Simon Goldschmidt

Simon Benedikt Goldschmidt (* 1600 (probably) in Kassel ; † October 14, 1658 ibid), protective Jew of Kassel, was court banker, court jeweler, first headmaster and schtadlan of the state Jewry .

family

Simon Goldschmidt was the son of the court banker Benedikt Goldschmidt and his wife Rosina (Röschen). Around 1630 he married Giedel (* after 1608 (probably) in Frankfurt am Main ; † 1658 in Kassel), Wolf's daughter.

He was the great-grandfather of the businessman Hesse Goldschmidt in Kassel.

Life

Simon Goldschmidt is mentioned as early as 1625 in Kassel, later in 1630–1635 also in Fulda .

After his father's death in 1642 or shortly thereafter, he took over the office of court banker and court jeweler.

Like his father, he also had very good personal contact with the Hessian Landgrave Wilhelm V. In December 1647, he and his brother Abraham complained successfully to the Landgrave's widow, who was the guardian of the eight-year-old Wilhelm VI. ruling Landgravine Amalie Elisabeth , about the fact that both of the mayor and the city council were asked to provide horses, harnesses and the like as a war effort, which contradicts her letter of protection . The mayor and city council were then instructed to refrain from doing this, as Simon and Abraham "were not under municipal jurisdiction, but under the landgrave's mayor". Also in 1647, Simon is mentioned as the house owner “behind the carriage” (that is, behind the urban scales).

Later he tried to have the private church services, which were still not authorized in 1649, but were even punishable by the police, carried out in the house of the Goldschmidt family. In 1651 he asked for written permission to hold these services. The government did not give him any personal approval, but generally allowed "the Jews who lived here, some of whom had crept in again, to be held in remote, retired places outside the Goldschmidt house". The Goldschmidt house at "Judenbrunnen 10" became the center of cult life in Kassel around the middle of the century.

In 1652 Simon exchanged a meadow in the Untereustadt, which he owned together with his wife Giedel, for a garden in front of the Ahnaberger Tor.

In the same year and still in 1653 it is mentioned that Simon Goldschmidt thwarted the Kassel property right for Joseph Munzenberg from Fulda, for which his mother Gente fought, since his father Jacob belonged to the followers of the orthodox rabbi Isaak in Bettenhausen , a declared opponent of the Goldschmidt family .

In 1655, Simon delivered the required silver to the Kassel Mint.

At his suggestion, the tobacco cultures in the Werra Valley are said to have developed from 1655 onwards , which can be shown to have been at least promoted by him.

In 1656 he gave the Landgrave two crystal chandeliers as a New Year's present, as otherwise only the members of the court used to do. The landgrave made him a gift of money. In this rare case that a sovereign exchanges gifts with a court Jew , Simon's position at court becomes clear.

literature

• Sigismund von Dobschütz: The ancestors of Elisabeth Goldschmidt from Kassel and Mannheim. - First publication: Hessische Familienkunde (HFK), publisher: Arbeitsgemeinschaft der Familienkunde Societies in Hessen, Volume 24, Issue 4/1998, page 161f., Verlagdruckerei Schmidt, Neustadt / Aisch, 1998; ISSN  0018-1064 . - New publication with additions and corrections: "Maajan - The Source", Issue 76, Swiss Association for Jewish Genealogy, Zurich 2005; ISSN  1011-4009 .
• Dr. Jona Schellekens, James Bennett and Rüdiger Kröger: From Goldschmidt to Goldsmid: An Anglo-Dutch Family From Hessen (unpublished manuscript), Hebrew University, Jerusalem 2004.

Web links

• Short biography at www.heymannfamily.com

See also

• Jewish life in Kassel