How were Jews treated in the 1500s?

Answer 1

Depends where. In Spain, the Jews had just been expelled; and many of those who remained were being tortured under the Inquisition. In England, Jews were forbidden to live during the 1500s (they'd been expelled before that). In Germany, the Jews were subject to the caprices and decrees of local princes, since the central monarchy was weak in the 1500s. Martin Luther was at first cordial to the Jews, but later ranted and calumniated against them. In Central Europe, there were blood-libels and pogroms in the 1500s. In Italy and France, the Jews were subject to the harsh decrees and taxation of the Church.

In Turkey (on the other hand), things were relatively good. Turkey was one of the very few countries which welcomed Jews at that time. In North Africa, things were pretty stable.

Answer 2

It depends where. They had been kicked out of France (in 1453) and Austria (1421). After being expelled from England (1290), they were not allowed to return until 1655. There were many blood libels in the 16th century. In Spain, the Inquisition was wreaking its full-fledged horrors; and in Germany, the Jews were still subject to the caprices, whims and anti-Semitic decrees of the local noblemen. In Eastern Europe there was grinding poverty, both for Jews and non-Jews. In Prague, in the late 1500s, Rabbi Judah Loewe had to personally intercede with the King to try to stop the proliferation of blood-libel canards and their resultant pogroms.

In Turkey, however, things were better. Turkey openly invited those expelled from Spain and Portugal to settle there, and tens of thousands did so.

Answer 3

There wasn't one because Jews were banned from England. Jews were expelled from England in 1290 and were not allowed to return to England until Oliver Cromwell admitted them in the mid-1600s.

Answer 4

This was a period when Jews had just been expelled from Spain and had long been expelled from England. The reformation was a central feature of this century, and Martin Luther, although he started out hoping that Jews would join his reformed church, ended up deeply disappointed. As a result, Jews were driven from a large fraction of the newly Lutheran lands. Calvinists were generally more welcoming, but like Catholics, they tended to require that Jews stay in the ghetto and not mingle too freely with Christians. The Ottoman Empire saw the exiles from Spain as an engine of economic development and welcomed Jewish settlement in many Ottoman lands. The other opportunity Jews had was to move east into Poland, where the leadership also saw Jews as a potential development engine. By midcentury, Poland granted its Jewish community limited self rule under the authority of the Council of the Four Lands.