; beneath it, the painted parchment on which the text is written is set against the background of palm branches and of partly overlapping painted postcards with

358 ÖNB Reg. J.II./6. 359 See, inter alia, Jehuda Reinharz. “Old and New Yishuv: The Jewish Community in Palestine at the Turn of the Twentieth Century,” Jewish Studies Quarterly 1/1 (1993), 54–71; Bartal, “The ‘Old’ and the ‘New’ Yishuv,” 3–19. Yossi Katz (“The Re-emergence of Jerusalem: New Zionist Approaches in Attaining Political Goals Prior to the First World War,” Political Geography 14/3 [1995]: 280–282) remarks that from 1882, the beginning of Zionist activity in Palestine, and until the years immediately before the First World War, Zionism’s attitude toward Jerusalem’s Orthodox Jewish population could be summed up as negative. Zionist efforts focused on the establishment of agricultural settlements on the coastal plain and in the Galilee, and, in the urban sector, on Jaffa and the establishment of Tel Aviv, the first Hebrew city. The failure of political lobbying in the Ottoman empire and Europe in order to obtain a charter over Palestine, in addition to the difficulties in the establishment of settlements, led the Zionist movement to take an interest in Jerusalem and other concentrations of Jewish religious populations. The new strategies included demographic “conquest,” as well as the promotion of cultural and national positions. In my opinion, the gift presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph in 1908 reveals the development of this new strategy and, if so, the possibility that an artist who identified himself with the New Yishuv may have been involved in the design of the dedication. In his “Alliance of the Hebrews,” 119–147, esp. 120–129, Michael K. Silber notes personalities such as Akiva Yosef Schlesinger, who first wrote down his ideas in the 1860s and was not alone among Orthodox thinkers who envisaged an alternative Jewish society in the Holy Land. Earlier, the Sephardi Rabbi Yehuda Alkalay (1798–1878) and the Prussian Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Kalischer (1795–1874), elder “precursors of Zionism,” had advocated immigration to Palestine and the establishment of agricultural colonies, the organization of armed guards, the adoption of a flag and national costume, and the use of Hebrew as a spoken language for men and women alike. These precursors contended that it was morally proper that religious studies be combined with work and therefore called to organize and flee to a safe cultural sanctuary.

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Fig. 20: Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6.

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Fig. 21: Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Silver scroll-case, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6.

Fig. 22: Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel. Receptacle for Esther Scroll, 1908. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J. II./6.

views of the Land of Israel, along its sides and bottom. In contrast to the traditional use of religious and royal symbols, the integration of a modern communication medium as part of the decoration of a gift’s dedication—illustrated postcards, which reached a peak in popularity between 1898 and 1918360—points to the “modern character” of circles in the Old Yishuv and, moreover, to a new mode of perception and social organization of the space. Postcards, which were commercially produced since the 1860s, were most popular in Palestine by the end of the century, marketed by foreign and local publishing firms. Illustrated postcards were produced in black and white as well as in color, the latter being a new technology that was in much demand at the time.361 In the gift to Franz Joseph, the painted postcards reflect the ideology and values that the kolel wished to convey

360 Shalom Sabar, “Between Poland and Germany: Jewish Religious Practices in Illustrated Postcards of the Early Twentieth Century,” Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry 16 (2003), 137–138. 361 Photographs were made by order, marketed as black-and-white postcards, printed in color as units or as series, or placed in high priced albums; see Yoel Amir, Holy Land Scenes 1906: The Imberger Album of Colored Photos – Then and Now, ed. Eyal Davidson and Eyal Meiron (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2006), ii, iv–v (Foreword) (Hebrew), and Haim Goren, “‘On Eretz Israel, Pilgrimage, the Templars – and Their Album’,” vi–xi (Preface); Amir, The Orientalists. See also be-

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to the general Austro-Hungarian society. As Sabar notes, the original Hebrew name for “postcard” was michtav galui, an open letter.362 In the gift’s dedication, the golden rays of light shining in the clouded sky highlight and add a heavenly touch to the Habsburg eagle with the imperial crown on top, symbolizing the divine source of the monarch’s House; they visually state that Franz Joseph reigns by the grace of God. In the center of the eagle, in place of the heraldic shield, is a portrait of Franz Joseph crowned with a laurel wreath, in a clipeus enclosed in a rich wreath of leaves in the manner of a victorious augustus—a widespread laudatory scheme in portraits of European monarchs on medals, coins, seals, and other official insignia, that was readily adopted by those wishing to please the royalty. Important official Austrian examples are the commemorative medal minted in Vienna in celebration of Franz Joseph’s journey to Jerusalem on 8–13 November 1869,363 and the signum laudis or signum memoriae medals minted since the 1890s, mentioned above. The portrait of Franz Joseph with laurel wreaths and inscribed in a clipeus also appears on other gifts: we examined the one presented to him on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee by the Commerce and Industry Chamber of Austria (fig. 12). Most relevant too, in our context, is the laureated image of the emperor-king on the badges made by Austro-Hungarian Jews from the outbreak of the Great War until his death in 1916, issued as a sign of loyalty (fig. 23).364 The golden rays of light radiating from Franz Joseph’s portrait and the Habsburg double-headed eagle in the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift also have a compositional role: they direct the beholder’s eyes to two small Stars of David that flank the frame on top, enclosed in medallions and enhanced by graceful leaves. The Star of David gained popularity as a Jewish symbol in the late seventeenth through eighteenth centuries; moreover, since the First Zionist Congress, held in 1897, it became widespread as the emblem of the movement for the rebuilding of the Land of Israel as the national home of the Jewish people.365 Therefore, in view of the images related to the New

low, esp. chap. 5.2, on the photograph album presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV. 362 Sabar, “Between Poland and Germany,” 138. 363 Arad, Crown on Jerusalem, 137–140, fig. 19. 364 See, for example, badges in Peter Steiner, “Namensliste der Feldrabbiner in der österreichisch-ungarischen Armee des Ersten Weltkriegs,” in Weltuntergang: Jüdisches Leben und Sterben im Ersten Weltkrieg, ed. Marcus G. Patka (Vienna: Styria Premium, 2014), 74–96, figs. p. 81, and Glässer, “Királyunkat, kit Mózesként rendeltél…,” figs. pp. 119–120. 365 See Alec Mishory, Lo and Behold: Zionist Icons and Visual Symbols in Israeli Culture, 123–126 (Hebrew); and in a religious context: Zohar Hanegbi, “Synagogue Ceremonial Furnishings in

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Yishuv appearing on the painted postcards in this dedication, the Stars of David may well convey both a religious and a national message. Two dedicatory verses in large crimson, biblical-style, Hebrew characters are written above the medallions that enclose the stars: “Long live the king” [‫ ]יחי המלך‬to the right and “Our Lord our King” [‫ ]אדוננו מלכנו‬to the left—the former the people’s blessing to King Solomon on his anointment (1 Kings 1:39),366 the latter an expression of devotion to God (e.g., in Isaiah 33:22 and Psalm 89:18), which here could also be interpreted as “our lord the king,” namely Franz Joseph.

Fig. 23: Loyalty badge, Austro-Hungarian Jews, 1914. Vienna, Jewish Museum. Inv. No. 3898.

In the same traditional characters and royal crimson, the scribe of the dedicatory text wrote at the top of the painted parchment: “Thine eyes shall see the king in his beauty” (Isaiah 33:17), thus adding to the prayer a messianic meaning promising perfect bliss. The verse can also be interpreted as referring to Franz Joseph who, as a righteous monarch, will see the glory of God. Those versed in the Bible, as was the pious emperor-king, would probably recall the second part of Isaiah’s verse: “They shall behold the land that is very far off,” the promised Land of Israel; the decoration of this dedication spreads out before the viewer’s eyes landscapes of this land depicted on the painted postcards, thereby binding imagery and text. As customary in the gifts from the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, the prayer is written in Hebrew, but the names of the sites are writ-

Eretz Israel in the Years 1835–1904: Tradition and Innovation,” doctoral dissertation (Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 2011), 79 (Hebrew). 366 Translated in the King James version as “God save King Solomon.”

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ten in German, thereby significantly increasing the immediate impact of the work. The images would evoke memories of holy places such as the Western Wall, Mount Zion, and Rachel’s Tomb, as well as of secular sites that the monarch either visited or may have known from representations in books, photograph albums, souvenirs, and other objects. The text is written as a prayer rich in praises to God and laudations to the emperor. While the religio-political flattery was typical and expected, some of the acclamations to the monarch are extravagantly exaggerated, as, for example, the characterization of the Diamond Jubilee as “a great event in the history of the world” [‫]דברי ימי עולם‬. In a strategy especially prevalent in the Old Yishuv, but widely used in Jewish communities inside the Habsburg realms as well, the writer of the dedication skillfully adapts references to liken Franz Joseph to the ideal biblical kings. One recurring verse is the thanksgiving prayer to God: “Thou wilt prolong the king’s life: and his years as many generations” (Psalm 61:6)—a plea to God that establishes a parallel between Franz Joseph and King David, and constitutes an assurance of God’s eternal protection. Moreover, the quotation of this verse in the dedication of a gift on this specific occasion is very sophisticated since the value of the verse “his years as many generations,” in Hebrew “days to the days [of the King]” [‫ְיֵמי‬-‫ ]ָיִמים ַעל‬in gematria (an alphanumeric code of assigning a numerical value to a name, word, or phrase based on its letters)—60—corresponds to the years of rule celebrated in a Diamond Jubilee. This correspondence is properly emphasized by much larger letters and diacritic, or cantillation, marks, calling attention to the fact that this is not merely a befitting verse, but should be perceived as a revelation and special mystical relationship between the two kings,367 David and Franz Joseph. Gematria and the interpretation of words as abbreviations have long been a common symbolic language in Judaism, especially among practitioners of Kabbala. The dedication points to the contemporary use of ancient traditions in Jewish art that, together with the images in the painted postcards, reveals a new way of thinking and acting, more open to dialogue and collaboration. A pertinent example of similar means of expressions of gratitude and affection to Franz Joseph, adopted by Habsburg Jews in Jerusalem and in the Habsburg

367 Gematria is a system wherein numerical values are attributed to each Hebrew letter; by applying the numerical values of combinations of letters, one can determine relationships between other words with equal and/or related numerical values. On this specific relationship, see Yehuda Liebes, “Long Live the King: The Strong Weakness of a Monarch,” in Religion and Politics in Jewish Thought: Essays in Honor of Aviezer Ravitzky, ed. Benjamin Brown, Menachem Lorberbaum, Avinoam Rosenak and Yedidia Z. Stern (Jerusalem: Israel Democracy Institute and Zalman Shazar Center for Jewish History, 2012), 1460–1461 (Hebrew).

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realms, appears in a congratulatory epistle in Hebrew sent to the emperor by Chaim Gelernter, the Chief Rabbi of Kuty (Galicia) two years later, on the occasion of Franz Joseph’s eightieth birthday: “Congratulations to our king, the mighty, righteous, and compassionate emperor, the praised Franz Joseph the First on the day when the glory of his glory was fulfilled for eighty years; may the Lord bless His Majesty and give him more and ever joyful years. My heart advised me that I should use my language for the reverence of our king, the language of the Holy Scriptures.” Rabbi Gelernter then read the Hebrew initials of the emperor’s name, “Peh” for Franz and “Yod” for Joseph, which together spell the Hebrew word “Pi,”“my mouth,” recalling Psalm 37:30—“The mouth of the righteous speaketh wisdom”—and reworded accordingly as “Franz Joseph [Pi] the righteous speaks wisdom.”368 The use of gematria in the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift is another example of the learned and wellthought-out utilization of traditional Jewish wisdom in local art, integrating text and image in a proud statement of positive Jewish identity construction as a contra to the discriminated Other in the Diaspora and, at the same time, attentive to the expectations of the Habsburg monarchy. In the dedicatory text of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift, these appeals for God’s favor and for His protection of the just monarch are reinforced by the glorifying declaration “the sceptre of thy kingdom is a right sceptre” (Psalm 45:6) and by the blessing “I will betroth thee unto me… in righteousness, and in judgment, and in loving kindness, and in mercies” (Hosea 2:19) —a description of the love of God for His people as a gracious compliment for Franz Joseph’s kind attitude toward his Jewish subjects. This expression of gratitude is also stated in the metaphor “in his mercy provides them refuge in the shadow of his wings,” and by the assertion that the emperor allows his Jewish subjects to “venerate God as required by the [Jewish] faith.”369 The author of the dedication then appropriately adds: “and also to us, dwelling in the Holy [City], he [the emperor] gave many signs of his love when he came in all his glory”—a pronouncement that clearly discloses the importance of the objects and texts in the self-enhancement of the Old Yishuv. The ornate and flattering language was widespread in appeals to honorable persons at the time, both in Europe and Jerusalem, but in the Old Yishuv it undoubtedly also allowed for the construction of a positive identity. Thus, on 7 October, 1870 (12 Tishrei 5631), Israel Dov Frumkin, editor of the journal Ha’havatzelet, wrote about Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem:

368 Kühn, “Kaiser Franz Joseph.” 369 See adaptations of the metaphor for the eagles’ wings as protection by the loving God, already discussed.

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“On 6 Kislev 5630 (10 November 1869), the country was lit up by the splendor of His Glorious Majesty, His Honor, the mighty emperor, the merciful Franz Joseph I…. After touring the site of the Temple, the worthy emperor paid [the Jews] the honor… of heading toward the Jews’ Street to visit the Jewish sites. He graced the Great Sephardic Synagogue with his illustrious presence.”370

The Views of the Land of Israel The selection of sites in the Land of Israel, displayed before the eyes of Franz Joseph in the painted postcards decorating the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift, raises several questions. The first parameter to be noted is the inclusion of secular sites, which is not self-evident in the context of a representative object from the Old Yishuv, and like the reference to the new medium of communication—postcards—points to modern practices in the circle of personalities who approved the design of the gift and to the heterogeneous character of the kolel.371 It is possible that these developments are related to the religio-political conflicts in and between the three main collectives in Hungary— the conservative Orthodox, the liberal Neologs, and the status quo supporters, as well as influence of Zionist circles; in the latter years of the nineteenth century, and especially at the beginning of the twentieth, the idea of a national revival was well received even in circles of the more Orthodox communities.372 Consequently, the depiction of new Jewish neighborhoods in Jerusalem and institutions that Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects founded and were proud of is perfectly understandable. Less obvious is the representation of cities with not considerably large Jewish populations, like Jaffa, Beirut, Sidon, and Damascus; moreover, the inclusion of new

370 Ha’havatzelet, 7 October, 1870 (12 Tishrei 5631), no. 2. Quoted by Tamar Hayardeni, “The Kaiser’s Cap,” 47 (Hebrew and English https://segula mag.com/en/articles/the-kaisers-cap/. 371 In the late nineteenth century, more and more printers decorated documents, maps, souvenirs, and other objects—not only with small images of holy places, but also of towns and settlements in the Land of Israel; their appearance on representative objects of the Orthodox communities would be unexpected; see Shalom Sabar, “On the Difference in Attitudes toward Visual Arts between Sephardim and Ashkenazim in Eretz Israel in the Late Ottoman Period,” Pe‘amim 56 (1993), 75–105, esp. 93 and figs. 10, 11 (Hebrew). Another illuminating source is a 1900 catalog of seals published by the Goldberg Printing House in Jerusalem; in addition to traditional seals with images of the holy sites of Jerusalem, they also displayed images of Be’er Sheva, Rishon Lezion, and yeshivot; however, the seals with images of these towns do not belong to the Old Yishuv; see Bracha Slae, “Holy on White: Depictions of Holy Places on Printed Objects from Jerusalem,” Et-mol 211 (2010), 8–11 (Hebrew). 372 Keren-Kratz, “Politics of Jewish Orthodoxy,” 231–233.

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settlements and small towns established on the basis of work productivity and self-sufficiency is rather surprising, all the more so because Orthodox institutions like the main synagogues in Jerusalem were hardly paid any attention. Following this line of thought, the Hungarian Orthodox community must have been very pleased by the inclusion of a view of the Batei Ungarin neighborhood (Kolonie Üngarische Gemeinde, the Houses of the Hungarians),373 which was built in 1891 in the new residential area spreading outside the walls of the Old City and next to the Orthodox neighborhood of Mea Shearim. As noted, this kolel, the bestorganized of all the kolelim, was the first of the Old Yishuv communities to build its own neighborhood. Its relationship to the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel would also justify the inclusion of Batei Machase, built on the slopes of Mount Zion toward the Western Wall (Armen und Pilgerwohnungen auf dem Berge Zion in Jerusalem, Houses for the Needy and Pilgrims on Mount Zion).374 Both housing developments exemplify the self-pride of the gift-givers: although the Batei Machase compound was built in the 1860s by an organization of Dutch and German Jews, whose aim was to relieve the harsh living conditions of the crowded Jewish Quarter, the Austrian Consul Count Joseph von Pizzamano personally supervised its construction in 1860, his last year in office. Significantly, the southern gate was called Joseph’s Gate, in honor of the Austrian emperor who made a donation when visiting Jerusalem. In addition, although most Hungarian families were not among the poverty-stricken Jews in Jerusalem, many of them received apartments there.375 Returning to the Jerusalemite identity of the gift-givers, the inclusion of new neighborhoods outside the city walls documents not only the needs of the growing population, the collaboration between Ashkenazi and Sephardi kolelim, and Mughrabi Jews of northwest Africa (Kolel of the Westerns, Maaravim), but also the

373 The Hungarian kolel followed the call of Rabbi Shmuel Salant, who served as the Ashkenazi Rabbi of Jerusalem from 1871 until his death in 1909, to build proper housing outside the city walls for the rapidly growing Jewish community crowded in the Old City, so much so that it risked the health of its inhabitants; see Eli Schiller, “The Batei Ungarin Neighborhood,” in Mea Shearim and Its Surroundings, ed. Eli Schiller, Ariel, 163–164 (Jerusalem: Ariel, 2004), 198–200 (Hebrew). The neighborhood is also known as Nahalat Zvi (“Land of the Deer”), following Jeremiah 3:19, thereby referring to it as a beautiful and desired land. This name also alludes to the main donor, Rabbi Yitzhak Zvi Ratzersdorfer, however this allusion is lost on non-Hebrew speakers. 374 Its full name is “The Company for Poor Shelters and Hospitality on Mount Zion and Holy City Jerusalem, may it be rebuilt and re-established speedily in our own days, Amen!” 375 Schiller, “Batei Ungarin Neighborhood,” esp. 198–200. In 1857, the opportunity arose to purchase a large plot of land at the southeastern end of the Jewish Quarter and build a neighborhood there. This land was purchased by Kolel Hod (Hod is an abbreviation for Holland and Deutschland), which administered the funds collected in those countries for the benefit of Jews living in the Land of Israel.

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reconceptualization of Jerusalem from the Holy City to a more modern city; therefore, the choice of the sites and the naturalistic depiction of the landscapes add a new “secular” dimension to the image. Nevertheless, the appearance of new settlements, including the pioneer communes labeled Colonie Pethach Tikwah, Colonie Rishon Le Zion, and Colonie Zichron Jakob, as well as the first Jewish agricultural school, Mikveh Israel, is not self-explanatory.376 Although part of such settlements and small towns, founded with the aim of cultivating the soil and developing small industries, was established by progressive circles within the Old Yishuv and not by Zionist newcomers, for whom the productive settlements were an achievement that brought great fulfillment,377 those circles were a minority; central circles in the Old Yishuv fiercely opposed such instruments of change in the way of life.378 One of the relevant progressive leaders, Rabbi Yoel Moshe Salomon, operated in various sectors. On the one hand, he contributed to the founding of the agricultural settlements of Petach Tikvah in 1878 and Yehud in 1882 (among the towns depicted in the painted postcards), as well as to the establishment in 1869 of the pioneer private Jewish neighborhood known as Nahalat Shiv‘a on a plot of land outside the walls of the Old City, which he bought with six of his friends; on the other hand, he was instrumental in the establishment of the strictly conservative Orthodox neighborhoods Mea Shearim (1874—1880) and Batei Machase on Mount Zion (1860—1890), which are also represented on those postcards. Salomon strongly disapproved of living on alms, but was devoted to charity work and traveled to Europe to raise funds for the building and maintenance of hospitals; he was also one of the heads of Knesset Yisrael, the central coordinating institution of the Ashkenazi Orthodox communities. In a similar phenomenon, notably from the opposite direction, some New Yishuv immigrants felt at home in the Old Yishuv society. Despite serious disagreements between the various factions, there was a neighborly interaction and cooperation, whenever needed, to advance common interests.379

376 Also “colonies” Beer Tobiah, Ekron, Yessud Hamaala, Rehovot, Gadarah, Yehudiya, Rosh Pina, and Metula are represented in the painted postcards. In some cases, only the name of the settlement is seen and the view of the site itself is hidden by another painted postcard. It is noteworthy that Joseph Niego, an Austrian subject, was the director of Mikveh Israel school from 1891 to 1902. 377 To mention but one example, in the context of representative objects, we may recall the album with photographs of new settlements presented by Theodor Herzl and other members of the Zionist Movement to the German emperor Wilhelm II in November 1898, then visiting Palestine. The aim of the Zionist delegation was to achieve the emperor’s support for the Zionist cause. 378 Bartal, “The ‘Old’ and the ‘New’ Yishuv,” 9–13. 379 See Reinharz, “Old and New Yishuv,” 57. Cooperation was motivated, inter alia, by the difficult economic situation and material dependency on donations from Diaspora Jews—the haluka

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Puzzling questions arise regarding not only the selection of sites, but also the prominence of some of them in the dedication’s design, in contrast to the scarce attention paid to others and even the absence of central sites in the life of the Old Yishuv. One example of this issue is the covering up of some of the sites in the painted postcards with neighboring ones. For instance, at the foot of the axis of symmetry, a location that traditionally endows an image with greater symbolic importance, the artist appropriately painted a postcard of one of the Four Holy Cities of the Land of Israel—Hebron; however, the view of Hebron is hidden by the painted parchment bearing the dedication text and by the adjoining postcard, therefore, only the name of the city is witness to its presence. Could it be that the composition of the Jewish population in Hebron, mostly Sephardi Jews and Chabad Hasidim whose origins were mainly in small towns in the hands of Russia at the time, rendered Hebron less important than the three other Holy Cities—Jerusalem, Safed and Tiberias—in the eyes of the Austro-Hungarian gift-givers? If so, could ignoring the Hasidic Tiferet Israel Synagogue, but not the Perushim Hurva Synagogue, be an expression of the rivalry between the two communities? It is not that simple; also the slight importance given to the Hurva Synagogue, whose name is the sole visible part on the painted postcard, as in the case of Hebron, is enigmatic. This fact stands out especially in view of the presence of sites whose religious or political meaning to the emperor was doubtful. In effect, we would expect to see highlighted representations of both synagogues, because their founding was made possible, among others, by Franz Joseph’s support. In 1849, Joseph Pizzamano, then Austrian Vice-Consul in Jerusalem, recommended to the imperial court to intervene before the Sublime Porte and achieve a firman (decree) for the Perushim’s reconstruction of an early seventeenth-century synagogue in the Hurva (“the Ruin”) courtyard and the construction of the Hasidic community’s own synagogue. The result of Pizzamano’s efforts was the rebuilding of the Hurva Synagogue between 1857 and 1864, with the assistance of the British Consulate, and a little later also the construction of the Tiferet Israel Syna-

system that continued to be largely assumed even in circles motivated by a desire for radical change in the way of living of the Old Yishuv. In effect, as the twentieth century was approaching, the very existence of new settlements with an eye toward self-reliance, as well as the establishment of humanitarian, cultural, and educational institutions, continued to be possible only through philanthropists’ sponsorship and the support of various Jewish organizations in the Diaspora; see Arieh Bruce Saposnik, “‘... Will Issue Forth from Zion?’ The Emergence of a Jewish National Culture in Palestine and the Dynamics of Yishuv-Diaspora Relations,” Jewish Social Studies (New Series) 10/1 (2003), 152–155.

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gogue, which was finished in 1872.380 Moreover, disregard of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue in the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian gift to Franz Joseph is even more surprising if, indeed, as told by a popular local tradition, the emperor took an interest in it when walking through the Jewish Quarter in 1869 and willingly donated to its completion (see discussion below). The minimal attention paid to these synagogues also stands out when reviewing the historical context at the turn of the century, since by then both synagogues had acquired a status similar to that of venerated places of old in both oral tradition and visual culture.381 Surprisingly, the Hungarians’ or Ohel Itzhak Synagogue, built by their kolel in the Old City near the Western Wall in the 1870s and completed in 1904, does not figure in this context at all.382 Could the appearance of the landscapes of new agricultural settlements and towns, all of which are only partially hidden, reflect the religious and ideological discourse taking place in the Old Yishuv? As noted, although most of it was strictly Orthodox, various personalities and relatively progressive circles in the Old Yishuv, both among the Hasidim and the Perushim, favored a productive and

380 The Hurva Synagogue was founded in the early eighteenth century by followers of Judah Hehasid and destroyed by Muslims in 1721. The plot lay in ruins for over 140 years and became known as Hurva —“The Ruin.” In the early nineteenth century, the community tried, in vain, to obtain a firman to rebuild the synagogue; it was granted in 1855 only after the intervention of the British Consul and Sir Moses Montefiore. The Hurva became Jerusalem’s main Ashkenazi synagogue until its destruction after the withdrawal of Israeli forces during the Israeli War of Independence; see Arie Morgenstern, “Building of the Hurvah Synagogue: ‘The Beginning of Redemption’: From the Renewal of the Ashkenazi Community in Jerusalem to the Dedication of the Synagogue 1816–1864,” in The Hurvah Synagogue: Six Centuries of Jewish Settlement in Jerusalem, ed. Reuven Gafni, Arie Morgenstern, and David M. Cassuto (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2010), 82–83, 93–95 (Hebrew). The Tiferet Israel Synagogue was built by the notable Nissan Beck, son of Rabbi Israel Beck from the Sadigura Hasidic dynasty in Bukovina, which belonged to Austria at the time. In the early 1840s, father and son established the first Hasidic community in Jerusalem. The ground for the synagogue was bought in 1843, but only after Emperor Franz Joseph interceded with the Ottoman Porte, a firman was granted in 1858; the building slowly took shape and was inaugurated in 1872. On this synagogue, see the comprehensive studies in Reuven Gafni, Yochai Ben-Ghedalia and Uriel Gellman, eds., High Above All: The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue and the Hassidic Community in Jerusalem (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2016) (Hebrew). See also below, chap. 9, with narratives relating to Franz Joseph. 381 Shalom Sabar, “From the Temple to the Hurvah Synagogue: Iconization of the Hurvah in Popular Jewish Art of the Old Yishuv,” in The Hurvah Synagogue: Six Centuries of Jewish Settlement in Jerusalem, ed. Reuven Gafni, Arie Morgenstern, and David M. Cassuto (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2010) 111–132 (Hebrew). 382 In the photograph album sent by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV in 1916, this synagogue is called the Great Israel Synagogue. See examination below, pp. 267, 270 and fig. 60.

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self-sufficient way of living and played an active role in the foundation of such settlements and towns. Works of art and visual culture, as a whole, may tell us about those who commissioned them and about the patrons, artists, and designers, no less than about the subject matter represented. The question therefore arises: who was responsible for the choice of cities, neighborhoods, and monuments depicted in this gift? Could the presence of non-Orthodox sites, including agricultural settlements, point to perceptions of national identity in the spirit of the New Yishuv in some circles of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel? In what measure were the representatives who signed the dedication of this kolel, first and foremost the strictly Orthodox and anti-Zionist Rabbi Joseph Chayim Sonnenfeld,383 aware of possible interpretations of the decoration of their gift? Thus, this dedication is a typical example of how the gifts presented to the emperor-kings can serve not only as documentation of the relationships, expectations, and questions of mutuality, but also as fascinating historical documents of topographical, demographic, socio-cultural, and identity transformations—chronicles of the development of the city and the Old Yishuv. In the 1890s, when modern secular and national movements grew stronger, hardline Orthodox circles, such as those headed by Rabbi Sonnenfeld, parted ways with progressive Jewish movements. Yet it is commonplace nowadays that the demarcation between Old and New Yishuv was not as sharp as once thought. The 1908 congratulations of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph suggests that, in the early twentieth century, the conceptual borders between them were flexible, and that the coexistence in the same kolel of groups holding different positions on the proper way of living was possible. Neighborly interaction and cooperation in charitable organizations were dictated by real needs and naturally created opportunities for dialogue and associations whenever the various communities had a common purpose.384 This behavior is reflected in this gift’s representation of Jerusalem, and of the Land of Israel as a

383 The two other representatives who signed the dedication are Rubin S. Jungreis and [Yehiel] David Deutsch. Joseph Chayim Sonenfeld/Sonnenfeld (1848–1932) was born in Hungary and was a disciple of the famous Ktav/Ksav Sofer. He moved to Jerusalem in 1873 and became a central personality in the Old Yishuv. In 1891, he was instrumental in establishing the Batei Ungarin neighborhood, and in 1898 took over as leader of the ultra-Orthodox community of Jerusalem. 384 In addition to sources already mentioned, see Yehoshua Kaniel, “The Terms ‘Old Yishuv’ and ‘New Yishuv’: Problems of Definition,” The Jerusalem Cathedra: Studies in the History, Archaeology, Geography and Ethnography of the Land of Israel, I, ed. Lee I. Levine (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1981), 232–245, esp. 232–237 on the disapproval of each other, 240 and 243–245 on the heterogenous character of the collectives; Reinharz, “Old and New Yishuv,” esp. 62–65, 69.

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whole, as what can be called a space that transcends at least some of the differences in religious and socio-cultural perceptions of Jewish life at the time. Old Yishuv members developed different identities in their various milieux, advocating particularities as positive group identification. This self-perception was different from that of Jews as alien Others rooted in vicious antisemitism, yet the efforts of Old Yishuv members to enhance the perception of their ethnic, religious, and cultural particularities reflect awareness of that dangerous attitude. Indeed, as we will clearly see in the photograph album presented to Karl I/IV on his coronation, the imagery of these gifts shows an intriguingly unknown Oriental place, but not the Orientalist exoticism of places and barbarically permissive peoples. We should note at least one more related detail regarding the selection of some of the sites and their identifiers in the painted postcards of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift—a detail that once again raises the question about the identity and ideology of the artist and those who approved the iconography. Most of the painted postcards show great similarity to real postcards. Moreover, it seems that the artist chose a model representing the most typical view of the sites regardless of whether the identifying element of the site in the model was Jewish, Christian, or Muslim—whether he copied the model or used it to create his own drawings. Thus, surprisingly, Jerusalem is represented by the view of the Dome of the Rock with a tall minaret in the foreground—not the iconic ensemble of the Dome of the Rock/Temple and the Aqsa Mosque/School of Solomon flanking the Western Wall, long-adopted by Jewish art—and Mount Carmel is identified by the Carmelite Monastery up a hill, in the far distance, although, in both cases, the choice of a monument venerated by Jews would achieve the desired effect while also conveying the religious identity of the gift-givers.385 Similarly, no signs of Jewish presence are seen in a general view of Jaffa from the sea that shows ships and boats that brought visitors and newcomers to the Land of Israel/Palestine or closely built houses hugging the contours of the hills. No religious symbols are seen in such views either—no crosses are seen atop churches on the Mount Carmel and Bethlehem postcards, and no crescents are visible on the Muslim monuments on the Temple Mount, despite the fact, as Pamela Berger has shown, that a crescent often crowns the latter when depicted in a Jewish context. These examples may suggest that the artist who decorated the dedication text may have not paid attention to details in the postcards that he used as models when creating his work, or he may have used Christian and Muslim monuments

385 On the Temple in the guise of the Dome of the Rock, see above, esp. pp. 98, 101, 103–105. On Mount Carmel, see Josef W. Meri, “Re-Appropriating Sacred Space: Medieval Jews and Muslims Seeking Elijah and Al-Khaḍir,” Medieval Encounters 5/3 (1999), 242–246.

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as identifiers of popular sites but blurred their religious symbols. Such neutral, religiously noncommittal general views might cater to customers of all faiths, although many contemporary painted postcards and photographs with similar scenes show and even highlight these details, which add the special touch sought by customers.386 Indeed, Jewish printers showed not only Jewish monuments, but also representative Christian or Muslim monuments, and not always blurred indicators such as the cross or the crescent. An open, market-minded, attitude is reflected in a successful series of postcards of the Land of Israel published in the late nineteenth century by A. L. Monsohn Lithographic Press, which was founded and operated by two brothers from the Old Yishuv. The series included holy places, tourist sites, neighborhoods of Jerusalem, and new settlements, including sites that also appear in the dedication of the 1908 gift to Franz Joseph presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel. For example, one of the Monsohn postcards exhibits the gates of the Old City of Jerusalem identified by their names and accompanied by a verse from Psalms that enhances their religious significance—“Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem” (122:2).387 In the Monsohn postcard, the Gate of Mercy is labeled Golden Gate, its Christian name, in German, English, and Hebrew—an indication that the target audience also included non-Jewish pilgrims and tourists from various nations and faiths. Churches also appear in the Monsohn series, for example, the French Dominicans’ St. Etienne against the background of the Georgians’ neighborhood.388 In the light of these examples, could it be that the painter of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s dedication “redesigned” some of the landscapes? Did he choose a long-distance view of Mount Carmel that blurs the silhouette of the monastery, or a perspective from the shore of Jaffa that does not show churches and mosques, or did he just hide them behind the postcard beside it? These possibilities may indicate the inclination of the artist—who may have belonged to a Jewish circle outside the Old Yishuv—to accommodate the exigencies of his Orthodox customers. In addition, some of the scenes may have been based

386 For example, a view of Jaffa from the sea appearing on a postcard that was part of a series of colored photographs produced by the Imberger Brothers House was shot from the same angle as the view painted on the postcard in the blessing to Franz Joseph. See Yoel Amir, Holy Land Scenes 1906, ii–v; idem, The Orientalists, fig. on p. 80, for an 1898 postcard of Bethlehem from afar produced by the Schneller Institute Printing Press; see also the fig. on p. 82 for a 1910 view of that city by Thomas Nelson & Sons, titled “This was David’s home. Here lived Ruth and Naomi. Here also our Lord was born.” 387 Nirit Shalev-Khalifa, “Postcards from Nineteenth-Century Jerusalem,” Ariel 168 (2005), 49 (postcard no. 6) (Hebrew). 388 Ibid., 52 (postcard no. 7).

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on photographs, drawings, or engravings. Different sources could explain why some of the scenes appear to be realistic and detailed while others seem to be rather schematic and concise, although, in effect, the image was mediated by photographers no less than by painters who were motivated by the demand for “documentary” material and other commercial interests, as well as their own perspectives and agendas. Art and photography provide ample space for redesigning and manipulating visual images, and many of the photographs of biblical sites and the local population were, in fact, staged scenes; consequently, the results were not objective documentation but subjective interpretation.389 A different question on the search of expressions of identities, as reflected in this gift, arises from the particular design of each of the three pieces that compose it. There was no single consistent rationale of the design behind the final composition of its parts, from either an iconographic or stylistic perspective. What could this eclecticism mean regarding the identities of artists and customers? Could it be accidental, considered unimportant, or rather reflect the heterogeneity of the Jewish society at the time? There is no information on the identity of the artists. The iconography and style of the dedication reflect new Western influences extraneous to the strictly conservative Orthodox core of the Austro-Hungarian kolel. Differently, the silver filigree scroll-case in lace-like patterns (fig. 21) may be the work of an Old Yishuv craftsman or, variably, a Jewish Yemenite silversmith, some of whom worked for a wide range of customers ever since they arrived in Jerusalem in 1882, or of an artist from the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, which opened its filigree atelier with two Yemenite craftsmen.390 All these possibilities are valid. On another plane, the meaning of the silver scroll-case decidedly refers to Franz Joseph as King of Hungary owing to a small gold-plated coat-of-arms of that half of the Dual Monarchy that was set between gold filigree branches soldered to the case,391 and a tiny Hungarian banner added on top of the scrollcase—with no reference to his Austrian title. These details, which in my opinion

389 These strategies will be discussed below, in chap. 5.2, in the context of the photograph album presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV on his accession to the throne. 390 Yael Guilat, “The Yemeni Ideal in Israeli Culture and Arts,” Israel Studies 6/3 (2001), 28–29. In the Zionist ideology, the Yemenite was constructed as an authentic Hebrew, the surviving remnant of the ancient Hebrew nation; he preserved the image of the biblical Israelite whose existence authenticated the distant past, the biblical Hebrew culture that preceded the exile. This may be a primary reason why the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts adopted and adapted to its needs the traditional Jewish-Yemenite filigree and embroidery craftsmanship. 391 The Hungarian shield is canonically topped by St. Stephen’s crown, however instead of the slanted cross, the craftsman set three small buttons in that position. Might he have tried to avoid depicting a cross?

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reflect a political position that can be discerned on other objects as well as in narratives created by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, will be discussed below. Lastly, the olivewood box in which the scroll of the Book of Esther was presented is decorated according to a third design concept, featuring the traditional selection of iconic holy places in the traditional iconographic schemes and style, as well as with Austro-Hungarian heraldry (fig. 22); moreover, it is crafted with the same materials and techniques used for the boxes that held the 1898 and 1888 gifts of this kolel—the latter being the box made by Yaakov Dov Jacob that housed the object presented to Franz Joseph on the fortieth anniversary of his accession, the whereabouts of which are unknown; it is also similar to another lost box, most probably made by the same workshop, that held the gift presented by the Old Yishuv to Franz Joseph upon his departure from Jerusalem in 1869. In the 1908 box, the name of the kolel is carved in German on a decorative mother-of-pearl plaque on the front part of the lid392 and the holy places and heraldic symbols appear on the cover of the lid, which is bordered by a rich motherof-pearl decorative frame and a narrow band in wooden intarsia. Three medallions skillfully carved in mother-of-pearl stand out: the one in the center displays the image of the Dome of the Rock as the Site of the Temple; the one on the left shows the coat-of-arms of Hungary flanked by an oak and an olive branch, which traditionally symbolize strength, nobility and wisdom, and glory and peace, respectively; a third medallion, on the right, features the double-headed Habsburg eagle with Austria’s coat-of-arms in its center and the Habsburg crown on top. “Jerusalem” is carved on the border of each medallion. In contrasting material, color, and technique, the images of four venerated sites are carved on the wood itself between the medallions and on their sides, and are framed with heavy but graceful olive, fig, and vine branches. Below them, on the frame of the panel, the sites’ names are written in German in black ink: from left to right, Grab von Rachel (Rachel’s Tomb); Zion, Klagemauer (Wailing Wall); die heil[ ] Höhlen Hebron (The Holy Caves, Hebron, i.e., the Tomb of the Patriarchs); and, below the image of the Dome of the Rock in the mother-of-pearl medallion: Tempelplatz (Site of the Temple). The schematic iconography of the venerated sites on the 1898 and 1908 boxes of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel is similar, not identical, as may be seen in the depictions of Zion and the Western Wall; they point to the use of different models, yet keep the symbolically important sense of religious and cultural continuity that was essential to the construct of a collective identity.

392 “Oest. Ung. Bohm. Mahr. Israel. Gemeinde.”

5 1916—Gifts to Karl I/IV: Embracing Modernity The gifts of the Habsburg Jews in Jerusalem to Emperor-King Karl I/IV were sent in a period of much confusion, despair, and fear for their lives. In the historical accounts included in Shai Agnon’s In Mr. Lublin’s Store, the Nobel laureate author refers to Franz Joseph and his heir through a dream of the storyteller that reveals the apprehension of the Jewish community upon the emperor’s death: I remembered that when Emperor Franz Joseph had passed away, Charles, who is called Karl, had become the Emperor, and even though Franz Joseph had been old and grey I suddenly felt sad that he was dead, because he was a good king and we were at peace during his lifetime, and now that he has gone to his eternal rest, who knows what times are awaiting us and how the new Emperor Karl would treat the Jews? Even if he doesn’t hate us, the kingdom is not under his control but is controlled by ministers and advisers.393

The atmosphere of apprehension among the Jews at the time of the Great War certainly increased with the death of the old emperor and the accession of his unknown heir apparent. This was also true of the Jewish Orthodox community in Jerusalem, not only the Habsburg subjects and protégés: How did they face the political and socio-economic crisis of the Great War and the new and unstable situation? Specifically, how did the Habsburg kolelim face the new Habsburg Court and government? How did they confront uncertainty and the need to build a new and suitable relationship? Mass poverty, hunger, epidemics, and death reigned not only in many areas of Austria-Hungary but also in Jerusalem, much more so in the Old Yishuv. The last consul, Friedrich Kraus, served during the war years and made great efforts to help the Habsburg Jewish communities in Palestine, which numbered about 6,000 Austrian and 3,000 Hungarian subjects. Kraus did not hesitate to plead their case in his many letters to the Imperial and Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Austrian Ministry of the Interior in Vienna. The situation worsened already in October 1914, when the Ottoman empire unilaterally annulled the Capitulations Agreements and terminated the special privileges they granted to foreign nationals.394 Alms from the original homelands of the members of the Old Yishuv in Europe almost came to a halt, and the monetary assistance of the Jewish com-

393 Shmuel Yosef (Shai) Agnon, In Mr. Lublin’s Store, trans. Glenda Abramson, ed. Jeffrey Saks (New Milford, CT: Toby, 2016), 195. The book contains a series of stories written between 1962 and 1968, pieced together by the author’s daughter and published in Hebrew in 1975. 394 Jacobson, “A City Living through Crisis,” 78–79. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-006

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munities in the United States was not enough to alleviate the suffering.395 Humanitarian institutions, such as hospitals, hospices, and soup kitchens, could hardly cope with the basic needs of the population and people were dying of epidemics and starvation. Unlike German officials, who could exert political influence on the Ottoman authorities due to the military power of the German Empire, Consul Kraus did not have such an option. Therefore, he chose to inform the Imperial and Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Austrian Ministry of the Interior of the desperate situation and urged the authorities in Vienna to assist the Jewish subjects. He also did his best to provide flour and food, and to defend Habsburg Jews against the growing harassment by the local authorities and Arab population, and in the face of the Ottoman governor’s order to expel Jewish foreigners.396 When confronted with refusals of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to respond to the plight of the Habsburg Jewish communities, Kraus underscored the political advantages of a “Habsburg colony” in the Holy City, but when the situation became critical, he called to put aside all other programs and immediately deal with the dire food shortage and epidemic crisis.397 A petition sent to Kraus by Pinkas Spira (Schapira), a representative of the Austro-Galician kolel, reflects the anguish of the Jewish community in Jerusalem in mid-1916, when thousands died of hunger. The opening words say it all: “In view of the desperate situation, the whole community of men, women, and children, and even elders, wants to go today to the consulate and ask for bread lying

395 Moreover, both the donors and the local Jewish institutions had to make do with ever-limiting policies made by the Ottoman authorities in Jerusalem. The Old Yishuv leadership became more and more dependent on the New Yishuv for mediation and material support, even after Orthodox American circles joined assistance efforts. To make things worse, in late 1916, when Karl I was called upon to replace the ailing Franz Joseph, the Ottoman government stopped the relief activities of the Jewish American communities and organizations. Time and efforts were wasted in finding alternative networks; see Jacobson, “A City Living through Crisis,” 79–84. 396 Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 41–43 and, to limit ourselves to late 1916 and early 1917 – documents no. 213 (file Jer. II/128, no, 250), 214 (PA XII/380, no. 348), 216 (Jer. I/16, 47/1917), 217 (PA XII/377, Liasse XLII/2), 219 (Jer. I/24, no. 846); idem, “The Activities of German and Austrian Diplomatic Representatives on Behalf of the Jews of Eretz-Israel,” in Siege and Distress: Eretz-Israel during the First World War, ed. by Mordechai Eliav (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1991), 157–158, 163–164 (Hebrew); idem, “Das österreichische Konsulat in Jerusalem und die jüdische Bevölkerung,” Studia Judaica Austriaca 10 (1984), 70–72. 397 Robert-Tarek Fischer,“Die einzige Kolonie,“ 114–117. Even the outstanding Austrian institution in Palestine, the hospice on the Via Dolorosa, was unsafe in the face of conflicts with the Ottoman authorities and feared confiscation; only with the arrival of German and Austro-Hungarian troops in Palestine in early 1916 and its transformation into a recreation and nursing home for soldiers, was its existence secured.

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at its doors…. We need flour now and cannot wait, not even a few days.”398 A petition to Kraus from the same kolel, dated 23 January, 1917, laid out the worsening situation.399 At the time, the death rate in the Jerusalem Old Yishuv reached around 300 persons per month. In early October 1917, the consul reported to the Imperial and Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Austrian Ministry of the Interior in Vienna that a quarter of the Austro-Hungarian Jews had already died of hunger and malnutrition; the rest could still be saved if help came quickly.400 The Ministry of Foreign Affairs finally acceded to support the needy Habsburg Jews in Palestine by granting financial support from its own resources, and by facilitating the transfer of funds and medical supplies contributed by Jewish relief committees,401 a last-ditch effort before the Ottoman empire and its Austrian and German allies lost Jerusalem and its surroundings to the armed forces of the British Empire. A protagonist in one of the stories by the local Jewish writer Yehuda Burla, a Jewish soldier in Palestine who had no need to prove loyalty and heroism, broods over the horrors of the war as the experience of all soldiers rather than as the fate of the Jews, and poignantly asks: “How could God, may He be praised, desire this?”402 The difficult situation brought about new forms of contact and accommodation of the Jerusalemite Orthodox communities with other models of Jewishness, first and foremost the national-oriented New Yishuv that evolved from the 1880s onward. Dialectics of openness and closure as well as the permeability of the borders between the communities, borders that had temporal dimensions regarding worldly (as opposed to spiritual) issues and spaces, were already revealed in the

398 Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 446, document 213, 20.6.1916, File Jer. II/128, no. 250. Desperate plights for help were also made by other Jewish communities, such as the community in Safed. See Ibid., 247–249. 399 Ibid., 451–453, document 216, file Jer I/16, 47/1917. 400 Mordechai Eliav, “Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem and the Jewish Community,” 109–110. Kraus had already suggested several venues for immediate help, i.e., the shipment of goods that should be declared as war material. Jacobson (“A City Living through Crisis,” 73–92) notes that the Jewish community was well organized and managed to arrange various means of support relatively quickly. Relief and support networks required negotiations and brought to the fore tensions that had already existed but surfaced only now, at this time of crisis. Such tensions rose among the donors, the New and the Old Yishuv, and also central figures within the same sub-community, each of which had different perceptions and visions for future life in Palestine. 401 Isaiah Friedman (“Austro-Hungarian Government and Zionism,” 153–154, 157) remarks that the Austro-Hungarian government did not take a similar interest in the New Yishuv. As noted, it suspected the Zionists of pro-Entente sympathies, despite the fact that Zionists feared a total defeat of the Central Powers. 402 Yehuda Burla, “Rescue,” in Without a Star: A Novel – War Stories (Tel Aviv: Davar and Massada, 1962), 170 (Hebrew).

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dedication of the scroll of the Book of Esther presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph in 1908. A new, more realistic, and far-sighted position reveals itself in the visual and literary imagery of the offerings presented to Karl I/IV by the Old Yishuv Habsburg kolelim. Visual images and texts encourage the new emperor-king to trust in God and wield his sword with no fear, call his subjects to respect his authority, and paint an ideal future of peace and prosperity—a dream that the intense suffering at the time aimed to shatter. In view of these significant innovations, how can one explain the decision of the Old Yishuv Habsburg kolelim in late 1916 to send gifts created by artists of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts? This puzzling decision stands in contrast to the perception of the Bezalel School in the eyes of the Old Yishuv leaders, who saw it as a perilous intruder because it opposed their norms of life. The Bezalel School’s founder and director, Boris Schatz, sought to mend the Old Yishuv way of life, most of whose members had no general education and no wish to reach self-sufficiency. The reform would be achieved through the modern cultural milieu that the Bezalel School was creating, uniting the Jewish people within the wider discourse of religious, cultural, and national identity. Progressive circles had hailed the establishment of the Bezalel School as the site from which “Beauty will issue forth out of Zion, and art from Jerusalem,” as a headline in an article in a Jerusalem-based journal proclaimed, translating the words of Isaiah into the new national language of Zionism, that the “Torah will issue forth out of Zion and the Word of the Lord from Jerusalem.”403 Schatz believed that the Zionist cultural revolution had to go through the synagogues;404 however, in most cases he was met by the Old Yishuv with hostility. In the eyes of Orthodox Jews, the school was a menace, especially to the young generation that might be more attracted by the artists’ and students’ lifestyles, which the deeply religious Jews perceived as anathema. Most often, this is the generation that realizes change. The gifts presented by the Habsburg kolelim to Karl I/IV will be examined in the context of the difficult living conditions of the Jewish population in Jerusalem, especially of the Old Yishuv, against the background of war-stricken Europe and the precarious political situation of Ashkenazi Jews as foreigners under the Otto-

403 Arieh Bruce Saposnik (“‘... Will Issue Forth from Zion?’,” 156), quoting (anonymous, but probably Eliezer Ben-Yehuda), “Bezalel: Ki Mi-Zion Yetzeh Yofi va-Omanut Mi-Yerushalayim (Bezalel: Out of Zion Will Come Beauty and Art from Jerusalem)” Hashkafa 7/19 (26 December, 1905), 1–2, based on Isaiah 2:3. Hebrew. . 404 Per Nirit Shalev-Khalifa, a researcher at the Ben Zvi Institute in Jerusalem; see Nir Hasson, “‘First Monumental Zionist Work of Art’ Uncovered in Jerusalem,” Haaretz, 15 October 2012 .

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man government. Their main protector, Austria-Hungary, on whom they set their hopes, was an ally of the hostile sultanate and local authorities. Despite the hardships during the war, the two Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem presented splendid gifts to Karl—gifts fit for a king. The Austro-Galician kolel sent a scroll of the Book of Esther in a silver scroll-case housed in an olivewood box,405 and the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel sent him a photograph album of Jerusalem406—both of which exhibited an innovative iconography. As usual, the congratulatory texts contain prayers and thanks to God combined with laudations to the monarch based on the Hebrew Bible and later Hebrew literature, yet the emphases and tone, as well as their iconographic programs, are different from what we saw in the gifts to Franz Joseph. Their innovative iconography reveals apprehension as well as hope for the continuity of Franz Joseph’s protection of his Jewish subjects and, most importantly, conveys a plea to God for a peaceful and prosperous future for the new emperor-king and his realms, which was essential for their own wellbeing. The two gifts raise several basic questions besides the already-mentioned issue of the decision taken by the Habsburg kolelim to engage artists from the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, for which we will propose a motive. First and foremost, we will ask how the Bezalel teachers and students, as modern artists, met the challenge and came to terms with the political and religious agendas of the Old Yishuv, and how they bridged the cultural gap between the old and the new collectives. How did the Bezalel artists relate to central motifs in the Old Yishuv’s visual culture, in their aim to build a bridge and promote issues such as the revival of the Jewish nation in its land? What character did they attribute to the local space and, in contrast, what did the new meanings of the local space signify to traditional Jews, who saw it as a holy space with no special national connotations? Consequently, we might ask whether the original (and suprising) iconography of the gifts was the result of cultural negotiations and identity politics. Menahem Ussishkin’s remark at the Eleventh Zionist Congress, which took place in Vienna in September 1913, is noteworthy in this context: “In Jerusalem we have a community of 60,000 Jews and we must inject life and vigor into this community…”407 Another path of hypothesizing raises essential questions regarding interpretations and adaptations of the artists to link the socio-political and ideological worlds of the gift-givers and recipients. Why were certain images and narratives 405 ÖNB PK 1737. Olivewood box: 645 x 170 x 170 mm. 406 Hofmobiliendepot, Möbel Museum Wien, MD H01187/000. Book: 358 x 262 x 80 mm. 407 Quoted by Katz, “Re-emergence of Jerusalem,” 284, with additional data and examples throughout his paper.

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selected, which were left out, and why? How did the gift-givers and artists expect the recipient to interpret these unique gifts? In this multifaceted context, it is important to examine what were the roles of the Orthodox gift-givers and the Bezalel artists in the design of the iconographic program. If the gift-givers were involved in the design, we may ask to what extent the artists carried out the guidelines of the client, and in view of the fact that all dedications were signed by the highestranking representatives of the corresponding kolel, how the approval of the designs can be explained. This last issue brings us back to the question regarding the decision to commission the gifts from the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts. The economic crisis in Jerusalem at the time of the war, compounded by the calamitous situation in the Old Yishuv, brought about and greatly increased the dependency of the Old on the support of the New Yishuv. The critical need of support may have motivated the authorities of the two kolelim to commission the Bezalel artists or, conversely, to accept the artists’ proposal to create the objects. Furthermore, aware that the works of the Bezalel School were acquiring a name, the leaders of the Habsburg kolelim may have hoped that an impressive gift created by Bezalel artists would touch the heart of the emperor-king and would induce him and his court to be compassionate and alleviate their suffering.408 These artists, as with the rest of Jerusalem’s inhabitants, were in need of every penny to buy food and survive; therefore, it is possible that the urgent need to obtain a commission, in addition to ideological reasons such as those expressed by Ussishkin and Schatz’s remark, that the Zionist cultural revolution had to go through the synagogues, motivated the artists to compromise and work with the Old Yishuv for very little money. There is at least one known case of this practice: Yaakov Stark’s decoration of the Ades Synagogue of the Aleppo community in the Nachlaot Quarter of Jerusalem.409

408 The economic crisis in the Old Yishuv had disastrous effects. Although this fact did not bring about a reform, it may have prompted cooperation with the New Yishuv, including the presentation of a gift to the new emperor-king. On this situation, see Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation, esp. 121–125, 128–129, 130–131. As for the Bezalel School, which blossomed until the break of the Great War, by 1916 it was suffering political and financial difficulties, forcing the school to close in 1917, before the British entered Jerusalem. See detailed discussion below, chap. 10.5. 409 Nirit Shalev-Khalifa, “Zionist Imagery and Landscapes of Eretz Israel in the Aleppo Synagogue in the Nahalat Zion Neighborhood,” in Aleppo Studies – The Jews of Aleppo: Their History and Culture, I, ed. Yaron Harel, Yom-Tov Assis, Miriam Frenkel (Jerusalem: Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2009), 260 (Hebrew), and below.

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5.1 The Austro-Galician Gift: Victory, Peace, and Prosperity The Olivewood Box The three components of the scroll of the Book of Esther presented by the AustroGalician kolel are innovative, first and foremost the large olivewood box (figs. 24, 25). The box stands on a marble base, opens in the front with a tall door, and is padded on its interior with blue velvet. Two inscriptions, both in German, identify the recipient, the gift-givers, and the artists. One is a brief dedication on the front of the marble base, which reads: “His Majesty our Gracious Emperor and King Karl on the occasion of [his] enthronement in 1916, humbly presented by the Austro-Galician Jewish Community of Jerusalem [in] Palestine.”410 The other inscription, engraved on a silver-plated plaque framed in filigree on the inside of the door, names the artists who crafted the box, the scroll-case, and the decorated dedication painted on the scroll, as well as the director of the Bezalel School: “Made in the Bezalel workshops under the supervision of H. Prof. B. Schatz. Incrustations: M. Horodezki and E. Eidem; silver work: S. Persow & M. Weiss; parchment painting: S. Bendawid; silver reliefs: M. Horodezki. Address / Professor Boris Schatz / Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts / Jerusalem.” A handwritten letter to the emperor-king accompanied the gift and was signed by the representatives of the kolel.411 This impressive box is crowned with a double crenellation reminiscent of the Old City walls and many Jerusalemite monuments that adopted this ancient architectural element as a decorative motif, including the Arab residence that housed the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts from 1908 to 1990 and, of course, many objects made at the school. Decorated with wooden intarsia in natural colors and mother-of-pearl inlay, arched shapes frame and accentuate all the elements on the front (fig. 24): the tall door which highlights in its upper part a small Austrian crown against the background of rays of light, obviously symbolizing the heavenly source of Karl’s title, and the monarch’s portrait that appears right below it, in another arched frame set in a small triumphal arch; moreover, the Hebrew inscription below the portrait reads “His Majesty Emperor Karl I”—a telling address regarding the identitifications of those Galician Jews, since the gift was presented on Karl’s coronation as King of Hungary. The lower half of the

410 S. Majestät unserem Allergnädigsten Kaiser und König Karl anlässlich der Thronbesteigung im Jahre 1916, alleruntertänigst dargeboten von der Oest. Galiz. Int. Isr. Gemeinde Palästinas Jerusalem. 411 Lasar Spira, Pinkas K. Spira, Josef Stokstiel, Leib Frieder, Mayer Aron Sondner (?), Samuel Weber (Secretary).

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Fig. 24: Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts artists for Austro-Galician kolel. Receptacle of gift to Karl I/IV on his coronation, 1916/17. Front. Olivewood and mother-of-pearl. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737.

door exhibits two large allegorical figures. The figure on the right, an almost naked winged young man, leans on his sword and holds a huge globe of the world on his shoulder like Atlas; significantly, the map of the Dual Monarchy, whose borders are highlighted by a heavy black line and a touch of mother-ofpearl for the Adriatic Sea, occupies the entire front part of the globe. The figure on the left is a winged young woman dressed in a chiton knotted on one shoulder, leaving one breast bare, as in an ancient fashion reminiscent of the figure of Nike sculpted by Paionios (425–420 BC); she wears a mural crown and holds a palm branch—symbols that transform her into a syncretic figure of Nike and

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Fig. 25: Site of the Temple. Detail of fig. 24.

Tyche.412 Is the angel warrior Atlas a personification of the Dual Monarchy? He does not brandish his sword, but instead leans on it; therefore, Nike-Tyche, who embraces him with her left arm, would be a personification of Victory and, at the same time, Peace and Prosperity. This allegory, which refers to a victorious and peaceful Austria-Hungary, matches perfectly the biblical verse appearing beneath the figures that encourages the new emperor-king: “Gird thy sword upon thy thigh, O most mighty, with thy glory and thy majesty” (Psalm 45:3). Two small medallions in the upper corners of the box’s front side enclose a menorah (pl. menorot)—the quintessential Jewish symbol. Significantly, the Austrian crown set against heavenly rays, the portrait of Karl, and the globe of the world dominated by the Dual Monarchy map are located on the same axis, and are therefore clearly bound together by the grace of God. While the political message is most appropriate, the appearance of the two almost-nude personifications on a representative

412 A turreted Nike/Tyche is known since ancient times. See, for example, a Nabatean coin of Aretas III, 84–71 BC, in the Israel Museum, Accession no. 75.01182 .

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artifact from the Old Yishuv is puzzling, and may have been offensive to most of its strictly Orthodox Jews. We can only wonder who approved the decoration of the box. The artist who conceived the iconography did not forgo the icons of venerated sites: a prominent Jerusalemite monument appears on each of the remaining three faces of the box. As with Karl’s portrait, the icons are set in arched frames at the same height and in the same techniques, and each is identified and accompanied by a biblical verse in Hebrew beneath it and by Jewish symbols in the spandrel-like upper corners of each side. The left face of the box features the Site of the Temple, with the verse “For mine house shall be called a house of prayer for all people” (Isaiah 56:7) beneath it; the spandrels are decorated with a palm tree (whose rich symbolism we have already discussed) and a large fish (fig. 25), which could refer to fruitfulness (Genesis 1:21–22) and may also recall God’s protection of the just.413 The right face of the box displays David’s Tower accompanied on the bottom by the verse “The Lord shall bless thee out of Zion: and thou shalt see the good of Jerusalem” (Psalm 128:5); the spandrels bear an eagle and a lion, which are traditional metaphors of royal virtues.414 Lastly, the back face of the box bears the image of the Western Wall and the verse “O wall of the daughter of Zion, let tears run down like a river” (Lamentations 2:18)—a verse recited on the day of the destruction of the Temple, which in the present context could be a plea to God to have mercy on Jerusalem; the spandrels on this side are adorned

413 On the palm tree, see Steven Fine, Art and Judaism in the Greco-Roman World: Toward a New Jewish Archaeology (Cambridge University Press, 2005), 141–145, and the extensive discussion there about its use as a symbol of the just and of Judaea, and its widespread use in Jewish and Roman art and coinage in the Hasmonean and Roman periods. As noted, the palm also found a central place in the Austro-Galician gift presented to Franz Joseph in 1908, and we will also see it in the gift of the Rothschild Hospital. On the place of the big fish in an allegory of fertility, see Bavli, Ketubot 5a. Bavli, Berachot 20a quotes Rabbi Yose as saying: “I am a descendant of Joseph over whom the evil eye had no control,” since alei ayin can also mean “above the eye.” Rabbi Yosi said, “Just as fish in the sea are covered with water and protected from the evil eye, so, too, the descendents of Joseph (who are said to multiply like fish) are protected from the evil eye.” In Bavli, Bava Bathra 74b, a big fish recalls the escathological meal of the righteous – justice standing behind all interpretations. 414 On the eagle as an allegory of God protecting his people, see Job 39:27–30, Psalm 103:5, Exodus 19:4, Deuteronomy 32:11–12, and the examples above, especially in the examination of the Austro-Galician gift presented to Franz Joseph in 1908. On the lion as an allegory of strength, boldness, and courage, see, inter alia, Proverbs 28:1 and 30:30, Isaiah 31:4 and 38:13; on the lion, endowed with those qualities yet submissive to God, see, e.g., 2 Samuel 17:10 and Mishnah, Avot 5:20, the latter quoted and visually represented in the dedication of this gift, examined below.

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with a harp and an image that cannot be deciphered easily, perhaps alluding to a river or a willow tree that would refer to Psalm 137:1–2: “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.” The verse and images connect renewal of Jewish life in Jerusalem to mourning for the destroyed Zion (Agadath Bereschith 71:1 [Buber, p. 139]), and the rebuilding of the Temple to remembering Zion.415 The original iconography of the olivewood box is a message of encouragement to Karl that visually translates the king’s words to his people upon his accession—that he would lead them to victory and peace—as does the verse of the psalm inscribed on the front of the box containing this gift. It also emotes the sanctity of Jerusalem and the Jewish people’s hope that the Temple and city may be rebuilt in their day. Once again, this message is wholly predictable; what is unexpected is the design of the two allegorical figures.

The Silver Scroll-Case Like the olivewood box and the richly ornamented dedicatory text on the parchment preceding the story of Esther, the silver-plated scroll-case is also decorated with images of holy places in Jerusalem (fig. 26). The scroll-case is an elongated hexagonal prism whose faces have flattened edges; it ends in a convex shape topped by a baldacchino-like ornament in openwork, and a handle on the bottom to roll the enclosed scroll. Another handle, beautifully decorated in silver filigree and granulation, is set on one of the flattened edges of the prism to pull the parchment scroll through a slot. The faces of the scroll-case are richly decorated in chased and repoussé foliate motifs, silver filigree and granulation, and precious stones. The delicate twisted threads and tiny grains create a variety of stylized volutes, scrollwork, and geometric patterns that combine Oriental-Yemenite work and Secessionist ornamental motifs articulating the various parts of the scroll-case. The main theme of the decoration is the representation of Jewish holy places, which appear on five of the six faces. These traditional iconic images include figures and vegetation, set in medallions, which are further highlighted by filigree-ornamented square frames, and detailed in Hebrew in the decoratively stylized characters created at the time at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts. Starting from the side handle and reading from right to left, as in Hebrew, is David’s Tomb identified as Zion; next, on the second face, the Dome of the

415 See decoration of East European synagogues in Amar, “Tradition and Innovation,” 69–70.

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Fig. 26: Bezalel artists for the Austro-Galician kolel. Scroll-case of Book of Esther presented to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Silver and precious stones. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737.

Fig. 27: “From People to People.” Detail of fig. 26.

Rock represents the Site of the Temple, as noted in the inscription; the next face is decorated with an image of the Western Wall, followed by the icon of Absalom’s Tomb on the fourth face and David’s Tower on the fifth, each identified literally by the accompanying inscription. Differently, the sixth face presents an inscription in typical interwoven Bezalel Hebrew letters, that reads “From People to People” (fig. 27). The highly decorative Bezalel alphabetical characters draw both from Islamic arabesques and the composite European typography of the early twentieth century, influenced by the Secessionist style. In the Bezalel School, the ornamental dimension of the characters was often considered more important than readability. The inscription on the scroll-case sent to Karl by the Austro-Galician kolel is paradigmatic: only the different filling of the intertwining letters makes it possible to distinguish each word and read the message.

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The artistic design of Hebrew letters was a central component in the creation of a national identity on the cornerstone of a great past, since the written word lies at the core of Judaism; therefore, Bezalel teachers and students engaged in this task throughout the school’s existence. This endeavor coincided with the national movement to revive the Hebrew language and was perceived by artists and designers as a natural expression of both continuity and renewal of Jewish culture and aesthetic traditions. In 1906, Boris Schatz wrote: “We have already begun to create a special style in Hebrew lettering, and we have succeeded in making beautiful ornaments and in giving the ancient letters a modern form.”416 The inscription on the scroll-case may have been designed by Shmuel Ben-David (1884–1927). The Bulgarian-born Ben-David was a versatile artist who devoted much of his artistic endeavor to the research and design of a new Hebrew typography; he worked in engraving, illustration, painting, and tapestry, and decorated the dedications of the gifts of the Austro-Galician and Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl on his accession to the throne.417 However, it is also possible that the designer of the inscription on the scroll-case was Yaakov Stark, whose style is very similar to that of the verse on the scroll-case. Stark was considered Bezalel’s foremost artist of the letter.418 As he died in 1915, having been one of the many young victims of the harsh living conditions in Jerusalem, the inscription on the scroll-case must have been created sometime earlier, or worked from one of the many models that he and his students designed. Noticeably, the overall look of the Bezalel scroll-case presented by the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl in 1916 differs completely from that of the silver filigree scroll-case presented to Franz Joseph in 1908 by the same kolel. The eclectic combination of techniques and styles typical of the Bezalel School suits the Orientalist perceptions of an exotic and luxurious palace—in this case in Persia, the setting of the story of Esther—and thus might have made a greater impression on the Habsburg monarch; yet, like the 1908 scroll-case pre-

416 Shilo-Cohen, “‘Hebrew Style’ of Bezalel,” 145, quoting Boris Schatz, Bezalel: Its History, Nature and Future (Jerusalem: Snunit, 1910), 7 (Hebrew). 417 Ben-David’s last name is spelled Bendawid in the inscription identifying the artists, that appears on the inner side of the door of the box housing the Austro-Galician kolel’s gift. 418 See examples in Nurit Shilo-Cohen and Yigal Zalmona, “The Style and Iconography of Bezalel Objects,” in Bezalel 1906–1929, ed. Nurit Shilo-Cohen (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1983), 213– 245; Shlomo Zangelevitz, “Artist of the Hebrew Letters,” Et-mol 158 (2001), 27–28 (Hebrew). Stark immigrated to Palestine/Land of Israel from Galicia in 1906. He was part of a small group of artists who gathered around Boris Schatz, first as a student at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts and afterwards as a teacher.

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sented to Franz Joseph, this one may also be a luxury item that was not created expressly for Karl: it is the only component of the gift not clearly related to him either in image or word; the expression “From People to People,” which is not distinctly related to the monarch or the event, and unclear in this context, might be an indication. Regarding the object itself, and most significantly, the use of Hebrew, the ancient language of the Jewish people, together with the adoption of the modern “Orientalization” that fits into Secessionist Viennese modernity, is a sophisticated expression of self-Otherness.

The Dedication The same stylistic sources served Shmuel Ben-David in decorating the dedication preceding the story of Esther (fig. 28). Three arched panels, the central one double and much wider, stand out against the background of a vine scroll pattern that binds them into a coherent visual whole. The exact shape and ornamentation of each panel differ, but the common features harmonize the whole: wide frames decorated with interlacing motifs enclose exotic and biblical flora and fauna, and their interior space, shaped as Tables of the Law, frames and organizes the text, all of which is in Hebrew. Ben-David painted this decoration in vivid colors and integrated Jewish and Zionist symbols, including images of sites in Jerusalem venerated by Jews, as well as Oriental motifs. The panel to the right addresses “King” Karl I [sic!] and his consort, Queen Zita. A head portrait of Karl is encircled by interlacing ribbons that form a medallion, which is held by a pair of paradisiacal birds. The portrait appears in the upper, heavenly, space of the arch, between and above tall palm trees that function as its columns, against the background of a deep blue sky; the yellow stone painted in the loop on top of the medallion—a popular decorative motif in Muslim Art—accentuates the axis of symmetry and may be interpreted as representing the sun, the source of the golden rays of light that cross the blue sky. At the bottom, on the same axis, the interlacing ribbons highlight the view of the Temple Mount and the city around it, and also enclose a pair of heraldic lions on the sides of this scene; in addition, a pair of large, white, outspread wings appear along the upper part of the interlacing ribbons, i.e., above the city of Jerusalem. Turning toward the sides of the panel, the interlacing ribbons climb around the pair of stylized palm trees that rise up to the king’s portrait. In light of the many references to Franz Joseph and Karl in relation to ideal biblical personages in the Old Yishuv addresses, could these palm trees not only be an Oriental motif but also a metaphor for the righteous new king and justice (Psalm 92:12)? The heraldic lions and wings, beside and above the scene of the Temple Mount, may refer to the Kingly and Holy Jerusalem, respectively.

Fig. 28: Shmuel Davidov (Ben-David) for the Austro-Galician kolel. Dedication of Esther Scroll to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Vienna, ÖNB PK 1737.

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The central panel, which, as noted, is much wider and double-arched, highlights the Austrian crown by encircling it at the meeting point of the arches, at the top of the axis of symmetry. In the bottom frame, at the foot of the axis, a wide-angle view of the Old City of Jerusalem from the southwest is visually and symbolically linked to the crown, which restates the bond between the Habsburg House and the Holy City. The interlacing loops of the ribbons emphasize the view of Jerusalem, twisting and bending to the sides to form and enclose a Star of David, each of which contains a heraldic galloping gazelle, and reaching the corners to display the two most representative venerated monuments—the Western Wall in the right corner, and the Dome of the Rock that traditionally represents the Site of the Temple in the left corner. Twisting upward in a couple of spiraling shafts that recall Solomonic columns, the interlacing ribbons enclose iconic images of David’s Tower and Absalom’s Tomb in the upper corners, and inwards—the Tomb of Zechariah and the Tomb of Bnei Hezir each flanked by heraldic peacocks. The symmetrical composition further emphasizes the Austrian crown in the center. Last, but not least, the space in each pair of Solomonic columns houses two more significant Jewish symbols—a galloping deer in between the right pair and a lion in between the left, accompanied by a rabbinic adage: “Quick as a deer and mighty as a lion [to do the will of your Father in Heaven]” (Mishnah, Avot 5:20). Accordingly, the deer symbolizes humility and the lion boldness, two of the virtues that characterize ideal kings. Above them rise lighted high menorot, designed in a typical Bezalel style. The left panel houses the signatures of the heads of the kolel.419 Intertwined ribbons encircle Stars of David in the bottom corners and the image of Rachel’s Tomb in the center; they then proceed down to encircle the artist’s name in German and Hebrew, S. Davidov and Ben-David, respectively, as well as the place and year, Jerusalem 1917. As is traditional, the writer acclaims Karl as a mighty, enlightened, and righteous king, wishing that God may protect him and that his star and his consort’s may always shine. Drawing from Psalms 45 and 17:8, the writer exalts God and implores Him to show His loving-kindness and to guide, instruct, and protect the new king, keeping him as the apple of His eye and sheltering him under the shadow of His wings.420 Recalling David’s praise of God before the whole congregation (1 Chronicles 29:11) and Psalm 72, the writer goes on to implore God that Karl’s reign may prosper and be as glorious as the kingdom of Israel in the Golden

419 Elazar Nathan Spira, Pinhas Kahana Spira, Josef Stokstiel, Yehuda Leib Frieder, and Samuel Aharon Weber, the secretary. I could not decipher the sixth signature. 420 See also Deuteronomy 32:10–11.

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Age of Solomon, and also serve as a model to other kings for generations to come.421 In closing, the gift-givers identify themselves as loyal Jews from Galicia in the beloved Austrian Empire, living piously in the Holy Land, who address the monarch on behalf of their president, the righteous Rabbi Abraham Haim David Sofer.422 The representatives of the kolel express heartfelt blessings with great respect and humility, and, wishing that Jerusalem may be rebuilt in their own days, they sign in the left panel. The rebuilding of Jerusalem was a topos perceived in varied ways by different ideological sectors of the Jewish people. Keeping with the Bezalel practice, the icons of holy places and the profusion of biblical flora, fauna, and Jewish symbols bridge the traditional Jewish visual culture and the new Hebrew culture that the school was creating, as part of the national revival that it supported and advanced. This may also explain the depiction of icons of holy places against a naturalistic background.423 The popularity of photographs, paintings, and printed material on the Land of Israel, which were in high demand in the West at the time in fields such as pilgrimage, travel, scientific research, and academic studies, may have served as an incentive as well. In the same spirit, looking to finding a common denominator between their client’s ideology and their own, Bezalel artists adopted the ancient Jewish tradition that emphasizes the deep roots and love of the people of Israel for their land through metaphors and artistic ornaments based on the most representative flora and fauna. Thus, they depicted “a land of wheat and barley, and vines, and fig-trees, and pomegranates; a land of olive-oil and honey” (Deuteronomy 8:7–12)—the Seven Species in which the Land of Israel abounded, together with lions, gazelles, deer, goats, doves, and peacocks. These, and other flora and fauna, became outstanding symbols of the biblical and paradisiacal land being rebuilt. Significantly, in his endeavor to reshape and improve the society and culture of the revived ancient homeland, Boris Schatz created a collection of local flora and fauna in the museum that he founded as an integral part of the school: this collection would facilitate the creation of a national visual language, as well as the depiction of the renascent biblical land by teachers and students. As for the many images of the Star of David, its abundant use may be due to its popularity at the time; as a modern symbol of Judaism since the First Zionist Congress, held in Basel in 1897, it had become the symbol of the Zionist movement with which the Bezalel School identified. Similarly, the menorah came to

421 See also Nathan’s prophecy to David in 2 Samuel 7:16–17. 422 On the Sofer (Schreiber) dynasty, see chap. 1.3. 423 Shilo-Cohen (“‘Hebrew Style’ of Bezalel,” 155) remarks that Schatz made several field trips with his students, so that they could sketch scenes from first-hand knowledge rather than copying existing representations.

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symbolize multiple meaningful ideas—the light of the Torah and the Jewish faith, hope for the renewal of the Temple and the realization of the return to the Land of Israel, and the end of the exile in the light of a new Hebrew culture, i.e., in a religious and national sense. Moreover, the influence of the Secession induced their use as decorative motifs. One illuminating example of a visual image based on the double meaning of the old-new symbols was created by a Habsburg Jewish artist, Ephraim Moses Lilien (1874–1925), one of the founders of the Bezalel School together with Boris Schatz, who had a great influence on teachers and students. This is a personification of the Jewish Nation for the title page of the magazine Ost und West published in 1904 (fig. 29). Lilien’s image of the Jewish Nation is a beautiful young woman wearing a dress decorated with a profusion of small Stars of David and a diadem crowned with that star; she is trapped in the thorns of exile and holds a rose of Jericho (a plant that blooms anew when watered) between two sprigs in her hand; a relatively large menorah and a Star of David decorate the background.424 Skillfuly drawn in the Viennese Secessionist style, this image is a definite expression of the modern, proudly “Orientalized,” self-Otherness: a redressal from the older, Orientalized or colonized Oriental towards a positive, self-aware view of the Other. Noticeably, despite their liberal ideology, Bezalel artists were well acquainted with Jewish religious and artistic traditions. One visual expression in the decoration of the Austro-Galician dedication is the depiction of two menorot with only five branches instead of the usual seven, which might be more than a stylistic feature: one of the most popular exegetical positions argues that a variety in the number of arms on the menorah (five, nine, or eleven) is the result of a stipulation in the Babylonian Talmud proscribing the imitation of the original seven-branched menorah in the Temple;425 yet, despite this prohibition, most known images indeed have seven-branches.

424 See Mishory, Lo and Behold, fig. 19. The magazine Ost und West was dedicated to Jewish art, literature, and science. The founders of the magazine wished to give Jewish culture new momentum by bringing Eastern and Western European Judaism into more contact with one another; see Maren Krüger, Jewish Museum Berlin, at https://www.jmberlin.de/blog-en/2013/03/a-secondlook/; Lynne Swarts, “Lilien’s Sensual Beauties: Discovering Jewish Orientalism in Ephraim Moses Lilien’s Biblical Women,” Nashim 33 (2018), 90–120. Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, “Defining ‘Jewish Art’ in Ost und West, 1901–1908: A Study in the Nationalisation of Jewish Culture,” The Leo Baeck Institute Yearbook 39/1 (1994), 83–110. The Galician born Lilien came to Palestine in 1906 to establish the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts together with Boris Schatz, and taught at the school during its first year. Lilien adopted and adapted biblical subjects to the Zionist context and set them in Oriental settings rendered in the Secessionist style, while making wide use of Jewish as well as appropriately adapted Christian symbols. 425 This prohibition is not mentioned in the Jerusalem Talmud; moreover, most menorot in ancient synagogues and funerary contexts in the Land of Israel, except for the Golan area, have se-

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Fig. 29: Ephraim Moses Lilien, “The Jewish Nation,” 1901. Title page for the magazine “Ost und West,” 1904 (Stefan Zweig: E.M. Lilien: Sein Werk. [Verlag J. Jäger und Sohn, Goslar 1903]).

ven arms. See Rachel Hachlili, The Menorah, The Ancient Seven-Armed Candelabrum: Origin, Form & Significance, Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism, 68 (Leiden: Brill, 2001), esp. 200–202, 276. Most menorot in modern times have seven-branches.

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5.2 The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian Gift: A Unified Ideal Kingdom The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel presented the emperorking a book titled “Pictures of the Holy City of Jerusalem,” as inscribed on the spine of the silver-plated cover (fig. 30). The back of the book bears in the central field an inscription stating that the cover was created at the Bezalel silver and gold studios under the direction of S. Persoff and M. Weiss; the place of its manufacture, Jerusalem, is inscribed in the bottom frame. The book comprises a dedication, richly decorated and signed by S[hmuel] Davidov/ Ben-David, that spreads over three pages (figs. 31, 32), which is followed by a translation of the Hebrew text into German and an additional laudatory text, also in German, signed by Josef Simonovitz, David Weber, and Salomon Roth. These texts precede the main body of the book: thirty-seven photographs of Jerusalem and its close surroundings. As with other objects sent to royalty and benefactors, it must have been presented in an appropriately designed box; however, there is no documentation regarding its presentation. The effective exaltation of the European monarch as a means of acknowledging his authority, expressing gratitude and loyalty, and, at the same time, ensuring his continued protection and assistance, remained the main aim of the gift-givers. Naturally, this aim required the kolelim to favorably identify themselves with the recipient and his court—an aim that would enhance the identity of these Jewish communities, which was important also in the context of internal Jerusalem politics. In these aspects, the book was no exception among the gifts to reigning houses. Like the gift presented to Karl by the Austro-Galician kolel, it is exceptional in its originality and problematics. Both reflect profound changes in the socio-political, cultural, and psychological atmosphere in the Jewish communities of Jerusalem. Moreover, the visual language of the book may facilitate more clearly diverse interpretations by the recipient, the gift-givers, and the artists of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts who created it, while—based on traditional as well as innovative iconography and style—it sets the stage for the meeting of all involved.

The Book Cover: The Dual Monarchy and the Twelve Tribes of Israel Engraved patterns of papyrus flowers, pomegranates, and birds in a symmetrical arrangement decorate the central fields of the front and back covers, which are enclosed in wide frames, as well as the space on the spine of the book. These are usual elements both in traditional Jewish art and in Bezalel works, serving as visual metaphors for the paradisiacal Land of Israel. As noted, Orthodox Jews would perceive this iconography as a representation of the Promised Land in

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Fig. 30: Bezalel artists, “Photographs of the Holy City of Jerusalem,” silver-plated book cover. Gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/IV, 1916/17. Hofmobiliendepot, Möbel Museum Wien MD H 01187.

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Fig. 31: Shmuel Davidov (Ben-David) for the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel. Dedication of the photograph album presented to Karl I/IV, first page.

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which spiritual perfection, justice, righteousness, and peace reign, and, consequently, God renewed the fertility of the soil to the heart’s content of his people. As in the dedication of the Austro-Galician gift to Karl, the profusion of flowers, pomegranates, and birds was a vision of the imminent Messianic era, but could also represent the romantic Orientalist perception of the Land of Israel as an exotic land and the Zionist dream for the reconstruction of the national homeland and its realization.426 This positive self-Orientalization was projected by modernist Jews onto the Orthodox communities. The front cover of the book presented to Karl is crafted in filigree and relief, ivory carving, and enamel against the background of the engraved pattern of flowers, pomegranates, and birds (fig. 30). The portraits of Karl I/IV and Zita appear on the upper part of the central field; enclosed in a fine filigree frame, they are carved on ivory plaques set on both sides of a tiny column that supports the Austrian crown made in gilded metalwork. This unit was created by M[eir] Horodezki,427 who inscribed his name in minute letters below the images of the imperial couple. A meaningful saying is inscribed on an open scroll soldered at the bottom: “Pray for the welfare of the kingdom—Avot 3:2.” This ancient Jewish saying certainly would have been most significant in the historical context of the Dual Monarchy, since it affirms the need to respect and obey the monarch for the sake of preserving order and stability and preventing political anarchy, social chaos, devastation, and suffering. Mishnah, Avot 3:2 is based on Jeremiah 29:7: “And seek the peace of the city whither I have caused you to be carried away captives and pray unto the Lord for it: for in the peace thereof shall ye have peace.”428 Peace and social order, in contrast to anarchy, were already considered by biblical prophets and early Jewish sages as the best guarantee of safety for diasporic Jews. Indeed, the entire proverb continues: “Pray for the welfare of the kingdom, since but for fear of it men would swallow each other alive.” The way to avoid brutal persecutions and massacres was to pray for the welfare of the monarch; thus, the Jewish people’s prayer for the good of the gentile emperor, under whose scepter they lived and in whose hands their fate was held, was, in fact, also a prayer for their own good. Such prayers were also composed, said, and presented to rulers whose attitude toward Jews was far from just and humane, although for a very different reason—fear of even worse treatment. A relevant example is the prayer said in the Beth-Yaacov Synagogue in Jerusalem for the welfare of the anti-

426 As we will see, Ben-David used these symbols in this threefold sense in his decoration of the dedications of the gifts from the two Jerusalemite Habsburg kolelim to Karl. 427 Born in Russia, he immigrated with his family in 1913; he would sign his name as Gorodeski until he hebraized it to Gur-Arieh. 428 See also Ezra 6:10: “That they [the Jews] may… pray for the life of the king and of his sons.”

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semitic Tsar Nikolai Alexandrovich and his kingdom, on the occasion of his wedding in 1894; another is the prayer for Abdulhamid II in 1898, on the twenty-second anniversary of his accession to the throne, presented by Shmuel Salant, Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi of Jerusalem, who signed most of the gifts and epistles from the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph.429 However, Jews had long-learned to distinguish rulers motivated by awareness to justice —“Righteous among the Nations,” like Franz Joseph—from those who would occasionally benefit from a Jewish community because of immediate narrow interests. Naturally, Karl’s Old Yishuv subjects quoted Mishnah, Avot 3:2 in the hope that the new monarch would be righteous and kind-hearted like his predecessor. When considering how the specific relationship of the Old Yishuv leaders and the emperor-king developed, it is important to understand the latter’s relationship with other Jewish communities in Europe. The principle of respect for the crowned head was present in the minds of the leaders of Jewish communities in the AustroHungarian Diaspora. In 1907, Leo Singer published a collection of discussions on Jewish religious ethics in Hungarian, titled The Doctrine of Duty, which includes a section on the respect due to the king and his kingdom. Rabbi Singer recalls the maxim in Mishnah, Avot 3:2, and says: “Our holy religion commands us to show grateful respect to the king and the authorities, as these guard the calm of us all by administering equal justice so that we will not be disturbed in our fruitful working by evil men.” In the same anthology, Rabbi Singer also quotes Proverbs 24:21: “Fear thou the Lord and the king: and meddle not with them that are given to change” (in other words the rebellious), and emphasizes the obedience due to the king and the laws of the kingdom, specifying that he who does not respect them deserves the Lord’s punishment as well as the just contempt of the citizens.430 In the historical context of Austria-Hungary at the time, the prayer for the

429 Mahzor Kol-Bo, Vilna, 1914, in Robert Scheinberg, “‘A Blessing for the Czar?’ – in Honor of July 4” (July 3, 2012) ; photographs of these documents, as well as of a prayer for the welfare of Franz Joseph and his kingdoms, can be found at the Kedem Auction House, Jerusalem, “In Days of Yore and to These Times” (August 8, 2014) ; see also Hacohen, “Nation and Empire,” 65, on the preference of acculturated Jews of nation-states that promised integration, in contrast to the fear of more traditional Jews who maintained that, should the empire collapse, domestic chaos and nationalist oppression would result in populist antisemitism. 430 Based on the influential treatise on Jewish ethics Hovot Ha’levavot (Duties of the Heart), written by Bahya ibn Pakuda, c. 1040. See Norbert Glässer and András Zima, “The Emperor-King’s Hungarian Maccabees: The Components of Hungarian Jewish First World War Propaganda,” in Information History of the First World War, ed. László Z. Karvalics (Budapest: L’Harmattan, 2015), 154.

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welfare of the kingdom in Mishnah, Avot 3:2 is often called “Who givest salvation unto kings,” in accordance with Psalm 144:10: “It is He [God] that giveth salvation unto kings: who delivereth David his servant from the hurtful sword;” in view of the unpromising situation of Austria-Hungary at the time Karl ascended the throne, the latter verse would be most meaningful to this monarch. Returning to the analysis of the iconography on the album’s front cover: Austria-Hungary is represented in the wide frame as an ideal realm. In contrast to the frame on the back cover, which is decorated with a geometric pattern, this frame exhibits a special and innovative iconography with an important symbolic meaning—ten enamel coats-of-arms of crownlands and duchies of the Dual Monarchy, alternating with ten ivory reliefs with the symbols of the Twelve Tribes of Israel. The silver-plated background is ornamented with granulation and a spiral pattern. This iconographic unit presents various questions, among them: Why were these ten specific crownlands and duchies chosen? Why only ten, despite the fact that the evident wish to reach compositional symmetry meant that the twelve tribes had to be crowded into ten pictorial spaces? We should note that had the iconographers wished it, there was enough space to organize a twenty-four plaque composition. Moreover, the order of appearance of the Habsburg crownlands and the tribes of Israel may certainly express different nuances in their meanings. What did the twelve tribes mean to each of the three players—the gift-givers, the recipient, and the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts? Above all, what did the juxtaposition of the tribes of Israel and the Habsburg crownlands mean? Various explanations are given for the order and symbols of the tribes of Israel, based on a range of biblical texts and contexts, and other Jewish literary sources. They originate mainly in the admonitions of Jacob to his sons and his blessings before they became a people (Genesis 49) and in the blessing of Moses to the tribes before they conquered the Land of Israel and settled there (Deuteronomy 33:2–27). These circumstances and the time of the blessings, shortly before the death of the Patriarch and of the great leader, imbue the words with a prophetic and messianic character.431 The rich allegorical imagery in Jacob’s blessing to his sons, referring to the character and episodes in the lives of each of them, became the source of the emblematic representation of the sons and the tribes, while allowing for a variety of choices.432

431 Ariella Amar, “L’art et l’artiste aux premiers temps du sionisme,” Perspectives – Revue de l’Université Hébraique de Jérusalem 11 (2004), 174. 432 Questions regarding the visual symbols chosen to represent the twelve tribes, and their iconographic sources, are important topics of Jewish art, but are beyond of the scope of our topic. To mention but one example: the choice of the mandrake as the symbol of the tribe of Reuben is

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Confronted with the task of crowding the twelve tribes into ten pictorial spaces, the artist of the book cover adopted a known scheme—a depiction of Simeon together with Levi, because Jacob spoke to them together when blessing each of his sons (Genesis 49:5–7). In addition, the artist represented the tribes of Dan and Gad together, in what may have been an ad hoc solution to fit the twelve tribes on ten plaques.433 Moreover, and significantly, the artist adopted unusual symbols for some of the tribes. For example, the usual image of a sword for Simeon derives from his killing—together with his brother Levi—the people of Shechem after the latter defiled their sister (Genesis 34), for which their father said: “Cursed be their anger, for it was fierce; and their wrath, for it was cruel” (Genesis 49:7). Departing from that common symbol, the artist of the book cover chose to symbolize Simeon by a bow and arrow, whose connotations are other than the violent killing of a great number of people indiscriminately; probably in a similar aim, Levi is represented by a harp, which may refer to the role of his tribe in the liturgy of the Temple as the singers and players of musical instruments appointed by King David (1 Chronicles 15:16; 25:6–7)—a symbolism that may have been perceived as more appropriate in the context of Karl’s coronation. An example of a less common symbol that may have also been chosen as more suitable for the occasion is the representation of Joseph by a crown, instead of the more usual fruitful bough (Genesis 49:22), or a palm tree that portrays him as a righteous man, based on Psalm 92:12. The crown represents Jacob’s blessing, which, in the words of the Patriarch, excelled the blessings of his ancestors and was greater than the oldest mountains

based on the story in Genesis 30:14–22, telling that Reuben found the love-plant in a field and gave it to his mother Leah. Leah’s barren sister Rachel desired and obtained the plant in exchange for Jacob spending the night with Leah. Soon after, Leah, who had been infertile for some time, became pregnant again and gave birth to two more sons, Issachar and Zebulun, and a daughter, Dinah. The iconographer of the tribes on the cover of Karl’s book cover followed earlier artists and chose this symbol, which had become very popular. Among the works that the Bezalel artist may have known are Ephraim Moses Lilien’s illustration for Morris Rosenfeld’s Lieder des Ghetto (Berlin: S. Calvary, 1902), 63. . Another well-known work was Yaakov Stark’s mural painting in the Ades Synagogue in Jerusalem, dated 1912; see Amar, “L’art et l’artiste,” 184–190; and Shalev-Khalifa, “Zionist Imagery and Landscapes,” 257–264. Also very popular were late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century works such as mizrach plaques by Moshe Shah Mizrachi in Jerusalem (Amar, “L’art et l’artiste,” 184–185), and other unknown craftsmen in central and eastern Europe; see Dan Bahat and Shalom Sabar, Jerusalem – Stone and Spirit (Tel Aviv: Matan, 1997), fig. on p. 147 (Hebrew). 433 Their symbols are the traditional ones: Dan is represented by a serpent (Genesis 49:16–18) and Gad by tents (Genesis 49:19, i.e., brave warriors who camped in tents).

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and the riches of the ancient hills (Genesis 49:22–26). Moreover, Joseph loved his brethren, forgave them for their false moves, and saved them, and was thus recognized as a prince among them (Genesis 50:15–21). The ideal virtues and acts of Joseph enrich the desired parallel between Karl and the ideal biblical kings, David and Solomon, and between the Habsburg House and the biblical unified kingdom. As for the choice and order of appearance of the heraldic symbols of AustriaHungary, these could have been based either on the order in which the lands of Franz Joseph, and later of Karl, are listed in their royal titles,434 their political importance, geographical location, or local traditions. Nevertheless, neither the order of the monarch’s titles nor the political importance of the entities or their geographical location explain the choice and position of the heraldic symbols. Yet, while neither the order nor the choice of symbols of the tribes is dictated by a specific canon, both can be explained on the solid basis of the Hebrew Bible and therefore support my reading of the order of the crownlands.435 An examination of the biblical sources reveals that the iconographer planned the reading by starting with the twelve tribes, moving clockwise, from the top righthand corner, and chose a sequence according to the order in which the mothers of Jacob’s twelve sons first gave birth and not the order of the birth of the sons themselves. The presentation of the tribes starts with the sons of Leah: her first-born, Reuben, then Simeon together with Levi, followed by Judah; in this specific scheme, Issachar and Zebulun, to whom she gave birth years later, after her sister Rachel’s handmaid

434 Karl’s grand title was “His Imperial and Apostolic Majesty Karl the First, by the Grace of God, Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, of this Name the Fourth, King of Bohemia, of Croatia, Slavonia, Lodomeria and Illyria; King of Jerusalem etc., Archduke of Austria; Grand Duke of Tuscany and Cracow, Duke of Lorraine, of Salzburg, Styria, Carinthia, Carniola and of the Bukovina; Grand Prince of Transylvania; Margrave of Moravia; Duke of Upper and Lower Silesia, of Modena, Parma, Piacenza and Guastalla, of Auschwitz [Oświęcim] and Zator, of Teschen [Cieszyn/Těšín], Friuli, Ragusa [Dubrovnik] and Zara [Zadar]; Princely Count of Habsburg and Tyrol, of Kyburg, Gorizia and Gradisca; Prince of Trent [Trento] and Brixen [Bressanone]; Margrave of Upper and Lower Lusatia and in Istria; Count of Hohenems, Feldkirch, Bregenz, Sonnenberg, etc.; Lord of Trieste, of Cattaro [Kotor], and in the Wendish Mark; Grand Voivode of the Voivodina of Serbia, etc.” 435 The order of the twelve tribes can be explained by various biblical sources. Jacob’s twelve sons, who headed the twelve tribes, may appear in the order of their birth in Genesis 29:32–35; 30:5–13, 17–24 and 35: 18; in the order of their mothers—first Jacob’s two wives (Leah and Rachel) and then their two handmaids (Bilhah, Zilpah) in Genesis 35:23–26; as listed in Jacob’s blessing in Genesis 49:3–28; the order of the precious stones associated with tribes’ names on the ephod (ceremonial vestment) and breastplate worn by the High Priest in Exodus 28:9–12, 17–21; the order in Moses’ blessing to the Children of Israel (Deuteronomy 33:6–25); or the order of the encampment in the desert (Numbers 2).

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Bilhah and her own handmaid Zilpah bore sons to Jacob, appear next. After the sons of Leah appear those of Bilhah—Naphtali and Dan—the latter together with Gad, who was the first-born of Zilpah; Zilpah’s second son, Asher, comes next. Joseph and Benjamin, Jacob’s sons by his beloved wife Rachel, the latest to give birth, appropriately close the reading. Guided by the order of the tribes, with Reuben at the head, the reading of the Habsburg kingdoms and crownlands should run clockwise, from the top right: the Kingdom of Hungary followed by the Archduchy of Erdély (Siebenbürgen in Transylvania), the Kingdom of Croatia and the Kingdom of Slovenia, i.e., the Lands of the Crown of St. Stephen, followed by the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Margraviate of Moravia, which was linked to Bohemia, and the Jewish communities from both, together with the Kingdom of Hungary, presented gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl. The Habsburg lands in Cisleithania, the Austrian part of the Dual Monarchy, come next—the Archduchies of Upper and Lower Austria and the Duchy of Styria. Yet, in light of allusions to Hungary or Austria, instead of an indivisible Dual Monarchy, this could also be an affirmation of their separate identities. This political-hierarchical order raises the question as to why the list closed with the city of Temesvár (Timişoara) in the Kingdom of Hungary. To keep the unity of each equal but separate entity, we should start the reading with this city, but it is difficult to assert a clear reason to place it at the head,436 therefore this question remains unresolved. As for the question regarding the choice and order of appearance of the Lands of the Crown of St. Stephen first, the obvious reason would be that Hungary, Bohemia, and Moravia were the original homelands of the gift-givers. It is striking that Galicia, with its large Jewish population, is not represented. This may be the result of conflicts between the two kolelim that, as on other occasions, sent separate gifts, and may also reflect problems regarding their identification with Austria or Hungary, as mentioned (see below my thematic discussion of the gifts).

436 Could the reason be the part played by the city of Temesvár as one of the refugee centers during the Romanian offensive against Transylvania, in the First World War? As the heir to the throne, Karl was involved and even present on the battlefield. Hungary, preparing for the coronation may have attached importance to this fact. See Norbert Falusi, “1916. Erdély: A remény koronázása az összeomlás előszelében,” in “Fogadd a koronát...”: Ünnep és válság, hagyományok és reformkoncepciók, ed. Norbert Glässer et al., A Vallási Kultúrakutatás Könyvei, 46 (Szeged: Néprajzi és Kulturális Antropológiai Tanszék, 2021), 95–112, esp. 105–112. I am grateful to Norbert Glässer for the discussion of this question. A high percentage of the population would not be a reason either. The Jews of Temesvár made up around 9.5 % of the total population at the time, whereas in Budapest they reached 24 %. Only after 1863, when the Jewish community was given civic rights, the Jews gained permanent access to the city and permission to build religious institutions.  

 

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Ultimately, the central question is to the unique representation of the symbols of the tribes of Israel together with those of the crownlands of the Habsburgs realms. Some of the many gifts presented to Franz Joseph by his subjects, and of the far fewer that Karl I/IV had the opportunity to receive during his brief reign, display the coats-of-arms of the gift-givers’ homelands as representatives of regions, cities, or institutions. In this respect, the iconography of such gifts from their subjects in the Dual Monarchy does not differ significantly from that of the gift presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel in Jerusalem. The coat-of-arms is an indicator of a homeland, which in the case of the Jewish Habsburg subjects living in Jerusalem would assert their recognition of the emperor-king and their loyalty to him. However, the conjoining of the coats-ofarms of the Habsburg realms with the symbols of the twelve tribes of Israel means much more than that: it is a metaphor for Austria-Hungary as an ideal kingdom, commensurate with the united biblical kingdoms of David and Solomon; similarly, the Austro-Hungarian monarch is presented as an ideal king comparable to his biblical counterparts. Moreover, Karl, his court, and his subjects—the latter belonged to a variety of ethnic groups and nations, were associated with different religious faiths, and had different mother tongues—could discern in the imagery a parallel between the Habsburg realms and the twelve tribes united in an ideal kingdom under one king, while each kept its own identity. Ultimately, nations and peoples would be presented as respecting the maxim of the sages in Mishnah, Avot 3:2, inscribed on the cover—an ideal that would serve as an incentive for the monarch to carry out his planned reforms to give more autonomy to the main sectors of his realms; Jewish subjects expected the reforms to respect the full civil rights at last given to them by Franz Joseph, despite the fact that they were not recognized as a nation. At the same time, the gift-givers could see in the juxtaposition of the Austro-Hungarian crownlands and the Twelve Tribes of Israel an image of themselves as loyal to the Habsburg king and deserving of his protection, while fulfilling the Jewish precept to live piously in the Holy Land. It is the integration of the two sets of historical spaces and times that makes the message straightforward, impressive, and authoritative as a reference to the king, in whom the Dual Monarchy and his peoples living there or in Jerusalem—are bound by God’s will. For the Orthodox Jews who presented the book to Karl I/IV, and for the Zionist movement with whom the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts identified, the great significance attributed to the tribes of Israel stemmed from their potential to evoke the ingathering of the exiles and the rebirth of the nation of Israel. However, as noted, contrary to Orthodox Jewry, which perceived the ingathering as part of the messianic prophecy of redemption at the End of Times, centered on the long-awaited coming of the messiah and the rebuilding of the Tem-

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ple,437 Bezalel artists referred to the story of the settlement of all twelve tribes in the Land of Israel to affirm that the ingathering and blossoming of the land anew were already taking place.438 The Zionist movement and the Bezalel School circulated the representation of the twelve tribes, transforming this imagery into a national symbol. This was not a minor issue. The iconography of the book cover suggests that main circles in the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, as branches or satellites of the Jewish communities in the Habsburg realms, were integrating their national identities into the expectations of those Jews who expected to be legally recognized and respected as all other peoples and nations in the Habsburg realms.439 This interpretation is further supported by indicators of nationalism appearing in the gift presented to Karl by the Austro-Galician kolel and to Franz Joseph by the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel in 1908. Lastly, the symbolism of the tribes of Israel corresponds with that of the exuberant flora and fauna of the imagined biblical land. For emancipated Jews, the lush nature could represent both the religious perception of the Land of Israel and the romantic-Orientalist one. In his decoration on the dedication of this gift to Karl, Ben-David depicted it as an exotic space particularized by Jewish religious and national symbols that could also be meaningful to the new Habsburg monarch as a vision of the reign that he wished to create—a paradisiacal land of peace and abundance in Austria-Hungary.

The Dedication The text of the book itself opens with a dedication and blessing to the new monarch and his consort, neatly handwritten in German. This text harmonizes with the dedication on the following pages, organized in profusely decorated archshaped frames (figs. 31–32). The ornamental frame on the first page recalls the front of a Torah Ark, the furniture that houses the scrolls of the Bible in a synagogue. This frame creates an interior space in the shape of the Tables of the Law, a design that highlights the religious and prophetic character of the visual and written message of the Jewish community. The dedication written on the first page, in German and in Secessionist-style characters, reads: “Your Majesty Emperor Karl I

437 Beliefs based on Deuteronomy 30:1–5 and promises of the prophets, as in Isaiah 11:11–12, Jeremiah 29:14, Ezekiel 20:41–42, and prayers such as the Amidah. 438 Amar, “L’art et l’artiste,” 174–175, 194. 439 In this respect, this study of the gifts contributes to the historiography of the Jews in Central Europe in the context of the major crisis during the war and post-war period, and in view of the claims that they were not a nation because they did not have a “home” of their own.

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of Austria: King Karl IV of Hungary. Empress and Queen Zita! Dedicated by the Austrian, Hungarian, Bohemian, [and] Moravian community in Jerusalem in most humble reverence.”440 The decoration of the double columns supporting the structure is a combination of Oriental motifs that recall columns in palaces and temples in ancient Egypt, which were a favored element in Orientalist painting, design, and architecture, and are hebraized by stylized Stars of David drawn on the column capitals. Similar columns are depicted in great detail in the much-acclaimed and highly demanded lithographs based on paintings by David Roberts, who visited Egypt, the Holy Land, Jordan, and Lebanon in 1838; two representative paintings by the famous artist depict the richly decorated Temple of Isis in Philae and the monumental Temple at Karnak.441 An additional source of influence may have been the contemporary Egyptian Revival style in architecture and design, which also became popular in synagogues and Jewish decorative arts.442 In this context, the columns decorated with motifs adopted from the architecture of ancient Egypt in the scroll of Esther and its silver and enamel scroll-case of excellent craftsmanship, presented by the Jewish community in Egypt to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee (fig. 33), are a case in point.443 Our last example of this style in Jewish artifacts at the time relates to popular objects from Central Europe, such as a late nineteenth-century mizrach tablet from Germany.444 These motifs had been adopted and stylized as decorative elements by Orientalist and Secessionist artists to a point that became stereotypical; together with motifs adopted from ancient cultures in Egypt and Mesopotamia, revealed in all their splendor in archaeological excavations, they were a main source of inspiration to Bezalel artists. These motifs also influenced the Egyptian Revival style and the so-called Moorish style, which were perceived in wide Jewish circles as visual references appropriate to the noble roots of Jews in

440 “Eurer Majestät Kaiser Karl I von Östr: König Karl IV von Ungarn / Kaiserin und Königin Zita! / In untertänigster Ehrfurcht Gewidmet von der Östr. Ung. Böhm. Mahr. Israeliten Gemeinde zu Jerusalem.” 441 Illus. in: Egypt & Nubia / from drawings made on the spot by David Roberts…; lithographed by Louis Haghe (London: F. G. Moon, 1846–1849), v. 1, pt. 40. Library of Congress, reproduction number LC-USZC4-3966. 442 Diana Muir Appelbaum, “Jewish Identity and Egyptian Revival Architecture,” Journal of Jewish Identities 5/2 (2012), 1–25; see also below, esp. chap. 10.5. 443 Designed by I. Della Rocca and made by Rudolf Stobbe, Alexandria. ÖNB BA Adr. Reg. J./56. See Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser,” fig. on p. 124. As we shall see, Jews in the Diaspora often adopted local motifs and adapted them to their specific needs. 444 Bahat and Sabar, Jerusalem – Stone and Spirit, fig. on p. 147.

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Fig. 33: I. Della Rocca and Rudolf Stobbe, Alexandria, for the Jewish Community of Egypt. Esther Scroll presented to Franz Joseph in 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./56.

the magnificent and splendid Oriental cultures of the ancient past,445 leaving no allusions to a specific nationality or ecclesiastical architecture. The combination of Jewish and Orientalist motifs, both in this object and in the double page paint-

445 The Moorish Revival style, used mostly for decorating domes, slender minaret-like towers, horseshoe and pointed arches, arabesque patterns and ablaq—adopted by European architects for the design of synagogues in Europe—is an architectural phenomenon that began in Germany in the 1830s and became popular throughout much of Europe until the outbreak of World War I. See Ivan Davidson Kalmar, “Moorish Style: Orientalism, the Jews, and Synagogue Architecture,” Jewish Social Studies (New Series) 7/3 (2001), 68–100 (esp. 69–72, 77), and Rudolf Klein, “Oriental-Style Synagogues in Austria-Hungary: Philosophy and Historical Significance,” Ars Judaica 2 (2006), 117–134; Susan Beth Teichman, “The Evolution and Spread of Moorish Revival Synagogues as Influenced by German Jews and Reform Judaism,” MA thesis (Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum and Parsons The New School for Design, 2016), 20–25, 35–37, 39–43). An outstanding example near Palestine is the contemporary Sha‘ar Ha’shamayim (Gate of Heaven) Synagogue in Egypt, and it is also visible in secular buildings in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, briefly reviewed below, chap. 10.5.

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ing, emphasizes the particular self-Orientalization that was integral to the process of construction of a proud self-Otherness by Bezalel artists who were searching for an independent Jewish “local” style, further discussed below. The Egyptian-style columns, on this first page of the ornamented dedication in the book presented to Karl, support a pediment designed as a combination of non-structural stylized elements in soft flowing lines; the pediment encloses a typical scheme of the Tables of the Law flanked by a pair of heraldic lions and topped by a crown. This is a well-known motif in Central-European Jewish art since the seventeenth century; however, the “Tables of the Law” in our dedication page do not display the Ten Commandments or the first ten letters of the Hebrew alphabet that represent them, but a verse from Psalms, in Hebrew: “Thou settest a crown of pure gold on his head” (21:3), a psalm of thanksgiving that celebrates God and the new king—appropriately written in that precious color. The other Jewish element in the decoration of the first page, highly stylized in the spirit of Secessionism, is a pair of lighted silver menorot that rise on top of both ends of the lintel of the architectural frame. The menorot are decorated with twelve stones in various colors, recalling the stones on the High Priest’s breastplate—despite the different arrangement than that stipulated in the Bible. What other kinds of symbols helped to convey an attractive and effective message from the Land of Israel? It turns out that biblical metaphors were considered most appropriate. Prominent motifs charged with local Jewish symbolism are pomegranate branches laden with flowers and fruits, that covered the entire background of the architectural structure’s high base and the pediment on top and refer to the land’s fertility (Numbers 13:23, Deuteronomy 8:7–12). The graceful branches create a look of luxurious abundance and liveliness, which is further enhanced by the rich golden and crimson colors. Those that spread across the base issue from vases on both sides and highlight a pair of heraldic peacocks in the center. Its symmetric composition and the predominance of golden, crimson, green, and silver colors bring together the eclectic elements of this paradisiacal construction of an ideal past and a no-less-ideal anticipated future. The double gate that opens across the following two pages, one in front of the other, spans wide openings that frame a Hebrew account of the celebrations in honor of the new king (fig. 32), that took place in the community’s synagogue in Jerusalem. As with the decoration on the opening page, Ben-David combined stylized flora that blend Secessionist and Oriental motifs, Classical elements, and Jewish symbols, and chose a similar but much richer palette in gold and silver. The wider use of gold and silver is not the only difference that gives the double page a more lavish look: the design is much more stylized and the eclectic selection of motifs is much richer. No less important, Ben-David added motifs from ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian decorations to dominant motifs from the local

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Mamluk architectural language, thereby adding a flavor of Jerusalem to the aura of luxury and Oriental exoticism of this creative construction. Against this background of Orientalism, what kind of a religious-national choreography was offered in the imagery, and what role did it play in the rich display of decorative motifs? The element that immediately attracts the eye of the beholder is a large dome rising above the double column in the center of the wide, flat-arched, gate. Its front presents interlacing loops, braids, and knots that highlight a large Star of David, through which a pair of hands in the posture of the Cohen priestly blessing is visible; a smaller Star of David sits on top of the dome. The double column, as those on either side of the gate, is profusely decorated with a diamond grid inhabited by a pattern of colorful flowers, jeweled rings, silver-colored flutes, and above all—stylized golden menorot on a crimson background. The menorot direct the eyes of the beholder to Stars of David encircled by the interlacing at the ends of the lintel, above the side columns. Three axes of Jewish symbols are thus created in the center and at the ends of the double gate, which are further emphasized by pairs of roaring lions sitting in a heraldic position at the foot of the columns. The powerful lions point to Neo-Assyrian influence and recall the sculpted guardian lions in the Temple of Ishtar, near the palace of Ashurnasirpal II in Nimrud, dated (883–859 BC), while details like the rich mane ending in curls may have been taken from guardian figures such as the winged human-headed bulls, possibly lamassu or shedu, from the citadel of Sargon II in Khorsabad (Dur-Sharrukin), 721–705 BC, as well as various deities.446 Lions and hybrid animals sitting or standing at entrances and other strategic points at city gates, temples, and palaces are common throughout the Middle East. The Ben-David decoration reflects the assumption in Orientalist fantasies, shared by the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, that the visual and material culture of the Kingdom of Israel in the Golden Age of David and Solomon was closely related and as rich as that of the neighboring great cultures at the time, which were being revealed in all their magnificence by archaeological findings. As in the region’s great cultures since antiquity, lions also had a place in royal imagery in biblical Jerusalem. Thus, Solomon’s luxurious throne was described as having “six steps, and the top of the throne was round behind: and there were stays on either side on the place of the seat, and two lions stood beside the stays. And twelve lions stood there on the one side and on the other upon the six steps: there was not the like

446 For the Temple of Ishtar’s lions, see London, British Museum, item ANE 118895; see also Chikako Esther Watanabe, “The Lion Metaphor in the Mesopotamian Royal Context,” Topoi. OrientOccident, Suppl. 2 (2000), 399–409, esp. 404–405, 407 .

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made in any kingdom” (I Kings 10:19–20). Therefore, the lions in the decoration of the dedication might also point to a religio-national message. By contrast, and consonant with the eclectic language of the Bezalel School, the vases that stand at the ends of the lintel, on the same axis as the Oriental columns and lions, recall the Greek lydia, which are flanked by a pair of heraldic goats standing on their hind legs and leaning their forelegs on the vases’ shoulder. In a compositional detail, stylized branches with hanging leaves and fruits issue forth from the vases, rising and turning inward horizontally, parallel to the lintel—a motif that appears in various Bezalel works and may derive from Secessionist ornaments. This motif directs the eye of the beholder back to the dome in the center of the double gate, where the arches meet, and through the abundance of detail that includes a pair of heraldic peacocks standing on decorative merlons while displaying their flamboyant eye-spotted tail. Lastly, to reference but two popular local motifs, two Mamluk ornamental bands run across the lintel and the flat arches, adding a Jerusalemite touch: one band consists of two parallel ribbons that loop and encircle glazed stones, as in the Madrasa Al-Ashrafiya dated 1482 (fig. 34); this decorative band, in the BenDavid decoration, also opens to create the dome in the center and the Stars of David at the ends; moreover, in an overly decorative transformation, the ribbons enclose a vegetal motif. The other motif is also a transformation of an architectural ornament: crenellations become a double band of stepped merlons, in a pattern of interlocking stones in two alternating colors.447 It is helpful to compare the double gate in the dedication of the book presented to Karl by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel with the gate in the epistle sent to Franz Joseph in 1898 by the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem (fig. 66), discussed below.448 Here, I will only note that also the artist of the Rothschild epistle adopted elements from local Muslim architecture, such as the parallel bands that loop and enclose glazed stones, as well as patterns of interlocking stones that appear in the dedication of the book presented to Karl. Nevertheless, the Rothschild artist created the illusion of a three-dimensional gate as well as of the passage of time, whereas Ben-David’s approach was much more fantasy-oriented; perhaps in his wish to show as many exotic Oriental motifs as possible, Ben-David gave up the illusionist third dimension and other realistic features, and incorporated a rich assortment of stylized local and traditional Jewish elements and Zionist symbols, in a sort of horror vacui characteristic of ancient 447 Joggled voussoirs and lintels in alternating colors were common in Ayyubid architecture; in more complex designs, they became a major decorative architectural feature under the Mamluks and Ottomans. 448 ÖNB Adr. Reg. J./96. See esp. chap. 6.3.2.

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Fig. 34: Jerusalem, Sultan al-Malik al Ashraf Qaytbay, Madrasa Al-Ashrafiya, 1482.

and revival Oriental art, in a search for style and identity. Thus, when taken together with the text of the prayer and blessings, the gate designed by Ben-David may have been intended to evoke the glorious period of Kings David and Solomon as imagined at the time, rooted in the luxurious Orient, and the modern nation that bridges between the great past and desired future, detached from the difficult present. The rich design and biblical associations of the dedication pages may have pleased the gift-givers and, no doubt, Ben-David was very proud of this work. The decoration of the first page of the dedication served as the model for his tombstone (fig. 35), which he may have designed for himself; it was made at the artist’s untimely death, in 1927, by Meir Horodezki (Gur-Arieh), one of the artists who

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Fig. 35: Shmuel Ben-David’s tombstone, produced by the Studio for Industrial Art according to his own design, 1928.

worked on the book cover, together with Zeev Raban, a master artist at the Bezalel School.449 The few changes in the design must have been required by the very different functions of the artifacts and the different mediums.

449 See Gideon Ofrat-Friedlander, “‘The Periods of Bezalel’,” in Bezalel 1906–1929, ed. Nurit Shilo-Cohen (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1983), 109–110, fig. 13. According to Alec Mishory, the tombstone was designed by Boris Schatz. In any case, Mishory was unaware of Ben-David’s illustration for the dedication of the yet-unpublished gift to Karl I/IV; see Alec Mishory, “A Purim Masquerade: Fowls and Foxes in Shmuel Ben David’s Illuminated Scroll of Esther (ca. 1923),” Ars Judaica 9 (2013), 64. The tombstone was made in the Studio for Industrial Art, which Raban and Gur-Arieh founded in 1923 in the backyard of the Bezalel School.

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In contrast to the innovative style of the Bezalel artist, the text is written in the usual florid laudatory style. It tells us that, at the ceremony in honor of Karl IV in the prayer hall of the community, a “heart-warming sermon” for the special day was read and, afterward, the participants recited Psalms 21, 45, 61, 72, 92, and 144. The writer adds that a prayer, which was composed especially for this event, was recited “bowing in humble submission, reverence, and love.” As in Psalm 21:3, the writer sings the praises of God and exalts Him for setting a crown of gold upon the head of kings and seating them on a royal throne; the writer then adopts psalms that praise God for gracing the ideal biblical kings with a long and fruitful life, a life of good deeds, and years as many generations (21:4; 45:7; 61:6–7; 72:5 and 72:15), adapting them to refer to Karl. Drawing inspiration from Psalm 72, the writer also asks God to endow the king, Karl, first and foremost with the virtues of righteousness, knowledge, wisdom, integrity, strength, and courage, as well as mercifulness and care for the well-being of all his loyal subjects. Again following the psalmist, the writer glorifies God, who has been a “shelter for [the king], and a strong tower [protecting him] from the enemy… covering [the king] under His wings” (61:3–4),450 as well as for granting him victory over his foes: “Thine arrows are sharp in the heart of the king’s enemies; whereby the people fall under thee” (45:5).451 The writer then proceeds, like the psalmist, to implore God to protect Karl and give him determination and courage in battle, success, and prosperity. It is important to note that the writer of the prayer emphasizes that the king, Karl, trusts in God, similarly to the psalmist who praises the devout biblical king (21:7; 61:4; 144:2). The writer does not forgo the queen and king’s heir; he draws inspiration from psalms to acclaim the queen and invoke divine favor upon her, the heir, and all descendants. Lastly, he heartily asks God to bring peace and prosperity to Karl’s House and realms, quoting the psalmist: “Peace be within thy walls, and prosperity within thy palaces” (122:7).452 The special role of the prayer to God in Psalm 72, to guide and protect the king, is most appropriate in a congratulatory epistle on the occasion of the enthronement of a new king, since it also discloses the people’s expectations of the sovereign chosen by God. The prayer and blessings conclude by beseeching God that in the king’s and gift-givers’ own days, Judah shall be saved and Israel shall dwell safely (following Jeremiah 23:1–8, especially verses 3–6).

450 Among the Psalms recited in the ceremony, see also 21:5–12, 45:4–7, 144:1–10, as well 28:8, 61:6–7, 63:1, 68:1–2, and 84:8–9. 451 Also recited in the ceremony: Psalms 62:4–7, 68:1–2, 72:8–11, and 144:1–10. 452 Similar pleas for peace appear in Psalms 29:11, 34:14, 37:37, and 119:165; see also Proverbs 12:20 and 16:7, and Isaiah 26:3 and 12, 54:10, and 55:12.

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The repetition of praises to God and pleas that He grant the king victory and peace, taken from Psalms 21 and 144—the first and last of those recited at the ceremony—is most telling. In their new context, the recurrence of verses praising and thanking God, followed by the prayer to Him that He guide and protect the king in times of war—as well as verses of encouragement to the king not to fear and to wield his sword, because God will deliver the devout and righteous from evils and enemies—show the concern of Jerusalemite Jews. Most Old Yishuv members were suffering the hardships of war; moreover, the Habsburg subjects and protégés had become dependent on a new monarch whose nature, positions, and visions were unknown to them, whose military and political situation was deteriorating, and whose pact with Germany and fear of its ambitions limited his power. The reading of psalms is viewed in Jewish tradition as a medium to earn God’s favor, inculcate belief into one’s mind and heart, and reinforce a sense of moral responsibility; therefore, psalms are often recited in times of adversity, such as disease, poverty, war, and danger. Lastly, with regards to the visual design of the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel’s gift, a noticeable difference from the dedication of the Austro-Galician gift, by the same artist, is the absence of icons of holy places, be it in their traditional design that does not show the pass of time, or in a naturalistic setting. These sites do not figure on the book cover either, but they do appear in the photographs in the body of the book; nevertheless, the medium indeed influences the perception and interpretation of these gifts. Perhaps images of these sites appeared on the box that held the gift, as was the case with other objects presented to Franz Joseph and Karl. Unfortunately, we have no further information on this.

The Photographs: A Mirror of Religiosity, Positive Oriental Otherness, and the Colonialist View as Historical Documentation The thirty-seven photographs of Jerusalem and its surroundings, in the album presented to Karl, are set on thick textured paper and protected by sheets of semi-translucent paper on which the titles are carefully handwritten in German in black ink. The photographs have both a documentary and a socio-cultural interpretative aspect. They may have been chosen as historical documentation of the deep roots of the Jewish people in Jerusalem, reaching biblical times despite the reversals of history, and a mirror of the deeply religious life of the gift-givers in the Holy City. The photographs show the city not only as a pilgrimage center but also as the home of foreign peoples and customs, and serve as documentation to the Old Yishuv’s perception of its Otherness as a positive identity, which they convey to

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the general society; furthermore, they may function as an alternative, virtual journey of the mind or soul. As with other artworks, and material culture as a whole, these photographs are an integral part of the historical, political, and socio-cultural milieu in which they were created and used. They were shaped by social, cultural, ideological, and aesthetic concepts that, at the same time, contribute to shape culture, identities, memories, and social bonds. Like other types of images, they may give us direct and indirect messages, and may complement, reinforce, or contradict views. Moreover, the images are not always clear and self-explanatory: they may often seem ambiguous and may have been intentionally created as such. By adding captions and other contextual indicators, the photographer or party that market such a commodity implanted some potential meanings, and discouraged others. These are not the only factors that influence the reading and interpretation of the images. In the context of this book, I have chosen factors that shed new light on identity constructions of those involved.

The Photographer and the Viewer: Creators of Meanings and Memories What role do the photographs play in asserting one’s affiliation to a culture and place, and in confirming the gift-giver’s distinct and positive identification with the new monarch? The photographer influences the perception and interpretation of their work the moment they choose the subject matter and composes the scene by selecting a setting, a certain perspective, framing, cropping, and including or excluding parts of a site. Factors such as lighting effects, focus, and a still and sharp, or blurred image, all of which were technologically possible at the time, are important factors as well.453 For example, blurred figures might be the result of movement at the time of exposure, a process that required a window of time to stand still in order to obtain a sharp image;454 blurring could produce various impressions, such as movement, time, and the authenticity that is absent from a per-

453 Two techniques used in Jerusalem at the time stand out—albumen prints made from wetcollodion glass negatives and prints made from dry-gelatin plates; see Yeshayahu Nir, “Cultural Predispositions in Early Photography: The Case of the Holy Land (1),” Journal of Communication 35/3 (1985), 46–47. The choice of a specific technique may have been influenced by the pictorial values preferred by the artist, since all photographers were subject to the same constraints of the early photographic processes, on the one hand, and the rather difficult local conditions, on the other. 454 Erin Pauwels, “Resetting the Camera’s Clock: Sarony, Muybridge & the Aesthetics of WetPlate Photography,” History and Technology 31/4 (2015), 482–491.

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fectly staged still composition; however, it is not always possible to ascertain whether in this album, this was an accidental or an intentional effect. In the aim to achieve their goals, the editors chose works that used various types of framing and composition, views from afar or middle distance rather than close-ups, various angles of view, light and shadow, focusing on the site or on the monument, or the people in the presence of the latter two; when people appear, their identity and attitude, including the interaction between them or between them and the viewer (who is perceived as standing beside the photographer), greatly influence the viewer’s perception of the image. Another factor used by artists and editors in this album to influence the perception of the image is the title, or its absence: titles can suggest and lead to desired interpretations while setting others aside. The identity of the authors and the editors could also be suggestive of possible meanings; unfortunately, no information is available for either of them, nor are the date and context in which the photos were taken.455 The various factors work differently on different individuals. Differences in the perception and interpretation of images arise from cognitive and emotional predispositions, such as ideological attitudes, collective and personal intellectual and emotional experiences, as well as aesthetic considerations. Both the photographer and the viewer appropriate the subject and give it their own, often contradictory, meanings. Moreover, memories and meanings are dynamic, and therefore the perception, interpretation, and impact of the moment caught in a photograph also change with time. Photographs in this album are considered as considered visual documents in the specific historical, ideological, and emotional context and conditions in which they were created and seen in real time by a specific individual or collective. This means that their perception and interpretation are subjective and highly variable. Since the invention of this technology in 1839, and until well after the time the album was produced and presented to Karl, photography was regarded as a scientific tool, a perfect documentary medium, because its so-perceived mechanical nature was considered to provide a faithful replica of reality. With regards to photography at the time under discussion, we might borrow Marshall McLuhan’s pioneering and controversial statement, “the medium is the message,”456 in the sense that the medium embeds itself in the message and influences how the message is to be perceived.

455 I was able to identify two of the photographers, based on copies of their work in archives and private collections. 456 Marshall McLuhan, Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man (New York: McGraw-Hill), 1964, esp. chap. 1, p. 24.

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Photographing Jerusalem: Living Traces of a Legendary Past Only a few months after the invention of photographic technologies that made it possible to travel and photograph in situ, in 1839, Western photographers reached Jerusalem, following explorers, missionaries, archaeologists, scholars, and travelers. The Land of the Bible, especially Jerusalem, became a focus and mine of valued photography. From this date until the outbreak of World War I, more than one hundred photographers, mostly European, took pictures of the landscapes and holy places of Jerusalem, and from the late 1860s, owing to new technologies, the amount of photographs of the city’s inhabitants also increased considerably. Until the 1880s, most photographs were taken by Christians, including local Armenians, Greek Orthodox, and converted Jews who opened studios in the mid1850s.457 The relatively small number of Jewish and Muslim photographers may be due to religious prohibitions against making graven images; however, as the nineteenth century progressed, the number of those photographers grew.458 Moreover, when photographers first reached Jerusalem, as was the case throughout most of the Ottoman period and until then, only Muslims (with a few exceptions), were allowed to enter the Haram el-Sharif/Temple Mount. Only after the Crimean War, and with the growing dependency of the Porte (the central government of the Ottoman empire) on the European powers, were the gates of the sacred mount gradually opened to visitors, and, consequently, a profusion of paintings, prints, and photographs have reached the world market. The Jewish religious prohibition against going into the Holy of Holies of the Temple, whose exact location is unknown, prevented religious artists from working on the Temple Mount, and may point to mostly non-Jewish photographers who “captured” the site. However, this situation gradually changed, and I have identified one of the photographs of the Muslim monuments on the sacred esplanade of the Temple Mount as the work of a Jerusalem Jewish photographer, Yaacov Ben-Dov.459 Of

457 Among the important pioneering photographers who worked in Jerusalem, we may mention George Skene Keith, Auguste Salzmann, Felix Bonfils, Francis Frith, James Graham, Elijah Meyers, the converted Jews Peter Bergheim and Mendel John Diness, and Francis Bedford. Many of their photographs are digitalized in the Library of Congress online archives; other collections of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century photographs can be found online at the New York Public Library, the Harvard University Museum sites, and the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem. 458 Vivienne Silver-Brody, Documentors of the Dream: Pioneer Jewish Photographers in the Land of Israel, 1890–1933 (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1998), 26, 29; Shay, “Historical-Cultural Geography and Photography,” esp. 50–57. 459 Ben-Dov was born in 1882 in a shtetl near Kiev. He learned religious as well as secular studies and attended the Academy of Arts in Kiev. In 1907 he immigrated to Palestine, joined the New Yishuv, attended the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, and later taught there. At the outbreak of World War I he joined the Ottoman Imperial army and was commissioned as a medical photogra-

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course, more than one photograph of the Temple Mount in the album may be by him, or another Jewish photographer. Most photographers were motivated by the aura of Palestine as the Holy Land. The uniqueness of the historical, religious, and cultural significance, especially of Jerusalem, moved them to capture the landscapes and the people while simultaneously creating allusions to the legendary historical biblical past and present. Moreover, many Christian photographers understood the need of the Church to prove the truth of the Christian doctrine, and cooperated with it in order to reassert the Church’s views in the face of scientific discoveries, schools of philosophy, and the social sciences that criticized religion and endorsed rational thinking and practices. These photographers operated so as to provide what would be perceived as incontestable evidence of the truthfulness of the New Testament, in the sense that seeing is believing. In many cases, manipulation may have been considered necessary in order to represent the scene or subject as “faithfully” as possible in the eyes of the customer, so that they would conform to his preconceptions and expectations:460 as is well known, the image of the Land of the Bible by most Christians and Diaspora Jews was largely romanticized. In this context, it is interesting to note that the first book on the Holy Land and its surroundings that was illustrated with engravings made from photographs was titled Evidence of the Truth of the Christian Religion: Derived from the Literal Fulfilment of Prophecy, Particularly as Illustrated by the History of the Jews, and by the Discoveries of Recent Travellers. Its author was Dr. Alexander Keith, a minister in the Church of Scotland; his son, Dr. George Skene Keith, one of the early photographers of Jerusalem, contributed to the 1847 edition.461

pher in the Austrian army in Jerusalem. In 1917, he acquired filmmaking equipment, probably through his Austrian military connections, and, in time, became a pioneer of that field in Palestine; see the Information Center for Israeli Art, Israel Museum. Another well-known Jewish artist and photograher who photographed the Temple Mount was Ephraim Moses Lilien, an Austrian Zionist who served in the Austrian army as a photographer and, as such, obtained a special permit to enter the shrine during his stay in Jerusalem in 1914; see Micha Bar-Am and Orna Bar-Am, Painting with Light: The Photographic Aspect in the Work of E. M. Lilien (Tel Aviv: Tel Aviv Museum of Art, 1991), 222. Lilien’s photographic work in Palestine had not been published at the time. 460 Nir, “Cultural Predispositions (1),” perpetuating the attitudes of Protestant and Catholic photographers on pp. 48–50; Issam Nassar, “‘Biblification’ in the Service of Colonialism: Jerusalem in Nineteenth-Century Photography,” Third Text 20/3–4 (2006), 317–326, esp. 318–320; idem, “Early Local Photography in Jerusalem: From the Imaginary to the Social Landscape,” History of Photography 27/4 (2003), 320–321. 461 The first edition is dated 1823. The second, by Waugh & Innes of Edinburgh in 1826, was illustrated with drawings. Alexander Keith, a minister of the Church of Scotland, visited Palestine in 1839 as part of a mission to study the cradle of Christianity and, at the same time, convince Jews to acknowledge Jesus and return to the Land of Israel as prophesied in the Bible. He returned to

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In many cases, scholars, amateurs, artists, and locals identified sites and monuments with biblical landmarks, offering little or no corroboration by scientific research. The depictions were often enhanced by the presentation of local scenes as evocative of historical and religious events, and as the continuation of traditions known from the Bible.462 Many of the photographs of locals were staged, using models wearing an eclectic collection of colorful Oriental costumes that would identify them as pious Jews or Eastern priests who would be perceived as biblical figures. In addition, animals such as camels and donkeys, and local vegetation such as palm trees, cacti, and other typical flora and birds were sometimes added, in many cases by artists who prepared the photographs for engraving and printing in books and albums, on postcards, and the like. In effect, artists, photographers, and writers wishing to convey relevant “truths” had to find a way to comply with the demands of the market, however contradictory some of them were to reality—demands for precise documentary descriptions, on the one hand, and religious demands to present emotional experiences, on the other.463 To achieve such religio-political interests, photographers resorted to the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century European invention of the “exotic Orient,” exalted by romanticism and cultural colonialism, and cultivated by artists, designers, writers, composers, and choreographers at the time. Following ethnographers, these photographers paid attention to the particular physiognomy,

the Holy Land with his son, George Skene Keith, in 1844. Alexander Keith is the author of various well-known books on the Holy Land; see Sheona Beaumont, “Photographic and Prophetic Truth: Daguerreotypes, the Holy Land, and the Bible According to Reverend Alexander Keith,” History of Photography 42/4 (2018), 338–355, and eadem, “Photographic Truth and Prophetic Picturing: Rev. Dr Alexander Keith’s ‘Evidence of the Truth of the Christian Religion’ (1847)” (Paper presented at the Society of Biblical Literature, St Andrews, 10th July, 2013) . See Nir, “Cultural Predispositions (1),” 33– 35, with examples of manipulations in George Skene Keith’s photographs, which replaced the highly imaginary drawings in the early editions of his father’s important book. See also Franz Joseph’s image of the Holy Land in this study, esp. chap. 3. 462 This important topic has been extensively researched in archaeology, as well as religious, cultural, and the political sciences. See, e.g., Nassar, “‘Biblification’ in the Service of Colonialism,” esp. 319, 322–325; Nir, “Cultural Predispositions.” 463 Noa Hazan and Avital Barak, “A Visual Genealogy of a Sacred Landscape,” Israel Studies Review 32: 1 (2017), 20–47, esp. 23–26. The authors note, on pp. 25–26, that the publication in Europe of the photographic album titled Souvenir d’Orient: Album Pittoresque by the Bonfils family studio, illuminates the relationship between Holy Land photography and geopolitical changes that took place in the land at the time. The album contained eighty-five photographs of the Temple Mount and other views of Jerusalem that mythicized and romanticized the city. It was presented in the Exposition Universelle held in Paris in 1878 and earned the Bonfils a medal as well as international recognition.

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garments, customs, and rituals of the local inhabitants and peoples—more specifically the inhabitants of biblical sites—who were romantically perceived as primitive but noble figures, living remnants of a historical or mythical past. Attitudes to the Holy Land differed from attitudes to other lands of the Orient, which attracted attention based on the preconceptions of their exotic, barbaric, and sexually permissive peoples who, at the same time, aroused contempt as inferior peoples and cultures.464 Photographers of the Holy Land catered to those who could not afford a pilgrimage or a visit, and wished to see and experience virtually the venerated sites and, through them, their closeness to God, rather than experience sensual aspects of the Orient. Both the physical and the virtual encounter with the religio-mythical Holy Land could awaken deeply rooted constructed memories and expectations that would transform the images perceived in a unique manner. Therefore, some painters and photographers depicted romantic views of Jerusalem from a variety of high locations—points of view that blurred the unappealing aspects of decay, filth, and poverty seen everywhere. They sought to sell wellcomposed photographs having religious connotations as souvenirs to pilgrims and tourists, as well as to artists who often reworked them for printing and created conventional views of historical and biblical sites.

The Photograph Album as a Geography of Identity The editors of the book presented to Karl were well aware of the ways that the medium influenced the means through which these sites were perceived, as well as of the expectations of the gift-givers. The decision to send a photograph album to Karl was most probably influenced by the prestige and popularity of the relatively new technology and its widespread perception as an unquestionable documentary medium, offering qualities that would add to the effective character of the images and, consequently, to the value of the gift and the self-pride of the gift-givers. The selection of images by the editors, and the approval by the gift-givers, are consonant with the decision of the same kolel to present sites and monuments as they appeared on postcards—a new medium of communication—in its 1908 gift to Franz Joseph. Both media and the selection of subjects support my proposition that this was a means not only to please the recipient, but also to enhance the identity of the kolel and its projection as a deeply religious collective, well rooted in the ultra-Orthodox

464 Both Yeshayahu Nir and Issam Nassar agree that local Jewish and Arab photographers would usually present a more positive image of their own community than their foreign colleagues; see Nir, “Cultural Predispositions (1),” 34–35, and Nassar, “‘Biblification’ in the Service of Colonialism,” esp. 320–323. Also, Shay, “Historical-Cultural Geography and Photography,” esp. 50–57, 76–79.

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ideology of central circles, yet able to negotiate on some aspects—the opposite of their prejudiced characterization as a backward and stagnant community. The selection of themes in Karl’s albums was the usual fare in books, prints, and postcards—landscapes of Jerusalem and its surroundings, romantic views of biblical sites, holy places, attractive secular sites, local people with a focus on stereotypes rather than on the particular and the individual, as well as rituals and customs that convey a religious and, preferably, also an Oriental atmosphere free of “uncivilized” practices common in images that fed the debasing Orientalist perspective. Various exciting contemporary developments influenced the rationale that guided artists and editors, and, not the least, also progressive personalities in the Old Yishuv—the discovery of new photography techniques, the rediscovery of the Land of the Bible, the extraordinary achievements of scientific archaeology, and research of religious texts, rites, customs, and traditions in the endeavor to prove the veracity of the Bible.465 Obviously, the venerated biblical sites and landscapes would be perceived by the royal Christian recipient precisely as his religious beliefs and political and socio-cultural position would guide him. The editors selected images of collective identity built on awareness of the symbolism of the space, the place, and its monuments. We may consider the selection of themes as “a geography of identity” of the Jewish community in Jerusalem, with a focus on the gift-givers, while also giving thought to the memories and feelings that the photographs may invoke for the viewer. Since photographs were perceived by most people as faithfully showing what was seen at a specific site at a certain time, the selection could construct desired identities and memories and deconstruct others. Although the themes were well known in the market, the editors’ choice of subjects from the more popular repertoire, the space assigned to them, and their sequential order are all suggestive.

A Virtual Tour Aware of the fact that the royal addressee had never visited Jerusalem, the editors took him on a virtual tour to the most venerated Jewish sites, impressive general views, and tourist attractions; having put much thought into it, they closed his tour with sites related to the Austro-Hungarian kolel and the artists’ affiliation— the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts. The tour may have been designed to present not only a Jewish anthropological perspective on Jewish religious customs and

465 The aims and methods are opposite to contemporary scientific research on the Bible and this land; see also research by Nassar and Nir on the methodologies of archaeology and the politics of identification and interpretation of sites at the time.

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daily life, enhancing the identity of the gift-givers, but also to create a shared political and cultural platform between them and the Habsburg monarchy—both as “Others” and as “Belonging.”

A First View The album opens with two photographs set on one page that offer the virtual visitor a preliminary view of the Old City. The upper, larger, one, set in a vertical rectangular frame, is titled “Jerusalem from Herod’s Fortress” (fig. 36). The photograph was taken from a tower that rises above the remains of one of the three massive towers located in the citadel built by Herod the Great between 37 and 34 BC, just south of Jaffa Gate—the main entrance to the Old City from the west, to which travelers came from the port of Jaffa.466 It shows a view of the streets and houses toward the Temple Mount, with the Dome of the Rock rising high above it. The street that runs from Jaffa Gate diagonally inward, forking to the right—named David Street today—reaches the Temple Mount, but at that time Jews usually reached it from The Armenian Patriarchate Street that runs to the holy site via Mount Zion and the cardo, which appears later in the album. The other photograph on the first page is a wide cityscape looking to the west, labeled “General View of Jerusalem” (fig. 37). Of the large buildings silhouetted sharply against the evening glow of the sky, the one on the left is clearly identifiable—the Dormition Church on Mount Zion. The construction of the church seems to be almost completed but scaffolds still surround it, a detail possibly pointing to a date around 1909.467 The domed building to the right of the landscape is the Dome of the Rock. These monuments frame the Jewish Quarter with its two main synagogues, the Hurva and Tiferet Israel, standing in the far distance in the center of the cityscape;468 consequently, the Jewish Quarter

466 The site of the citadel, on the western hill, immediately south of Jaffa Gate, was chosen for military reasons: it is strategically located at a vulnerable spot where the southwestern and northwestern hills meet; remains of earlier fortifications form an elbow in the city wall, at a point where strong defenses were critically needed; see Hillel Geva, “The ‘Tower of David’—Phasael or Hippicus?,” Israel Exploration Journal 31 (1981), 57–65; Dan Bahat, “David’s Tower and Its Name in Second Temple Times,” Eretz-Israel 15 (1981), 396–400 (Hebrew); and below. 467 The bell-tower was completed in October 1907 and the church dome in July 1909; see Haim Goren, ‘Real Catholics and Good Germans’: The German Catholics and Palestine, 1838–1910 (Jerusalem: Magnes, 2005), 262 (Hebrew). 468 The dome to the right of the Dome of the Rock looks smaller because of the distance. It may be the Church of the Holy Sepulcher; if so, the photograph provides a view of the main shrines of the three main faiths. The view suggests that the photograph was taken from the Mount of Olives, perhaps near the Church of St. Mary Magdalene.

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Fig. 36: Jerusalem from Herod’s Fortress.

Fig. 37: General View of Jerusalem.

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and the two iconic domed synagogues are in a position that enhances them as the focus of the photograph. This photograph supports Ilia Rodov’s opinion that the synagogues’ high domes, which offset the Dome of the Rock on the Temple Mount and the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian Quarter on the skyline of the Old City, implied that the Jews were reclaiming their primogeniture in the Holy City.469 These may have been the editors’ reasons for the choice of this view, wishing to introduce the virtual visitor first and foremost to a panorama of the two centers of Jewish life in Jerusalem—the Temple Mount, and the Jewish Quarter and main Ashkenazi synagogues. As we shall see, the album ends in a similar way, with representative views of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel.

The Most-Sought First Destination: The Temple Mount Ten photographs of the Temple Mount appear next, the highest number representing any one site. Six show the Muslim monuments on the Temple Mount, and the other four—the Golden Gate, which is the only gate in the eastern wall and, as noted, has an important place in Jewish tradition, and three views of Jews praying at the Western Wall. The photographs are taken from high up or from angles that magnify the presence of the monuments and intensify the religious atmosphere of sacredness and timelessness, thereby mythicizing and romanticizing Jerusalem. Moreover, the editors may have been aware of the many legends, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim, woven around these monuments. How could they highlight the Jewish ones and upstage the extraneous ones? The two opening photographs, which we just saw, addressed this same challenge. The first photograph, containing the group of sites around the Temple Mount, shows the Dome of the Rock, the monument that would immediately draw the attention of the visitor when entering the sacred temenos (fig. 38, top). It is seen through a free-standing arcade, a kanatir, rising at a liminal point—the head of the stairs that lead to the upper esplanade. As usual with the gifts of the AustroHungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, and the public more generally, the shrine is misnomered Omar Moschee. This is a 1914 photograph by the Jewish photographer Yaacov Ben-Dov,470 who in 1911 established the photography workshop at the Bezalel School of Arts together with Boris Schatz and became one of the leading Jerusalemite Jewish artists working in this medium. No doubt, the edi-

469 Rodov, “With Eyes toward Zion,” 156–157. 470 See a copy of this photograph at .

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Fig. 38: Umar Mosque (on top). Entrance to Umar Mosque (bottom).

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tors were well aware of the visitors’ natural reaction to the Temple Mount: only after first seeing the magnificent shrine, the visitors’ attention is drawn to the western passage of the lower esplanade toward the south; this scene, which appears below on the same page, is titled “Entrance to the Umar Mosque [Omar Moschee]” (fig. 38, bottom).471 The relative size of the figures in the far background may give an impression of the enormity of the site and its proportions vis-à-vis the monuments as well as the monuments’ proportions in comparison to man. In Karl’s album, the area of the esplanade on the Temple Mount was endowed with a mythical and symbolic atmosphere by minimizing human presence to small figures in the far distance. The other views of the sacred esplanade are devoid of people. The next two scenes in this group focus on the two most sacred monuments, which are by far also the most popular in photographs, postcards, and souvenirs. One of them presents the Dome of the Rock, consistently labeled “Umar Mosque,” seen from the Al-Aqsa Mosque (fig. 39); the other shows the central part of the façade of the Al-Aqsa Mosque, here called “Solomon’s Temple,” seen from the Dome of the Rock (fig. 40). Both monuments are seen through the ceremonial kanatir at the head of the southern stairs to the upper esplanade. The photographer not only chose the natural perspective that the monuments dictate to the viewer—perfectly framing the monuments in frontal view through the center of the kanatir—but also adds a dimension of ritual ceremony that maximizes the impact of the sight, no matter what the religious faith of the photographer or the beholder was. The axis between the monuments on the Temple esplanade is further emphasized by the kas, the main ablution fountain located on the lower esplanade.472 The choice of the two monuments from that specific perspective, connecting them while magnifying the Dome of the Rock, may have been intended to invoke for the visitors the meanings of the Jewish Temple, as opposed to Muslim traditions. For example, the tradition that on the Day of the Resurrection, the black stone in the Kaaba will be brought to Jerusalem as a bride to her husband, and will intercede for those who make pilgrimage to pay it honor; that tradition also

471 In the center of the pictorial space, left of the passage, stands the sabil (public fountain) of Qait’Bay, and on the right—the Madrasa Al-Othmaniya (school for Islamic studies), followed to the south by the Madrasa Al-Ashrafiya and the minaret of the Gate of the Chain. 472 It functions as a source of water for ritual washing of the hands, feet, and face before entering the mosque. It was first built in 709 by the Umayyads, enlarged by Emir Tankiz in 1327– 1328, and again in the late twentieth century to accommodate more worshippers. The higher viewpoint allows the beholder to see the roofs of the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the dome above the point where the southern bay crosses the central nave in the same sacred axis, in front of the mihrab.

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Fig. 39: Umar Mosque.

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Fig. 40: Solomon’s Temple.

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claims that both stones will be taken to heaven with the righteous.473 Jerusalemite Jews and Christians, as well as many visitors, were aware of the eighth century Muslim tradition identifying the Temple Mount as the site of the Isra, the Night Journey of Muhammad from the “sacred sanctuary” in Mecca to the “remotest sanctuary”—the Masjid al-Aqsa (Qur’an 17.1). This tradition identifies the “remotest sanctuary” with the mosque at the southern end of the esplanade, whereas the stone in the center of the Dome of the Rock became associated with Muhammad’s ascension to Heaven, the Miraj.474 As is well known, the Crusaders, impressed by the beauty and aware of the rich symbolism of the site and its two main monuments, Christianized them as the Templum Domini and Templum Solomonis, respectively. The Muslim and Christian traditions are based on the Jewish one, which sees the venerated rock as the center of the Holy of Holies of the Temple Foundation Stone (Even Ha’shtiyah), the stone from which the world was created and on which it stands—a central belief that gave birth to many religious traditions.475 The editors of the album meticulously highlighted and reaffirmed the Jewish tradition by means of the site that they reveal to the virtual visitor in the next photograph: the holiest of all, the Foundation Stone (fig. 41), which stood at the heart of the Temple, now beautifully enclosed and honored by the Muslim shrine. Indeed, the title of the photograph, “Moriah Stone,” clearly refers to Jewish tradition. Since ancient times, Jewish biblical tradition has associated Mount Moriah with Shalem/Jerusalem and the Temple Mount: “Then Solomon began to build the house of the Lord at Jerusalem in Mount Moriah, where the Lord appeared unto David his father, in the place that David had prepared in the threshingfloor of Ornan the Jebusite” (2 Chronicles 3:1). Biblical, talmudic, and

473 Ofer Livne-Kafri (“Jerusalem: The Navel of the Earth in Muslim Tradition,” Der Islam 84 [2008]: 66–67), remarking that this is not a descent of a heavenly Jerusalem to earth, but an ascension of the Kaaba and Jerusalem to heaven. As research has showed, the sacred axis in Abd AlMalik ibn Marwan’s plan of the temenos symbolically ties the Dome of the Rock with the Al-Aqsa Mosque and directs the believer toward the Kaaba in Mecca. 474 The Temple Mount is considered the second most sacred house of prayer after the Masjid alHaram in Mecca. Although the Qur’an does not mention Jerusalem by name, the “remotest sanctuary” has been placed in Jerusalem by Islamic religious authorities since the early Islamic period. Jerusalem is mentioned many times in the Hadith. Research on this topic is extensive. Two very different useful sources are: Livne-Kafri, “Jerusalem,” and Mustafa Abu Sway, “The Holy Land, Jerusalem and the Aqsa Mosque in the Islamic Sources,” in Where Heaven and Earth Meet: Jerusalem’s Sacred Esplanade, ed. Oleg Grabar and Benjamin Z. Kedar (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2009), 334–343, 338 on the Miraj. 475 Livne-Kafri, “Jerusalem,” e.g., 47–49, 53–57, 62–63; Abu Sway, “The Holy Land, Jerusalem and the Aqsa Mosque,” 335–343; see also Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, esp. chap. 2.

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midrashic writings connect the Temple with a rock that at some point was linked to the text in Isaiah 28:16: “Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation.” Jewish tradition adds that the rock, which became known as the Foundation Stone, was created in Zion, because “Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined” (Psalm 50:2).476 According to the rabbinic sages, a stone was set in the Holy of Holies from the times of the early prophets, before the Temple was even built, and it is from this stone that the world was founded (Mishnah, Yoma 5:2).477 As noted, one midrash elaborates upon God’s words as spoken by Ezekiel —“This is Jerusalem: I have set it in the midst of the nations and countries that are round about her” (5:5)—placing Jerusalem and the Foundation Stone in the center of the world, the navel of the earth (Tanhuma, Kedoshim 10). Consequently, it was only natural to develop a tradition whereby Adam was created from the dust of the place from which the sanctuary was to rise for the atonement of all human sin, so that sin should never be a permanent or inherent part of man’s nature. Jewish tradition further elaborated on that stone and saw in it the same place where Adam, Cain, and Abel, and later Noah and his sons, had placed their offerings, and upon which Abraham built the altar and bound Isaac upon it; later on, Jacob set his head on that stone to sleep; awakening from a dream, he realized that the Gate of Heaven was at this site and that he should set up a pillar there, on the place where God’s House would rise (Genesis 28:11–22); this is believed to be the very same foundation stone upon which the Ark of the Covenant would one day rest,478 the place upon which David and Solomon built the altar. Lastly, a source of water in a hollow part of the stone may have created yet another Jewish tradition, according to which the Temple rests upon the fissure above the great abyss, which is the source of the creative waters. All these traditions developed and reinforced the be-

476 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 5. 477 Pamela Berger, Crescent on the Temple, 14–17, 19, 25–26, and chap. 12; Mitchell Schwarzer, “The Architecture of Talmud,” Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 60/4 (2001), 476. See also Ecclesiastes Rabbah 1:1, and Mircea Eliade, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Company, 1987), 44–45. 478 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 11, 13; Tosefta, Yom Ha’kippurim 3:6; Yerushalmi, Yoma 5, 3, 27a; Bavli, Yoma 54b; Leviticus Rabbah 20:4; Song of Songs Rabbah 3:10; Vilnay (Legends of Jerusalem, 15–16) adds that, based on Psalm 125:1–2 (“They that trust in the Lord shall be as Mount Zion, which cannot be removed, but abideth for ever; as the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the Lord is round about his people from henceforth even for ever”), the Zohar, the main work by the kabbalists, tells us that groups of angels and cherubim hover above the Foundation Stone and sing that psalm at sunrise.

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Fig. 41: Moriah Stone.

Fig. 42: View of Umar’s Mosque (the Temple Mount).

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lief that the Temple sits upon the wellspring of the earth, the center and source of creation, and the destined site of the Throne of God at the End of Days,479 thereby confirming the Jewish identity of the Holy City. Ancient traditions from the Hebrew Bible were adopted and adapted by the writers of the New Testament; therefore, the deeply devout Karl would probably perceive these photographs as faithful images that perpetuate the truth of the New Testament and Christian traditions. As a firstborn son, Jesus was presented in the Temple (Luke 2:22–24), and when still a boy he taught the doctors there (Luke 2:41–52); toward the end of his earthly life, his moral values led him to cleanse the Temple from sinners (John 2:14; Matthew 21:12, Mark 11:15–19, Luke 19:45–48) and also predict its destruction (Matthew 24:2). Moreover, the fact that he referred to the Temple as “his Father’s house” (Luke 2:49; John 2:16, 14:2) and wept over the city (Luke 19:41) means that no Christian can forgo the inherent holiness of the place. A number of other highly significant events in the early history of the Christian Church also occurred in the Temple courts, as recorded in the Book of Acts and the apocryphal books. The photographs vividly evoked these events and added to the significance of this gift for the new emperor-king —importantly, without shaking the gift-givers’ basic belief in the city’s Jewish identity. The centrality of the Dome of the Rock/Templum Domini/Temple in the period under discussion is evidenced by a local story, recounted by the Israeli geographer Zeev Vilnay, that blends cultural colonialism, romanticism, and religious beliefs. The story tells that in 1911, during archaeological excavations in the City of David at the edge of Mount Moriah, “a rumor spread that the English archaeologists penetrated at night by hidden labyrinths to the sealed cave in the depth of the Foundation Stone and absconded with the Temple treasures. The rumor caused great excitement in Jerusalem for many days.”480 The last photograph of the monuments atop the Temple Mount, titled “General View of the Umar Mosque” (although showing the entire mount from the southwest) (fig. 42), might express the hope of the Old Yishuv members that Jerusalem and the Temple will be reconstructed in their lifetime. Periodicals and chronicles at the time inform us that on festive days, especially during the Three Pilgrimage Festivals, religious Jews climbed onto the roofs of synagogues and

479 See Frédéric Manns, Le symbole eau-esprit dans le judaïsme ancien, Analecta 19 (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1983), 285; idem, L’Évangile de Jean à la lumière du Judaïsme, Analecta, 33 (Jerusalem: Franciscan Printing Press, 1991), 135; Margaret Barker, The Gate of Heaven: The History and Symbolism of the Temple in Jerusalem (London: SPCK, 1991), 18; Livne-Kafri, “Jerusalem,” esp. 53–56, linking these traditions in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. 480 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 27.

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houses near the Temple Mount and the Mount of Olives to gain a better view of the site of the Temple—a symbolic way of fulfilling the biblical precept to ascend to the sacred mount and present offerings at the Temple on those festivals. It is also highlighted that Jews would go up to high places around the Temple Mount on the Ninth of Av, the day commemorating the destruction of the Temple, to look at the site and mourn the loss of the House of God. For all these reasons, Old Yishuv Jews sought to live near the Temple Mount so they would be able to look at it while praying, in anticipation of the imminent coming of the messiah,481 and the editors of the album found it appropriate to include various views of the venerated site. The editors then take the virtual visitor to a view of the Gate of Mercy, called in the album by its Christian name, “Golden Gate” (fig. 43). This double gated “Gate of Mercy” is the only one in the eastern wall of the Temple Mount—the wall that faces the Mount of Olives. The photograph was shot from the Kidron Valley, east of the Old City, and highlights the particular shape of the façade and the richly sculptured frieze that crowns the arched double-openings and runs around the building.482 More than just complementing the preceding photograph of the Temple Mount from the southwest, the inclusion of this view is justified by its beauty and underscores the gate’s religious and political importance, which turned it into a tourist attraction and pilgrimage site. This gate, which has been closed for hundreds of years, has acquired a profound messianic significance for Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Jews explain its closure in various ways. One evokes the gate of a New Jerusalem, based on Ezekiel’s vision after the destruction of the city and the Babylonian exile. The prophet saw a New Jerusalem centered in the rebuilt Temple and the glory of God returning to his House: “Afterward he brought me to the gate, even the gate that looketh toward the east. And, behold, the glory of the God of Israel came from the way of the east: and his voice was like a noise of many waters: and the earth shined with his glory” (43:1–2). After seeing the vision of the most holy Temple on the top of the mountain, Ezekiel says he was led to the outer gate of the sanctuary that faced east, and it was shut: “Then said the Lord unto me: This gate shall be shut, it shall not be opened, and no man shall enter in by it; because the Lord, the God of Israel, hath entered in by it, therefore it shall be shut. It is for the prince; the prince, he shall sit in it to eat bread before the Lord; he shall enter by the way of the porch of that gate, and shall go out by the way of the same” (Ezekiel 44:1–3). Consequently, the gate must remain closed until the coming of the messiah and the restoration of the Land of Israel at the End of

481 Dotan Goren, “‘Longing for the Temple Mount’,” 47. 482 For a detailed nineteenth-century description, see Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored, chap. 3.

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Fig. 43: Golden Gate.

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Times. Therefore, as with Jewish tradition, prayers at the Gate of Mercy have a special value as they are believed to usher in the coming of the messiah in an era of freedom and peace. Jews, Christians, and Muslims await the coming of the messiah through this gate. Christians further affirm this eschatological belief by referring to the tradition that it was through this gate that Jesus entered Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, followed by his apostles and the people of Jerusalem who welcomed him as king and messiah.483 Iris Shagrir notes that, in the specific blending of the Palm Sunday ritual and the ceremonious entry and reception of a Christian king or other high authority into the city, the participants experienced the ritual space both as a religious and a political space, in the spirit of the biblical verse “Behold, thy King cometh unto thee” (Matthew 21:5, drawing authority from Zechariah 9:9). Obviously, the title of the photograph in the album and the Christian name of the gate, which brings with it the corresponding religious and royal connotations, would add to the emotional response of the Austro-Hungarian emperor-king. Karl, like Franz Joseph, may have also been aware of additional religio-political narratives. A popular Jewish tradition in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries tells us that the Muslims blocked the Gate of Mercy because of Zechariah’s prophecy that the messiah, preceded by Elijah, would come by this gate (Zechariah 9:9). Moreover, it says, Muslims created a graveyard in front of the gate “[because they] believe that Elijah is a Cohen, a priestly family and, as such, he is forbidden to walk into a graveyard lest he become impure [and will not be able] to enter through the Gate of Mercy and bring to his people Israel salvation and redemption.”484 Another local tradition, based on an ancient Arab prophecy, asserts that the Golden Gate has long been sealed because a prophet from the West might enter through this gate and make himself master of the city, ending Turkish rule when Nile water was brought into Palestine.485 Consequently, many Muslims still go to the gate every Friday to offer their midday prayers, entreating Allah to deliver them from foreign invasion. The tradition of a triumphant Christian emperor entering the city through this gate was widely known among Christians and Muslims. A most influential story is the tradition regarding the Byzantine emperor Heraclius’s restitution of the relic of the True Cross, which was

483 The Palm Sunday procession, since the time of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem, at the latest, entered the city by the Golden Gate; see Nurith Kenaan-Kedar, “Symbolic Meaning in Crusader Architecture: The Twelfth-Century Dome of the Holy Sepulcher Church in Jerusalem,” Cahiers archéologiques 34 (1986), 114. 484 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 54–57, note 49. 485 Bar-Yosef, “The Last Crusade?” 98–99, who notes that Nile water was carried to Palestine via the British-built pipeline. See also Dudík, Kaiser-Reise, 213, quoted above, pp. 87–88.

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taken by the Persians when they conquered Jerusalem in 614. This emperor brought the relic back to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in 629, entering the city through the Golden Gate, not in full regalia as he at first attempted but, following the instruction of the angel of God, in great humility as Jesus did.486 Significantly, the event would have taken place only a few years prior to the Muslim conquest of Jerusalem in 637/638 CE—the beginning of a long period as a Muslim city.487 The Heraclius tradition may have been in Beda Dudík’s thoughts when looking at the Golden Gate during Franz Joseph’s visit to the venerated site, when a crowned Christian emperor and king was standing in front of it. His thoughts certainly referred to narratives prophesying that a victorious Christian monarch would finally enter Jerusalem through the Golden Gate and return the city to Christianity. Karl, who certainly wished to strengthen Christianity and Austrian influence in the Holy Land, may have been aware of this tradition and Dudík’s moving daydream. As in the time of Franz Joseph, now, too, the idea of the Peaceful Crusades and a Christian Jerusalem was a topos not only in secret political plans, but also as romanticized in the arts, literature, and music. Could the many Jewish traditions that stand behind the Christian and Muslim religio-political constructions balance extraneous connotations of how the photograph was labeled? The following three photographs further document the core of the Old Yishuv’s identity: they are dedicated to Orthodox Jews praying at the Western Wall of the Temple precinct, and explicitly convey their deep religiosity and belief that hearfelt prayers at the site would open the Gate of Heaven. The first shows men and women of various communities praying at the venerated wall (fig. 44, top). The other two, which I identify as the work of Yaacov Ben-Dov, are most interesting. One, titled “the Wailing Wall” (fig. 44, bottom), is a typical scene of the Sukkot festival, one of the Three Pilgrimage Festivals of the liturgical year. In the photograph, a stereotypical Ashkenazi Jew faces the viewer (and not the Western

486 Jan Willem Drijvers, “Heraclius and the Restitutio Crucis: Notes on Symbolism and Ideology,” in The Reign of Heraclius (610–641): Crisis and Confrontation, ed. Gerrit J. Reinink, Bernard H. Stolte (Leuven: Peeters, 2002), 175–190, esp. 175–186. The legend became known between the late seventh and mid-eighth centuries, and became widespread when the Crusaders decided to make it part of their history by opening the gate twice a year, on Palm Sunday and on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Cross’ see Stephan Borgehammar, “Heraclius Learns Humility: Two Early Latin Accounts. Composed for the Celebration of Exaltatio Crucis,” Millennium 6 (2009), 159. 487 Shagrir (“Adventus in Jerusalem,” 7–8, 12–15), notes also the legend of Charlemagne’s pilgrimage and his entrance into Jerusalem.

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Fig. 44: Yaacov Ben-Dov, Wailing Wall (worshipers on top and bottom, the latter at the Sukkot Festival), c. 1910.

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Wall), holding the Four Species that he will wave at the ceremonies according to the ritual specified in Leviticus 23:40.488 Behind him, a boy holds a prayerbook and a small bundle, and a woman covers herself with a large mantle while both look at the photographer, thereby creating direct visual and emotional contact with the beholder as well, who would perceive himself as standing by the photographer and witnessing the event. The pose, young age, and shy expression of the boy facing the viewer create a feeling of spontaneity, authenticity, and veracity that are effective in involving the viewer in the scene and touching his heart. Other typical figures wearing Sephardi or Ashkenazi garments pray facing the Wall, including an old Ashkenazi Jew who piously leans his head and hand against the wall, intent in his thoughts and prayers. The presence of worshippers spanning a wide range of ages can be interpreted as a statement of the ongoing observance of the biblical precepts and traditions that was so important to the Old Yishuv; the numerous inscriptions covering the ancient stones of the wall in the three photographs further attest to the devoutness of generations of believers. Images of people of various ethnicities in typical garb, as well as those depicting local customs, added greatly to the attraction to a variety of objects. The figures in this photograph, typical of different Jewish communities, and the figure holding the Four Species, would be perceived by Jews as their own, again from the perspective of their proud Otherness, whereas non-Jewish viewers might see in them another particularity of both the holy and exotic city. The lower part of the Ben-Dov original was trimmed at the bottom, leaving only the upper part of the figures, perhaps to adapt it to the album’s format.489 It is not only religious longings, but also national yearnings—certainly of the Bezalel artists involved—that are suggested in a novel manner, as in the photograph of Jewish women praying at the Western Wall (fig. 45), shown next. Created by Ben-Dov, it was cropped on its left probably for the same reason—to adapt it to

488 Observance of Sukkot is commanded by God in Leviticus 23:34–44, detailed in the Book of Nehemiah 8:14–16, which notes that the Four Species are to be used as materials for building a sukkah. In the Temple, the waving ceremony was performed on all seven days of Sukkot, and elsewhere only on the first day. Following the destruction of the Temple, Rabbi Yohanan ben Zakkai ordered that the Four Species be waved everywhere on every day of Sukkot (except on Shabbat), in memory of the Temple; see Dov Linzer, “Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai and Zekher le-Mikdash,” Milin Havivin 2 (2006), 1–14 . 489 A copy of the Ben-Dov photograph, which shows the figures in full length, is kept in the Central Zionist Archives, Jerusalem (PHG\1017426, original no. 15069). The Jerusalem City Archive holds a copy of the abridged version (no. 21148, dated c. 1910). I am most grateful to Lavi Shay for his generous help in searching for the sources of the album’s photographs.

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Fig. 45: Yaacov Ben-Dov, untitled (women praying at the Western Wall).

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the page. Some of the women sit on the ground in the Sephardi custom and others stand as in the Ashkenazi tradition. The original, or a copy of the original signed by the author, was set on thick textured paper, on which Ben-Dov signed once more and added in Hebrew: “Women mourning on the Ninth of Av at the Western Wall, 1915,” and below the title: “Mine eye, mine eye runneth down with tears”—a transformation of Lamentations 1:16, the book traditionally read on the day commemorating the destruction of the Temple.490 The inclusion of the title and biblically inspired verse added by Ben-Dov would have had on Jewish beholders an effect similar to that evoked by the figure holding the Four Species, since the Book of Lamentations not only mourns God’s desertion of the city and the destruction of the Temple, but also enjoins the hope of redemption, which the Bezalel members were working to promote according to their own ideology. No doubt, the title and verse added by Ben-Dov would have been meaningful to viewers acquainted with the Hebrew Bible and history of Jerusalem, each from his own viewpoint. The Ben-Dov scenes of believers praying at the Western Wall were probably staged. They focus on ethnic and religious types in typical garb and striking poses that were in much demand. In addition to the depiction of stereotypical figures, photographers showed local Jewish customs (such as writing their names on the stones of the Wall and their pleas on small pieces of paper that were placed in its crevices, or the belief of the greater effectiveness of praying near specific stones) that drew the attention of customers. Photographs of the Western Wall and their titles may also point to ancient as well as contemporary traditions regarding the Divine Presence of God keeping vigil over His people at the Western Wall or behind it, His pledge never to destroy the Wall, or righteous believers who experienced the Divine Presence while praying there.491 Unlike the works of many Christian painters and writers at the time, who focused on the desolation of the land and the misery of the Jews in order to convey the message that the Jews were paying the price of sinfully refusing to see Christianity as the only true faith,492 Ben-Dov shows Jewish men and women praying quietly, with none of the above-mentioned pathetic elements; his images convey faith, perseverance, and hope. Moreover, in his choice of subjects and visual

490 Jerusalem, Central Zionist Archives PHG\1017425 (original no. 15068), dated c. 1910. Also https://www.kedem-auctions.com/he/node/20638, dated 1915. 491 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 163–178. 492 Vivienne Silver-Brody, “Selected Sectarian Postcards, Texts, and Snapshots of Jerusalem: Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries,” in Jerusalem in the Mind of the Western World 1800–1948, ed. Yehoshua Ben-Arieh and Moshe Davis, With Eyes toward Zion, 5 (Westport CT: Praeger, 1997), 207.

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schemes, Ben-Dov, like other artists, seems to have been influenced by demands of the market for souvenirs, an attitude that attests to a notable change in the iconography of holy places as sites attractive not only to religious believers, but to tourists and secular customers as well. This marketing strategy is evident in most of the photographs in this album.

A Tour of Picturesque Sacred and Secular Sites around the City Considering the progressive ideologies of open-minded circles in the Old Yishuv and among the Zionist artists and editors, how do these photographs promote the city as a tourist attraction while emphasizing its Jewish identity? With that purpose in mind, the editors of the album took the royal visitor, as it were, around the city walls, from Herod’s fortress to the Kidron Valley, stopping by picturesque sites traditionally associated with the Jewish Scriptures and history. Some of these sites are also the backdrop of curious local customs, might raise romantic feelings, or were frequented by scholars, writers, tourists, and other travelers. Moreover, the last five photographs deviate from the tourist’s path to introduce him to five institutions of the gift-givers’ kolel. The first three photographs of the tourist venue exhibit architectural views of the ancient citadel of Jerusalem that may represent three variations of images intended to meet the needs and wants of pilgrims and tourists. The first photograph is dedicated to the imposing tower commonly known as David’s Tower (fig. 46); the second, to a view of the citadel’s courtyard from the northwestern tower (fig. 47, on top); and the third—to the main entrance to the citadel (fig. 47, on bottom), which is necessarily located on its eastern wall, i.e., from inside the Old City. As noted, the citadel was built by Herod the Great between 37 and 34 BC at a strategically vulnerable spot where the southwestern and northwestern hills meet, and where strong defenses were indispensable, just south of Jaffa Gate. At this site, around 150 BC, the Hasmonean kings had built a series of ancient fortifications—a four-meter-thick wall with two mighty towers of earlier defenses. Herod reinforced the Hasmonean wall and developed a powerful fortress with three massive towers that rose high over the city to protect its main entrance as well as his palace, and control the whole area.493 By showing details such as differences in the masonry and in the method of

493 All three towers built by Herod have vanished, except for the base of the large tower upon which the one that we see today was built and rebuilt. Herod named one of them Phasael in memory of his brother, another after his friend and general, Hippicus, and the third after Mariamne, his Hasmonean wife. All through the nineteenth century and until the early 1980s, the preserved tower was identified by most writers as that of Phasael. Since then, however, an examination of the literary sources and accumulated archaeological data has led many, if not most, archaeologists, to

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laying the stones, the photographs reveal several construction phases belonging to different periods. The outline of the citadel, as it appeared at the time the photograph was taken, dates from the mid-sixteenth-century Ottoman construction of the city walls. The fortress has been commonly known as King David’s Citadel since the Byzantine period, probably because the Byzantines identified the western hill of Jerusalem as Mount Zion and the fortress as David’s palace, mentioned in 2 Samuel 5:9–11. Flavius Josephus (fl. first century AD) had already referred to the southwestern hill of Jerusalem as King David’s citadel.494 Based on historical and archaeological evidence, it seems that throughout the Byzantine period a Christian shrine revering King David existed at this site, which was a popular destination for local believers and pilgrims.495 Jews maintained the tradition of David’s palace at the site, which was reinforced by its appropriation by the Crusaders, who also adopted the tower as an iconic symbol of the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. One visual example of this appropriation is a royal seal of the Crusader kings bearing the symbols of their kingdom: the Templum Domini—the Dome of the Rock with a cross on top, the Tower of David, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.496 These monuments symbolized the victory of Christianity over Islam, the royal seat, and the embodiment of Christianity. The identification of the fortifications as David’s citadel was maintained in the nineteenth century by pilgrims, travelers, scholars, and locals set out to locate the site of biblical narratives; they called the massive tower and slender minaret, added by Muhammad Pasha c. 1650, the Tower of David, a name that until today can refer to either the tower or the whole citadel.

identify it with the Hippicus Tower. Hezekiah King of Judah built a wide wall in this area at the end of the eighth century BC. A detailed description of its construction on the eve of the Assyrian invasion of Judah appears in the Bible: “He [Hezekiah] strengthened himself, and built up all the wall that was broken, and raised it up to the towers, and another wall without” (2 Chronicles 32:5). Its remains were excavated deep in the bedrock of the hill. This mighty fortification protected a new residential quarter built on the southwestern hill of Jerusalem, which until that time comprised only the City of David and the Temple on Mount Moriah. The wall was damaged in 587/86 BC, when Jerusalem was conquered by the Babylonians; see Dan Bahat, “Jerusalem between the Hasmoneans and Herod the Great,” in Cities through the Looking Glass: Essays on the History and Archaeology of Biblical Urbanism, ed. Rami Arav (Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 2008), 117–128. 494 Flavius Josephus, The Jewish War 5.4.1.137, transl. William Whiston, The Works of Josephus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1987), 703. 495 The Pilgrim of Piacenza, misnomered Antoninus, visited the Holy Land around the year 570. In Jerusalem, he visited David’s Tower (Antoninus’ Travels, 21), where he prayed and recited psalms. According to Ora Limor (Holy Land Travels: Christian Pilgrims in Late Antiquity [Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 1998], 212, 214, 231–232 [Hebrew]), this is the earliest mention of a Christian shrine at the site. 496 Museum of the History of Jerusalem, Tower of David, Jerusalem—copy of the original kept in the National Library of France, Paris.

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Fig. 46: David’s Tower.

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Fig. 47: Herod’s Fortress (courtyard) (top); Gateway to Herod’s Fortress (bottom).

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The impressive structure became a well-known landmark in the topography of Jerusalem and one of the main iconic symbols of the city in Jewish art: it appears in cultic and everyday objects, souvenirs, and also on the gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl by their Old Yishuv subjects, where it is identified as Zion City of David, David’s Tower, or left untitled. It also became a major tourist attraction, and, accordingly, the photograph was staged in a highly picturesque part of the fortress (fig. 46): the high and strong walls rising from the slanted rampart and crowned with battlements, a large tower with machicolations, and the Ottoman minaret towering the walls and piercing the sky. Following one of the most popular iconographic schemes of the site, the view in Karl’s album is enlivened by local figures— a man riding a camel engaged in conversation with the figures standing before him, and women typically sitting on the ground by the rampart. Camel riders, sometimes in caravans, rode daily along this part of the city wall on their way to or from Hebron and often stopped there. The camel rider and the other locals create the Oriental atmosphere of relaxation and pleasure in exotic lands. This image attracted Westerners and corresponded to what the post-colonial perspective explains as the Western observer’s perception of the Other as inferior,497 by assigning him different features, attributes, and practices, whether real or imagined. From an art-historical point of view, the carefully staged pose of the figures in this and other photographs had become so common, that it earmarked the development of an Orientalist iconographic tradition dictated by the travel industry. The iconization of attractive sites in photography is similar in character and aims to the creation of schemes of holy places that would be easily recognized by religious customers. We have already noted this practice in the photographs of Jewish men and women praying in front of the Western Wall and in Karl’s book, where they appear in stereotypical poses and in garments of Jews of various ethnic origins or identified with circles related to different religious communities or yeshivot. The second photograph of David’s Citadel shows the interior courtyard (fig. 47, top). Several construction phases belonging to different periods can be observed: on the left, well-dressed large Herodian stones, that weigh over a ton each, are distinguished by their chiseled edges and flat central boss; carefully laid without gaps between them, they are impressive remains of the ancient fortress. The upper courses were built later with much smaller stones. The mid-seventeenth-century Ottoman minaret, also on the left side but in the background, is the tower attributed to King David that appears in the previous photograph. Two figures break the desolation that pervades the ruined site—a local young man to

497 See Said, Orientalism, esp. 13, 15–16, 18–20, 202–203.

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the left and a Westerner to the right; perhaps in an Orientalist attitude, the figures stand apart from each other and there is no eye contact between them. The third photograph displays the monumental gateway to the citadel (fig. 47, bottom). The barbican is reached by a flight of stairs on the northern side or a ramp from the south. The gatehouse is entered through a high pointed archway that frames a lower one on the interior of the thick wall, and is flanked by several niches with similar pointed arches. Strong buttresses on both sides of the gatehouse that rise up to its second floor add to the width of the first and create an impression of added height for the entire structure; this is further enhanced by the merlons topped with decorative pinnacles on the façade’s battlement. A bridge above the moat connects the gatehouse with the inner gate tower, which served as a second line of defense. An elaborate Ottoman Arabic inscription above the portal of the gatehouse refers to the restoration of the citadel by Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent in 938 AH (1531/1532 CE), who may have also built this barbican. A Turkish soldier standing guard in front of the gateway, and a woman wrapped in a dark mantle walking on the street, add to the allure of this Jerusalemite sight. The juxtaposition of locals and Western visitors was common, and the different look, pose, and garments would point to their very different origins, cultures, and social status. From a colonialist point of view, these features would have been perceived by Westerners as documentation of their superiority over the inferior Other. Nevertheless, the editors of the album might have contrasted European visitors with locals intentionally, in order to highlight cultural differences as attractive elements of the real city (contra the colonialist perspective)—in opposition to the mythical city—that was developing at the time. These images, catering to tourists, would still confront the far away “observer” with a constructed positive cultural interaction, while referring to sites related to the history of the Jewish city. Taking a virtual walk along the northern wall of the Old City, the visitor reaches Zedekiah’s Cave, as labeled in the album, and the nearby Damascus Gate. Zedekiah’s Cave is a rock-hewn cavern used by past builders of Jerusalem as a quarry.498 Based on various biblical narratives, Jerusalemites told that in 586 BC, when fleeing Nebuchadnezzar’s troops, Zedekiah, the last king of Judah before

498 Its entrance, between the Damascus Gate and Herod’s Gate, is at the base of the bedrock, which served as the foundation for the Old City walls from the Ottoman period and it extends across an area of c. 9000 sq. meters, beneath most of the Muslim quarter. It was used as a quarry for more than 2000 years, certainly in the Second Temple period and probably also at the time of the First; see Yehiel Zelinger, “Jerusalem, Zedekiah’s Cave,” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 119 (2007) ; idem, “Jerusalem, Zedekiah’s Cave – Final Report,” Excavations and Surveys in Israel 125 (2013) .

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Fig. 48: Damascus Gate.

the destruction of the First Temple and the exile to Babylon, hid there and tried to escape the enemy through this cave, but was discovered on the other side, when coming out of it in Jericho. At the very same time that Zedekiah pursued his path in fear, and almost reached the plains of Jericho, Nebuchadnezzar’s soldiers went hunting and heard footsteps; thinking that some fine game was approaching, they held themselves in readiness and, to their astonishment, it was Zedekiah who stood before them! They seized him immediately and took him to the king of Babylon. The Bible tells us that Nebuchadnezzar’s soldiers slew Zedekiah’s sons in his presence and then plucked his eyes out, bound him with fetters of brass, and carried him off to Babylon, where he remained a prisoner until he died.499 Versions of this story, and frightening narratives about adventurers who dared to explore the cave, were rampant at the time.

499 2 Kings 25:1–7; 2 Chronicles 36:12; Jeremiah 32:4–5; 34:2–3; 39:1–7; 52:4–11; Ezekiel 12:13. Less common is the identification of the king as Hezekiah King of Judah, c. 715–686 BC. See also Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 238–240, referring to Jeremiah 39:4–5 and Rashi’s commentary to 2 Kings 25:4. No less interesting and attractive to travelers was the cave’s identification as King Solomon’s quarries, proposed by Charles Warren, who arrived in Jerusalem to head the Palestine Exploration Fund expedition in 1867. See his Underground Jerusalem: An Account of Some of the Principal Difficulties Encountered in Its Exploration and the Results Obtained (London: R. Bentley, 1876), 54–55, 60, 65.

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A viewer unacquainted with the mytho-historical stories and contemporary narratives about the cave would probably take no interest in the unimpressive look of its entrance. In contrast, the photograph below it, showing the Damascus Gate (fig. 48), would certainly draw his attention: it is the largest and most imposing of the city’s gates, crowded with both locals and tourists. The name of the gate derives from its location, the starting point for pilgrims and travelers en route to or from Damascus by way of Nablus.500 The gate—flanked by two towers, each equipped with machicolations and crenellated with delicate stepped merlons, and a turret looming over the pointed archway—may have been designed by Sinan, Suleiman’s court architect, c. 1536.501 In the mid-nineteenth century, the area was cleaned and the remains of an ancient Roman triumphal arch, probably built by Hadrian (r. 117–138), were exposed; the remains of the victory column base can still be seen in front of the gate.502 For Jews and Christians, the archaeological finds call to mind the tragic fate of the great city, which became Aelia Capitolina while Judaea became Syria-Palaestina—a collective memory that added to the historical interest and romantic appeal of the beautiful gate. In the album’s photograph, peddlers and a cart pulled by a donkey add to the Oriental ambience of this vivid landmark in the city.

Honor to His Predecessors and to Biblical Personages The virtual royal visitor is then led to another popular landmark, the so-called Tomb of the Kings, north of the Damascus Gate (fig. 49). This is one of the most carefully planned and decorated rock-cut tombs of the Late Second Temple period; in addition, the large courtyard that leads to the tomb, roughly 27 meters long from north to south and 25 meters wide from west to east, was also cut from rock at the time. The photograph focuses on the monumental façade, whose architectural design is typical of that period’s funerary monuments in its original combination of diverse Classical architectural orders and local styles. It is noteworthy that there

500 Nablus is the important biblical city of Shechem, hence the gate’s name in Hebrew, Sha‘ar Shechem (Nablus Gate). Its Arabic name, Bab el-Amud (Gate of the Column), is most common and has been in use since the tenth century, at the latest. It preserves the memory of the tall Roman column that stood inside the gate and can be seen on the map on the mid-sixth-century mosaic floor in the Church of St. George in Madaba. As a Roman victory column, it may have been crowned with a statue of Emperor Hadrian. See . 501 Ibid. The course of the northern wall known to us today was first delineated in the Roman period, when Aelia Capitolina was constructed on the ruins of Jerusalem. 502 Ibid. The triumphal gate was integrated in the city walls built at the end of the third or early fourth century.

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Fig. 49: Tombs of the Kings.

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are no two identical façades. The grandeur of the site led to the mistaken belief that these tombs had once been the burial place of the kings of Judah, but although already in the 1860s the tombs were identified with Queen Helena of Adiabene,503 the attractiveness of a name referring to the biblical kings may have prompted the local population, including the editors of the book presented to Karl, to keep the traditional name. The photograph attests to the ruined state of the ancient tomb, but in the romantic spirit that reigned at the time, the erosion not only erased but also invited the creation of new layers of meaning. The figure of a local young man pensively looking at the remains further enhances the melancholic atmosphere. The image of Jerusalem is further imbued with a romantic hue in a photograph of a narrow-arched street, typical of the Old City (fig. 50). It figures on the same page with a photograph of the ancient historical landscape of Jerusalem: to the left is a view of the southern slopes of Mount Moriah, where a few remains of the City of David, early Jerusalem, are visible, and to the right—the slopes of the Mount of Olives, opposite the City of David, that house the Arab village of Siloam (Shiloah in Hebrew, Silwan in Arabic). Between these two Judaean hills lies the Kidron Valley, named after the stream that once flowed through it to the Dead Sea. More fertile than the hills surrounding Jerusalem, tradition identifies the valley as the king’s garden described in the Bible (2 Kings 25:4; Jeremiah 52:7; Nehemiah 3:15), which is said to be the source of inspiration for verses in Ecclesiastes: “I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruit” (2:5) and the Song of Songs, both traditionally attributed to King Solomon.504 In the area of the Ophel, between the City of David and the Temple, Solomon built his royal palace. Another local tradition related to King Solomon, dating from the 1860s and based on 1 Kings 3:1, identifies one of the tombs in the village of Siloam as the funerary temple built by the king for his Egyptian wife,505

503 Ruth Jacoby, “The Decoration and Plan of Queen Helena’s Tomb in Jerusalem,” in: The Real and Ideal Jerusalem in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic Art: Studies in Honor of Bezalel Narkiss on the Occasion of his Seventieth Birthday, ed. Bianca Kühnel (Jerusalem: Center for Jewish Art, Hebrew University, 1998), 460–462; Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored, chap. 7. For local legends, A. M. Spoer, “Jewish Folklore from Palestine,” Folklore 42/1 (1931), 76. 504 Relevant to the meaning of the photograph at the time it was taken, nineteenth-century excavations around the Temple Mount and in the adjacent village of Siloam exposed, among other important parts of a water system, walls and a road thought to have served pilgrims on their way to the Temple, dating back to the Second Temple period; see Ronny Reich, Eli Shukron and Omri Lernau, “Recent Discoveries in the City of David, Jerusalem,” Israel Exploration Journal 57/2 (2007), 153–169; George Wesley Buchanan, “The Area of the Temple at Zion,” The Expository Times 116/6 (2005), 181–189, esp. 182–183, 185–186. 505 Gabriel Barkay, “Who Was Buried in the Tomb of Pharaoh’s Daughter?,” Biblical Archaeology Review 39/1 (2013), 41–49.

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Fig. 50: Street in the Old City.

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which further emphasizes the Jewish identity of the site since biblical times. These traditions were very important since, besides the biblical associations to King Solomon, religious Christians like Karl would probably see this wadi as the site of the Pool of Siloam, where Jesus miraculously healed a blind man (John 9:1–11), and the Gihon spring as the Virgin’s Fountain, according to a local Christian tradition. The editors did not forgo the three most visited rock-cut tombs in the Kidron Valley, on the slope of the Mount of Olives—Absalom’s Tomb, the Tomb of Bnei Hezir, here titled in German “Lepers’ House,” and Zechariah’s Tomb, dated between the second century BC and the first century AD. As noted, the German title “Lepers’ House” corresponds to the common local Hebrew name Beth Ha’hofshit (House of the Free) in the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, which according to an ancient local tradition was the site where King Azariah (2 Kings 15:1–5) or King Uziah (2 Chronicles 26:19–21) retired after being smitten with leprosy. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, poverty-stricken lepers often lived in caves outside the city walls, many of which were located in ancient tombs. This custom may explain the strength of the attribution of the ancient tomb to the biblical king. The photographs of the Kidron Valley address various questions regarding the growing perception of Jerusalem as a concrete physical place, and not as an idealized, imagined, city, and regarding the construction of multiple socio-cultural and political identities by its Habsburg Jewish dwellers. In the gifts presented to Franz Joseph by the two Habsburg kolelim, the Kidron Valley tombs appear in iconic schemes disconnected from the real space. In contrast, in Karl’s album they are photographed in the real landscape—an arid area that did not change much from that seen by pilgrims and travelers years earlier.506 We cannot but recall Franz Joseph’s experience at this site, which reflects the attitude of believers to venerated sites in the Holy Land over time: in a letter to Elisabeth, written soon after his arrival in Jerusalem, he told her that “it struck us all how everything, especially the Mount of Olives and the Jehoshaphat Valley, seemed to be just like one they imagined from one’s childhood stories and Bible lessons.”507 Yet, the photographs of the monuments show the passage of time, raising some collective memories, blurring and erasing others, and inviting new layers of meaning through one’s interaction with the space—the worn-out rocks and stones, the exotic design, and the intellectual and emotional experiences of the beholder upon seeing them.

506 Limor, “Placing an Idea,” 280. 507 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, 111–112.

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The editors of Karl’s book took care to choose two photographs that include a meaningful figure—an Austrian army officer who stands at the foot of Absalom’s Tomb (fig. 51) and the same, or perhaps another officer, who stands at the foot of the Tomb of Bnei Hezir (fig. 52).508 In both photographs, the officer stands in the leisurely pose of a traveler who has reached his challenging destination, leaning slightly on his staff and looking up pensively at the monuments. The rocky hill, the angle of the photographs di sotto in sù, and the considerable height of the monuments highlight the prowess of the officer, although in the case of Absalom’s Tomb the height could not be wholly appreciated, owing to the quantity of small stones that had raised the general level of the ground and were cleared away not often enough, due to neglect, a lack of interest, or the labor that would be involved.509 The façade of the Tomb of Bnei Hezir is lower, but is cut higher on the rock; therefore the contrast between the human figure and the monument is similar. As a result of the setting, the Austrian officer could be perceived as a representative of Austrian strength and presence in the Holy City—a narrative that would certainly have a positive meaning in the eyes of Karl’s court and the privileged subjects who would see the gift. Unlike private pilgrims and tourists, who would purchase photographs of themselves in Jerusalem as a souvenir, army officers as well as diplomats, archaeologists, and scholars might be considered representatives of the monarchy, and therefore impressive photographs at important sites would be a source of pride and would perpetuate a national achievement. In Karl’s court, which soon after the emperor-king’s accession to the throne promoted a secret plan to strengthen Austria’s presence and influence in Jerusalem as the protector of Catholic interests in the Holy Land, these photographs of an Austrian officer would have had a special political meaning. As for the religious meaning of the Kidron Valley tombs, the barrenness of the site, the bleak and lifeless space, and the many narratives that the visitor would hear about the monuments and their mytho-historical dwellers gave birth to various eschatological beliefs in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, first and foremost the already-noted tradition about the resurrection of the dead and God’s judgment.510

508 I am grateful to Peter Steiner, researcher and curator at the Museum of Military History in Vienna, for identifying these figures. On Austro-Hungarian uniforms in WWI, 1916, see . 509 This is also true for the third Kidron Valley monument depicted in the album, the so-called Tomb of Zechariah. 510 See Limor (“Placing an Idea,” 288–290), quoting pilgrims of all three faiths; Bavli, Ketubot 111 a–b; and later exegetical commentaries: Midrash Pesiqta Rabbati 31:5 and Ma‘asei Daniel, in Midreshe Ge’ulah, ed. Yehuda Even Shmuel (Jerusalem and Tel Aviv: Mossad Bialik, 1954), 225 (Hebrew).

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Fig. 51: Absalom’s Monument.

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Fig. 52: Leper’s House (Bnei Hezir’s Tomb).

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In Karl’s album, Absalom’s Tomb appears first (fig. 51), probably because the editors foresaw that it would be the first to be seen in the royal virtual tour. As the socalled Tomb of the Kings, already examined, and other rock-hewn Second Temple tombs, this early first-century CE monument typically incorporates an eclectic mixture of elements from various cultures—Hellenistic, ancient Egyptian, and Nabatean. The architectural design and technology would have certainly added to the attraction of the site. Absalom’s tomb stands on a square base; its lower part is carved into the bedrock and houses the dead, and the upper part, built from ashlar stones, is the commemorative component called a nefesh (soul), a typical feature of these tombs. The lower part conforms with the Hellenistic scheme that characterizes the other tombs as well—a pair of half-columns flanked in the corners of the façade by quarter-columns adjacent to pillars (distylos in antis). The plain columns, crowned by capitals in the local style reminiscent of the Ionic order, support a Doric entablature and, above it, an Egyptian concave frieze. The upper part, the nefesh, consists of a square base, a round drum, and a structure recalling a tholos, a familiar feature in contemporary Nabatean funerary temples, crowned by a lotus flower that was already broken when the photograph was taken. At that time, around six meters of the twenty-meter-high monument were covered with dirt and stones. The stones in front of the tomb accumulated owing to the ancient local custom of parents to throw stones at the monument in the presence of their children, in order to remind them of the punishment that awaits those who disobey them. The photograph of Absalom’s Tomb is followed by that of the Tomb of Bnei Hezir/Beth Ha’hofshit (fig. 52), a Hasmonean monument dating to the late second or early first century BC, the oldest of the Kidron Valley tombs. Contrary to the two other tombs, it is completely carved into the rock and keeps with the Hellenistic scheme in the Doric order.511 The columns support an architrave, on which the inscription in ancient Hebrew letters discovered in 1865 lists priests of the Hezir family as those who are buried in it;512 the long list reveals that the tomb was used for generations. A frieze in the same architectural style and a cornice complete its Classical façade. Unlike the Tomb of Bnei Hezir, yet similar to Absalom’s Tomb, the Tomb of Zechariah (fig. 53), dating to the first century BC, exhibits a mixture of architectural styles and elements typical of this area. The monument is a monolith hewn out of the rock; its columns are crowned by capitals in a local version of the Ionic or511 Hachlili, Jewish Funerary Customs, 30. The nefesh (soul), a typical component of these Second Temple tombs, is lost. There is no agreement among archaeologists regarding its design. 512 “This is the grave and the nefesh of Eliezer Hania Yoazar Yehuda Shimon Yochanan Bnei [sons of] Yosef Ben [son of] Oved Yosef and Elazar Bnei [sons of] Hania, priests of the Hezir family.”

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Fig. 53: Zechariah’s Tomb.

der; a Doric architrave and a concave Egyptian frieze complete each face, and a pyramid—the nefesh—rises above. Whereas the façade is finely worked, the other sides of the tomb are rather crude.513 Two photographs were taken of this tomb, both of which are arranged on the same page and focus on the façade of the monument: the one on top was shot from a diagonal perspective while standing by the nearby Tomb of Bnei Hezir, whereas the one on the bottom was taken from the front. The latter, if not both of them, are probably the work of the Jewish photographer Yaacov Ben-Dov, whom I identify based on a copy at the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem.514 In the bottom photograph, taken from the front, ruined Jewish gravestones may be seen strewn over the foreground. Of all the tombs in the Kidron Valley, Ermete Pierotti wrote: “The Jews… hold the place [the Tomb of Zachariah] in great veneration and pay very highly to be interred after death anywhere near it; which

513 Its four sides are decorated with a pseudo-distylos in antis, with short flutes carved in the upper part of the plain column’s shafts. See Moshe Fischer and Oren Tal, “Architectural Decoration in Ancient Israel in Hellenistic Times: Some Aspects of Hellenization,” Zeitschrift des Deutschen Palästina-Vereins 119/1 (2003), 21–22. 514 Two very similar photographs are kept in the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem, one dated c. 1916, by an unidentified author (PHG\1016322; earlier signature 13588), and the other, in the Yaacov Ben-Dov collection (GNYBD\400656).

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is the cause of the accumulation of stones round it.”515 The large number of small stones and debris hid the lower part of the monument and did not allow the viewer to appreciate its true elevation—the height of the visible portion was six meters, but it actually stands thirteen meters high. The deep-rooted special veneration may explain why Zechariah’s Tomb was allotted two photographs in Karl’s album. As noted, Jewish tradition since the Middle Ages identified the Tomb of Zechariah as that of Zechariah ben Jehoiada, the righteous priest who called the people to repentance and spiritual renewal because they continued to commit some of the sins of their forefathers before the exile, and announced God’s judgment and punishment. A conspiracy was formed against him, which resulted in his being stoned to death in the courtyard of the Temple at the command of King Joash of Judah (2 Chronicles 24:20–22).516 According to the Babylonian Talmud (Bavli, Gittin 57b), Rabbi Hiyya bar Abin says: An old man from among the inhabitants of Jerusalem related to me: In this valley that lies before you, Nebuzaradan, captain of the guard of the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar, killed 2,110,000 people. And in Jerusalem itself he killed 940,000 people on one stone, until the blood of his victims flowed and touched the blood of Zechariah, to fulfill what is stated: “And blood toucheth blood” (Hosea 4:2).

The continuation of this text outlines the details of what happened: Nebuzaradan found the blood of Zechariah, the son of Jehoiada the priest, and saw that it was bubbling up from the ground, and he said: What is this? Those in the Temple said to him: It is sacrificial blood that had been poured there. He brought animal blood, compared it to the blood bubbling up from the ground, and saw that it was not similar to it. Nebuzaradan said to them: If you tell me whose blood this is, it will be well for you. But if not, I will comb your flesh with iron combs. They said to him: What shall we say to you? He was a prophet among us, who used to rebuke us about heavenly matters, and we rose up against him, and killed him (2 Chronicles 24:20–22), and for many years now his blood has not settled. Nebuzaradan said to them: I will appease Zechariah. He brought the members of the Great Sanhedrin and of a lesser Sanhedrin and killed them alongside the bubbling blood, but it still did not settle. He then brought young men and virgins and killed them alongside it, but it still did not settle. He then brought schoolchildren and killed them alongside it, but it still did not settle. Finally, Nebuzaradan said to him: “Zechariah, Zechariah, I have killed the best of them. Would it please you if I destroyed them all? When he said this, the blood at last settled.”517

515 Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored, 183–184. 516 Ibid., 184, noting that the Pilgrim of Bordeaux calls it the Tomb of Isaiah, and Benjamin of Tudela (traveled from 1165 to 1173)—the Tomb of Hosea. 517 Tradition adds that at that moment Nebuzaradan contemplated the idea of repentance and said to himself: “If, for the death of one soul, that of Zechariah, God punishes the Jewish people in this manner, then that man, that is to say, I, who has killed all of those souls, all the more so will I

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The tomb was a site of Jewish prayer, especially on the Ninth of Av, the annual day of mourning for the destroyed Temple, because in rabbinic literature Zechariah’s death is related to the destruction of the Temple by Nebuchadnazzar. A different tradition maintains that Zechariah was killed on the Day of Atonement (Yom Ha’kippurim; Targum on Lamentations 2:20), and therefore Jews prayed there on that day, too.518 Another popular legend tells that, in 1639, as drought and famine covered the land, only a special prayer by local Jews, while circling the tomb, brought the much-awaited rain.519 These and other traditions may have aimed to counterbalance Christian ones, such as Matthew’s words (23:34–36): Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city. That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.

According to the Hebrew Scriptures, Abel was the first man killed by his brother and Zechariah was the last, both just and pious men; therefore, Christian tradition contends, Jesus’s words are a prophecy on his own redeeming sacrifice. Other Christian traditions dating from the Middle Ages identified this tomb as that of St. Zechariah and St. Simeon, and the Tomb of Bnei Hezir as that of James the Less, an association probably based on traditions found in the apocryphal gospels.520 In addition to written sources, the Christian identification of these tombs is attested by the titles labeling several photographs at that time,521 and reflects

be subject to great punishment from God. He fled, sent to his house a document detailing what was to be done with his property, and converted to Judaism” (Ibid.). 518 . Targum Lamentations 2:20 identifies the figure as Zechariah son of Iddo (translated by Christian M. M. Brady, 1999). 519 Dovid Rosoff, Where Heaven Touches Earth: Jewish Life in Jerusalem from Medieval Times to the Present (Jerusalem: Feldheim, 1998; revised 2001), 95. 520 On the identification of these three Kidron Valley monuments as those of biblical and other figures venerated by Christians, see Leah Di Segni, “On the Development of Christian Cult Sites on Tombs of the Second Temple Period,” ARAM Periodical 19 (2007), 382–383; and Pringle, Churches of the Crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, 186–187. 521 See, for example, the digital library of Pennsylvania University. . Also Pierotti, Jerusalem Explored, 181–183; Yaron Z. Eliav, “The Tomb of James, Brother of Jesus, as Locus Memoriae,” Harvard Theological Review 97/1 (2004), 43–46.

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the endeavor of the Church, Christian archaeologists, and scholars to identify sites and monuments as proof of the authenticity of the New Testament and later Christian traditions. The identification of ancient monuments with biblical figures changed over time and was a source of discord among the various faiths; thus, it added to the challenge to assert the Jewish identity of the Holy City.

Holy Places and Picturesque Sites around Jerusalem Looking up to the Mount of Olives from the distance, the editors show the virtual royal visitor two typical views centering on three landmarks that can be seen from afar—the Russian Church of the Ascension that rises on the summit of the hill, its 64-meter-bell-tower piercing the sky; the bell-tower of the Pater Noster Church, to the right of the Russian church; and to its left—the minaret of the mosque built by the Muslims on the site of the Crusader Church of the Ascension soon after Salah al-Din conquered Jerusalem and Islamicized holy places. The view of the Mount of Olives is not the only image that the editors decided to include in the album, despite the fact that no visual element clearly identifies it as part of the ancient Jewish tradition. How, then, could the editors convey its Jewish religious or national significance? Once again, they may have relied on well-known traditions. One main Jewish tradition, based on the location and height of the Mount of Olives separating Jerusalem from the arid Judaean desert, associates it with destruction and rebuilding, death and redemption. Ezekiel, who lived in Babylonia at the time of the destruction of the First Temple, described a vision of the idolatrous worship in the Temple and of the Presence of God leaving it. The description ends with a vision of the glory of the Lord, who rose up from the midst of the city and stood upon the mountain on the eastern side of the city (Ezekiel 11).522 This vision became the source of biblical exegesis, legends, and traditions. For example, Midrash Lamentations Rabbah, dated to the sixth century—one of the early midrashim written in the Land of Israel—comments on the destruction of the First and Second Temples in Jerusalem and the national destruction that accompanied it. This biblical exegesis tells us that during the last three-and-a-half years before the destruction of the Temple, the Shekhina, the Divine Presence of God, dwelt on the

522 Nevertheless, in his prophecies on the End of Days, Ezekiel brings a message of hope from God: “Thus saith the Lord God; I will even gather you from the people and assemble you out of the countries where ye have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel…. And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you…. Then did the cherubims lift up their wings, and the wheels beside them; and the glory of the God of Israel was over them above. And the glory of the Lord went up from the midst of the city and stood upon the mountain which is on the east side of the city” (11:17–23).

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Mount of Olives. There, God called on the people of Israel to repent, but the people did not heed, the Temple was destroyed, and the Divine Presence left Jerusalem and ascended to His place.523 In its position looking out upon Jerusalem and offering a panoramic view of the Temple Mount, following the destruction of the Second Temple, the Mount of Olives became a site of pilgrimage and prayer. Jews would go up to the Mount of Olives to look at the Temple Mount, especially on the Three Pilgrimage Festivals, as a symbolic way of fulfilling the biblical precept to pray and bring offerings and, conversely, on the Ninth of Av, to mourn the loss of the Temple. Its importance as a site from which the Temple Mount and the Gate of Mercy could be best seen might be a reason for allotting two photographs to it in the album. Yet, the Mount of Olives more often appears in the background of images of Jerusalem centered on the Temple Mount, as in the dedication of the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Karl I/IV. Zechariah’s prophecy on the End of Days may provide another theological reason for the double depiction of the Mount of Olives: “Then shall the Lord go forth, and fight against those nations, as when he fought in the day of battle. And his feet shall stand in that day upon the Mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east” (14:3–4); moreover, in the end, the enemies will be defeated “and there shall be no more utter destruction; but Jerusalem shall be safely inhabited” (14:11). The prophecies of Zechariah (14:3–4) and Ezekiel (43:2), that from the Mount of Olives the Divine Presence would make his return to His place in the Temple to judge His people, explain the long association of the mount with the resurrection of the dead, redemption, and the rebuilding of the Temple. More often than not, legends support each other. For example, the tradition, that at the end of the flood in the days of Noah the dove brought the olive leaves to the ark from this mountain, may have added to its holiness and to its association with redemption.524 Following Jewish traditions, the Mount of Olives became a sacred mountain for Christianity and Islam as well.525 Unlike what was just proposed, could not only the challenge to assert its Jewish identity, but also the wish to create a common platform with the Austro-Hungarian monarch, stand behind the importance given to this site? For Christians, the Mount of Olives is the site from which Jesus looked at Jerusalem, prophesied its imminent destruction, and wept over it (Luke 19:41–44). Moreover, these verses, as well as Joel 3:1–2, explain why Christianity

523 Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 287–288, quoting Lamentations Rabbah, Petichta 25; Ezekiel 11:23; Jeremiah 3:14; Malachi 3:7; Hosea 5:15; Isaiah 55:6; and Avot de-Rabbi Nathan (A) 34. 524 For this tradition see Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, 296. 525 Limor, “Place of the End of Days,” 15–18; Vilnay, Legends of Jerusalem, esp. 285–286, 291– 292, 296–297.

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asserts that this is the site from which Jesus ascended to heaven and to which he will return at the End of Days (Acts 1:9–11)—traditions that would certainly touch the heart of the Christian monarch to whom the book was dedicated. A common platform does not necessarily hurt the religio-national aspirations of the Jewish collective to assert its identity as deeply rooted in the Land of Israel, but it does compel the editors to reassert it in a more sophisticated manner. In this spirit, the editors take Karl to the third-most sacred site in the Land of Israel after the Western Wall and the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron, by means of two photographs—“Rachel’s Tomb from the Inside” and “Rachel’s Tomb from the Outside” (fig. 54). The photographs convey the deep religious meaning of Rachel’s Tomb for Jews and the centuries-long veneration of the site; their perseverance, and not only payments, may have moved the Ottoman government to recognize it—together with the Western Wall—as a holy place where Jews had a right to pray, despite the fact that it was also sacred to Muslims and Christians. The first photograph shows the small and simple room, with the whitewashed tombstone in the center and a hanging chandelier of oil lamps in front of it. On the rear wall, an engraved plaque hangs between the squinches that support the dome; the opening words, “Tombstone of Rachel, our Mother, her virtues may protect us, amen,” are followed by the words of Jeremiah 31:15–17: A voice was heard in Ramah, lamentation, and bitter weeping; Rachel weeping for her children refused to be comforted for her children, because they were not. Thus saith the Lord: Refrain thy voice from weeping, and thine eyes from tears: for thy work shall be rewarded, saith the Lord; and they shall come again from the land of the enemy; and there is hope in thine end, saith the Lord, that thy children shall come again to their own border.

Lower down and to the right rests a memorial plaque made by David Yellin in 1907, thanking all donors.526 A Jew dressed in black, perhaps the Ashkenazi guard of the shrine, stands on the left. The poor condition of the room and of the old photograph prevent the viewer from seeing the names of the many Jewish pilgrims inscribed in Hebrew letters on the walls. The other photograph shows the tourist face of the site (fig. 54), and is paradigmatic of the changes in the iconography of the venerated sites brought about by the “rediscovery” of the Land of the Bible/Palestine in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries: elegantly dressed Western visitors leisurely stand by carriages on the road in front of the tomb, while a caravan of heavily burdened ca-

526 Dotan Goren, “Inscribed on Tablets on the Road to Efrat: Initiatives to Renovate Rachel’s Tomb in the Late Ottoman Period,” Et-Mol 238 (1975), 9 (Hebrew). David Yellin was an educator and leader of the Yishuv. He was one of the founders the first Hebrew college for teachers.

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Fig. 54: Rachel’s Tomb from the Outside.

mels approaches from the opposite direction, thereby contrasting locals and visitors, the exotic but backward Orient and cultured Europe.527 The small and humble tomb, the olive trees, the camels and donkeys often seen striding slowly on the road, and the small town sprawling over the hills in the background, at the heart of a biblical site, struck the imagination and awakened the religious fervor of pilgrims, travelers, and artists. Visitors came for a variety of reasons, such as religious piety and the hope of divine help, a search for unknown exotic sites, and a better knowledge of the history of a mythical and mysterious place. As noted, in the minds and hearts of believers, photographs of biblical sites became undeniable evidence of the authenticity of the Bible, recalling and recreating memories of mytho-historical sites and events. Again, Franz Joseph’s emotions, as revealed in a letter he sent to his consort from Jerusalem, is a very important source in our context and may also be relevant regarding his heir: It struck us all how everything… seemed to be just like one imagined it from one’s childhood stories and its descriptions in the Bible… the Tomb of Rachel… flowering trees on a smooth hill, stone houses built one above the other as in an amphitheatre, exactly as the landscape of Bethlehem in mangers’ plays.528

In fact, the exact location of biblical sites is much discussed. The Bible gives two different sites for Rachel’s tomb. It tells us about Jacob going north toward Bethel, a story that ends with the burial of Rachel who died in childbirth near Ephrath/

527 The photograph in Karl’s book must have been taken between late 1906, when the tomb’s dome was repaired and painted with a special preparation of plaster, and 1910, when the painting of one of the exterior walls appeared to be damaged. On the restoration and painting, as well as a 1910 photograph, see ibid., 9 and fig. on p. 6. 528 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, 111–112, 114; Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 115–117. and note 281.

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Bethlehem, in the territory of Judah: “And Rachel died, and was buried on the way to Ephrath, which is Bethlehem. And Jacob set a pillar upon her grave: that is the pillar of Rachel’s grave unto this day” (Genesis 35:19–20); Jacob confirmed that event before his death (Genesis 48:7). Alternatively, Jeremiah heard Rachel crying for her children from Ramah, about seven kilometers north of Jerusalem, on the border between Judah and Benjamin (31:15–17).529 Rachel’s tomb is paradigmatic of the construction of memories of a constitutive event and of a site in which to root its memory and preserve it through cultic practices, as well as of the appropriation of the venerated site by other religions. From the early fourth century until today, Rachel’s Tomb on the road to Bethlehem has been venerated by Christians, and later on by Jews and Muslims as well, integrating the verses in Genesis and Jeremiah. Christians would have known Rachel from the Hebrew Bible as well as from Matthew, who tells that at the Massacre of the Innocents “was fulfilled that which was spoken by Jeremiah the prophet, saying, in Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not” (2:17–18). One of the first texts to mention the tomb is the so-called Itinerarium burdigalense, written by an anonymous Christian pilgrim from Bordeaux in 333. About half the way from Jerusalem to Bethlehem, on the right side of the road, the pilgrim saw a tomb in which Rachel, Jacob’s wife, lies;530 that location, which corresponds to the narrative in the Book of Genesis, became commonplace. The same site was identified as Rachel’s Tomb in 1154 by the Muslim traveler Muhammad al-Idrisi, who adds that “the tomb is covered by twelve stones, and above it is a dome vaulted with stones.”531 At about the same time, this tomb was also identified by Jewish travelers. One of the best known is the travel chronicler Benjamin of Tudela, who visited the Land of Israel around 1173; another, Isaac Chelo, who visited the tomb in 1334, provided a description of the site in his days, which corresponds to Idrisi’s account: it is “a monument com-

529 Also 1 Samuel 10:2 locates her tomb in the tribal territory of Benjamin. On this question, see Nadav Na’aman, “The Jacob Story and the Formation of Biblical Israel,” Tel Aviv 41/1 (2014), 107–108. 530 The earliest identifications of this tomb as Rachel’s burial place were written by Christians in the first decades of the fourth century—Eusebius Bishop Caesarea and the Pilgrim from Bordeaux. Jerome, who lived in Bethlehem in the fifth century, also mentions it, and the mid-sixth century map on the floor mosaic of the Church of St. George in Madaba places Ephrat near Bethlehem and is identified by the inscription “A voice was heard in Ramah.” See Limor, Holy Land Travels, 39; Pamela Berger, “Jewish-Muslim Veneration at Pilgrimage Places in the Holy Land,” Religion and the Arts 15 (2011), 24. 531 Ibid., 24.

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posed of twelve great stones, surmounted by a cupola also of stone.”532 A midrash by the eleventh-century Talmudist and poet Rabbi Tobiah ben Eliezer describes the tombstone as built of eleven stones representing eleven tribes and a twelfth stone set by Jacob on top.533 A pile of stones set to mark a sacred site was a wide spread practice in the Middle East;534 narratives and local material culture enriched each other over time. In the early seventeenth century, most probably around the year 1622, the building at Rachel’s Tomb was given its familiar shape. At that time, the governor of Jerusalem allowed the Jewish community to surround the four columns around the tomb with walls, making it, for the first time, a nearly closed structure. In the early 1840s, Sir Moses Montefiore acquired a permit from the Turkish authorities to repair the tomb, which had been seriously damaged in the 1837 earthquake, and to build an antechamber with a mihrab for Muslim worshippers on the eastern side. A heavy iron door was installed for the domed room, with special keys entrusted solely to two caretakers, one Ashkenazi and one Sephardi;535 the Ashkenazi is probably the figure seen in the photograph. The renovation was followed by the Sultan’s firman in 1841 officially recognizing the rights of Jews to retain the place and pray there.536 The deep identification of the Jewish people with Rachel is based on two elements of her image: motherhood—her life-long struggle to give birth, and Jeremiah’s prophecy of heavenly salvation and restoration of the people of Israel because of Rachel’s weeping in compassion and deep sorrow for her lost children, i.e., the ten lost tribes of the Northern Kingdom taken into exile to Assyria in the eighth century BC (2 Kings 17:6; 2 Esdras 13:39–45). The tribes of her two grandsons, who formed the House of Joseph, were part of them. Although Jeremiah’s prophecy refers to the impending destruction of Solomon’s Temple and the Babylonian exile (586 BC), and the majority of the people who went into that exile were from the tribe of Judah, and although Rachel was not the ancestor of that tribe, she is considered to be a mother of all the tribes of Israel; therefore, the prophecy refers to the people of Judah as her children. Jeremiah’s

532 Ibid., 24–25, with information on other Jewish travelers who visited the tomb; Cohen-Hattab and Kohn, “Nationalization of Holy Sites,” 73–74. 533 See Midrash Lekach Tov, Genesis 35:20, quoted by Nadav Shragai, The Story of Rachel’s Tomb (Jerusalem: Gates for Jerusalem Studies, 2005), 24–25 (Hebrew). 534 Pamela Berger, “Jewish-Muslim Veneration,” 24. 535 Shragai, Story of Rachel’s Tomb, 32–43, 48, 231; Dotan Goren, “Inscribed on Tablets,” 6–8. 536 Dotan Goren, “Inscribed on Tablets,” 6–9; Shragai, Story of Rachel’s Tomb, 48; Fred Strickert, Rachel Weeping: Jews, Christians, and Muslims at the Fortress Tomb (Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 2007), 111–117; Cohen-Hattab and Kohn, “Nationalization of Holy Sites,” 73–74, note 22.

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prophecy is what lies behind the midrash wherein Jacob buried Rachel on the way to Ephrath because he foresaw that his people would pass her burial site as they were led into exile, and wished that Rachel could ask God to take compassion on them.537 In rabbinic literature, Rachel’s mourning also functions as an archetype for the mourning over the destruction of the Second Temple by the Roman empire: Rachel’s sorrow is transformed into historical allegory—a mother crying over her nation-children, the victims of defeat and violence by a great empire.538 Rachel’s association with redemption, salvation, and the sorrows of women is an essential element in the devotion to her by all three Abrahamic faiths, which turned her tomb into a pilgrimage site for people seeking hope and consolation. On certain days it would be surrounded by women offering prayers and vows in the hope of becoming mothers, like Rachel who implored Jacob: “Give me children, or else I die” (Genesis 30:1).539 Like Franz Joseph, the deeply religious Karl would have known the figure of Rachel from both the Hebrew Bible and Matthew 2:13, and he also may have heard narratives on a variety of miracles brought about by praying at her tomb. All things considered, the religious and national meaning of Rachel’s Tomb would not arouse discord, but would extend a shared platform of human values, especially in the heart of the Christian monarch involved in a dangerous war that was threatening his kingdom. The site and its images would nurture empathy and common hopes, and in turn—also a shared identity of Jerusalemite Jews with other Habsburg subjects. Two picturesque religious and historical sites follow. The two photographs, arranged on one page, represent main water sources in the Land of Israel—the Jordan River (fig. 55, top), which turned the valley into a fertile paradisiacal garden, and Solomon’s Pools (fig. 55, bottom), which provided water to the city of Jerusalem. The first is a beautiful and peaceful view of the river whose quiet waters and rich vegetation on both banks honor the description in the Bible: “And Lot lifted

537 Among the most influential: Midrash Pesiqta Rabbati 3, dated between the seventh and midninth century. See Shragai, Story of Rachel’s Tomb, 16–17, notes 4 and 5; Lamentations Rabbah, Petichta 24, in ibid., 18–19; Genesis Rabbah 82:10, in ibid., 305. 538 Yosefa Raz, “‘And Sons Shall Return to Their Borders’: The Neo-Zionist (Re)turns of Rachel’s Sons,” The Bible and Critical Theory 11/2 (2015), 23–25. Jews prayed at Rachel’s Tomb, especially on the first day of every Hebrew month, during the Ten Days of Penitence in the month of Elul, and on the eleventh of Heshvan, the supposed day of Rachel’s death. Old Yishuv Jews would pray for themselves and for the benefactors whose donations provided them with sustenance. 539 Adela Goodrich-Freer and Moses Gaster, “Some Jewish Folklore from Jerusalem,” Folklore 15/2 (1904), 192.

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Fig. 55: Jordan River (top); Solomon’s Pools (bottom).

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up his eyes, and beheld all the plain of Jordan, that it was well watered every where… even as the garden of the Lord” (Genesis 13:10). Impresssed by the landscape, Lot decided to settle there. As the only relatively large river in Palestine (although in some places, in the summer, it was only a narrow stream), the Jordan played a significant role in the Bible as well as in the later history of the Land of Israel. The river runs through the heart of Jewish traditions and is spiritually meaningful to Christians as well. By far the most significant single event relating to the Jordan River in the history of the people of Israel is the crossing of the tribes of Israel into the Promised Land after the death of Moses—an event that he anticipated in Deuteronomy 3:20–27, and is described in Joshua 1:2 as well as in chapters 3 and 4. The most significant event for Christians is the baptism of Jesus (Matthew 3:13; Mark 1:9; Luke 3:21, 4:1), with John recognizing him as the Son and the Lamb of God (1:29–36). Although the photograph in Karl’s book does not allow for identifying the site—neither as that of the crossing nor of the baptism or other miracles either in the Hebrew Bible or the New Testament—in a religious milieu, the mere mention of the Jordan River would suffice to recall the biblical events, once more creating a common space of encounter. This historical imagery helped to construct a direct connection with older narratives as part of the process of renewing Jewish traditions. The photograph of Solomon’s Pool focuses on the lowest of three ancient reservoirs attributed to the biblical king, located about 5 km southwest of Bethlehem, near the old road that runs from Jerusalem to Hebron. A small Ottoman fortress that protected the water system, near the upper pool, is visible on the horizon between two hills.540 In Jewish tradition, as well as in early modern biblical research, it was common to associate great works with King Solomon, who personifies the ideals of wisdom and greatness. The pools are attributed to Solomon, based on the story in Ecclesiastes 2:4–6: “I made me great works; I builded me houses; I planted me vineyards: I made me gardens and orchards, and I planted trees in them of all kind of fruits: I made me pools of water, to water therewith the wood that bringeth forth trees.” The book is traditionally attributed to Solomon because the writer identifies himself as King of Jerusalem and son of David, and also in light of the wisdom revealed in it. In his Antiquities of the Jews, Josephus wrote that Solomon used to ride upon his chariot in the mornings to a place called Etham, “very pleasant it is in fine gardens, and abounding in rivulets of water.”541 Ain-Attan, or Ein-Eitam, is

540 The fortress was known as Qal‘at el-Burak (Castle of the Pools) or Qal‘at Murad (Castle of [Sultan] Murad); in the second half of the nineteenth century it became a ruin; the distance from which the photograph was taken does not allow to perceive its condition. 541 Flavius Josephus, The Antiquities of the Jews 8.7.3.186, transl. William Whiston, The Works of Josephus (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 1987), 226.

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located southeast of the lower pool and is one of the springs that feeds it.542 Traditions could be kept or forgotten; they could certainly be recalled and reconstructed according to a new historical context. The remnants of the impressive pools and their location, considered in light of the story in the Book of Ecclesiastes, inspired their attribution by the locals to the admired and venerated biblical king. Therefore, the fine view of the pool and its name justified its inclusion in the album presented to Karl as part of the strategy to emphasize the deep roots of the Jewish people in its ancient homeland, based on the biblical story as history, and on the messianic religious belief that the greatness of the past enhances perceptions of the present and the future.

Embedding in Memory the Identity of the Gift-givers and Artists Back in Jerusalem, the home of the gift-givers and the artists, the royal visitor and recipient of the photograph album will first see two views of the city in photographs arranged on the same page. The upper one, untitled (fig. 56), shows a typical narrow and twisting street in the Old City, the Armenian Patriarchate Street; the Old City wall, and behind it the bell tower of the German Catholic Church of the Dormition on Mount Zion, may be seen in the background. A dark figure in the

542 The three pools stretching across the Artas Valley, constructed of massive masonry, are arranged in steps, each about 6 meters lower than the one above it. They are rectangular or trapezoidal in shape, partly hewn in the rocky bed of the valley and partly built of large hewn stones, between 118 and 179 meters long, 46 and 81 meters wide, and 8 to 16 meters deep, with a total capacity of over a quarter of a million cubic meters. Solomon’s pools were part of an elaborate system that provided water to Jerusalem for the last c. 2000 years. In the past, the three pools were fed by four local springs (‘Ein Saleh, ‘Ein Farujeh, ‘Ein ‘Atan, and ‘Ein Burak) and two major aqueducts (Arrub and Wadi El-Biyar) bringing water to the pools from springs and other pools at higher elevations to the south. Recent evidence suggests that their construction was gradual: the lower pool was probably constructed during the Hasmonean period, between the mid-second- and midfirst-centuries BC, and was connected to the lower-level aqueduct that carried the water over a distance of 21.5 kilometers to the Temple Mount. Repairs and improvements were made by Herod and rulers in the Roman, Mamluk, and Ottoman periods. See David Amit and Shimon Gibson. “Water to Jerusalem: The Route and Date of the Upper and Lower Level Aqueducts,” in Cura Aquarum in Israel, II: Water in Antiquity, Proceedings of the 15th International Conference on the History of Water Management and Hydraulic Engineering in the Mediterranean Region, Israel, 14– 20 October 2012, ed. Christoph Ohlig and Tsvika Tsuk, Deutschen Wasserhistorischen Gesellschaft 21 (Siegburg: DWhG, 2014), 14–20; Matthew J. Adams, Mark Letteney, and Max T. B. Peers, “Survey and Excavations at Solomon’s Pools, Palestine: 2018 Preliminary Report,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 151/1 (2019), 15 and 33; HYDRIA Project, “Solomon’s Pools and Relating Aqueducts, the Heart of Jerusalem’s Past Water Supply,” 2009 .

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Fig. 56: Untitled (Street of the Armenian Patriarchate, Old City).

Fig. 57: The New Jerusalem.

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shadow of the long row of houses on the right breaks the stillness of the image.543 It is noteworthy that this street, turning from Jaffa Gate to Zion Gate and the cardo, was the safest way for Jews to reach the Jewish Quarter. The photograph on the bottom is simply titled “New Jerusalem” (fig. 57). No venerated or potential tourist site appears in this nice view of the city. Nevertheless, based on the choice of the five photographs that follow, it seems that it was not by chance that this view was chosen and placed here: the buildings of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts stand out in the background of the cityscape, where the school moved in 1908.544 We thus may say that it represents the artists involved in the production of the book presented to Karl. The photograph may have been shot from the roof of the building on the Ethiopians’ (Heb. Hahabashim) Street that first hosted the Bezalel School, looking from south to west. It may be the work of Zadok Bassan, who had moved his studio from the Old City to that same quarter in the early 1900s.545 Bassan is considered the “court photographer” of the Old Yishuv, but he was also interested in images of other collectives and individuals in their daily life, city streets, institutions, and events, including the Bezalel School in its first years. The editors chose a grand finale for the album: photographs of five important institutions of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel. Of all the photographs in the album, these five were certainly chosen by the editors as markers that would enhance the image of the gift-givers. All these institutions were located in the Batei Ungarin (Hungarians’ Houses) neighborhood, except for the Hungarians’ Synagogue that was located in the Old City near the Chain Gate, a main entrance to the Temple Mount.546 Therefore, the album ends with a proud figurative identity card of the artists and the gift-givers. 543 The photographer of the Armenian Patriarchate Street stood under the arch spanning from the western wall of the Armenian Monastery of St. James. 544 The house, built in the late 1880s in an eclectic local style, was purchased in 1907 from a rich Turkish effendi by the Jewish National Fund for the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts. The school extended to the adjacent building; in 1990, it was relocated to Mount Scopus, and is expected to move to a new compound under construction in downtown Jerusalem. 545 Some of the last photographs in Karl’s book may also be the work of Zadok Bassan (1882– 1956). One of the first Jewish photographers in Jerusalem, Bassan established his first studio in the Old City in 1900. For about half a century he documented daily life in Jerusalem with his camera, including its institutions and routine Jewish life. In his photographs, outdoors as well as indoors, Bassan used his heavy studio camera with glass negatives. He was very meticulous in his work and choice of a composition, while carefully using sources of light that lent a spiritual atmosphere even to scenes of daily routine; see Silver-Brody, Documentors of the Dream, chap. 5: Tsadok Bassan. 546 As noted, the neighborhood was also known as Nahalat Zvi, in honor of its main donor, Rabbi Yitzhak Zvi Ratzersdorfer. See above, chap. 4.3 on the gifts presented to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee; and Eli Schiller, “A Collection of Rare Photographs from Batei Ungarin (Hungar-

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Each institution of the kolel was allotted its own page in the album. The first photograph presents the Hasidic Chasam Sofer (Chatam Sofer) Yeshiva (fig. 58), which was built in 1899, and the next one shows the Perushim yeshiva built in 1898 and named in honor of Ksav Sofer (Ktav Sofer): in the Hungarian Jews’ tradition, two yeshivot, both of which include a synagogue, were built for each community already in the first phases of the construction of the Jewish Quarter. In both photographs, the children and some of the grown-ups are standing still, orderly, and aware of the special occasion, looking at the photographer. This behavior also stands out in the photographs of two of the other three institutions—the Talmud Torah and the Hungarians’ Houses for the Needy (fig. 59). For the latter, the photographer chose the most popular view of the Hungarians’ Houses—the interior courtyard with its peculiar stairs built on wide semi-arches, which reach the balcony that runs along the second floor and onto which the small apartments open. In his 1945 epic, Only Yesterday, Shai Agnon describes the neighborhood as seen by a new immigrant from Galicia around the year 1910: There are about fifteen big houses with three hundred appartments for the members of the Hungarian Society who live there three years for free, and sometimes more, according to the wish of the donor and the officials who run the Society. All the houses are alike, and each apartment has two rooms and a small corner where the women cook their dishes. And a big yard paved with stones goes between one row of houses and another, and there is the cistern.547

Agnon’s protagonist goes on to describe the dwellers somewhat ironically, which corresponds to the common name of the kolel, Shomrei Ha’homos (Guardians of the Walls)—in a religious sense: Just as the houses are all alike, so are their tenants. All of them are dignified people who keep the Torah and the Commandments, who serve their Creator with a full belly. And they don’t yield to anyone either in earthly matters or in heavenly matters, and they punish any person who is not like them by persecution and contempt and ostracism and refusing charity and expulsion.548

Agnon’s witness hints at the difficulties of modern Jews to differentiate between the Orthodox groups; actually, they had a rich life of their own, their own aspirations and identity constructions. The final photograph in the album presents the interior of the Hungarians’, or Ohel Itzhak Synagogue, which in the album is labeled “Great Israel synagogue”

ian Houses),” in Mea Shearim and Its Surroundings, ed. Eli Schiller, Ariel, 163–164 (Jerusalem: Ariel, 2004), 201–209 (Hebrew). 547 Shmuel Yosef (Shai) Agnon, Only Yesterday, trans. Barbara Harshav (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2002), 276. 548 Ibid.

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Fig. 58: Chatam Sofer Yeshiva.

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Fig. 59: Houses for the Needy (Hungarians’ Houses).

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(fig. 60). It was built from 1891 to 1904 in a courtyard near the Chain Gate, that was purchased for the Hungarian kolel in 1867,549 and became one of the most important prayer houses in Jerusalem. As the photograph shows, the synagogue’s plan and liturgical furniture keep to strict Eastern European Orthodox tradition. For example, the bima, on which the table for the reading of the Torah stands, is placed in the center of the room; it is a polygonal wooden structure crowned all around with high arches in fine ironwork, with an enclosing screen or balustrade placed between thin columns and made in the same technique. Also, the use of a small lectern (amud tefilla) for the Shiviti plaque, in front of which the prayer leader (sheliach tzibbur) of the congregation stands, appears beside the ark and is shaped and decorated like it. The architectural design and furniture convey the strict conservatism of the Orthodox community in Hungary and in its Jerusalem kolel.550 In the photograph, a boy concentrating on his reading while alone in the synagogue, adds an emotional dimension of innocence and reality to the spiritual atmosphere. The five photographs of the kolel Ungarin are a tribute both to the royal recipient who bestows his legal protection on his Jerusalem subjects, and to the gift-givers who were well aware of the need to project a positive image of the kolel. Therefore, the five photographs are also a perfect way to end the collection, which opened most appropriately with general views of Jerusalem highlighting the two main synagogues and the Temple Mount.

549 In 1904, a second floor was added to the building. The expansion affords the establishment of the Or Meir Yeshiva, where students studied Torah day and night, therefore necessitating a mikveh (ritual bath), a small number of apartments for students, and two prayer rooms named in honor of the donor—the Hasidic room, named Beth Itzhak (Itzhak’s House), and the other for the Perushim, named Ohel Itzhak (Itzhak’s Tent). A local narrative tells us that while construction was taking place, the Ottoman authorities warned that no extension would be allowed because the roof would end up being higher than the Dome of the Rock. The kolel had to abandon the idea of crowning the synagogue with a dome and instead built a tiled roof. Construction of the roof was completed overnight in order to take advantage of the Turkish law stipulating that once a building had been completed with a roof, it could no longer be demolished. See (Hebrew). 550 The photographer probably was Ben-Dov. See Central Zionist Archive PHG\1017514, wrongly identifying the synagogue. Photographs of the synagogue’s interior, like the one in Karl’s album, are very important because a Jordanian military legion destroyed the building after it took possession of the Old City following the 1948 war. Regarding the strict adherence to the typical Eastern European synagogue’s plan and furniture, we should note that, at the time, Jewish reformers in Hungary, the Neologs, were introducing changes in architecture and liturgy; for example, influenced by the location of the altar in the church, they moved the bima close to the Torah Ark niche.

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Fig. 60: Great Israel Synagogue (Ohel Itzhak or Hungarians’ Synagogue).

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The Photographs: Desired Images The selection of photographs, regarding the choice of sites and photographic strategies, disclosed careful thought on questions such as: what religio-political ideology, socio-cultural and scenic considerations influenced the photographers and the editors of the book in their aim to construct the desired image of the land and its peoples? And, in view of the many changes that affected both the Old Yishuv and the Habsburg kingdoms at the time, what strategies were applied in the photographs to construct a continuum between the glorious past, the difficult transitional present, and the desired blissful future? The selection and order of the photographs offer anthropological insights into the Jewish communities of Jerusalem, their constructions of identity and expectations of simultaneously belonging to different collectives in a positive Otherness, as well as their perceptions of Karl’s expectations. Most of the sites, monuments, and scenes have a clear Jewish biblio-historical or traditional background that reaffirms the continuity of the Jewish people’s presence and bond to the Land of Israel, and the fulfillment of the Jewish precept to live there. No Christian or Muslim sites were chosen as the subject; when they appear, it is only as part of the cityscape—for example, the Dormition Church on Mount Zion, or as a reference to the site of the destroyed Jewish Temple of ancient times, as in the case of the Muslim monuments on the Temple Mount, even when they are identified by their Muslim names. The Jewish exclusion of “the Other” is used to reinforce a particular identity and a sense of belonging to the place, and perhaps even to recall the divine command to settle in the land (Genesis 12:1–7). This strategy would counter any non-Jewish claims to the land and its holy places that the photographs and many narratives embedded in the collective memory may suggest to Christian and Muslim beholders. As in the scene titled “Wailing Wall” (fig. 45), the depiction of cultic practices performed by Jews of a wide range of ages, enhanced by the illusion of direct eye-contact between the protagonists and the beholder, further asserts the deep and continuous Jewish bond to the land and its holy places. As noted, the presence of a young boy in some of these identity-constructing scenes added a sense of authenticity to the Jewish narrative. Continuity of devotion was not enough. How were codes of the unique sacrality and mystery of the Holy Land held by the various protagonists constructed and conveyed? Like painters and craftspersons, most photographers adapted their work to match these codes, more often than not, in disregard of the real place and real inhabitants of the present. At times, it may even be asked whether a photographer was interested in objective documentation at all. There were several ways to achieve their goals. For example, sites and scenes were presented so as to create a unique local atmosphere and raise emotions sought by customers. Aware of the imaginary perception of Jerusalem, only normative stereotypical figures were

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chosen by artists; Orientalist elements common in other photographs of the exotic Orient and in the design and decoration of souvenirs, throughout the nineteenth century and first decades of the twentieth, do not appear: there are no images associated with the imagined licentious sexual life and “barbaric” or primitive manners and customs that fed the fantasies of Orientalists, attracted and repelled Westerners.551 None of the signs of abandon, neglect, backwardness, or misery often depicted in snapshots and in some ethnographic literary and visual sources is present either. These qualities conform to the believers’ preconceptions of the Holy City and therefore meet their expectations. No overt expressions of dissonance are visible. In a common strategy among Jewish artists, Yaacov Ben-Dov, in his photographs of Jews at the Western Wall, first and foremost took care to present them praying piously and in solemnity, in well-staged scenes using models dressed in typical garments, headdresses, and respectable demeanors, while Christian artists, as noted, often showed elements of wretchedness. Ben-Dov and the gift-givers expected the beholder to perceive Jews as honorably fulfilling the religious precepts of their faith. In this context, the recurrent iconic images of a site and the performance of commemorative rites are all important for the durability of a place of memory and related beliefs and traditions, which, in turn, are essential for the construction and crystallization of collective identities. In another strategy, the oft-striking emptiness and absence of human presence were used to create a mythical and timeless atmosphere, as in images of the Muslim monuments on the Temple Mount that were used as mnemonic devices, calling to mind the destroyed Jewish Temple. Leading Old Yishuv personalities and artists may have been intuitively aware that a memory lasts only as long as there is a group of people for whom it has a specific importance and who are interested in preserving it.552 Finally, captions accompanying the photographs, or their absence, helped to achieve various aims. They were used not only to identify the subject and essential

551 See, for example, Franz Joseph’s description of the ride to Jerusalem in letters to his consort. He noticed the incredible poverty, misery, and backwardness, which no doubt were aspects of the conditions that he encountered but were also perceived and interpreted through Orientalist eyes: “Scattered villages that appeared to us like distant wonderful green oases amidst this desolate region; they lay in the middle of palm and fig trees surrounded by cactus hedges. Some houses are made of stone. Most, however, are only miserable loam huts in a large heap, more like a mole colony than human dwellings. The inhabitants, farmers, are very dark brown-skinned…. All are very dirty”; see Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, 106. Significantly, Franz Joseph’s attitude is relatively compassionate in comparison to the biting disdain of many Western visitors for an “inferior” society. 552 Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 153, based on Maurice Halbwachs, La mémoire collective (Paris: A. Michel, 1950; reprint 1997), 97–142. See also below, my final remarks.

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elements, but also to influence the viewer’s interpretation by selecting one of the various possible meanings and anchoring it with words, guide him to the intended interpretation, add to or limit the meaning given by the author, and divert from other connotations. A caption, or its absence, may project a unique atmosphere, suggest a specific narrative, leave space for various interpretations, or create a special relationship between the persons photographed, the site, and the beholder. Paradigmatic of this strategy is the photograph by Yaacov Ben-Dov of women praying at the Western Wall, which in the album is simply labeled “Wailing Wall,” unlike an earlier copy that presents the verses mourning the destruction of the Temple that the photographer adapted from the Book of Lamentations and added in his handwriting. The verses would have reinforced the message of faith and the continuity of traditions woven around the site, yet they were omitted and consequently may awake other associations. Indeed, the absence of a caption, as in the two photographs depicting an Austrian officer in front of the Kidron Valley tombs, opens the way to construct narratives, for example, on the empire’s strong presence in the Holy City in an expression of local patriotism—a real presence at a real site embodying the mythical past as well as Austrian power in the present. In this respect, the decision of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to write the captions accompanying the imagery in German, in its gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl, allowed for a direct and more personal reading.

6 The Uniqueness of Old Yishuv Gifts The gifts from Habsburg subjects were valued by the court as a means of demonstrating loyalty and of creating a sense of common purpose and unity. Yet, what made the offerings from Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem distinct in relation to others? What is clear is that they expressed a dual identity formation: one, Central European, Habsburg; the other, a new Jerusalemite Jewish identity, which in some Old Yishuv circles developed into a pre-national or ripened national identity, through a process of modernization and a developed relationship with the New Yishuv. How are we to understand the gifts in relation to the history, and certainly the historiography, of Jewish art at the time? Texts are an important element in Jewish art;553 therefore, in the study of Old Yishuv gifts it is essential to examine how the visual imagery and texts interrrelate and influence meanings and interpretations. Nevertheless, the unique trait of the representative objects of the Old Yishuv is their special iconography, which highlights iconic images of sites sacred to Jews. The importance of Jerusalem, and of the Holy Land as a whole, in the context in which these objects were created, lies in their being the place chosen by God for His people and His House—a belief at the core of the Jewish religion. Jerusalem further served as a platform anchored in history, traditions, memories, and longing for the ideal biblically and eschatologically blessed city, shared—although in different and often opposite ways—by Jews and Christians, and later also Muslims. Each collective strived to assert its authority by localizing its memories and marking the space. The care for the biblical holy places and the prayers there are the essence of the life of these collectives in Jerusalem; accordingly, those places play a central role in their traditions, narratives, and material culture. It was not only images and words conveying the message, but also the materials used in the creation of the objects. Jewish artists and craftsmen chose local materials that could add to the emotional appeal of their work, such as olive-

553 Research on the debated question regarding the predominance of word over image in traditional Jewish art is very rich, and reflects developments in historiography of Jewish art. See, for example: Fine, “Lernen To See,” 24–35, esp. 27–34, remarking that the notion that Judaism is a “religion of the book” and not a “religion of the image” became a modern truism; Kalman P. Bland, The Artless Jew: Medieval and Modern Affirmations and Denials of the Visual (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001), whose position is concisely presented in the introduction; Carl S. Ehrlich, “‘Make yourself no graven image’: The Second Commandment and Judaism,” in Textures and Meaning: Thirty Years of Judaic Studies at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, ed. Leonard Ehrlich et al. (Department of Judaic and Near Eastern Studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2004), 254–271 (published electronically: https://www.academia.edu/20276337/_ Make_yourself_no_graven_image_The_Second_Commandment_and_Judaism_2004). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-007

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wood, dried flowers from the holy places, and the local material variously known as the Dead Sea, Bethlehem, or Moses stone. Beautifully crafted mother-of-pearl and silverwork added a noble look and material value to the object; gold, enamel, and precious stones were less common, for obvious economic reasons. The symbolism of local materials used in the creation of the objects more than sufficed. For example, taking the coffee set presented to Franz Joseph and his consort on their Silver Wedding Anniversary (figs. 1–2), and noting the excellently crafted plate and vase presented to the emperor by the Austrian Jerusalemite Perushim in 1853 (fig. 7), it is pertinent to add that the Dead Sea stone gained much popularity in the nineteenth century among Muslim, Christian, and Jewish craftsmen and customers; it was highly appreciated because it was considered a natural product of the Holy Land and, in addition, not easily obtained and rather hard to work, often defying the artist’s intentions, craftsmanship, and ideas. In fact, this is a black bitumen or tar-like stone found in the Dead Sea area and the Judaean Desert, on which engraved lines and inscriptions in a whitish color create a special decorative effect against the dark background. In contrast, olivewood and mother-ofpearl carvings are ancient handicrafts in Palestine that have never lost their popularity; in Christian art, the two latter media were revived by Franciscan artisanmonks in the region of Bethlehem in the sixteenth century, and by the nineteenth century had become a major industry practiced by Christian, Muslim, and Jewish craftsmen in Jerusalem, too. The variety of natural colors and tonal depth made olivewood objects very attractive, while mother-of-pearl was especially admired because of its translucence and iridescent colors, which were heightened by the use of various tints and a glossy finish. Mother-of-pearl is more costly than olivewood and its carving requires special training; therefore, it was much appreciated and often used by Old Yishuv craftsmen for luxurious objects. The Austro-Hungarian, and later also the Austro-Galician kolel, which used mother-of-pearl for inlays on olivewood in the various representative gifts known to us, must have been very proud of the expenses they invested—considering their limited financial resources—in order to create a gift fit for their emperor and king.

6.1 Gifts from Jerusalem’s Christians The sites and monuments of the Holy Land nurtured the ancient biblical past and kept their memories alive; they were perceived as eternally preserving the intrinsic sacredness of the place. This perception of the Jewish biblical sites was meaningful to Christians as well; consequently, despite differences in interpretations, the land and its holy places were reclaimed by followers of both faiths as their own heritage. Naturally, the presence of Jesus and his disciples was the most im-

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portant element for Christians, and therefore they lived primarily in Jerusalem, Bethlehem, and Nazareth. Similarly to Jewish communities and institutions, the Christian foundations also depended on assistance from abroad and donations from the many pilgrims that arrived in search of spiritual and earthly blessings. Therefore, artists and craftsmen, many of whom were members of religious orders, focused their activity on the flourishing market of mass pilgrimages, mainly during religious festivals,554 and tourists who included the Holy Land in their journey to the Orient. Artists also cooperated with religious orders and organizations hosting pilgrims or whose work was directed toward the establishment of humanitarian institutions for health care and education and the maintenance of religious institutions, such as churches, monasteries, and convents. Christian craftsmen developed small industries for the manufacture of relics, icons, souvenirs, postcards, maps, and books; in addition, monasteries and private individuals opened ateliers headed by talented artists who created precious objects for wealthy customers or objects to be presented by the various institutions to European royalty and other benefactors. The sanctity attributed to the Land of the Bible influenced the iconography of representative objects created by Jews, Christians, and Muslims. Naturally, the iconographic programs highlight the meaning and connection of each faith to venerated sites. Due to the cultic value of images in Christianity, its representative objects were often decorated with images of saints or scenes related to the New Testament and Christian traditions, all the more so when they contained relics. Parallels to these iconographic themes—biblical figures or scenes—are common to Old Yishuv objects, though in a rather limited repertoire; they appear in amulets, cultic and everyday household objects, and souvenirs, but not in the known gifts of the Habsburg kolelim to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs.555 Another common trait of gifts in the Christian and Jewish milieux are relevant texts that accompany the visual imagery, complementing and enriching each other. An illuminating example of similarities and differences, between objects created by Jewish and Christian artists in Palestine for a variety of customers, are albums displaying images or symbols of holy places created in a collage of dried local flowers complemented by photographs or drawings. One of these albums, presented to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee by the Sisters of the Most Holy

554 Yehoshua Ben-Arieh, Jerusalem as a Religious City (Jerusalem: World Zionist Organization, 1975), 22. 555 However, scenes like the Sacrifice of Isaac and the outcome of the story in the Book of Esther are popular in folk art.

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Rosary in Jerusalem,556 shows scenes related to the fifteen Mysteries of the Rosary made in the above-mentioned special technique. The images in this album were completed and refined by delicate drawings in pencil and watercolor, identified by a brief explanation in German and paired with a photograph of the corresponding holy place prepared by the prestigious Maison Bonfils photo studio. This and similar albums combine a folkloric art form with the attractive and relatively new medium—photography. Since this practice was based on local natural materials— flowers gathered at the holy places themselves—sites and scenes crafted in this technique were not only pleasing to the eye, but were also believed to have apotropaic powers. Therefore, the objects had a special religious and emotional value that surpassed by far their material worth. Similar albums of images made from dried local plants, mostly paired with written descriptions of the sites or short poems (instead of the more costly photographs), were produced by Jewish craftsmen and taken to the Diaspora by pilgrims and tourists, or sent by Jewish communities to generous donors. Just as in albums celebrating Christian holy places, the flowers in those albums honoring Jewish sites were gathered in their corresponding locations. In one of the albums that reached Vienna at the time, now kept in the Jewish Museum of that city,557 the flowers are arranged in decorative and symbolic shapes; for example, on the page dedicated to Mount Zion, the flowers and leaves create a Star of David and are accompanied by the verse “God shall bless thee out of Zion” (Psalm 128:5). Indeed, similar objects were often made by both religious communities and, moreover, craftsmen of one religious faith would sometimes work for another. However, this does not seem to have been the case with the gifts sent by the Old Yishuv subjects to Franz Joseph and Karl, because

556 ÖNB BA Reg.J./40. See Peter Karner, “Die Tradition der Toleranz – Kaiser Franz Joseph I. und die evangelischen Kirchen,” in Geschenke für das Kaiserhaus: Huldigungen an Kaiser Franz Joseph und Kaiserin Elisabeth, Österreichische Nationalbibliotek Wien (Vienna: Christian Brandstätter, 2007), fig. on p. 151. 557 The album was made by Aharon Zwebner, with poems by S. A. Günzburg, Jerusalem. See the Jewish Museum in Vienna (JMW 023638). Other examples can be found in various collections in Israel, for example, in the album “Flowers from the Holy Land / Pirchei Eretz HaKedosha” by Avraham Moshe Lunz, created c. 1896. The album has a fine olivewood binding with a relief depicting the Western Wall and the inscription “Jerusalem” in Hebrew letters framed by a variously-colored inlay pattern in wood—a common ornament in olivewood objects for all religious faiths. In the Lunz albums, which were produced in his printing house, the flowers are accompanied by a brief description, in Hebrew and another language, of the most important places. In albums of this kind, the thin card pages with collages of dried flowers are protected by interleaved pages of paper. On such albums by Lunz and other Jewish craftsmen, see Grayevsky, The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 20; and for other examples, see Iris Fishof and Noam Bar‘am-Ben Yossef, Souvenirs de Terre Sainte pour les pèlerins du XIXe et XXe siècle (Jerusalem: Israel Museum, 1996).

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both the visual and the literary imagery reveal a deep knowledge and understanding of Jewish traditions, which allowed craftsmen and writers to create them with much forethought. Another illustrative example of the uniqueness of representative objects made in the Holy Land and the particularities of those that met the needs of Jews —as opposed to those made for Christians—is the gift presented by the General Commissariat of the Franciscan Order on the occasion of Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee.558 The gift is an altarpiece and reliquary made in Bethlehem, displaying two important features that also appear in the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem—one, the essential reference to the holy places, which in the Christian cultic object is represented by a relic from the Grotto of the Milk in Bethlehem, protected and honored in a special compartment richly carved in mother-of-pearl, and the other, a depiction of the Last Supper in the Coenaculum in Jerusalem, made of the same material and in the same technique. The depiction of the Coenaculum refers to the gift-givers, the Friars Minor, who were installed on Mount Zion around 1336 by Robert of Anjou, King of Naples and titular King of Jerusalem, and his consort Sancha of Majorca, who purchased the site in 1333.559 The friars were evicted by the Ottomans in 1524, but by the time the reliquary was created and presented to Franz Joseph, Christian pilgrims were again allowed to visit the upper room believed to be the Coenaculum, with the strict stipulation that no devotion would be celebrated there. Nonetheless, the friars kept their identity as Guardians of Holy Mount Zion. The other feature common with the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim is a dedicatory text praising Franz Joseph as King of Jerusalem and benefactor of the Holy Land, which in the Christian reliquary is inscribed on an enamel and silver shield. Further embellished by an ornate frame and doors in gilded-bronze, in a traditional Baroque style, the altarpiece as a whole suited the design of cultic objects in most Christian chapels and churches at the time; were it not for the dedication, only a very close examination might reveal its origins in the Holy Land. As the importance of the holy places and their monuments was clear to Jews, Christians, and Muslims alike, representations of these sites appear in myriad objects. In the context of a gift exchange between dignitaries, Kâmil Pasha, Governor (mütesarrif, an administrative authority in the Ottoman empire) of Jerusalem, was well aware of the importance of the Christian holy places to the House of Habsburg-Lothringen. Therefore, he sent to Franz Joseph’s brother, Archduke Fer558 Kaiserliche Schatzkammer GS D 150. The altarpiece was presented in a decorated box together with a portrait of the monarch, now lost. 559 Arnald of Sarrant, Chronicle of the Twenty-Four Generals of the Order of Friars Minor (1369– 1374), trans. Noel Muscat (Malta: TAU Franciscan Communications, 2010), 469, n. 393.

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dinand Maximilian, who had made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in 1855, a precious scale model of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre made of olivewood with an intricate mother-of-pearl inlay. Such minutely detailed models can be disassembled to reveal the different parts of the church. Proving to be very prestigious and expensive, such models of sacred monuments were made between the seventeenth and the early twentieth centuries as gifts to European royalty and other benefactors, and were sold as souvenirs to wealthy pilgrims.560 The model presented to Ferdinand Maximilian was made by a craftsman from the Latin Quarter and the Austrian Consul, Count Josef von Pizzamano, reported that its excellent workmanship surpassed all expectations and the model faithfully reproduced even the smallest detail of the most sacred church.561 Models of Jewish monuments made in that technique are not known in Old Yishuv crafts. We know of a few models of Rachel’s Tomb made in limestone or cast in plaster by the Jerusalem Jewish craftsman Meir Rozin in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Models of Solomon’s Temple, Herod’s Temple, and Jerusalem in the Second Temple period were made in the 1890s by Johann Martin Tenz, a converted Jew, and models of the Temple, Muslim monuments on the Temple Mount, and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre were made by the Protestant archaeologist and architect Conrad R. Schick during those same years.562 However, all these models have a different character and purpose.

6.2 Gifts by Habsburg Jews in the Diaspora: Jewish and Local Iconography and Style Jewish choices of iconography and style as indicators of identity are varied and evoke ambivalence; they may reflect the difficulties that acculturated Jews in Vienna encountered when choosing a path, in view of the pressures to assimilate,

560 Only about thirty such wooden models of the Holy Sepulchre are known, made in different sizes and with varying degrees of refinement. See Rehav Rubin, “Relief Maps and Models in the Archives of The Palestine Exploration Fund in London,” Palestine Exploration Quarterly 138/1 (2006), 43–63, with further bibliography; Michele Piccirillo, La nuova Gerusalemme: artigianato palestinese al servizio dei Luoghi Santi, Studium Biblicum Franciscanum, Collectio maior, 51 (Bergamo: Edizioni Custodia di Terra Santa, 2007). 561 Dagmar Redl, “Die Reise von Erzherzog Ferdinand Maximilian ins Heilige Land 1855,” in Mit Szepter und Pilgerstab: österreichische Präsenz im Heiligen Land seit den Tagen Kaiser Franz Josephs, ed. Bernhard A. Böhler, Erzbischöfliches Dom- und Diözesanmuseum Wien, 5. Juli bis 2. September 2000 (Vienna: Österreichischer Wirtschaftsverlag, 2000), 151. 562 Rubin, “Relief Maps and Models,” 51, 53 for the models of Rachel’s Tomb .

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on the one hand, and the wish to project a particular Jewish religious and cultural identity, on the other. Simultaneous calls for assimilation, acculturation, and opposition to any change in traditions and norms also existed in other diasporas in various directions and in varying degrees, and differences between the gifts of the various communities reflect different motivations and aims, as well as degrees of adoption and adaptation of socio-cultural practices of the dominant culture in the countries in which they lived. Jewish communities in the Dual Monarchy, and similarly Old Yishuv communities in Jerusalem, were highly heterogeneous, but most if not all of them wished to express their appreciation, gratitude, and commitment to the monarch as perfectly compatible with their religious identity. Whether in monuments, epistles, gifts, and a variety of representative objects and acts, Jewish Habsburg subjects usually combined imperial and royal imagery with Jewish symbols. The texts written by Jewish communities in other diasporas also had common traits, which were based on the Bible and later Jewish pearls-of-wisdom and drew parallels between the monarch and the ideal biblical kings. Moreover, in translating God’s promises to the people of Israel to the Habsburg monarchs and their realms, Jewish Habsburg subjects affirmed that God would protect the continuity and prosperity of the imperial and royal house. Nevertheless, judging by the few known gifts from Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, there are also some differences: the Jewish communities of Jerusalem rewrote more sophisticatedly the biblical verses and sayings of the sages in order to thank, praise, and please the king.563 Another difference lies in the material value of the gifts: as noted, those presented by Jews in the Habsburg realms were usually more costly than those presented by the Old Yishuv, and may be commensurate with gifts presented by the dominant society both from a material and artistic point of view. It is noteworthy that a common practice of all communities, which found expression precisely in the differences between the artifacts created by them, is the integration of local motifs to better reflect their complex identities. Self-identities in the Habsburg realms were constructed in consideration of religious ideologies, loyalty to the monarch and, at the same time, to a particular nation, as well as closeness to one of the dominant cultures in the multinational and multiethnic empire. This strategy also characterizes offerings from Habsburg Jewish communities that settled outside the Dual Monarchy. Two clear examples of gifts from such communities that settled relatively close to Jerusalem are those 563 This is obviously a generalization. To mention but one example, briefly presented above, in his poem to Franz Joseph, Matitjahu Simha Rabener extensively quotes biblical verses and uses a sophisticated form of acrostics; see Bányai, “‘The Emperor’s Deliverance’,” 39–42. The texts in the Diaspora are variously written in Hebrew, the local language, and German.

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presented to Franz Joseph by the Jewish community of Egypt. One, a portfolio presented by the community in Alexandria to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth in 1879 on the occasion of their Silver Wedding Anniversary, is decorated with a frame of interlacing motifs that clearly reflect Islamic influence, while a Star of David in each corner, stylistically integrated into the ornamental pattern, conveys the Jewish identity of the gift-givers.564 The other is a scroll of the Book of Esther presented by the Jewish Habsburg community of Egypt to the emperor on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee (fig. 33), in which the silver and enamel scroll-case as well as the dedication preceding the biblical story are delicately decorated with ornamental motifs recalling architectural decoration in ancient Egypt—a contemporary Egyptian Revival style, which we saw in the dedications of the gifts from the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem to Karl I/IV, created by the Bezalel artist Shmuel Ben-David;565 the text of the dedication of the 1898 gift from the Jewish community in Egypt praises the monarch who wisely leads his peoples and protects his Jewish subjects, and asks God to bless him; however, in contrast to all the dedication texts sent to Franz Joseph by the Old Yishuv in Jerusalem, this dedication is not based on quotations of biblical verses. Naturally, Jewish communities in Palestine and the Diaspora adopted local motifs; but Christian Habsburg subjects living abroad did so as well. To offer but one example in the same geo-political and cultural area and period, the AustroHungarian community in Alexandria presented a skillfully designed and crafted gift to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary566—a portfolio beautifully decorated with motifs based on stylized papyrus flowers made of blue, green, and white enamel, and embellished with gilded ornaments.

Gifts by Jewish Institutions in the Habsburg Realms How were Jewish identities in the Habsburg realms defined through their gifts? How did those gift-givers assert their identification with and belonging to the monarchy, and, at the same time, their cultural differences? Gifts by Jewish institutions in the Habsburg realms to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs, as those of the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects and Jewish institutions in Jerusalem, were usually decorated with symbols of the monarchy and Jewish symbols, integrating imagery and styles common in the visual culture of the dominant society to demonstrate shared cultural platforms. Therefore, many ob-

564 ÖNB Bildarchiv 34447/750. 565 ÖNB Bildarchiv Reg. J./56. 566 ÖNB Bildarchiv 34447/751.

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jects of acculturated Jews in the Dual Monarchy incorporated allegorical figures and naked putti taken from the Classical repertoire common in the West at the time, and depicted views of the Habsburg lands where the gift-givers settled, as well as establishments such as synagogues and charitable institutions that the Jewish community founded there. The allegorical figures, some of which are barely dressed, reflect essential differences between acculturated Jews living in centers of the Austrian Empire and Orthodox communities, more so with regard to the strictly Orthodox communities of the Old Yishuv of Jerusalem. Thus, in view of the heterogeneity of Jewish communities, the appearance of nude putti, and the scarcity, minimal perceptibility, or even absence of Jewish symbols in gifts, such as that presented by the Shomer Israel Association to Franz Joseph in 1873, on occasion of his Silver Jubilee,567 should not surprise us. The Shomer Israel Association, whose name means “Guardian of Israel,” was a faction of a highly acculturated movement in Galicia that was active in the second half of the nineteenth century and favored a German cultural orientation; it was organized in 1869 in response to the intensified political activity among the Jews following the Austrian constitution of 1867 and the prospects of emancipation that it brought. The heterogeneity of Jewish communities, and the concomitant conflicts between them, is clearly illuminated by a gift of the Israelite Theological Institute in Vienna (Israelitischtheologische Lehranstalt), one of whose aims was the scientific study of Judaism—a goal that placed it in the area of conflict between traditional Judaism, which set limits in the belief in research, and liberal Judaism. On the occasion of Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee, this institute presented a congratulatory blessing, richly decorated with floral motifs and, on top of the parchment, the Tables of the Law—the cornerstone of Judaism—standing on a large book; a pair of heraldic female angels holding palm branches hovers at the sides and above the Tables of the Law, and raises the Austrian crown—an element that reflects the gap between these two ideological branches of Judaism.568 In a similar spirit, clearly wishing to convey their successful acculturation, a variety of classical figures appears in the richly decorated congratulatory epistles sent by the Jewish Community of Bohemia to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary.569 The epistles were set in a box designed in the shape of a book, whose cover is decorated with a seal bearing the initials of the imperial

567 ÖNB Bildarchiv, *2244/267; Joshua Shanes, Diaspora Nationalism and Jewish Identity in Habsburg Galicia (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012), 41–45. 568 ÖNB Bildarchiv Reg. J./51. The parchment sheets were presented in a cardbox covered with leather and ornamented with castings and precious stones. 569 ÖNB Bildarchiv 34447/399.

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Fig. 61: Jewish Community of Bohemia, gift to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth on their Silver Wedding Anniversary, 1879. Vienna, ÖNB 34447/399.

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couple, surrounded by decorative flowers and laurel wreaths populated by nude putti. Most impressive is the full-page Classicist decoration on one of the sheets (fig. 61), of five large figures, some reminiscent of biblical figures as depicted at the time, praising the imperial couple, which is represented by their busts set on high pedestals and adorned with a large Austrian heraldic shield on front; in addition, a pair of Classical figures, typical of Roman and Neo-Classicist architectural decoration and appropriately depicted in the grisaille technique, rests on the extrados of the gate of honor that frames the scene and presents laurel wreaths to the Austrian crown set on top of the gate. The Jewish identity of the gift-givers is conveyed by a shield decorated with a Star of David at the foot of the pedestals and Tables of the Law on the front of the socle. Garlands and leaf wreaths symbolizing victory, wisdom and glory complete the decoration. This design, well adapted to the royal visual language, would be at odds with the Old Yishuv. Our last, but not a less striking, example of the adoption of classicist figures to convey the dual identity of the acculturated gift-givers, is the design of the album cover presented to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee by this same community. It features a pair of nude putti supporting an elaborate frame that highlights an image of the Tables of the Law set on clouds, with bursting rays of golden heavenly light (fig. 62).570 Although the heavy Neo-Baroque style, popular in the Habsburg Court,571 was adopted by the artists of the dedicatory inscriptions on the gifts of the Jerusalemite Austro-Galician kolel in 1898 and 1908, no similar figures appear in them or in other representative objects created by or for the Old Yishuv prior to the noticeable and not self-evident change in the gift presented by this kolel to Karl I/IV on his coronation as King of Hungary (fig. 24). This was an exceptional period in the history of Jerusalem, and even in that context it is difficult to explain how Old Yishuv leaders approved this Bezalel design, as noted in the examination of this artifact. An interesting example of places sacred to Jews and Jewish local monuments, in gifts presented by Jews in the Dual Monarchy, is the dedication of a beautifully ornamented album offered to Franz Joseph by the Jewish community of Czernowitz (Bukovina) on the occasion of the monarch’s Golden Jubilee (fig. 63).572 It shows an image of the local synagogue, which was built between 1873 and 1878 in the Moorish Revival style, the architectural design of which was intended to recall

570 ÖNB Bildarchiv, Reg. J./59; Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser,” fig. on p. 129. 571 As Shapira notes, Neo-Baroque was the “official” style of the monarchy and the Catholic Church, even though the “Renaissance” in Vienna in the second half of the nineteenth century identified Italian Renaissance and Neo-Classical elements as the style to be developed in the city. See her Style and Seduction, chap. 1: The Historicists – 1860s–1870s, esp. 30–55 and note on p. 48. 572 ÖNB Bildarchiv, Reg. J./62.

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Fig. 62: Jewish Community of Bohemia, gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./59.

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Fig. 63: Jewish Community of Czernowitz (Bukovina), gift to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./62.

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the Temple of Solomon as imagined by architects searching for the “authentic” ancient Jewish style at the time.573 This architectural approach differs completely from the practice of representing the Temple Mount, or the Temple itself, by the image of the Dome of the Rock that was current in Jerusalem. This same page also features a large allegorical figure of Austria as well as heraldry, the Austrian crown, and a Star of David. A second example, perhaps the richest and most illustrative, is the portfolio presented by the Jewish community of Vienna to Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and Stephanie of Belgium in 1881, on the occasion of their wedding—a gift that certainly constitutes a tribute to Franz Joseph (fig. 64).574 The artist neatly crafted the monuments and the fine ornaments that enhance the casing in ground glass and silver casting, set on a black-velvet surface. He created a large and very delicate silver and golden frame in the schematic shape of a domed structure that houses in its center an image of the Leopoldstädter Tempel—the largest synagogue in Vienna; above it, inside the dome of the architectural frame, we see the interior of the Stadttempel, the main synagogue in the city.575 At the bottom of this frame are three charitable institutions: a house for widows, a hospital, and a hospice. Silver-casted floral motifs decorate and highlight the architectural frame and the four corners of the cover, which feature four more charitable institutions: a childcare house, an orphanage, an institute for the deaf, and another for the blind. What better way to present these institutions, which were dedicated to Franz Joseph, as a contribution to the prosperity and glory of his kingdom? Over the years, the monarch’s court linked loyalty with donations to national projects. In 1898, Franz Joseph thanked social benefactors, proclaiming that no homage gives him more joy than acts of charity.576 Conse573 On the synagogue, see Julian Zachariewicz, “Israelitischer Tempel in Czernowitz,” Allgemeine Bauzeitung 47 (1882), 48–49, ills. 28–32, quoted by Sergey R. Kravtsov, “Jewish Identities in Synagogue Architecture of Galicia and Bukovina,” Ars Judaica 6 (2010), 94, figs. 19–20. As noted, in many European Jewish circles the so-called Moorish style was intended to point to romantic, idealized, Oriental origins of the Jewish people, with the unfounded hope of convincing Christians of the nobility of their Oriental blood. Actually, the Islamic elements were mainly decorative motifs; perhaps the only structural elements adapted from the “Orient” was the slender pillars with floral and vegetal capitals, and these, too, were often made of iron, using the latest Western methods of construction; see Kalmar, “Moorish Style,” esp. 69–72, 77; Rudolf Klein, “OrientalStyle Synagogues in Austria-Hungary,” 118–119, 121–132. Synagogues in this style were also built in Bohemia and other realms of Austria-Hungary, as well as in other European regions. 574 ÖNB Bildarchiv, Adr. Dep./32; see also Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser,” figs. on pp. 130–131. The drawings were made by Louis Pompejus. 575 The Stadttempel, also called the Seitenstettengasse Temple, was built by the Viennese architect Josef Georg Kornhäusel, in 1824–1826, and the Leopoldstädter Tempel was designed by the prestigious Viennese architect Leopold Föster and built in 1854–1858. 576 Brix, “Geschenke für den Mythos,” 53; see also Unowsky, Pomp and Politics, 116–120, 141.

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Fig. 64: Jewish Community of Vienna, gift to Crown Prince Rudolph of Austria and Princess Stephanie of Belgium on their wedding, 1881. Vienna, ÖNB Adr. Dep./32.

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quently, the Jews’ philanthropic foundations responded to the emperor’s perception of civic virtue, and expressed the pride of well-off acculturated families and social circles for their integration into the general society, as well as their gratitude to the monarch for making it legally possible. The foundations also conveyed the donors’ pride on their good deeds in accordance with Jewish religious and social tenets. Because any such project required the permission of the monarch, expressions of praise and gratitude were essential. The architectural design of the monuments depicted in this object has an additional symbolic value and, moreover, discloses the search of Jews for a positive dual identity at the time. All of the buildings, except for the Leopoldstädter Tempel,577 built in the Moorish Revival style meant to represent the noble Oriental roots of the Jewish people, were designed in the eclectic Classicist style popular in Vienna at the time—two or threestoried buildings, symmetrically divided into wings subordinated to and focusing attention on the larger central part, rich in architectural elements and ornaments such as columns, architraves, balconies, and ceremonial stairs. In this way, “Jewish architecture” became part of the Austrian narrative and an expression of the integration of Jews into the general society.578 As Shapira notes, “to expand the limitations of ‘Jewishness’ and embody a Jewish self-identification, it was crucial for the Jewish patron to exhibit good taste. In this way he could claim authority.”579 In Vienna, around the end of the nineteenth century, good taste among the Jewish community meant discretion and lack of ostentation, impressive but not extravagant buildings, an elegant styling of the body, and socially correct manners—to be a man of the world but a Jew at home. Thus, the monuments built by the community in Vienna, and the magnificent look and material value of the

577 The Leopoldstädter Temple is exceptional in this respect. Ludwig Förster designed it in the Moorish Revival style popular in synagogues at the time. The tripartite façade of the Leopoldstädter, with its tall central section flanked by lower wings on each side, became the model for numerous Moorish Revival synagogues, such as the Zagreb Synagogue, the Spanish Synagogue in Prague, the Tempel Synagogue in Kraków, and the Templul Coral in Bucharest; see Björn Siegel, “The Temple in Leopoldstadt and Its Function in Habsburg Vienna: The Role of History in Fashioning Jewish Modernity,” Austrian Studies 24 (2016), 109–123. The synagogue was destroyed by the Nazis in the shocking Kristallnacht on 10 November, 1938. 578 For buildings built by Jews in Vienna at the time, see Markus Kristan, “Jewish Ringstrasse Principals and Architects,” in Ringstrasse: Ein jüdischer Boulevard (= A Jewish Boulevard), ed. Gabriele Kohlbauer-Fritz (Vienna: Almathea and Jüdisches Museum Wien, 2015), 59–88, as well as images in other contributions to this richly illustrated catalogue of the exhibition at the Jewish Museum in Vienna. See also Shapira, Style and Seduction, and her introduction in Design Dialogue. The residential houses in the Ringstrasse and its surroundings expressed the Jews’ pride and asserted their presence and influence in Vienna. 579 Eadem, Style and Seduction, 7–8.

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gift to Crown Prince Rudolf, clearly convey the pride of the patrons in their achievements and contribution to the blossoming of the city and, consequently, their proud self-identities. Not just historicist styles were adopted by craftsmen who created gifts to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs. Architects, artists, and designers, or the clients who commissioned the works, also chose avant-garde styles such as the Secession and Modernism, as well as new iconographic interpretations. Shapira remarks that if Jewish patrons of historicism were considering how far they could stretch the limitations of Jewish identity without provoking anger and challenges to their authority, Jewish patrons of Modernism were refashioning their Jewish identity as a modern statement of Otherness and progressive culture.580 A special example of an original iconography based on Jewish tradition, via the adoption of the Secessionist style—which in many circles was still considered innovative although at the time, 1916, it had already reached its peak and was declining—is the dedication of a gift to Karl upon his accession to the throne, presented by the Israelite Association of Holiday Resorts for Needy Children (Izraelita Szünidei Gyermektelep Egyesület), centered in Budapest.581 The foundation aimed to provide a vacation in the countryside to poverty-stricken Jewish children. The congratulatory text, beautifully decorated by Salamon Seelenfreund,582 is arranged over three sheets of parchment. The decoration of the first sheet (fig. 65) is organized in a heraldic composition that shows a pair of large, winged, hybrid beings standing on twisted columns traditionally known as Solomonic columns. The figures, possibly cherubs whose upper torso is that of a man and lower body is that of an animal, hold lighted menorot designed as Trees of Life as well as a garland of laurel leaves; at the foot of each menorah stands a pair of birds that might be stylized doves.583 The frame of this page is decorated with a pattern created by pairing the Hebrew letter kuf, which corresponds to the Latin letter “k,”

580 Ibid., 13. 581 ÖNB K. Karl/25, catalogued as Israelitischer Ferien-Kolonien Verein Budapest. The congratulatory text, written on two parchment pages, was presented in a case made of cardboard and wood, with silver plated corner protectors and a closure, beautifully decorated with fabric, painted ornaments, and the initials of Karl and Zita. 582 Salamon Seelenfreund was born in Szentes, Hungary, in 1875. He studied art, worked in Budapest, and traveled to Rome, Paris, and Germany for further studies in graphics arts. In 1921, he immigrated to Palestine and Hebraized his name to Shlomo Yedidya. He died in Tel Aviv in 1961. Yedidya was an artist of the Hebrew letter par excellence; see Timna Rubinger, “Shlomo Yedidya – Seelenfreund Salamon,” Baderech (Memorial Museum of Hungarian Speaking Jewry, Safed) . 583 For a brief review of the dove’s symbolism in Judaism, see .

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Fig. 65: Salamon Seelenfreund, for the Israelite Association of Holiday Resorts for Needy Children, Budapest, gift to Karl I/IV on his accession to the throne of Hungary, 1916. Vienna, ÖNB K. Karl/25, page 1.

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with its mirror image and the sign for the vowel “a” decoratively appearing between them;584 the “ka” motif alternates with a decorative element based on the Tables of the Law. The background of this page is also decorated with a motif of interlacing Hebrew letters, in this case the letter mem, which corresponds to the Latin letter “m” and derives its name from the Hebrew word mayim, water. In the Kabbala, the ancient Jewish tradition of mystical interpretation of the Hebrew Bible, the letter mem symbolizes the power of life, creation, and renovation; it also symbolizes God’s kingdom, the visible and the hidden.585 Therefore, the motif perfectly suits the figurative decoration of cherubim holding menorot as the Tree of Life and standing on Solomonic columns representing the Temple. Owing to the lack of information on the iconography of this work, and in light of the historical context, the pattern created with the Hebrew letter kuf and the sign for the vowel “a” may probably refer to Karl, as the first words of the dedication—Kaiser and Apostolic King of Hungary—and the letter mem may have been chosen by the artist not only because of its kabbalistic meaning, but also as the first letter of the Hebrew word melech, “king,” which would suit the historical occasion, the coronation of the new King of Hungary. As befitting the Jewish interpretation of Hebrew letters, my reading remains open to additional elucidations. The frame of the second page is similar to that of the first, but the artist painted a seemingly decorative motif that alternates with the kuf motif. The frame of the third and last page is decorated with the letter kuf for the name Karl, this time alternating with the Hebrew letter tzadi, for Zita; the pattern of the tzadi creates an ivy leaf, or perhaps a heart, in the center, which may have a rich religious and royal symbolic meaning. The signatures of the institution’s representatives appear on this last page. The cover of the portfolio displays the Latin letters “K” and “Z,” for Karl and Zita, in a monogram, and the corresponding Hebrew letters kuf and tzadi graphically designed. Well acquainted and identified with the Jewish national revival, Seelenfreund saw a definite Jewish artistic expression in the Hebrew letter and combined it with Jewish symbols in vast and complex arrays of decorative patterns.

584 The sign for the vowel “a” turns the letter “k” into “ka.” 585 The Hebrew letters contain three dominant hidden qualities that, within Rabbinic tradition, support Judaic allegories. One is the names of the letters, which possess related meanings; another is the numerical value associated to them (gematria), which in the context of the Torah reveals unforeseen associations; and the third—the importance of the form and proportion of the letters due to concepts inherent within them. See Jeremy Aranoff, “Torah, the Quintessential Blueprint: An Approach to Contemporary Jewish Architecture,” MA Thesis (Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, 2012), 3 .

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The congratulatory text in the Israelite Association for Needy Children’s gift comprises a blessing to His Most Gracious Highness the Emperor and King Karl, which includes a request to allow the foundation to honor one of its institutions by giving it the names of the king and his consort, “the Most Gracious of Queens.” The greetings and petition are humbly submitted by the association’s members, who, in March 1917, sign as the emperor-king’s most loyal subjects. As noted, when discussing the significance of gift-giving, the consent of the monarch would be appreciated as a precious reward. The choice of the Secessionist style, particularly when integrating Oriental elements and Jewish motifs, may have been an attempt to make the Jewish identification fashionable, bringing past and present together; this attempt may have stood behind what some Jewish circles expressed as the—as noted, imagined—noble roots of the Jewish people in the magnificent ancient Orient. This same strategy was adopted by Shmuel Ben-David at about the same time for the decoration of the dedications of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim to Karl I/IV. The religious ambience in Seelenfreund’s work is stronger than that of Ben-David, but, in contrast to the texts of the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, biblical references do not play a central role in the Budapest congratulatory text. In our context, the two typical examples of the depiction of the destroyed Temple in gifts of Jewish Habsburg subjects in Austria-Hungary—in the congratulatory text presented by the Israelite Association for Needy Children and in that of the Jewish Community of Czernowitz—display imaginary reconstructions of the most sacred Jewish monument, whereas a review of the known objects presented to Franz Joseph and Karl by Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem shows that artists from the Old Yishuv, or those working for it, consistently chose the image of the Muslim Dome of the Rock to represent it or, rather, its site. Moreover, the presence of sites venerated by Jews in the Holy City and its surroundings on gifts to the two monarchs remains an essential identifier of the Old Yishuv.

6.3 Gifts by Austrian Jewish Philanthropic Foundations in Jerusalem Special gifts to Franz Joseph are those presented by institutions founded by Austrian Jewish philanthropists in Jerusalem. Acculturated Jews who integrated into the general society and became main players in the centers of finance and power in the West established hospitals, hospices, and institutions in the Land of Israel/Palestine. By assisting the needy and training those able to work in various skills, they were expected to mitigate, in time, the harsh economic conditions that affected the lives of their brethren. As noted, emancipated Jews generally disap-

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proved of the ultra-Orthodox communities’ rejection of general education, which would allow them to relinquish the practice of living off handouts, and endeavored to heal what they saw as social ills of the Old Yishuv.586 In practice, this meant a clear preference for providing assistance by founding humanitarian and educational institutions rather than giving alms and donations for daily subsistence, thereby enabling that population to engage in productive work and move away from generational poverty and dependence.587 There were several and different incentives for the activities of Jewish philanthropists in Europe and Palestine. Assistance to their brethren was a clear and highly visible expression of religious virtue, in the spirit of the precept mentioned above that commands every Jew to “open thine hand wide unto thy brother, to thy poor, and to thy needy, in thy land.” What means and strategies could they use to integrate this religious precept with expectations from the Habsburg monarch for foundations and other sorts of donations to national projects, including charitable institutions? As noted, philanthropic foundations not only improved the standard of living of the monarch’s subjects; they also had a real material and highly perceivable presence in the landscapes of his realms that enhanced his prestige as supporting social projects for the welfare of his peoples. Notable contributions by Jews in the Habsburg realms might have been a useful response to their own delicate situation, in view of growing antisemitism in Germany and Austria, which by the end of the nineteenth century could no longer be ignored. Their contribu-

586 Ben-Ghedalia, “European Jewish Philanthropy,” 15–16, 31–33, 162; idem, “Empowerment: Tzedakah, Philanthropy and Inner-Jewish Shtadlanut,” Jewish Culture and History 19/1 (2018), 73–75. See also above, esp. chap. 1.3, pp. 42–49. 587 Consequently, the Old Yishuv had to emphasize the self-sacrifice of its members in the name of study and prayer in the Land of Israel; they also begged for solidarity and support according to religious precepts of charity. The dramatic, often desperate, pleas kept a diminishing flow of relief coming in, but were accompanied more and more by resentment for people who would not work to sustain themselves. Another significant challenge was set by the Zionist New Yishuv, which offered the Diaspora an alternative way of implementing the precept to settle the Land of Israel and recreate the Jewish nation by working the earth and engaging in productive work; see Bartal, “The ‘Old’ and the ‘New’ Yishuv,” 3–19. This vast modernization process included the first school for Jewish girls, founded in 1854 and later named in memory of Evelina de Rothschild, and in that same year the Meir (Mayer) Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem, both of which were established by Dr. Albert Cohen on behalf of the Rothschild family; the establishment of centers for training farmworkers for the Yishuv (1855); the Lämel School (1856), with the support of Austria; the construction of the first gristmill in the new Jewish neighborhood of Mishkenot Sha’ananim (1857); the agricultural school of Mikveh Israel (1875); infirmaries and other charitable institutions, printing presses, small industries, and weaving mills. Initiatives mainly came from Austrian, French, and British Jewish organizations.

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tions also allowed them to display their patriotism while retaining their ethnic and religious identities. Independent of the general reticence of Orthodox circles to any change in their norms, which even led them to avoid humanitarian institutions, virtuous deeds would earn benefactors merits and blessings in the heavenly and earthly realms; besides fulfilling religious tenets, the display of the donors’ names on the façades of institutions, which in many cases were also named after them, would enhance their status both in the Jewish communities and in society generally. Philanthropic activities benefit donors in all these aspects because their deeds reaffirm the elements of reciprocity that are part of gift-giving. Yet, would it be possible to incorporate contributions to their brethren in the ancient homeland into the philanthropic deeds expected by the court? Due to the special religious and political importance of the Holy City against the background of the Peaceful Crusades foundations in Jerusalem would be considered a major contribution to the prestige of the European monarchy that extended them its protection. In this sense, Jewish philanthropists operating in Jerusalem may be seen as agents of the empire, because in a European context Jerusalem had become an arena of inter-power rivalries: conflicting religious and political interests of the European powers had turned the real and imagined Holy City into the object of contest, arguments, discord, clashes, and international diplomatic manipulation. Consequently, Jewish philanthropic foundations should also be seen as stemming from the interests of liberal Jewish circles in Europe in gaining legitimization as loyal citizens, who demonstrate their patriotism by promoting the interests of their specific monarch in Palestine. Moreover, the rivalry between the European powers brought about a parallel contest between successfully emancipated Jewish families and organizations for a trans-national political leadership of the Jewish community that philanthropy had built.588 Already in 1856, Ludwig August Frankl wrote, in his itinerary Nach Jerusalem! (To Jerusalem!), a significant analysis that illustrates the contest for power in the Jewish philanthropic world of his day: [Jewish public opinion] probably examined the [Lämel] endowment from a socio-political viewpoint as well. Just as America was represented in the Holy Land through Touro’s bequest, England through Sir Moses Montefiore, France through the Rothschild family, by promoting charity among their Jewish co-religionists; so too from Austria, whose monarch has

588 Matthias B. Lehmann, “‘A New Book in Jewish Affairs Begins’: Maurice de Hirsch and the Waning Power of Jewish Philanthropy at the Fin-de-Siècle,” Journal of Modern Jewish Studies 17/4 (2018), 474, 480–483; Ben-Ghedalia, “Empowerment,” esp. 75.

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more Jewish subjects in the Holy City than Christians, material beneficence and spiritual elevation should now arrive.589

Ben-Ghedalia remarks that this passage portrays Jewish philanthropy as part of European interests in the East, a kind of internal Diaspora colonialism, with the wealthy Jewish communities of the West acting as Jewish powers through the philanthropists.590 In this socio-political position, acculturated Jewish philanthropists may have perceived their pious acts as a “civilizing” mission in a colonialist sense; in effect, the meeting between these two societies was rough, each rejecting the ideology and lifestyles of the other. Philanthropic acts ultimately meant self-empowerment for both the European powers and the Jewish donors—in our context, the Habsburg monarch and the Austrian Jewish philanthropists—as well as benefits for the Old Yishuv population, despite the fact that central figures resisted changes in its norms and customs.

6.3.1 The Gift of the Lämel School Two gifts are known to have been sent to Franz Joseph by Jewish philanthropic institutions in Jerusalem that were established under the auspices of Austria, both on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee. One, a book sent by the Simon Edler von Lämel School, and the other—a congratulatory epistle sent by the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital. Both institutions were honored by a visit from Franz Joseph during his stay in Jerusalem and by a portrait of the monarch. Lämel was the first modern Jewish school in Jerusalem. Its original aims reflect the idealistic ideology and praxis of Jewish philanthropy in the Habsburg Monarchy since the mid-nineteenth century. The school was established in memory of the Viennese industrialist and philanthropist Simon Edler von Lämel at the initiative of his daughter, Elisa Herz-Lämel (1788–1868), who obtained the assistance of Ludwig August Frankl, secretary of the Jewish Community of Vienna (Is-

589 Yochai Ben-Ghedalia (“‘To Worship the Rising Sun of Austria’: Ludwig August Frankl’s Mission to Jerusalem (1856),” in From the Habsburgs to Central Europe: The Centers of Austrian and Central European Studies, ed. Arnold Suppan and Richard Lein, Europa Orientalis, 6 [Vienna and Berlin: LIT, 2008]: 112), quoting Ludwig August Frankl, Nach Jerusalem, I (Leipzig: Baumgärtner, 1858), 10–11. 590 Ben-Ghedalia, “‘To Worship the Rising Sun’.”

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raelitische Kultusgemeinde Wien). In a politically wise move, Herz-Lämel placed the school under the auspices of Franz Joseph, in celebration of his twenty-fifth birthday, and took care to note that the Habsburg emperor bore the title “King of Jerusalem.”591 Originally envisioned to educate children of Habsburg subjects regardless of their religion and sex, it was founded in 1856 with the purpose not only of improving the standard of living of the relevant population, but also of turning them into devoted subjects of the Austrian emperor. As Louise Hecht remarks, Elisa Herz-Lämel insinuated that her Jewish allegiance to Jerusalem was a shared imperial interest, and therefore entrusted the Austrian Consul in Jerusalem, Josef von Pizzamano, with the supervision of the institution. This clever political move, adds Hecht, not only meant that the donor had incorporated her Jewish attachment to Jerusalem into her Austrian patriotism, but also that the school received public recognition and was subject to state control in administrative and financial matters, a status that would ensure its continued existence.592 Indeed, this idealistic liberal ideology was fiercely opposed by the very conservative Orthodox Jewish community in mid-nineteenth-century Jerusalem as well as in Vienna and, consequently, the original utopian plan was transformed into a realistic one—a school for Jewish boys.593 The only decoration of the book offered by the Lämel School to Franz Joseph, which was written in Hebrew and German, is a large image of the Austrian heraldic symbol carved on the front of its olivewood jacket.594 There is no documentation on the case that probably housed and protected the book and, judging by the extant artifacts sent to the emperor, it might have been decorated with images of sites in Jerusalem that were sacred to Jews, as well as Habsburg symbols.

591 Louise Hecht, “‘The Servant of Two Masters’. Jewish Agency for Austrian Culture in the Orient before the Era of Emancipation,” Austrian Studies 24 (2016), 13–15; Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” esp. 22–28. 592 Louise Hecht, “‘The Servant of Two Masters’,” 14. In 1888, the management of the school was transferred to a German Jewish philanthropic society, and in 1910, to the Hilfsverein der Deutschen Juden, a German-Jewish relief association. 593 Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 23, 25–27; idem, “‘To Worship the Rising Sun’,” 106–108; moreover, the school was attended only by Sephardi boys. See also Israel Bartal, “On the Multiethnic Image of Jewish Society in Jerusalem in the Nineteenth Century,” Pe‘amim 57 (1993), 117–118 (Hebrew). 594 It is kept at the National Library of Vienna, ÖNB BA Reg.J./194. The dedication is signed by the director of the school, Ephraim Cohn. On the Lämel School, see Ben-Ghedalia, “‘To Worship the Rising Sun’,” esp. 105–108, 110.

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6.3.2 The Gift of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital: A Singular Identity The other gift, the greeting epistle sent by the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, features an interesting figurative decoration. One of the first hospitals established in Jerusalem by Jewish benefactors, it was originally founded in the Old City of Jerusalem in 1854 by James Mayer de Rothschild of Paris, who, along with his four brothers, had been bestowed with the hereditary title of baron by Emperor Franz I of Austria in 1822. Although named in memory of his father, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, at the inauguration the hospital was dedicated to Franz Joseph,595 who placed it under his auspices and saw in it a statement of his presence and influence in the Holy City. Similar to several congratulatory homages by Jews in the Dual Monarchy—including those noted here, the gift by the Viennese Jewish community to Crown Prince Rudolf and Princess Stephanie on their wedding (fig. 64) and the one presented to Franz Joseph by the Jewish community of Czernowitz in Bukovina on the occasion of his Golden Jubilee (fig. 63)—the Rothschild Hospital epistle is decorated with an image of the institution (fig. 66); moreover, images of the hospital’s two façades, together with icons of holy places in Jerusalem, decorate the carved olivewood case in which the epistle was presented (figs. 67–68). The epistle and the case also include Austro-Hungarian heraldic symbols.

595 Idem, “European Jewish Philanthropy,” 145–147; Norbert Schwake, “Medical Services in Jerusalem during the Late Ottoman Period,” in The History of Jerusalem: The Late Ottoman Period, 1800–1917, ed. Israel Bartal and Haim Goren (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2010), 292 (Hebrew). The project was directed by Dr. Albert Cohen (1814–1877). Albert Cohen was born in Pressburg, then part of the Austrian Empire, and as a physician and Orientalist with much philanthropic experience, he became director of the Jewish Relief Committee of Paris and the representative of the French branch of the Rothschild family. The institutions established by Cohen were commonly presented as French achievements, yet they were established with Franz Joseph’s support and the whole process was closely accompanied by the Austrian Consul in Jerusalem, not by his French counterpart; see Ben-Ghedalia, “Habsburgs and the Jewish Philanthropy,” 17–20.

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Fig. 66: Jerusalem, Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, 1898. Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96.

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Fig. 67: Abraham Keller, receptacle of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital epistle (detail: façade of the hospital looking to Rav Kook St.). Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96.

Fig. 68: Abraham Keller, receptacle of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital epistle (detail: façade of the hospital looking to Nevi’im St.). Vienna, ÖNB Reg. J./96.

The Epistle: Jewish, Local Arab, and Viennese Traditions in the Orient Several questions arise from the original and suggestive decoration of the epistle, such as, how was the epistle featured and presented as recognition not only of the benevolence of the monarch but also of his power and authority? Such references to the monarch, whose ideal identity was being carefully constructed by the Austrian court and the Church at the time, would further secure an ongoing relationship with the hospital and the empire’s legal assistance. Not least, what would the epistle mean regarding a positive dual identity of Habsburg Jewish philanthropists and the contribution of their institutions in Jerusalem to that perception? As in many decorated epistles from Jerusalem, a gate of honor structures the visual imagery and the text. A small drawing of the hospital, close to its actual ap-

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pearance and identified by its symbol, appears on the left spandrel of the painted gate; it is depicted against a clear and bright sky-blue background and enclosed in a frame shaped as a schematic domed structure, which may have been intended to visually highlight the neo-Classicist Austrian building while pointing to its setting in the Oriental space; indeed, behind and beside the hospital’s image in its suggestive frame, the artist painted an imaginary Oriental cityscape of a domed building, minarets, and palm trees. The coats-of-arms of Austria and Hungary, set on palm branches that in this context symbolize victory and glory, crown the arched opening of the gateway; the years of Franz Joseph’s reign until this point, 1848 to 1898, are written on the right spandrel. The hospital depicted in the blessing is the one inaugurated in 1888 in a new and impressive building in the New City outside the walls, and not the original and much smaller hospital established in 1854 in the Old City. The new hospital was designed by the Jerusalemite architect Alexei Franghia in the eclectic neo-Classicist style popular in Vienna at the time—the heart of the empire that placed it under its auspices and whom it honored. It is a symmetrical building with a higher central body emphasized by its gabled roof, receding side-wings, elaborate stairs, balconies, and rich Classicist architectural ornaments. We can point to parallel institutions in Austria designed in a similar style, such as the hospital depicted in the gift of the Viennese Jewish community to Crown Prince Rudolf and Princess Stephanie on their wedding day (fig. 64). As noted, from the early 1860s, after Jews were given the right to settle and own land in Vienna, and following the declaration of equal rights in 1867, Jewish patrons favored and supported already renowned and avant-garde architects and designers in the process of changing aesthetic norms and achieving recognition in the commercial market; moreover, Jewish patrons commissioned these architects to design and furnish their new palaces and institutions that they founded according to established as well as trendy styles. As discussed above, the special design served as an expression of the patron’s integration into Viennese society and his contribution to its culture. Choosing to retain aspects of Jewish culture while consciously restyling their way of life, the acculturated Jews of Vienna created models for identity and self-identity that allowed them to claim access, acceptance, and even influence in the dominant society.596 Behind the architectural design of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital in Jerusalem stands a political strategy current in the nineteenth- and early twentieth-century European milieu in the Holy City: the European powers built churches, mon-

596 Shapira (Style and Seduction, esp. 2–9, 222) adds that their designs exhibited the dialectical process of representing themselves in Vienna and demonstrate their ability to cross frontiers as a survival tactic vis-à-vis geography, language, culture, and careers in the Diaspora.

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asteries, hospitals, hospices, schools, and humanitarian institutions in eclectic historical styles that not only linked past and present, but also clearly pointed to the nationality and religion of the royal patron in order to better position the presence and influence of his kingdom in the city. Moreover, architects and artists often added a Jerusalemite touch to those buildings by using local materials and by adopting local building traditions and decorative motifs that would suggest the deep bond of the patron nation with the city.597 This attitude reflected romantic fascination, imperialistic ambitions, and colonial paternalism. In view of the importance of national institutions built by European powers in Jerusalem, the architectural design of the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, as that of the Austrian Hospice and the Tantur Hospital, was much more than an expression of the patron’s belonging to Viennese society and his contribution to its culture: its “national” architectural style reinforced the assertion of an impressive presence and influence of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy in the Holy City. The importance attributed to architectural styles as symbols of roots, bonds, and connection can be illuminated by the strategy from an opposite perspective, adopted by the architects of the two main synagogues built by the Old Yishuv in the Old City of Jerusalem in the nineteenth century, both of which were financed by Central European Jewish communities and assisted by Austrian authorities— the Hurva Synagogue of the Perushim and the Hasidic Tiferet Israel Synagogue. Neither of them follows the architectural styles typical of synagogues in the native lands of these communities, but adopts an eclectic local style combining the domed schemes of Byzantine origin, typical of Palestine architecture in the Ottoman period, with Central and East-European architectural and decorative ele597 The buildings were designed by renowned architects, experts on “national styles”: Neo-Classical elements characterize the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem (built in 1856–1858, opened in 1863); distinct Neo-Gothic stylistic elements create an association with France or Britain, as in the French Quarter built between the 1870s and the early 1900s, and the British St. George Cathedral built in 1899; Neo-Romanesque arches and towers stand out in the Augusta Victoria Hospice and the Dormition Church, both built between 1898 and 1910 for Wilhelm II in the Neo-Romanesque style, which the German emperor considered an original German style; late medieval and Renaissance motifs point to Italy, as in the Italian Hospital (1911–1919); and onion domes represent Russia, as in the Novy Ierusalima Russian compound (built between 1860 and 1890) and the church of Maria Magdalena (1888). For a general survey, see David Kroyanker, Jerusalem Architecture: European-Christian Buildings Outside the Old City Walls, Jerusalem Architecture – Periods and Styles 3 (Jerusalem: Keter, 1987) (Hebrew), in the corresponding chapters; on the Russian compound, see Elena Astafieva, “The Russian Empire in Palestine, 1847–1917: A Look Back at the Origins of Russia’s Near Eastern Policy,” TEPSIS Paper 10 (English version, 2016), 2–4; on the French Quarter, see Dominique Trimbur, “French Presence in Palestine – Notre-Dame de France,” Bulletin du centre de recherche français à Jérusalem 3 (1998), 117–140; idem, “France, Western Europe and Palestine 1799–1917,” Bulletin du centre de recherche français à Jérusalem 3 (1998), 163–166.

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ments that may be considered cultural traits.598 This aesthetic choice may have been perceived by Jews and some non-Jewish Western circles as a genuine expression of the local “Oriental” roots of Jews and, at the same time, an integrative part of the culture that identifies the peoples of the Habsburg monarchy. Digressing from the Neo-Classicist style of the Rothschild Hospital, which was representative of a main trend in Vienna at the time, the gate of honor that gave structure to the text and the imagery in the congratulatory epistle differs in its architectural design from all other gates of honor illustrated in the known epistles and dedications of gifts sent to Franz Joseph and Karl by their Old Yishuv subjects. The gate of honor in the Rothschild Hospital epistle attests to the transformation of the Central European identity in the Levant through a dialogue with local architecture and Oriental imagery; it is rooted in Oriental art and local architectural design, and is very close to objects that cater to the tourist industry. The influence of graphics and tourism is exemplified by the adoption of a common scheme in decorated postcards at the time: about one-third of the gate illustrated in the Rothschild Hospital epistle fades away on the righthand side in order to leave room for the text, similarly to a series of postcards created by the printing press of the orphanage for Arab children established in Jerusalem in 1860 by the German missioner Johann Ludwig Schneller. In one of these postcards (fig. 69), the right side of an arch that draws our eyes to a view of the Lake of Gennesaret (Heb. Kinneret, also known as the Sea of Galilee) fades away exactly as in the Rothschild Hospital epistle, with the same purpose in mind.599 Another similar feature is a plant climbing by the left side of the gate, the only side that is actually drawn: fern-like plants in the Schneller postcard and a palm tree in the Rothschild Hospital epistle.

598 The Hurva Synagogue was designed and constructed in a Neo-Byzantine style, under the supervision of Assad Effendi, the sultan’s official architect. The design may have been influenced by the Ottoman origins of the architect and, in turn, highly influenced the design of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue. The latter was built by Nissan Beck and advised by the Russian architect Martin Eppinger, who built representative buildings in the Russian compound in Jerusalem; see Morgenstern, “Building of the Hurvah,” 84–88, and Faina Milstein, “The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue: Urban and Architectural Study,” in High Above All: The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue and the Hasidic Community in Jerusalem, ed. Reuven Gafni, Yochai Ben-Ghedalia, and Uriel Gellman (Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi, 2016), 210–211 (Hebrew), respectively. 599 Amir, The Orientalists, fig. on p. 4 (with an error in the caption); Gil Gordon, “‘The Best of Them All’: The German Mission Printing House of Schneller in Jerusalem during the Late Ottoman Period,” Cathedra 138 (2010), 97 (Hebrew). Schneller, or the Syrian Orphanage, was a German Lutheran institution that provided orphaned and abandoned Arab children with a Christian education and vocational training.

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The choice of the plant by the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle is significant: as noted, the palm is not only a typical local tree, but also represents Judaea since Roman times and has a Jewish symbolic meaning; moreover, in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the palm tree also symbolized the exotic and romantic Orient. Another outstanding feature common to both artists is the choice of a Muslim-type of gate: the designer of the Schneller postcard chose a horseshoe arch, typical of the Land of Israel since the mid-seventh century (the Umayyad period), and the designer of the Rothschild Hospital epistle chose a pointed arch, which became common in the region since the mid-eighth century (the Abbasid period). The local pointed arch was later adopted by the Crusaders, became a favored element throughout the late Islamic period and, together with other local architectural elements, found its way to monuments built by the European powers in the Holy Land in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Indeed, the pointed arch is not the only local architectural element in the Rothschild Hospital epistle that attests to a transformation of the Jewish Yishuv’s identity and its well-rooted place in the local space: the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle also adopted a variety of appealing elements from the Mamluk and Ottoman decorative repertoire. For example, the gate of honor is illustrated as if built and decorated in the local Arab style, alternating white and red or white and black stones (ablaq), and also alternating the colors in the patterns of interlocking stones, which became common in the Holy Land since the late twelfth century (the Ayyubid period). The ornamental potential of these elements was further developed and culminated from the mid-thirteenth century until the Ottoman conquest of the area in 1517 (the Mamluk period) and, as noted, was maintained by the new sovereigns in the area. Another fashionable Muslim decorative motif that remained popular throughout the Ottoman period and was adopted by the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle are looping ribbons with inlaid glazed stones in the loop, running along walls and around openings. The illusion of a three-dimensional structure in the drawing of the gate framing the Rothschild Hospital epistle, and the damaged trompe l’oeil tiles in the interlocking pattern that highlights the arched opening, add to the magic by suggesting a magnificent and exotic ancient site. The artist’s choice of stylistic elements attests to a good knowledge of local Arab architecture as well as a subtle aesthetic taste, unlike many artists who adopted an eclectic style based on Orientalist fantasies, wishing to enhance the exotic aspects of their works and maximize their appeal to their audiences. One example of the latter choice is the Bezalel artist Shmuel Ben-David’s fantastic decoration for the dedication of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim to Karl I/IV (figs. 28, 31–32). Indeed, Ben-David’s luxurious structures are impossible from an architectural point of view and are designed as a rich collection of decorative elements,

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Fig. 69: Postcard produced by the Schneller Institute, showing a view of Lake Gennesaret.

whereas the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle creates the illusion of a romantic and luxurious past that has been lost. The sophisticated adoption of local Oriental elements by the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle could also be understood as an identifier of the Jewish philanthropist and the hospital’s director, who wished to highlight their identity as cultivated, refined, open-minded, and cosmopolitan players in the highest socio-cultural echelons. Beller notes that some circles could interpret this aesthetic preference as disclosing Otherness and foreignness, in a Central and Eastern European context, thus undermining a perception of Habsburg identity.600 However, in the case of the Rothschild Hospital epistle and other Jerusalemite artifacts, it was the actual Oriental architectural site, with the ornament used as decorative element not competing with the meaning of the cityscape itself as untimely and accessible for the West, that put the giftgiver on the safe side.

600 See Steven Beller, “Dis-Oriented Jews?: Orientalism, Assimilation, and Modernism in Vienna 1900,” in Design Dialogue: Jews, Culture and Viennese Modernism, ed. Elana Shapira (Vienna: Böhlau, 2018), 301–302.

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Jerusalem above the Gate of Heaven: Central and Eastern-Europe Tradition At the same time, we find in the decorated dedication of the Rothschild Hospital epistle a continuity of Diaspora traditions, specifically from Central and Eastern Europe, which witnesses how many factors were reworked in the construction of a local Jewish and a proto-modernist Zionist identity. It is most interesting to note, from a cultural and artistic point of view, the depiction of schematic Oriental buildings on the arched gateway that frames the text of the dedication and strongly suggests the city of Jerusalem, even if just only on the left side, which is completely drawn. This iconographic scheme was known in synagogues in Eastern Galicia, which was part of the Austrian Empire at the time the Rothschild Hospital epistle was created. An important example appears in the eastern wall paintings of the Yablonov (Yabloniv/Jabłonów) Synagogue (fig. 70)—a typical vaulted wooden building built between 1650 and 1670 and painted in 1688, with a restoration between 1727 and 1734.601 The arched shape of the wall highlighted the Torah Ark, which is also a metaphor for the gate of heaven and was probably set in a niche flanked by wall paintings and inscriptions. This decoration was organized in painted arched gates, topped by domed and tower-like buildings; the city is depicted twice, in two different schemes—to the right and to the left of an inscription on that wall. Moreover, the image to the right served as a model for a stained-glass window in the women’s gallery of the so-called Temple Synagogue in Krakow, probably created between 1894–1909, under Habsburg rule.602 The image in the Temple Synagogue exemplifies the continuity of an iconographic tradition. Indeed, depictions of a city were commonly placed above prayer tablets, which

601 Ludwik Wierzbicki, “Bożnica w miasteczku Jabłonowie nad Prutem” (The Synagogue in the Town of Yabloniv on the Prut River), Sprawozdania komisji do badania historyi sztuki w Polsce 4 (1891), 45–51, plates 16, 19 and esp. 20; Amar, “Knock Knock,” 299–300 and note 5, fig. 1. The wall paintings were photographed in 1891 and the synagogue was destroyed in World War II. Two eighteenth-century wall paintings are similar: the closest is in the Minkivtsi Synagogue (Polish Mińkowce, Podolia), the other is the Kamianka Buzka (Polish Kamionka Strumiłowa, Ruthenia/Galicia), now in Ukraine. Sergey Kravtsov thinks there was a similar painting in Hvizdets/Gwozdziec, then also in the Austrian Empire; I am grateful to him for this information. Amar (“Knock Knock”) mentions two synagogues in south Germany with an image of Jerusalem in a painted arch—in Horb, created by Eliezer Zussman in 1735, and in Bechhofen in 1732/33, yet there the image of the city appears inside the arch (302 and figs. 5, 5a, and 302, 304, fig. 6a, respectively). See also Tamar Shadmi, “Wall Inscriptions in East European Synagogues: Their Sources, Meanings, and Role in Shaping the Concept of Space and Worship,” doctoral dissertation (Bar Ilan University, 2011), 405, figs. on pp. 407–416 (Hebrew); Rodov (“With Eyes toward Zion,” 139), who notes that Moldavian schemes were largely influenced by the waves of immigration of Polish and Ukrainian Jews. 602 I am most grateful to Sergey Kravtsov for this information. The synagogue, built in 1860– 1862, is in the district of Kazimierz.

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Fig. 70: Austrian Galicia, Yablonov Synagogue, eastern wall painting, 1688. Restored between 1727–1734, 1891 drawing (Wierzbicki, “Bożnica w miasteczku Jabłonowie,” pl. 20).

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were designed and prepared from the outset and then filled with special prayers on commission by donors, whose names are regularly mentioned. In this specific context, it may be suggested that the city represented in the Yablonov, Temple, and other synagogues in Central and Eastern Europe is Jerusalem. Quite often, the schematic buildings of the painted Jerusalem recall scenes in the area where the synagogue was built—an iconographic scheme already known in medieval Jewish and Christian art, and in similar arrangements in Islamic art.603 Of all possible early sources, taking into account later derivative images, a miniature in the well-known Worms Mahzor dated to 1278, with later additions made around 1280 (fig. 71),604 seems worthy of consideration. As in the Rothschild Hospital epistle, the Yablonov, and other synagogues, the buildings appearing on the gate of the Worms Mahzor miniature may represent the rebuilt Jerusalem of the renewed kingdom of Israel, a time of never-ending peace and prosperity (Jeremiah 31: 38–39). Like most medieval German mahzorim, the Worms miniature depicts the gateway as a symbol of the Gate of Heaven through which the supplicants’ prayers reach God, as implied in the prayer for the Day of Atonement enclosed in it. The prayer, recited on the holiest of Jewish Holy Days, begins with the words: “Blessed art Thou, our God, Lord of the Universe, who openest for us the Gates of Mercy.” The text of the Rothschild Hospital epistle suggests that Franz Joseph’s Golden Jubilee is a holy, propitious, day; thus, also for the opening of the Gate of Heaven and for God’s acceptance of thanks from the director of the hospital, its personnel and patients, for choosing Franz Joseph as their king, and for protecting him and his kingdoms. Appropriately, the director recalls the monarch’s visit to the hospital and his generous donation during his sojourn in Jerusalem, and, as expected, the thanks of the thousands of patients for the protection that he extended to them. Praises and blessings to the monarch complete the message.

603 One of the closest schemes in Islamic art, and the most famous and influential, is the mosaic decoration of the Umayyad Great Mosque of Damascus, built by Al-Walid I c. 715; see Oleg Grabar, The Formation of Islamic Art (rev. ed.; New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987), 88–89. Amar (“Knock Knock,” 307) emphasizes that in Judaism the depicted city may refer not only to the past (the destroyed Temple) and to the future (the rebuilding of the House of God and redemption at the End of Days), but also to the Heavenly City, which blends with the Earthly City, with one reflecting the other. This tradition differs completely from the Christian one cited in Revelation 21. For its rich symbolism, see, besides Genesis 28:17, Isaiah 26:1–2, Ezekiel 44:1–3, and Psalm 24:7–10. 604 Jerusalem, NLI, MS Heb. 4° 781. C, II, f. 73a. A mahzor is a Hebrew prayer book containing the Jewish liturgy for festivals. On this specific mahzor, see Aliza Cohen-Mushlin, “Later Additions to the Worms Maḥzor,” in Worms Mahzor MS. Jewish National and University Library Heb 4° 781/1: Introductory Volume, ed. Malachi Beit-Arié (Vaduz and Jerusalem: Jewish National and University Library, 1985), 94–96.

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Fig. 71: Worms Mahzor, 1278. Jerusalem, National Library of Israel Collection, MS. Heb. 4” 781. C, II, f. 73a.

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If artists are considered cultural borrowers or translators, what was the source of inspiration for the artist of the Rothschild Hospital epistle? Did he or the client, a connoisseur, conceive this iconography based on the decoration of East and Central European synagogues, or other link in the iconographic chain? Could he have known medieval and early modern Jewish, Christian, or Islamic traditions? Or, could it be coincidental, and this was an original idea of the artist or customer? All these possibilities are valid. The document was signed by Dr. I. Grg. [Gregory] D’Arbela, director of the hospital. D’Arbela, born in Poltava (Ukraine) in 1847, arrived in Jerusalem in 1888; with the support of the Rothschild Hospital’s agents, he assumed the position of director at the end of his first year in the city. The charismatic physician, who was a passionate traveler, enjoyed a prestigious position in various European courts and in the Jerusalemite society, where his house was a meeting place for diplomats from diverse countries and the local intelligentsia.605 Krishna Somers notes that D’Arbela had been the personal physician and trusted confidant of His Highness Sultan Sayyid Barghash bin Said of Zanzibar, who showered many honors on him, and he was also the chief physician of the Sultan’s armed forces from the early 1880s to 1886. Moreover, having been offered Italian nationality by the king of Italy, and subsequently adopting it as his own, he was appointed diplomatic envoy of Italy, representing the king of Italy and Italian interests in Zanzibar and the East African littoral.606 D’Arbela sought diplomatic status as consul in Palestine, making applications to Italy, Austria, Hungary, and France, and at last was appointed Vice-Consul to the Netherlands. Impressed by his multiple talents and prestige, Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, the father of the modern Hebrew language, named D’Arbela president of the Jerusalem Language Society (Safa Brurah). Theodor Herzl, whom D’Arbela met in Vienna in 1897, wrote in his diary “a note about this splendid man for future assignments.” Lastly and extraordinarily, in 1899 the Turkish government bestowed

605 On Itzhak Gregory d’Arbela (Amchislavsky), born in Ukraine to a Hasidic family, his several names and identifications, and adventurous personality—traits that took him to several countries and a rich career—see Krishna Somers, “The D’Arbela Saga: Some African Reflections,” Adler Museum Bulletin 33/2 (2007), 17–32; David Tidhar, “Dr. Yitzchak Gregory from the House of D’Arbela (Amchislavsky),” in Encyclopedia of Pioneers and Builders of the Yishuv, VII (Tel Aviv: Sifriyat Rishonim, 1971), 2847 (Hebrew); Haim Be’er, “The Physician and the Tent of the Messiah: Dr. Yitzchak Gregory from the House of D’Arbela-Amchislavsky,” in This Is the Place – People, Places and Stories of Jerusalem (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 2017), 86–99 (Hebrew). 606 Somers, “D’Arbela Saga,” esp. 19–25. The role as envoy of the Italian king, and as an Italian national, may explain the change of his last name to an Italian sounding name; for other explanations, see Be’er, “The Physician and the Tent of the Messiah,“ 89–90.

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upon D’Arbela the Majeda of the Third Degree, a decoration in recognition of his distinguished career.607 D’Arbela left Jerusalem in 1903. D’Arbela’s conscious process of self-styling was a clear example of an acculturated Jew’s self-identity, which gave him new access and influence within the higher social echelons of the general society.608 Therefore, the originality and high quality of the Rothschild Hospital epistle are consonant with his high social status and the growing and richer artistic activity in Jerusalem. The exaltation of Franz Joseph is not based on biblical sources; however, could the original allusion to the opening of the Gate of Heaven and the view of the Holy City be read in his court not only as binding the Jewish Habsburg subjects to Austria-Hungary through a visual tradition well known among Jews there, but also as corresponding to the newly introduced identification of Franz Joseph as a unique Christ-like figure by the Austrian Church? The gifts show that the intermedial collaboration between artists and writers who created the gifts produced sophisticated meanings; moreover, as is well known, image and word might be given different meanings by different beholders through collective and personal experiences and identifications relevant at the time.

The Olivewood Case D’Arbela commissioned a renowned carver, Abraham Keller, to manufacture the olivewood case that held the epistle. Keller designed a cylindrical box (figs. 67– 68) whose shape and decoration recall the two scroll-cases for the Book of Esther presented to Franz Joseph by the Austro-Galician kolel—the 1908 case, which Keller signed (fig. 19), and the 1898 one that I attribute to him (fig. 14).609 Keller may have surpassed his client’s expectations in two ways. Firstly, he devoted a large space to the two façades of the hospital on the central part of the cylindrical case;610 moreover, he maximized the size and ornamentation of the building, most probably to please also the recipient of the object, as may be seen by com-

607 Somers, “D’Arbela Saga,” 27–28. 608 This aim may be one main reason for his conversion to Christianity after he finally left Jerusalem. He died in Tunis in 1911. 609 See above, chap. 4.3, on the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Franz Joseph on his Golden Jubilee. 610 The main façade, with double stairs (labeled on the olivewood case Mayer Rothschild Hospital, v.a.) faces Nevi’im Street; the other façade (labeled Mayer Rothschild Hospital, h.a.), faces today’s Rav Kook Street.

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Fig. 72: Jerusalem, Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, photograph, 1910. Jerusalem, Central Zionist Archives PHG\1003727.

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paring it with photographs (e.g., fig. 68 and a photograph dated 1910, fig. 72).611 Secondly, and no less important, Keller included the indispensable images of the holy places in their iconic scheme, thus proclaiming the Jerusalemite Jewish identity of the gift-givers. Three holy places flank the façades of the hospital and are labeled in German: “The Tomb of David” and “The Tomb of Rachel,” on one end of the olivewood case, and “Umar Mosque” (the Dome of the Rock) which, as usual, represents the Site of the Temple, on the other end; the seal of the Rothschild Hospital, instead of a fourth holy site, completes the symmetrical composition. Acanthus-like leaves on both ends of the tubular case add a finishing touch to the decoration.

6.4 Singularity, Tradition, and Innovation in Old Yishuv Gifts Our examination of gifts with figurative decorations presented to Franz Joseph and Karl by their Old Yishuv subjects attests to a continuous transfer of ideas, models, and techniques between the Jerusalem communities and those in their original homelands. These sources were adapted to the specific context, aims, aesthetic preferences, and material possibilities of the gift-givers. Each community strived to clearly convey its particular identity. Images of local Jewish sites and monuments were a common means used by the Old Yishuv for conveying the sacredness of Jerusalem, deep roots in the land, and wisely suggest God given rights. Another special trait, judging by the known objects, may be the popularity of the Book of Esther as a gift to the monarchs. As will be shown, the image of Esther became popular among acculturated Jews in Austria in the second half of the nineteenth century also in public media, and therefore may reveal another facet in the complex character of Habsburg Jews—the search for a particular identity that would convey a proud Jewish Otherness and, at the same time, a belonging to the Habsburg peoples. The popularity of Esther’s Book among Jews in the Dual Monarchy and in Palestine may have been fed by the threat of endemic antisemitism in Central and Eastern Europe; at the same time, these factors nurtured not only the need, but also the wish of Jewish Habsburg subjects to glorify the benevolent emperor who emancipated them, and on whose willingness to recognize and assist them the kolelim depended. Changes in iconography and style, as well as in the character of the texts throughout this period, point to socio-cultural 611 – Jerusalem, Central Zionist Archives, PHG\1003727. For a photograph of part of the Rav Kook façade, see first slide in the PowerPoint Presentation https://shimur.org › ‫הדסה‬-‫רוטשילד‬-‫החולים‬-‫בית‬005.

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changes in the Old Yishuv that were closely linked to transformations in identities and identifications. As noted, the decoration of the Deutsch epistle in German, sent in 1854 by the Jerusalemite Perushim to Franz Joseph (fig. 6) at a very early phase in the crystallization of the emperor’s attitude toward his Jewish subjects, features iconographic schemes and motifs that were commonplace in the gifts presented to this monarch and his heir, in different ways and measures and at different times. Therefore, it may serve us well to highlight main traditional elements as well as innovations in their visual language.

Tradition The first element that catches the eye in the design of the decorated dedications is the adoption of a gate of honor to facilitate the organization of image and text in a careful hierarchical arrangement of the pictorial space, which adds to the religious and political meaning of the message. Since ancient times, it was not the symbol itself that represented the bond between God and His people, but its location within the composition, which was planned with forethought to convey both the close bridge between heaven and earth and, at the same time, the unbridgeable gap. Paradigmatically, in the Deutsch epistle, a primary symbol—the Tables of the Law—is located, as it were, in the heavenly realm, and the text of the petition appears beneath it, in the earthly domain; a verse at the head of the text aptly bridges between the two spheres: “Eternal praise in your gates, Jerusalem” (des ewigen Lob ist in deinen Thoren Jerusalem), which is an adaptation of a Song of Ascents, Psalm 122:2, “Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem.”612 The ideological, semantic, and aesthetic values of its position on the main compositional axis enrich its symbolic meaning. Similarly, in the offering presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl (fig. 31), the Tables of the Law are set in a symbolically honored space, on the pediment of the gate-like frame that also recalls the Torah ark in a synagogue. Other outstanding examples in the gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl are the placing of the portrait of the monarch chosen by God or his heraldry, which has a religio-political meaning, in the upper part of the gate. There we find the laureated portrait of Franz Joseph, thoughtfully set in a clipeus in the center of the Habsburg heraldic symbol in the 1908 gift to the monarch by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel (fig. 20); in the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Karl (fig. 24), the monarch’s portrait is glorified in a clipeus, high above the palm trees, against the

612 Translated into German as “Unsere Füße stehen in deinen Toren, O Jerusalem.”

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background of the blue sky and golden rays of light. Iconographic considerations, such as the location of key symbols and the name and title of the monarch in the composition, which require a carefully thought out coordination between image and text, reinforce the multilayered meanings and also characterize the design of other epistles and objects created by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects or artists engaged by them. A review of the gifts as part of the visual culture of the Old Yishuv also demonstrates that, of all the Jewish symbols that were common to Jewry in the Land of Israel and the Diaspora, images of holy places in this land were essential indicators of the identity of religious Jews living in the Promised Land and, as such, the most prominent of all.613 Moreover, when incorporated in an object presented to a specific monarch, images of these sites would usually be coordinated with his portrait or with symbols of his House or kingdom. In the case of the Austrian Habsburg House, the coordination between images of sacred sites in the Holy Land and the monarch’s portrait or his heraldry may also suggest his title to the crown of Jerusalem, which, even if only nominal, endowed him with great religio-political prestige. This iconographic strategy stands behind the decoration of the goblet in the coffee set presented to Franz Joseph and Elisabeth in 1879 by the Habsburg kolelim (fig. 2), and the decoration of the dedications of the Austro-Galician kolel gifts presented to Franz Joseph in 1908 (fig. 18) and Karl in 1916 (fig. 28), wherein symbols or the portrait of the monarch are clearly linked to scenes of holy

613 Referring to but one adopted motif and one original Jewish one that frequently appear in a variety of objects: rays of heavenly light that highlight religious and political symbols and the Tables of the Law are paradigmatic. Common also in Christian art, rays of heavenly light often appeared as a symbol of God and his Law in cultic and secular objects. One variation, in a Palestine Jewish object, is a late eighteenth-century Hanukkah lamp decorated with the Tables of the Law flanked by lions; right above, on top of the axis of symmetry, is a schematic rising sun contraposed with a menorah on the bottom (Einhorn, “Sacred and Secular Objects,” 37–38, fig. 16). The same combination also appears in gifts presented to Franz Joseph by Jews in the Habsburg realms, as in the one presented to him and his consort on their Silver Wedding Anniversary by the Jewish community of Moravia (ÖNB Bildarchiv 34447/551), and in the gift from the Jewish community of Bohemia on his Golden Jubilee (fig. 62). The Tables of the Law appear in the dedication of the gift by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl on the occasion of his accession to the throne (fig. 31)—although not against the background of heavenly golden rays, but crowned with a crown of gold and flanked by lions that hold it while raising their hind legs, common motifs in Jewish art. Golden heavenly rays of light liken Franz Joseph to a God-graced augustus in the dedication of the 1908 gift from the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel just mentioned, appropriately set in the heavenly area of the pictorial space (fig. 20). In a similar vein, the artist of the box housing the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Karl on his coronation set the Austrian crown in the center of heavenly rays of light crafted in mother-of-pearl inlaid in the olivewood box, above a portrait of the new emperor-king (fig. 24).

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places. Similarly, in the Deutsch epistle, the golden rays symbolizing the heavenly origins of the Tables of the Law draw the eyes of the beholder to the two iconic images of holy places in the upper corners of the spandrels of the gate-like frame, from which the eyes are directed to the lower corners, where the images of two other sites appear. The connection is made perfect by the three inscriptions in gold—the two biblical verses that proclaim “Moses commanded us a Law” (Deuteronomy 33:4) and “Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined” (Psalm 50:2), as well as the name and title of Franz Joseph—which all create a religio-political bond between the Old Yishuv and the emperor. The rays of light in the 1908 gift by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph play a similar role in pointing to iconographical foci.

Innovations Traditional topics can find innovative visual expressions, and visual images can acquire new meanings. For example, in our context, the meaningful bond between the Habsburg kolelim and Jerusalem, the awareness of these communities of the importance of the title to the crown of Jerusalem for the Habsburg House, and their appreciation and loyalty to the monarch intersect and reach a most appropriate visual expression in the original melding of two traditional elements into one image: the paradigmatic symbol of Jerusalem—the Western Wall flanked by the Muslim monuments representing the Site of the Temple and Solomon’s School—set in the center of the heraldic Habsburg eagle on the goblet of the coffee set presented by Habsburg kolelim to Franz Joseph I and Elisabeth in 1879 (fig. 2). Another unique example of tradition and innovation is the iconography of the 1898 Rothschild Hospital epistle to Franz Joseph (fig. 66), which integrates the old motif of Jerusalem above the Gate of Heaven, preserved in Eastern and Central European synagogues—highly visible spaces—with an Orientalist city skyline representative of Jerusalem, drawn above the gate of honor that frames the congratulatory text. This imagery, probably known to the hospital’s director and/or the artist, is an original counterpart of that known in the European homelands; both are based on stereotypical schemes of local landscapes and express the artists’ or their customers’ multiple identities as acculturated Jewish Habsburg subjects building themselves in multicultural Jerusalem, as well as their pride in their religious and cultural heritage and their broad knowledge. Other innovations in iconography and style stem from new socio-cultural outlooks and aesthetic preferences at the turn of the century. The dedication in the gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel on the occasion of Franz Joseph’s Diamond Jubilee displays images of secular sites generally asso-

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ciated with the ideology of the New Yishuv on the same plane with images of venerated sites. The imagery, whose sources may be market-oriented postcards, photographs, and contemporary paintings, may also be perceived as representing the settlement and rebuilding of the Land of Israel rather than the landscapes of the romanticized Holy Land of biblical times. It may thus reflect the positive stance of some Orthodox circles toward a Jewish national space. The choice of photographs in the album, presented by that same kolel to Karl, is a mature position on a new, modern, Eretz-Israel culture, at least in the editors’ circles. There may be additional intents and purposes behind the photographs in the album presented by the same kolel to Karl I/IV, where some of the holy places function as the setting of staged scenes designed to call the attention of the beholder not only to the sacredness of the land, but also to its exotic views and peoples, i.e., to its tourist appeal. In the dedications of the two gifts to Karl, the gap between the visual and literary imagery in the Deutsch epistle comes to a peak. This does not mean that the holy places became less meaningful to the Old Yishuv, but that they acquired additional meanings and functions, probably introduced by artists whose ideology differed from that of the strictly Orthodox circles of the kolel. No doubt that in terms of iconography, the most surprising innovation is the inclusion of allegorical figures inspired by semi-nude Greco-Roman personifications, common in contemporary Classicist trends and Secessionist style in the West, on the olivewood box that was part of the gift of the Austro-Galician kolel to Karl upon his enthronement (fig. 24). The puzzling question resurfaces: Who approved the rather inconceivable iconography in an Orthodox milieu, and why? This book offered possible reasons.

Literary Texts—The Book of Esther The popularity of the Book of Esther as a gift seems to be another outstanding, though not distinctive, feature of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim in the Land of Israel/Palestine. Three of the four known gifts sent by the Old Yishuv subjects to Franz Joseph on the occasion of his Golden and Diamond Jubilees, and one of the two sent to his heir Karl I/IV upon his accession to the throne, are the scrolls of the Book of Esther. This biblical book was also presented to Franz Joseph by Jewish Habsburg subjects in the Diaspora, including those in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. Why was Esther’s story a favorite subject among Jews at the time? Owing to the lack of documentation and the loss of a plethora of material, books, and artworks from the Nazi period, I can only surmise that this may have been the result of the inherent threat due to the rise of antisemitism in Vienna after the confirmation of Karl Lueger as mayor of the city in 1897, whose populist politics and antise-

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mitic rhetoric incited the masses. Moreover, at the same time religio-political conflicts in Palestine intensified. Esther’s story is often considered representative of the threat to the existence of the entire Jewish people in the Diaspora since biblical times—alienation, persecution, false accusations, and massacres—that also celebrates the deliverance from a plot of annihilation and holds the hope for redemption. In addition, by emphasizing the fate of the court official who devised the evil plan against the Jewish people—death—the Book of Esther might serve as a warning to those who seek to harm them in the present. Alternatively, since the Middle Ages, the story may have served as a model for the life of Jews living in exile in Europe, as individuals and as a community; it became a source of comfort and inspiration that opened the possibility of leading a creative and rich life in a foreign milieu as part of the complex social, political, and economic dynamics of that world, while remaining devoted and loyal members of the Jewish people.614 The biblical narrative is set in Persia and reveals the situation of Jews as a subculture within a huge multiethnic kingdom of 127 provinces from India to Ethiopia (Esther 1:1). The image of Jews in Persia under King Ahasuerus is similar to that of Jews as aliens in the European Diaspora of the last centuries: “And Haman said unto King Ahasuerus, there is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the people in all the provinces of thy kingdom; and their laws are diverse from all people; neither keep they the king’s laws” (Esther 3:8). The members of this nation live apart and are scattered, yet maintain their distinct identity through practices that render them different from all other peoples.615 Orit Ramon remarks that the description of King Ahasuerus and his kingdom, court, advisors, and the relationship between them and the Jews living in the kingdom, enabled Jewish exegetes of the Book of Esther to comment on the function of the political systems in their own times and examine the society in which they lived as well as the relationship between that society, its political elite, and the Jewish community.616 The

614 W. Lee Humphreys, “A Life-Style for Diaspora: A Study of the Tales of Esther and Daniel,” Journal of Biblical Literature 92/2 (1973), 216; Orit Ramon, “‘One Hundred and Twenty Seven Provinces’: Political Reality, Political Thought, and Jewish Existence in Exile in Maharal’s Commentary on the Book of Esther,” Judaica Bohemiae 46-1 (2011), 8. For a different interpretation of the biblical story, suggesting that the Hebrew version of Esther could be read as a Judaean text critical of the strategies of Diaspora Jews not oriented to Jerusalem, see Elsie R. Stern, “Esther and the Politics of Diaspora,” Jewish Quarterly Review 100/1 (2010), 25–53. 615 Daniel Boyarin, “Purim and the Cultural Poetics of Judaism – Theorizing Diaspora,” Poetics Today 15/1 (1994), 4. 616 Ramon (“‘One Hundred and Twenty Seven Provinces,” 8–10) proposes that Maharal’s commentary on the Book of Esther formulated an original Jewish political philosophy aimed at defining a unique and separate Jewish identity in exile.

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verse from the Book of Esther just quoted is noteworthy; it ends with Haman’s recommendation to Ahasuerus: “Therefore it is not for the king’s profit to suffer them” (3:8). No doubt, similar antisemitic cries were spread by nationalist masses in Vienna, and in Central and East European nations as a whole. It is impossible not to recall the biblical story when reading Shai Agnon’s In Mr Lublin’s Store: “Even if he [Karl I/IV] doesn’t hate us… the kingdom is not under his control but controlled by ministers and advisers.”617 The narrative can take on meanings that reflect the history and life of a specific community in a specific period of time; this is why it is tempting to ask whether the popularity of the Book of Esther as a gift of Jewish communities to Franz Joseph and Karl could be related to the essential need of Jews to express their identities, loyalties, and sense of belonging, in the face of the rise of antisemitism in Vienna and elsewhere in the Habsburg realms. Elana Shapira calls attention to the significant image of Esther in the decoration of palaces built by acculturated Jewish families in Vienna. Esther is perceived as the heroine and instrument of salvation from superstitious beliefs and plots, and as a contribution to a new historical narrative of Jews that embraces the historicist trend in Viennese culture at the time, drawing on the positive connotations of acculturated Hellenistic Jews. For example, in a public visual statement, a caryatid wearing a tiara ornamented by a Star of David represents the Jewish queen of the Persian king, and is very visible among the twenty-six caryatids decorating the façade of the Palais Todesco (1864)—the residence of Sophie and Eduard Todesco facing the Vienna State Opera on the fashionable Ringstrasse, that was being built at the time.618 Esther also stars in the ceiling painting in the salon of Ignaz Ephrussi’s family palace, which was built on the Ringstrasse, opposite the Votivkirche, in 1872–1873. In the Ephrussi palace, the depictions of the Coronation of Esther and the Trial of Haman symbolize the triumph of Judaism over antisemitism and a self-fashioning as highly cultured Jews and Europeans.619 Both families were great patrons of the arts and succeeded in engaging the prestigious architect Theophil Hansen to design their palaces in the fashionable Neo-Classical style, in which Hansen excelled;620 moreover, the Todesco fa-

617 See above, p. 170. 618 Shapira (Style and Seduction, esp. 5–6, 23–24, fig. 1) adds that another caryatid in this series, whose hair is covered and carries a book close to her, could be identified as a devout Jewish woman and therefore an allegory of Devotion. 619 Ibid., 26–27, fig. 3. 620 Among his most famous works in Vienna are the Parliament House, the Musikverein—a widely acclaimed concert hall, the Academy of Fine Arts, the Stock Exchange, and an earlier romanticist, eclectic, building—the Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox Church—which features elements of the Byzantine and Moorish Revivals and on the interior, also Neo-Baroque elements.

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mily also gained the cooperation of the famous architect Ludwig Förster in the design of their palace.621 The Classicist style in art and architecture was interpreted as a continuation of the Jewish Hellenistic culture in Judaea/the Land of Israel— an evocation that allowed Habsburg Jews to keep an acculturated Jewishness while becoming part of the gentile society in Vienna; this attitude also allowed them to become promoters of the cultural trends at the time that would advance the cultural status of the city and of themselves.622 According to Shapira, the choice of Esther as a subject of the decoration of these palaces is a unique expression of Jewish self-identification with an ideal past—to which we may add a much-wished-for blissful present, built on the Austrian society’s recognition of the keen loyalty of Jews to their monarch. Lastly, the success of this strategy is evidenced by the performance of Franz Grillparzer’s fragment of Esther’s story on the opening night of the Burgtheater in 1888. Shapira notes that there was an awareness that this play was identified with the fight of Jews against antisemitism.623 The Jewish communities in Jerusalem must have certainly been equally aware of the didactic meanings of the story and its promise, which were recalled every year at the festivities in celebration of this miraculous reversal of destiny that resulted in salvation. This brings us to briefly restate our review of the texts of the gifts. The texts belong to the literary genre of praises to monarchs; they are based on quotes from the Bible and later Jewish literature, which were often adapted to the new context and include verses from prayers for the peace and welfare of the kingdom that were recited in the Diaspora since ancient times, as well as legal writings and oral media such as folk stories.624 At the same time, the texts are rich in prayers for the speedy rebuilding of the Temple, the reconstruction of Jerusalem, and peace and abundance in the Land of Israel. Quoting psalms, blessings are sent from Zion, the holy city of Jerusalem. Specific holy places are not mentioned, but the holiness of the city as chosen by God to build His House is indeed acknowledged.

621 Among his most important relevant works are the Dohány Street Synagogue in Budapest (1854–1859), and the Leopoldstädter Tempel in Vienna (1858). Förster was Theofil Hansen’s mentor and father-in-law. 622 Shapira, Style and Seduction, 25–27; see also Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 23–26. 623 Shapira, Style and Seduction, esp. 25–26. 624 The halakhic rule that Jews under a foreign government should obey the laws of their rulers, dina de-malkhuta dina, is based primarily on Nehemiah 9:37. The various versions reflect the socio-political status of Jews in a particular kingdom at a particular time; see .

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Intertextuality, a literary device widely used in the Jewish Enlightment (Haskalah) literature that blossomed from the early to late nineteenth century, is essential to the interpretation of these texts. The writer had a clear purpose beyond literary aesthetics and sophistication: on the one hand, the allusions and quotes indeed sounded pleasant and elevated, in accordance with the literary style well known to the contemporary reader, who was also fully aware of the shift made by the writer from the promise to Israel in the Hebrew Bible to the Habsburg monarchy;625 on the other hand, the allusions and adaptations were often complex to a point that one may ask whether the writers really expected the Christian monarch and his court to discern and understand the various nuances, and what purpose was served by using literary devices. The blessings written in Hebrew were endowed not only with an aura of sacrality and authority: Hebrew letters are enriched with a mystical symbolism—including the use of gematria in revealed as well as veiled Kabbalistic forms, and their particular design—which highly influences the meanings of words and, therefore, the messages.626

The Artists A word should be added on the identity of the artists who created the visual culture of the Old Yishuv and the gifts presented by the Habsburg kolelim. To overcome the unfavorable evaluation dictated by a set of Western standards that appreciate the material value and styles favored by the court, Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects engaged their best artists and craftsmen, yet their names are mostly unknown. The anonymity of most religious artists and craftsmen is a function of the perception of their work as a purely reverent homage to God through perfection and beauty, even if it involved a hope of the greatest reward—redemption of their souls. It is this perception of the gifts and dedications to Franz Joseph, especially when added to the iconic character of the visual imagery, to the continued use of local materials, and to the similar character of the texts, which allowed the Old Yishuv to convey a sense of continuity that lends a religious, socio-cultural, allimportant, symbolic meaning to the construction of a collective identity. The

625 For examples in works by Hungarian Jewish writers, see Bányai, “‘Emperor’s Deliverance’,” 32 and note 9; see also below, esp. ch. 8. 626 See the interesting paper by Shalom Rosenberg, “The Mystics of Graphics,” in Ot le’Olam (A Sign Forever: The Hebrew Letter: Thought–Art–Design), ed. Itzhak S. Recanati (Jerusalem: Emuna Teachers College, 2000–2001), 54–65 (Hebrew). Additional papers in this anthology are also of interest.

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growing appreciation of creativity and innovation is evident in the detailed identification of the artists who designed and made the gifts for Karl on his accession to the throne of St. Stephen, which may be contraposed to the words that Mordechai Schnitzer wrote at the end of the Deutsch epistle in 1854. This attitude reflects a new pride in the way society perceived them and, most importantly, how they gained their own pride in their contribution to building a society based on a new, progressive, Hebrew culture in the renascent Jewish nation—which was a main desideratum of artists in the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts.

7 The Receipt of Gifts from the Old Yishuv A popular legend among Galician Jews recounts an old man’s memories of the young, good-hearted Franz Joseph, who did not know that one day he would be crowned: When on leave from the army for the Day of Atonement… on a chilly winter day, the now old man saw Emperor Franz Joseph traveling on a sleigh, who noticed some small old men shivering by the way, their teeth chattering. “Halt!,” ordered the emperor to the coachman, and he jumped out of the sleigh. He took off his fur coat, threw it to the old men, and called them to get into the carriage lest they freeze to death. While calling the poor men, the emperor saw before him a tall old man with a long white beard dressed all in white and holding in his hand a stick with a silver button. “Who is this man?” thought the emperor, for he was very surprised. The tall old man in white then said to him: “You know, I am Elijah the Prophet and I have come to test you, because it was decided in Heaven that one day you shall be emperor. As I came down to make sure that this is what should happen, I saw that you are kind and good-hearted, and care for the people’s wellfare… hence you will have many peoples under your scepter. I have seen that you are compassionate and merciful; for that reason I promise to protect you from all those who will seek thy life.” Then the tall old man in white sat beside the emperor in the carriage, pointed him in the right direction, and disappeared. Indeed, Elijah the Prophet kept his word. It happened that an enemy of the emperor—and every emperor has many enemies—crept up behind him to take his life, but Elijah the Prophet was there, invisible, and averted the misfortune.627

In Jewish tradition, Elijah has always been connected with the love of God for His people, expectations of better times, help in times of distress, and hope. Many narratives were created around the image of Franz Joseph as a just man and even a messiah, in stories of miracles that resemble those about or created by Hasidic rebbes.628 After having shown how Jewish gift-givers in the Old Yishuv aimed to support and sustain the bond of loyalty between the emperor as the benevolent monarch to his Jewish subjects in his realms and in the Old Yishuv, how critical would be his reactions to the evaluation of the effect of the gifts discussed in this book? No concrete reaction by Franz Joseph or Karl in return for the offerings presented to them by Jewish communities is recorded in official documents, but there are sev-

627 Kohlbauer (“Der Kaiser,“ 116, 118), who notes that the legend about the prophet Elijah as a personal guardian angel of the Austrian emperor probably originated in connection with the failed assassination attempt on Franz Joseph’s life on 18 February, 1853. 628 See Haim Schwarzbaum, Studies in Jewish and World Folklore, Fabula Supplement, 3 (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 1968; reprint 2015), 6–12, 224, 226, and Louis Ginzberg, Legends of the Jews, IV (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1947), chap. 7: . https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-008

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eral historical anecdotes related to these tributes, both in Vienna and in the chronicles of the Jerusalemite Yishuv. No doubt, the most telling anecdote relates Franz Joseph’s reaction to Rabbi Nissan Beck’s gift on the occasion of the emperor’s departure from Jerusalem in 1869. As noted, the emperor expressed a wish: “I hope my Jewish subjects will always remember me,” which, in fact, acknowledges the importance of the gift as a sign of the Jews’ appreciation of his rule and their loyalty to him, and, furthermore, satisfies the need of the Jewish community in Jerusalem to be accepted and appreciated for their particular identity and to show their loyalty to the Habsburg monarchy.629 The closest to an official document of an imperial reception is Consul CabogaCerva’s letter to Foreign Minister Count Gyula Andrássy, sent on 10 April, 1879, explaining the rationale behind his recommendation to accept the thirty-eightpiece coffee set presented by “these good people who are very poor” to Franz Joseph on his Silver Wedding Anniversary, because it was skillfully made of the local Dead Sea stone in an Oriental style, making it an appropriate souvenir. By contrast, among the most outstanding Jewish chroniclers in Jerusalem in this context were Pinhas ben Zvi Grayevsky and Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin, who repeatedly tell us how greatly appreciative Franz Joseph, his consort, and his court were of the gifts of Old Yishuv, and they even mention messages of gratitude and medals of honor.630 One of these accounts may be historically correct: as noted, at the beginning of the introduction in a copy of his book Divrei Yosef, the geographer and author Rabbi Yehosef Schwarz wrote a note stating that Franz Joseph awarded him the Imperial Gold Medal for Arts and Sciences. Rabbi Frumkin’s remark—that the book pleased Franz Joseph so much that he ordered to have it taught in Jewish schools in his realms—may be an invention. In view of the many narratives that the Old Yishuv invented regarding the emperor’s appreciation for the collective, as did Jews in his realms, an examination of accounts regarding the receipt of objects may yield new insights into the contemporary Jewish history and culture of these milieux. Nevertheless, two additional factors should be taken into account: one, Franz Joseph was known for his unemotional and laconic style. “Thank you, it is very beautiful, I am very pleased…,” was his typical expression of recognition and gratitude for an homage;631 in addition, it seems that official sources on the receipt of gifts from the Jewish communities in the Dual Monarchy are scarce and, as in the case of the Habsburg Jewish communities in Jerusalem, it was the local Jewish press that re-

629 I will elaborate on these narratives below. 630 See above, pp. 115–117, 121–122. 631 See, inter alia, Schmid-Bortenschlager and Schmid, “Mythos Franz Joseph,” 59.

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ported on the enthusiastic attitude of the emperors and their court. The significant difference is the strict monarchical rule that did not allow the publication of any information on the sovereign without his official authorization, a policy that was firmly applied in the Habsburg realms.632 Having said this, one notable example of the receipt of a gift presented to Franz Joseph by a Jewish delegation in Vienna is an article in the most widely read Jewish newspaper in Austria—the Österreichische Wochenschrift—edited by the well appreciated and influential Rabbi Dr. Josef Samuel Bloch (1850–1923). Bloch was a defender of Jewish culture and religion, and of the civil rights of Jews at a time of vicious and rampant antisemitic outbursts. The main article in the December 1908 edition of the newspaper describes a reception held by Franz Joseph in his office in the presence of representatives of the Austrian Jewish communities.633 Bloch wrote that Chief Rabbi Moritz Güdemann opened the homage presentation by reciting the Jewish blessing, first in Hebrew and then in German, at the sight of a crowned head. Then Dr. Alfred Stern, president of the Jewish community of Vienna, delivered a speech and handed the emperor a collective gift from all the Jewish communities of the monarchy—a silver box set on wooden legs, that contained the many greeting cards. “His Majesty was very satisfied and expressed his pleasure to receive such a nice present. The emperor especially liked the arrangement that assigned each community a separate sheet,” noted Dr. Bloch, and then added that Dr. Stern apologized on behalf of the representatives of Ragusa in the Crownland of Dalmatia (now Dubrovnik in Croatia), who could not join them due to travel difficulties. The Ragusa Jewish representatives had asked Dr. Stern to respectfully submit their homage to His Majesty. To this expression of regret for not being able to attend the reception, the emperor graciously replied: “Please, tell the gentlemen that I regret not having met them. Greet my Ragusans.” There may be a grain of truth in this self-laudatory account. Firstly, no respectable person, needless to say a member of the Chamber of Deputies and the director of a newapaper like Bloch, would dare quote the monarch untruthfully; secondly, Gabriele Kohlbauer writes that

632 Censorship was strict. See Seth Lippincott, “Crown Prince Rudolf: Life, Politics and Death” (2006), 11–12 . 633 Österreichische Wochenschrift: Centralorgan für die gesammten Interessen des Judenthums 15, Ig., Nr. 49, Dezember 1908, 854. Copies of the newspaper’s issues are kept at the Jewish Museum, Vienna. I am grateful to the librarians for their assistance in obtaining the material. Dr. Josef Samuel Bloch is briefly quoted by Kohlbauer in “Der Kaiser,” 119. Born in Galicia and member of parliament from that crownland, he tirelessly fought against antisemitism, and was founder and editor of the widely read Österreichische Wochenschrift. Bloch launched the newspaper in 1884 to raise Jewish consciousness, pride, and solidarity. He opposed the adoption of nationalities and advocated Austrian loyalty. See also Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, 35.

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Franz Joseph was so impressed by the design of the gift that two years later, on the occasion of his eightieth birthday, the Austrian Jewish communities decided to present him a collective tribute along the same lines, but this time in a silver container in the shape of a tempietto (a small circular temple). As in the greeting on the occasion of the monarch’s Diamond Jubilee, the congratulations and blessings were written in German and each was signed by a representative of the respective community and bound together with black and gold cords, black and yellow being the colors of the Habsburg monarchy.634 These examples suggest that perhaps, after all, there is also some truth to the positive acceptance of Old Yishuv gifts, albeit highly exaggerated by Jerusalemite Jewish sources. Important evidence on the great skill of a Jerusalemite artist is provided by a gentile connoisseur, William Cowper Prime, who visited Jerusalem in 1856 and published his memoirs in 1857, in a book titled Tent Life in the Holy Land. Prime tells that he met an old Jew named Mordechai, who was very talented in stonecarving, and bought some of his works. According to Haim Be’er, in his non-fictional stories on Jerusalem, this artist was Mordechai Schnitzer.635 The importance of Prime’s account lies in the fact that it was provided by a learned foreign traveler unrelated to the Old Yishuv, and not by a local Jewish writer. It seems that the multiplicity and vast array of servile flattery in the texts in honor of the emperor cover the entire Hebrew lexicon, so much so that the quantity sent to him became a nuisance to the court. There is at least one source referring to texts sent to Franz Joseph by his Jewish subjects in his realms that had been annoying. Rabbi Yehuda Zvi Gelbard from Drohobycz (Galicia) lets us understand that the monarch or his aides requested his subjects to stop sending the emperor these extravagant adulations.636 To quote but one example, in his Sefer Ha’yovel (Jubilee Book) Rabbi Gelbard himself celebrates him on his Golden Jubi-

634 Kohlbauer, “Der Kaiser,” 119, figs. on pp. 120–121. Kohlbauer quotes Harry Kühnel, Elisabeth Vavra, and Gottfried Stangler, eds., Das Zeitalter Kaiser Franz Josephs: Schloss Grafenegg, 19. Mai–28. Oktober 1984, I: Von der Revolution zur Gründerzeit 1848–1880, Katalog Niederösterreichische Landesausstellung (Vienna: Amt der NÖ Landesregierung, 1984), 296–297. 635 William Cowper Prime, Tent Life in the Holy Land (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1857), 105 (EBook of the 1874 edition: . Prime stood behind the establishment of the Department of Art at Princeton University, to which he bequeathed his ceramics collection; he became its first chair and was later named vice-president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Unfortunately, I could not trace additional information on Prime buying Schnitzer’s works. In his “Self-made King of Art,” 75, Beer’s clear identification of the old carver may be correct; it supports my remarks on the general atmosphere of self-enhancement prevalent in the Old Yishuv. 636 Govrin, “From Figure to Image,” esp. 56, 62.

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lee as the “[rising] sun of life, shining and brightening up….”637 These exaggerated acclamations are the dominant element in the prayers, blessings, and congratulations created and sent by the Old Yishuv, too, in part due to the belief of many Jewish Habsburg subjects that this was a reciprocal relationship—an attitude that later scholars and writers considered plainly naïve. Finally, an examination of catalogs and other written sources suggests that central criteria in the selection of objects to be collected and exhibited were: the social status of the gift-giver and his national and religious identity, with the aim of representing a wide spectrum of Habsburg subjects; the political and material value of the gift; its potential to project power and pomp; its effectiveness as a propagandist instrument; and its aesthetic value.

637 For this and other examples, see ibid., 57–58.

PART III Between History and Story: The Austro-Hungarian Monarchs in Jewish Tradition

8 A Mutual Promise and Commitment Moshe Gros tells us that, when visiting Jerusalem, Franz Joseph heartily promised his Jewish subjects: “I am grateful to you for your pledge of commitment and loyalty. Differences in religious faith among my peoples will never constitute a barrier that comes between us in my heart. You can be sure of my protection forever.”638 This meaningful promise was given more than once to Jewish communities in his realms,639 and it was the hope of all Jews that, despite the recurring outbursts of antisemitism, Karl would follow in Franz Joseph’s footsteps and keep this promise. How did the gifts contribute to repeated pronouncements of this promise by Franz Joseph and later by Karl? What role did the elaboration of events, memories, and myths in the visual and literary imagery of the gifts of Jewish Habsburg subjects to their monarchs, and in the narratives woven around them, play in the construction of identities? How effective were the artifacts and narratives in sustaining the critical bond between the Jerusalemite Habsburg kolelim and institutions and the monarchs?

8.1 Franz Joseph: The Biblical Hero of a Jewish Holy War In his 1966 semi-historical novel Austeria (The Inn), set primarily in a remote inn near a small town in Eastern Galicia, then on the border of the Austro-Hungarian kingdom, the Polish Jewish writer Julian Stryjkowski tells us about a group of anxious Jews discussing what to do in face of a group of murderous Cossacks approaching the town in the first days of the Great War. After much debate, they ultimately put their faith in Austria, the monarchy, and the emperor: We are in Austria, not Kiszyniow. And Praise God that this will not change in the slightest as long as Emperor Franz Joseph reigns…. It’s just a pity that he is not a Jew. But perhaps it’s just as well he’s not. If he were a Jew, who knows whether he would pledge himself to his own people. He has a Jewish heart. That’s enough.640

638 Gros, “Kaiser Franz Joseph,” 5. 639 See, for example: “I accept with gratitude the assurance of the respect and unwavering loyalty of the Nógrád County Jewish community. Religious difference does not form a dividing wall in my feelings for my peoples. You too can therefore count at all times on my royal grace and protection,” in “Hírek – A király szavai márványban,” Zsidó Hiraldó, 25 October, 1894, 9, quoted by Glässer, “‘Bless Our King’,” 82–83. 640 Michael Klein, “The Myth Lives On,” 123. Julian Stryjkowski, born Pesach Stark (1905–1996) to a family of Hasidic Jews, was a journalist and writer notable for his social prose of radical leftist leanings. He was considered one of the best Polish Jewish writers of the communist era. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-009

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During the difficult years of the war especially, antisemitic circles incited the populace against Jews by blaming them for all their misfortunes; consequently, the Jews’ belief that only the Emperor of Austria and King of Hungary could guarantee their safety became an ever stronger source of solace and hope. The following chapters will elaborate on the previous excerpts from Jewish literature, as well as dedications of gifts from Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem containing a variety of illuminating texts characterizing Franz Joseph as a monarch by the grace of God, powerful, just, righteous, honest, merciful, caring, and compassionate. The texts already quoted, as well as those below, are based on verses from the Bible and later Jewish literature, expounding and exemplifying royal virtues; quoted and elaborated to full advantage in sermons, prayers, blessings, poems, and stories in order to place Franz Joseph in a commensurable light with the ideal Kings David and Solomon. Moreover, Franz Joseph’s attitude toward the Jews was perceived as that of a father to his sons in the various senses and meanings that this comparison allows for, and, to a large extent, as an almost absolute identification with the Divine Father. The praises to God were most often redirected to the emperor, to a point that a reader, unaware of the subject to whom these acclaims are directed, would infer that the addressee is the King-Messiah from the House of David, an angel of God, second only and closest to God himself. Perhaps the same naiveté can explain an opposing attitude, the familiarity that many Jews allowed themselves when referring to the emperor: as noted, many Jews in the Dual Monarchy and the Old Yishuv not only hebraized his name, but also called him by an affectionate Yiddish nickname. As Julian Stryjkowski wrote in his Austeria, Galician Jews felt that Franz Joseph had a Jewish heart. They were not alone. At the outbreak of the Great War, emancipated Jews living in the Habsburg realms heavily identified with the Dual Monarchy’s aims. By serving in the army, donating money, and helping not only the Jewish victims of war but also gentiles, Jews identified themselves as Austrians, truly loyal to the Austrian cause and the supranational monarchy. Several visual images illustrate this attitude. Badges created between 1914 and 1916 by Jewish communities both in Austria and Hungary as a sign of loyalty exhibit a head portrait of Franz Joseph the victor, crowned with a laurel wreath inscribed in an enameled Star of David (fig. 22).641 Jewish institutions, aware of the army’s urgent need to raise the morale, courage, and will-

641 Several color variations were made with the Star of David: black and yellow for the Austrian part of the empire; red, white and green for the Hungarian part; blue and white for the Zionist movement; and black, white, and red for the German allies; see Michaela Feurstein-Prasser, “Badge from the First World War,” in The First Europeans: Habsburg and Other Jews – A World before 1914, ed. Felicitas Heimann-Jelinek and Michaela Feurstein-Prasser (Vienna: Mandelbaum,

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ingness of the 320,000 Jewish soldiers to make sacrifices, spread and promoted patriotic words of encouragement in sermons, journals, greeting cards, and postcards.642 Therefore, the relationship between the sovereign and his Jewish subjects had political and religious implications that served the interests of both sides. Moreover, comparisons with biblical heroes became especially common. Because of the socio-political changes in the lives of Jews (first and foremost the emancipation and granting of civil rights) Franz Joseph had been compared, early in his lifetime, to Moses, who liberated his people from Egyptian bondage and led them to the Promised Land, peace, and bliss. During the war, Moses, rising from behind the Tables of the Law, encourages the army of the Dual Monarchy on a popular Jewish New Year greeting-card sent by Jewish soldiers on the front to family and friends at home (fig. 73).643 Also noteworthy is an adaptation of the traditional Jewish prayer “Blessing for the crowned head” in the “Prayer after Victory,” penned by Rabbi Simon Hevesi of Pest after the victory in Gorlice and published on 9 May, 1915, on the front-page of the Jewish weekly Egyenlőség (Equality), which presents a parallel with the dedications of gifts from the Habsburg kolelim of the Old Yishuv: We prayed to you on the threshold of war, Everlasting God. Master of Armies, you who give strength to the people. Our ancestors had faith in you and you were our recourse. Be with us in our just cause. Bless our king who you ordered as Moses to show the way, let the light of your triumph shine on him in your grace so he can halt his enemies.644

2014), 172–173, no. 40; Steiner, “Namensliste der Feldrabbiner,” figs. p. 81, including a similar badge minted in Germany at the time, as a sign of loyalty to Wilhelm II. 642 Postcards, prints and various propaganda objects can be found in the Jewish Museum in Vienna and in private collections. Nevertheless, Isaiah Friedman remarks, the Austrian command prohibited Jewish servicemen from corresponding with their families in Yiddish or Hebrew, which often were the only languages they knew, and promotions and decorations were rare. See his “Austro-Hungarian Government and Zionism,” esp. 154–155. 643 This Jewish New Year greeting card shows Jewish soldiers praying in the battlefield. In the center stands a prayer table with the Tables of the Law and the figure of Moses rising from behind. The postcard is part of a collection in the Israeli Defense Forces Archive and was exhibited in the Ramla Museum, Israel, in 2011; see . Exemplars are found in private collections, and are reproduced in papers and in the web. 644 See Glässer and Zima, “The Emperor-King’s Hungarian Maccabees,” 156. In Hungary, the general attitude of Jews toward Franz Joseph was more positive than that of Christians. András Gerö remarks that the law provided that voices of criticism were to be dealt with as an “offence to the king and members of the royal house.” Consequently, the Hungarian people were “forced to talk exclusively in a loyal tone when in public, while everyone knew that the king was disliked by many for his past actions.” This restriction was even more strictly enforced by the censorship during the war years. However, observes Gerö, in retrospect it is hard to tell whether it was the spirit

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Fig. 73: Moses encourages the army of the Dual Monarchy. Jewish New Year greeting postcard. Private collection.

Expressing the views of Neologs, Rabbi Hevesi adds: “Oh, be the protector of our Hungary, extend a protective arm when she battles her foes, show your marvelous helping power.” In another comparison with a biblical hero, appearing in sermons read by Rabbi Rubin Färber of Ostrava in Moravia, by Rabbi Samuel Guttmann of Lemberg in Galicia at the Hanukkah celebrations in 1914, and by Army Chaplain Albert Schweiger in Hanukkah 1915; Franz Joseph was equaled to Mattathias, and Austria to the Maccabees, whereas Russia was compared to the pagan Seleucid empire that exercised autocracy over Judaea and Samaria, persecuting the Jews.645 Because Austria’s main enemy in the first two years of the war was Tsarist Russia, the home of pogroms and state-sponsored anti-Jewish oppression, Jews felt that the war of the Dual Monarchy was a Jewish holy war to defend AustriaHungary and save Jews, mainly the Jews of Galicia, from Russian tyranny. Franz Joseph’s Jewish subjects and protégés perceived Austria-Hungary as a “Kingdom of Grace,” contrasted with the realm of organized massacres and “evil decrees”

of inner conviction or the constraint of laudatory loyalty that stands behind the positive feelings of the general population for the emperor in the last years of his life; see his “The King is Dead! – Long Live the King!” . 645 Rozenblit (“Holy War and Revenge,” 77–79) notes that also Zionists made that comparison.

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Fig. 74: Jewish soldier performing the Atonement ritual. Jewish New Year greeting card. Private collection.

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across the Russian border.646 Rabbis serving in the Austro-Hungarian army or attending the Jewish communities in cities and towns compared Russia with Amalek, the archetypal eternal enemy of the Israelites and a symbol of evil who will be defeated with the help of God.647 One such visual expression is a contemporary caricature in a Jewish New Year greeting card illustrating a Jewish soldier performing the kappara, or atonement ritual, with a rooster in the image of Tsar Nikolai II accompanied by the traditional text: “This is my exchange, this is my substitute; this is my atonement. This rooster will go to its death, while I will proceed to a long good life and peace” (fig.74).648

8.2 Death of Franz Joseph: A New Sun Rises in the Firmament? It was as early as 21 November, the day of death of Franz Joseph, that Charles I addressed a proclamation to the peoples of his empire. He noted that he wished to continue and finish the work of Franz Joseph. He declared that in the war he would rebuff all enemy attacks and

646 Malachi Hacohen, “Dilemmas of Cosmopolitanism: Karl Popper, Jewish Identity, and ‘Central European Culture’,” Journal of Modern History 71/1 (1999), 115; Daniel Unowsky, The Plunder: The 1898 Anti-Jewish Riots in Habsburg Galicia (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2018), esp. chaps. 1, 3; idem, “Peasant Political Mobilization and the 1898 anti-Jewish Riots in Western Galicia,” European History Quarterly 40/3 (2010), 412–435, esp. 413–414, 427–429. 647 On the Jews’ hopes for a better attitude from Tsar Nikolai II—hopes that did not come true— see Gros, “Kaiser Franz Joseph,” 3. On Russian antisemitism in the reign of Nikolai II, see Monty Noam Penkower, “The Kishinev Pogrom of 1903: A Turning Point in Jewish History,” Modern Judaism 24/3 (2004), 187–225; Glässer and Zima, “The Emperor-King’s Hungarian Maccabees,” esp. 156–157; Hacohen, “Dilemmas of Cosmopolitanism,” esp. 114–116. Rozenblit, Reconstructing a National Identity, esp. 4, 25, 38; eadem, “Holy War and Revenge”; Dieter J. Hecht, “‘Der König rief, und alle, alle kamen’: Jewish Military Chaplains on Duty in the Austro-Hungarian Army during World War I,” Jewish Culture and History 17/3 (2016), 207 . 648 Zemplén Múzeum, Szerencs (Hungary), and Ramla Museum of History (Israel). For the much discussed practice and examples of postcards with blessings for the Jewish New Year, with the image of an Orthodox Jew holding an atonement rooster whose head is that of the tsar, see Shalom Sabar (“Between Poland and Germany,” 152, 155, 157, fig. 13, note 39), who notes that many of these postcards were made in Poland and Germany, and the problem of sending such a subversive image at the time may have been solved by pasting a piece of paper to conceal it from hostile eyes. See also Norbert Glässer and András Zima, “Unchangingness in Change: The Changed Selfimage of Budapest Jewish Groups in the Interwar Years as a Result of the Changed Borders in the Carpathian Basin,” Acta Ethnographica Hungarica 56/1 (2011), 63–92, fig. 4. David Asaf ( [Hebrew]) thinks that most postcards were printed in America. The Israel Defense Forces and Defense Establishment Archive–“Collection of the Jewish Fighter in Armed Forces and Underground Worldwide,” holds a small collection of postcards depicting Austro-Hungarian Jewish soldiers on the battlefield and at home.

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help his nations to a victorious conclusion of the war. On the other hand, he also said he would bring the blessings of peace back to his nations and that he wished to be a just and loving ruler respecting equality in law as well as freedom and guaranteeing all the protection afforded by the legal system.

Thus wrote András Gerö, quoting the new emperor-king.649 Karl’s first words to his Jewish subjects were encouraging, and were interpreted as a recognition of the community as an honorable collective and as a condemnation of antisemitic accusations questioning their participation in the war: The Jewish population always demonstrated its loyalty and devotion to my Homeland and their home. And in the present great time they have contributed to the successes won through the grace of God with their readiness to sacrifice blood and treasure. I assure their co-religionists that in my lands they will enjoy the rights due to all citizens without restriction… for the Jewish soldiers all behaved very bravely.650

Obviously, Karl’s recognition of his Jewish subjects’ readiness to join the army referred to those living in his realms; as Consul Count Caboga-Cerva wrote to the authorities in Vienna, those living in the Old Yishuv were far from favorably disposed to join it. Nonetheless, Karl’s statement that Jews would enjoy all civil rights would certainly reach the Old Yishuv and would set alight the hope that Karl would keep Franz Joseph’s promise to his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem. Nevertheless, the situation of the Jews in Austria-Hungary and Palestine was unstable, and suffering and fear of the unknown permeated their lives. Although various politicians in Hungary called for progressive social reforms that would also benefit Jews, many others supported the idea of a Christian national king649 András Gerő, “The King Is Dead! Long Live the King!” https://www.geroandras.hu/en/theking-is-dead/ based on a paper presented in Vienna, April 9, 2016, unpaged. Complete version: “A beteljesítetlen elvárásoktól a boldoggá avatásig – IV. Károly,” in idem, Hit, illúziókkal. Középés Kelet-európai Történelem és Társadalom Kutatásáért Közalapítvány – Habsburg Történeti Intézet (Budapest, 2019), 133-76. Idem, “Reprezentációk Olvasata: Koronázás és közvélemény 1916ban,” in “Fogadd a koronát…”: Ünnep és válság, hagyományok és reformkoncepciók, ed. Norbert Glässer et al., A Vallási Kultúrakutatás Könyvei, 46 (Szeged: Néprajzi és Kulturális Antropológiai Tanszék, 2021), 55–72, on Karl’s complete failure to live up to his promises. 650 Glässer, “‘This Crown Came Down to Us’,” 19, reffering to a quote by Arnold Kiss, chief Neolog rabbi of Buda, in Egyenlőség, 6 January 1917, 4. See Austro-Hungarian war propaganda in relation to Jewish soldiers, as in a postcard presenting group portrait of Jewish soldiers with a Torah scroll at the center, and portraits of Karl and Zita in the background. Idem, “Királyunkat, kit Mózesként rendeltél…” Királytisztelet, konfesszionalizálódás és állampatriotizmus az izraelita felekezetei sajtóban 1944 előtt (Budapest: Monarchia Kiadó, 2020), fig. p. 157. Nevertheless, the army’s attitudes toward Jews were more complicated. Most religious observances were respected, but there were many restrictions and biases, as noted by Isaiah Friedman, “Austro-Hungarian Government and Zionism,” 154–155.

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dom, a position that entailed anti-Jewish politics. The ideology of the latter found expression already at the coronation ceremonies and the political discourse after that event. Consequently, even Neologs—the liberal and reformist Jews who had been more inclined toward integration into Hungarian society—asked themselves, among other troubling questions, why there were no Jews on the list of those to be knighted at the celebration of the new king’s coronation.651 However, like most other Habsburg Jews, also Hungarian Neologs, Orthodox Jews, and Jewish circles who opted for keeping the status quo in religious affairs kept to the principle of obeyance to the crowned ruler, long present in Judaism, and to the hope that the new king would continue the benevolent policy of his predecessor. Laudatory comparisons of Franz Joseph and his heir to biblical figures continued. In a funerary oration in honor of Franz Joseph, Immánuel Löw (1854–1944), Chief Rabbi of Szeged, Hungary, portrayed him as a contemporary biblical king and King of Jerusalem: “Our great king loved those who spoke the truth. He bore the title of King of Jerusalem and followed the teachings of Solomon,” and added the essential reference to the loyalty of Jews to Hungary: “The Holy Crown is a brilliant jewel: it radiates a supernatural light that inspires reverence and also love, attachment, and self-sacrificing devotion to the wearer of the crown.”652 In another representative eulogy drawing a comparison with biblical figures, Field Rabbi Adolf Altmann praised Franz Joseph as good, pure, pious, just and righteous, a king that united the peoples of his kingdom and worked for their good— a characterization that recalls the virtues of Solomon. The Jews, said Rabbi Altmann, loved the emperor and would love him forever. Like Moses who could not enter the Promised Land, so Franz Joseph would not see the peace he yearned; but, added Rabbi Altmann caring for the future, the Jewish people wished the new emperor success: like Joshua who became the leader of the Israelite tribes after Moses’s death, so Karl would bring to his peoples and to their promised land— meaning Austria-Hungary—“a happy, blessed peace.”653 Lajos Szabolcsi, editor-in-chief of Egyenlőség, elaborated on the same comparison, perhaps also making reference to Isaiah 40:3:

651 Gerö, “The King is Dead!”; Glässer, “‘This Crown Came Down to Us’,” 14–15. 652 Immánuel Löw, Száz Beszéd, 1900–1922 [One Hundred Speeches, 1900–1922] (Szeged: Schwarcz Jenő Kiadása, 1923), 14, 20–21, quoted by Glässer, “‘Bless Our King’,” 86–87. For a review of sermons delivered in honor of Karl IV by Neolog, Orthodox and status quo rabbis, see János Oláh, “Megelőlegezted neki a jó áldását, fejére aranykoronát helyezel,” in “Fogadd a koronát...”: Ünnep és válság, hagyományok és reformkoncepciók, ed. Norbert Glässer et al., A Vallási Kultúrakutatás Könyvei, 46 (Szeged: Néprajzi és Kulturális Antropológiai Tanszék, 2021), 135– 146, with a list on 135. 653 Rozenblit, “Holy War and Revenge,” 80.

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We stand there at the bier of Francis Joseph I. We were an oppressed and persecuted people when he ascended to the throne; today we mourn him as the free citizens of a free nation…. He was like the majestic figures of our Bible. He was Moses in his wisdom, love and sobriety. He was Moses in his death too. The great old man died on the last mountain, on the threshold of the future. Grant Oh Lord, God of all kings, that his Joshua may lead us to the promised land of peace and development. We place our trust in you, Joshua of millions, our new ruler! You were able to spend your youth at the side of the Master. He placed his hand on you, anointed you…. We, abandoned children, are crying on the wilderness. Come, Joshua and lead us with your triumphant youth!654

The eulogies mourning Franz Joseph also expressed the hope that after years of wandering in the wilderness, a long journey full of trials but with the promise of victory, Karl, representing the new generation, would lead Franz Joseph’s peoples on the road to peace. This expanded parallel became a recurrent topos in the speeches of rabbis mourning the deceased old emperor, which aimed to plant hope for the future under his heir.655 On 3 December, 1916, Rabbi Arnold Frankfurter held a memorial service for the late emperor in the Leopoldstädter Tempel —the largest synagogue in Vienna.656 His sermon was published, at least in part, in the prestigious Pester Lloyd newspaper—one of the many Budapest newspapers that reported extensively on the death of Franz Joseph and the mourning services. In his sermon, Rabbi Frankfurter emphasized: Everything Austrian Jews have and are [today], they owe to God and the Emperor…. He razed the walls of the Ghettos; he guided them from darkness to light, from serfdom to freedom. With the passing of Franz Joseph I, the resplendence of his infinite love, solemn noble mindedness and chivalry elapsed. However, a new sun rose on the firmament—Emperor Karl I.657

Similar expressions are found in sermons, prayers, and the dedications of gifts from the Old Yishuv to Franz Joseph, once again adapting Psalm 72, which contains a prayer for the success of the righteous biblical kings and highlights the importance of justness, judgment, mercy, and peace. Such expressions should also be considered in light of Psalm 84:11—“For the Lord God is a sun and shield: the Lord will give grace and glory: no good thing will he withhold from them that walk uprightly”—which ties the faithful to God and the king.

654 Glässer, “’This Crown Came Down to Us’,” 12, quoting Lajos Szabolcsi, “Meghalt a király” (The King is Dead), Egyenlőség, 1 November 1916, 1. 655 Glässer, “‘This Crown Came Down to Us’,” 12. 656 At the same time, Rabbi Emanuel Havas did the same for Hungarian soldiers at the Stadttempel in Vienna; see Dieter J. Hecht, “‘Der König rief, und alle, alle kamen’,” 212. 657 Ibid. Regarding Franz Joseph as the source of all good, see this book, esp. pp. 62–63, 123– 124, 324, 363.

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Similarly, news of the death of the beloved emperor-king was received by Jews in Jerusalem with deep sorrow. The ceremonies in his memory were held in three Jewish institutions related to the Habsburg monarch—the Lämel school, the Tiferet Israel Synagogue, and the Hungarians’ Synagogue (which in the photograph album presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Karl I/ IV on his coronation is labeled the Great Synagogue). The ceremonies combined Jewish rituals and imperial Habsburg traditions. The ceremony in the Hungarians’ Synagogue differentiated between the mourning prayers for Franz Joseph and the blessings to the new king, Karl, by sitting on the ground during the first and standing during the latter. The Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel also organized a prayer at the Western Wall. The Jewish Jerusalemite journal Lefi Sha‘a issued a volume titled Special edition in memory of the deceased just Emperor and King Franz Joseph, may he rest in peace, which dealt with three topics: the attitude of Franz Joseph to the Jews; memories of his visit to Jerusalem and of his attentiveness to the Jewish community; and the ceremonies and elegies in his memory organized by the Jewish community in Jerusalem. The latter were given extensive space. The authors describe the death of Franz Joseph as that of a father and sole shield of the Jewish people, who have become orphaned, with no one to care and protect them. Biblical verses on the righteous and other appropriate Jewish texts exalting virtuous personages were widely used to describe him as exceptionally graced by God. However, in a realistic approach, the texts also express the people’s hope that Karl will continue to walk in Franz Joseph’s footsteps and declare that their commitment to him as their new emperor-king “will give him the love they gave to his righteous and merciful uncle, may he [his memory] be blessed for ever.”658 Prayers and sermons in the spirit of Psalms 72 and 84 were much needed. The peaceful steps that Karl initiated in the spring were not fruitful and dried up by that summer. The Dual Monarchy’s armed forces were suffering heavy losses, the civil population experienced hunger and disease, and quickly becoming demoralized.659 In view of growing discontent, the declaration in Dr. Bloch’s Österreichische Wochenschrift on 22 June, 1917, may have been apropos: “In fact, the Jews are not simply the most loyal supporters of the monarchy, they are the only unconditional Austrians in this federation.”660 Nevertheless, the confusion and ap-

658 Six elegies appear in the Jerusalemite journal Lefi Sha’a 8, the special edition in memory of the deceased emperor and king. The speakers were Rabbi Moshe David Gros, teacher at the Ezra pedagogical institute; Nisim Danon, the vice Sefardi Rabbi; Joseph Chayim Sonnenfeld, head of the Hungarian kolel; Ephraim Cohen-Reiss, director of the Ezra institutions; Pinhas Kahana-Schapira, head of the Austro-Galician kolel, and Yeshayahu Peres, director of the Lämel School. 659 Brennan, “Reforming Austria-Hungary,” esp. 87–91. 660 Österreichische Wochenschrift, 22 June 1917, 390.

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prehension of the Jewish population intensified in the face of the growing antisemitism, all the more so as the neverending war caused more and more suffering. Beller remarks that “Franz Joseph did not start out as a friend of the Jews; indeed, their most cherished political home, German liberalism, was his bête noire. It was only belatedly—and relative to the disastrous rise of political antisemitism among the Viennese, the Bohemian Germans, and almost all the other national populations with the exception of the Magyar ruling class in Hungary—that Franz Joseph became more protective of his Jewish subjects, and appeared to them in a better light when compared to everyone else.”661 Written nearly fifty years after this event, Shai Agnon shared the memories of a Jewish Habsburg subject that expresses the deep angst of the people—what could not be openly said at the time. Agnon’s hero in his In Mr. Lublin’s Store said: “who knows what times are awaiting us and how the new Emperor Karl would treat the Jews. Even if he doesn’t hate us, the kingdom is not under his control but is controlled by ministers and advisers.”662 Few people may have suspected the extent of the problem. Although more than once Franz Joseph failed to conceal his prejudices, these were minor observations when compared to the general atmosphere at the time of his death. Karl, notes Brennan, had racist, ethnic, and cultural biases, particularly against men of the old guard, Jews, socialists, and alleged freemasons. Without provocation, Karl despised and held unfavorable opinions and feelings for those groups, which he also applied to individuals he perceived as belonging to those categories. In February 1911, in a letter to Archduke Franz Ferdinand, then heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, he described Budapest as a “nest of Jews.” In June of that year, while in London, he wrote Zita that the embassy staff contained “nothing but Jews.” In June 1917, he told German army officer Hans von Seeckt of his concern about having sworn in, on the Virgin Mary and Saint Stephen, Vilmos Vázsonyi—a Jew—as Hungarian Minister of Justice. In January 1918, Leopold Count Berchtold noted in his diary: “The emperor finds the presence of three Hebrews in the [Hungarian] cabinet not very pleasing but says that, since they are accompanied by seven ‘respectable’ men, the percentage is not so bad after all.” Count Ádám György Miklós Károlyi —who considered Karl antisemitic—noted that when Karl made him prime minister on 27 October, 1918, the emperor was so gloomy and exhausted that “he did not even ask if his future ministers were to be Jews or not, a question he rarely failed to put.” Karl’s first prime minister, Ernest von Koerber, who renounced his position a few weeks later, commented to Jewish Austrian statesman and histor-

661 Beller, “World of Yesterday Revisited,” 44. 662 See above, p. 170.

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Fig. 75: Karl I/IV addresses a group of Jews. Postcard, 1916–1918. Vienna, Jewish Museum, object 4812.

ian Joseph Redlich, an influential politician before and during World War I, that Karl seemed to have little sympathy for Jews.663 Our last meaningful example refers to Karl’s remembrances: the emperor-king himself mused that popularity was like a “soap bubble,” and that no sooner had the public started to idolize its ruler than it withdrew its love, “influenced by the short-sighted Jewish hacks and other vermin.” Karl also rued the bad blood caused by the central food offices, which were “so harmful because they were staffed only by Jews, who made colossal business….”664 It is probable that Karl’s Jewish subjects were not aware of his serious antisemitic prejudice. His religious bigotry and antisemitic biases were known only to his close friends and government officials, and he enjoyed the firm support of Jews that Franz Joseph had ensured for his House. A color postcard printed through Jewish initiative, possibly to build self-assurance, shows the new emperor-king standing majestically on a high veranda covered with a red carpet and, in

663 Joseph Redlich was a very qualified statesman. Could his Jewish background have been one of the reasons why Karl decided not to appoint him prime minister? 664 Brennan, “Reforming Austria-Hungary,” 308–309, note 36.

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the background, the Austrian and Hungarian colors. He addresses a stereotypical audience of mostly old Jews who look on from below; the expressions of their faces disclose hope blended with concern and acknowledgment of the monarch’s authority and power. A caption in German and Hebrew reads: “Your fellow believers suffered greatly because of their patriotism.665 The Jewish population is very patriotic. We will never forget it,” and below it: “Address of the successor to the throne in Chernivtsi” (fig. 75).666

665 Meaning, when Galicia fell under Russian rule. 666 On the back is a stamp of the old Jewish Museum with an old inventory number, “W.Kr.50.” Jewish Museum Wien, object 4812. Czernivtsi/Czernowitz was an important center in the northern, Ukrainian, part of the Austrian Crownland of Bukovina, with a large Jewish population. Photographs of rabbis and representatives of various Jewish communities blessing Karl, while presenting him the Torah scrolls, are kept in the Jewish museums of Vienna and Budapest.

9 Narratives and Homages: The Construction of Identities, Belonging, and Otherness Even though stories about rulers and other personalities documented in historical and literary texts were pure invention, what role did they play in shaping the identities of the kolelim in the Old Yishuv? The similarities and differences between history and fiction shift, following the dialectics between truth and invention, honesty and propaganda, mythmaking and rationale, in the creation of history and the image of rulers and peoples—ancient, medieval, and modern. The rationale behind the narratives about rulers spread by their courts lies in the desire for political and cultural domination over peoples and nations, although this is not the only factor to consider. As we have seen, numerous narratives are constructed by their subjects to serve their own interests. Whereas royal myths emerged in early modern Europe as arguments for the divine right of kings to exert authority and power, popular folklore could enhance the socio-cultural identity of the impoverished and underprivileged subjects who created, enriched, and disseminated the stories. Thematic continuity is a characteristic of the narratives of both royalty and its subjects. Moreover, stories often serve as antecedents to the construction of facts by interested political entities and non-critical collectives and individuals who accept them as true. Narratives, popular folklore, and literary works refer to the legends and myths on Franz Joseph with nostalgia or irony, and thus keep his image alive as either an important personage in the history of the Habsburg peoples or an empty figure in an equally irrelevant story having no relation to historicity. Much has been written about Jewish Habsburg subjects during Franz Joseph’s long reign, the integration of acculturated and well-off circles into the general societies in his realms, their considerable contribution to the prosperity of the empire, and their attitudes to the Imperial House at the time.667 Research on Karl’s brief reign has focused primarily on his policy and management of the Great War, but only scarce attention has been paid to the Jews’ contribution to his govern-

667 Among the classical sources, see Carl E. Schorske, Fin-de-siècle Vienna: Politics and Culture (New York: Vintage, 1979); Steven Beller, Vienna and the Jews, 1867–1938: A Cultural History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989; reprint 1993, 1995); Wistrich, Jews of Vienna; Marsha L. Rozenblit, The Jews of Vienna, 1867–1914: Assimilation and Identity (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1983); Weinzierl, “Jewish Middle Class in Vienna”; Shapira, Style and Seduction. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-010

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ment’s efforts in the military, socio-economic, and humanitarian spheres.668 Even less is known about two issues worthy of research: one, the two devout Christian monarchs’ perception of the Land of Israel—the biblical Holy Land—and its Jewish inhabitants; the other, the attitudes of the Jews of the Land of Israel toward the monarchs, especially Karl I/IV. Nevertheless, this poses an interesting question about Franz Joseph, the monarch we know much more about, because he became a figure wrapped in myth in his lifetime both in the Habsburg realms and the Jerusalemite Old Yishuv, so much so that it is often difficult to separate history from story. Steven Beller has observed: The existence of a Habsburg myth does not mean that much in this myth was not based on realities: the reality of a state of law; the reality of at least de facto pluralism in the Austrian half of the Austro-Hungarian Empire; the reality of the absence of large-scale physical violence against Jews; and the reality of an imperial administration that kept the nationalist and antisemitic demagogues at bay such that the Jewish bourgeoisie of Vienna, the young Stefan Zweig included, could imagine themselves relatively safe.669

Other facts, such as the broad acceptance of antisemitism as a respectable attitude, suggest that Zweig, like many other Jews, idealized the monarchy. Various documents, chronicles, and stories quoted in the relevant sections in this study demonstrate the existential angst of Jews throughout the Habsburg kingdoms and Palestine. The persistence of Franz Joseph’s mythical image in local oral tradition and literature, long after his death, may have been fed by the difficult conditions of life in Ottoman Palestine and in Austria-Hungary during the Great War, as well as in the former Habsburg lands and Palestine in the interwar period,670 followed by the horrors of Nazism and the Holocaust.

The Enhancement of Identity: Local Jerusalemite Stories The invention of the imperial friend gave the Jews consolation and hope, and in the Old Yishuv it also functioned as a means of enhancing their own self-image. Nevertheless, the process of romanticizing the Old Yishuv and its invented reciprocal and loving relationship with the Habsburg emperor involves much irony.

668 One of the few exceptions regarding the contribution of Jews is the volume edited by Marcus Patka on behalf of the Jewish Museum, Vienna: Weltuntergang: Jüdisches Leben und Sterben im Ersten Weltkrieg (Vienna: Styria Premium, 2014). 669 Beller, “World of Yesterday Revisited,” 42. 670 Lisa Silverman, “‘Nicht jüdeln’: Jews and Habsburg Loyalty in Franz Theodor Csokor’s Dritter November 1918,” Religions 8/4 (2017), 1–2, 10 ; Govrin, “From Figure to Image,” esp. 59–60.

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Local Jerusalemite stories from the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries attest to a socio-cultural struggle taking place at the time. Thus, most Old Yishuv narratives depict its members as poor but gentle, witty, and sharp-tongued, and since they were dependent on the good will of the monarch—also as respectful and appreciative of his power in the traditional Jewish custom. In the case of Franz Joseph, these narratives also meant gratitude for the benevolent way in which he exerted his power. In contrast, Western elites and emancipated Jews largely perceived Old Yishuv members as a marginal, simple, people living in an outdated odd way, detached from and in opposition to the dominant culture of Western society. This was part of the politics of the time, the Orientalist perception ranging between a romantic colonialist tone and a colonialist hatred and rejection of “the Other.” Empathic remarks such as that of the Austrian Consul to Jerusalem, Count Caboga-Cerva, who wrote to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Vienna that he “convinced these good people, who are very poor, to send a modest offering” to the emperor, are an example of this dual attitude held in the Habsburg government. The same may be said about Beda Dudík’s empathy for Jews praying at the Western Wall. The empathy expressed by Caboga-Cerva and Dudík, and the need of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to create respect, expose the patronizing attitude of colonialism, on the one hand, and the colonial mentality of local Jews, on the other. How might the Old Yishuv succeed in rising above the stereotypes of their poverty and backwardness? As part of this struggle, the gifts sent by the Habsburg kolelim to Franz Joseph and Karl exemplify two means to this end: one, artistic—well-thought out and well-crafted artifacts that point to an awareness of trends in royal circles and to a search for a mature local Jewish art; the other, narratives, which through their long life were embellished time and again by the communities that created them, and by the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries were elaborated on and disseminated in local Jewish periodicals, chronicles, memoirs, and literature.671

671 Ibid., 80–82. Although referring to only a few representative stories, Govrin nevertheless presents various attitudes of Jewish writers, poets, and storytellers who wrote to or about Franz Joseph in Ottoman Palestine, the State of Israel, and Austria-Hungary. In his “Nation and Empire,” 63, Malachi Hacohen notes a wide selection of Central European Jewish intellectuals—from Joseph Roth (1894–1939) to Franz Werfel (1890–1945) and from Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) to Karl Popper (1902–1994)—who began envisioning in the 1930s cosmopolitan commonwealths in the image of the vanished empire. The Zionists, too, remarks Hacohen, were wistful about imperial Austria—for example, Asher Barash (1889–1952), founder of the Association of Hebrew Writers in Palestine. Hacohen adds that the empire’s appeal was never greater than after it had already collapsed, and a Europe of nationalizing states degenerated into warfare.

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Both means aimed to create self-respect as well as respect from other collectives for their particular dual identity as worthily belonging both to the Habsburg monarchy and the promised Jewish Holy City. Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, who were influential in the creation of the culture and identity of the entire Orthodox collective in Jerusalem, invented the image of the loved and loving emperor. Not only did the gifts and laudatory epistles of his Jewish subjects testify to the special appreciation of the Jerusalemite communities for Franz Joseph, but many more stories and legends were woven around him than around any other monarch. Some of the narratives enhance real events, whereas others may contain only grains of truth, and still others may be plain invention. Many of the texts thoughtfully laud the monarch and tell us about the special attention, care, and affection that he demonstrated to Jerusalemite Jews during his visit to the city in November 1869. To recall but two examples, the dedication in the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian gift to the emperor-king in 1908 clearly says: “and also to us, dwelling in the Holy [City], he gave many signs of his love when he came in all his glory.” This claim is another aspect of the use of the “glory” of the Habsburg monarch by his Old Yishuv subjects to reclaim a sense of respectability and further acknowledgment. Not less important are Rabbi Beck’s words to Franz Joseph’s closest retinue, on the emperor’s departure from Jerusalem, that that the Jewish community is offering him not “gold and silver and precious stones as a gift,” as was expected in his court, “but… just a stone, a stone from the Holy Land which means so much to His Majesty that he made a great effort and incurred many expenses to come and see!” Old Yishuv Jews presented themselves as modest and deeply pious, resisting negative projections on them by Christians and Western acculturated Jews alike. In an obvious manipulation, the Habsburg kolelim often created the impression that the emperor-king’s visit to his Jerusalemite Jewish subjects was one of the main purposes of his journey, while other stories emphasized how much the attention, affection, and gifts they showered upon him pleased him. Therefore, on the whole, our study of the gifts and popular narratives expands the historical perspective on the Old Yishuv, as well as the understanding of its basic values, norms, self-identities, and attitudes toward Franz Joseph and Karl, and therefore also sheds light on its expectations from the monarchs and their courts.

A Welcome from the Sky According to a local story, an original media event took place in Jerusalem on 9 November, 1869, on the first night of Franz Joseph’s stay in the Holy City. The emperor looked out upon the Old City from the window of his room at the Austro-Hungarian Hospice in Jerusalem, where he sojourned during his visit. Sud-

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denly, a bright light illuminated the dark autumn sky. Greatly amazed, he realized that this was an illuminated inscription that read: “Welcome, His Honor, the righteous and merciful Emperor Franz Joseph. May he be exalted and his realm blessed!” In Yellin’s account, the Jewish community had set a large box on the roof of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue, on the spot where the yet unbuilt dome would stand; they cut out the blessing written in big letters, both in Hebrew and German, on the side of the box facing the hospice, and then lit a large number of candles inside it.672 This visual element—the odd appearance of the Hasidic Tiferet Israel Synagogue, which at the time of Franz Joseph’s visit still lacked the dome that would have completed the roofing—may have inspired this story. Moreover, this story further underscores the integration of the idealized image of the emperor in local discourse, as in Orthodox communities in the Habsburg monarchy; in this case, however, it contains a prayer that the veiled expectations of assistance, based on the acknowledgment of their loyalty and inherent value, may be fulfilled.

The Synagogue that Tipped Its Cap This is not the only story that the odd look of the Hasidic Tiferet Israel Synagogue, lacking the dome that would complete the roofing, may have inspired. Another of the most recounted local stories to this day—and a wonderful testimony to the subtleties of using customs, imagery, and narratives in order to advance a religio-political agenda—recounts an event said to have occurred a couple of days later. When visiting the Jewish Quarter, we are told, the emperor stood in front of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue and asked his guide, Rabbi Nissan Beck, who was the spirit behind its construction: “Why is the synagogue lacking a proper roof?” Seizing the moment, the quick-witted rabbi quipped: “Why, Your Majesty, the synagogue tipped its cap in your honor!” It is said that Franz Joseph smiled and graciously replied, “How much will it cost me to have the synagogue replace its hat?”—and subsequently donated the funds needed for the dome’s construction. This story became widespread not only in local Hasidic circles but in the entire Jewish community; since then, the dome has been known by locals as “Franz Joseph’s kippah”—673 kippah in Hebrew meaning both cap and dome.

672 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 13–14. 673 Hayardeni, “The Kaiser’s Cap.” It should be noted that, contrary to Hayardeni’s identification of the personages in a photograph included in her article, Franz Joseph does not figure there, as the photograph is much later. See also Reuven Gafni (“Domes, Ruins & Memories: The Tiferet Israel Synagogue as Reflected in Hebrew Literature and Writings,” in High Above All: The Tiferet Yisrael Synagogue and the Hassidic Community in Jerusalem [Jerusalem: Yad Izhak Ben Zvi,

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Interestingly, these two picturesque tales seem to have been reported only by Jewish circles. According to Tamar Hayardeni, the anecdote on the amiable dialogue between Franz Joseph and Nissan Beck, about the synagogue welcoming the emperor as a man salutes his king, lacks any historical basis and may have been invented at the beginning of the twentieth century, at the earliest.674 The journalist Israel Dov Frumkin, who wrote in the newspaper Ha’havatzelet on 7 October, 1870 (12 Tishrei 5631), may have provided corroboration for this occurrence during Franz Joseph’s visit to the Jewish Quarter: [The kaiser] went gladly to the synagogue named Tiferet Israel, which stands proud thanks to the efforts of… Nisan Beck… and looked favorably on the beauty and power of its dimensions. And as proof of his appreciation for the agent [Beck], he stretched out his illustrious hand and donated a thousand francs to the synagogue, to show that his generosity also extended to Jews.675

As Hayardeni notes, there is no indication that the money was given to build the dome, nor is there any reference to Beck’s comment about the synagogue tipping its hat to Franz Joseph—details that Frumkin, as a close friend and former brotherin-law of Beck, would have known and mentioned. Moreover, adds Hayardeni, in an article in Ha’havatzelet 8 September, 1871 (22 Elul 5631), Isaiah Halevi Horowitz names Rabbi Abraham Jacob of Sadigur, the son of Rabbi Israel Friedman of Ruzhyn, as the benefactor who provided for the “capping” of the synagogue: The synagogue was built between 1857 and 1872 by Jerusalem’s Vohlin Hasidic community … with funds from the Ruzhyn and Sadigor Hasidic dynasties in Russia and Austria, and was named after Rabbi Israel Friedman of Ruzhyn. The Hasidic master purportedly instigated its construction after his disciple Nisan Beck, who had emigrated to Ottoman Palestine, returned to visit his mentor in Sadigor. Beck informed the rabbi that Czar Nicholas I of Russia was about to purchase land close to the “Wailing Wall” and build a church and monastery there. Beck came back to Jerusalem with a mission—to buy the site from its Arab owners, whatever the cost, before the czar made his move. Rabbi Israel raised the capital to acquire the property, despite its exorbitant price, and built a synagogue there.676

2016], 120–124 [Hebrew]), who mentions various examples of the retelling of this story in Hebrew literature, as well as narratives on the special relationship between the Austrian emperor and Nissan Beck (ibid., 124–125). In Haim Be’er’s Feathers (98–99), a guest at a meeting of the Viennese salon in Jerusalem, a gravedigger, tells that his grandfather was among the representatives of the Old Yishuv who accompanied Franz Joseph on his visit to the Jewish Quarter, and told him what happened there. Typical of oral traditions, the gravedigger’s story differs slightly from other accounts—differences that may also be a result of Be’er’s literary license. 674 Hayardeni, “The Kaiser’s Cap,” based on articles in the press in 1898. 675 Ibid. 676 Ibid. The same benefactor, Rabbi Abraham Jacob of Sadigur, is named in an article in the journal Ha’tzefira, 9 Nisan, 5658/1st April, 1898.

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According to Isaiah Halevi Horowitz, in the same article, the “King of Hungary” stood in front of the Tiferet Israel Synagogue and said: “The glory of this sanctuary will be great.”677 As for the candle-lighted inscription on the roof of the synagogue, could this story be an elaboration of real events? On the first evening of Franz Joseph’s visit, fireworks that could be seen from the roof terrace of the Austro-Hungarian Hospice were lit in his honor, and a torch-lit welcoming procession was organized by the Austro-Hungarian Jews in Jerusalem.678 The torch-lit procession, which may have been developed into a fantastic story, was not the only homage to Franz Joseph organized by Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem. Real events certainly were the source of two accounts, which were also embellished over time: the welcome by a Jewish delegation at Colonia (today’s Motza), and the magnificent welcoming ceremonies upon Franz Joseph’s entrance into the city. Moreover, their reconstructions and presentations expose subtle political rivalries between the Austro-Hungarian and Austro-Galician kolelim, and between the various Christian, Jewish, and Ottoman communities in Jerusalem, that have not yet been studied.

Who Welcomed Franz Joseph in Colonia? How did the two main and rival Jerusalemite Habsburg kolelim embellish the narratives regarding the real and mythicized visit of Franz Joseph to Jerusalem? What do the stories tell us about the relationship between the various kolelim? What do they tell us about the atmosphere and communal life in the Old Yishuv? In effect, all accounts of “historical” events relating to Franz Joseph in the life of the Old Yishuv are inherently related to the construction of identities, Otherness, and belonging of each of the Habsburg kolelim to the Orthodox Jewish community in the Habsburg realms, the Habsburg monarchy, and Jerusalem. An interesting account, of which there are various versions, tells us about a welcoming delegation of Jews and another of Arabs, that paid homage to Franz Joseph in Colonia en route to Jerusalem, at the point from which the Holy City could first be seen—no doubt a liminal moment for all religious visitors. I have already noted the essential letter presented by representatives of the Jewish community in Jerusalem to the Austrian Consul, Count Caboga-Cerva, respectfully requesting his authorization to welcome Emperor Franz Joseph, “be he exalted,” 677 Ibid. 678 Böhler, “Kaiser Franz Joseph im Heiligen Land,” 178, quoting Stefan Rosenberger, “Franz Josef I. – Kaiser von Österreich und apost. König von Ungarn in Jerusalem 1869,” in: Missions-Notizen 1870, 46.

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who would soon arrive “on eagles’ wings,” and to read the hymn written specifically for that occasion by Yoel Moshe Salomon. As documented in the Austrian Consulate’s Archive, the consul allowed ten riders to welcome the emperor on behalf of all Ashkenazi Jews on the morning of 9 November in Colonia.679 However, five other accounts disclose interesting dissimilarities. In his letters to Elisabeth, Franz Joseph describes in detail the trip to Jerusalem, replete with a description of the local entourage of Bedouins from the desert, Druzes from the Haran, and exotically dressed Turks in bright costumes and turbans holding dangerous sabers and riding on horses, donkeys, mules, and camels.680 He was delighted and greatly flattered by this exotic escort that protected him and his retinue on their way, and by the war games that these guards played in his honor, all of which, he notes, were purchased at a high price.681 Interestingly, despite the renowned importance that Franz Joseph attached to imperial protocol, neither the lively homage of the local entourage who escorted him from Colonia to Jerusalem, nor the delegation of his Jewish subjects who honored him there, or the three exotic sheiks and the kavass of the Austrian Consulate who joined them after a short time, are noted. As in Franz Joseph’s detailed account of the escort along the first part of his way, in his letters to his consort, a woodcut published in the Illustrirte Zeitung of Leipzig on 18 December, 1869, which printed the only known visual image of the emperor on his way to Jerusalem, depicts the exotic aspects of the journey.682 In the woodcut, the emperor and his picturesque entourage, including squads of spirited Turkish, Bedouin, and Druze riders, gallop enthusiastically toward the Holy City, which is schematically represented as an Oriental walled city set against a serene landscape of rounded hills. The title of the Illustrirte Zeitung image, “Emperor Franz Joseph riding on his way to Jerusalem on 9 November, 1869,” is neatly descriptive and obviously intended to convey the artist’s precise visual report of this historic event. Notwithstanding, in this woodcut, as in Franz Joseph’s letter, there is no indication of the presence of a delegation from the Old Yishuv in the entourage. Might this detail not have been considered important?

679 Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 149–152, document 51 (Jer. I/16), including the text of the poem; see also Dudík, Kaiser-Reise, 180. 680 Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, 103–106, 108–109. 681 Letter of November 8, describing the ride from Jaffa through Ramla to Abu-Gosh, in ibid., 103–106. 682 The mosaic picture in the chapel of the Austro-Hungarian Pilgrims’ House is an allegory, a symbolical narrative; see Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, 56–57, 87–88, fig. 10, and plates 1 and 6, for the mosaic and the earlier proposal.

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In contrast, Beda Dudík does mention the Old Yishuv delegation. He briefly states that in Colonia, the imperial entourage stopped to change from travel clothes and the improvised Oriental head-covers into official uniforms, in accordance with the strict imperial protocol for their solemn entrance into the Holy City. There, in Colonia, a first delegation from Jerusalem greeted Franz Joseph: ten riders, each holding an Ottoman and an Austrian banner; to the surprise of all, the riders were Hungarian, Moravian, and Bohemian Jews,683 subjects of the emperor. Perhaps because a commentary on the site interested him both as a historian and a chaplain, Dudík also notes a moving detail: Colonia is located near the Terebinth Valley (Elah Valley), where the brook in which David picked up the stones to combat Goliath flowed—a crucial milestone in the history of the Kingdom of Israel that has much religio-political significance. Thus, the note on the Jewish delegation has only a modest role, yet, significantly in our context, the AustrianCzech Dudík specifies that these were Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian subjects holding an Austrian banner. Our two additional sources are Jewish—a Jerusalemite chronicler, who was not present at the site, and a Hungarian journalist, about whom I could not find information in this regard. The Jerusalemite Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin tells us that the riders rode on similar horses, holding the emblems of the Ottoman Sultanate and the Austrian Empire, dressed in similar garments, sporting a band in the colors of the Austrian banner across their chests, and wearing a sword on their hips.684 After presenting the emperor with a scroll bearing a welcoming greeting in Hebrew and German, they performed an Arab-type horserace and accompanied the imperial entourage all the way to Jerusalem. To the emperor and his entourage’s surprise, the riders were his Jewish Habsburg subjects living in Jerusalem.685 His account is quite similar to Dudík’s, apart from the significant details on the identity of the members of the delegation and the colors they wore. The banners, and additional nationalist details are also highlighted in the article titled “Tárház—A király Jeruzsálemben” (“Repository—The King in Jerusalem”), which appeared in the illustrated family journal Vasárnapi Újság of Budapest on 28 November, 1869. The journalist reports that the king put on his field marshal uniform and pinned the order of St. Stephen on his chest, and, following suit, the members of his entourage also changed into processional garments. Only a narrow ridge of hills now separated them from the destination after the long trip. At the top of this ridge, “the first delegation from the city met us: the Hungarian Jews of Jerusalem

683 Dudík, Kaiser-Reise, 180. 684 Meir Haim Beck, son of Rabbi Nissan Beck, led the delegation. 685 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 8–17.

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bearing a tricolor banner with the inscription: ‘Long live the emperor and Hungarian Apostolic King Francis Joseph. Long live the nation. The Hungarian, Moravian, and Czech Jewish community’.”686 There is no mention of Austria. We shall discuss below the details in the Jerusalem and Budapest versions, which, in my opinion, find an echo in the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem to the Austro-Hungarian monarchs.687

The Welcome to the Holy City: Was Franz Joseph Pleased? Another example of the elaboration on a real event by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, whose aim was to enhance, brings us to the welcoming ceremony in honor of Franz Joseph upon his entrance into Jerusalem. The Jewish communities welcomed the emperor-king at a gate of honor that they installed on Jaffa Street, as was the case with the gates of the Christian communities and the local Ottoman authorities, and in clear competition with them. It was designed in the shape of a sukkah,688 and a room was added on both sides—one for the Ashkenazi notables of the city, and the other for the Sephardi. Rabbi Nissan Beck was the living spirit behind the ceremony. According to Yellin, “the roofing of the sukkah was marvelous and heartwarming: large branches of orange and lemon trees heavy with fruit were specially brought from Jaffa to build the roof. Moreover, the sukkah was ornamented with precious curtains from the Torah Ark of synagogues in Jerusalem as well as with beautiful embroideries and silver and gold jewels that embellished those synagogues… the quality was amazing. The interior, even more than the exterior, conveyed spirituality, warmth and life…. At the emperor’s arrival to the gate, the honorable heads of the Ashkenazi and Sephardi communities went out, offered him bread and salt, and a Torah Scroll which he most respectfully kissed.”689 We should note the association drawn between respect for the monarch and respect for the Torah, in the context of the religio-political Jewish tradition: the Torah scroll carried by official delegations that welcomed a ruler was perceived as a symbol of the revealed heavenly teaching, which the personage was expected to

686 Vasárnapi Újság, 28 November, 1869, 660, quoted by Glässer, “‘Bless Our King’,” 81. Haim Be’er may have based his story on Yellin’s account of one of his protagonists’ memories of this event, who tells that his uncle took part in the ride; see Be’er, Feathers, 102–103; and below. 687 See below, p. 375. 688 A temporary structure roofed with branches built yearly for the religious Feast of Tabernacles (Sukkot). 689 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 11–12.

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honor.690 Yellin, who probably enhanced the self-glorifying account of the Old Yishuv, wrote that this very special welcome was much more impressive than those of other communities and deeply moved the monarch.691 Yet this narrative contradicts Franz Joseph’s experience of the welcome upon entering the city, as described in a letter to his consort: he tells her not about the rich multisensory experience, but about the patriotic cries of the Jews greeting him, who comprised the majority of the welcoming masses, which were a nuisance that marred the pleasantness of the moment.692

Franz Joseph’s Visit to Jewish Sites Not by chance the charismatic Nissan Beck was a main protagonist in several narratives that I interpret as aimed at reinforcing the self-pride of the Old Yishuv. The lively rabbi guided Franz Joseph during his visit to the Jewish Quarter, translated and expanded upon the welcoming addresses and blessings of the Ashkenazi and Sephardi rabbis, and provided him information on each and every site. Among the Jewish institutions that the emperor took time to visit and favor with a donation—besides the Tiferet Israel Synagogue that, according to the amusing and widely spread anecdote, at long last acquired a dome thanks to Beck’s ingenious explanation and the emperor’s generosity—were the main Sephardi synagogue, named Kaal Grande Espaniol and later renamed Rabban Yohanan Ben-Zakkai Synagogue, as well as the Lämel School and the Mayer de Rothschild Hospital, which had been established by Austrian Jewish philanthropists under the auspices of the emperor and in his honor. Franz Joseph also visited the compound of apartment houses for the needy known as Batei Machase on Mount Zion, which, although not an Austrian initiative, was constructed in 1860 under the personal supervision of the Austrian Consul Count Joseph von Pizzamano and its southern gate was called Joseph’s Gate, in honor of the emperor.693 Local tradition adds

690 Glässer (“‘Bless Our King’,” 77–78; idem, “Királyunkat, kit Mózesként rendeltél…,” figs. pp. 36–37) observes that in Orthodox Jewish communities, mainly in Galicia and Bukovina, presenting the Torah scrolls was an essential part of receiving the crowned ruler, which was performed even during the difficult years of the First World War. Indeed, many photographs record this ceremony, which was held also on visits by members of the royal family and high nobility. 691 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 11. 692 “Durch ihr patriotisches Geschrei nicht eben angenehm hervorthaten”; Nostitz-Rieneck, Briefe Kaiser Franz Josephs, 108. Obviously, this remark also demonstrates Franz Joseph’s great popularity among the Jews of Jerusalem. 693 As noted, Franz Joseph also paid visits to the Greek Orthodox Patriarch, the Armenian monastery, the Anglican Church, as well as Muslim and Jewish holy sites; in addition, he generously helped institutions of all three faiths.

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that the monarch enjoyed Nissan Beck’s company so much, that he invited the rabbi to accompany him to other sites in Jerusalem, including the Temple Mount. Beck apologized that, due to religious precepts, he was forbidden to step on the sacred mount, and they parted amiably.694 A fantastic story is told by Pinchas ben Zvi Grayevsky about Franz Joseph’s visit to the Sephardi Kaal Grande Espaniol/Rabban Yohanan Ben-Zakkai Synagogue. The story shows much more than the wish of a non-Habsburg community to enhance itself by inventing a special relationship with the monarch. The whole Jewish community did. As told by Grayevsky, Franz Joseph accepted the invitation of the Sephardi Chief Rabbi Abraham Ashkenazi, and on 9 [sic] November, 1869, visited the synagogue: The Sephardi rabbis welcomed the emperor and his entourage, dressed in special festive garments…. As soon as he entered the synagogue, the emperor kneeled, kissed the earth, and said: “This is the synagogue of the great Rabbi Yohanan Ben-Zakkai, head of the sages of Israel at the time of the Roman siege of Jerusalem. And most probably at this very site Titus cruelly spilled the blood of Israel…. May my kneeling and bowing down in this place atone for the terrible sin of Rome to Israel.”695

No less surprising, local Jewish stories emphasize “the love of Franz Joseph for pious Orthodox Jews,” as opposed to “dislike for those who abandon their God and their people.” In one instance, Moshe David Gros tells us, Franz Joseph turned his back on a Jew in disapproval because the latter converted to Christianity, and said he did not want to see or talk with him anymore.696 Undoubtedly a legend, this story demonstrates the endeavor of Jerusalemite Orthodox Jews to enhance their identity through the invented special appreciation of the emperor for their piety. In this respect, Old Yishuv Jews did not differ from Jews in the Habsburg monarchy who could not, or refused to, acknowledge the ambiguities of politics, mistaking political rhetoric for reality.

694 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 10. Mishnah, Eduyot 8:6 states: “Sacrifices may be offered even though there is no Temple.” Conversely, Maimonides, better known as Rambam (1138?–1204) stated: “Even though the Temple is in ruins today due to our sins, everyone is obligated to revere it like when it was standing… [Therefore] is not permitted to enter any place that is forbidden” (Rambam, Hilchot Bet Ha’bechirah 7:7). Controversies in this regard exist to this day. 695 Pinhas ben Zvi Grayevsky, Memories of the First Lovers [of Jerusalem], XV (Jerusalem: M. Werker, 1927–1928), 211–212 (Hebrew). Other reports only tell us that the Ashkenazi and Sephardic rabbis gathered in the synagogue to welcome the emperor, prayed very loudly, and the Chief Sephardi Rabbi David Chazan raised his hands and blessed Franz Joseph; see Böhler (“Kaiser Franz Joseph im Heiligen Land,” 181) who, like Beda Dudík, does not mention the fantastic story. 696 Gros, “Kaiser Franz Joseph,” 3–4.

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Only a few events related to Franz Joseph and the Jewish communities in Jerusalem are recorded in the archives of the Austrian Consulate. The emperor’s few remarks in his letters to his consort and the chronicle of his journey to the Middle East by his spiritual counselor, the priest and historian Dr. Beda Dudík, are the main primary sources for the emperor-king’s perception of his Jewish subjects in the Holy City and their attitude toward him. Summing up the emperor’s visit to Jerusalem, Dudík wrote that Franz Joseph was cheered by the Jewish and Muslim population upon his departure from the Holy City, because he and his entourage generously donated to assist the poor and sick697—a humanitarian act that set aside differences in nationality and religious faith. The narratives show that Franz Joseph’s policy toward his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem, as well as in his empire, is beholden to the myth that they wove around him and to the epithet given to his realms as “a Kingdom of Grace.”

697 Dudík, Kaiser-Reise, 226.

PART IV Discussion: The Old Yishuv Gifts as Venues of Identity Construction

10 Constructions and Reconstructions of Identities The gifts from the Habsburg Jewish communities and institutions in Jerusalem to Franz Joseph and Karl were presented on festive occasions. Like other laudatory genres directed to the monarch, the giving of these gifts was expected, and implicitly required by the court. This was to further its aim of constructing ideal identities of the sovereign, of binding his subjects to him, and of alluring and inducing them into relinquishing other existing attachments, thus stimulating loyalty and the stabilization of the dynasty. His court encouraged expressions of acknowledgment of the monarch’s unquestionable right to his title, power, and authority from all Habsburg nations and peoples of all faiths and social strata; presentation ceremonies and publicity in all media turned them into visible testimonials of recognition and commitment, implying a tacit recognition of the idealized identity of the monarch as real. The gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg communities were to convey a relevant message to a very different socio-cultural and religious milieu, in a troubled and rapidly changing period that, from a Jewish frame of reference, began with long-wished-for emancipation, and ended in virulent antisemitism and the downfall of what they had perceived as a kingdom of grace. The gifts per se, including their visual and literary imagery, were examined from a fresh contextual and intertextual critical perspective that afforded a better understanding of their multilayered meanings as well as of the aims of those involved and the means used to achieve them. Understanding the context in which the recipients received these objects requires consideration of social conventions and mental frameworks of experience and expectations, as well as instantaneous and unconscious modes of perception and reception, no less than the intellectual analysis of iconography, iconology, and the weight of aesthetics on the effectiveness of images and image-bearing objects. Change and continuity alternate in the visual design and texts of these objects, basic topoi repeatedly appear in new guises and with new meanings, and shed light on the events, experiences, thoughts, and attitudes of the people involved in their creation and giving. The careful examination of the artifacts pointed to different visual and literary strategies used by artists and writers to link the ideological, socio-political, and cultural worlds of the gift-givers and the recipients. Moreover, it illuminated the inherent problems of the roles of the gift-givers’ leaders and of the artists, whose interests and aims did not always coincide when it came to the choice of content and style of visual design. In the end, however, all of their essential considerations coalesced to create singular artifacts that

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would hopefully fulfill the expectations of those involved in this social interaction, in a rapidly changing historical period. These gifts helped to create social relations, increasing or reducing prestige, as well as status and asymmetries, which could optimize the chances of the giftgivers to be reciprocated. In this context, this book showed how the complex perceptions of Belonging and positive self-Otherness of the gift-givers, in relation to the Habsburg kingdoms, Central and Eastern European Jewry, and the local space under Ottoman Muslim rule, affected the creation of the gifts and the narratives related to them. A central parameter in this regard is the self-perception of the imperial and royal house as deserving of the homages, which the gift-givers indeed considered while, in turn, hinting at the reasons why they merit the monarchs’ favors and the ultimate fulfillment of their veiled expectations. The desire-driven constructions and embodiments of identities were achieved by the gift-givers and recipients by means of rituals, narratives, image manipulation, literary and publishing practices, and popular media that engaged various dynamics of dissemination and circulation. Portrayals and references to members of royal houses were rendered in accordance with contemporary ideas on social structure and codes of behavior, usually influenced by royal biblical and Roman imperial culture, theological concepts, and dynastic traditions. Whereas some artists kept to traditional iconography, deviations from tradition are of considerable interest and shed light on the development of interrelated visual and literary rhetorical languages. Perhaps more than any of the Habsburg peoples, Jews, including those living in Jerusalem, were grateful to Franz Joseph for his fair attitude and saw in his reign a Golden Age. For them, this monarch became the model for Karl, who needed and expected the same recognition and keen blessings given to his idealized predecessor.

10.1 Identity and Belonging Identity and identifications change over time and are intimately bound to feelings and recognition of belonging; it may be said that they feed and rely on each other. Collective identities are constructed to reinforce bonds and create boundaries, include or exclude, unite communities and also differentiate, separate, and build borders and barriers between them; they engender situations and conditions to legitimize social, cultural, and political actions, rule and assert power in different contexts that can lead to integration of multicultural diversity, recognition, and pluralism, while simultaneously excluding and building walls that define who belongs inside and who, the unworthy or/and dangerous “Other,” be-

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longs outside. Multiple layers of identification and loyalty reflect norms, values, and feelings of collectives and individuals; they juxtapose, complement and enhance each other, and also awaken conflicts. Repetitive acts help to internalize these feelings. The examination of gift-giving provides insight into some of these layers.

10.2 Kings by the Grace of God Gifts became a tool in the imperial media campaign to construct the emperorking’s idealized identity and magnify his image. This process becomes clearer over the long reign of Franz Joseph; obviously, the historical context of Karl’s brief reign did not allow either for repeated presentations of gifts or elaborate ceremonies, the only exception being his enthronement as King of Hungary. The rationale behind celebrations, homages, and the presentation of gifts was to promote loyalty to the monarch, common purpose, and supranational unity and order by constructing national myths around his image as divinely chosen and beloved by God and all his peoples. In this way, the power structure of the dynasty would be ensured. However, notes Shedel, fifty years after Franz Joseph’s accession, “the Habsburg monarchy was faced with having to strengthen its own irrational appeal in order to ease the political tension in Austria-Hungary. Therefore, the court and the Austrian Church stretched the limits of mythicizing to previously unknown spheres,”698 and based the claim to loyalty upon the appeal of tradition. Whether old or newly invented, tradition and religion went hand in hand in Austria and were an indisputable source of legitimacy and, consequently, loyalty.699 The Habsburg House had no land or ethnic particularity on which to base dynastic support. Therefore, to succeed in unifying the multiple peoples and nations under its scepter, Franz Joseph and Karl sought recognition as kings by the grace of God; their legitimacy and authority were given by God, as opposed to the will or choice of mere mortals. The divine source would make the monarch invulnerable: any offense against him would be considered an offense against God. With that in mind, upon his accession on 2 December, 1848, Franz Joseph reinstated the title “Emperor by the Grace of God” to validate the divine origins of his crown, and Karl’s oath at his coronation in Budapest on 30 December, 1916, further pro-

698 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 73–75. 699 Ibid., 71–74, 84–85; Praschl-Bichler, “Eine Zeremonie,” 204. Historical precedent and continuity could reinforce emotional and political adherence.

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claimed: “We, Charles IV, by the Grace of God perpetual Apostolic King of Hungary and her associated countries….”700 Habsburg subjects were expected to recognize the emperor as the source of their well-being, security, prosperity, and happiness, which the court proclaimed as dependent on the integrity of the empire, centered on the person of the emperor-king by the grace of God. Thus, court and Church portrayed Franz Joseph not only as an example of the diligent monarch who tirelessly works for the good of his peoples, but first and foremost as a Prince of Peace,701 a strict but benevolent father to all his peoples through whom God bestows all that is good on his loving peoples.702 Moreover, notes Shedel, the Austrian Church realized a transformation of the identity construction from a king anointed by God to a Christ-like monarch. This shift in emphasis was facilitated by already widespread stories about Franz Joseph as a truly exceptional merciful ruler who protects the weak, relieves need and poverty, is forgiving and mild, and maintains his dignity when confronting bereavement. The Austrian bishops indeed went beyond conventional legitimacy by divine will and declared him to be nothing less than a god—703 an image that would delegitimize any demands of the disparate nations under his scepter for national and political rights. As noted earlier, awareness of this attitude is reflected in the efforts of his Jewish subjects, in his realms as well as in the Old Yishuv, to comply with the expectations of the monarchical authorities. Obviously, Jews had to respect their own religious and cultural norms, therefore the manifestations differ. Remarkable expressions are the recurring references to Franz Joseph that reconstruct praises to God, as in the noted visual and literary metaphor of God who protects His people in the shadow of His wings, common in Psalms, which could blur the distinction between God and the virtuous king that He crowned. The beautiful biblical metaphor appears in most prayers, sermons, and texts, such as the petition to Consul Caboga-Cerva to organize a welcoming

700 On Franz Joseph, see above, p. 15, note 14. On Karl, see Norton, “Budapest Habsburg Coronation,” 66. 701 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 82–83, quoting, inter alia, Julius Laurencic (ed.), Unsere Monarchie 1848–1898: Die österreichischen Kronländer zur Zeit des fünfzigjährigen Regierungs-Jubiläums seiner k.u.k. apostol. Majestät Franz Joseph I (Vienna: Georg Szelinski, K. K. Universitäts-Buchhandlung, 1898), 266; Telesko, “Franz Joseph as the ‘Media Emperor’,” 133. In addition, the emperor was promoted as an exemplary family man; see Smetana, “Viribus unitis,” 112– 113, fig. 90. 702 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 83–84, 86–87. 703 Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 84–87, note 46, for the bishop’s letter, and quoting Franz Graf Coronini-Cronberg, “Franz Joseph I” (in J. Schnitzer, ed., Franz Joseph I und seine Zeit, 8), who says: “He is Christ in the noblest meaning of the word”—indeed, an exceptional declaration.

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ceremony for Franz Joseph upon his arrival in Jerusalem in November 1869; delegates then said that “it was heard from everywhere that, beloved by God, the emperor would arrive on eagles’ wings,” paraphrasing Exodus 19:4, as well as praises for protecting his Jewish subjects under his wings, which appear in several gifts. The dedication of the 1908 offering by the Austro-Galician kolel also features a visual allusion. Another special praise to Franz Joseph as an emperor by the grace of God is evident in the gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, which draws a parallel between his Golden Jubilee and the biblical jubilee. Created in micrography, the arch of the gate is delineated by a quote from Leviticus 25:10, suggesting Franz Joseph’s reign as a gift of God to his people. These are just two examples of how gift-givers prayed for the king and thanked him by adopting and adapting biblical and later Jewish texts referring to the beloved one of God. This practice was perceived as an act of faith because such prayers arose from the conviction that the king was God’s anointed and, as such, bears marks of God (whom he represents on earth) and, guided by Him, executes His will for the people. Since antiquity, Jewish sages have called for obedience to the monarch in whose kingdom Jews lived, as he was the only entity able to preserve social order. For Jews, social order meant security, which explains the quote from Mishnah, Avot 3:2 in the gifts to Franz Joseph and Karl. In the belief that the king’s need for respect and loyalty and their own needs for protection intersected, Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects respected the monarchs’ authority out of free will. Contrary to the exchange of gifts, gift-giving may only hint at the expectation of return. Therefore, writers of congratulations and other texts combined biblical texts and later Jewish literature in sophisticated ways to express the unspoken expectations of the Old Yishuv gift-givers regarding not only the physical needs of its members, but also the construction of their identities. Psalm 72, a common source, is a typical example: exalting God, the writers beg Him to endow the God-graced king who honors the King of Kings with all virtues, particularly those derived from divine acts of protection and care for His people; care for the lands and peoples under his scepter is manifested in every God-fearing king. This attitude is one important aspect of the creation of the emperor-king’s identity, on the one hand, and of the identity of Jewish Habsburg subjects, specifically those pursuing a pious life in Jerusalem, on the other. The gifts functioned as vehicles of praise as well as persuasion. Thus, their study also sheds light on the practices that gift-giving sustains and the discourses that guide it, as well as on the relationship between gift-giving and other kinds of praise. Unowsky shows that at the time of the Golden Jubilee, it was still possible to achieve compatibility between nationalist movements and the inviolable loyalty

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owed to a monarch chosen by God, and even later the possibility of national selfexpression together with supranational loyalty to the dynasty was still attractive. Unowsky remarks that, during the Diamond Jubilee celebrations, different nations and peoples carefully highlighted their singular characteristics (which were much more than typical garments and justified receiving special recognition and the granting of political rights) and not the common denominators that made them into one state, as expected by the court. Yet, they still respected the emperor-king’s celebrations.704 An intertextual reading of the artifacts, ceremonies, and parades suggests that there was more than one reason for this behavior. Regarding the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem, whose singular identity is prominent in the visual design and texts of their gifts, the aim was not to assert a distinct national identity in order to achieve greater political power, but to gain recognition for their unique ethno-religious identity as compatible with loyalty to the Habsburg monarch; this positive Otherness and Belonging meant spiritual benefits that his Old Yishuv subjects could offer him and his realms, and that made them deserving of his legal protection and support. Thus, the gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee demonstrates the development of new positions regarding identities and expectations, including national aspirations in the Land of Israel, all the while respecting the authority of the emperor-king. In an exceptional image of the ideal of unity of different peoples under the Habsburg king graced by God, the gift presented by this same kolel to Karl I/IV creates a multilayered parallel by the juxtaposition of the symbols of the tribes of Israel—which kept their particular identity while united in the ideal kingdoms of David and Solomon—with heraldic symbols of the Dual Monarchy’s crownlands.705 This parallel between the Dual Monarchy and the ideal Kingdom of Israel, which was established by the grace of God because of the love of God for His people,706 presents Karl as a Prince of Peace and his empire and kingdoms a utopia. The dedication of the Austro-Galician gift to the emperor-king alludes to the blissful future by inscribing Karl’s portrait on a clipeus held by a pair of paradisiacal birds—prefiguring the muchawaited end of the war and the terrible suffering that it brought—interlacing it with an icon of heavenly and kingly Jerusalem.

704 Unowsky (Pomp and Politics, 180–182, 184) notes that the 1908 homage procession, conceived as a great statement of supranational unity, highlighted divisions in society, but these difficulties did not, for the most part, reflect antagonism toward the emperor or the state itself; also Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” 91–92. 705 As noted, Karl intended to grant more autonomy to his nations in various aspects. 706 See, for example, Deuteronomy 7:7–9.

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10.3 The Claim to the Crown of Jerusalem Successors to the Ideal Biblical Kings and Heroes The original visual metaphor of different peoples maintaining their own identity under the scepter of a common king, with the juxtaposition of the tribes of Israel and the Austro-Hungarian kingdoms, is one of the several ways by which Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects lived with the construction of identities during the reigns of Franz Joseph and Karl as ideal monarchs, peers of the great biblical kings. As argued in this book, all known gifts from the Old Yishuv include in their dedications adaptations of biblical verses that tie together praises to God, Kings David and Solomon, and the Austro-Hungarian monarchs. Moreover, allusions to venerated biblical figures as a means to idealize the monarchs were well known to contemporary readers in the Austro-Hungarian kingdoms. Habsburg subjects were familiar with the way that writers transferred and applied to their king the promises of God to the people of Israel in the Bible, to convey that God’s protection of the dynasty and its continuity is the natural progression of the ancient bond between God and the Chosen People. As a father to all his people who gave freedom of faith and civil rights to the Jews,707 Franz Joseph was likened to Moses, who guided his people from slavery in Egypt to freedom in the Promised Land; since neither of them lived to see the realization of his mission, this comparison allowed Jewish religious leaders, writers, and poets to see in Karl the new Joshua, who would complete his predecessor’s task. The repetitions in the rearrangements and adaptations of texts embedded these narratives in the collective memory. The biblical figures had a twofold symbolism, as models for the Habsburg monarchs, who were consequently exalted as their peers, and as references to the great heritage of the Jewish people and their contribution to society and culture. As such, the figures of Moses, David, Solomon, and other biblical heroes appeared in Vienna in highly visible media such as architecture, which conveys concepts and beliefs through shape and form. One notable example is the residential palace of Karl Goldschmidt, designed by the Jewish architect Wilhelm Stiassny in a Classicist style around 1880. The four atlantes in its monumental portico are not figures from the Greek or Roman mythology. Instead, the face of the figure on the left strongly recalls biblical Moses in Michelangelo’s famous statue, naturally without the horns that were mistakenly added by the great Renaissance artist. The other three figures are as707 In effect, the institution of constitutionalism, following the 1867 Compromise, made Franz Joseph the guarantor of the rule of law, and hence the protector of the rights of all peoples of the monarchy, the wise and caring patron of all imperial subjects; Shedel, “Emperor, Church, and People,” esp. 85, 88.

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sumed to represent biblical figures as well: the second one from the right shows great similarities in its anatomy and type of body rotation with David as sculpted by Michelangelo, although he looks older, perhaps because of his beard. Due to the lack of defining attributes, the identification of the two other figures is difficult; nevertheless, Ursula Prokop suggests that the second figure from the left might represent King Solomon, who often appears together with King David, while the elder figure on the right might be the prophet Jeremiah.708 No doubt, the depiction of biblical heroes, especially when on the façade of a building, as in the Goldschmidt and Todesco palaces—the latter displaying Esther—would point to a newly awakened yet fragile self-confidence of the Jewish citizens. The same biblical heroes are recalled in the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects, yet not in visual images but in the dedicatory texts, prayers, and narratives. The motives and aims of these images, such as pleasing the monarch and self-enhancement, are similar, but the different media reflect the particular religious position and the socio-cultural and political situation of Jews in Vienna and in the Jerusalemite Old Yishuv. Moreover, whereas the depiction of David, Solomon, and Moses on the façade of a palace of affluent Jews in Vienna reflected what was considered the Golden Age of the Austrian Empire and its Jewish subjects, the parallels drawn between the emperor-kings and warrior heroes (like Joshua and the Maccabees) in art, literature, homilies, and folk narratives during the Great War were undoubtedly intended to encourage the monarchs but, in fact, reflect deep apprehension.

Kings of Jerusalem Another path of identity-making brought to play by Jerusalemite Habsburg subjects stems from the self-identity of the royal house as holder of the crown of Jerusalem. This crown had a prominent place in Franz Joseph’s and Karl’s royal title and was often noted by high officials in the imperial court,709 regardless of the actual political situation.

708 Ursula Prokop, “Das Palais Goldschmidt am Schottenring. Ein jüdisches Bildprogramm im Zusammenspiel von Bauherr und Architekt” (The Palais Goldschmidt on Schottenring. A Jewish Iconographic Program in the Interplay between Client and Architect), in Design Dialogue: Jews, Culture and Viennese Modernism, ed. Elana Shapira (Vienna: Böhlau, 2018), 97–108, esp. 101– 104, figs. 4.3, 4.4. As Prokop remarks, the highly aestheticized figures are also intended as an antithesis to the common antisemitic topos of the “ugly Jew,” which was current at the time. 709 I noted two important examples: one, a reference by Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Prince Felix von Schwarzenberg, in his letter to the Ministry of Commerce on 5 April, 1851, to advance the upgrading of the Austrian Vice-Consulate in Jerusalem to the rank of full consulate; the other, Beda Dudík’s remarks in his account of Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem in 1869. See above, pp. 85–88, 90, 113–114, 144–145.

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Eager to fulfill the expectations of the monarchs, Jewish Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem recalled the royal title to Jerusalem in the dedications of their gifts and other addresses. An early and illustrative example is the inscription on the Dead Sea stone vase, part of the gift presented by the Old Yishuv Perushim to Franz Joseph in 1853: “His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria, King of Jerusalem, etc.”—the crown of Jerusalem being the only one mentioned besides his main, Austrian, crown. Another example is the sophisticated allusion to the title crown of Jerusalem in the dedication of the gift presented by the Austro-Galician kolel to Franz Joseph on the occasion of his Diamond Jubilee—“King of Jerusalem is your name”—highlighted in large silver letters and located on the axis of symmetry. No doubt the most interesting reference to the prestigious title, certainly from an iconographic point of view, appears on the goblet-shaped vessel in the coffee set presented by the Habsburg kolelim in Jerusalem to Franz Joseph and his consort on their Silver Wedding Anniversary:710 as noted, the iconic image of Jerusalem appears at the heart of the heraldic Habsburg eagle, in the common scheme of the heraldic emblems of the Austrian Empire’s crownlands. The iconic image of Jerusalem incorporated into the heraldic Habsburg eagle is a unique iconographic invention of the Old Yishuv artist. The image on the goblet would be read, certainly by the Habsburg House, not only as the paradigmatic symbol of Jewish Jerusalem and as an identifier of the Jerusalemite Jewish subjects, but first and foremost as a celebration of the monarch as King of Jerusalem, heir to the biblical and Crusader kings. In a visual allusion to Karl’s commitment to Jerusalem and right to its crown, Shmuel Ben-David, the artist of the dedication of the Austro-Galician kolel to the new emperor-king, used the interlacing ribbons that articulate the imagery to bind Karl’s portrait to the image of Jerusalem, the holy and royal city. The claim to the crown of Jerusalem was a topos in the Austrian imperial court, even if it was clear that the Habsburg monarch would not be able to realize it. An outstanding visual instance of this deep-rooted wish is the allegorical wall mosaic titled “The Military and Peaceful Pilgrimages from Austria-Hungary to the Holy Land since Ancient Times” in the chapel of the Austro-Hungarian Hospice in Jerusalem. As noted, the iconographers reconstructed history to show only Austrian and Hungarian Crusader kings and knights, as well as saints from areas that would later form part of the Austrian realms, together with Austrian pilgrims dressed in typical national costumes representative of the Austrian lands of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries—the donors of the mosaic decoration. All of them, military and peaceful pilgrims, are led to Jerusalem by Franz Jo-

710 See above, Introduction, pp. 1–2, and figs. 1–2.

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seph as a sanctified monarch. Both the iconography and title of this unique work, which obviously were officially approved, manipulate history to highlight the deep roots and continuity of the commitment of the Austrian royalty and their subjects to the Holy City, on the one hand, and of the subjects to their emperor, on the other.711 The references to the title of King of Jerusalem by grace of God had political and religious significance in various contexts—one, the perception of Franz Joseph as a sanctified monarch and a Christ-like figure, which was assiduously spread from 1898 on by his court and the Austrian Roman Catholic Church; another, the parallel established with the biblical and the Crusader kings of Jerusalem; and a third, the rivalry between the European powers for presence and influence in Jerusalem, as part of the wider contest for hegemony in Europe at the time. The political contest also includes a religious aspect—the rivalry between Austria and France over representation of Catholicism in the Ottoman Sultanate,712 and the aim of the Austrian Catholic Church to limit the influence of Lutheranism and Protestantism promoted by Germany and England. This interpretation is validated by the sophisticated depiction of the German Emperor Wilhelm II as heir to David and Solomon, the ideal biblical kings, as well as to the last Crusader King to reign over Jerusalem—the King of Germany and Holy Roman Emperor Friedrich II Hohenstaufen—in the ceiling paintings of the Ascension Church at the Augusta Victoria Hospice on the Mount of Olives, c. 1910, noted above. It is not by coincidence that this reconstruction of history was created only two years after the mosaic in the chapel of the Austro-Hungarian Hospice was installed. This begs the question, how did Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects successfully claim authorship to Jerusalem?

10.4 The Old Yishuv Habsburg Subjects’ Self-Enhancement The Old Yishuv saw its raison d’être in the fulfillment of the precept of life in the Land of Israel, first and foremost in Jerusalem, conducted according to the moral and ethical codes of the Jewish faith. This basic belief, in its many manifestations, assumes knowledge and creates authority and power, in addition to spiritual values. It was the essential element in the creation of its identity and legitimacy and,

711 Arad, Crown of Jerusalem, esp. 49–62. 712 Mordechai Eliav, “The Austrian Consulate in Jerusalem: Activities and Achievements,” in Austrian Presence in the Holy Land Austrian presence in the Holy Land in the 19th and early 20th century : Proceedings of the Symposium in the Austrian Hospice in Jerusalem on March 1–2, 1995, ed. Marian Wrba (Tel Aviv: Austrian Embassy, 1996), 41–51, esp. 45.

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as such, found expression in representative artifacts and texts. The gifts presented by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to their monarch emphasize the piety of these Jews in visual and literary images, an identity that also figures prominently in many local narratives. Despite the huge gulf between the Old Yishuv and the Habsburg emperorkings, the gifts bespeak the dialectic between the leaders of the Habsburg kolelim, promoted by these communities as proud and wise, and the omnipotent sovereign, or in another set of opposite perceptions—between the poverty-stricken and weak Jews and the strong and powerful gentile monarch. The underprivileged Jews highlighted their ancient heritage, and their leaders made use of their wide experience and wisdom to show gratefulness and devotion to the benevolent monarch, while keeping their positive self-esteem and pride. A related facet of the Old Yishuv identity constructions is the imaginary reciprocal love between them and Franz Joseph. As noted, the gifts and narratives also subtly suggest a special loyalty of these Jews either to the emperor of Austria or the king of Hungary, i.e., to the Austrian or Hungarian half of the Dual Monarchy (see discussion below).

Piety, a Sacred Place, and a Sacred Language Identification with specific sites, history, myths, traditions, rituals, and customs is essential for the creation and cultivation of a collective identity, a sense of belonging, and the consolidation of social unity. Holy places, especially in Jerusalem, were imagined, constructed, reconstructed, politicized and manipulated by the various collectives that placed their spiritual center in the Holy City, with the aim of highlighting their special bond to this unique place and turning the sacred sites into effective instruments in their service. Both historical and mythical sites construct and reflect symbolic orders and identities; every intervention affects their multidimensional values as well as perceptions of structure, stability, and continuity. These values are a product of interpretation and identity-making practices. Therefore, since cultural diversification challenges the collective identity of a community, the community had to create and keep a sense of uniqueness and distinctiveness. This meant the construction of a common sacred history and heritage, including memories and the continuity of the cult at holy sites as a common denominator. The holy places would then function as anchors of their collective identity. The preservation of visual schemes of holy places and monuments built in remembrance of the events that took place, or are believed to have taken place, may have been perceived by the Old Yishuv as conveying two important messages: the continuity of history as programmed by God, and the importance of the role played by the deeply religious Jews who look after those sites and pray there to

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bring forth the heavenly promised redemption and rebuilding of Jerusalem. The venerated sites and monuments became spiritual symbols, unconnected to the historical, geographical, and demographic area; they were places of remembrance of a mythical Jerusalem as well as anchors of eschatological expectations, and, as such, were transformed into the cornerstone of the construction of the Old Yishuv’s collective identity as keeper of the Promised Land; “Guardians of the Walls” was the name of the Hungarian kolel, and “Love of Jerusalem”—the name of the Galician kolel. These meaningful names were instruments of self-empowerment. Identities are reflected in the creation of visual and literary imagery, and, in turn, the perception and interpretation of the latter influence the former. Therefore, while in traditional icons the spiritual overshadows the physical dimensions of sites and natural settings link them to temporal reality, even photographs staged for the tourist industry could be interpreted by believers as mirrors of a site’s sacredness; for example, not only staged photographs of Jews praying at the Western Wall, but also a view of the Temple Mount could convey longing for the rebuilding of the House of God. The importance of places sacred to Judaism, not only in a religious context but also in the context of the construction of a cultural and national identity, was also clear vis-à-vis Zionism. National identity was to be constructed on memories of a glorious past that could be revived in accordance with contemporary ideologies; therefore, sacred and historical sites, many of which were desolate and ruined, should be purchased and renovated. As such, they found a place of honor in the objects created at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts to congratulate Karl on his coronation.713 From the late nineteenth century, these sites became common in the decoration of synagogues and a variety of objects created by Jewish communities under Austrian imperial rule, yet they did not serve as particular identifiers. Representative objects of the Old Yishuv show that sacredness of sites and monuments has long been conveyed not only by rituals, images, and texts: the materials used to manufacture the artifacts also play an important mediating role. Materials taken from holy places or just typical of any area in the Land of Israel, such as olivewood, dried flowers, or the so called Dead Sea/Moses/Bethlehem stone, are perceived as mnemonic tools. Furthermore, the Jerusalemite Jewish gift-givers and artists may have been aware of the religious significance of natural materials from the Holy Land for the recipients, as actually transporting the site’s sacredness.

713 See Katz, “Re-emergence of Jerusalem,” 287; and below.

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In a literary context, the epistles and dedications of its Habsburg members to their monarchs convey the particular quality of holiness in the Old Yishuv’s way and purpose in life, by means of texts based largely on the Bible, especially Psalms. As noted, the reading of Psalms is viewed in Jewish tradition as the most appropriate means to implant belief, praise and thank God, and obtain His favor. The wish to convey the special religiosity as a main identifier may also explain the use of Hebrew, instead of German or Hungarian, in the prayers and blessings appearing in the dedications of the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim to their monarchs. Hebrew had long become associated with religious texts, ritual, and liturgy, and was attributed a special purity, as opposed to the secular daily languages. Therefore, the Austro-Galician kolel used mostly Hebrew, and although German was used by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel for the description of ceremonies in honor of the emperor-kings—to note their names, the name of the kolel and its representatives, and the names of the sites depicted714—the prayers and blessings were written in Hebrew.715 The use of micrography and gematria, both identified with Jewish tradition, are additional signifiers of deeprooted religio-cultural identity.

Local Narratives Self-perceptions and the wish to enhance oneself are the basis for the many narratives created by Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects around the image of Franz Joseph. Drawn from both real events and fictional constructions, countless narratives elaborate on the invented special attitude, care, and affection of the king for his Jerusalemite Jewish subjects. Many of these narratives follow repetitive patterns of folk tales. In this sense, the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects support Werner

714 Michael Silber (“Historical Experience of German Jewry,” 127–129) notes that German was spoken by many Hungarian Jews until the very end of the nineteenth century. 715 As noted, the Austro-Galician kolel chose only venerated sites and consistently identified them in Hebrew. Differently, in the 1908 gift to Franz Joseph, the artist of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel included secular sites and, as in all its gifts to the monarchs, labeled all of them in German. We should recall, despite Silber’s remark in the previous note, that by the second half of the nineteenth century Jews in Hungary had been encouraged, if not pressed, to adopt the Magyar language and culture, and many also identified with the Hungarian nation, including not only the modernizing, upwardly mobile Jews in Budapest and other cities, but also Orthodox Jews in small towns. No doubt, the choice of sites and language renders the interpretation problematic. The choice of Hebrew by the Austro-Galician kolel, and German by the Austro-Hungarian one, might also be a result of socio-cultural factors. Jerusalemite chroniclers writing about Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem tell us that Nissan Beck was the only German speaker in the delegation of Jews that accompanied the emperor on his tour of the Jewish Quarter.

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Telesko’s assertion, that ideal identities and self-empowerment were frequently built on the emotional identification of societies with the ruler through the construction of a seemingly personal relationship with him.716 The proclamation of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, in the dedication of its gift to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee—“and also to us, dwelling in the Holy [City], he gave many signs of his love when he came in all his glory”—is paradigmatic. The meaning and importance of the gifts for the gift-givers were conveyed not only through the particular iconography, intertextuality, and the efforts to use appreciated materials and reach a fine craftsmanship, but also of the narratives created around their enthusiastic receipt by the emperor-king and his court. Jerusalemite chroniclers and writers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries praised the craftmanship and emphasized, possibly exaggeratedly, how much the objects pleased the king. For example, Grayevsky wrote that the beauty of an olivewood chest with inlays of black wood and mother-of-pearl, presented to Franz Joseph on the fortieth anniversary of his accession, impressed the monarch and his court so much that it was displayed in the king’s treasury rooms along with other prized objects, and another gift delighted the empress so much that she kept it in her palace. Moreover, according to that chronicler, the Austrian consul noted that had the artists signed their works, they would certainly have received an imperial medal or some other highly regarded reward.717 All these stories contributed to the process of construction of positive self-identities. The exaggerated local story told by Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin, on the presentation of a parting gift to Franz Joseph by the Old Yishuv on the last day of his visit to Jerusalem, is worth further attention because, although based on a real event, it exhibits many of the typical elements of legends and fairy tales.718 Thus, only on the third attempt to meet the emperor at the Austro-Hungarian Hospice, and definitely owing to the favorable impression that the witty Nissan Beck made on three important figures of the imperial retinue, the Jewish delegation could finally present to the monarch its beautiful gift. When reminded that the emperor would not receive gifts, Beck inevitably called the attention of these officers to the great efforts that their monarch had made to step on the Holy Land’s soil and touch its holy stones, efforts that justified the presentation of this homage by his Jewish subjects. The gift was made in an appreciated local stone by a prestigious local artist and housed in a beautiful box made by typical local techniques. Franz Joseph, 716 Telesko, “Franz Joseph as the ‘Media Emperor’,” 133. 717 Grayevsky, The Craftsman and the Locksmith, 7, 22. As noted, the award of a medal to the geographer Yehosef Schwarz may be a true story. 718 See above, pp. 53–54.

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deeply moved, thanked the gift-givers and expressed the best wish that the gift-givers could expect: “I hope my Jewish subjects will always remember me,” thereby acknowledging their importance. Lastly, according to Yellin, when shown the beautifully crafted bowl, Empress Elisabeth was so pleased that she asked the court officials to send it to her private palace and, again most appropriate for those literary genres, “there it is to this day.” Taken together, the objects and narratives bring to light the construction of the Old Yishuv’s self-identities through its invented special relationship with the idealized gentile king, who was much kinder than other contemporary monarchs.

Localized Identities The care for holy places and prayers in situ were a cornerstone in the crystallization of the identities of the various Old Yishuv communities, therefore artists and writers emphasized the singular bond to those sites on all occasions and in all media. The most venerated sites were common to all communities, and their images decorated most artifacts; consequently, the depiction of these sites on such objects could not be indicative of a specific kolel. However, the comparative examination of gifts and narratives related to the Austro-Galician and AustroHungarian kolelim reflects subtle but meaningful socio-cultural and political differences between the communities. Most interesting are the differences that artifacts, narratives, and events may reveal in the self-perception of each Habsburg kolel and in their varying attitudes toward the emperor-kings, the components of the Habsburg realms, and the Dual Monarchy as a whole. The predominance of the symbols of one of the two equal and indivisible parts of the Dual Monarchy, as they appear in the dedications of the 1898 and 1908 gifts to Franz Joseph, reveals that the AustroGalician kolel highlighted the symbols of imperial Austria and the Habsburgs, and Franz Joseph’s motto as Austrian emperor; in contrast, the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel played up Hungary’s heraldic symbols. Thus, the latter added only a Hungarian coat-of-arms and flag to the scroll-case of the Book of Esther that it sent to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee as emperor of Austria. This attitude is also suggested by the gifts presented by the Habsburg kolelim to Karl: the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel addresses him once in German as Emperor Karl I of Austria and IV of Hungary, and twice in Hebrew, in large crimson letters, as King Karl IV of Hungary; in contrast, the Austro-Galician kolel calls him Emperor Karl I both on the box and in the dedication of its gift on the occasion of the monarch’s coronation as king of Hungary. In other words, the kolelim address the King of Hungary or the Emperor of Austria, and not the monarch of a dual monarchy, as might have been

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expected by the Habsburg court. Understandably, the order of appearance of the crownlands of the Dual Monarchy on the cover of the album presented to Karl by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel places the homelands of the gift-givers as the first priority, followed by the Austrian crownlands, while the omission of Galicia from the crownlands might be explained by the fact that that kolel sent its own gift. However, the depiction of only Hungarian institutions in the photographs is suggestive of a more sophisticated meaning to that double absence. The prominence in most of the gifts of one of the two halves of the Dual Monarchy and of the corresponding title of the monarch seems to be neither expected nor accidental. If so, the question arises as to whether the Old Yishuv Habsburg kolelim joined the political discourse in Austria-Hungary. Why would they? The hope of the gift-givers to touch the hearts of their brethren in their original homelands in order to obtain more alms, which clearly explains the separation of the Galician and Hungarian kolelim in 1858 and 1862, is irrelevant in the context of gifts to the emperor-king. It even contradicts the interest of the Habsburg court, which strove to strengthen the monarchs’ status, power, and authority as rulers of both halves of a legally indivisible Dual Monarchy. No doubt, Galician Jews felt a special appreciation for Franz Joseph, who in 1867 gave equal rights to Jews and, unlike the Russian tsar, stood by them at difficult times. For example, in the spring of 1898 thousands of peasants and townspeople in western Galicia rioted against their Jewish neighbors, ransacked and looted their homes and businesses, assaulted, threatened, and humiliated them—although never reaching the deadly violence of the 1881–1882, 1903, and 1905 pogroms in Russia—Franz Joseph declared a state of emergency.719 On the contrary, authorities in other parts of Europe did nothing to suppress such vicious events and the tsar’s court may have even tacitly encouraged them. When widespread antisemitism endangered the monarchy, the Habsburg state provided or attempted to provide stability and order. The gifts and numerous narratives created by Austro-Galician Jews suggest that, aware of the suffering of their brethren in Russia and Romania, they were loyal first and foremost to the

719 Daniel Unowsky sees the 1898 anti-Jewish riots as evidence not of Galician backwardness and barbarity, but of a late nineteenth-century Europe reeling from economic, cultural, and political changes wrought by mass politics, including the new Catholic Church’s antisemitism rooted in medieval times. The outbreak and suppression of the 1898 riots were shaped by the changing political realities in the Austrian half of the Habsburg Monarchy (Cisleithania) in the late nineteenth century; see his The Plunder, esp. chap. 3; idem, “Peasant Political Mobilization,” esp. 413, 416–418, 420, 425–429; Shanes, Diaspora Nationalism, chap. 1: Galician Jewry under Habsburg Rule: The First Century, 1772–1883.

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Habsburg emperor; in contrast, most Hungarian Jews may have combined the required Hungarian patriotism and national loyalty with allegiance to the Habsburg monarchy, i.e., to Franz Joseph as King of Hungary. It is possible that when necessary, those living in Jerusalem followed their brethren’s positions in Austria-Hungary. Palestine’s Jews functioned within multiple social systems which were parallel, interlinked, or conflicting with each other. Their communal self-perceptions varied according to the particular context in diverse social networks.720 In this context, the discrepancy between reports in a Jerusalemite chronicle and a Jewish journal in Budapest regarding the welcome given to Franz Joseph by his Jewish subjects on 9 November 1869, when the emperor-king was on his way to Jerusalem, is illuminating. As noted, the Jerusalemite chronicler Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin tells of ten riders who welcomed Franz Joseph while holding the emblems of the Ottoman empire and Austria;721 according to the Hungarian version, reported in the journal Vasárnapi Újság, the king pinned the Order of St. Stephen to his chest and the riders were Jerusalemite Hungarian Jews bearing the tricolor [Hungarian] banner with the inscription “Long live the emperor and Hungarian Apostolic King Franz Joseph. Long live the nation. The Hungarian, Moravian, and Czech Jewish community.”722 Consul Caboga-Cerva allowed a delegation of ten riders to welcome the emperor on behalf of all Ashkenazi Jews,723 but the writers overtly address their particular national identity, as expected by their respective national governments. Finally, three 1853 laudatory poems by Hungarian Jews, which according to Viktória Bányai point to three representative voices, may shed light on some subtleties of the visual and literary imagery and narratives on the gifts to Franz Joseph presented by the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel, on the one hand, and the Austro-Galician, on the other. The poems express, each in the writer’s particular literary style, the expected pronouncements of loyalty, but also reveal differences in the actual support for the emperor in the different socio-political and cultural circles with which each writer identified:724 on the one hand was the emperor’s brutal repression of the 1848/9 Revolution, and on the other, recog-

720 On the heterogeneity of the Old Yishuv, I referred to Wallach, “Rethinking the Yishuv,” 275– 294. 721 Yellin, “Kaiser Franz Joseph in Jerusalem,” 11. 722 Glässer, “‘Bless Our King’,” 81, quoting Vasárnapy Ujság, 28 November, 1869, 660. 723 Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 149. 724 Bányai (“‘Emperor’s Deliverance’,” 31–32 and note 9) notes that the three poems were first published in the Jewish periodical Kochvei Yitzhak.

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nition of his benevolent attitude toward the Jews, in comparison to other sovereigns. These attitudes were in conflict throughout Franz Joseph’s long reign. All three poems are based on Jewish biblical and liturgical literature. One, by Simon Bacher, is closely related to the prayer for the welfare of a king, based on Psalm 144:10: “It is he that giveth salvation unto kings: who delivereth David his servant from the hurtful sword.” The poem reflects the most traditional attitude of gratitude of the Jewish people to Franz Joseph and avoids references to the attempt on the emperor’s life by a fellow Hungarian.725 Another, by Josef Löwy, seems to be a compromise between the essential display of loyalty to the Habsburg monarch and the patriotic political position required by the Hungarian government; Löwy voices his pain at the shaming of his homeland, Hungary, after the failed revolution and the attempt on the emperor’s life. Löwy writes that Franz Joseph is loved by “his” people, a characterization that suggests that he is not “our,” the Hungarian people’s monarch. Nevertheless, at the end of the poem, the poet reveals his appreciation to the emperor, who promised the long-awaited legal emancipation of the Jews.726 The third poem, by Matitjahu Simha Rabener, addresses Franz Joseph as “the anointed one of the Lord” and calls upon the emperor’s subjects to bring their heartfelt blessing before the God-chosen as a sacrifice, shouting two or even three times, “Long live Franz Joseph! Franz Joseph is our king!”727 Although most Jews ultimately placed their hopes on the emperor-king rather than on national governments, and backed the Austro-Hungarian Compromise and the monarchy, these examples—the poems as well as the gifts of the Habsburg kolelim—allude to a phenomenon worthy of further study.

10.5 Redefinitions and Identifications The gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects at the turn of the century mirror winds of change in the socio-cultural Jewish milieu in Jerusalem. They reflect ideological changes rooted in the wish of growing circles to reach self-sufficiency and work the land, which led to cooperation with national movements and the New Yishuv whenever they had a common purpose. The motivation of Jews to immigrate to Palestine might have been rooted in the wish to achieve re-

725 Ibid., 5–36. 726 Ibid., 37–39. Josef Löwy may represent erudite Hungarian Jews who worked in commerce and supported moderate reform in Judaism and modern education, an ideology that would be further developed by the Neolog movement. 727 Ibid., 39–42.

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ligious redemption in the Land of Israel, to realize a Jewish national identity, or, most probably, a combination of these and other reasons, including persecutions and extreme poverty in Central and Eastern Europe. Not least, the gifts to Karl reflect concerns related to the accession to the throne of a largely unknown royal figure at a peak in the Great War. Constructed memories were used to imagine a utopian future and strengthen the will and dedication to realize these dreams.

Orientalism and Jewish Identities From the perspective of visual culture, the Jerusalemite Jewish objects attest to the adoption of current artistic trends in the West, changing from the historicist Neo-Baroque to Orientalism and the Secession, in an awareness of its potential to represent some aspects of the local space. From a Western imperialist and colonialist perspective, Oriental motifs represent “exotic” beauty, and, at the same time, serve to justify paternalism and other expressions of “Western superiority,” such as political, economic, and cultural dominance. Yet, in Jerusalemite objects, the Oriental elements would not address the fascination with exotic landscapes and peoples, and ethnographic interest in “the Other” fed by cultural colonialism; they followed the perception of local types and their lifestyle as embodying traditions from biblical times, which completely differed from the dichotomic feelings of attraction and repulsion that characterize colonialism. Oriental elements might address the constructed noble origins of the Jewish people in the Orient, following one of the self-identities of acculturated Jews in Central and Eastern Europe; moreover, in their innovative, modern character as adopted by the Secessionist movement, they would express the modern, proudly Orientalized self-Othernesss. These radical changes can be seen in the imagery of the gifts to Karl, which were created by artists of the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts between late 1916 and early 1917. The Bezalel transcultural iconography and style reflect the search for a new Hebrew identity that was greatly influenced by Eurocentric narratives, thus connoting a wish to simultaneously belong and differ. In this wide spectrum, the culture of “the Other” was as much admired as disdained and feared.728 Jews, as Arieh Bruce Saposnik and other scholars note, played a central role in the way Europeans imagined the Orient. At the same time, Orientalism influenced how Europeans viewed the Jews who had long lived in their midst, and how Jews perceived themselves and their place in the various milieux in which they lived and functioned.729

728 Beller, “Dis-Oriented Jews?,” 301.

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Some of the Orientalist elements favored in Western painting and local souvenirs that were included in offerings of Jerusalemite Habsburg subjects to Franz Joseph and Karl may be considered banal clichés. These mainly point to the artists’ awareness of trends in the tourist industry and the demands of the growing Jewish middle class in the Diaspora for a variety of artifacts decorated with images of the Land of Israel, with no discrimination between imagination and reality. However, there was also a much more sophisticated use of Oriental elements, based on the careful observation and talented stylization of local Muslim architecture and architectural decoration, and remains of ancient cultures in the wider area, as well as the “Oriental Revival” in Jewish art and architecture in contemporary Europe. A strategy was for Jewish circles to construct a proud and positive identity regarding various aspects of Orientalism. Imperative questions are: How did these constructed images fit into their vision of history? And what role did political power play in the process of building cultural and religious Otherness? In this spirit, Oriental architectural elements in the decoration of gifts by Habsburg subjects in Jerusalem, as in the Rothschild Hospital congratulatory epistle to Franz Joseph and the gifts to Karl by the kolelim, may have been interpreted in Vienna as indicators of Jewish identity by recalling institutions such as the Moorish-style synagogues in the Habsburg kingdoms and elsewhere in Europe. Famous Habsburg examples are the noted influential Leopoldstädter Tempel built in Vienna in 1858 and the Great or Dohány Temple built in 1854–1859 in Budapest, both by the leading Austrian architect Ludwig Förster, as well as the Rumbach Street Synagogue in Budapest built by his equally influential fellow national, architect Otto Wagner, in 1872. Another important source of inspiration was the Egyptian Revival style, an eclectic mixture of Egyptian and Mesopotamian elements revealed in the archaeological excavations throughout the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The fascination with the ancient cultures of the Orient also influenced another main source, the 1887 publication by Charles Chipiez of a reconstruction of the Temple of Solomon: in Chipiez’s vision, the architecture of ancient Israel melded Assyrian and Egyptian themes.730 The architectural design of these Oriental monuments, at least in the eyes of their architects and Jewish patrons, aimed to revive a “pure” Jewish style.731 Nevertheless, this “revival” was a fictional construction of identity in all its psychological, socio-cultural, and political meanings, at a time of increasing ac-

729 Saposnik, “Europe and Its Orients,” 1105–1106. 730 Appelbaum, “Jewish Identity,” esp. 18–21; Sergey Kravtsov, “Reconstruction of the Temple by Charles Chipiez and Its Applications in Architecture,” Ars Judaica 4 (2008), 25–42. 731 Kravtsov (ibid., esp. 25–27) remarks that this style was an amalgamation of elements typical of Moorish architecture in Spain and Italy, and Byzantine architecture.

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culturation and assimilation as well as socio-economic and political achievements in Vienna, on the one hand, and the rising antisemitism in reaction to those achievements, on the other. Whereas many acculturated European Jews at the time turned to romantic Orientalism to create for the Jewish people “noble roots” in a glorious ancient past,732 and a positive self-Otherness, antisemites, especially in Austria and Germany, turned to the Jewish adoption of Orientalism to claim that Jews were strangers in Europe and should be denied emancipation. Other circles of emancipated and integrated Jews responded to the Orientalist trend of the late eighteenth to early twentieth centuries and to its use by antisemites by rejecting that practice, and by the claim to their belonging to Europe.733 Moreover, some Jewish circles took steps to distinguish themselves from their uncultured “Asiatic” brethren moving from Eastern Europe to Vienna and the West, but others, among them young Zionists, including teachers and students at the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, romanticized the Eastern Jew, the Hasidic Ostjude, as representative of an authentic ethnic Jew, in contrast to the decadent Western European Jew who was perceived as shallow and imitative—the opposite of a renascent vigorous and healthy Jewish culture that would flourish as a modern society in the ancient homeland. This new Hebrew culture would be rooted in the Orient—the land and the local people who preserved aspects of the ancient biblical people as seen in Zionist eyes.734 From another, complementary, and no less important perspective, Zionist settlers would import the best of European civilization, which they considered culturally and morally superior, and become a bridge between East and West to the mutual benefit of the Jews as well as other peoples of the Orient.735

732 Saposnik (“Europe and Its Orients,” 1105–1106), who also notes the religious significance of the Orient (mizrach) in Judaism since ancient times, as a catalyzer of the fascination with the Orient in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Europe, as well as to the Eastern European origins of a high percentage of Jewish immigrants to Palestine. 733 Shapira (Style and Seduction, 17–18) points to a corresponding path in the use of style: the adoption of Classicist architectural elements to challenge the Oriental allure of the Secessionist movement and revert to an identification with the Hellenistic Jews to further develop the ideal of their culture and heritage. Shapira emphasizes that the wish of acculturated Jews to prove their belonging to Vienna, their support of Austria’s modernization, and their ability to acknowledge and transform prejudice against them into gestures of cultural triumph was integral to their achievements (p. 219). 734 See, e.g., the selection of works of Ephraim Moses Lilien, in Mishory, Lo and Behold, esp. 39– 41. 735 Saposnik, “Europe and Its Orients,” 1107–1111.

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Bezalel: The Integration of Tradition into a New Hebrew Culture “One cannot build a present and a future without a past, and therefore the sources of creation must draw on the people’s cultural heritage.” Boris Schatz736

How did Bezalel artists bridge between the various ideologies regarding the identity of the reviving ancient homeland? The case of the objects presented to Karl I/ IV upon his accession to the throne is especially interesting owing to the wide gap between the religious and socio-cultural background and ideologies of the gift-givers and the artists who created the artifacts and aimed to create a new Hebrew culture as part of the Jewish nation’s revival in its land. Considering the ideology of main circles of the Habsburg subjects’ kolelim and the Bezalel School’s ideology and praxis, possible answers to central questions and paths for further research will be suggested. How did Bezalel artists use old and well-rooted Jewish traditions, strongly embedded collective memories, norms, and practices essential to construct and stabilize identities? We might assume that Old Yishuv leaders were aware that the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts attributed national connotations to the local space and the holy places, yet it is important to consider what these new perceptions might mean to Ultra-Orthodox leaders such as the head of the Austro-Hungarian kolel. Schatz’s Bezalel aimed to create a new Jewish culture and train the Jewish population, especially the impoverished Old Yishuv members, in a variety of arts and crafts that would allow them to free themselves from the haluka, that is, living off alms. These were central founding ideals that would transform the real life and the problematic image of the Old Yishuv. As noted, an anonymous leading article on the first page of the paper Hashkafah, on 26 December, 1905, proclaimed the importance of the upcoming foundation of the Bezalel Museum and School under the title: “Beauty will issue forth from Zion and art from Jerusalem”—a secularization of the traditional verse “for out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem” (Isaiah 2:3). Saposnik remarks that according to Schatz’s ideology, this aim was not irreverent. On the contrary, it was an effort to end the national calamity brought about by the current situation;737 consequently, Schatz sought every opportunity to work with and for the Orthodox communities. For example, he hoped to create high-quality works in synagogues in order to improve the quality of life and culture of the Jews in Jerusalem. This was

736 Quoted by Natalia Berger, The Jewish Museum, 415, 418. 737 Saposnik,“‘... Will Issue Forth from Zion?’,” 160.

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no easy task, as the strictly religious Old Yishuv rebuked him.738 In one instance, in 1911, Schatz succeeded to get a commission for Bezalel artists and students to decorate the Hurva Synagogue, but the work was not even finished when it was defaced by an angry (and stupid, in the words of Schatz) member of the Old Yishuv.739 A letter by the head of the Bezalel rug atelier, Yaacov Kantrovitz, tells that one morning the painters reached the synagogue to continue their work, only to find that their paint containers were empty.740 The negative, aggressive, reaction of congregants of the Hurva Synagogue stands out when compared with the openness of the Jerusalemite Aleppo (Arab. Halab, Heb. Haleb) community, who hailed from this Syrian city numbering a relatively large Jewish population at the time. This community, more affluent and liberal than the Old Yishuv communities, invited the Bezalel artist Yaakov Stark to decorate their synagogue, the Ades Synagogue in the Nachlaot quarter of Jerusalem that same year. The main feature in Stark’s mural painting in that synagogue are the symbols of the twelve tribes of Israel, which were rendered in an original iconography. Both in the synagogue and in the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian gift to Karl I/IV, this motif may be interpreted, certainly by the gift-givers and the Aleppo congregation in Jerusalem, in the traditional Jewish sense as a symbol of the ideal biblical kingdoms of David and Solomon and the ingathering of the Jews at the end of time; nevertheless, the Bezalel artists, without rejecting that meaning, probably also conceived this motif in a secular national

738 Ultra-Orthodox Jews not only opposed the Zionist ideals pursued by the Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts, but also ruled out the liberal lifestyle of teachers and students, admonishing them to keep away from Boris Schatz and his school. Indeed, even the talented and moderate editor of the Orthodox newspaper Moriah, Yitzhak Yaakov Yellin, who supported the national ideals of Zionism and called upon the Old Yishuv to reform and reach self-sufficiency, explained in September 1910 the contribution of the Bezalel School to the Jerusalemite Jewish society as the undermining of tradition in the ideology of the young generation, first and foremost among young women. According to Yellin, what attracts young people to join that school is the permissive atmosphere. See Mordechai Eliav, “‘Moriah’: An Ultra-Orthodox Newspaper Fights for the Betterment of Jerusalem,” Cathedra 70 (1994), 80 (Hebrew), and Moriah 9 (16 September, 1910), quoted by Menachem Friedman, Society in a Crisis of Legitimation, 79. Saposnik notes that as early as November 1906, when Bezalel had been in operation for just over half a year, Schatz found himself defending his institution against accusations of heresy. See his “‘... Will Issue Forth from Zion?’,” 156– 160. 739 Shlomo Zangelevitz (“Young People with Plenty of Hopes and ‘A Maccabees of Our Times’,” Et-mol 186 [2006]: 15) quotes one of the letters written by Schatz in the periodical Ha’herut 8 (1911); Shalev-Khalifa, “Zionist Imagery and Landscapes,” 263. 740 The handwritten letter by Yaacov Kantrovitz is kept in the Itzhak Einhorn Collection in Tel Aviv. I am grateful to Nirit Shalev-Khalifa, to whom Einhorn showed this letter, for confirming this source.

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sense, as symbolizing the contemporary return of its sons to their ancient homeland, to rebuild it as a progressive society.741 Like Stark, the Bezalel artists who designed the gifts presented to Karl by the two Habsburg subjects’ kolelim (except for the artist who created the imagery on the front of the box for the gift presented by the Austro-Galician kolel) opted for a visual language that would fit the socio-cultural and religious norms of their communities, on the one hand, and would reflect Zionist ideology, on the other. The Bezalel artists were acting in accordance with the new strategies developed by the Zionist movement to advance the national revival. Yossi Katz provides us with a noteworthy document—the response of Aaron Kaminka, one of the earliest and most important activists of Hovevei Zion, to Menahem Ussishkin’s opinion upon his return from Palestine in 1913, urging the movement to operate in Jerusalem: We must raise the glory of Jerusalem which is a much easier task than expanding the Jewish community in the country—be it by virtue of the vast annual capital inflow from all the Jewish parties, which goes particularly to Jerusalem, or because of the vast interest which Jerusalem excites in the Occident as well as the Orient among all the sects…. If Jerusalem will be a city suffused with Jewish culture (it can be Orthodox to its heart’s content at the same time while basking in the glory of Jewish law and religion as Rome mutatis mutandis did in her time) and the Jewish community there will prove unified and influential then it may prove possible to install a pasha in Jerusalem and its environs even before we are granted autonomy in the country.742

In this spirit, Bezalel artists integrated traditional Jewish and national symbols and depicted them in the eclectic Orientalist style influenced by the Viennese Secession, typical of their school. These elements functioned as powerful ideologi-

741 Shalev-Khalifa (“Zionist Imagery and Landscapes,” 264) also notes the adaptation of a biblical verse that runs along the entire circumference of the synagogue as another expression of the openness of the Aleppo community and the audacity of the Bezalel artist. The verse reads: “I will bring them to my sacred house... for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all peoples,” instead of Isaiah’s “Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer… for mine house shall be called a house of prayer for all people” (56:7). In a general sense, the adapted verse can refer to the House of the People, the national house, and in a specific sense—a “Lesser Temple.” The words on sacrifice rituals were omitted. Stark completed the monumental mural paintings in 1912. The iconography of these paintings greatly influenced the decoration of other synagogues and numerous artifacts; see Amar, “L’art et l’artiste,” esp. 184–190. 742 Katz, “Re-emergence of Jerusalem,” 285, quoting CZA File A24/125/9, letter from Kaminka to Ussishkin on 20th February, 1913. Hovevei Zion (Lovers of Zion) was a group of early organizations, founded in 1884, in response to the anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian empire that also encouraged immigration to Palestine and are considered the forerunners of Zionism.

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cal vehicles in historical, social, and cultural discourses and, at the same time, their images played an ornamental function attractive to the Western public. The Orientalism of the Bezalel School responded to the nineteenth-century enthusiasm for national styles by creating an “authentic” Jewish style that would express a proud self-Orientalization and self-Otherness. Bezalel artists drew inspiration from Orientalist synagogues in the West, integrated elements of the Egyptian Revival style, recent archaeological findings, and the reconstruction of the Temple by Chipiez. An important monument, the Sha‘ar Ha’shamayim (Gate of Heaven) Synagogue, which presented also Art Deco elements, had been built in Cairo in 1898–1905.743 Most probably, images of this synagogue were known to progressive, well-trained Jerusalemite artists such as the teachers and students at Bezalel. Another influential architectural monument that may have influenced the Bezalel artists is the façade of the Gymnasia Herzliya in Tel Aviv, the first Hebrew high school in the first Hebrew city. This building was designed by Joseph Barsky, advised by Boris Schatz, in 1909–1911, both of whom drew inspiration from the reconstruction of Solomon’s Temple according to Chipiez and archaeological findings in the area.744 This trend may have also influenced the decision to include the Damascus Gate and the entrance to the Citadel in the photograph album presented to Karl I/IV. Yet, as noted, behind these similarities with Western Orientalism, many differences may be discerned as well. Accordingly, how did the artists bridge Jerusalemite Jewish traditions inherent in the self-perception of the Old Yishuv gift-givers and the ideology of the Bezalel School? One main means was to keep the religious importance of the most representative symbols while endowing them with new meanings. The monuments at holy places retained their traditional meaning as symbols of the uniqueness of the Land of Israel, the deep roots of the Jewish people in their ancient homeland, and the precept of living there, and they also played their role in actively reconstructing the national home. Thus, the twelve tribes, which traditionally symbolize the ideal united biblical kingdoms of David and Solomon, symbo-

743 It was designed by the Jewish-Egyptian architect Maurice Youssef Cattaui together with the Austro-Hungarian architect Eduard Matasek. In fact, wealthy, educated, Egyptianized Jews of Cairo conveyed the values of liberal, enlightened, and cosmopolitan Europe. Hana Taragan (“The ‘Gate of Heaven’ (Sha‘ar Hashamayim) Synagogue in Cairo [1898–1905]: On the Contextualization of Jewish Communal Architecture,” Journal of Jewish Identities 2/1 [2009]: 31–53, esp. 31–32, 34– 37, 46, fig. 1) calls the Neo-Egyptian style Neo-Pharaonic; see Kravtsov, “Reconstruction of the Temple,” 31–33. 744 Kravtsov (ibid., 36–42) notes that in 1908/9 the construction of the Diskin Orphanage and Bikkur Holim Hospital in Jerusalem also commenced based on Barsky’s plans, which show elements of Egyptian and Assyrian ancient architecture, recent archaeological findings, Chipiez’s drawings, and Jewish symbols.

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lized now also the ingathering of the Jewish people who were building a modern, creative, and productive society. The menorah (which traditionally means the light of the Torah and the hope of rebuilding the Temple) now also symbolized the light of the new society, and the Star of David, a modern symbol of the Jewish people, became the symbol of Zionism. Lilien’s illustration for the title page of the 1904 magazine Ost und West, a personification of the Jewish nation (fig. 29), is paradigmatic. Concluding the topic of old-new symbols, we will recall that the abundance of real and imaginary flora and birds in the decoration of the gifts of the Habsburg subjects’ kolelim traditionally symbolized the messianic era awaited by the Old Yishuv, also represents the Zionist national revival. In his utopian novel Jerusalem Rebuilt: A Daydream, Boris Schatz described the Land of Israel—and Jerusalem in particular—as he envisioned it in a hundred years’ time.745 The Third Temple, a museum, has been built on the Temple Mount. At the entrance to the museum, Schatz wrote, carpets whose decoration is a first attempt at formulating a Hebrew style will be displayed. The first one, produced in Bezalel, opens the collection; it features an anemone menorah and the inscription “Put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground” (Exodus 3:5).746 Schatz then remarks: Rachel’s Tomb, the Tomb of Absalom, the Tomb of Zechariah, the Cave of the Patriarchs, the Tombs of the Kings, the Western Wall… all around… ruins and tombs…. These were our only possessions in Jerusalem at the time.747

In addition, this gallery includes other early artifacts produced in Bezalel. These objects are decorated with subjects and motifs such as death and revival, ruins and tombs, trees and flowers, inscriptions in newly designed Hebrew letters, and Jewish symbols like the menorah and the Star of David.748 In describing these artworks,

745 The book was written in 1918 and published in Jerusalem in 1924. 746 Natalia Berger, The Jewish Museum, 414 (quoting Boris Schatz, Jerusalem Rebuilt: A Daydream [Jerusalem: Bezalel, 1924], 34 [Hebrew]). 747 Natalia Berger, The Jewish Museum, 414. 748 Natalia Berger (ibid., 414, 419) notes that Schatz was aware of the fact that the artistic level of some of the items produced in Bezalel’s early years was not high. Among the reasons for the rather poor quality was the wish to produce artifacts that coud be made available not only to the well-off, and the need to produce large quantities in order to increase incomes. Moreover, believing that foreign influences on Jewish art were detrimental to it, Schatz propounded withdrawal from them in order to achieve the creation of an original art. In fact, the withdrawal from European art resulted in many of Bezalel’s students leaving the establishment prior to the First World War.

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Schatz reiterates that “one cannot build a present and a future without a past, and therefore the sources of creation must draw on the people’s cultural heritage.” It is commonly agreed that despite many unrealistic ideas, such as the romantic ambition to create a synthetic model of Jewish art out of heterogeneous European and Oriental cultural sources, the Bezalel School played a significant role in the development of a new Hebrew culture in the Land of Israel.749 Thus, although it did not realize the utopian metaphor coined by Theodore Herzl for Schatz’s future institution—a “holy site in the desert”750—and its influence on the Ashkenazi Orthodox communities was very limited. However, to judge by the known objects, Bezalel artists did succeed in introducing various innovations into the iconography, media, and style of the gifts. One example is the use of photography in the gift of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel—a fashionable medium in the secular market that was not readily accepted in strictly religious circles. Another is the use of themes that would be appealing to tourists. Could it be, as noted above, that the kolelim presented artifacts designed and created by Bezalel artists because both the Old Yishuv and the Bezalel School were in very difficult economic straits? Perhaps, like Stark in the Ades Synagogue, the poverty-ridden artists created the gifts for very little money. Jerusalem was experiencing hunger and epidemics. In fact, in 1915 Stark himself became a victim of that situation. Nevertheless, the iconography on the Austro-Galician box, meant to convey an appropriate allegory of a triumphant Austria-Hungary, is so unthinkable in the context of the Orthodox Old Yishuv, that lacking any documentation or parallel for this object one may wonder what involvement the representatives of the kolel had in its design or its approval. The question remains moot. Altogether, this study gives us better insight into the ways of living, ideologies, practices, and emotional life of the gift-givers and recipients behind their constructed images—the images of themselves that they wished to project, and how these images were perceived by different societies, communities, and individuals at different times. The exploration of these topics strongly suggests that the practice of matching expectations may have been perceived by most Orthodox Jews of the Old Yishuv and, in a completely different milieu, the Habsburg Austro-Hungarian royalty, not as a loss of identity dictated by a strict machinery, but as an essential mode of existence and a means of achieving material and ethereal benefits.

749 Dalia Manor, “Biblical Zionism in Bezalel Art,” Israel Studies 6/1 (2001), 55–75. 750 Eugeny Kotlyar, “Boris Schatz and the Early ‘Bezalel’: The Utopia of Art and the Art of Management,” Tsaytshrift 9/4 (2014), 161.

11 Between Nostalgia and Irony: Franz Joseph in Modern Hebrew Literature In a pioneering paper, scholar of Hebrew literature Nurit Govrin noted that, until 1990, more than forty writers and poets in Palestine/Israel wrote about the emperor, more than thirty of whom wrote during the monarch’s lifetime and around ten after his death; however, she remarked, the list is not complete.751 Most of them idealized the emperor. Nevertheless, when considering the idealization of Franz Joseph by his Jewish subjects in Jerusalem, various Israeli writers refer to those narratives in their historical novels and fictionalized autobiographies with a mixture of respect and irony. Two of these classic writers, who also represent two different eras, approaches, and literary styles, are Nobel laureate Shai Agnon, who was born in Habsburg Galicia in 1888, emigrated to Palestine in 1908 and died in Jerusalem in 1970, and Haim Be’er, born in Jerusalem in 1945. Their intertextual works, written in hindsight and commingling past and present, well-based history and carefully built fiction, may throw light on the place, the people, and the atmosphere at the time. In his 1945 novel Only Yesterday, Agnon describes Franz Joseph as a king who “spread his grace over most Ashkenazi residents of the Land of Israel and took them under his wing to defend them against the wrath of the oppressors,”752 to a point that many saw him as a savior, a messiah, and divinely chosen king. In his witty ironic style, Agnon wonders through his protagonist, a Jewish immigrant from Russia who asks his friend why the revival of the nation has been delayed: “So, you came from Galicia? Tell me, why are the people of your country so remiss about ascending to the Land of Israel? Perhaps they are waiting for Kaiser Franz Joseph to lead them here in golden cars.”753 Agnon expresses the despair of Jews in the Habsburg realms’ antisemitic atmosphere together with widespread self-deceit, while casting doubts that Zionism is the answer. A complex view is brought again through the fantastic dream of a protagonist in one of the stories compiled

751 Nurit Govrin (“From Figure to Image”) refers to Gershon Schofman, David Fogel, Uri Zvi Greenberg, Avidgor Hameiri, Asher Barasch, Baruch Kurzweil, Shai Agnon, and Haim Be’er who wrote with irony about the idealized image, in contrast to writers and poets who romanticized him as having qualities of ideal perfection. Writing on the occasion of various events in the life of Franz Joseph, they note his assistance to the victims of the fires in Brody (1859), his visit to Jerusalem, his gift of a printing machine to the publishers of the journal Ha’ariel, and his visit to Czernowitz (1880). 752 Agnon, Only Yesterday, 226. 753 Ibid., 51. On Franz Joseph’s so-called “golden carriage,” see Franz Joseph 1830–1916, 248– 250; Gloria A. Austin, The Golden Carriage and the House of Hapsburg (Weirsdale, FL: Equine Heritage Institute, 2018). https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-012

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in Agnon’s In Mr. Lublin’s Store: regarding the apprehension of Jews after the old emperor’s death, he says: “he was a good king and we were at peace during his lifetime and now that he has gone to his eternal rest who knows what times are awaiting us…” Anxiety is even more poignantly expressed in Agnon’s Ad Hena, which reveals the narrator’s experience during World War I: And yet I dozed off and slept. How do I know that I slept? Because of the dream I dreamt. What did I dream? I dreamt that a great war had come to the world, and that I was called to it. I vowed to God that if I returned safely from the war, whoever came out of my house to greet me on my return from the war would be sacrificed. I returned home, and there I was myself, coming out to greet me.754

As Gershon Shaked notes, this dream recycles the myth of Jephtah’s daughter, suggesting that no one can escape wartime devastation unscathed.755 Written on the basis of his own memories, and years after the works of notable Austrian Jewish writers such as Stefan Zweig and Joseph Roth,756 Agnon’s intertextual works evoke the fragile emotional life of Jews at the time. Gershon Shaked notes that the loss of authority in the blended image of the emperor and the creator is implicit in Agnon’s work, “but the prodigal son yearns to return to them nevertheless.”757 However, a careful examination highlights subtle differences in the blurring of lines between the idealized emperor and the creator and king of the universe. In all these aspects, Agnon’s descriptions of the attitudes of Jews to Franz Joseph are surprising in their similarities, both in praises and hidden expectations appearing in the dedications of the gifts and epistles sent to the monarch by his Old Yishuv subjects.

754 Gershon Shaked (“After the Fall: Nostalgia and the Treatment of Authority in the Works of Kafka and Agnon, Two Habsburgian Writers,” Partial Answers 2/1 [2004], 81) translates the title as “Until Now.” The Institute for the Translation of Hebrew Literature renders the title as: To This Day (in Hebrew; Tel Aviv and Jerusalem: Schocken, 1952). Agnon worked in Germany from 1913 to 1924. 755 Shaked, “After the Fall,” 87, note 4. 756 Joseph Roth (1894–1939) volunteered to the Imperial Austrian army in 1916, an experience that greatly influenced his work. For Roth, as for many other Jews, including Stefan Zweig, the collapse in 1918 of the Habsburg empire marked the beginning of a pronounced sense of homelessness and despair for the future of humanity. His novel Radetzky March (1932) is one of the best known of this period. Stefan Zweig (1881–1942) was one of the most famous writers of his time, and his The World of Yesterday: Memories of a European (1934–1942) describes the period until the fall of the Habsburg empire as the golden age of security. 757 Shaked, “After the Fall,” 85, referring to Agnon’s story “At the Outset of the Day,” originally published in A Book that was Lost and Other Stories (New York: Schocken, c. 1995) and in TwentyOne Stories (New York, 1970), 252–260.

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In his 1979 historical novel Feathers,758 Haim Be’er portrays Jerusalem in the 1950s and ’60s through the eyes of a naive boy growing up in an Orthodox Jewish neighborhood. Now a soldier in the traumatic 1973 Yom Kippur War, the narrator looks back to his childhood, living among grotesque neighbors who immigrated from the former Habsburg monarchy and could never adapt to the shabby reality of the Oriental city. Be’er vividly portrays these maladjusted neighbors, who lived in two dichotomous environments contrasting the difficult present and a seemingly blissful past, elaborating on cherished recollections and inherited memories of the Golden Age of Jewish society in Vienna at the time of “their Emperor.” Invoking phenomena related to displacement and (dis)belonging, these people remain loyal subjects of Franz Joseph and recall what was probably an invented role of their parents and other members of their families in the consolidation of the precious bond between Jewish Habsburg subjects—including those living in Jerusalem—and the monarch. Moreover, they celebrate Franz Joseph’s anniversaries and other imperial events by telling stories and showing off “invaluable relics” related to him in their “Viennese salon;”759 what is more, they choreograph secret plans for the restoration of the monarchy. As Govrin notes, Be’er’s account is reliable, well based on historical books, journals, and memoirs, and there is almost nothing fictional in the stories recounted by the members of the salon.760 The nature of Be’er’s accounts may have been strongly shaped by the socio-cultural ambience in the Orthodox quarter in Jerusalem in which he was raised, as well as by events in the 1970s, when he wrote his novel. Indeed, reality surpasses all imagination. Like the stories about Franz Joseph’s affection for his Old Yishuv subjects and his admiration for the gifts that they gave him, embellished upon and disseminated by chroniclers of Jerusalem in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, also the stories embellished and recounted by the protagonists in Be’er’s novel aim to enhance not only the monarch but themselves (the storytellers) as well. For example, in a story probably based on real events, one of the prominent and most eccentric members of the Viennese salon reaches the house of the mon-

758 English translation by Hillel Halkin (Waltham, MA: Brandeis University Press, 2004), from the original Hebrew book titled Feathers. In chap. 6, the author recalls most of the known stories and legends on Franz Joseph and his consort, especially on his relationship with the Jews and his visit to Jerusalem. 759 Be’er (Feathers, 103) tells that the “monarchical pair” dreamed about establishing a Franz Joseph Museum in Jerusalem. Among the “relics” were an Austro-Hungarian shield manufactured in metal, the Austrian banner, black-and-yellow pennants, a variety of disparate objects with portraits of Franz Joseph and Elisabeth, coins, and the like. 760 Govrin, “From Figure to Image,” 82–85, esp. 82.

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archic couple hosting the celebration of the eightieth anniversary of Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem, bringing with him a large package. He slowly and carefully opens it, as a precious relic merits. To the surprise of his hosts, he reveals an oil portrait of the old emperor that the guest succeeded in rescuing from the cellar of the Lämel School. The portrait had been presented by the Imperial and Royal Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Vienna to the headmaster of the school, in celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of the institution’s foundation. The headmaster respectfully hung it on the wall of his office, but after the British victory in 1917, the military governor, Sir Ronald Storrs, ordered that all enemy artifacts be removed from sight; the portrait had to be stored away from the eyes of the public. In Be’er’s story, the rescuer-guest explains that the portrait was given to him by the janitor of the school for the banquet that the Viennese salon was holding in commemoration of “the entry of the monarch of Jerusalem into his royal city.” “Lo, our eyes have seen the king in all his glory!” exclaimed the proud hero-guest while unveiling the portrait before the eyes of the marveled hosts, adapting Isaiah’s reference to the faithful who will be rewarded by symbolically seeing God (33:17).761 Indeed, “Franz Joseph, a sword girt on one hip and a feathered hat on his head, regarded them from the cracked canvas.”762 Yet the hero’s exclamation of (self-)admiration cannot but remind us of the manipulation of the same biblical verse by the writer of the dedication of the Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian gift to Franz Joseph on his Diamond Jubilee, where the expression “Thine eyes shall see the King in his beauty,” at the top of the dedication, may be interpreted as referring to the Habsburg emperor-king as a just monarch, who consequently will see the glory of God as reflected in the images of the Land of Israel.763 Embedding historical facts documented by the Austrian Consulate with popular traditions, Be’er also tells us, through the boy-narrator, that at that banquet the guests were treated to the “Hymn from Zion,” which was especially written by Yoel Moshe Salomon to welcome the emperor upon entering Jerusalem, while the image of Franz Joseph in the oil painting listened deafly.764 The hymn was an essential element of all the events that the Viennese salon celebrated, but now the emperor was perceived by his loyal Jewish subjects as present at the ceremony in his honor.

761 Be’er (Feathers, 100) refers to the Book of Proverbs. 762 Ibid., 100–101. 763 See above, esp. p. 158. Be’er did not know any of the gifts, as he told me in a conversation in October 2019. Therefore, his adoption and adaptation of Isaiah’s verse may point to the widespread use of that prophecy. 764 Be’er, Feathers, 102; and see Mordechai Eliav, Under Imperial Austrian Protection, 149–152, document 51 (Jer. I/16), including the text of the welcome poem.

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In another story, developed from a real event, the eccentric protagonist who obtained Franz Joseph’s portrait from the Lämel School enhances the image of the monarch by recounting a meeting between the emperor and Rabbi Joseph Chayim Sonnenfeld, in which the head of the Ultra-Orthodox Jews and the Hungarian kolel referred to him as “a descendant of the Roman Emperor Antoninus Pius, who had a close friendship with Rabbi Yehudah Ha’Nasi”—in a story about these two Roman-period personages, based on Bavli, Avodah Zarah 10a–b.765 In an instructive historical event, the same influential rabbi refuses to participate in the welcome to Wilhelm II when the German emperor visited Jerusalem in 1898 because “his well-learned teacher identified Germany with Amalek and there is no sense to bless in the name of God a king and his kingdom who are descendants of Amalek,”766 and whose deeds Jews are commanded to remember only in order not to sin. Although an exception in an otherwise warm welcome for Wilhelm II, Rabbi Sonnenfeld’s refusal was given much importance in strictly Orthodox circles of the Old Yishuv, and contrasts with the general appreciation for Franz Joseph. Referring to the need of Central and Eastern European Jews, specifically Franz Joseph’s subjects, for respect as a positive collective, another relevant event in his childhood, rather sarcastically recalled by the narrator of Feathers, is an obvious flight of imagination of one of the monarchist members in the Viennese salon in Jerusalem, who dreams of the restoration of Franz Joseph’s empire. The Jewish monarchist recalls a great event in his native town: Franz Joseph, on an imperial visit, respectfully kissed the Torah scrolls carried in the arms of the leaders of the congregation that welcomed him, while ignoring the crosses and icons brought from the churches by the priests.767 Our last pertinent example of the idealization of Franz Joseph, on the one hand, and the self-enhancement of the members of the Viennese salon, as representatives of Jewish Habsburg subjects, on the other, brings us back to the celebration of Franz Joseph’s visit to Jerusalem and the gifts presented to him by his Old Yishuv subjects. The narrator in Be’er’s book recalls the excitement of the guests attending the meeting, which reached a peak when one of them placed on the table a wooden chest decorated with inlays of ebony and mother-of-pearl and announced that it is “the twin sister” of the box that his great-grandfather, the celebrated olivewood artisan Yaakov Dov Jacob, had made on order for the Jews of the Hungary Society—the very box given to Franz Joseph and later put on dis-

765 Be’er, Feathers, 100; Govrin, “From Figure to Image,” 84. Yehuda ha’Nasi (Judah the Prince) was the editor of the Mishnah. 766 Joseph Chayim Sonnenfeld, Chochmat Chaim (Wisdom of Life), ed. Shlomo Zalman Sonnenfeld (Jerusalem: S. Z. Sonnenfeld, 2002), 438 (Hebrew). 767 On this Jerusalemite story, see Be’er, Feathers, 93.

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play in his private museum in Vienna, among the other priceless articles donated to him by his subjects. As noted, the story of the great success of the box is told by Grayevsky, in his book on artisans and craftsmen working in Jerusalem, published in 1920.768 In the context of memories of the golden days of Franz Joseph told by his former Jewish subjects, an anecdote from the mid 1960s, recounted by the German diplomat Jörg von Uthmann in his 1976 book on Jews as look-alikes of Germans and the complex relations between them, is most illustrative: “‘Is it not the Emperor’s birthday today!?’—exclaimed the old lady at the Nebentisch and lifted the glass, her Austrian accent betraying the idea that a Habsburg was being celebrated here: Franz Joseph’s birthday, on 18 August, 1965. But this was not the backroom of a Viennese suburban bar, but one of the most famous restaurants in Tel Aviv.”769

768 Ibid., 103; on other accounts, see above, pp. 53, 121, 169. 769 Jörg von Uthmann, Doppelgänger, du bleicher Geselle: zur Pathologie des deutsch-jüdischen Verhältnisses (Stuttgart-Degerloch: Seewald, 1976), 7. See interview of Karl Vocelka by Tobias Kühn on 9 September, 2016 .

12 Place, Memories, and Identities: Closing Remarks People and collectives create places, endow them with values and meanings, and derive identity from them. They create topographies of memory that make the connection between past and present seem permanent and tangible;770 it is their actions at specific locations that turn objective spaces into subjective places. The venerated sites, and the physical images of these sites, create mental images of times, events, and visions with which these places are associated and have a formative role in the construction of individual and collective memories.771 The sites and their images display a subjective force that turns them into instruments capable of acting upon processes of cultural, religious, and social memories, and therefore also processes of identity formation. Identities are always in a process of construction and constant negotiation, and are never completed; influenced by a variety of factors, they are subject to transformations and reconfigurations over time, in different and sometimes contradicting directions. How do the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg communities to their monarchs offer novel insights into the construction of their identities? By expanding the notion of place in relation to Jerusalem of the Habsburg monarch, who lived and acted in another place and context, the gifts expand the space of the Old Yishuv to accommodate the complex identities of its members. Considering transformations of cultural and political identities in the Habsburg realms, this book showed how this expansion granted Old Yishuv members a sense of security and dignity, supported their way of life, and preserved bridges with the monarch and the Jewish communities in their original homelands. Not least, the gifts designed by Bezalel artists promoting modernization and the construction of a new society and culture helped to advance identity transformations at a time of crisis, in an era that ended with the fall of the Habsburg and Ottoman empires. Aware that we tend to view cultural and social statements constructed by a variety of entities through layers of earlier interpretations and interpretive traditions, the artifacts were examined in a critical approach, taking into account

770 Halbwachs, The Collective Memory, 12–15; see also Sylvie Mazzella, “La ville-mémoire: Quelques usages de La Mémoire collective de Maurice Halbwachs,” Enquête 4 (1996), 177–189 . 771 Halbwachs (The Collective Memory, 3, 6, 12) observes that collective memory is based on spatial images. “Religions are rooted in the land… because the community of believers distributes its richest ideas and images throughout space,” and “the basic separation between the sacred and the profane made by such groups is realized materially in space.” https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-013

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changes in the self-perceptions of the various collectives, their relationships, the perception of the Jerusalemite space, and the traditions of Judaism, as well as the possibilities and limitations of the changing society, the appearance of modern ideals of nation and, moreover, the nationalization of history. Jerusalem is a perfect example of mnemonic topography that has been greatly manipulated since early times. For generations, Jews and other peoples who perceived the city as holy constructed its sacred topography in accordance with their ideologies; they expressed their religious beliefs in symbolic forms that unfold and cohere in space. The Old Yishuv communities may have been intuitively aware that there is no inherent identity to places; as noted by Truc, memory lasts only as long as there is a group of people for whom it has a specific importance, and who are interested in preserving it.772 In practice, the preservation of a place of memory requires the creation of a cult and its continuity. Therefore, as Maurice Halbwachs and other scholars note, in the absence of remains of monuments or other signs of a foundational site, people create places of memory in place of the lost memory of the original sites. An appropriate site may be created based on narratives, revelation, or inspiration. Thus, in contrast with memories of the original location of an event based on presence at the site at the time it took place, institutionalized memories of places—those that become part of the memories and heritage of a collective—are created ex nihilo, having no real relationship with the “historic” memory of the original place.773 They are legendary. This is the case in the Land of the Bible. Being anchored in a specific space and time, the gifts of the Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects to their monarchs shed light on the creation of a religious, socio-cultural, and political space of myths, especially in Jerusalem, against the backdrop of competing forces attempting to control the sacred site, its history and constitutive symbolism, and at the same time, destabilize the collective identity and cohesion of others. The space created, seen from sacred and/or secular perspectives, obviously needs to be perceived in ways acceptable to the contemporary ideologies of a community—its memories, traditions, religious beliefs, social structures, practices, and aspirations; the motives and aims change and are not equally visible at different moments in time.774 Through the gifts of the Old Yishuv, this study

772 Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 153. 773 Halbwachs, The Collective Memory, 13–14; see also notes by Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 150, and Éric Brian, “Portée du lexique halbwachsien de la mémoire,” in Maurice Halbwachs, La topographie légendaire des évangiles. Étude de mémoire collective, ed. by Marie Jaisson (Paris: Presses universitaires de France, 2008), 113–146, esp. 117–122, 127–129, 138. 774 See Gregor Feindt et al. (“Entangled Memory: Toward a Third Wave in Memory Studies,” History and Theory 53/1 [2014]: 24–44, esp. 27–33), who note that in a synchronic perspective, every

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opened fragmentary remnants of the past and offered a novel perspective of the rationale behind the choice of which, when, where, and how sites and monuments of Jerusalem were recalled by a collective. The rationale was, and still is, dictated by a combination of political, socio-cultural, ethical, and religious principles and aims of the community or individuals interested in using the rich symbolism of the city to awaken and maintain dreams and hopes, and to develop a positive self-image that would nurture the sense of community and shared identity, belonging, and destiny in the various milieux in which the people involved lived. As this book reasserts, constructed memories of a past shape collective aspirations and, consequently, influence the present and the future. Boris Schatz rightly restated a well-known saying: “One cannot build a present and a future without a past, and therefore the sources of creation must draw on the people’s cultural heritage,” and strove to reconcile perceptions of the biblical past and secular modernism, the latter adapting and integrating Jewish traditions that would be present also in the desired future. The gifts and narratives created by the Old Yishuv assert that collective memories are reconstructions rooted not only in traditions, but also in experiences, images, and ideas from the present; in fact, the past is a compound of persistence and change, of continuity and newness.775 In its history and collective memories, the glorious past and ideal future of Jewry are embedded in the Land of Israel. The localization of its holy places, marked by monuments, recalled by images, and reinforced by legends, stories of heroic deeds and heavenly miracles in past golden ages, “prove” their authenticity and legitimize collective memories essential for the construction of identity and authorship of Jerusalem. This belief sustains the main endeavor of the Old Yishuv—to live a pious life in the Land of Israel, look after its holy sites and monuments, and pray there. Jerusalem is a dynamic space in constant transformation, and different and often opposing perceptions of this space are a source of tension. Nevertheless, in the end, it is the ideal, imaginary, Jerusalem that believers keep in their hearts

act of remembering inscribes an individual in multiple social frameworks, a phenomenon that entails the simultaneous existence of concurrent interpretations of the past; moreover, in a diachronic perspective, memory is entangled in the dynamic relation between single acts of remembering and changing mnemonic patterns. These researchers suggest an approach based on the players’ interpretations rather than artifacts of memory and, based on Halbwachs, argue that memories are best understood if the concept retains a strong link to a constructivist conception of the past. Interpretations are superposed and altered by newer ones. 775 On this topic see Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 148; Halbwachs, La mémoire collective, 119, 239; idem, The Collective Memory, 12–15, remarking that memory is a “construction of the past using data taken from the present.” See also ibid., 25–28 (Introduction by Lewis A. Coser), for reservations regarding Halbwachs’s position, as well as pp. 120–121.

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and minds. We saw this phenomenon in the visual and literary texts of Jewish communities as well as in letters of Franz Joseph to his consort, the diaries of Crown Prince Rudolf, Beda Dudík, and pilgrims, and memoirs of writers, scholars, and artists. The iconography of the gifts of Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects mirrors these perceptions, beliefs, and feelings; adorned with symbolic icons of sacred sites, the gifts are consonant with the concept of Jerusalem as “no longer a city in concrete terms, destroyed and rebuilt over the ages… but the quintessential holy city… an eternal city.”776 Unlike the real Jerusalem, rapidly changing in its topography, socio-political, and cultural structures—reflected in gifts since the early twentieth century—this symbolic Jerusalem is immutable and unchanging. Aware of the unique symbolism of the city and questioning the Western perspective of the real and ideal Jerusalem, as well as of center and periphery, Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects—searching for the ultimate expression of their multiple identifications and belonging—chose this city as the paramount place of encounter with their monarchs, who saw in it a precious source of religious and political prestige and influence. This study points to the gifts presented to Franz Joseph and Karl as a potential instrument in the exploration of a complex of basic ideas and themes from disparate cultures and times, reinterpreted in the rapidly changing reality. The objects and narratives built contextual cultural identifications and cross-cultural dialogues, disclosed common platforms as well as discordances; their study offers novel insights into the legitimacy of political orders, specifically the raison d’être, structure, norms, and practices of the Old Yishuv and the Habsburg court at the time of the Dual Monarchy. The examination of the gifts, presentation ceremonies, their receipt, and the narratives created around them, opens a new window into ways in which marginalized societies—in this case an ethno-religious community, Old Yishuv Habsburg subjects living in Jerusalem in the late Ottoman period—used images and words, art and literature, as a means to define, redefine, and empower themselves in their unbalanced relationships with dominant societies; these relationships involved confusion, cooperation, and hostility as well as admiration and disdain. Moreover, new insights can be gained on topics such as the nature and experience of home, roots, heritage, authenticity, historical narra-

776 Truc, “Memory of Places and Places of Memory,” 149, quoting Halbwachs, La topographie légendaire, 156. Truc adds that this is a source of tension central to the sociological issue of the relationship between memory and places—between “on the one hand a material reality, figure, monument or place in space, and, on the other, a symbol, in other words the spiritual meaning… linked to and superimposed on the reality,” based on the same work by Halbwachs, 128. See also Maggiolini (“Images, Views, and Landscapes,” esp. 28, 35–37, 45–46), who differentiates between Catholics and Orthodox Christians, on the one hand, and Protestants, on the other.

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PART IV – Discussion: The Old Yishuv Gifts as Venues of Identity Construction

tives, migration, exile, diaspora, national identity, urban spaces, and new communities. In both spaces, Jerusalem and the Habsburg monarchy, the artifacts offer an opportunity to gain insights into the interaction, consonance, and dissonance among public and private identities of collectives and individuals. The expanded mental and emotional space that resulted from the multiple identifications of the gift-givers—as loyal to the Habsburg monarch, to a specific nation in his realms, and to their communities in Jerusalem—alleviated their feelings of Otherness and displacement in each milieu. Jerusalem was the site where the Jewish Yishuv recalled collective experiences, defined a positive identity and proud Otherness, policies of inclusion and exclusion, common interests, and aims. In a challenging role, Old Yishuv gifts provided repositories of memory and helped to create and affirm identities; artists and writers sought to establish and give permanence to relationships, disseminate ideologies, and transmit them to subsequent generations. The complex and continuous search is evidenced by the variety in iconography and eclectic styles of design; moreover, artists and writers created subtle and multivalent visual and literary metaphors by quoting, adopting, and adapting sources, and by manipulatively emphasizing or omitting selected elements. Therefore, the visual images that accompany the texts should not be considered merely ornamental elements or literal illustrations; rather, the images are powerful ideological constructs that explain, interpret, and complement the narratives and contribute to a better understanding of the messages encoded in the objects; they are instruments for the creation, dissemination, and perpetuation of perceptions of Jewish life and culture in Jerusalem in the late Ottoman period—the artistic, historical, anthropological, social, and political mental frameworks of experiences and discourses in Jewish and non-Jewish milieux. The gifts and narratives transform the lamentable situation of a long-alienated people, victimised and excluded, into a proud celebration of their identity. In this sense, this book also blazes another path to study: how early local Jewish art met the challenge to advance religious, social, and, later, national identities and corresponding aims that are expected to put an end to the existential condition of Jewish communities in this difficult period. Agnon pointed out that just as all houses of the Hungarian quarter are alike, so are their dwellers. In effect, they had a complex inner world, and in the idealization of the past confronted with reality we see the creative possibilities embedded in the gifts as revealing different histories, cultural encounters and coexistence, identity constructions and transformations.

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Index of Persons Abd al-Malik ibn Marwan, Umayyad Caliph 103 Abdul al-Rahman, Sheikh 51 Abdulhamid II, Ottoman Sultan 33, 34, 194 Allenby, Edmund 21, 39 Altmann, Adolf 338 Andrássy, Count Gyula 1, 53, 325 Barghash bin Said, Sultan Sayyid 311 Bartlett, William H. 100–102 Beck, Nissan 31, 42, 53–54, 57–58, 70, 311, 325, 347–349, 353–355, 372 Be’er, Haim 31, 42, 53-54, 57, 111, 121, 327, 353, 386, 388–390 Ben-David, Schmuel 182–183, 184, 185, 189, 191, 193, 200, 203–207, 282, 294, 305, 367 Ben-Dov, Yaacov 212, 219, 231–235, 252, 270, 272–274 Bloch, Josef Samuel 326, 340 Brandard, Edward 101 Burla, Yehuda 172 Caboga-Cerva, Count Bernhard 1, 52, 143, 325, 337, 346, 350, 362, 375 D’Arbela, Gregory I. 311–312 Davidov, Schmuel, see Ben-David, Schmuel Deutsch, Ignaz 45, 51, 108–109 Deutsch, Shimon 44 Diskin, Simcha Shlomo 116 Dudík, Beda 87, 91, 145, 231, 346, 352, 356, 395 Elisabeth, consort Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary 1, 61–62, 64, 67, 88– 89, 118, 122, 247, 282–284, 316–317, 351, 373 Erdődy, Count Tamás 39 Ferdinand I, Emperor of Austria 35 Ferdinand Maximilian, Archduke of Austria 62, 280 Ferdinand von Beust, Count Friedrich 53 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-015

Franghia, Alexei 302 Frankel, Zacharias 111 Frankl, Ludwig August 296–297 Franz Ferdinand, Archduke 26, 66, 341 Friedrich II Hohenstaufen, Holy Roman Emperor 145, 368 Güdemann, Moritz 26, 68, 326 Gaon, Saadia 79 Gelbard, Yehuda Zvi 327 Gelernter, Chaim 159 Goldberger, Tobias 126 Goldschmidt, Karl 365 Grayevsky, Pinhas ben Zvi 111, 116, 121, 122, 325, 355, 372, 391 Gur-Arieh, Meir 176, 193, 206. See also Horodezki 176, and Gorodeski 193. Helena, Queen of Adiabene 245 Herod, the Great King of Judea 217, 218, 236, 237, 264 Herz-Lämel, Elisa 297–298 Herzl, Theodor 311, 385 Hirschinger, Salomon 117 Hoffmann, Josef 66 Jacob, Yaakov Dov 53, 121, 169, 390 Keith, Alexander 213 Keith, George Skene 213 Keller, Abraham 136, 140, 151–152, 312 King David 78, 79, 116, 197, 199, 204, 206, 225, 332, 352, 364–365, 366, 368, 376, 381, 383–384 King of Jerusalem 35, 88, 111, 113–114, 118, 140, 144, 263, 279, 298, 338, 367–368 King Solomon 78, 79, 103, 116, 129, 144, 146, 157, 185–186, 197, 199, 204, 206, 224, 225, 242, 245, 247, 263, 332, 338, 364, 365–366, 368, 381, 383–384 Kramer, Eliyahu Ben Shlomo Zalman 41 Kraus, Friedrich 52, 170–172 Kreutz, Moshe 120

424

Index of Persons

Lämel, Simon Edler von 297 Löw, Immánuel L. 338 Lefler, Heinrich 66 Lilien, Ephraim Moses 187–188, 213, 384 Lueger, Karl 25, 68–69, 71, 127, 318 Marie Valerie, Archduchess of Austria 66 Maximilian I of Mexico, Emperor 62, 115, 279–280 Mehmed V, Ottoman Sultan 34 Mizrachi, Moshe Shah 77 Montefiore, Moses 100, 105, 111, 164, 260, 296 Moser, Koloman 66 Mucha, Alphonse 66 Muhammad Ali 33 Perlberg, Johann Friedrich 100, 102 Pizzamano, Count Joseph von 45, 50–51, 161, 163, 280, 298, 354 Prime, William Cowper 327 Raban, Zeev 207 Rothschild, James de 136, 299 Rothschild, Mayer Amschel 299 Rubin, [Pinkas] Mendel 126, 334 Rudolf, Crown Prince of Austria 4, 21, 62, 75, 83, 91–92, 96–97, 120, 126, 288, 291, 299, 302, 395 Salant, Shmuel 43, 120, 161, 194 Salomon, Yoel Moshe 76, 148, 162, 351, 389 Schön, Josef Benjamin 126 Schatz, Boris 173, 175–176, 182, 186–187, 207, 219, 380–381, 383–385, 394 Schick, Conrad R. 280 Schneller, Johann Ludwig 167, 304–306 Schnitzer, Mordechai 45, 53, 76, 108–109, 110–113, 115, 323, 327 Schreiber, Avraham Shmuel Binyamin 43. See also Sofer, Avraham Shmuel Binyamin 267 Schreiber, David 146 Schreiber, Ignatz L. 126 Schreiber, Moshe, see Sofer, Moshe 42, 44 Schwarz, Yehosef 98–101, 110, 116–118, 325, 372

Schwarzenberg, Prince Felix von 35, 114 Seelenfreund, Salamon 291, 294 Singer, Leo 31, 194 Sixtus of Bourbon-Parma, Prince 39 Sofer, Abraham Haim David 186 Sofer, Avraham Shmuel Binyamin (Avraham Shmuel Binyamin Schreiber / Ksav Sofer) 267 Sofer, Chasam, see Sofer, Moshe 44 Sofer, Ksav, see Sofer, Avraham Shmuel Binyamin 267 Sofer, Moshe (Moshe Schreiber / Chasam Sofer) 44, 267 Sonnenfeld / Sonenfeld, Joseph Chayim 126, 165, 340, 390 Spira, Lasar (Elazar Nathan Spira, Elazar Shapira, Lazar Spira Cohen) 126, 145, 176, 185 Spira, Pinkas K. (Pinkas Kahana Spira) 145, 171, 176, 185 Stadion, Philipp 24 Stark, Yaakov 175, 182, 381–382, 385 Stephanie, Princess of Belgium 120, 126, 288–289, 299, 302 Stern, Alfred 326 Stokstiel, Josef 176, 185, 187 Suleiman the Magnificent, Ottoman Sultan 80, 241, 243 Tenz, Johann Martin 280 Tyre, William of 103 Umar ibn Al-Khattāb, Rashidun Caliph 103 Ussishkin, Menahem 174–175, 382 Vilnay, Zeev 227 Wallenstein, Moses (Moshe Nahum) 126 Weber, Samuel, (Samuel Aharon Weber) 176, 185 Werner, Karl Friedrich 101–102 Wilhelm II, German Emperor and King of Prussia 63, 76, 100, 145, 162, 303, 333, 368, 390 Yellin, David 257

Index of Persons

Yellin, Yitzhak Yaakov 53–54, 90, 115, 325, 348, 352–354, 372–373, 375, 381 Zimirinski, Yehiel Zvi 122

425

Zita of Bourbon-Parma, consort Empress of Austria and Queen of Hungary 39, 183, 193, 201, 291, 293, 337, 341

Index of Subjects Austro-Galician kolel 7, 75, 114, 119, 126–129, 132, 136–137, 140, 141, 143, 144–150, 171, 174, 176–177, 180, 181, 189, 200, 247, 156, 276, 285, 312, 315–316, 318, 340, 350, 363, 367, 371, 373, 382 Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian and Moravian kolel 7, 31, 81, 102, 116, 124, 126, 127, 131–132, 136–137, 150, 153–159, 165, 189, 199, 200, 209, 219, 266–271, 340, 373–376 Bezalel School of Arts and Crafts 11, 77, 106, 152–153, 168, 173–176, 180–182, 186, 189, 195, 199–201, 204–205, 207, 212, 216, 219, 233, 235, 266, 323, 370, 377, 379–380, 382–385, 392 Book of Esther, Esther Scroll 126–127, 130, 132, 136, 140, 153, 169, 173–174, 176, 180, 182, 201, 282, 312, 314, 318–320, 373 Gematria 158, 159, 293, 322, 371 Haluka 2, 7, 49, 51, 162, 380 Hasidim, Hasidic 27, 31, 41–43, 51, 53, 150, 163–164, 267, 270, 303, 324, 348–349, 379 Hibas (Hibat) Yerushalaim (Love of Jerusalem) 42, 43 Micrography 120, 126, 127, 130, 363, 371 Neologs 29, 338

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-016

New Yishuv 4, 10, 150, 153, 162, 165, 171–172, 175, 212, 275, 295, 318, 376 Orientalism 204, 277, 377–379, 382–383 Ottoman Empire 32, 34–35, 37–38, 40, 41, 52, 75, 78, 98, 151, 170, 172, 212, 279, 375, 392 Peaceful Crusades 36, 76, 86, 92, 100, 231, 296 Perushim 41–43, 45, 51, 108, 111, 113–114, 119, 126–127, 132, 163–164, 267, 276, 303, 315, 367 Pietas austriaca 83–84 Pilgrims, Pilgrimage 9, 36, 49, 51, 53, 80, 82– 83, 85–87, 91, 93, 97–98, 104, 106, 135, 137, 144, 145, 148, 152, 161, 167, 186, 209–210, 215, 221, 227–228, 231, 236– 237, 243, 247–148, 256, 257–259, 261, 277–280, 367, 395 Secession 187, 291, 377, 382 Sephardi, Sephardim 353, 354, 355 Shomrei Ha'homos (Guardians of the Walls), see also Austro-Hungarian, Bohemian, and Moravian kolel 43, 267 Sublime Porte 163 Zionism, Zionist 4, 10, 28, 30, 52, 76, 139, 153, 156, 160, 167, 168, 172–175, 186– 188, 193, 199–200, 335, 346, 370, 379, 381, 382, 384, 386

Index of Sites and Monuments Absalom’s Tomb 134, 137, 181, 185, 248, 251, 384 Al-Aqsa Mosque, see also Midrash Shlomo and Solomon’s Pool 1, 99, 100–104, 147, 149, 221, 223–224 Austrian Hospice, Austro-Hungarian Hospice 53, 86, 144–145, 171, 303, 347–348, 350, 367–368, 372 Batei Ungarin, Houses of the Hungarians 44, 161, 266, 269, 270 Bethlehem 1, 91–92, 110, 166–167, 258–259, 263, 276–277, 279, 370 Bnei Hezir’s Tomb, see also House of the Free, and Lepers’ House 105, 133–135, 137, 185, 247–248, 250–252, 254 Chatam (Chasam) Sofer Yeshiva 267–268 Damascus Gate 38, 241–243, 383 David, City of 133, 136, 152, 240, 245 David’s Tomb 105, 107, 180, 314 David’s Tower 98, 105, 133, 147, 152, 179, 181, 185, 236–238, 240 Dome of the Rock, see also Site of the Temple, Umar Mosque, and Templum Domini 149, 152, 166, 169, 181, 185, 217, 219, 221, 227, 237, 270, 288, 294, 314 Gate of Mercy 79, 147, 149, 167, 228, 230, 256 Golden Gate, see also Gate of Mercy 88, 149, 167, 219, 228, 230–231 Haram al-Sharif, see Temple Mount 212 Hebron 45, 51, 110, 133, 163, 169, 240, 257, 263 Helena of Adiabene’s Tomb 245 Herod’s Fortress 217–218, 236, 239 Herod’s Gate 241 Herod’s Temple 280 Herodian 240 House of the Free 105, 133–134, 137, 247

https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110767612-017

Jehoshaphat Valley, see also Kidron Valley 90, 101, 105, 133, 135, 247 Jewish Quarter 50, 87–88, 90, 126, 161, 164, 217, 266–267, 348–349, 354 Kidron Valley 105, 133–134, 136–137, 228, 236, 245, 247–248, 251–252, 274 Ktav (Ksav) Sofer Yeshiva 267 Lämel School 50, 295–298 Lepers’ House 134, 247, 250 Mayer de Rothschild Hospital 50, 127, 136, 151, 205, 295–296, 299–314 Midrash Shlomo, see also Solomon’s School, and Al-Aqsa Mosque 1, 99, 100–104 Mount of Olives 87, 90, 105, 133, 135, 137, 145, 147–149, 228, 245, 247, 255–256, 368 Ohel Itzhak / Hungarians’ Synagogue / Great Israel Synagogue 164, 266, 268–271, 340 Rachel’s Tomb 100–102, 105, 107, 110, 133, 136, 139, 158, 169, 185, 257, 259–261, 280, 384 Safed 29, 41, 44–45, 120, 126, 147, 163, 338 Site of the Temple, see also Dome of the Rock, Umar Mosque, and Templum Domini 1, 81, 101, 103, 104, 106, 114, 133, 136, 146–147, 149, 152, 160, 169, 178–179, 181, 185, 228, 314, 317 Solomon’s Pools 261–264 Solomon’s School 1, 99, 100, 101, 103, 104, 114, 133, 136, 146, 147, 317 Sublime Porte 163 Temple Mount 78–79, 87–88, 98, 99, 101– 105, 110, 146–148, 150, 166, 183, 212, 213, 217, 219, 221, 224, 226–228, 245, 256, 264, 266, 270, 272–273, 280, 288, 355, 370, 384

428

Index of Sites and Monuments

Templum Domini 81, 101, 103–104, 224, 227, 237 Tiferet Israel Synagogue 51, 150, 163–164, 217, 303–304, 340, 348–350, 354 Tomb of the Kings, see Helena of Adiabene’s Tomb 243, 251 Tomb of the Patriarchs 110, 133, 169, 257 Umar Mosque 103, 136, 220–221, 223, 226, 314

Western Wall, Wailing Wall 1, 80, 91, 101, 103–104, 107, 110, 114, 133, 136, 139, 146–147, 149–152, 158, 161, 164, 166, 169, 179, 181, 185, 219, 231, 233, 235, 240, 249, 257, 272–274, 317, 340, 346, 349, 370, 384 Zechariah’s Tomb 133–134, 137, 247, 252– 253 Zedekiah’s Cave 241–242