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33-576: Family members received honorary titles from the authorities and were members of the administration of the Kingdoms of Aragon and Castile . They were the baillie ("bayle")—the tax officers and treasurers, and alfaquim —senior advisors to the king and royal physician in Barcelona and Aragon in the 12th and 13th centuries. They held the title of " nasi " (prince in Hebrew), since they are considered by

66-598: A hereditary family name. Some sources claim that in Eastern Europe, the family adapted the surnames Epstein and Horowitz . The first appearance of the name Benveniste was in the 11th century in southern France (present-day Septimania and Provence ). Earlier, in the 8th century, the region was shaped by Charlemagne from the Frankish Kingdom of the Carolingian . The big Narbonne Jewish center

99-661: A last name, relating to the father. There are many variations of the name in Italy and the Mediterranean countries: Benvenuto, Benvenuti, Benvenga, Benvenisti and more. At this time one of the ministers, a sworn enemy of the Jewish minister, burst into laughter, and said to the king: "Your Majesty, that Jew-minister expert in our country's flora was making fun of you. He deliberately gave you a wrong name for that flower in order to embarrass you before your ministers and viziers. That

132-514: A particular semantic codification/closure of the concept (a dialogical construct) are connected to essentialist arguments relying on the reification of something that does not exist beyond the social action of those building Castile not only by identifying with it as a homeland of any kind, but also in opposition to it . A hot topic concerning the concept of Castile is its relation with Spain, insofar intellectuals, politicians, writers, or historians have either endorsed, nuanced or rejected

165-603: Is a territory of imprecise limits located in Spain . The use of the concept of Castile relies on the assimilation (via a metonymy ) of a 19th-century determinist geographical notion, that of Castile as Spain's centro mesetario ("tableland core", connected to the Meseta Central ) with a long-gone historical entity of diachronically variable territorial extension (the Kingdom of Castile ). The proposals advocating for

198-707: Is legendary, the more famous king substituting for his father Pepin , king of the Franks , who in order to enlist the Jews of Narbonne in his efforts to keep the Umayyad Saracens at bay, granted wide-ranging powers in return for the surrender of Moorish Narbonne to him in 759. The Annals of Aniane and the Chronicle of Moissac both attribute this action to the Gothic leaders of Narbonne, rising up and massacring

231-464: Is not a 'bienva,' but a 'malva'." The king angrily asked the Jewish minister to explain, threatening him with dire punishment. The minister said: "Your Majesty, I am ready to accept your judgment. But first, I beg you, hear me out carefully. Your Majesty, when we were out in the field, you asked me to tell you the name of that plant. There you were, standing before me, Royal Highness, and I thought: By no means am I going to offend Your Majesty by telling you

264-445: The 1833 territorial division of Spain . Originally an eastern county of the kingdom of León , in the 11th century, Castile became an independent realm with its capital at Burgos . The County of Castile, which originally included most of Burgos and parts of Vizcaya , Álava , Cantabria and La Rioja , became the leading force in the northern Christian states' 800-year Reconquista ("reconquest") of central and southern Spain from

297-666: The Crown of Aragon and the Kingdom of Navarre , the definition of what constituted Castile gradually began to change. Its historical capital was Burgos . In modern Spain, it is generally considered to comprise Castile and León and Castile–La Mancha , with Madrid as its centre. West Castile and León, Albacete , Cantabria and La Rioja are sometimes included in the definition (controversial for historical, political, and cultural reasons ). Since 1982 there have been two nominally Castilian autonomous communities in Spain, incorporating

330-482: The Kingdom of Aragon and the County of Barcelona as tax collectors and advisers. In 1150 Aragon and Barcelona were united by the marriage of their rulers. The Sephardic Jewish families appear together with the name Benveniste in official and Jewish documents of Narbonne, Barcelona and Aragon from the 11th-13th century AD with the title Nasi added to their names. They appear in the travel books of Benjamin of Tudela from

363-602: The Moorish rulers who had dominated most of the peninsula since the early 8th century. The capture of Toledo in 1085 added New Castile to the crown's territories, and the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa (1212) heralded the Moors' loss of most of southern Spain. The kingdom of León was integrated in the Crown of Castile in 1230, and the following decades saw the capture of Córdoba (1236), Murcia (1243) and Seville (1248). By

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396-603: The Treaty of Alcaçovas with Portugal on March 6, 1460, the ownership of the Canary Islands was transferred to Castile. The dynastic union of Castile and Aragon in 1469, when Ferdinand II of Aragon wed Isabella I of Castile , would eventually lead to the formal creation of Spain as a single entity in 1516 when their grandson Charles V assumed both thrones. See List of Spanish monarchs and Kings of Spain family tree . The Muslim Kingdom of Granada (roughly encompassing

429-462: The toponym in their own official names: Castile and Leon and Castile-La Mancha . A third, the Community of Madrid is also regarded as part of Castile, by dint of its geographic enclosure within the entity and, above all, by the statements of its Statute of Autonomy, since its autonomic process originated in national interest and not in popular disaffection with Castile. Other territories in

462-601: The 12th century. Dr. David Raphael author of books on Spanish Jewry, director writer of the musical documentary Song of the Sephardi, and short film on Nachmanides 1263 Disputation of Barcelona descends from Vidal Benveniste de Porta, bailiff to King James of Aragon and brother of Rabbi Nachmanides (known as the Ramban) Castile (historical region) Castile or Castille ( / k æ ˈ s t iː l / ; Spanish : Castilla [kasˈtiʎa] )

495-551: The 1980s. In 1833, Spain was further subdivided into administrative provinces . Two non-administrative, nominally Castilian regions existed from 1833 to 1982: Old Castile , including Santander (autonomous community of Cantabria since 1981), Burgos , Logroño (autonomous community of La Rioja since 1982), Palencia , Valladolid , Soria , Segovia and Ávila , and New Castile consisting of Madrid (autonomous community of Madrid since 1983), Guadalajara , Cuenca , Toledo and Ciudad Real . The language of Castile emerged as

528-626: The Jewish tradition as descendants of King David and members of the House of David in the Jewish communities (mainly Barcelona ) and were prominent religious and secular leaders in the 11th to the 14th centuries. In the 14th to the 15th century, they held the titles of "Benveniste de la Cavalleria" —"of the knights" (a name given by the Knights Templar to their treasurers and tax collectors) and “ don ”—a noble person in Aragon and Castile. In

561-529: The Saracen garrison. Pepin with his sons Carloman and Charles redeemed this pledge in 768, granting to Makhir and his heirs extensive lands, an act that called forth an unavailing protest from Pope Stephen III . In 791 Charlemagne confirmed the status of the Jewish Principate and made the title of Nasi permanent. The Makhir family enjoyed for centuries many privileges and that its members bore

594-710: The advent of the Bourbon Monarchy following the War of the Spanish Succession until the arrival of parliamentary democracy in 1977, the Castilian language was the only one with official status in the Spanish state. Makhir Makhir ben Yehudah Zakkai of Narbonne or Makhir ben Habibai of Narbonne or Natronai ben Habibi (725 - 765 CE or 793 CE) was a Babylonian-Jewish scholar and later,

627-569: The aftermath of the massacres of Jews which began in Spain on 6 June 1391, some such as the de Cartagena family converted to Christianity and became powerful conversos in Burgos . After the expulsion of the Jews from Spain in 1492, non-converts were dispersed mainly to Portugal, Greece - Salonica , other parts of the Ottoman Empire , and North African countries. In Portugal, they were forced to convert to Christianity in 1497 and became some of

660-480: The events, as Zuckerman says, according to the Jewish calendar and portrays William, again according to Zuckerman's interpretation, as an observant Jew. Count William was actually the son of the Frankish Count Theoderic and in 806 became a monk. In another identification, Zuckerman concludes that Theoderic was none other than Makhir, and that the well-documented descendants of Theoderic embodied

693-437: The fact that in both medieval Iberia and Languedoc, before being used as a surname, Benveniste (from the Spanish expression "bien viniste" meaning '(you) have arrived well') was used by Jews as a given name. It was one of the votive names typical for medieval Jews in southwestern Europe: it expressed a wish for the child to be welcome in this world. As many other names based on father's given names (patronymics), it gradually became

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726-465: The former Crown of Castile are left out for different reasons. The territory of the Castilian Crown actually comprised all other autonomous communities within Spain with the exception of Aragon , Balearic Islands , Valencia and Catalonia , all belonging to the former Crown of Aragon, and Navarre , offshoot of the older Kingdom of the same name. Castile was divided between Old Castile in

759-594: The idea of the maternity of Spain by Castile, thereby permeating non-scholar discourses about Castile. Castile's name is generally thought to derive from "land of castles" ( castle in Spanish is castillo ) in reference to the castles built in the area to consolidate the Christian Reconquest from the Moors . The Encyclopædia Britannica ascribes the concept to the sum of the regions of Old Castile and New Castile , as they were formally defined in

792-414: The modern day provinces of Granada, Malaga and Almeria) was conquered in 1492, formally passing to the Crown of Castile in that year. Since it lacks official recognition, Castile does not have clearly defined borders. Historically, the area consisted of the Kingdom of Castile . After the kingdom merged with its neighbours to become the Crown of Castile and later the Kingdom of Spain , when it united with

825-516: The north, so called because it was where the Kingdom of Castile was founded, and New Castile, called the Kingdom of Toledo in the Middle Ages. The Leonese region, part of the Crown of Castile from 1230, was from medieval times considered a region in its own right on a par with the two Castiles, and appeared on maps alongside Old Castile until the two joined as one region - Castile and Leon - in

858-442: The plant's true name, 'malva' – 'ill-going'! So I told you that the plant is called 'bienva' 'well-going'!". The king was mollified, and he said to the Jewish minister: "You have vanquished those of my ministers who wish you ill. I am pleased with your explanation. And to commemorate this occasion, I hereby; dub you bien veniste ('Benveniste') or 'your arrival was for good'". Yet, the above nice family legend does not take into account

891-707: The primary language of Spain—known to many of its speakers as castellano and in English sometimes as Castilian, but generally as Spanish. See Names given to the Spanish language . Historically, the Castilian Kingdom and people were considered to be the main architects of the Spanish State by a process of expansion to the South against the Moors and of marriages, wars, assimilation, and annexation of their smaller Eastern and Western neighbours. From

924-571: The richest traders and bankers ( the Mendes family ) of Europe. Today, the name is borne by families in Europe, the Americas, Asia, and Israel. It was also used as a prænomen . The Italian name is a composition of the words "bene" meaning "well," and "veniste" meaning "came." The name was given to babies, a welcome to the world, a way of thanking God for a descendant. The name was gradually adopted as

957-483: The supposed leader of the Jewish community of Narbonne in a region which at that time was called Septimania at the end of the eighth century. According to a tradition preserved by Abraham ibn Daud in his Sefer ha-Qabbalah , written about 1161, Makhir was a descendant of the house of David . Ibn Daud wrote: Whatever Makhir's Babylon origins claimed by his descendants, the relation between Makhir and Charlemagne

990-534: The title of " nasi " (prince). Benjamin of Tudela , who visited Narbonne in 1165, speaks of the exalted position occupied by the descendants of Makhir, and the "Royal Letters" of 1364 also record the existence of a rex Iudaeorum (King of the Jews) at Narbonne. The place of residence of the Makhir family at Narbonne was designated in official documents as "Cortada Regis Judæorum". Arthur Zuckerman maintains that Makhir

1023-438: Was actually identical with Natronai ben Habibi , an exilarch deposed and exiled in a dispute between two branches of the family of Bostanai in the late eighth century. Zuckerman further identified Makhir (Natronai) with a Maghario, Count of Narbonne (actually Viscount ), and in turn with an Aymeri de Narbonne , who lived in the 12th century but whom heroic poetry makes father of William of Gellone (died 813). This William

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1056-457: Was established, according to Jewish and Christian sources by prominent Jews from Bagdad at the request of the Carolingian kings. The Babylonian names of Makhir , Hasdai , Sheshet and Shealtiel are the names of chief rabbis and leaders - Nasi (considered by the Jewish tradition as descendants of King David) of the Jewish center. The numerically literate Sephardim assisted the Crowns of

1089-568: Was subject of at least six major epic poems composed before the era of the Crusades , including Willehalm by Wolfram von Eschenbach , (who also, in another work, was a chronicler of the search of the Grail). The historical William, i. e. William I , Count of Toulouse led Frankish forces at the fall of Barcelona in 803. The account of the campaign in Ermold Niger 's Latin poem dates

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