Answer “El Call”—Barcelona's Jewish Quarter

Small numbers of Jews may have arrived in Barcelona soon after 70 CE as part of the wave of migrants arriving in Europe fleeing Roman repression in Palestine. They settled in what became known as El Call, the labyrinth of narrow streets in the heart of the Gothic quarter.

The community prospered and reached its period of splendor in the 13th century when four to five thousand people lived in the neighborhood, perhaps accounting for some 15 percent of the city’s population. El Call was the center of intellectual life in medieval Catalunya and provided the city with its doctors, lawyers, financiers and translators. Jews’ knowledge of many languages, especially Arabic, allowed them to work as traders and ambassadors for the Catalan count-kings.

However, officially, Jews were property of the crown and in 1215, papal instructions called for Jews to wear hoods and a red button sewn on their clothes to identify them. The rise of the Dominican order, the intellectual precursors of the Inquisition, was also an increasing threat.

The situation worsened when Barcelona was hit by a run of famines beginning in 1333 and in 1348, the Black Death struck, which took out an estimated fifth of the population. Many blamed Jews, leading to an attack on El Call in 1349.

By 1391, there was rising discontent with the economy, the municipal government and taxation; a few Jews were employed as tax collectors, making them an easy target of ire. On August 5th of that year, a righteous mob descended on the Call. By the end of the day, 300 people were dead, resulting in the effective extinction of the Call. This occurred despite King Joan I of Aragon’s attempts to make amends by giving Jews added privileges and tax exemptions.

Those survivors who could afford it emigrated to the Maghreb and the Eastern Mediterranean, but many stayed in Barcelona, moved out of the Call and converted en masse to Christianity. The abandoned synagogues were demolished, their stones used to build the royal palace and the new Generalitat building.

Read more: Barcelona in the Plague Years.

In 1480, the Spanish Inquisition aimed to maintain Catholic orthodoxy under “Catholic Kings” Ferdinand and Isabella and root out “false” converts from Islam and Judaism. The new converts became known respectively as moriscos and conversos or, in the insulting terms of the time, marranos or xuas (pigs). In Barcelona, the repression began in 1487 when 12 people were burnt at the stake in Plaça del Rei along with 229 effigies of fugitives.

The final straw for the city’s Jewish community came in March 1492 with the edict to expel all Jews from the Spanish kingdoms, giving them four months to convert or go into exile. Despite the protests of Barcelona’s councilors, who claimed it would involve a great loss to the city as the Jews ran profitable trades such as the coral business, the expulsion of the remaining Jews went ahead.

Exploring the Call

Start at Arc de Sant Ramon del Call, one of the old entrances to the Call. The front side of the building at the end of the street on the right is the Barcelona History Museum’s El Call location. Yet here toward the back, see if you can find a well-worn grove on the stone door frame. This may be a mezuzah where scriptures would’ve been left according to Jewish tradition.

Now head back a few meters to Carrer de Marlet. Immediately on your left is a replica of a stone marker in Hebrew dedicated to the memory of a 12th-century rabbi who donated money for a hospital.

You now reach the intersection with Sant Domènec del Call, the main street running through the Call, originally known as Sinagoga Major. All the street names were Christianized when the Jews abandoned the quarter and an effigy of Sant Dominic can be seen halfway along the street.

Outside the Call, along Banys Nous (“New Baths”) is Caelum, a bakery with an arcaded tearoom downstairs that the owners and many guidebooks claim to be the remains of the women’s section of the old Jewish baths.

Some of the most interesting and uncontroversially authentic remains are in Plaça de Sant Iu at the side of the cathedral where, if you’re observant, you can spot several stones with Hebrew inscriptions taken from the synagogues of the Call demolished after 1391 and used to build the 16th-century Palau del Lloctinent.  

This text has been adapted from a 2011 article by the same author.