apply there. The privileges of the Jews of Provence were confirmed in 1482. However, from 1484, anti-Jewish disturbances broke out, with looting and violence perpetrated by laborers from outside the region hired for the harvest season. In some places, Jews were protected by the town officials, and they were declared to be under royal protection. However, a voluntary exodus began and was accelerated when similar disorders were repeated in 1485. According to Isidore Loeb, in a special study of the subject in the Revue des Études Juives (xiv. 162–183), about 3,000 Jews came to Provence after the Alhambra Decree expelled Jews from Spain in 1492. From 1484, one town after another had called for expulsion, but the calls were rejected by Charles VIII. However, Louis XII, in one of his first acts as king in 1498, issued a general expulsion order for the Jews of Provence. Though not enforced at the time, the order was renewed in 1500 and again in 1501. On this occasion, it was definitively implemented. The Jews of Provence were given the option of conversion to Christianity and a number chose that option. However, after a short while – if only to compensate partially for the loss of revenues caused by the departure of the Jews – the king imposed a special tax, referred to as "the tax of the neophytes." These converts and their descendants soon became the objects of social discrimination and slander. During the second half of the 17th century, a number of Jews attempted to reestablish themselves in Provence. Before the French Revolution abolished the administrative entity of Provence, the first community outside the southwest, Alsace-Lorraine and Comtat Venaissin, was re-formed in Marseilles. Early modern period 17th century At the beginning of the 17th century Jews began again to re-enter France. This resulted in a new edict of 23 April 1615 which forbade Christians, under the penalty of death and confiscation, to shelter Jews or to converse with them. Alsace and Lorraine were the home of a significant number of Jews. In annexing the provinces in 1648, Louis XIV was at first inclined toward the banishment of Jews living in those provinces but thought better of it in view of the benefit he could derive from them. On 25 September 1675, he granted these Jews letters patent, taking them under his special protection. This, however, did not prevent them from being subjected