Capital and oldest city of the kingdom of Navarra, Spain. Next to Tudela, it possessed the most important Jewish community. The Jewry was situated in the Navarreria, the oldest quarter of the city. When Navarra came under the guardianship of Philip the Fair, and the Pamplonians refused to pay him homage, the Jewry was destroyed by the French troops, the houses were plundered, and many Jews were killed (1277). In 1280, upon the complaint of the Jews, the city was directed to restore to them the confiscated propertiesand to assign to them other ground for building purposes. In 1319 the city council, in conjunction with the bishop, to whom the Jews were tributary, had resolved, in compliance with the wish of King Charles I., to rebuild the Jewry; but this was not done until 1336.
The new Jewry was near the Puente de la Magdalena, and was surrounded with strong walls to guard it against invasion. In the Jewry was the Alcaceria, where the Jews carried on considerable traffic in silk goods, while in a separate street were stores in which they sold jewelry, shoes, etc. Some of the Jews were artisans, and were employed by the royal court; others practised medicine. The physician Samuel, in recognition of his services as surgeon to the English knight Thomas Trivet, was presented by King Charles in 1389 with several houses situated in the Jewry and which had formerly been in the possession of Bonafos and his son Sento, two jugglers. In 1433 the physician Maestre Jacob Aboazar, who had his house near the Great Synagogue, accompanied the queen on a journey abroad. Contemporary with him was the physician Juce (Joseph).
In 1375 the Jews of Pamplona numbered about 220 families, and paid a yearly tax of 2,592 pounds to the king alone. They had, as in Estella and Tudela, their independent magistracy, consisting of two presidents and twenty representatives. Gradually the taxes became so burdensome that they could no longer be borne. In 1407 King Charles III. issued an order that the movable property of the Jews should be sold at auction, and the most notable members placed under arrest, unless they paid the tax due to him. To escape these frequent vexations many of the Jews resolved to emigrate; and a part of the Jewry was thus left uninhabited. No sooner had Leonora ascended the throne as coregent (1469) than she issued an order to the city magistrate to require the Jews to repair the dilapidated houses.
The policy of Ferdinand and Isabella triumphed in the Cortes of Pamplona in 1496. Two years later the Jews were expelled from Navarra. Many emigrated; and those who were unable to leave the city embraced Christianity. Ḥayyim Galipapa was rabbi of Pamplona in the fourteenth century; and the scholar Samuel b. Moses Abbas was a resident of the city.
- Kayserling, Gesch. der Juden in Spanien, i. 34, 43. 73, 93, 105 et seq.;
- Rios, Hist. ii. 452, iii. 200;
- Jacobs, Sources, s.v. Pamplona.