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Makhir ben Yehudah Zakkai of Narbonne or Makhir ben Habibai of Narbonne or Natronai ben Habibi (725 - 765 CE or 793 CE) was a Babylonian-Jewish scholar and later, the supposed leader of the Jewish community of Narbonne in a region which at that time was called
Septimania Septimania (french: Septimanie ; oc, Septimània ) is a historical region in modern-day Southern France. It referred to the western part of the Roman province of Gallia Narbonensis that passed to the control of the Visigoths in 462, when Septima ...
at the end of the eighth century.


Writings by Abraham ibn Daud

According to a tradition preserved by Abraham ibn Daud in his ''
Sefer ha-Qabbalah ''Sefer ha-Qabbalah'' (Hebrew: ספר הקבלה, "Book of Tradition") was a book written by Abraham ibn Daud around 1160–1161. The book is a response to Karaitic attacks against the historical legitimacy of Rabbinic Judaism, and contains, amon ...
'', written about 1161, Makhir was a descendant of the house of David. Ibn Daud wrote: :Then King Charles sent to the King of Baghdad aliphrequesting that he dispatch one of his Jews of the seed of royalty of the House of David. He hearkened and sent him one from there, a magnate and sage, Rabbi Makhir by name. And
harles Gottlieb Christoph Harless (originally Harles) (21 June 1738 – 2 November 1815) was a German classical scholar and bibliographer. Biography He was born at Culmbach in Bavaria. He studied at the universities of Halle, Erlangen and Jena. In ...
settled him in Narbonne, the capital city, and planted him there, and gave him a great possession there at the time he captured it from the
Ishmaelites The Ishmaelites ( he, ''Yīšməʿēʾlīm,'' ar, بَنِي إِسْمَاعِيل ''Bani Isma'il''; "sons of Ishmael") were a collection of various Arabian tribes, confederations and small kingdoms described in Islamic tradition as being desc ...
rabs And he akhirtook to wife a woman from among the magnates of the town; *...* and the King made him a nobleman and designed, out of love for akhir good statutes for the benefit of all the Jews dwelling in the city, as is written and sealed in a Latin charter; and the seal of the King therein earshis name Carolus; and it is in their possession at the present time. The Prince Makhir became chieftain there. He and his descendants were close nter-relatedwith the King and all his descendants. Whatever Makhir's Babylon origins claimed by his descendants, the relation between Makhir and
Charlemagne Charlemagne ( , ) or Charles the Great ( la, Carolus Magnus; german: Karl der Große; 2 April 747 – 28 January 814), a member of the Carolingian dynasty, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and the first Holy ...
is legendary, the more famous king substituting for his father Pepin,
king of the Franks The Franks, Germanic-speaking peoples that invaded the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century, were first led by individuals called dukes and reguli. The earliest group of Franks that rose to prominence was the Salian Merovingians, who con ...
, who in order to enlist the Jews of Narbonne in his efforts to keep the
Umayyad The Umayyad Caliphate (661–750 CE; , ; ar, ٱلْخِلَافَة ٱلْأُمَوِيَّة, al-Khilāfah al-ʾUmawīyah) was the second of the four major caliphates established after the death of Muhammad. The caliphate was ruled by the ...
Saracens at bay, granted wide-ranging powers in return for the surrender of Moorish Narbonne to him in 759. The ''
Annals of Aniane The ''Chronicle of Aniane'' (or ''Annals of Aniane'') is an anonymous Latin history covering the rise of the Carolingian family from 670 to 840. It was composed by a monk of the Abbey of Aniane. The ''Chronicle of Aniane'' is closely related to t ...
'' and the ''
Chronicle of Moissac The ''Chronicle of Moissac'' (also known as ''Chronicon Moissiacense'') is an anonymous compilation that was discovered in the abbey of Moissac, but is now thought to have been compiled in the Catalan monastery of Ripoll in the end of the tenth c ...
'' both attribute this action to the ''
Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
'' leaders of Narbonne, rising up and massacring the Saracen garrison. Pepin with his sons Carloman and Charles redeemed this pledge in 768, granting to Makhir and his heirs extensive lands, an act that called forth an unavailing protest from
Pope Stephen III Pope Stephen III ( la, Stephanus III; died 1 February 772) was the bishop of Rome and ruler of the Papal States from 7 August 768 to his death. Stephen was a Benedictine monk who worked in the Lateran Palace during the reign of Pope Zachary. In ...
. In 791 Charlemagne confirmed the status of the Jewish Principate and made the title of ''
Nasi Nasi may refer to: Food Dishes Nasi Goreng is an Indonesian and Malay word for ''cooked rice'', featured in many Southeast Asian dishes *Nasi goreng, a popular rice dish often simply called ''nasi'' *Other Southeast Asian ''nasi'' dishes: **Nasi ...
'' permanent.Zuckerman 1965:51. The Makhir family enjoyed for centuries many privileges and that its members bore the title of "
nasi Nasi may refer to: Food Dishes Nasi Goreng is an Indonesian and Malay word for ''cooked rice'', featured in many Southeast Asian dishes *Nasi goreng, a popular rice dish often simply called ''nasi'' *Other Southeast Asian ''nasi'' dishes: **Nasi ...
" (prince).
Benjamin of Tudela Benjamin of Tudela ( he, בִּנְיָמִין מִטּוּדֶלָה, ; ar, بنيامين التطيلي ''Binyamin al-Tutayli'';‎ Tudela, Kingdom of Navarre, 1130 Castile, 1173) was a medieval Jewish traveler who visited Europe, Asia, an ...
, who visited Narbonne in 1165, speaks of the exalted position occupied by the descendants of Makhir, and the "Royal Letters" of 1364 also record the existence of a ''rex Iudaeorum'' (King of the Jews) at Narbonne. The place of residence of the Makhir family at Narbonne was designated in official documents as "Cortada Regis Judæorum".


Bnei Makhir and Carolingian dynasty

Arthur Zuckerman maintains that Makhir was actually identical with Natronai ben Habibi, an exilarch deposed and exiled in a dispute between two branches of the family of Bostanai in the late eighth century. Zuckerman further identified Makhir (Natronai) with a Maghario, Count of Narbonne (actually
Viscount A viscount ( , for male) or viscountess (, for female) is a title used in certain European countries for a noble of varying status. In many countries a viscount, and its historical equivalents, was a non-hereditary, administrative or judicial ...
), and in turn with an
Aymeri de Narbonne Aymeri de Narbonne is a legendary hero of Old French ''chansons de geste'' and the Matter of France. In the legendary material, as elaborated and expanded in various medieval texts, Aymeri is a knight in the time of Charlemagne's wars with the Sa ...
, who lived in the 12th century but whom heroic poetry makes father of William of Gellone (died 813). This William was subject of at least six major epic poems composed before the era of the
Crusades The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated, supported, and sometimes directed by the Latin Church in the medieval period. The best known of these Crusades are those to the Holy Land in the period between 1095 and 1291 that were in ...
, including '' Willehalm'' by Wolfram von Eschenbach, (who also, in another work, was a chronicler of the search of the Grail). The historical William, i. e.
William I William I; ang, WillelmI (Bates ''William the Conqueror'' p. 33– 9 September 1087), usually known as William the Conqueror and sometimes William the Bastard, was the first Norman king of England, reigning from 1066 until his death in 1087 ...
,
Count of Toulouse The count of Toulouse ( oc, comte de Tolosa, french: comte de Toulouse) was the ruler of county of Toulouse, Toulouse during the 8th to 13th centuries. Originating as vassals of the kingdom of the Franks, Frankish kings, the hereditary counts ru ...
led Frankish forces at the fall of
Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...
in 803. The account of the campaign in Ermold Niger's Latin poem dates the events, as Zuckerman says, according to the Jewish calendar and portrays William, again according to Zuckerman's interpretation, as an observant Jew. Count William was actually the son of the
Frankish Frankish may refer to: * Franks, a Germanic tribe and their culture ** Frankish language or its modern descendants, Franconian languages * Francia, a post-Roman state in France and Germany * East Francia, the successor state to Francia in Germany ...
Count Theoderic and in 806 became a monk. In another identification, Zuckerman concludes that Theoderic was none other than Makhir, and that the well-documented descendants of Theoderic embodied a dynasty of Franco-Judeic kings of Narbonne, representing the union of the lineage of the exilarchs with Carolingians. However, this underlying chain of identifications has been shown to be flawed, a negative opinion shared by other scholars, while the broader suggestions of a Jewish principality in Southern France have likewise been disputed. Zuckerman's use of sources and analytical approach have also been criticized.Chazan, Robert,
Review of ‘A Jewish Princedom in Feudal France, 768–900’, by Arthur J. Zuckerman
, ''Jewish Social Studies'' 35:2 (April 1973): 163–165


See also

*
Descent from antiquity In European genealogy, a descent from antiquity (DFA or DfA) is a proven unbroken line of descent between specific individuals from ancient history and people living today. Descents can readily be traced back to the Early Middle Ages, but beyond ...
* History of the Jews in France * Hachmei Provence *
Resh Galuta The exilarch was the leader of the Jewish community in Persian Mesopotamia (modern day Iraq) during the era of the Parthians, Sasanians and Abbasid Caliphate up until the Mongol invasion of Baghdad in 1258, with intermittent gaps due to ongoing ...


References


Bibliography


"Machir".
''
Jewish Encyclopedia ''The Jewish Encyclopedia: A Descriptive Record of the History, Religion, Literature, and Customs of the Jewish People from the Earliest Times to the Present Day'' is an English-language encyclopedia containing over 15,000 articles on th ...
''. Funk and Wagnalls, 1901-1906 {{authority control 8th-century Frankish rabbis Jewish royalty Clergy from Narbonne Provençal Jews 725 births