The Jews House Steep Street Lincoln - geograph

Jews' Court is a Grade I

listed building In the United Kingdom, a listed building or listed structure is one that has been placed on one of the four statutory lists maintained by Historic England in England, Historic Environment Scotland in Scotland, in Wales, and the Northern I ...

Steep Hill Steep Hill is a street in the historic city of Lincoln, Lincolnshire, England. At the top of the hill is the entrance to Lincoln Cathedral and at the bottom is Well Lane. The Hill consists of independent shops, tea rooms and pubs, and is popular ...

Lincoln Lincoln most commonly refers to: * Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States * Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England * Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S. * Lincol ...

, England. It houses the headquarters of the

Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology The Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology or SLHA aims to create a greater awareness of the history of Lincolnshire, and works to discover and record its heritage. In its present form, the society came into being in 1974, but it has an ...

. Jews' Court is located immediately above

Jew's House The Jew's House is one of the earliest extant town houses in England, estimated to have been built around 1170. It is situated on Steep Hill in Lincoln, immediately below Jew's Court. The house has traditionally been associated with the thrivi ...

on Steep Hill. The three-storeyed stone building dates from but was altered in the 18th century and the windows were replaced in the early-19th and 20th centuries. The Jews' Court may contain some late medieval stonework but a recent architectural survey has shown that there is very little medieval stonework above basement level in the existing building. Historian

Cecil Roth Cecil Roth (5 March 1899 – 21 June 1970) was a British Jewish historian. He was editor in chief of ''Encyclopaedia Judaica''. Life Roth was born in Dalston, London, on 5 March 1899. His parents were Etty and Joseph Roth, and Cecil was the young ...

believed it to be the site of a medieval

synagogue A synagogue, ', 'house of assembly', or ', "house of prayer"; Yiddish: ''shul'', Ladino: or ' (from synagogue); or ', "community". sometimes referred to as shul, and interchangeably used with the word temple, is a Jewish house of wor ...

. Documentary evidence of 1290 when the Jewish community of Lincoln was expelled shows that the Jews' Court has always been divided into two houses, and a charter of 1316 mentions that a Jewish ''scola'' or synagogue had stood to the west in the tenement behind these two houses. In 1910, a

well A well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The ...

was dug in the basement of the building; the owner subsequently claimed that this was where the body of

Little Saint Hugh of Lincoln Hugh of Lincoln (1246 – 27 August 1255) was an English boy whose death in Lincoln was falsely attributed to Jews. He is sometimes known as Little Saint Hugh or Little Sir Hugh to distinguish him from the adult saint, Hugh of Lincoln (died ...

had been found and charged people to see it. By the early-20th century the property had been sub-divided into cheap accommodation. It was bought by

Lincoln City Council The City of Lincoln Council is the local authority for the district of Lincoln, in the county of Lincolnshire, England. The council consists of 33 councillors, three for each of the 11 wards in the city. It is currently controlled by the Labour P ...

in 1924 and in 1928 it was proposed to be demolished under a

slum clearance Slum clearance, slum eviction or slum removal is an urban renewal strategy used to transform low income settlements with poor reputation into another type of development or housing. This has long been a strategy for redeveloping urban communities; ...

order. Lincolnshire Architectural and Archaeological Society (a predecessor of the Society for Lincolnshire History and Archaeology) objected to the proposed demolition and were given the building by the city council on condition it was refurbished. It is now owned by the charity the Jews' Court and Bardney Abbey Trust. The

has its headquarters at Jews' Court and the building includes a lecture room and bookshop. The Lincolnshire Jewish Community, which is affiliated with Liberal Judaism, in 1992 began holding Shabbat and High Holy Day services at Jews' Court; one of the services was filmed in the TV series '' The Story of the Jews'' by

Simon Schama Sir Simon Michael Schama (; born 13 February 1945) is an English historian specialising in art history, Dutch history, Jewish history, and French history. He is a University Professor of History and Art History at Columbia University. He fi ...

References

Sources

*Johnson C. (2015) ''Jews' Court: Truth and Legend'' in Walker A. (ed), ''Lincoln City Centre North of the River Witham'' in the Survey of Lincoln Vol.1. *Johnson C. and Jones S. (2016) ''Steep, Strait and High: Ancient Houses of Central Lincoln''.

Lincoln Record Society Lincoln Record Society is a British text publication society founded in 1910 which edits and publishes historic records relating to Lincolnshire and the Diocese of Lincoln. The ancient diocese covered not only Lincolnshire, but also Leiceste ...

, Boydell & Brewer, Woodbridge
Lincolnshire Jewish Community
BBC Lincolnshire, 28 October 2014 *''Hutchinson Concise Encyclopedia'': Lincoln

External links

o
''Jewish Communities and Records – UK''
(hosted by ''jewishgen.org''). {{coord, 53.2322, -0.5387, type:landmark_region:GB, display=title 12th-century synagogues Buildings and structures in Lincoln, England Grade I listed buildings in Lincolnshire History of Lincoln, England Medieval synagogues in England Norman architecture in England

See also

References

Sources

External links