Qh. K&ey anwned ;tha;t Ithe magazine'n JwAh The Sassoons, famous leaders of the Jewish In the pedigree as he gives it back to the Avignon and Arles, who later moved to Aleppo, headmkip woad be &uni.Liah w& ;the 3whh nu- community in Bombay, originally from Baghdad, Ibn Jachija family, there are chronological dif- Syria and to Egypt. The Christian French family menda;tuhe he mevuXunn. 2 have, Rhexe@xe, also claim to be heirs of the Exilarchs, but I ficulties which throw some doubt on the claim. of Levi-Mirepoix also claim a Davidic descent ;taken ;the. fibe~Ly0a editing in explanatohy have not seen their pedigree carried back before However, he goes on to give an essentially accu- and if there is any truth to the claim, they phnaeh wkich 7 &&5t WUhdp headm ~6 dee the 16th century. Apparently an Italian Sason rate pedigree of the Ibn Yahya family and then probably descend from a converted member of the bachghuunck .to place kin xe&henca. -- MHS claimed descent from Shephatiah, son of King Da- to show how they were descended from the heredi- Narbonne family. I would be very interested to vid, whom .mediaeval tradition makes the ancestor tary heads of the Sanhedrin in Tiberias, thence see a purported complete pedigree for them. The rabbinic dynasties had, in Judaism, the of Hillel and other early rabbis. Whether this through the Exilarchs back to King David. This Zuckerman, whose studies are based on rab- kind of prestige which in other cultures is at- purported Davidic Sason is an ancestor of the pedigree is either an essentially valid tradi- binic records, maintains that Makhir, of Nar- tached to royal families. However, ancient Is- later Sassoons is uncertain. Neither do I know tion or it is the most clever genealogical for- bonne, played a major political role in early rael had a real royal house, the kingly family the basis, if any, for the claim that the Sas- gery I have ever seen (and I have seen many); French history and was identical both with the established by David, son of Jesse at about 1000 soons derive from the Ibn Shoshan (Bensusan) but, in my opinion, its validity can only be deposed Babylonian Exi larch of Davidic descent, B.C.E. Throughout the Middle Ages it was widely family, of Toledo, Spain, who were accepted as granted if the Charlap claim of descent from Ibn Natronai ben Habibai (or Haninai) and with Duke believed that the Jewish "heads of the Exile" or being of Davidic descent by the llth or 12th Yabya is also granted, for this is the only Theuderic, father of Saint William (or Gellone), Exilarchs in Babylon were the lineal heirs of centuries C.E. I have not seen any connected plausible way in which the Charlap family could Duke of Toulouse. Initially, when I read these King David and that a considerable number of pedigree of this family, but am attempting to have obtained a valid pedigree. Hence I am very startling claims they seemed to me so unlikely other families shared that male line descent. find one. anxious to obtain documentary evidence relating and based on evidence that was both so compli- Scholars disagree as to the possible validity of An important Marrano family fled the Portu- to the Charlap family in Poland. cated and so weak, that I was tempted to reject such claims, but it seems clear that no pedigree guese Inquisition, settling first in Ferrara, I originally copied the Charlap pedigree them out of hand. Further research, however, so far suggested in completely accurate. I shall Italy, and later in Constantinople. On return- when I was a student at Harvard and it was mere- has convinced me that identifying Theuderic with endeavor to list those families who have made ing to Judaism they chose the family name, Nasi ly one of those dry lists of names, of interest Makhir is sound, that Theudericl s grandson Ber- such a claim (or for whom it has been made) and (Hebrew for "prince" or "leader") which came to only as connecting links. As I have learned nard was a second Makhir, and that a considera- to mention a bit of what I know about the claims. be attached to those claiming Davidic descent, - more and more about those names, the list has ble number of other members of Makhirls family The prestige of the Davidic royal family again, unauthenticated. gradually been transmuted into an important his- came with him from Babylonia and married into led Irish scholars of about the sixth century Rabbi Abraham Ibn Daud, writing in the 12th torical document, throwing new light on a con- the upper levels of the Carolingian nobility. C.E. to invent a marriage between one of their century, said that he had seen the seal-ring of siderable number of problems, including those of I do not think that Makhir was identical with legendary kings and a daughter of King Zedekiah, Hai, Gaon of Pumbedita (head of a great Babylo- the relationships between the Exilarchs in Baby- Natronai, though I suspect that he was a brother. last ruler of independent Judah. Queen Victoria nian rabbinical academy) and that the seal showed lon and the Patriarchs in Jerusalem and the con- Much of my own evidence is formally as weak and inherited the rights of the Scottish kings, who a royal lion. Sherira claimed a remote descent tinued recognition of the leadership of the Da- as complicated as Zuckerman's, but the genealog- were alleged by a curious confusion of two rul- from the Exilarchs, his line having separated by vidic family by the Jewish community in Babylon. ical evidence greatly extends his thesis. ers to be the heirs of the Irish kings. This the third century C.E. or earlier. The seal- The family of Don Jachija (corrupted into Don- I am not prepared at this time to give many doubly false claim led some "scholars" to main- ring was probably brought to Spain by some chin etc.) also claim descent from Ibn Yal?ya, details of what will probably be some very tain that Queen Victoria was the representative descendant of Hai, and one of the many Davidic but a detailed pedigree has, apparently, not controversial conclusions. However, I will of the kings of Judah. Similar claims were pre- families in Spain may descend from Sherira. been preserved. point out as an indication of the potential na- sented on behalf of the Ethiopian kings, said to Among the possibilities are the family of Among other Davidic families is that of the ture and importance of the materials that the be the heirs of a son of King Solomon and the Albalia of Merida (Ibn Daud's mother was of that Maharal of Prague, Rabbi Judah L6w ben Bezalel, Bollandistes (Catholic historians of the saints) Queen of Sheba. This unlikely tale is 'lsupport- family, so he would have had more opportunity to legendary creator of the Golem. I do not yet maintained that the same Theuderic whom Zucker- ed" by a chronologically impossible pedigree. I see their possessions), Ibn Ezra of Granada, and have any information on his ancestry. The pedi- man identifies as Makhir had a daughter, Saint have seen no scholarly study of this and do not Ibn Gaj jath and Ibn Daud of Lucena (a different gree of Rashi (given in part by Dan Rottenberg, Ida, married to a Saxon Duke, Egbert. It has know how far back the claim goes. family from that of the historian Abraham Ibn in his Finding Ouh Fathehcs, 1977, p. 11) is a usually been supposed that this Egbert was a lo- The Bagratid kings of Armenia and Georgia Daud). I know of no connected pedigrees for any transparent forgery, as Rottenberg points out on cal duke in Frisia; however, I have found evi- (in Southern Russia) also claimed a Davidic de- of these families. Perhaps the best-known of the previous page. This does not affect the dence (far short of adequate proof but person- scent, which is certainly untrue for the Arme- the Sephardic fami lies claiming descent from claim that Rashi (Rabbi Solomon ben Isaac, the ally compelling) that he was Egbert, Duke of nian kings. The Georgian kings have a full ped- King David is the Abrabanel (Abarbanel, Abrava- great llth century commentator) was of Davidic Wessex, founder of the English monarchy, then in igree back to King David, going through close nel) family of Seville, whose pedigree is known descent. However, it is worth pointing out that exile at the court of Charlemagne. I think that relatives of Jesus of Nazareth. This is a for- continuously from about 1320. Some of these Rashi's maternal uncle, R. Simeon the Great b. Saint Ida Wah a daughter of Theuderic, that un- gery, probably of eleventh century date, and families may derive from refugees from the pre- Isaac b. Abun, of Mainz, was alleged to be of like her brother, "Saint William," she was pro- modern scholars, notably Prince Cyri 1 Toumanoff, Charlemagne royal Jewish family of Narbonne in , Davidic origin and it is possible that a valid bably a good Christian, and that she was a grand- think that the Georgian Bagratids descend in the southern France (see below). maternal line has been transformed into a pater- mother of Alfred, the Great. The conclusion male line from the Armenian Bagratids . Nonethe- The most impressive of these Sephardic fam- nal descent. Another probably Davidic family of that Alfred's great-grandfather was a Jewish less, I think an argument can be made that they ilies is that of Ibn Yahya (Jachija, Iacchia, Mainz was that of the famous tenth century Ger- prince from Babylon may be treated merely as a do derive from the Jewish Babylonian Exilarchs.