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Innsbruck

The 1901 Jewish Encyclopedia

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Capital of Tyrol, Austria. While Jews settled throughout Tyrol, especially in the southern part, as early as the beginning of the fourteenth century, no mention of them at Innsbruck is met with until the end of the sixteenth century. As elsewhere in the country, they were engaged in business, chiefly as dealers in grain and bullion or as money-lenders and brokers. By a special privilege granted by Archduke Ferdinand II. June 11, 1578, Samuel May, descendant of the specially privileged Solomon of Bassano, was permitted to establish himself at the court at Innsbruck, at first for eight years, and then for an additional period; and this privilege was subsequently extended to his children. May and his friends lived in the so-called "Judengasse"; but there never was a ghetto at Innsbruck. In 1748 Maria Theresa expelled from Innsbruck the Jews Uffenheimer and Landauer, although both were prominent purveyors, and the first a court factor. When the Jews were expelled from HOHENEMS in 1670, the Dannhauser and other families went to Innsbruck. A descendant of the Dannhausers, Wilhelm, was for twenty-four years a member of the municipal council of Innsbruck. Although the Bavarian edict of 1813 (when Tyrol was under Bavarian rule) regulating the condition of the Jews was confirmed by Austria in 1817 (after the latter had again come into possession of Tyrol), the laws against new settlers, the acquisition of real estate, and the holding of public office, remained in force down to the promulgation of the constitution of 1867. The revolt of Hofer in 1809 began at Innsbruck with excesses against the Jews, although Hofer was supplied with funds by the Jew Nathan Elias of Hohenems, and the firm of Arnstein & Eskeles of Vienna.

There is no separate community at Innsbruck, but under the law of 1890 the Jews of the city are included in the community of Hohenems. The Jews of Innsbruck number 40 families, and about 160 individuals, in a total population of 27,056. They have independent schools and religious committees, and have their own synagogue and cemetery.

The neighboring village of Rinn, near Hall, is noted as the place where the child Andreas Oxner was said to have been murdered by Jews July 12, 1462 (see Jew. Encyc. 3:262, s. BLOOD ACCUSATION). The so-called "Judenstein," where the deed was alleged to have occurred, is still a place of pilgrimage. The story, with which many miracles have been connected, has long since been proved to have been a mere invention (Scherer, "Die Rechtsverhältnisse der Juden in den Deutsch-Oesterreichischen Ländern," pp. 594-596, Leipsic, 1901).