Twelve Autograph Letters Signed by, (or relating to), Rabbi Mayer Charleville, Chief Rabbi of Metz. The correspondence consists of questions of ritual law, family and communal affairs

(FRENCH JUDAICA)

Alsace

Early 19th-century

Hebrew, Judeo-German, and French

Mayer Charleville (1730-1812) was the first Chief Rabbi of Metz appointed by Emperor Napoleon I. In his official capacity as “Grand Rabbin” of the “Consistoire Israelite” (Consistory) of the Department of Moselle, Charleville adjudicated religious matters for the surrounding region of Alsace. See Richard Ayoun, Typologie d’une carrière rabbinique: L’exemple de Mahir Charleville (Nancy, 1993), pp. 32, 35, 38, 40, 51, 654-5; Arthur Hertzberg, The French Enlightenment and the Jews: The Origins of Modern Antisemitism (1968), p. 369; EJ, Vol. VIII, p. 523.